Dr.
Firehammer and the other researchers stared in shock and horror as a shadowy
figure with blazing white eyes emerged from the portal. Null stood for several
seconds, looking from side to side and surveying the room.
“Bill, show Wendellor what’s going on
in here, quick!” Firehammer demanded to the crystal ball in the corner in an
urgent whisper.
“On it,” B.I.L.L. responded.
“Open… the… door,” Null commanded in
a low and threatening voice.
“I’m afraid I can’t do that,” the dwarf
firmly declared, having steeled his resolve.
The dark being shook his head before
raising one hand into the air, conjuring forth a large, inky tentacle from the
ground on the other side of the translucent magical barrier. Null swung his arm
to the side and the tentacle followed suit, smashing the testing chamber’s
ceiling light and leaving it dimly lit by a few arcane lanterns.
“Anyone who can’t hold your own in a
fight, run now!” Flint shouted gruffly as he unlocked the room’s door with his
keycard. Most of the researchers immediately fled through the open door,
leaving only Dr. Firehammer, a human named Dr. Kosef, a vampire named Dr.
Armand, and the room’s duo of security constructs.
Null laughed wickedly as he vanished
into the floor and reappeared in one of the room’s darkened corners. First to
react to his arrival were the security constructs who took aim with their magical
rifles. The gems along the sides of each rifle rapidly lit up in series from
back to front as the guns began firing rounds of glowing green projectiles.
The shadow man deftly bobbed and
weaved between the shots as he approached the nearest droid. In a flash, he
drew a katana with a midnight black hilt and gleaming white blade. In the same
motion, he swung it through the air and sliced his assailant’s firearm in
twain. The guard extended its arm-blade in time to parry the next swing, but it
was mightily kicked backward, and the third strike relieved it of its arm.
Null thrust his katana through the
construct’s abdomen and held up the damaged automaton to block the next few
shots from its companion. Once the impaled guard had been rendered inactive by
its ally’s misplaced shots, Null hoisted it into the air, pulled his blade from
its torso, and hurled it against the second construct, smashing them both
against a wall.
The monstrous figure grunted angrily
as he was struck in the shoulder by a shot from Dr. Kosef’s arcane handgun. A
moment later, Null rose from the floor behind the human researcher and
separated his head from his shoulders with a well-placed sweep.
Dr. Arman leapt through the air and
struck down at the murderous nightmare with his enchanted saber, but Null leapt
back, avoiding the strike before striding forwards and crossing blades with the
vampire. After a few swings back and forth, the two got into a blade-lock,
which Null resolved by forcefully shoving Armand back with his immense
strength. With a wicked grin and a wave of his hand, the monster motioned his
summoned tentacle to strike at his off-balance foe. Armand was flung into the far
wall by the dark tendril’s mighty swipe.
A loud boom rang through the facility
as Dr. Firehammer discharged his arcane blunderbuss into the tentacle,
dispersing it into smoke. The dwarf grunted in surprise as the firearm was
wrenched from his grasp and thrown across the room. The grizzled scientist
grabbed the enchanted hammer from his belt and swung it hard into Null’s
midsection. The strange creature recovered from the pain with inhuman speed and
easily deflected the next few hammer blows. Null grabbed hold of the dwarf’s
wrist and twisted it to breaking. Dr. Firehammer screamed in agony as the
weapon dropped from his limp hand. Before his adversary could recover, Null
rammed the hilt of his katana into the researcher’s chin with enough force to knock
him into unconsciousness. The monster threw Firehammer to the ground and
stopped to survey his handiwork, just in time to see Armand turn to mist and
fly through the crack between a door and a wall.
