.png)
.png)
The sun bled crimson across the dunes of Alt Liryo.
Once a proud and green lush southern kingdom on the edge of Kingdoms of Iliryo, Alt Liryo now burned beneath war banners and demonic fire. Ancient sandstone citadels cracked beneath siege engines while storm clouds swirled unnaturally overhead, black as bruises. The air smelled of blood, ash, and scorched incense.
Upon the shattered battlefield stood three unlikely warriors.
Tsukishiro, the Crow Sorcerer, moved like a ghost among slaughter.
His pale face remained calm beneath strands of long black hair whipping in the desert wind. Elegant white robes flowed untouched by dust, though death swarmed around him in endless spirals of black feathers. Hundreds of magical crows screamed through the sky like living blades, tearing armored riders from horseback and clawing out the eyes of screaming warriors.
Above him glided a radiant snowy owl.
Its enormous white wings shone with holy light that cut through smoke and darkness alike. Arrows shattered against its glowing feathers. Curses dissolved before reaching Tsukishiro’s body. Whenever enemy sorcerers hurled fire or shadow magic toward him, the owl answered with flashes of silver brilliance that burned the corruption away.
The soldiers of Atl Liiryo called the spirit owl The Moon of Heaven.
The enemies called it a nightmare.
Beside Tsukishiro stood Azhar ibn Sahir, the Sand Mage of the southern deserts.
Gold rings gleamed across his fingers as he thrust both hands into the air. The dunes themselves answered his rage.
The earth erupted.
Towering waves of sand crashed into charging cavalry, swallowing horses whole. Giant serpents formed from swirling grains burst upward from beneath enemy ranks, wrapping around screaming warriors before crushing armor like brittle clay. Storms spiraled around Azhar’s body, his flowing desert robes whipping violently as glowing runes ignited beneath his feet.
“THE DESERT REMEMBERS!” Azhar roared in Arabic.
The battlefield obeyed him.
Then there was Roan.
Young. Freckled. Terrified.
The red-haired squire could barely keep hold of his shield as warriors thundered toward him through smoke and chaos. His leather armor was cracked and stained from battle, his short sword chipped from blocking blows too heavy for someone his age.
Yet he stood.
Again and again.
A curved blade crashed toward Tsukishiro’s back
Roan intercepted it with his shield.
The impact nearly shattered his arm.
Another warrior lunged at Azhar through the storming sands
Roan tackled the attacker into the dirt before stabbing wildly in panic.
He was no legendary hero.
Not yet.
But among monsters and sorcerers, the frightened boy refused to run.
All around them, Middle Eastern war drums thundered through the desert ruins as thousands of armored warriors surged forward beneath black banners. Spears glittered beneath the dying sun. Horses screamed. Steel collided against steel while explosions of magical energy lit the battlefield in flashes of gold, black, and silver.
Then the demon appeared.
It rose from the broken gates of Alt Liryo like something clawing its way out of Hell itself.
Twenty feet tall.
Skin blackened like volcanic stone.
Its eyes burned molten gold beneath a crown of twisted horns. Chains hung from its arms, dragging burning hooks through the sand. Every footstep caused the earth to rot and crack beneath it.
The armies stopped.
Even seasoned warriors backed away in fear.
The demon smiled.
Then it spoke a single word in an ancient tongue.
The world split open.
A shockwave of dark magic exploded across the battlefield, tearing soldiers apart and hurling bodies through the air. Tsukishiro’s crows scattered violently. Azhar’s sandstorms collapsed instantly. Roan was thrown backward across shattered stone.
The snowy owl shrieked.
Light burst outward protectively around the trio
But the demon raised its hand.
Reality twisted.
The battlefield vanished.
For one impossible moment, Tsukishiro saw endless darkness filled with floating eyes.
Azhar heard whispers beneath the sand.
Roan felt like he was falling forever.
Then
Silence.
Heat.
Wind.
The three awoke buried halfway in crimson desert sands beneath an unfamiliar sky.
No armies.
No ruins of Alt Liryo.
No demon.
Only endless dunes stretching toward black mountains in the distance.
Three moons hung above the desert.
Roan slowly lifted his head, coughing sand from his mouth.
“...where are we?”
Tsukishiro looked upward silently.
Even his crows seemed afraid.
Azhar’s expression darkened beneath his face scarf as ancient symbols carved into nearby stones glowed faintly beneath the moonlight.
He recognized them.
And that terrified him.
“This,” Azhar whispered carefully, “is not our world.”
Far away across the dunes
Something enormous moved beneath the sand.
The dunes exploded.
