The Tale of the Darkcross

"Now, I suppose I should start with the tale me mother used tae tell me: In the deepest, darkest shadows of the forest. There's a group wae eyes glowing red, and a great evil within. It's said that this group, they prey on the young, the auld, the weak and the defenceless but most of aw, they prey, on the dead".

The group feel a shiver down all of their collective spines as the elder dwarf continues.

"It's rumoured that they scour around the cemeteries of every town in the continent, searching for the freshly planted to take the remains. It's been said that they take the recently dead to their dark lair where they commence their sick rituals".

"W-w-what kind of, rituals?" Lani asks with some fear in her voice.

"Dark, dark rituals lass. Rituals that pervert the very essence of life and **** itself, stealing the **** of life from living and revival of the dead. Making them an army of brainless pricks ready to serve their new masters and their devious agenda".

The chilled spines feel even colder as the dwarf takes a breath.

"However, they became more and more known throughout the continent as the amount of people who saw the final resting place of their family members disturbed began to rise. The populace had enough so one day, the people all handed together and they marched throughout the entire continent".

Greyr then leans back, tapping into the memory as he continues speaking, "If I recall correctly, it must've been over four hundred folk looking for 'em. So, from the moment the ragtag legion began looking for them, the Darkcross could not remain hidden for long".

"They scoured every dark forest, every cemetery, every shadow they could find and for weeks, nothing. That was until one day, during another search, they found the Darkcross members in the middle of a desolate swamp once thought to only be inhabited by the lost souls from the war hundreds of years ago. The men all brandished their weaponry and struck down the cult with no remorse. Blood splattered against the fallen mossy trees, coating the lily pads in the murky swamp and turning the water a shade of red".

Greyr shifts on the crate where he currently sits, his expression darkening as he finally goes on, "The Darkcross were thought to be dead. Their bodies scattered along the swamp like broken branches, all except one, The Madame, and with her dark magic, she slaughtered them all".

A silence creeps in as Greyr suddenly stops, a pain within him is expressed on his face as he sullenly states, "Amongst those was my uncle. Not by blood, a friend of me da's but blood couldnae have make him closer".

The dwarf stifles a tear as he takes a breath before clearing his throat.

"But from that day, the Darkcross would lose something greater than their lives, their anonymity. Not widely known but, no, longer, faceless. It's been said in corners of taverns and places of ill repute, that their leader, is a woman with a silver split tongue and shining scales".

The main group of Kyuala, John, Lani, Amilia and Terra all look at each other with surprised stares as all of the clues come together however the others catch onto this as Daffodil asks, "Hey, what's wae the stares?".

The group are silent for a few seconds before John says, "When we were in the cave, we met a lizard woman, who was known as the Madame. She was, charismatic, intriguing and scary. Eventually, Amilia saved my life by plunging a sword through her chest".

Greyr is shocked by this revelation.

"Wait, the cat, killed, Ivellise?" Greyr asks.

"Yeah, I did, bitch had it coming. So what?" Amilia bluntly responds.

Greyr takes a breath once again, looking down at the floor before saying, "Ivellise wasn't the leader".

The room goes silent once more, everyone unsure of what to say but eventually it's Terra who asks the key question.

"If not Ivellise, then who?".

Greyr looks to them all with a cold stare in return as he says, "Her name, was Imoga, the Darksister of the Nyll".

That name doesn't ring any sort of bells for most of the group, all but one, Lani.

"Wait, the Darksister?! She's supposed to have been dead for at least 70 years!" Lani says.

Greyr responds with, "Aye, that she was but apparently the dark forces of nature decided to bring her back to terrorise those that put an end to her life in the first place, the Grand Magisters of Keryne-".

Amilia eventually had enough as she snarkily comments, "Okay, you keep just bringing up random history shit. Can you just get to the fucking point before I die of old age?".

"Amilia!" Kyuala says, hitting the cats shoulder.

Amilia doesn't respond, instead she exhales in annoyance as she crossed her arms and sits back down like a child in a huff.

Greyr sighs but before he has the chance to speak again, Lani says, "For context for the others sake, the Grand Magisters used to be a collective of the greatest mages and some of the most powerful apprentices in the northern continents".

"Used to be?" Moray asks.

"They all died 50 years ago, along with Imoga" Greyr answers before continuing, "See, after the slaughter in the swamp. She decided to delve into her blood magic and resurrected them all, her personal battalion in her war against the Magisters but the rumour goes that since there was no one to sacrifice for the resurrection spell, she used her own blood".

"The worst thing you can do, even as a blood mage" Lani adds before going on, "If you use your own blood for any blood magic, the spells effect you as well as the recently resurrected and so with her revival of the dead. She was dying, literally using her own life to power her army".

Greyr takes back the reins of the conversation as he says, "And so, with her army in play, she enacted her plan. The battle of Keryne.".

