Scene 1

Narrator Arim- “The young warrior circled his cart around his teacher, Perren, trying to goad him into a competition of speed; historically, he lost those in strength and agility, but what he still lacked, it was compensated with a metaphorical battery producing bundles of energy.

                                          Kuelin (played by old Arim)

Kuelin- “One lap? No, wait, we’re going straightforward. How about who gets to the clearing ahead first?”

                                          Perren (played by Finley)

Perren, puffing from his pipe- “Is there any way to mix you and Goidel, and clay some new, more balanced members out of the two of you?”

Narrator- “The remark irked the enthusiastic Kuelin and his chagrin guises amused his teacher. The two bickered the entire runway, but as some survivors said - at least there were other noises than deadly screams with the heroes. Kuelin gave them hope and food, while Perren imparted soothing words and medicine, enough to keep on their feet while they fled the incoming waves of liquid tendrils. 

Yes, for some reason, the lake stood stagnant in its spawning point, but that didn’t mean it stopped its chases. River lines started to pour outside the outskirts of the dark water, hunting for everything that even dared to breathe in its presence. 

Animals, plants, nothing was spared from the ravaging hunger of the flood. Slowly but surely, the landscape became barren and lifeless, a desert in birth. 

One such deluge encroached on the group Kuelin and Perren were helping out; without missing a beat, the duelist charged his gauntlet with a shining light and the air got still. No other noises could be heard, except for the humming of Perren’s attack and the onslaught of the income flood.

The duelist pushed his left foot back, preparing for a large feedback. Kuelin recognized the move and urged everyone to hunker down. “It’s a giant slayer!”, the boy screamed, with enthusiasm. In a blink, Peren launched the shining light into a straight line from his rapier towards the barraging water. A scorching line evaporated the incoming invader- a needless attack, as soon after, the river was supplanted by another surge of the dark liquid. 

Kuelin- “ Stand back, teach!”

Narrator- “ The precocious warrior stabbed his claws into the ground, pulsating energy into the gauntlets, as if he was gathering them for a mighty strike. The land started to crack and split in front of them, forming a small canyon along the brittle ground over which the giant slayer traveled. Their combination worked better than expected, as it plunged the river into the bowels of the earth.

Kuelin- “ Phew… That. Took. Over three thirds. Of. My. Strength.”

Perren- “ Can’t believe we had to rely so early on such tactics…but good job, pupil. You bought enough time for the people to escape.” 

Narrator- “ The duelist didn’t lie. The move almost cost them a piece on the board, but the outcome more than exceeded the price for it. Perren used his dagger and rapier to fend off the straggling hand or tendril that spawned from time to time, but the canyon ate so much of the river, only small parts of it managed to reach the group. 

And, as if it had a mind of its own, the river stopped flowing. Actually, it stood still, even the part that was in the middle of cascading. To their shock, it then reversed its course, as if it was retreating, regrouping back. The two warriors were left uneasy by the display, and decided to let Kuelin drag a cart, with Perren left as the designated scout and shield.”

Scene 2

Narrator Brigit -” A cavity at the top of the largest tree around sheltered the three children who saw first hand the emergence of the lake. For hours they hold on to each other, shivering from fear - of the end and of being left alone.  

The one with emerald feathers, Brigit, took a glance from time to time, spying on the outside to see if the horror had ended. Every peak, instead, made her more terrified by what she saw:

A rapid, rushing murky stream, an ever flowing deluge of dead matter rushing from one side of the forest and disappearing into its darkness; but that’s not what scared the girl the most. She could barely blink, as her eyes were glued on the ever-disappearing pitch-black of the forest. It seemed like the flood was sipping even from that darkness. 

The trees’ branches started to root and fell, and what curtain of leaves the forest plaited in decades was untied in matters of hours. Giant as it may be, even their tree wasn’t spared by the hunger. In fact, because of its size, it didn’t suffer the quick death of the smaller trees. 

‘Crack’, ‘Pop’ and louder and faster ‘cracks’ made the kids hurdle together in a corner, sobbing and screaming for help. The tree started to topple to the side, crashing with the might of a hammer; then the hundreds of hands hidden beneath the surface begin pushing the dead oak to the middle of the lake. 

Except for a few curious hands, the rest of the underwater army ignored the kids. The ones that dared sniff inside the hollow place, Brigit smacked with a scabbard of a fallen Kildare soldier she found inside the tree. Even after that, the dark water mostly ignored the prisoners.

Once brought to the edge of the lake, the children could have gotten an insight to what was at the middle of the maelstrom, but out of the three, only young Brigit dared to stretch her neck out and look at…nothing. Just an endless, vast amount of white nothing, surrounded by a spinning stream of dark water. 

She didn’t know why, but at that moment, the girl left out a screech fueled by the nightmares that invaded her head without remorse. Her head started to spin, and her eyes lost any anchors on reality. If the other two weren’t with her, Brigit would have fallen into the abyss way before the tree.

