Chapter 3
For so much of the past few days Harald been acting on instinct. He’d acquired a number of new powers, powers he’d been forced to harness without conscious thought, reaching for whatever was at hand so that he could survive another moment, another exchange, another battle.
But here, now, facing Brauxis with Alabenthos presiding, he found himself calm. Composed. Calculating.
It felt… odd.
Slowly, he paced around the great Emanation, who turned every so often to keep Harald before him.
Very well. He’d be methodical. He’d take Brauxis apart piece by piece and demonstrate to Alabenthos both his self-control and the mastery he’d gained.
Harald tapped his four Thrones. The power surged within him. Four Thrones. Harmony. Shadows. War. And now, Knowledge.
Such power. With a casual twist of his will, he activated Aura of the Aching Depths.
Had it only been a few months since he’d gained the Ability?
What a paltry thing it had been then. Now it flooded the sun-saturated air with a gelid tint, as if they were underwater in a cool, green-saturated pond.
He felt his Thrones empower the Passive, felt his will fall upon Brauxis, who didn’t flinch or respond.
He activated his 8th Level Passive, Dread Wellspring.
His Aura grew more fearsome, and inevitably now his stats would receive a +1 as the fight continued, right up until they hit +4 and augmented his next attack with the void.
Dark Vigor added another +2 to each of his physical stats, so that he felt even more lithe, wicked, and potent.
Still Brauxis waited. The shadowed air seemed neither to touch nor bleach his war plate of its slate blue hues.
Was he immune?
No matter. Harald was still warming up. Thronebound Mantle filled the arena with his dark will.
It washed against Brauxis like dark waves, heightening Harald’s mastery.
Over this he laid Sovereign Silence, so Brauxis was now beset by the full might of the abyss, his thoughts no doubt slowed, his fears augmented, his awe of Harald reaching a burning pitch.
The very arena had now become a dark nexus of Harald’s might.
Currents of shadow undulated through the air, and Harald’s breath puffed forth in clouds of condensation, so cold had it become.
He felt his will close about Brauxis like a fist, and he clenched his jaw as he sought to compel the Emanation to react, to respond, to show some element of fear.
“Ho! Thou art powerful indeed, Harald!” Brauxis sounded jovial. “I am pleased, for I feared this combat would fail to interest me. But witness. I was created to meet creatures of darkness on equal footing, and nothing banishes the abyss so much as pure illumination.”
And the partial halo that hovered above his head swelled in brightness, giving forth a searing radiance that scorched Harald’s darkness. So bright did it become that Harald had to squint to gaze upon the Emanation, even as his own dark aura began to falter and lighten.
Two powers were at play. Harald could dimly sense their overlap, but the Emanation’s resistance to his auras and will was clearly bolstered by an Active and a Passive both.
Harald slashed in Brauxis’ direction with Chyron’s Scourge and unleashed an experimental Demonic Edge. An arc of sizzling black fire flashed toward the angel only to weaken and fade as it entered the halo’s radiance so that it splashed against the blue armor and did no discernible damage.
Damn.
Enough. Harald felt a snarl arise from his very core, anger at his powers being so neatly mitigated, and snapped.
This was meant to be a fight, was it not? With a cry, he hurled himself forward, cloaking himself in shadows with Umbral Aegis so that his form became clad in shadow plates and activating Abyssal Attunement so that the Scourge flooded with the black power of the abyss.
Right at Brauxis he ran, and the angel raised his burning white blade to parry the first strike, which sent a great wash of black and white flames into the air as Scourge met heavenly sword.
But Harald kept moving, leaping at the last so that he somersaulted over the raised blade and unleashed a Tenebral Surge as he did so.
A radial burst of abyssal force exploded out from him, flooding down over Brauxis, who brought a wing about to shield himself from the detonation.
Harald landed on the far side, dropped into a crouch and spun, Scourge scything around to take off a leg, but the sheer brilliance of the halo made him misjudge the distance.
Not only that, but a white blade parried the blow and then a huge boot pounded into Harald’s chest, cracking the Umbral Aegis and knocking him back so that Harald was forced to arch, reach over and down to plant a hand on the weathered stone and flip and fall into a sliding crouch even as he saw Brauxis come flying toward him like an avalanche of feathers and armor and blade.
Had the Tenebral Surge done nothing?
