by Brian Nyaude
32
Moving greatly amongst the beasts, I soared out of the way towards the castle’s entrance gate. It was crazy, the lions just kept coming one after another. Four lions leaped in the air, taking advantage of the winds they were releasing from their mouths. Large gusts of winds in every direction kept me further away from the castle gate, drawing me closer to the lions’ jaws. One of the smaller lions grabbed my foot, biting hard on it. I kicked its head and released its grasp away from me. As the second approached from behind me, I soared sideways in the nick of time to avoid its powerful fang. Strange hallowing winds ringed my ears loudly, coming from two other lions in front of me. Now what!
I was losing my strength in my body. One of my guns disappeared, leaving the sword as my only weapon.
Upon realizing this fact, it was far too late. Most of my life force had been consumed by the purple sword. Okay, the price of its power was far too great to contemplate. I had to get rid of it quickly. However, right now it was my only defense. So I was going to get rid of it once the lions were taken care of. Jaws wide open, the two lions in front of me roared fiercely, pushing me back with the power of their winds. Up above me, another large lion had leaped quietly and roared too at me. Darn it, this situation was slowly getting out of control.
I was swept back and down towards the ground, falling with my back first. Behind me, another larger lion stood gazing down at me. Its eyes dark as the night and fur as long as ravish grass. It opened its mouth, widening hard for another assault. This was going to hurt badly. Unconsciously, I forced my will into it using my mind slipper. Taking over its hollow blank mind and bending it to my control. This creature was hollow, with no thoughts and no memory. Truly, a beast of pure instinct!
“I order you to stop and attack the others,” I commanded it using my willpower.
There was no way I could defeat these creatures in my current state. Every portion of my body seemed sore and I could barely move my arms anymore. Justly, I was in a dire situation with no way out. Perhaps, it would have been best if I had gone with the others. I felt angry, the red energy from the gauntlet was starting to glow out of me. Figuring it out was time I didn’t have on my hands.
“Attack them now,” I ordered it.
The lion looked at me and then went completely berserk on the others. I felt it, the light from the sun hitting behind my neck. By now, all my chances of victory had disappeared. Katarina was far more powerful now than before thanks to the sun. I moved out of the way, staying far back from the rampaging lion I was controlling. Sad to say, I wasn’t in complete control of the large beast. It was attacking everything without discrimination with roars of winds so powerful they were destroying the castle gate walls. I struggled back to my feet and took advantage of this new opening. While the lions were distracted, the path towards the castle gate was clear. I could have gone inside through the sky, but I didn’t have the energy for it. I was dizzy, hungry, and grouchy, not the best things to have when trying to infiltrate an enemy base. Another troubling thing was happening, the lion under my control was coming after me too. Ebi had warned me that this sort of thing would happen if I ever tried to control an animal. Thinking back, I should have heeded his warning instead of thinking he was some senile old pervert.
“For crying out loud, go away?”
The lion sort of listened and took its eyes off me. My legs trembled coldly, locking uncontrollably. Indeed, I was in trouble. Accounting the lack of sleep and the loss of my energy, this was not going to end well for me. Even if I was able to make it inside, I doubt I would get past her soldiers easily. It felt like someone was jabbing needles into me every time I tried to get back to my feet. I ignored the pain and looked up towards the castle.
“Paul! Tye! I’m coming.”
The aching pain I was feeling at the moment was a sheer reminder of everything I had endured to get here. All the endless sacrifices my allies had done were not going to be in vain. “Wait for me, I will not leave you in this nightmare to rot.”
As I said that, I felt a bit of courage rekindle me with strength again. Wait a minute, I still had the bottle with the herbal pills, staked somewhere in my clothes. They had the power to revive my stolen energy, but only for brief amount of time. I quickly searched my clothes, trying to take them while I still had the chance. I found them in left shirt pocket and put one into my mouth. As before, it was nasty and tasted almost as bad as Suzanne’s cooking. I felt better again within seconds of ingestion, getting back on my feet to continue. The sensation to save my beloved friends was what kept me going through these dark times. Whoa! My enchanted lion was out of going out of control. The land lay in ruins thanks to its destructive power. By a stroke of luck, its claw missed my head by several inches. My gaze slowly shifted, I looked at the castle gate searching for guards or other creatures nearby. The castle gate was made of thick strong metal, not easy to get through by sheer force. As fate would have it, the gate began to open down slowly. Behind it, a battalion of soldiers stood stiffly, waiting on command to move out. The soldiers marched out towards me with large long spears. Call me crazy, but I felt some of my own energy within them. Trust me, I know my own energy. All of the energy that inn Monga beast took from us must have been somehow given to these soldiers who charged towards me.
