[CROSS-FACTION] North & Void RP – The Grim Gest ☠

[Xòtrios-argent-dawn]

"Harken, seeker of truths veiled and forgotten.
Beneath the hunted plain, lie entombed the valiant souls who bore the most disgusting of Holy Light in ages past.
Their temple, once fair and shining, now is hid ‘neath tangled vine and thorn, where desert winds whisper over the ruined stones.
The sepulchre is shrouded by Nature’s cruel embrace, its doors sealed by ancient ward and sigil, lest the unworthy disturb the slumber of the hallow’d dead."

Such were the instruction of the Hag, bidding the Grim Gest to Kalimdor.
Protecting the burial place where the last fragment of the Mask of Mothi lays were Constructs of the Light. Formidable guardians, yet not invulnerable.

Words echoing those of spirits of the past, and the essence of one of the sanctified constructs were key to break into what was revealed to be a long lost crypt of ages past.
A skeleton King, a Saint, sat on a Throne. Protecting the last Fragment his everlasting duty, and that of his spirit servants.

Anneke Blackbriar, the Grim Gest’s chosen Champion of Combat, faced Saint Corinthius in the dark of the consecrated crypt, and prevailed. In there, Shadow fought the Light, and when the dust settled the Holy ghosts layed, undone.

The triumphant Grim Gest have now all the fragments of the Mask of Mothi, key to disrupting the wards barring the way to the Prison where Morsteth Blightreek’s body lays, confined.
The warriors are now bound for a pilgrimage, where reuniting the pieces of the relic shall prove safer.
To the Mountain.

[Tyrinar-argent-dawn]

A scream - not of beast nor man - rings out from the heart of the Northern Mountain. It rendeth stone, it spliteth sky. Across Lordaeron, the cry of the stars is heard, and felt. A god bleeds, soaking into the earth.

Wild things twist and blight - feather turned to fang, root turned to rot. Insects hiss. Wolves walk backwards. The moon clouds a blind haze. All life 'round the mountain is twisted, cursed with the god’s mourning.

Xa’su’goth shrinks, struck in its heart, and in its pain, the Mountain quakes.

And now, it coils into the deep, disappearing from the world to mend its ruin.

[Xòtrios-argent-dawn]

The Mask of Mothi makes for a terrifying visage. A golden funerary mask of unfathomably old craft. Eyes barred open, fiery orbs of radiant magic staring down at you. Even without such a relic of the Light the Serpent would have been a force to be reckoned with. Even without the scars and wounds inflicted by the Enemy. Without the pain of the curse that afflicts your joints.

It wasn’t supposed to end like this.
You, on your knees.
He, standing over you,sword raised in one hand, ready to kill.

Maybe he is thinking the same, maybe he wanted us all to plea for salvation to the Winged Beings he guided…deep into the Sanctum.

What dreams must have told him that this -was- ordained, deserved, necessary, you cannot fathom. You cannot think, for he lacks studied forms but each blow he delivers would be enough to topple a master swordsman. The Serpent keeps true to his rank, to the legacy he forged battle after battle. “Dragonslayer”, you think as a vertical slash rips your crested cloak, barely evaded. The fabric burns devoured by the radiant flames his blade roars with, and the Draconic heraldry tailored onto it too, pride of your House.
Bitter is the irony, at the memory of Koiffen, airborne on the Proto-drake of Soulbane. Locked in a deadly fight with the Duchess. She lost her beast that day of many years ago, in Northrend. You know it’s your turn now, that Fate has put another “Drake” on his path.

To dodge a furious lunge you sidestep and try a resposte. He saw this an hundred times already, and a plated kick breaks a femur. Onto a knee again, looking down from the slope. The others are locked in combat with the “Saviors” he beckoned down from the Heavens. Loyal and relentless they gain yard after yard. Winged Saints fall. The Grim Gest kills to save Dernglen, to buy you time.
It hurts the pride deep, then shatters it…to have promised Salvation when your body crumbles already.

It wasn’t supposed to end like this.

You slash and it’s the lashing of a dying beast, showing fangs to it’s hunter. He evades, but it buys you enough time to balance on the sane leg.
“Stand up, Elf”, the orc’s words are your mantra and code. Plaguefist never spoke much but when he did, you listened. His word was Law and he made sure to keep it such with violence and brute force.
“Stand up”.
You have kept standing back up for years, you hate it and hope for rest. As one after another warriors that companied you fell it felt harder and harder, maybe it is enough. You have done enough.

The pause Koiffen granted you ends “now”. Another lunge is followed by a spin, and the heat of his fiery blade alone is enough to char the skin. You parry with the heft of the Flamberge of Tranquillien and it rings painfully. One arm fractures, bones shocked by the clash.
Another lure he threw, and only your eyes can react to the kick that comes. The shinbone of your sane leg shatters.

On your knees, again.
Blood magic won’t help, expended as you tried to convince him to relent when this Dance of Death started. To keep you whole, tank his blows. A failed attempt.

It wasn’t supposed to end like this.
You, on your knees.
He, standing over you,sword raised in one hand, ready to kill.

It won’t end like this.

The Serpent killed a “Drake” before, you killed a Serpent.
You are alone and on the precipice of true death. It grants you the luxury to act for your own self after a decade.
There is no Baron here, there is the Duke. You are in charge. You are a Sin’dorei, fed with pride and contempt since birth. It takes but a cinder to rise, phoenician at it.

Cascading blows rain on you as he feels something changing, deep within your soul. It costs you the left hand and another fracture as you keep the Flamberge up defensively. Not enough to finish, your turn now.

Aiming for the Serpent’s heart, you deliver an execution blow that carries the power of a falling thunderbolt. No Magic fuels it, no Blessing, no God. It’s your gift to a lost brother.

Then Darkness.

[Folien-argent-dawn]

The Mountain bleeds, as its sons and daughters do. Their survival had cost them their all.

With the past sundered, the Gest’s soldiers are sworn to reclaim what they have lost. The dreaded stables of Dernglen now lie empty, beasts of terror spread through Lordaeron, it’s rotting hills at the mercy of their hunger.

Blackwald had been the first victim, the Death Wargs were a nightmare incarnate for those foolish enough to wander. Stone-fleshed fiends, a blasphemous mix of bear and bat, are subdued by the Grim Gest.

The skies of Hillsbrad had witnessed fear. Under the wings of a monstrous frostwyrm, Rokad, the beast of Serpent Plaguefist, Strahnbrad had been conquered by it’s unrelenting frost. Pursued to Alterac, torn of it’s limbs in a chaotic battle, it is harnessed and captured.

One shall dread to wonder what other fiends lurk within Lordaeron.