"From the stories told, it was a foggy day, a day in which the apprentices would practice their air magic but the fog wouldn't be empty on that day as on the bridge, the dead battalion emerged. Quickly, unaware apprentices and mages were torn apart, flesh ripped from bone, screams echoing throughout the Grand Academy but even as the mages knew what they were against, the undead were too strong even for their great magic. However, ad the forces on the ground were distracted, the Great Council were in their hall, deciding on what their next course of action was, when all of a sudden, Imoga arrived. She and the Council had a war of words, none of which were recollected but it inevitably led to the end, Imoga channelled her immense magic, fuelled by the massacre from her forces down below and with a mighty shout, she cast the final spell of the battle and with it, the destruction of Keryne occurred. The entire academy gone in one fell swoop as she used all of her power to emit a great explosion, seen in multiple continents, all at once".

Greyr continues on, "The explosion wiped out everyone in an instant yet one Magister remained, the Grand Witch Kikila, the eldest members of the Magisters. From all accounts, she was frail during the attack so she remained at her home in Lothcan and was communicating via a Commu-Sphere. She heard every last word said within that room, along with her caretakers and family anf as the academy fell, her poor heart gave out, almost like the soul of the academy was taken and her life with it. So everyone who heard shared the stories, the name Imoga sending fear into every magic users hearts as she became a boogeymen for all aspiring Magisters".

Lani takes over from there, "After that, Imoga disappeared, thought to be dead since no mortal being could have survived that explosion".

"Ahh lass, but remember, Imoga wasn't truly mortal after using her own blood in the magic. Some people even whisper her name, saying that she is still out there, roaming in the shadows to this very day" Greyr says, finishing Lani's part for her.

Greyr then turns back to the others before talking, "That was the end of the Darkcross for 50 something years, until a few years back when this Ivellise and her merry band of pricks showed up".

"Woah" Is all the collective group, minus Amilia, can let out as they look at the man who seems to be glad to have gotten that off of his chest.

"But wae those fanny slits now taking a dirt nap, no more worries for this auld shagger! Now, break times over! Let's get this gear down and ready to shift!".

Greyr jumps up off of the crate he's sitting on and heads to the cart along with the others but that's when Kyuala says, "Remember, we need to keep a few for us and Sylas too. We owe him something at the very least".

"Awright, yous take a big bag and we can sell the rest, trust me, we'll get a lot of shiny, shiny of gold for this" Daffodil says as she grabs a bag and moves it toward the edge of the carriage.

TWENTY MINUTES LATER:

The group have gotten all the weapons off of the wagon and are currently tallying them up. Meanwhile, John has grabbed his bag and with it, the armour inside.

He opens the bag and pulls out the torso piece. He feels a small vibration as he holds the armour in his hands whilst he truly examines it.

He sees a simply iron cuirass from the from but with a few differences, the first being some sort of scale-like armour as a sort of underlay beneath the top layer. The second is that the armour has two black leather straps on each side, seemingly for the wearer to tighten the armour themselves which John appreciated.

The third difference is more of detail because as the cuirass is darker than regular iron gear, it also has some intricate markings on the armour. John narrows his eyes to scan the markings and from what he can gather, they seem to be almost rune-like with the closest comparison he can make is Nordic runes but that could be considered a stretch.

He holds the armour in his hands and revels in the fight for a few more moments before muttering to himself, "Just like a video game right? You get an upgrade, you put it on".

John then puts the armour down for a second as he takes off his leather shoulder guard.

He drops the shoulder guard onto the floor and grabs the cuirass once again before poking his head through the hole for his head and putting his arms through the sleeves of the armour.

The armour fits around his body snugly but not too tight that it becomes uncomfortable. He then moves around, testing its effects on his mobility but to his surprise, it seems to almost make him a little faster.

John then grabs the straps at the sides and begin to fasten them all, tightening the armour enough so it doesn't move around while he does.

He then begins to strike and move once again, the armour feeling even better than before now that it's fully fastened.

As he's doing all of this, he hears Daffodil say, "Woah! Swanky new armour John!".

John turns around and sees that everyone is now looking at him. He then sees Kyuala's narrowed, confused look as she asks, "What are you wearing?".

"Uhh, I found it back in the armoury" John responds with a hint of uncertainty of how they'll respond.

Just then, Lani flies over to John and then flies around him before saying, "Wow! It looks so cool!".

Terra is the next person to walk up to him and examine said armour. She looks at the dark runes that are etched onto the armour and realises that they look familiar. Terra then turns to Lani and asks, "Hey Lani, do you see those runes?".

Lani flies over to Terra's side and begins looking closer at the armour, "Oh yeah. Hmm, weird, why would the armour have runes?".

"Can you translate them?" Terra asks as she scans the 8 runes. Two on the chest and the remaining 6 on each smithed ab on the stomach of the armour.

"I should be able to, give me a moment" Lani responds as she makes her bag appear before pulling out a small notebook and begins etching the same runes into her book.

Terra and Lani now look at the drawn runes and begin to mutter amongst themselves as they start to translate them together.

A few minutes pass as the two translate the final runes. They then both have surprised looks on their faces as they look up to John who jokingly asks,

"What's wrong? Am I gonna die or something?".