Null quickly turned to look at the
entrance corridor as he began to hear metallic footsteps coming from it. Walking
down the hall was a tall construct shaped much like a full suit of armor and made
from adamantine. It was obviously highly advanced, judging by all of its
blinking lights and gizmos. Blue light shone from within its visor. The construct
examined the scene for a few moments before projecting a voice from the speaker
built into its helmet. “I see that you were able to best Dr. Firehammer and the
alchemos guards. While that is rather impressive and I would be quite
interested in studying whatever it is that you are, I am going to have to ask
you to return to the dimension on the other side of the portal.”
“Who
are you, a mere automated security measure, to command me, one of Nihil’s most
favored creations?” Null disdainfully sneered.
“Big
talk from someone that, by my analysis, has next to no grasp of the situation,”
the voice mocked in a voice full of confidence and amusement. “You see, I am
not a mere ‘automated security measure’ as you say. What you see before you is
one of my drones, which I am controlling remotely.”
“So
who, then, do I have the pleasure of speaking to? A retired technology professor?”
Null questioned in an insulting, irritated tone.
“Wrong
again, whoever you are. You truly know nothing of whom you are speaking to. I
am Wendellor the great, Phoros’ first artificer, member of the Undying Council,
inventor of many types of constructs seen throughout the world, and CEO of
SkullTech, the company whose headquarters you now stand within,” Wendellor
smugly detailed. “Now that you know who I am, who perchance are you who dares
to slink out of that strange dimension, break into my lab, disrupt my research,
assault my staff, and impudently insult me in my own place of business?”
“I am
Null, one of the entities, great and immortal beings the whims of which mere
mortals should not interfere in!” Null spat, a venomous edge to his voice.
“So,
the entities are not mere folktales, after all. I am hardly surprised, mind you.
However, knowing that they are real shall make for some fascinating research .
. . once I deal with you, of course,” Wendellor mused.
“I
have heard of you, a mad scientist who left his people and threw his lot in
with the dead because he could not get funding for his worthless inventions. So
then, this must be the Empire of Undeath I have heard so much about. I honestly
thought the Great Builder Empire would have wiped your foolish, rotting kingdom
off the map by now,” the entity disparagingly commented.
Boisterous
laughter echoed from the droid for several seconds before the company’s CEO
voiced his response, in a tone that demonstrated more amusement than outrage at
the insults. “Given that you know so much about our dimension—and I find it
unlikely you could have learned these things from spies—I gather that you must
have hailed from our dimension and somehow become stranded in that one,”
Wendellor theorized. “However, if my theory is correct (and I very much think
it is), then you must have been gone quite some time longer than you think.”
“You
must have at least some intelligence, seeing as you are correct about my origins,
but while I have certainly been gone a while, it cannot have been more than a
few decades, and that time has done nothing to dull my hatred for the accursed
crafters who put me in that place,” Null frustratedly responded.
“A
few decades, you say?” the brain chuckled over the speaker. “Given that the
dimension from whence you came has no obvious day-night cycle or other
indicated marker of time, I believe I can see how you became so woefully confused.
Now then, let me explain to you just how long you must have been gone and how
outdated your information is. For one thing, the Great Builder Empire of which
you speak was wiped out by the collective might of most of this continent’s
nations a little more than six centuries ago, and the people of that extinct
empire are now referred to as the ancient builders. Furthermore, the facts you
have listed about my past are accurate, apart from the fact that my so-called
people were avaricious fools who cared nothing for the advancement of science.
However, the time period in which it would have been at all accurate was before
the ancient builders were crushed, and I have since become an accomplished and
well-known inventor who has published many of the greatest scientific works
this world has ever seen,” Wendellor thoroughly corrected.
The
dark figure stood stunned for several moments, seemingly unable to process the situation
at hand.
“Do
not be alarmed, surprise and anger are typical side-effects of having just
found out that several centuries have passed you by,” the artificer reassured.
Null
remained in place for a few more moments, shaking with rage. A moment later, he
let out a terrifying and otherworldly scream, raised his blade, and leapt at
the scientist’s proxy. The drone held out its hand, which emitted a violet glow
as space twisted around Null, mid-air, and sucked him into a vortex. An instant
later, the entity was shot out of another vortex a few feet to the side of
where he had been, burying his blade in a wall.