“Have at thee savages,” I shouted raising the purple sword in the air.
The infuriating gusts of wind and stomping tremors of the huge lions distracted the soldiers enough for me to slip by them. I did have to cut down a few of them to get through them which I was not proud of. Even at half my strength, these minions posed no greater threat to me than I had imagined. I think having the bottle with pills with me gave me hope and produced a sense of carelessness in me. None of the soldiers could even touch or keep up with me. However, they always seemed to get up no matter how many times I knocked them down.
“Come on,” I yelled as it seemed like I was getting nowhere really fast. “Why can’t you just stay down?”
It was their armors, they were special in a way. Meaning physical attacks had no powerful effects against them. They had me completely surrounded and cornered against a wall. I felt numb aching pain in my arm. It was my left hand, it had gone completely numb. One guess, the purple sword. Every second I held onto it spelled terrible danger for me. Without any hesitation, I discarded it and rolled out of the way. One of the soldiers moved towards me and swung his spear at my head. I grabbed his hand and proceeded to throw him down using the force of his weight. Looking down at the purple sword, I was rather surprised by the amount of life force it had stolen from me. I mean I could do it too, just not on the same scale as that sinister sword. How Dashe ever came into possession of such a weapon was an answer I doubted I wanted to ever know. But why was it acting up now? Was it reacting to its former master Anrio’s presence? If I hadn’t removed it from Dashe at that moment, it would have taken away his whole life force. Just when I thought things couldn’t get any worse, I saw the sun finally out. It blazed the sand beneath my feet, soaking away every drop of darkness from the previous night. Oh my, all my efforts seemed to be in vain. There was no way I would stop that monstrous tyrant let alone escape her minions. No! No!
Every person had a weakness, even the strongest like her. I had to keep going if I ever wanted to see my two dear friends alive. One slight problem with that, she was now aware of my presense and was probably on her way towards me. In her eyes, I was nothing more than a nuisance she could easily have gotten rid of already. That being said, it bewildered me completely why I hadn’t seen her at all. Certainly, I had caused a lot of trouble throughout Danyen for her not to notice. Could it be that she wanted to lure me into her castle? The answer to my questions was ahead of me and I was determined to force my way into the castle to get it. What lay ahead of me was a path enshrouded by darkness with possibly no way back. I jumped into the air and soared towards the open gate. The castle soldiers followed from the ground, matching me speed for speed. Darn, anoth
er platoon showed up near the gate. They were not going to make it easy for me to get through. Knowing all that, I kept pushing ahead towards the gate without any sense of safety. Some of the soldiers took their flintlock rifles and fired upon me while others used bows and arrows, attacking at random. I saw their attacks and avoided them easily thanks to Ebi’s training.
“It looks like we have you now,” one of the soldiers threw a small axe up into my direction, finishing off his perfect attack with horizontal swing with his large sword. It was impressive, his combat skills were lethal. I dodged the axe by dropping lower towards the ground, completely in front of his blade. He had me in a tight corner with no way to easily dodge it. Swerving left, I grabbed the hallow edge of his blade and pushed it away. The soldier moved in closer to me, taking out a smaller blade from his armor. Just as he swung it down, I rolled out of the way and landed on the ground hard. Unlike the others, this soldier was strong and skilled. A small horde of soldiers came towards us, surrounding me in a corner with their projectile weapons. Among them, it appeared the stronger soldiers were mixed in with the weaker ones. How could I have missed that?
