Earthriel Epic

[Maharg67]

One 9.2[36]

 

When the large group, of necromans, came rushing around the corner, the Eternal Champion unleashed a great bolt of elemental flames upon them. There was a fiery elemental explosion and the dead fleshing living died; they dropped a variety of looted weapons, some of them magic, stolen from the palace.

 

The Imperial Hand Agents, and Jadekia, took a couple of powerful elemental magical items. They left behind the arcane magical ones, including items more powerful than those taken. The reason was the the living-dead were attracted to arcane magic in its various forms.

 

The Eternal Champion, and her three companions, moved carefully through the underground area fully eight levels below ground level. Peter, the leader of the three Imperial Hand Agents, pointed out that nobody living had gone into the area for over a year simply because there had been no pressing need to do so. Or so had stated the official records. As for thieves, it would be a very dangerous, and tricky, crime to undertake.

 

Peter spoke quietly. "We killed a few necromans until others came, in a larger group. The Emperor spoke of you being here. His mindeye is still strong and he communes with Akatosh and Talos along with others of the Thirteen Divines. He has troubles, still, from the day that he was not assassinated as he prophesied would happen."

 

Jadekia nodded. "Some great force altered the destiny of Tamriel, or so it appears to be, and the Emperor suffered for it. How much was changed is unknown to myself but much else was. Does the Emperor believe that the Empress would betray the Empire to the Necrotrinia?"

 

Peter shrugged. "We are merely of the Imperial Hand and are only given so much information, as you should know. Is this a test of our loyalty?"

 

The Eternal Champion sighed. "I was simply asking because I have not visited the Emperor for some years."

 

Another agent, the woman Kalista, spoke. "You visited the Emperor only three days ago."

 

Jadekia snorted in annoyance. "That was not me and the Emperor knew it. He told the fake Jadekia to leave before he had her killed. His Majesty stated that he 'sensed' something very familiar about the imposter but could not identity her. Yes, he did 'sense' that it was a human woman."

 

All three agents looked shocked.

 

Peter spoke. "We were not informed of the incident. How did you know of the incident?"

 

Kalista turned and scowled at Peter but it was too late. Jadekia reached out, with one hand, towards the three agents and there was a bright flash of magical energies.

Edited December 22, 2013 by Maharg67

[Maharg67]

One 9.3[37]

 

"It was like being in a very hazy nightmare, having an unsettling floating sensation and being only partly aware of what was happening." Peter took another sip of multiple purpose healing serum. "The thing was 'inside' of me but I was struggling against it and its hold on me was slowly weakening. There was something stronger behind it. Yet it did not have access to all of our minds or it was have known about the special, secret, link between the Emperor and yourself."

 

They were all crouched on the floor of a antechamber hidden behind a basic wall tapestry. The tapestry had been gifted to the Empress, who was openly a much nicer person than she was in reality, by poor people and then had been stuck away from Her Majesty's view because she detested poverty and poor people. Her name was Caula Voria!

 

All three Imperial Hand Agents had the same kind of story to tell. They had run into some kind of magical booby-trap and the next thing they knew, they were under some kind of control. It was direct control from the entities 'inside' them and indirect control from an outside force using the entities 'inside' them.

 

"In all my hard experiences, serving the Emperor and Empire, I have never known anything as disturbing as that!" Kalista sighed heavily as the pain eased away and the migraine was gone. "What were those things inside me?"

 

"A kind of living-dead spirit creature of a kind that I have never encountered before." The Eternal Champion had 'sensed' something was deeply, subtly, wrong when she had first spotted the three humans. "Ghosts are dead, wraiths are undead, phantoms are living but what of these things?"

 

Gordane, the other male agent, shook his head. "We should get out of here."

 

Peter frowned at his comrade. "Do not allow your fear to control you." He turned back to Jadekia. "Gordane is new to the Imperial Hand and relatively inexperienced. Mind you this was a hard event for all three of us."