A massive creature burst upward from beneath the crimson sands, scattering rock and dust high into the moonlit sky. Around it surged warriors clad in black desert armor, their curved blades reflecting the pale light of the three moons. They rode lean horses draped in crimson cloth, chanting in a language none of the three recognized.
Roan stumbled backward in panic.
“There’s hundreds of them!”
“More,” Azhar said grimly.
The warriors spread across the dunes like a tidal wave of steel.
Then the arrows came.
Tsukishiro moved first.
His white robes fluttered as he stepped forward almost soundlessly, and the darkness around him erupted into wings.
CAW!
Thousands of black crows burst into the air.
The flock became a storm.
Arrows vanished inside swirling feathers before falling harmlessly into the sand. The crows descended upon the charging warriors like living shadows, clawing faces, ripping eyes, tearing riders from their saddles. Men screamed as black wings consumed them in violent spirals.
Tsukishiro lifted one pale hand.
The flock obeyed instantly.
Half the crows condensed into spear-like streams of darkness and shot across the battlefield, piercing through enemy lines with terrifying precision.
Yet still the warriors kept coming.
“Too many,” Tsukishiro said quietly.
Azhar slammed both palms into the sand.
The desert answered with fury.
The ground rippled outward like water before erupting into colossal waves of swirling sand. Entire rows of warriors vanished beneath the dunes. Horses were dragged screaming underground as giant sand serpents rose from beneath them, coiling around armored bodies and crushing them with thunderous force.
Azhar’s eyes glowed amber beneath his face scarf.
He swept his arm sideways.
A tornado of burning sand roared across the battlefield, flaying armor from flesh and throwing warriors high into the air. Ancient runes ignited beneath the dunes as if the desert itself recognized the sand mage as its master.
But more enemies appeared beyond the hills.
Hundreds more.
War horns echoed beneath the black sky.
Roan’s face went pale.
“We can’t fight all of them…”
Tsukishiro looked toward the distant horizon.
Far away beyond the dunes, lights shimmered faintly beneath the night.
A city.
Towering walls of sandstone and gold stood against the desert darkness like a mirage. Massive domes reflected moonlight while enormous fires burned atop watchtowers.
A kingdom hidden within the wasteland.
“We move,” Tsukishiro said.
Another wave of arrows descended.
The glowing snowy owl swept downward instantly.
Its radiant wings spread wide, unleashing a burst of silver light that shattered the incoming arrows midair. The holy glow wrapped itself around Roan’s body like flowing mist.
Before the boy could react
he rose into the air.
“WHOA!”
Roan floated helplessly as the giant owl carried him above the battlefield with supernatural grace. Its claws never touched him; magic itself held him suspended safely beneath its wings.
Below, Tsukishiro began to run.
Or at least… it looked like running.
His feet barely touched the sand.
The crow sorcerer glided across the dunes like drifting smoke, white robes flowing behind him as black crows spiraled around his body protectively. Every movement was impossibly light, as though gravity itself had loosened its grip on him.
Warriors charged to intercept him
The crows tore them apart before they could even swing their blades.
Azhar followed beside him.
The sand mage thrust one hand downward, and the dunes surged beneath his feet. A flowing current of sand lifted him forward like a moving river, carrying him across the desert at incredible speed. Serpents of sand coiled around him defensively while walls of dust erupted behind to slow their pursuers.
The enemy army thundered after them relentlessly.
Horses raced across the dunes.
Torches flickered in the dark.
War drums echoed louder and louder.
“They’re still following us!” Roan shouted from above.
“They will not stop,” Azhar answered. “Not until we are dead.”
Tsukishiro glanced back once.
In the far distance, beyond the pursuing army, he saw something even worse.
A gigantic silhouette moving beneath the dunes.
Following them.
The sand itself trembled wherever it passed.
The crow sorcerer’s calm expression darkened for the first time.
“We must reach the city before dawn.”
Ahead of them, the desert kingdom grew larger.
And atop its golden walls
thousands of figures watched their approach.
The desert kingdom loomed closer with every passing second.
Its golden walls rose from the dunes like the spine of some ancient beast, illuminated beneath the ghostly light of the three moons. Horns echoed from its towers as shadowed figures gathered along the battlements, watching the chaos unfolding across the sands.
Behind the fleeing trio, the desert had become a battlefield.
The pursuing warriors surged forward relentlessly across the dunes, joined now by enemy mages draped in black and bronze robes. Strange staffs crackled with violet fire. Some rode massive desert lizards instead of horses, their eyes glowing unnaturally beneath iron masks.
And beneath them all
something hunted.
The sand bulged in enormous waves.