As
Null dislodged his weapon with a mighty heave, Wendellor’s adamantine hand
detached from his arm and flew through the air, propelled by an arcane
thruster. The gauntlet slammed into the entity’s side in a burst of magical
power and flung him to the ground. Raising his hand into the air, Null conjured
up a large dark tendril from the floor. The gauntlet reversed its course and
returned to the drone, reattaching itself. A hatch opened in the construct’s
metal forearm, from which four metallic tubes emitted a volley of small projectiles.
The tentacle swung through the air, but the projectiles curved their
trajectories to intercept it, vaporizing it in a series of small explosions.
Null emerged from the ground behind
his foe and swung his blade in a deadly arc, but it was blocked with surprising
speed by the drone’s arm. The katana struck the arm with full force, but the
cut only managed to make a small gash in the adamantine. Wendellor’s other hand
suddenly began to glow red-hot, and his arm swung in a wide arc. Null
disappeared into the floor just in time to avoid the punch, which made a
sizable dent in the wall. The entity reappeared at the other end of the room
and stretched out his hands. From his palms flowed a stream of darkness that
blotted out all light around the impressive construct. A moment later, the blue
light from the drone’s visor increased greatly in intensity, emitting a bright
beam of light that erased the magical darkness.
Electricity
started to rapidly build up around the drone’s right hand, crackling loudly. A
concentrated beam of it launched from the robotic arm, followed by another, and
another. Null nimbly sidestepped the first and barely dodged the second, getting
hit by stray electrical arcs in the process. He was flung backward upon being
struck dead in the chest by the third.
The
entity regained his footing in no time and sprinted toward Wendellor with
astounding speed. The construct took off into the air with the aid of magical
thrusters on the bottom of its feet. Null’s strikes passed just under the drone
as it took to the air. A hatch opened in one of the metallic warrior’s
gauntlets and a massive projection of a hand emitted from it, which followed
the gauntlet’s every move. The projection grabbed hold of Null and hoisted him
into the air, before slamming him against the wall of force. The entity tried
desperately to teleport away, but held within the beam of light from the
construct’s visor, he had no shadow to sink into. The drone’s other hand began
to glow with the same heat as the first and both gauntlets flew toward the
defenseless Null.
“This is the first time in ages that
I have been able to test my creation’s full might in the heat of battle. I
thank you for the data,” Wendellor excitedly declared. The next moment, both
red-hot fists collided with Null in dual bursts of fire and magical energy, and
the projected hand vanished.
From the cloud of smoke came a ball
of dark energy that crashed into the mechanical champion’s chest in a burst of
darkness that pushed it back several feet. Null emerged from the dissipating
smoke, dashing toward the open doorway while clutching his chest with one hand.
The drone’s fingertips emitted a terrific and precise burst of magnetism that
violently slammed shut the heavy steel door. The construct hovered rapidly
toward the entity, pulling back one hand for a punch.
Null
channeled his dark powers and his rage into his blade, setting it alight with crackling
dark energy. As his foe approached, he hurled the weapon with all of his might.
The katana planted itself in the drone’s chest, the tip of the blade sticking out
from the construct’s back, and waves of vile and destructive energy surging
through the machine. Despite the damage
it had sustained, the drone’s thrusters suddenly flared with a boost of power
and bolted ahead, taking the entity by the throat and slamming him against the
door. Null struggled against
Wendellor’s grip as his neck was seared by the red-hot gauntlet.
“This
is where your survival odds go into the negative,” Wendellor victoriously
announced as his drone’s other hand began charging with power. The entity was
too injured to free himself and struggled in vain as the construct charged its
weapon. A powerful sonic pulse emitted from the outstretched hand and blasted
the dark creature with a tremendous pressure wave. The door crumpled inward and
was flung several feet down the hall and Null was evaporated into a cloud of dark
and evil smoke that soon vanished into nothingness.
