The woman treaded across the forest barefoot with her head covered with her black cloak until she reached the blue wall of the dome cast by Dizonia Nexus. She looked out of the blue dome and saw her masked comrade at the other side of the dome. Her comrade waved excitedly when he saw her and shouted with a scottish accent.
“Riche! Hello darlin’ ! I love you!”
“Gyron shut up! Let’s get this over with. I can’t stand your face.” the woman said. Gyron placed his hands on his hips and touched his mask.
“But I’m wearing a mask, my love.”
“Yes, and that’s how you should’ve been born. Now let’s get this over with.”
They nodded at each other before pressing their palms against the blue dome. A black glyph appeared on both sides of the dome and started to eat away at the wall. Once the hole was complete, the individual on the outside entered the dome.
“Good work. Let us commence.” He said in a deep raspy voice. The black cloaked woman peered outside the dome and saw the red glowing eyes of the husks. She stepped to the side along with the black cloaked man and watched the husks enter through the hole and wander inside the forest. Bones of deer, giant centipedes, wolves, elk, horses, entered the woods where the Nexus Coven exam was taking place.
Another black hooded man stepped inside after the husks finished going through the hole. He looked at the woman and handed her a piece of paper. She unfolded the paper and checked the contents. Inside it read-
“Riche. Gyron. Take all the tesseracts. I distract the Nexus Twins.” She smirked and nodded as the hooded figure disappeared into the darkness of the woods. Riche, with the mellow sounding voice, opened her lips.
“Yes, Lord Kiolo.”
Myun’s hand glowed green as his tesseract projected a green glyph behind them.
Myun turned around swiftly and stopped.“Hyacinth! I’ll distract them for a bit, I’ll catch up to you! Go!”
“If you say so, Myun.” Hyacinth held her tesseract and projected a glyph below her body which shot out a red glass platform that propelled Hyacinth forward. Green bears started to be summoned from the green glyph of Myun .Their eyes glowed green once they have completed materializing into existence.
“I’m sorry, Persei!” Myun shouted at the two boys rushing toward him.
Yoven looked down at Persei who was so focused on summoning glyphs, he didn’t see the bears ahead of them. The boy gripped Persei tight. He can’t afford to let Persei lose for the third time and plus this was his first ever coven exam so the priority is on the boy in his arms.
“Persei, you’re not going to like my idea. We were supposed to do this together but I can’t let you lose.” Yoven muttered. Persei’s concentration wandered off and he responded. “What?”
“On the count of three, I’m gonna throw you across from Myun, and you gotta make sure to keep summoning your glyphs under you as you run, got that?!?” Persei was shocked for a moment.
“WAIT! WE CAN THINK OF SOMETHI-”
“THREE!”
Yoven hurled the black haired boy over the green bears summoned by Myun as he grabbed onto his tesseract and summoned an enormous orange glyph on the ground, enclosing Myun and the green bears. Persei flew over the orange glyph and started summoning his own blue glyphs under his feet and continued to run. When Persei was out of the range of the orange glyph, Yoven puffed his chest and took a deep breath. Then he exhaled. “Ignite.”
The outer portion of the orange glyph lit up in flames, creating an orange wall of kindle and flame.
Myun suddenly got cold feet but stood his ground firm. Yoven stepped forward to the center of the orange glyph he summoned and took out a glowing sword of fire from it, pointing it at Myun. Yoven let out a smirk and Myun stood his guard firm.
“Let’s dance green boy.”
Proxima and Dizonia’s eyes darted to the giant flaming wall shooting up at the sky. They walked to the location from the levitating blue glyph and watched Yoven slice through Myun’s green bears.
As they were distracted, Persei continued to run through the torch lit path still thinking about Yoven. He thought about the many sacrifices and kindness he gave him and closed his eyes in thanks. Persei reopened his eyes, filled with even more determination to reach the finish line and not let Yoven’s sacrifice go to waste.