A colossal shape moved below the surface, impossibly fast, circling beneath the armies and the fleeing sorcerers alike. Every few moments, entire dunes collapsed inward as though swallowed from below.
Roan looked down from beneath the snowy owl’s glowing wings and swallowed hard.
“It’s still following us…”
Azhar did not answer immediately.
Because he could feel it too.
The desert itself feared the creature beneath.
A barrage of dark magic suddenly streaked across the night sky.
“DOWN!” Roan yelled.
Tsukishiro twisted gracefully mid-glide as bolts of violet flame exploded around him. Black feathers scattered through the air while enemy mages atop the dunes raised their staffs again.
The crow sorcerer’s pale eyes narrowed.
Then he lifted two fingers.
The shadows beneath the enemy cavalry moved.
At first the warriors did not notice.
Then the sand behind them erupted into black wings.
Shadow crows burst upward by the hundreds.
Not ordinary crows.
These creatures were made entirely from darkness itself eyes glowing silver, feathers dripping like smoke. They slammed into the enemy mages from above, clawing at faces and tearing staffs from their hands. Horses panicked instantly as the magical flock descended in shrieking waves.
One mage began chanting
A shadow crow flew directly into his mouth.
The spell died with him.
Tsukishiro swept his arm outward.
The flock split into rotating spirals that darkened the sky like living storms, confusing enemy archers and obscuring the trio’s movements beneath shifting masses of feathers.
But the enemy adapted quickly.
One of the black-robed mages slammed his staff into the ground.
A ring of fire exploded outward across the dunes.
Several shadow crows ignited instantly.
Others dissolved into smoke.
Azhar reacted at once.
The sand mage thrust both arms forward violently, and the desert rose like a tidal wave between them and the flames. Sand hardened instantly into glass beneath the heat, creating enormous crystalline walls that reflected the fire magic back toward the enemy lines.
Explosions rippled across the dunes.
Warriors screamed.
The glass shattered into razor fragments that swirled into a deadly storm.
Roan stared in awe.
“How are you doing that?!”
Azhar’s amber eyes remained fixed ahead.
“The desert teaches survival.”
Then the ground beneath them trembled violently.
Too violently.
The creature below was getting closer.
A massive fin-like shape suddenly sliced through the sand behind the pursuing army.
An instant later
the desert exploded.
Something enormous burst upward beneath the enemy cavalry.
Hundreds of warriors vanished screaming into the jaws of a colossal sand beast covered in black armored scales. Its mouth was lined with rows of glowing teeth large enough to swallow horses whole.
The pursuing army scattered in terror.
Even the enemy mages panicked.
“What IS that?!” Roan shouted.
Azhar’s voice turned grim.
“A Dune Devourer…”
The gigantic creature crashed back beneath the sand, but its glowing eyes remained visible beneath the surface, stalking everything above.
And now
it had noticed the trio.
The dunes behind them erupted again.
Tsukishiro moved instantly.
The crow sorcerer leapt impossibly high into the air, his robes billowing like white smoke. The snowy owl banked sharply with Roan while Azhar rode a surging pillar of sand sideways across the battlefield.
A split second later
the Devourer burst upward between them.
Its enormous jaws snapped shut where they had been moments before.
The sound echoed like thunder.
Tsukishiro landed lightly atop a narrow dune ridge, balancing effortlessly as shadow crows circled him in spirals.
Then he smiled faintly.
“Azhar.”
The sand mage immediately understood.
Together, they began the trap.
Tsukishiro sent his shadow crows diving low across the dunes in every direction, creating dozens of false movements. The Devourer twisted beneath the sand, confused as it chased the magical shadows.
Meanwhile Azhar quietly pressed both palms downward.
The sand beneath the battlefield softened.
Shifted.
Collapsed inward.
The enemy army didn’t realize until too late.
The dunes beneath the charging warriors suddenly gave way into massive sinkholes. Horses and soldiers tumbled screaming into deep pits while shifting sands swallowed entire groups alive.
At the same moment
Tsukishiro directed every remaining shadow crow toward one location.
The Devourer lunged upward after the swirling darkness
straight into Azhar’s trap.
The sand mage clenched both fists.
The desert hardened instantly.
Thousands of tons of sand compressed around the gigantic beast like stone chains, trapping half its body beneath the dunes. The Devourer roared loud enough to shake the night sky.
The pursuing army halted in confusion and terror.
That single moment was enough.
“NOW!” Azhar shouted.
The trio fled toward the kingdom walls at full speed.
Behind them, the trapped Devourer began breaking free.
The dunes cracked violently.
Enemy war horns sounded again.
And atop the distant city walls
the gates slowly began to open.
No comments:
Post a Comment