“Everyone,
you can return to your stations now,” Wendellor announced, his drone pulling
the blade from its core before collapsing to the ground and deactivating due to
the massive damage it had sustained.
Wendellor briefly pondered the tapestry
on the back wall of his office. It was black as night with the monotone only
being broken by a ring of six sigils, with a seventh in the middle. The central
symbol was that of a test tube. Around it were a crown, a bat, a sarcophagus, a
pumpkin, a crossed sword and flail, and an eye. With a thought, the brain
channeled his arcane powers and telekinetically pressed upon the symbol of a
crown.
Ì
Valerach
paced up and down the rows of bookshelves, browsing the collection of books
that had recently come into his possession, adding to his tremendous library. Suddenly,
a raven appeared from thin air above the shelves and flew toward him. The bird
dropped a small, rectangular slab of stone above the lich’s head, which he
deftly plucked from the air with his skeletal fingers. The tablet’s back was
covered in glowing runes and its front was dark and possessed a picture of a
test tube in its center. Without hesitation, the lich pressed the symbol. In a
moment, the tablet’s front shifted from blank and dark with a sigil in the
middle to a live image of the interior of Wendellor’s office.
“What’s
gone horribly wrong this time?” Valerach questioned with a tone that had a hint
of both concern and annoyance.
“One
of my employees tested a prototype teleportation device yesterday. It exploded
and ripped open the fabric of reality, creating a portal to a strange and
unknown dimension,” Wendellor explained.
“That doesn’t seem like something you
would need my help for. Don’t you have a team for this sort of thing?” the
wizard queried.
“Yes,
I do, and they are exploring said dimension as we speak, but that is not why I
contacted you,” the artificer began. “A few minutes ago, a humanoid creature,
seemingly composed of pure darkness, with a pair of glowing white eyes and a
sword with a blade of the same color, stepped through the portal and into a
testing chamber. He viciously beheaded one of my researchers, beat another into
unconsciousness, and destroyed the room’s security constructs. I piloted one of
my drones into the room to deal with him, and prior to fighting, we had a brief
conversation, during which I gained some important information. It turns out
that this guy is named Null and that he is one of the entities that I have
heard about in legends. I called you because one thing that the legends say
about the entities is that they can come back to life in their lairs within a
short time of death. Thus, I decided that I must disable the portal to prevent
him from returning through it, but I cannot just leave my reconnaissance team
in some strange dimension. That realm could
still be extremely valuable to my research, so I need you to create an
antimagic field to temporarily suppress the portal’s magic.” Wendellor finally
finished.
“I
can see why you need my help then. I will teleport there right away,” Valerach
responded.
Ì
“What’s
that up ahead?” Morthos wondered aloud as he spotted a strange structure in the
distance.
“I can’t
tell. I suggest you fly over and check it out,” Helixea responded.
Mort
swooped down and landed next to the structure. The construction consisted of a circular
base made of dark gray rock, a cylindrical beam of what looked much like the
night sky, and a circular top of dark gray stone that mirrored the base.
“I think
it is some kind of portal,” Morthos shouted. The rest of the research team
quickly came forward and gathered around the demon, staring at the portal.
“One of you should step through and
investigate,” Bill chimed in.
“I’ll
go,” Igan the skeleton volunteered as he stepped through the gateway.
“I
can see from Igan’s perspective that the other side is safe and seems to be
another part of the same dimension,” B.I.L.L. explained.
“I
think I see a town in the over there!” Kethra shouted, pointing at what
appeared to be a small, walled settlement in the distance.
“Helixea,
I suggest you split the group and investigate both the town and the other side
of the portal,” B.I.L.L.’s voice directed.
After
a short discussion, the recon team split into two groups, with Mort, Thunder, Igan,
Abzug, Darvin, and Luth going through the portal, and Helixea, Kethra, Dr.
