SPELLSTRYKERS: BREACH

“If you wish to know the infinitudes of voydmagi, then first, stand at the edge of darkness itself, and embrace the flame that burns within it.”

~Anonymous

Voice recording of Maezyr Trei to Norvak

Norvak,

You are receiving this modulation hoping you and your mantle remain vigilant at all the times. Breaching the Darkfeill is only the tip of this black iceberg. The dreadspawn and their makers revealed much to decipher. While that provides an advantage, the intelligence received from these wretched things are remnants glinting in oblivion. We do not know what dangers lurk in places we do not fully understand—that is highly unacceptable.

May Djehuti guide you. Swift and fierce.

Voice Recording of the Lady Sovereign

No need for formalities. I’m fully aware of what you and Maezyr are up to. My insight on the Darkfeill and its nature mirrors your acquired knowledge, but you and I know what really rests within the heart of Shadara’s greatest sins. Do what you must. I expect your full account upon return.

Umbra bless you.

The Maleficent Vales of Nekropos | Darkfeill
Womb of the Dreadspawn
Sometime During The Calamity Era

A malevolent vortex unfurled before them, its dark maw gyrating with an ominous gravitational force that twisted the molten earth into an obsidian outer ring adorned with sinister, contorted spines pulsating with eldritch might. Spellstryker Norvak, clad in his Exalted Mantle, stood resolutely alongside Kaalia and Anas, their presence primed with an unwavering determination as they ventured into the heart of this nightmarish abyss.

Emerging from the swirling gate, they found themselves in a pallid forest, its trees choked with the baleful glow of unnatural growths, casting an eerie pall over the entire landscape. The vale exuded an overwhelming sense of foreboding, and the intruders couldn't escape the oppressive atmosphere, a chilling warning that seemed to implore them to retreat from this abyssal realm.

Retreat remained an untenable choice.

“It reeks of beauty and despair here.” Kaalia’s nostrils flared.

“The Darkfeill is many things,” Norvak replied. His voice was deep and black, rumbling from beneath the shadows of his hood. “Its sinful existence changes nothing.”

If Shadara was plagued with darkrotic cancer, then this would be the nightrealm’s forests. Nothing about these wilds was beautiful; it was as if the land’s grace, if it possessed such from the start, had been twisted by the blight. This plane was as unsophisticated and dejecting as its makers. It shouldn’t prevail, but it did—and the vale demanded to exist.

“This realm speaks.” Anas picked up on the vale’s deathly message. The clear and concise impression of discontent prowled the air. “It does not want us here.”

“Then our sentiments align,” said Kaalia. “It shouldn’t be here, either.”

Norvak and his mantle braved the dreaded tangle of odd corrosions and deathly flowers for miles. Strangers in a stranger land. It seemed as if Norvak knew the way. All around them, the spectral woods pulsated with what one would call an un-life, with an exuding a feeling of impending doom. Yet, by some odd and unfathomably perverse manifestation, the Maleficent Vale still sustained its outlandish and captivating beauty.

As for its creatures, whatever hid in the darkness scampered away, their claws clicking against the fog-veiled ground with panicked haste. They realized what had come here, what shouldn’t have come here. And even then, the most gruesome inhabitants of this vicious vale seemed to perceive these invaders as nothing to trifle foolishly with, a tangible terror that—if provoked—rivaled their own.

As long as these creatures continued their distance, then they were spared the wrath of Norvak.

The grim spellstryker and his Exalted Mantle delved deep into the thickets until the distant sound of seeping mists echoed from the grotto ahead. What reigned here was an altar of immense proportions, an imposing structure that could not be ignored, and its malignant grandeur defied explanation.

The trio of spellstrykers surveyed ahead. Norvak held the lead.

With a sudden, blinding flash, a streak of light flew through the thickets, coming directly towards them. The streak splintered before them. Norvak had blocked the shot with a flick of the hand.

The grotto’s eerie tune fell silent, too silent, then the mist that oozed into its gaping hole rose with violence, twisting into the shape of a nightmare come to life.

Norvak and his companions stood prepared. The sound of their heartbeats thumped silent against their chests as they waited for the beast to recognize the intruders and strike. Norvak and his mantle quickly became visible to the creature, and it tried to attack, yet an invisible power seized its advance. The creature released a low moan of agony before its form was swallowed up by the darkness.

“Was that a phantomshade?” Kaalia recalled its misty shape. Their kind were conjured by diabolist, or the lucky darkweaver powerful enough to summon one—let alone suffer its wrath if said darkweaver lost control.

Her answer came in the strangest of replies. “Be thankful it was only its kind and not the other.”

Before them stood a figure, or at least, it bore the semblance of one—a being enshrouded entirely in a cloak of darkness, its face obscured, and eyes like burning orbs of ghostly fire. Perched upon the highest peak of the shrine, it surveyed the grotto below, veiled in an enigmatic, misty haze.

However, any hopes the enigmatic figure might have harbored for a peaceful parley were swiftly shattered. Norvak and his mantle leapt into action with ruthless speed, intent on subduing this apparent man who was, in truth, a vessel of malevolence. Norvak's charged palm struck the scourgra with a blinding burst of sparks and a deafening crack, while Kaalia and Anas unleashed their staffs, conjuring chains of crackling light that coiled around the scourgra's limbs, binding it in a chaotic tangle secured by the staffs' unwavering strength.

In this ominous creature, they had found what they sought—a scourgra, a ghall of its kind, and perhaps the key to their elusive quest.

“Remind me,” Kaalia asked. “When was the last time a dreadspawn helped us?”