“Thank goodness Yoven managed to trap Myun and Hyacinth in his glyph-” is all he could say before he felt the impact of a punch across his face. He fell backwards and into the rocky ground, scraping his palms. Once his vision started to recover, he looked up only to be filled with horror once more.
“Hey there, Persei.”
“No… No no no, you were supposed to be with Myun!” Persei stuttered.
“Why? Do you hate seeing my face that bad?”
Persei has never felt so humiliated. He clawed the rock ground and gritted his teeth. He staggered to get back up and held his tesseract and summoned a glyph in his palm. He tries hitting Hyacinth with it but she just dodges each and every one of his attacks.
“I should’ve been the one to get to the finish line first! You don’t even need to enter the Nexus Coven!” Persei’s voice began to break as he got tired from trying to attack Hyacinth.
Hyacinth scoffed as she started to parry Persei’s attacks.“What are you talking about? I want to get into the Nexus Coven to become strong. I want to be the best kroma sorcerer.” Hyacinth punched Persei in the gut and knee kicked his face. Persei flew back in pain but quickly regained his position and started to slowly try to land a hit on Hyacinth.
“You don’t have all these expectations on you Hyacinth! I HAVE TO GET INTO THIS COVEN!” Persei landed a punch on her arm.
“FOR YOVEN!” He ducked, avoiding Hyacinth’s jab and elbowed her face.
“FOR MOTHER!” Persei then kicked Hyacinth’s foot which caused her to reel back.
“AND FOR THE HUSKS!” Persei summoned his blue glyph on top of his fist and punched Hyacinth in the gut, sending her backwards. He panted and tried desperately to stay standing as his body throbbed in pain. Hyacinth quickly stood back up and cracked her neck. She raised her face and stared directly into Persei’s blue eyes.
“But it was never for you.”
She quickly side kicked Persei who tried to block with his glyph but forgot his glyph wasn’t big enough to block his body. He flew to the side and slammed his back on a tree. The tree broke from the impact and plummeted down the steep hill along with Persei’s throbbing body. Persei hit the ground and made a loud grunt on impact. He opened his eyes and witnessed Hyacinth’s amber eyes staring down at him from the path that was far above him.
“Horiz. If you can’t decide what you want in life. Others will choose for you. If you’re gonna just sit there and lecture me about how other’s expectations have been weighing you down, you’d better give up already,” Hyacinth said.
She took a quick glance at the black haired boy laying on top of the broken tree meters below her and quickly darted her eyes back to the path. The sores of her skin from the impact of Persei’s hits throbbed in pain but she didn’t mind. She was already used to the pain from all the laborious training she had to go through. Hyacinth started walking briskly along the path and onward as Persei lay there on the tree. He extended his arm and reached for the sky.
“No…” Persei panted.
After regaining his strength a little from the hits of Hyacinth, Persei managed to lift himself off of the tree. He shook his head to get the dirt and leaves off his head and peered upwards.
“Damn...I fell far.” He started to climb the muddy hill until a sound entered his ear. Persei was always warned by the people of Bjorn Village and especially his mother about this. He never saw one before but hearing the sound of it made it even more chilling. He heard the low groans and the sound of bones breaking and bending. He was told to run, hide, do anything to get away from the noise because only one thing will come out from the darkness when you hear bones. Husks. Persei went back down against the tree and laid perpendicular against the trunk of the tree. He heard the shuffling and dragging of limbs in front of him and he made sure he was as silent as a rock.
“Please…” a voice begged. Persei shuffled upwards into the branches of the tree and lifted himself up just a tiny bit to take a look at what was happening. There were three husks, two wolf husks and one humanoid husk that stood tall, half the size of the canopy. Their red eyes glistened in the darkness but Persei’s eyes on the other hand, widened when he saw what the humanoid husk was holding. It was the orange kroma sorcerer that flew past them not too long ago, he was crying and had blood on his forehead. He didn’t have his tesseract tied around his neck which was odd. Persei lowered his head as the sorcerer begged for his life.