Bones, Arveene, Kethoth, and Stedd heading towards the settlement.
Morthos,
Thunder, and the four security guards emerged from the other side of the
gateway. Before them spanned a stretch of floating islands that were almost
identical to the one they had just come from except for the patchy, yellow
grass and purple-brown trees with yellow leaves.
Ì
A
short trek later, the group arrived before a tremendous tower made from bricks
of the same stone that the islands are composed of, as well as some kind of
purply-pink bricks. The tower appeared to have many floors, several of which
had walkways that stretched outwards before connecting to smaller offshoot
towers that hovered in the air despite a complete lack of obvious support. At the
top of the tower there was seemingly a dock, and hovering next to it was a
sizable ship made from the same materials as the tower. It had no sails or oars,
and levitated on its own.
“Should
we go in and investigate, Bill?” Mort queried as he looked the structure up and
down.
“Yes,
seeing as this place is likely a settlement of some sort, it could provide
valuable information regarding this plane’s inhabitants,” B.I.L.L. answered.
The
entrance to the tower was a large gate made of violet bricks and guarded on
either side by creatures that seemed to live inside of cube-shaped shells made
of a substance that looked much like that of the door. When the group
approached, the bizarre creatures got spooked and disappeared in a brief lavender
mist.
The
facility’s interior consisted mostly of long halls lined with doors to what the
researchers guessed to be apartments or homes, and large rooms housing communal
facilities such as fountains of weird, dark liquid and markets of miscellaneous
goods. Despite the tower exhibiting all other signs of being inhabited, the
team observed no endermen or other creatures out and about as they traveled,
only catching occasional glimpses of faces through windows or around corners.
Eventually,
the group came to what they guessed to be akin to a town square. The place was
a massive room, surrounded by buildings that looked to be shops and offices. In
the center was a large platform that was likely used for delivering speeches or
addresses. Five endermen wearing dark robes materialized on the platform. The
one in the center also wore a flowing black cape and a mask made from the same cyan
metal as Erebus and his men’s armor. The mask was in the shape of some kind of
alien skull and, unlike all the other endermen the researchers had seen, the masked
enderman’s eyes were orange rather than purple. In a few inhumanly long strides,
the masked enderman was at the edge of the platform. The creature’s booming and
aggressive voice rang out through the square speaking in his native language.
“All
I was able to tell from that is that his name is Aurack, and I think he has
some sort of title. From his tone, I don’t think he likes us very much,”
Thunder explained.
Realizing
that he had not been understood, Aurack made an otherworldly growling noise and
he and the other four endermen drew bladeless sword hilts made from blue-green
metal. The members of A.L.E.R.T. drew their own weapons in response as Aurack’s
subordinates stepped off the platform and towards the outsiders. As they
approached, the disciples activated their weapons. Violet blades of pure energy
began projecting from their hilts. Aurack raised his left hand into the air and
Luth the wight was levitated upwards. Using his right hand, the enderman
produced a double-bladed hilt from within his robes while he drew the security
guard toward him with his left.
Thunder
stepped into the ethereal plane and maneuvered behind the leading enderman as
twin orange blades of energy materialized from Aurack’s weapon. The tabaxi exited
the ethereal plane and swung his dual scimitars at his foe’s back. Aurack immediately
sensed Thunder’s presence behind him and whirled around, blocking the twin
scimitars with the two blades of his own weapon. The enderman laughed as he
telekinetically hurled Luth against a wall and let go of him. He then extended
his hand toward the tabaxi, throwing him across the platform with a wave of force.
Aurack gripped his weapon with both hands and rapidly twirled it through the
air as he strode toward his prone assailant.