The soldiers opened fire and I soared up out of the way. Their arrows narrowly missed me by a whim. Daringly, I swerved to my left and surged down towards them. Kicking the strong soldier first, I dropped him down into the ground before flying past the soldiers swiftly. To my disarray, the soldiers followed behind me, firing upon me at the same time. As persistent as they were, there was no way I could keep this up forever. Eventually I was going to make a fatal mistake and it would be all over. The sun blinded me, I could barely see my way through it. This was one of those days I regretted having enhanced vision. I squinted my eyes and flew even greater, ignoring all of my enemies behind and in front of me. More and more soldiers came out of the castle towards me. The new soldiers fired their projectile bullets, making me dodge in a zigzag manner. It seemed my chances of eluding them were far greater in the air than on the ground. The others ones behind me did not lose ground, they matched my speed even from the ground. I felt pain in my back and dropped down a few feet to the ground. Huge massive winds suddenly erupted in my path, sending the soldiers all around me flying in the air. It was followed by a terrible roar of wild manned lions. These beasts were raging out of control, caught up in a large struggle of survival. Strong winds spiraled the air in every imaginable direction. Perhaps it had not been a wisest decision to take over the mind of such a beast. The large lion was wreaking the most havoc, stomping and biting anything it could latch its claws and fangs on. Somehow, I managed to stay in the air without hitting my body against anything. Yes, the path towards the castle gate was clear, all the pesky soldiers had been swept away in the wind currents. Quickly, I soared towards it, taking advantage of this great chance I had been given.
“Don’t let him in,” one of the soldiers rattled towards the soldiers behind the castle gate. “Capture him at all cost if necessary, our mistress wants him alive.”
Alive! I doubted that completely. Slowly, the huge giant gate began to close up. They were trying to stop me from getting inside the castle. This was not good, I was still a great bit far from them.
“No you won’t,” I shouted with everything I heard, pointing my gun at one of the soldiers near the gate controller. I instantly fired a bullet of rage, sending him flying away from the gate. Tilting to the left, I angled myself and flew down closer to the ground. I was going to make it, but it was going to be really close.
“Please let me make it,” I whispered to myself while summoning even more power than before. The closer I got towards the gate, the smaller the opening got. I reached even greater speeds, pulling myself in through the small opening. By a fraction of second, I made it in before it closed completely. But unfortunately, my speed did not decrease at all. I kept flying uncontrollably through the dark sections of the large castles.
The power of the coat was still new to me. I had not yet learned how to stop at will let alone it’s other powers. Looking around, I saw the soldiers gazing at me in utter surprise. Yes, I was truly worthy of legend, provided I lived long enough to tell it. My speed did not decrease as I flew through an opening between two building towers. This was not going to end well. Before I knew it, my head smacked into a building in front of me, sending me spinning rapidly in the air. I fell into a stack of thick hay and did not get up at all. All of my limbs were aching badly. I had finally made it into the castle after a long and hard struggle. A deep sensation of pain was rushing through my body, making it hard to get up. Trapped in enemy territory, this was not how I imagined it to play out. The more I thought about it the more I realized I was an idiot. I had waltzed straight into the enemy’s hands without anyone to support and help me in times of need. Conceivably, it would have been best if I had listened to Showe and retreated to fight another day. As it was too late, I saw no way, but to keep going until I found Tye and Paul. While trying to get up, my body trembled with a sudden jolt of pain. Completely sending me down to the ground on my knees and hands. Great! Could it get any worse?
It seemed I had done it again, dashing in without thinking and ending up in a helpless state. Everything that could go wrong was actually going wrong. All of my efforts to get here seemed to be in vain now.
“Where is he?” one of the castle soldiers screamed out to his companions as they searched for me. “He should be around here somewhere.”
Their footsteps were getting closer with each minute. I struggled helplessly trying to get back up on my feet. The soldiers were coming towards me from the other side, barely a few sections of castle towers away. It wouldn’t be long before they found me. I took one knee up first and got myself up somehow.
“Come on body please,” I rattled forcing my hand into my clothes, trying to reach for the bottles with the pills.
This was just too much, my body couldn’t handle it anymore. Given that I had not slept yet, every movement I made felt like swords were being plunged into me. Still, I just couldn’t give up. I was so close and yet so far away from my kidnapped friends. I looked up further towards the main tower, hoping to catch a glimpse of hope. I just knew it somehow, they were definitely here somewhere and hopefully alive. Slowly and painfully, I opened the bottle and took one pill from the few that were left before ingesting wholly into my mouth. The taste was terrible as usual, not something I could ever get used to.
“You three search that area,” one of the guards ordered a trio of soldiers from his battalion and dispatched them into my direction.