 

Jadekia smiled. "When I blasted away the control of the one, who was controlling you, I hurt her badly. Yes it was a woman and it may have well been Empress Caula Voria."

 

Logically enough, the three agents were openly unhappy at the idea that would make matters very complicated because, in theory, the Imperial Hand served both the Emperor and Empress.

Edited December 22, 2013 by Maharg67

[Robert55]

:thumbsup: :thumbsup: :thumbsup: :confused:

[Maharg67]

One 10.1[38]

 

With long, silent, strides the albino like figure of a tall man, in black hooded robes, moved along the very ancient hallway past a line up of monstrous metallic soldier figures to the left. Except that the man had not been such for a very very long time and his body rotted away, healed again, with amazing speed. It burned him as it did so and yet the same process gave him amazing power.

 

He had awoken from regenerative sleep, from uneasy dreaming, only to find that the project in Vissernt had gone wrong. The living-dead there had risen with out his commands to do so, doing so far too early. His dealings with the stupid mortals, of Vissernt's leadership, had proven to be a mistake and yet they had not instigated the uprising for they had not even known about the existence of most of the living-dead entities. Nor would they have had the ability to instigate the rebellion of the First Night of Terror.

 

Necromandis wanted, very much, to know who had caused him so many problems. He vowed quietly, to himself, to make them suffer greatly for what they had done.

 

For now he had to make contact with others, of the Cosmic Renewal Council, and find out what they knew of what had been happening in Tamriel. Old plans would have to be adjusted or even replaced with new ones.

Edited December 22, 2013 by Maharg67

[Maharg67]

One 11.1[39]

 

FEAR Warriors, and Blades, scouted the area of devastation. None of the dead flesh living had survived but that was hardly surprising considering what had happened.

 

Promagnis spent time healing damaged plants and animals, which appeared to be one of his strengths of ability. Animals trusted him with surprising ease, even types with reputations for savagery.

 

Nobody came to investigate in person but they picked up magical forms of spying that were all negated by NexusOrb.

 

A patrol of FEAR Warriors, and Blades, moved carefully through forest quite close to the big clearing. As they did the wildlife were returning to their normal routines and it was growing darker again after a daytime's worth of busy activity. They moved quickly, quietly, with much stealth.

 

They came upon the newcomers carefully, noting an odd mixture of locals. There were short furry wozzles, humans of varied races, orcs, halflings of varied kinds, lizardfolk, catfolk and even hoblins. Amongst them were hedge-mages, healers, nature witches, along with Guild Mages and others. Most were country folk who had long been forced to flee their old homes to survive based in glowcrystal cave systems.

 

There were men, women and children. There were small animals pulling small carts and some livestock such as goats. Many adults carried small children or backpacks or both.

 

The Blades came out first to meet the newcomers and then the FEAR Clones slipped out of the trees with amazing speed and lack of noise. The elder matriarch, of the newcomers, came forward in a hooded robe with emblems of some of the Divines and lesser deities linked with them. She held a very old, but sturdy looking, wooden staff.

 

The matriarch threw back her hood. She was Cyrodilin of lightly tanned white skin, with brown hair large strong eyes of pale green. She spoke in Common Cyrodilin.

 

There was an amazing assurance, of calm and strength, that radiated from the woman.

"Blades I know of well enough but your friends are very different."

 

Bladeknight Sandrista nodded. "Yes, they are Auxiliaries assisting we Blades in the current crisis. Here is Aasha, who is in charge of the Bladers here. Bladers is the term granted to these fighters by the Blades. Greetings, Alexandis, we met when I was a teenager and you were much as you are now."

 

"I remember you." Alexandis smiled warmly. "We needed shelter, security, resources for this group and others following it. We saw the light, the explosion, and heard the mighty sounds. Yet I felt drawn in this direction knowing we would find assistance."