Abzug
swung his energized greataxe down at the acolyte in front of him. The enderman blocked
the strike with his blade of pure energy, but staggered backward from the
impact. The robed warrior sidestepped two more mighty swings and retaliated
with a slash of his own. Abzug caught the weapon under the blade of his axe and
twisted around, bashing the enderman with the haft of his weapon and disarming
him. The enderman blasted the orc with a wave of telekinetic power, but the
security guard stood firm and held his footing. Abzug swung his axe a great
arc, liberating his opponent’s head from his body.
Darvin
blocked the energy sword with his electric baton. The human forced the
enderman’s weapon to the side with his own and jabbed his baton into his foe’s
abdomen. Before Darvin could press his advantage, the acolyte shoved him back
several feet with a wave of force, then flipped through the air, sailing over
the security guard and landing behind him. The two combatants turned to face
each other in unison and blocked each other’s strikes with their own.
Igan drove
his opponent back with a series of strikes from his baton. The enderman lifted
her hand, levitating a plant pot that had been sitting in a shop’s window, and sent
the vase hurtling toward the skeleton. Igan leapt to the side, but the pot
caught him in the shoulder and sent him tumbling to the floor as it shattered
into numerous shards. The acolyte deflected the shrapnel with her violet blade
and advanced toward the security guard. Igan tried to stand, but the enderman
held him down with her telekinetic might. With a swing of her energy blade, the
enderman sliced the skeleton in twain.
Morthos
barreled toward the acolyte and bashed the shaft of his spear against the
enderman’s energy blade. With his brute strength, he shoved his foe back before
twirling his weapon through the air and sweeping the enderman’s legs out from
under him. The apprentice rolled to the side just in time to avoid being
impaled by the spearhead as it lodged itself in the ground. With a few beats of
his great wings, the demon flew up and over his now standing opponent’s
incoming energy sword and dislodged his own weapon in the process. Mort swung
his spear down in a great arc, slamming the shaft against the enderman’s head, sprawling
his unconscious form on the floor.
Beams
of lightning arced from Aurack’s outstretched fingers and blasted the tabaxi.
Thunder lay on the ground writhing in pain and unable to get his footing as the
enderman advanced. The diplomat gathered himself enough to mutter an
incantation which caused him teleport in a cloud of mist. Thunder appeared next
to one of his fallen scimitars, which he retrieved and used to block the
incoming beams of electricity. Aurack ceased his barrage of lightning and telekinetically
flicked his enemy’s other weapon from the platform.
Thunder
and Aurack crossed blades in a series of strikes that soon ended with the
tabaxi’s weapon being twisted from his grip. The ranger ducked a strike aimed
at his head, but was too slow to avoid a slash across the chest that left a long,
diagonal gash in his armor and scorched fur and flesh underneath. The enderman
mercilessly kicked his opponent in his injured chest and flung him from the
platform to the hard floor a few feet below.
Abzug
heard another foe approaching behind him and turned around just in time to
catch the incoming blast of electricity with his face. He stumbled back and
dropped his axe as he was wracked with sudden, sharp pain. The acolyte thrust
her purple blade forward and impaled Abzug through the chest. In his last
moments, the orc stared in shock at the enderman as she contemptuously kicked
his dying form off her blade.
Darvin
deflected his opponent’s energy sword using his baton and kicked at the enderman’s
stomach. The acolyte leapt backwards, dodging the attack and unleashing a
telekinetic blast. The security guard planted his feet and resisted the force,
only sliding back a couple of feet. He charged forward and leapt into the air,
striking downwards with his weapon. The enderman stopped the strike with an
overhead block and took one hand off of his weapon, punching Darvin in the gut.
The human’s alchemos chest plate absorbed the punch, allowing him to drive his
foe back with a mighty shove.
Morthos
flew towards Aurack as fast as he could, determined to stop him from slaying
Thunder. The head of the demon’s spear split in two before firing a bolt of
arcane power and then sliding back together. The enderman spun around and
deflected the shot with his weapon, sending the bolt careening through a nearby
store’s window. As Morthos touched down, he thrust his spear at Aurack, but the
experienced duelist deftly knocked the thrust aside.
