Archbishop Candor—Dragon’s Maw VIP Booth

  Candor was shaking with rage as he watched the warrior of Rembrand carried into the sky by the Forsaken Paladins' demonic familiar. “How! How is this possible?” he screamed at the terrified paladin next to him. Candor looked at the man’s wide, panicked eyes and realized he had let his mask slip.

  He forcibly calmed himself and let the candles in the room settle back to their natural flames instead of the hateful red beasts they were transforming into when he let his wrath get out of hand. The young paladin stayed frozen next to him as the hungering flames receded from where they had begun to feast upon him.

  With a modicum of control now, Candor looked around the room. One of the servants was a sizzling pile in the corner. He had been directly under one of the candelabras, and his meager defenses hadn’t saved him when the flames reached down. Shame…but I will use his sacrifice.

  Elron The young paladin gathered himself and spoke, “My…lord, how is that monster here? How is he a king? Why would we agree to this…?” His naivety shined through to Candor. Elron didn’t realize the gravity of this moment. This heathen had just made powerful allies and publicly humiliated the order while simultaneously positioning himself to make an example of his opponents.

  If candor allowed this to play out and simply let the man mercilessly butcher the faithful in a public display of dominance. That…that was the kind of thing that shook faiths and led to questions. Questions led to heresy. And heresy was how an order rotted from the inside.

  Candor pulled his gaze from the battle and back to his attendants. He had permission to handle this how he saw fit, and that's exactly what he would do. “Gather everyone you can. That scum is not going to leave this building alive. Candor himself stood up; he couldn’t intercede personally—that would be too far even for him with the man’s diplomatic status. What he could do was stretch the terms of this battle to the point of breaking and stall the knight commanders from intervening.

  And if all that failed, well, he would hunt the bastard down in the very streets of Hopes Path before he could flee back to his vile woods and trust that the glorious holy one would protect him from the fallout.

  Once the room cleared, Candor walked to the still smoldering body of the servant. He had been one of the faithful; he had received his brands willingly and with rapturous faith. Candor’s face twisted into a satisfied smile as he began channeling the skill taught to him by the holy one.

  The room darkened as the dead servant's brands sizzled with a gold-red glow. The faint whispy shape of a screaming figure was dragged from its ascent back into the servant's body as his brands forced the soul back into the charred corpse. “As you obeyed in life, so you will obey in death. Supplication unending, service unrelenting—this is the way of Rembrand.”

  Vraxious—Dragon’s Maw Arena

  Vrax watched in shock as Dutchess pulled her claw across the man’s chest. Immediately the scent of blood washed over the two devourers, and they began their grim transformation mid-flight. Faces peeled open and organs sagged as they picked up speed. Duchess threw the warrior like a ragdoll higher into the air for the Devourers to pursue like dogs chasing a stick.

  Near the apex of his flight, an orb of force wrapped around him, the stadium staff already trying to remove him from what was almost certainly a lethal situation. He slammed roughly into the orb of force face first, stopping abruptly midair, and the orb began slowly lowering him down. It made it about two strides before the Devourers hit it one after the other at full speed, pinging him and the orb off the armored viewing glass twice so hard it cracked.

  The second warrior of Rembrand probably wasn’t faring any better. Vrax saw blistering flashes of movement in the cornfield, followed by an armored arm spiraling bloodily from the field. Then another arm after it. A dome of force bloomed into the field. Holy shit, why am I even here?! That’s the Warriors out in the first…five seconds.

  Crixus crashed towards the tower, his heavy armor actually cracking the platform slightly. Vrax raced after him but circled the edge so he could dive into the cornfield if he needed to. Corvus finally came into sight, practically bursting from the field in a shower of popping corn hunks and fire. He clambered onto the platform and rushed straight at Crixus, who was about to enter the tower.

  Right behind him, both Paladin initiates came barreling up but headed straight for Vrax. Vrax crouched down and waited. Something wasn’t right. Corvus’s charge abruptly shifted as he extended a hand out to his side, and a massive surge of flames wrenched his body sideways and straight at Vrax. Ahh, yep, there is.

  “No, we’re going on a trip,” Crixus said confidently as a roiling red chain shot from his palm and harshly wrapped around Corvus’s waist midair. He pulled back hatefully and tore Corvus to the ground into a surprised heap before starting to reel him in hand over hand, dragging the chain back to himself.

  Vrax smiled; two paladin initiates he could handle. He waited until they were almost upon him and dove back into the circle of rot next to the portal just as one swung his sword in an arc of crackling fire that trailed down in a ghostly shimmer and crawled forwards as it burned on the ground. Okay, I'll admit that's cool; a fire that searches for its foes as a smite is a neat one.

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  The first initiate leapt through his own burning smite, and with a gesture, it leapt after him, quickly racing towards Vrax like a living bolt of roiling lightning. Vrax flailed for a second and dove into the still-standing corn as his left arm was drenched in fire. He was surprised how far his dive took him; he sailed nearly four strides through corn stalks before he rolled to his feet. The burning energy within his armor was one hell of a boost. His stigmata rent the life from his surroundings and smothered the fire that was creeping up his arm with a green haze.

  Okay, still a really impressive smite, but, uhh, kind of scary.