Oh no! My strength did not revive back as it did before. I felt better, although still fatigued beyond belief. Just how much damage had I done to my body? Tilting my back against the building, I kept track of the soldiers who were coming towards me. They did not appear strong; however, appearance could be deceiving. Their footsteps got closer, causing me to lower my breathing. No I was right, these trio of soldiers dispatched my way were certainly weak infantry. I felt their energy despite the armor they had on. My eye strength finally returned, I could now see through the walls of the buildings between us. Whoa, these three soldiers were idiots. They looked somewhat drunk as they moved dizzily with bottles of ales in their hands. Their armor was very thin and their swords looked blunt and brittle. Even Kaya could take them out without breaking a sweat.
“Focus, don’t act recklessly,” I warned myself trying to avoid rushing in again into an unnecessary battle only to end up in the same state later.
Hiding and staying in stealth was the best way to move around in this castle for now. But how would I do that? I thought through my situation and suddenly realized that my coat had the ability to transform into anything on my mind at that time. I had witnessed this strange phenomenon when I was trying to escape from Jura. For those who forgot, this had happened an hour after escaping from the secret layer beneath the princess’s castle.
“Look at that,” one of the guards pointed towards the mashed up roof I had hit with my head
. “I think he came this way.”
The three soldiers turned their heads towards the roof before examining the surrounding area. I hid out of site, a few feet away from them without making a sound. Intensely focusing my eyes to memorize all the details of the soldiers’ uniform. Only thing I could not imagine was the helmets on their heads.
“Please work,” I whispered grabbing the coat firmly with my right hand.
A nub of fresh air blew in my face. It seemed the tides in the wind were changing hurriedly, a signal of something to come. The coat got tighter and rougher than before, constricting my body completely. What was happening?
“Hey!” someone shacked me roughly forcing me back to my feet. “What are you doing sleeping at a time like this?”
I opened my eyes slowly avoiding the intense power of the sun. It was one of the three soldiers who had been sent to look for me. He sounded furious for some unknown reason and he held his sword firmly in an unfamiliar pattern.
“There is a dangerous enemy on the loose,” he babbled holding me by the neck with his right hand. “What rank are you soldier? Do you know what Katarina Fox does to people like you? You can’t afford to be on the ground sleeping at a time like this.”
From the tone of his voice, I could tell my coat had morphed into one of their armor and now he thought I was one of them. Phew!
That had been too close for comfort. However, I now had to think of another lie to get myself out of this situation. Not good, the men were beginning to look suspicious of me. I was a good liar, but not that good at thinking under pressure. There was nothing in my arsenal of lies that could help me out of this situation.
“Well sir,” I said placing my feet into the ground firmly. “I got attacked by the enemy while I was on patrol and he injured me heavily before he disappeared heading west.”
To my surprise, I was an even greater liar when I wasn’t thinking about it. Who knew?
The three men stared each other and then at me. I couldn’t tell if they had bought it or not since their faces were covered in helmets and face masks which only made them look more intimidating. One of them started to pace around me observing me in a creepy and weird sort of way. He didn’t say much, but he only chuckled and laughed to himself.
“He called you sir,” he laughed hinting something to the other two in unknown gestures only known to them. “Might be a sign of the promotion you talk about coming soon Oba.”
The other two were whispering something to each other and I couldn’t tell what they were saying at all.
“Where is your helmet soldier?” one of the two who had been whispering asked. “Every soldier in this castle was issued a helmet and I don’t see yours.”
Their movement suddenly shifted, becoming slightly more defensive and cautious. Crap! I hadn’t thought about that at all. It was really surprising how the soldiers inside this castle were all so organized and ranked. Just what was that villain up to? Nothing in this country made sense at all especially Danyen. For someone with her crazy evil nature, it was hard for to imagine her with a softer and disciplined side.
“I said where is your helmet?” one of them screamed raising his spear at me. “Don’t make me repeat myself again you hear?”
As I feared, they weren’t buying my story at all. If I kept talking it was only going to arouse suspicion and further delay me from my destination. How unfortunate for them to be here right now. Without delay, I grabbed the spear from one of them and lashed at him fiercely with a punch on the chest. The other two reacted raising both of their weapons in the air. Fortunately they were so weak that I only hit them both with one kick without disarming them first.
“My deepest apologies,” I said sincerely grabbing a helmet and mask from the first soldier I attacked. “You left me no choice.”
They didn’t reply as they were all unconscious on the ground. After hiding them out of sight, I made a hasty dash in the opposite direction, far away from the other soldiers.