Aasha spoke, studying the woman with some puzzlement for there was something familiar about her and yet she was sure she had never met the person. "We have a special place, a special way, of storing lifeforms and items. You would be in a kind of status."

 

Alexandis smiled and drew out of her robe a small silvery sphere with a black button on top. "I have a better idea. This may well give us a greater solution to difficulties that we are facing." She handed it to Aasha. "This is meant for you, TriMarshal Aasha of the FEAR Troopers."

Edited December 21, 2013 by Maharg67

[Maharg67]

One 11.2[40]

 

The second silvery sphere transformed the very large SanctumOrb greatly and at its core lay a SanctuaryCore, a compressed realm of land, underland, great lakes, sky-towers and more. There time passed 4x1, internal to external, but people aged more slowly as did much life. Into that place went peoples from the Underways of Vissernt and refugees from the lands, going to different parts because of some prejudices amongst the peoples. Indeed the people, from the Underways, went into a huge underground labyrinth part copied from the Ayleid one they were used to.

 

The second set of 'FEAR Clones' were born into the SanctuaryCore, being one thousand of them, and they began to grow quickly as children but to have a good, mixture of life. From the first they saw the first clones as their parents along with their clone-mothers. They were not all to be elite soldiers or even soldiers. The FEAR Clones went there to be with the new clones even before they were born and to be with the clone-mothers that they fussed over.

 

There appeared the TransformOrb where former necroro addicted mercenaries were being treated along with humanoids taken out of the experimental capsules, taken from the Vissernt Underways, for they were alive but very damaged. What they would become was something that even the SageWizards, and NexusOrb, did not know.

 

The TriMarshal gained deeper linkage to NexusOrb and to the SanctumOrb. They unlocked previously hidden databanks and learned that they were not on the version of Earthriel they had assumed they were in. For they were in Tamriel-Earthriel while they had started out in wayzone of Terra-Earthriel. There were no Wayzones in Tamriel-Earthriel, no human masses arriving from the Earth for the conspiracy to changed Earthriel had led to unexpected results of creating more than one Earthriel; how many had been created was something that they did not know. Also unknown was how the FEAR Clones had gotten from Terra-Earthriel to Tamriel-Earthriel.

 

The FEAR Troopers had ended up in the wrong place but perhaps for the right reasons.

 

Then there were the three prototype mass weapons of death and-or destruction, or MWDDs, in their special adapted Superbugs. The TriMarshal had them brought out of storage and began to do diagnostics on their network-systems, to work out how the SanctumOrb had altered them when it had first taken them in.

 

They were the D-nuclear superweapon, the macrodrone superweapon and the multiplier superweapon.

Edited December 22, 2013 by Maharg67

[Maharg67]

One 11.3[41]

 

FEAR Troopers were checking the superweapon network-systems, opening up Superbug hulls and drawing out aspects of the weapons. Assisting them were new type FEAR roboremotes guided by NexusOrb along with androids and robots. The androids were mostly more basic kinds that were clearly unlike Troopers but a minority of them were like the Troopers. FortOrb, the FEAR complex inside of the SanctumOrb, was very large and was 2x1 in relative time except for special areas that were 4x1. SanctumOrb was constructing many new resources for FEAR, through the FortOrb.

 

The weapons were in full deployment mode, special turrets projecting up and out of the vehicles. One turret had six launchers loaded with special cluster-head cruise-missiles. Another turret had launchers of a different kind. The third turret was most odd with a strange appearing cannon barrel. They were the D-nuclear superweapon, the macrodrone superweapon and the multiplier superweapon.

 

TriMarshal Aasta was overseeing the operation from a semi-enclosed observation chamber high in one wall of the main chamber. The TriMarshal was pleased with the high efficiency of what was going on because it was good to see that her people could carry out such tasks well. The TriMarshal was also pleased to stamp their authority on the SanctumOrb, fearing that Prograndis, Gloridisha and others were trying to take control of it.