“Never.” Anas could think of none.

“What are you?” Norvak got to the point. “Use your last words wisely.”

The dark ghall replied. His tongue was unexpected. Ancient. His voice was so unfamiliar few could decipher it. The brilliance of Norvak and what he and his spellstrykers have achieved accomplished this. They had a profound understanding of the dark and forbidden tongues. Nobody else spoke in this unusual Darkgearian slang except this one.

“I once was, but now no more. For now, I am what they will eternally regret.”

Kaalia's mouth turned down in a grimace, her eyes narrowed into a frown. “What did you just say?”

"You heard me correctly," the somber figure of a man rasped, his voice filled with an eerie gravity. "Now that you have my attention, I implore you to release me."

“It begs.” Anas was bothered by its demands. Ghalls never fear, their persistence unshakable. What was the use of such pleading when one was already dead? “This is a problem.”

The dark one countered. “Not really.”

Anas grappled with a perplexing choice, torn between wielding her Conjura staff to torment the Scourgra or permitting it to continue its enigmatic discourse. However, Norvak swiftly resolved the matter with a decisive gesture, retracting his hand from the creature's chest. In an instant, the binding spell's conclusion arrived with the abruptness of shattered glass.

The ghall was liberated in that instant. It was only for a second. A blade forged entirely of voydfire, called by Norvak, held the ghall at bay even as the Exalted Mantle’s chains diminished. The trio remained buoyant in the air. They’d be fools to drop all guard.

Should the ghall launch an offensive, his death would be imminent. Did this one value life in ways the others did not?

Norvak began the interrogation, his voice stern and authoritative. “What. Are. You?”

“For now, I am Xol’grym, and you should not have come here.” The ghall’s stare was calm against the darkness of Norvak’s grim cowl. “Here exists the womb of dreadspawn. The Darkfeill. And what rests in the dark below is but one of many paths to its bringer.”

“Good,” said Anas. It was why they breached the Darkfeill. To know the source of the enemy, strategies of war. “Means we are one step closer to your undoing.”

Xol’grym fixed her with a piercing stare. “You cannot face the powers of Deimos alone.”

To be this close was unanticipated. Deimos, father of calamity. The fallen one. He who confronted the Fundament decree was somewhere in that hole. Deep within the bowels of this profane-shaped grotto of ghostly mist. It was Deimos who brought Norvak here. The first of the dreadspawn to be detained—and what diabolist succumbed to Norvak’s counter-magi—led him and his strykers here. All that spawned from the faculties of darkra hailed from the roots of a depraved divine.

To Norvak, breaching the Darkfeill and coming so close to the maker of evil intrigued him. “Keep going.”

“They fear you,” Xol’grym replied. “Your name is a whisper among blacker minds. They are shrewder than you give credit. Proficient enough to foresee something like this from your kind. Be warned—you stand upon the fringes of Nekropos. Its inhabitants claim this place, the Maleficent Vale. Descend into its deep, and you will never return.”

“We cannot say that we were unprepared,” Kaalia said. “The dreadspawn we’ve butchered were alarmingly sentient.”

“And you’re no better,” Anas added as she mocked Xol’grym. “You’ve lived this far because we allow it.”

“No.” The voice of Xol’grym foiled their certainty. He was too calm—and as dark and foreboding as Norvak—to be shaken, for he was certain. “You exist because I have willed it. The phantomshade you witnessed was only the beginning. You stand under the command of my shroud. Sunder me now and you shatter the binds that shield you from imminent death.”

Kaalia and Anas were flabbergasted. Foiled in their faith in thwarting a ghall. This one was undeniably strong. Smart. Diplomatic. Friendly.

And a little too confident for Anas. “You can only sustain that spell in effect for so long.”

“Long enough to halt the emergence of a darkshade.” Xol’grym told her. He wasn’t playing. Phantomshades came first. Darkshades were the last resort, far more savage than their lesser kind. “Enough time for you to see reason and heed my request: an audience with the Black Malice.”

Norvak regarded his offer as absurd. “We will die here and now before approving such heresy.”

“Not even the sovereign can afford to squander one of Shadara’s most compelling defenders. I expected resistance. What I do not foresee is lunacy. You could have tried your hand at eliminating me. You did not. The choice you make here and now measures the depths of your devotion to the nightrealm—to its world queen.”

The Exalted Mantle, a prestigious regiment of the spellbinder militia. Spellstryker practices mirrored those of the Blackguard, going beyond militia code. Their scant numbers attested to their rigorous training under the High Abraa himself, an ambitious status to achieve. That said, the perception of spellstrykers concerning the Fundament stemmed from the element of chaos, elite spellbinders primed for war to put it simply.

Killing a spellstryker like Norvak and his mantle was a critical blow, if achieved. They were the only ones capable of breaching the Darkfeill. The only three that can dissect what makes a spawn of darkra tick, and what ticks it took to destroy them.

Xol’grym spoke sense. It would be suicide if they ventured into the grotto now.

“The lady has been making an obsession with amassing mementos for study.” There was no joking in Norvak’s voice. “Your head would suffice, but I doubt you will survive the spite of Black Malice—assuming you try to challenge her.”

Xol’grym's eyes glared with a seriousness. His voice was confident, undeterred by Norvak’s fiery blade. The ghall insisted they trust his words. “To challenge Nocturien’s blackest pride is to disgrace what sliver of Darkgearian existence I have living within me. Malice is Shadara. Shadara is Malice. In life, I spoke such words. In death, I persist. The world queen will know of my tale, and she will know what comes for you all—and how to prevent it.”