Day 12: A Lesson In Magic & Humility

Cold / Cage

“After him!”
Yvonne’s voice boomed throughout her cavernous halls, as the masked hero rushed past. Under his thick arm he carried the coveted artefact, sliding through the corridor at blinding speed while keeping the ornate chalice against his broad, muscular frame.

At each turn, he met with another skeleton warrior. They jumped at him with their sword or spear. But they missed every time. He danced out of their course with supernatural grace, steps light and precise. Only one skeleton got anywhere near enough for a swing with her axe. But he cut off her head with his radically curved saber while she wound the attack, his attack flowing seamlessly into the rhythm of his movement.
When he entered the second grand dome of Yvonne’s lair, he skidded to an abrupt halt. The shades of quick and nimble creatures scuttled around on all four. Ghouls. They came from above. They came from behind the pillars. They stared at him like famished predators, their grins cramped with large jagged teeth.

They had him surrounded. Their eyes roaming his bare chest and thick neck as they paced around him, thick icor dripping from their mouths. His gaze shifted between them as they shuffled ever closer.
One of them lunged first. He threw a dark pellet at the ground. A blast of bright smoke swept over the wave of ghouls. They shrieked and growled and cackled.
By the time the mist settled, he had already scampered off, leaving the ghouls slumped and defeated in a heap.

Yvonne looked down at his escape from the gallery with overwhelming resentment. Her glass shattered in her grip, leaving its dark content to trickle down her gloved hand.
Her bright skin contrasted elegantly with her dark lips, and with the low cut goth lolita dress with light trimming in various cross shapes. Her hair was a fair hue, fashioned in twin braids.
She looked like a doll. Immaculate. Beautiful. Void of emotion.
“Do not let him get away.” She commanded coldly.

He rushed into the next room, but a different type of enemy awaited at the top of twin stairs. A dark skinned woman, whose hourglass frame was wrapped in a tight dress made from bandages which also masked her face. She wielded a long staff of gnarled wood, the branches at the top twisting around a bright luminous jewel.
The mummy lady cackled, “This is as far as you go, champion of the Order. And no further. You face Meredith of the Frost.”

“...Meredith. Stand down.” Now." Yvonne hissed.
But Meredith was too preoccupied with her magic. She waved her staff in dramatic circles over her head, speaking her incantation in an arcane tongue.
The hero rushed towards her while she was still chanting. He leapt up fifteen fathoms to the top of the stairs, grabbing on to the railing and flipping to his feet.
But by then she had finished her spell. The room submerged in her magic.
The temperature dropped. It got cold. Freezing.

But he was still up. Sure, he wasn’t comfortable, especially wearing the open vest that exposed his rippling six-pack… But he wasn’t going to fall over immediately from it. He drew his sword, and approached the mummy.
“Uh… Gotcha. So, give up now?”

Instead of giving up, he slashed his sword in a hurricane of strikes. The bandages hung from her voluptuous frame, and she had to hold the bands up to cover herself. All while he ran past her quickly. He was in a hurry to get away from the cold.
Yvonne shook her head, “...Hel give me strength.”

The hero scurried into yet another room. A heavy metallic echo rang from the edges of the room. Huge warriors emerged from arcways, clad from top to toe in dark spikey armour. The shortest was three ells tall. They charged at him with reckless abandon.
He slid on his knees past two of them, who crashed into one another, and under the legs of a third one. Their sickles rained down at him from every direction. The hero slipped under their heavy strikes at exactly the right moment.

For a moment it looked as if they would be no match for him either, when yet another dark skinned woman leapt onto the stage. Another ghoul. This one, however, had light hair cascading down her back, dressed in flowing clothes like those of a dancer, translucent but for the dark portions covering her sleek yet ample chest and hips. She was covered in jewelry around her wrists, ankles and neck.

She smirked, “Time to play, big boy!”

She crossed her arms over her head in an alluring pose. Her hair danced in the charged airi. A bright spark flashed over her, sending a lighting bolt into the nearest armoured knight.
She didn’t fall. Instead, the lightning trailed along the metal into the next knight. Then another. It spread like wildfire, and reached the hero in no time. Leap away all he might, yet he ended up limp on the ground. Still alive, but paralyzed.
Yvonne clapped her hands, “Good job, Olga. If you will now, remove the cup from his body. It is of utmost importance that it does not leave the Demon Realm.”
“Yes, my lady.” The ghoul answered.
“And take him away to the dungeon.”

Another mob of ghouls came cackling at him, swarming around him before their greedy hands lifted him off the ground. Together they scampered away with him carried between them like a horde of excitable gremlins.
Yvonne sighed. An undead goblin servant scuttled up to her with a tray held aloft with another glass. She took it, and sipped the dark fluid.
Meredith arrived at the gallery, having changed into a top and short skirt, both made from bandages and sticking to her curves as if glued on.
She fell kneeling down before Yvonne, “Mistress… I am sorry. I have failed you. If it had not been for Olga… The artefact…”
“Meredith?” Yvonne interrupted her.
“Yes, mistress?
“Please, meet me in my chamber.” Yvonne said calmly, and walked away.