 

A power-door slid open and both Gloridisha and Prograndis came through the doorway. They stopped either side of Aasta but she 'sensed' no threat. Anyway she had two supersoldier bodyguards, one either side of the door that slid closed; they were behind the newcomers.

 

Gloridisha shook her head. "Very nasty weaponry, by the appearance of them and the data on those screens. That D-nuclear mobile launcher vehicle could easily destroy all of the Imperial Cities of the Empire."

 

Aasta shook her head. "No, predesignated targets are the nine Imperial Citadels that were sealed up centuries ago. We, the TriMarshal, do not know why this is so. The other two superweapons have no specific predetermined targets except that they have a priority for major cities and other very important areas. The other puzzle is that the superweapons are not designed specifically to destroy life but more so the living-dead. To learn the truth we had to get past a few cleverly designed layers of falsehood and half truth."

 

Gloridisha frowned softly. "So one of our feared scenarios is correct; there are at least three factions involved in the Secret Mystery War, apart from we who are trying to put a stop to it." She turned to Aasta. "One faction, of the Secret Mystery War, is known as the Cosmic Renewal Council. We know very little about them; they have a dark tendencies to carry out very large scale, very dangerous, experiments on any world they can do so on and which they choose to do so on. They often try to interfere with natural life forces, with the flow of time and events, with life and death itself. The creation of the living-dead would fit perfectly with their ways."

Edited December 22, 2013 by Maharg67

[Maharg67]

One 11.4[42]

Aasta responded with a question. "The other known faction of this Secret Mystery War?"

The BattleWizard frowned softly at her. "The Rainbowtarie. They have been supportive of the Living Alliance by passing over magical, psychic and other knowledge. They have also been supplying a range of basic goods like tents, blankets, healing-potions and clothes to be given over to refugees, the general poor, conscripts and others who need them. They are promising a greater range of items, and other forms of assistance, to come. They declare themselves to be enemies of the Cosmic Renewal Council but refuse to give us any more information about the 'council' or themselves."

They had all learned of the way that four Transplanetary Corporations had gotten together to try to change the nature of Terra-Tamriel and had seeming caused the creation of extra Tamriel Realms instead. They were the Umbrella Corporation, the Armacham Technology Corporation, th Weyland-Yutani Corporation and the Massive Dynamic Corporation. Umbrella Corporation workings had been found in Vissernt and the ATC was linked with the creation of the FEAR Clones. Both appeared to be involved in investigating or trying to destroy the living-dead.

Aasta frowned. "We should focus on dealing with the living-dead. They are the immediate problem."

Prograndis smiled at her. "Spoken from a soldier's point of view. Yes, we must deal with the living-dead, but they may only be part of the immediate problem facing Tamriel and the Living Alliance."

Aasta nodded. "At least we destroyed very many of the living-dead with that great explosion and rescued many necroro addicted mercenaries."

The BattleWizard nodded but she was also frowning softly. "That may have been a set up to try to infiltrate the SanctumOrb with an entity disguised as one of the mercenaries."

NexusOrb: "I have discovered that three of the mercenaries are shapeshifters of a kind unknown to me though I have a good understanding of how they may have been created. I suggest that I might find other shapeshifters amongst the mercenaries still being processed."

Aasta responded. "Massive Dynamic was involved with a big controversy some years back to do with experiments with possible discovery of and observation of Alternate Universes. The program was shut down by the US Federal Government but not much information was provided to the general public. There were a number of classified incidents linked with Massive Dynamic and their project. Incident reports were leaked to the Internet but were little believed by the general public; five of those reports involved shapeshifters as created by Massive Dynamic but in an alternative universe. Did you find any small, odd devices with them?"

NexusOrb: "No, I do not think they were that kind of shapeshifter though they could be a more advanced version of them; I have data on those events. They do have some exotic devices inside their bodies and linked to their brains through their nervous systems. All four of the Transplanetary Corporations might be working together by utilizing their resources from different projects; that is not a certainty!"