“Let me go! I have a family! I have friends!
I have AHHHHHH-”
Persei heard the screams of the man and a crunching noise that soon followed. The tearing of flesh sounded like slime being stretched. Persei closed his eyes and steadied his breathing to keep himself as quiet as possible. After the crunching noises stopped, Persei let out a sight and moved just little enough that a branch underneath him snapped.
The wolven husks shot their heads up and stared in the direction of the fallen tree. Persei could hear them growl and the big gulp of the large humanoid husk. He heard their footsteps inch closer to his hiding spot. His heart started to pick up the pace, his vision erratic, and his breathing uneven. He closed his eyes in hopes they wouldn’t notice him at all. When he opened his eyes, he saw the snout of one of the wolf husks poking out and the head of the skull moving closer ever so slowly.
A scream echoed from the torch-lit path above Persei and the wolves averted their eyes upwards.
“HUSKS!” The screams and fear of the kroma sorcerers attracted the attention of the wolf husks and both quickly ran to the source of the scream. The tall humanoid husk followed the wolf husks. It’s foot lay just on top of Persei as the husk stepped on the tree that was protecting Persei. He watched in horror as the husk hopped over to the steep hill and finally to the path.
Dizonia heard the scream of the kroma sorcerer and looked in it’s direction in surprise. “Proxima! Look down there!” She yelled. Proxima followed the finger of Dizonia and laid eyes on the countless husks approaching from the sides of the torch-lit path.
“Oh no!” Proxima said, getting ready to jump off the flying blue glyph. She cocked her head back as a black flying sword zipped inches away from her face. The sword changed its course and came flying backwards. Proxima held her tesseract and summoned a red glyph which produced powerful flames in the direction of the black sword to try to melt it. She quickly realized it was futile and jumped to the side to avoid it.
“That’s no ordinary glyph.” Both twins looked back to see where the sword returned to. It was caught mid-flight in the hands of a tall hooded man getting lifted off the ground by one of the humanoid husks. Both stared at the man in terror, neither of them ever saw or even heard of a person who can control the will of the husks aside from one man they studied about during their time at The Workshop.
“The Lich King.”
Dizonia muttered. Proxima was stunned by the name of her sister. That name has been the number one threat to all kroma sorcerers since the dawn of time. It is said that every twenty years, the lich king revives and possesses a kroma sorcerer to act as a host for his soul. Back when the twins were students, they believed it was a fairytale or a fable. Now is when this dark story rose from the grave, back to terrorize the kroma sorcerer once more.
Proxima’s sweat dripped down from her temples as she tried formulating a plan in her head to get everyone out and back into Bjorn Village where the glyph of the walls would ward off the husks.
“They must’ve gotten in through a hole in the blue dome...probably using a wall breaker glyph. Go find it. I’ll distract him.”
“What about the kroma sorcerers applying for the coven exam?”
Proxima summoned a glyph near her mouth and made an announcement that could be heard throughout the entire forest. Everyone cocked their ears and listened to Proxima scream.
“Everyone! Kromagoths and husks have entered the dome! Get to the finish line! It’s near Bjorn Village! Do anything you can to survive!” She reached in her bag and looked at Dizonia.
“Here, use this to propel yourself.”
Proxima handed Dizonia a piece of paper and a pen from her bag. The paper contained a modified version of Proxima’s red glyph with the outer circle incomplete.
Dizonia nodded and closed the outer circle of the glyph. She jumped off the blue floating glyph and the paper began to shoot out a concentrated flame which acted as a thrust for Dizonia to fly with. The Lich King noticed and held his hand up to try to command a tall humanoid husk to grab hold of Dizona. His hand got stabbed by a flying red spear.
“Oi. eyes on me.” Proxima said as her red eyes glistened in the darkness.
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