  The paladins stopped in the rotted clearing warily, eyeing the portal and looking into the corn where Vrax had disappeared. Vrax looked over towards the brawl happening at the tower while the paladins hesitated. Duchess was slowly floating his way, and if they wanted to wait for imminent death, that was on them.

  Crixus was slugging it out with Corvus; waves of fire were washing over his armor, and the red runes covering it were winking out one by one. The very ground and brick stonework of the tower were glowing, and the tower was starting to noticeably sag.

  Crixus weathered another blow, blocking with his thick vambrace wrapped in red chain. Then he brought the most vicious-looking serrated dagger Vrax had ever seen suddenly from a sheath on his chest and jammed it into Corvus’s shoulder. He twisted the blade slightly before bringing his closed fist down and hammering it in farther.

  Corvus Screamed in rage and took a faltering swing; the dagger stuck in his shoulder made the blow hitch, and Crixus used it to step under the blow and kick the paladin straight into the molten tower with horrific force. He crashed through the brickwork in a sizzling smatter, his armor lit up with verdant golden light as enchantments activated.

  There was a noticeable pause across the battlefield as the whole tower began slowly tilting toward the cornfield. Everyone held their breath, bodies ready to leap if it careened onto them. Then the entire bottom of the tower exploded out in a ring of glimmering fragments of what almost looked like golden ice shards.

  The paladin rushed from his smoldering heap and raised his hand towards Crixus. The innumerable shards coalesced into a single, not quite unified piece in the shape of a rough spear that quivered with barely restrained energy. Crixus took one good look at the gathering smite and leapt off into the cornfield after Vrax. A wall of glittering, deadly shards trailed after him.

  He never even hit the ground; they impacted one after another, exploding with golden flashes of power. Hundreds of them lifting him higher and higher as the river of projectiles arced to follow his trajectory. Runes winked out on his armor by the dozens, and each new hit blew chunks of thick metal fragments into the cornfield dangerously.

  Crixus screamed wordlessly and disappeared in a red flash. What the hell? Vrax took advantage of everyone looking up in confusion. He dashed forward, throwing his arms wide as he tried out his new change to the stigmata. Life flew from the cistern as the rotted patch around the portal sprang back to life.

  But this time it wasn’t a pleasant field of corn. Vrax had many seeds in his menagerie, but the ones he had the most of were all from the forsaken lands…or from his creations. The ground didn’t roil so much as it bulged at the force of thousands of roots forcing their way into existence at the same time. It started small.

  An almost perfect circle of Vein Diver dandelions sprang to life immediately, casting their deadly progeny into the air in scintillating clouds that swirled around the clearing. Then lurker mushrooms, both adapted and normal, began blooming along the ground, pushing upwards like hungering beasts. Finally, the green glow of adapted smelter moss oozed from the tilled earth, instantly creeping towards the initiates.

  Two other plants rumbled their way from underground, worsening the already hectic swirl of dandelion seeds. A pair of willows adapted with the slightest of green glimmer in their dripping branches arched over the portal, slightly intertwined.

  The paladin initiates stumbled in panic, lurkers nearby lashing at them, and clouds of vein divers already streaming into the gaps in their armor. Corvus saw the peril they were in. “Take the Fireblood potions!” He shouted out, stepping towards the sudden patch of the forsaken lands trying to consume his allies.

  A red glow lit Corvus from behind as the battered, blood-dripping form of Crixus stepped from a portal the color of rage just behind him and wrapped his chain around Corvus’s neck suddenly. “I said WE ARE GOING ON A TRIP,” Crixus screamed into Corvus’s ear while lifting him off the ground by the noose of chain.

  Crixus began taking halting steps towards the portal, ignoring the blows the paladin was raining back onto him with his armored elbows and occasional flashes of fire. When he started summoning the glimmering shards again, Crixux stopped briefly and tightened the chain to break his concentration.

  Vrax and duchess descended on the harried initiates while Crixus continued dragging the still struggling paladin towards the portal.

  Duchess simply snatched the closest initiate in her claws, cackling in his face before throwing him through the portal and diving in after him. Vrax dodged a stab from the other, lightly stabbing his chest twice before deftly sidestepping another slash. The vein divers were ravaging the paladin, making him easy prey; another two quick stabs with the new smite left a massive glowing miasmic mark across the man’s breastplate.

  Vrax leapt back out of range from another series of wild swings. The man was nearly blinded by the number of vein divers swarming into him through his eyes. Vrax flexed his will and snapped his armored fingers to activate the new primed smite. The man's top half simply disappeared in a shower of blackening organs and blood. The smite flared darkly, crackling in the air for a moment before the energy wafted away. Oh holy…that certainly works… Wait, no barrier? Why didn’t anyone try to save him?

  Crixus was slowly shuffling to the portal still. Vrax went to help him with Corvus when the announcers’ voice rattled across the arena again. It sounded strained, fearful. “Alright folks we have some surprise rule changes! At the request of…of the new sovereign, of course! He wanted more opponents, so the church will be obliging him, and unfortunately some…uhh…some of our barrier mages have fallen a bit ill, so we might not be quite as quick on the uptake for saving folks…” The cheering crowd seemed confused by that but not overtly bothered. The fight so far had been met with enthusiasm.

  Oh shit… I knew they would try something; I just didn’t think they would be quite this bold about it. If they want no holds barred, I’ll give them everything I’ve got. Let's see if they even have any paladins left with the balls to come after me in the forsaken lands after this.