Dread Wellspring Bestows +1
Harald threw himself aside, came up running, went out wide, and hurled Demonic Edge after Demonic Edge at the angel as he came in around tight. And now that his ire was roused, he felt personally affronted, and cast all caution to the wind.
Harald reached deep. He summoned the might of his four Thrones and brought the abyss into this plane. He felt it bloom into existence, felt the very fabric of reality warp and split, and then Maw of the Starless Deep yawned open beneath Brauxis’ feet.
The air took on bruised hues as a demonic aurora arose from the Maw to ripple and shimmer. The abyss sang within him and he wanted to laugh for joy as Brauxis leaped into the air, wings beating powerfully as he fought the Maw’s pull.
But Harald wasn’t done yet.
Thrones straining, he summoned Black Halo so that a great corona of glittering black blades appeared around him, scintillating and whipping around in a circle of death.
Turning toward the straining angel, he went to close and unleash another Tenebral Surge when he felt himself jerk to a stop, so abruptly that he slammed down to one knee and nearly fell over.
Golden chains as thick as his arm had ensnared his legs, their links burning bright, and they drank of his darkness, sucked at his power so that even as he struggled to rise, he felt his connection to the Maw grow thin and then snap.
The Maw closed.
Harald roared in fury and bent his will to break the golden chains. They bit into his Aegis, causing the shadows to warp and grind.
“You fight well!” Brauxis’ tone was exuberant. “But darkness is merely an absence of light! Your powers cannot withstand illumination!”
“Illuminate this,” growled Harald, and felt through the chains the Emanation’s will. They were an extension of the angel just as his own Abyssal Grasp was an extension of his. It was pure Ego against Ego, and his own was an overwhelming 33.
Dread Wellspring Bestows +2
Make that 35.
Harald felt his vision go red as he strained.
The chains were mighty, massive, and weighed as much as a mountain, but he didn’t so much fight their substance as their source.
He reached through the burning length to the Emanation’s own essence and grappled with it, shoved his fists deep into the burning brightness of the angel’s mind and fought for dominion.
Inch by inch he rose, the metal of the links distending, and then with a cry he tore himself free.
The chains shattered, fell apart around him, and he raced toward Brauxis, who let loose a cry of joy and dove down to meet him.
But the Maw opened again beneath the angel, yanking him down. With a yawp, the angel raised his burning white blade and loosed a flash of white fire at Harald, the move so quick Harald barely had time to widen his eyes.
“Aurelian Lance!” laughed Brauxis.
The Aetherlight Circlet activated upon Harald’s brow and the blast of white fire was knocked aside, but so potent was the attack that the Aetherlight Circlet itself flew from Harald’s brow.
The pair closed. Huge wingbeats sent storm blasts through the dark and frozen abyssal air. Harald released Umbral Aegis, its drain on his Thrones overmuch, and instead, at the last moment, he activated Abyssal Grasp and Shadow Dominion.
The darkness beneath the flying Emanation came to life.
Thick tentacles of living darkness writhed and reared like massive snakes just ahead of the angel’s flight path and lunged forward to clasp its wings.
Brauxis spun, white sword flashing, and lopped off chunks of the tentacles which withered and turned a bleached gray in the bright light of his halo, disrupting Harald's attack completely.
But between their distraction and the Maw’s endless hunger, it was enough.
Harald surrounded himself with the Black Halo once more, a thousand shards of abyss made manifest spinning and roaring through the air, and then unleashed them all into an augmented Tenebral Surge.
A torrent of black blades and fragments blasted out with unholy might, melding with the fury of black shadow to impact the angel who flew headlong and with little control right into the explosion.
Brauxis’ halo went nova. Harald cried out, flung up his arm, turned away as the entire arena went searing white.
For a moment he was blinded, and he leaped to the side, panicked, sure that he would be cloven in two at any second. He reeled, ducked, staggered back, and blinked away the sunspots.
Brauxis lay before him. He’d carved a furrow in the stone with one shoulder and fetched up against a mound of buckled pavers. Slowly, he beat one wing as he planted a hand on the ground and dislodged himself from the hole he’d made.
The time was now.
Dread Wellspring Bestows +3
Harald flared his fingers over the Chyron’s Scourge hilt. A dash forward, a mighty blow. He could cleave the Emanation apart. Now. This moment that he’d purchased by summoning all his powers at once.
Eyes wide, his blood rushing in his ears, the last of his Thrones’ power roaring in his ears, he lurched forward only to stagger to a stop.
Brauxis was laughing.