Meredith rose to her feet, and headed downstairs. Back to the large double doors at the end of the topmost stairs.
When she approached, they opened on their own. Meredith found herself walking into an elaborate chamber dominated by an elaborate casket lined with cushioneed velvet, with Yvonne seated before her mirror and fixing up her braids.
“Meredith… I saw you face off against that champion of the Order. How did that turn out?”
“He… Got away.” Meredith could hardly look in her direction admitting that.
“And do you know why he got away?”
“Because…" She clenched her fist, "Because I was not strong enough. I was not vigilant enough.”
“Meredith… In the century you were born into, you were one of the most talented ice mages of history. When you walked among the living, you were a living myth. If you were insufficiently powerful, I would not have brought you back from beyond the grave.”
“But…”
“So tell me, Meredith: Why did he get away?”
“But mistress, I wanted to…”
“Why did he get away?”
Meredith grumbled, “Because… Frost magic isn’t suitable for direct combat.”
“Very good. And why is that”?
Meredith sighed, “Because… Lowering the room temperature, even to freezing, doesn't instantly damage the tissue of a living human.”

“What an excellent answer, Meredith. But it begs the question, if you knew that all along, what were you doing in the midst of battle?”
“Mistress,” Meredith stepped forward with determination, “That man was going to take away the Vessel of the Fates. Without it, we will have no influx of human men trying to rescue their precious Order relic from the midst of the Demon Realm, only to fall in our clutches. And without men, we will have no source of spiritual energy. What then will become of the thousands of undead in Volodymyri? So I had to…”
“Meredith.” Yvonne interrupted, “Meredith... When I brought you back from beyond the cold grasp of ****, I had to defy the natural order and disrupt the cycle of life and **** itself. The very craft of necromancy is a stain on the Chief God’s creation. But even so, I saw to it that your soul manifested back in the material world. And that is because I had purpose for you here. Do you know what that purpose is?”
Meredith sighed, “To keep the morgue cold…”
“To keep the morgue cold. That’s right. So if you’re out there fighting, then what exactly prevents my specimen from growing humid and… ripe?”
“Well, sure. But…”
“I have Olga here to protect my dungeon from intruders. I picked her precisely for her lightning magic, which can penetrate any armour, is impossible to dodge and cannot be trained against while having no effect on my own undead. It is ideal for dealing with humans”
Meredith growled, “So I heard.”
“You are both doing a wonderful job. There is no reason to feel threatened.”
Meredith sighed once again, “Yes, mistress.”
“Good. As long as you understand, you are excused.”

Meredith left the room, when who should she meet but a few steps outside if not Olga herself, glancing towards her with a smug toothy smirk.
Meredith answered with a thoroughly dissatisfied scowl.
The moment the doors slammed behind, Olga unleashed her torment upon her victim:
“Ah… I’m totally so jealous! Imagine having to kick back in the cool room while the big girls’ gotta put their un-lives at the line in service of the whole dungeon! Mmm, well. That’s the price you gotta pay for being irreplaceable, I suppose.”
“Yeah. Imagine having to toss lightning bolts at people with pointy sticks for ten minutes every three months instead of working all day everyday like us dregs.”
“Absolutely.” Olga nodded, “Oh, except when I gotta train the troops, inspect them, and mobilize them when Welma wants another crusade to the Orderdom. Well, that’s Yvonne for you. A woman with ambition. Good thing she’s got someone she can rely on to get the job done!”
“She relies on us all, Olga.” Meredith stated, heading towards the stairs, except Olga wouldn’t let her get away and followed, “I'm woman enough to admit when I embarrassed myself there. Just a little. We all got our place to serve our mistress. That doesn’t mean I’m not just as powerful a mage as you. Hell, maybe even more powerful.”

“Whoa, whoa there!” Olga rushed ahead and got in Meredith’s way, “Did I hear you right? You think you’re more powerful than me? Care to put your hand where your mouth’s at?”
“I didn’t mean to…”
“I know what you meant. You’re getting a bit too big for your britches over there, and someone’s gotta put you back in your place. And who better than your gal pal Olga?”

Meredith tried to move past her, but Olga kept following like a shadow as she moved, “Battle magic isn’t really my thing. I freeze stuff, mostly. That’s just…”
“Oh, so now you’re gonna go and blame your spells, huh? What happened to all that tough talk earlier? Guess all you’re good for is run that mouth of yours.” She tapped the mask covering her mouth.
Meredith growled.
Olga laughed, “Come on now! You and me. A duel. Tomorrow at midnight. It’s not like you’re gonna die. You’ve done that already!”
“Fine… Just let me go now.” Meredith stormed past her, “I’ve got things to deal with right now.”

Meredith’s husband, the coroner Milo, was always preoccupied stitching together some corpse. His frame was broad, even when he wasn’t wearing six different layers of clothing, including the leather apron with oddly foreboding stains.
“I’m really in for it now, Miles.” Meredith said, pretending to read over her spellbook.
“Mhmm…. Yes, dear.”

She looked behind herself, trailing one of her freezing glyphs engraved in the wall with her finger, “I shouldn’t have let her get to me… I mean, I already should’ve learned my lesson when I made a fool out of myself with that hero. But to then fight the hero-mower herself…”
“Mhmmm… Yes, dear.”

“Well, I am undead, sure. Her lightning won’t bite. But my bandages are still flammable. I’ll be all naked and exposed. In public.” Meredith shook her head, “This is gonna go terribly.”
“You’ll do fine, dear.”
“I’ll do… Are you even listening to me? I couldn’t even handle a single champion, and now I’m up against the lightning bruiser herself! What? Are you saying you’ve got some trick up your sleeve that’ll completely turn the tides?”
“Yes, dear. Very easily.”
Meredith blinked, “Huh?”

And so the hour of the duel arrived. Olga strutted into the Arena. So did Meredith, carrying a giant bird cage over herself.
Olga snickered, “Delivering my prize for me after I’m done, huh? Well, saves me trouble.”
Meredith didn’t answer. The time for talking was over.
“Ready?” The ghost judge said, “Fight!”