Unfortunately for them, the screech attracted the attention of the denizens of the dark water - hundreds of diamond eyes looked at them, slowly encroaching on the cavity. The children could hear scratches on the bark, screaming for help; except for Brigit, her eyes wide open and trembling, huffing air to calm down, while the surrounding were just muffled sounds to her.

The creatures in the water started to surround them, closing in and ready to drag the kids underneath, to the bottom. Then, a shriek induced stillness into the air. The creatures stopped looking at the children, turning to the middle of the lake. Another shriek let them know that something was coming. 

The third shriek preceded a shining tower of blue light coming from the middle of the empty maelstrom. The light quickly transformed into a column of blue fire and from that column, a giant bird-like creature flew above the purple clouds. Its feathers burned continuously and its sharp talons left a trail of shimmering embers in flight.

The being then dived around, sending a burning shadow to evaporate small pieces of the dark water. The bird circled the lake and started to boil it with its fire, which tried to retaliate back with a barrage of attacks. The flying creature evaded most of them, but was quickly overwhelmed by the sheer number of spear-like tendrils and water bullets that tried to take it down. 

Brigit ears captured the shrieks, and she lifted her head, then for a moment she could swear that the two made eye contact. The bird planned around, and now it flew into the direction of the fallen tree, landing right in the cavity.

                                               The bird (played by Brigit)

Strange bird-” Me…save…you”.

Scene 3- 

Narrator Brigit- “ The children quickly grabbed onto the beast’s legs, certain that if their lives were to continue, they had to entrust it to the stranger. The bird then tried to lift into the air, but her size slowed her down, at least slow enough for the tendrils to pierce her wings. 

The blue fire healed the injuries quickly, at least that’s what the bird hoped for. But the flood’s relentless attacks pierced her wings and her body with such ferocity that the flames dimmed, and dimmed, and dimmed.

Brigit and the kids pleaded with the bird to stand up, cried for it to get better, and she heard them. She saw them and, for the first time in her life, felt another being's fears. In her half closed eyes, their desperation reflected clearly to her. 

The bird then spread her wings in a swift action, swatting away the water creatures, and then her body caught on fire. A giant, blue tornado of embers surrounded the bird, burning her into a pile of ashes. At first, the kids thought that this was it, that the bird also died. But then the ashes flew in all directions, as if something exploded inside of them.

From it, a being that walked on two legs and had two hands emerged - she was covered in the same type of feathers as the bird, with her face being half hidden under a mask-like upper beak. 

                                                   The firebird( played by Brigit)

The firebird-” Hold tight!”, demanded the woman with her firm voice. The children grabbed on to her, and she used her flames to explode some of the tendrils and provide a pathway for them to escape. 

Narrator Brigit- “ Her smaller scale left with more wiggle room to fly through and evade the incoming attacks, so the firebird took up to the skies and battered her wings with ferocity and swiftness. The lake tried to stop her escape attempt, using all of its meager tricks to bring them down. With each bat of the wing, the firebird and the kids gained more distance away from the danger, so the dark water retaliated with another option. A highly pressured bullet broke the sound barrier, giving the firebird a way to dodge the incoming attack. 

She turned around to see what the booming sound was, right in time to notice the water projectile being at only a meter away from her face. In the next moment, a hand came from behind her shoulder; the second moment, the hand snapped its fingers and a neatly-ornate shield appeared in front of them. 

The bullet smashed the shield into pieces, bending three of the fingers holding it backward. But the killing blow was stopped right in time by Masso, who jumped from Ashen’s back at the right second to help the firebird and the children. 

Unfortunately for him, though, he couldn’t fly, so the firebird barely caught him before he could plunge into the pale void. Ashen then swooped in turn to save the stranglers and brought them away from the epicenter of the disaster. They quickly meet up with the duelist and pupil on top of the last remaining stone cliff. 

                                                          Ashen (played by Tommen)

Ashen- “ Masso, Perren, think of an attack plan - quickly. I’ll hold off the incoming stream.”

Wincing his eyes from the pain to straighten his finger back, Masso does a mental rundown of the current group, but stops midway while catching a glance on what was Kuelin’s back.

Wordless, he shakily points his functioning fingers towards the young warrior and the little boy that tried to cower and hide his face behind Kuelin. Who, in turn, gave a healthy laugh at the situation. Masso turned toward Perren’s sour face, who, ashamed, simply explained that-

                                                          Perren (played by Finley)

Perren- “...he gave us the slip and hid in the carts. Luckily, Kuelin thought to see if there was anything we could back carry before abandoning the cart in the forest…and only then we found Arim.”

Narrator  Brigit- “ The Union leader looked like he aged a decade in a minute, and decided to ignore that matter for the time being. As for now, something else pressured them for their undivided attention. Masso then slowly approached the firebird, who kept a distance from the strangers, holding tight on the children. Two of which ran away from her protective hands towards the Union members. Except for Brigit. She kept a tight, piercing grip on the firebird.

Masso then kneeled in front of it and spoke to it.

                                                           Masso (played by Lian)

Masso- “Creature…you are from the other side, from where that flood came from, right? Do you know what we can do to stop it?”