Morthos barely managed to block the
incoming whirlwind of blows with the shaft of his spear before being flung
backwards by a telekinetic shove. With several hard wing beats, the demon was
able to slow himself enough to avoid being flung off the platform. As he tried
to advance again, he was struck in the chest by several arcs of electricity. Aurack
watched in awe as the lightning had little effect on the demon, who dashed
forward, ignoring the electricity coursing through his body. The enderman ended
the beam of lightning and gripped his weapon with both hands, blocking his
foe’s thrust.
The
two combatants’ weapons clashed for a moment before Morthos forced Aurack back
with a mighty shove and dismissed his spear to his gloves’ pocket dimension in
a flash of blue light. The demon put his
hands together and launched a fiery blast at his foe. The enderman nimbly leapt
out of the way, but a portion of his robe was set alight. Morthos took to the
air and pulled the bag of holding from his back as his foe was busy patting out
the flames. The demon landed next to Thunder and scooped the tabaxi into the
bag before returning the item to his back and flying into the air once more.
“Retreat!”
the demon’s voice boomed over the din of battle.
Having
recovered from being slammed into the wall, Luth sprinted towards the town
center’s exit. He quickly found his path blocked by an acolyte who was standing
over Abzug’s lifeless corpse. The wight readied his energized alchemos sword as
he advanced toward the enderman. She blocked the security guard’s blade with
her own and retaliated with a swift series of strikes. Luth blocked the attacks
with his weapon but was forced to take a few steps back in the process. The
enderman disappeared in a cloud of lavender particles and Luth was suddenly
electrocuted from behind. He spun around and dashed toward the acolyte, feeling
little pain from the lightning due to his undead state. The enderman realized
at the last moment that the lightning would not hold her foe at bay, and she let
go of the energy just in time to block his strike, however she was unable to
prevent herself from being shoved backwards against a wall.
Luth
fended off the acolyte’s energy sword with his own weapon as he grabbed her arm
and began to drain her life force, wisps of pale green energy flowing from her
arm and into his hand. A hollow laugh emanated from the wight as his injuries
began to rapidly heal themselves. The enderman let out a horrible, otherworldly
scream as she felt the very life being drained out of her. Before Luth could
sap the last of his foe’s energy, she managed to muster the strength to thrust
out her palm and fling him across the room with telekinetic power. Luth made a
break for the exit as the acolyte teleported away from him and towards the
center of the room.
Darvin
stepped forward and slammed his baton down on the shoulder of his staggering foe,
sending electricity coursing through the lanky creature. The human jabbed his
weapon forward, aiming at the enderman’s stomach, but it disappeared in a cloud
of purple mist, leaving him to stumble forward as he jabbed the air. Darvin threw
himself to the ground, narrowly avoiding being impaled by the acolyte’s glowing
blade of energy. The security guard rolled to his feet, causing his opponent to
lodge his weapon in the floor. Darvin swung his baton up and into the
enderman’s jaw, knocking him from his feet. Before his foe could recover, he turned
and fled from the room, following Morthos’ command.
As
the demon attempted to fly over his foe, Aurack, who had put out his flaming
robe, reached out and restrained Morthos in his telekinetic grip. The demon summoned
an arcane blunderbuss into his hand from within his dimensional storage gloves
and managed to maneuver himself enough to fire it. Aurack released his hold on
Morthos, instead using his power to stop the burst of magic projectiles in
their tracks. The enderman launched the energy beams back at the fleeing demon,
but Mort avoided them with a barrel roll and was out of the room moments later.
As
the members of A.L.E.R.T. ran from the room, Darvin looked over his shoulder to
see Aurack striding toward the entrance to survey the battlefield as his two still-standing
students approached him. A moment later, he turned and put a hand on the female
acolyte’s shoulder, saying something in his native language in what Darvin
guessed to be a congratulatory tone.
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