Edited December 23, 2013 by Maharg67

[Maharg67]

One 12.1[43]

 

The Thirteen Divines gathered together to intercede heavily into the events of Tamriel; this was something that they rarely chose to do for such was their power that they could easily do more harm than good.

 

So it was that the three Hero Divines came to the mortal realm as great, and powerful, fighting figures. They were Talos, Whiteheart and Auralis. Each had once been a great heroic mortal human who was then taken up to be granted status as one of the Three of the Thirteen. The Hero Divines burned away the living-dead that got within a hundred metres of them and exposed all of the living-dead faking being the living or normal steelgolems.

 

So began the Battle of the Torn Hills where the Hero Divines, along with a small army of DemiDivines and SemiDivines, took upon a great army of the living-dead that came from Vissernt. They came through bizarre magical means, being protected from the sunlight and strengthened by a glimmering mist of highly disturbing nature. Amongst the army were not only previously known kinds of the dead flesh living but also newer ones along with previously hidden ones.

 

The great striding Necrolords were there, in hulking bone-armor, hurling great bolts of power. Great dragonvyles flew massively through the night sky, surrounded by swarms of relatively smaller flying urgazyles. Zyles of many kinds swarmed through the glimmering mist, over the landscape.

 

Akatosh released dragons upon the great enemy army. The winged majestic beasts hurled themselves against the living dead and burned dragonvyles from the sky. Imperial Dragons were there in the dozens but also hundreds of lesser dragons still of great power.

 

The Battle of the Torn Hills was fought only partly on the mortal plains, being drawn into a realm of its own making as amazingly power magics were used. This realm was just verging into Tamriel proper and was partly in various other realms, including one of the secondary Aedric realms that still survived from the Mythic Age.

 

The great armies were pushed back and forth across a plain of broken hills, fast flowing rivers of cold water and great strong groves of very tough trees. Many hundreds perished with every passing minute as clouds of magical arrow arced up, and then down, to strike down many. The clashing of metals, and bone, filled the air along with howls of rage, battle cries and the screams of merciless death.

 

The conflict continued!

Edited December 23, 2013 by Maharg67

[Maharg67]

One 13.1[44]

 

Eternal Champion Jadekia, and her companions, killed more necromans that were disguised as Imperial Servants and some as Imperial Household Guards in elaborate armor more designed for appearance than effectiveness. The Empress had no real idea of practical military matters. Nor would it have helped the fairly clumsy necromans anyway. The Imperial Hand Agents were amazingly efficient killers though nowhere as good as Jadekia.

 

They came upon evidence that perhaps the Empress was not the real culprit behind what was happening; it was the remains of a short lived, but brutally save, fight between real Imperial Household Guards and necromans disguised as such. From the evidence the real guards had been heavily outnumbered but, with their powerful magical weapons, they had destroyed most of their enemies. Oddly enough the departing necromans had not taken the magical weapons but then again they were elemental magical in nature; the zyles were repelled by such.

 

Something had been taken from a chest that the real guards had been carrying. The heavily armored, and locked, chest had been broken open with seeming ease. It was that moment that Jadekia knew something, far more dangerous than living-dead necromans, was out there. It was not something she had encountered before or so she 'sensed'.

 

The thing, that had been in the chest, left the 'stink' of powerful dark arcane magic. The way the chest was designed, she both 'sensed' and worked out that it was a super soulstone of some kind, probably a blood soulstone of ancient make. Thankfully they could be made no more and were extremely rare. The only reason that the Empress might have one, she being no lover of magic of any kind, might be as part of her amazingly large collection of oddities. The Mages Guild had wanted full access to the collection, for a long time, so as to assess it and make safe many of its magical artifacts; the Empress enjoyed annoying them by refusing their requests even when the Emperor had supported them.

 

After sprinkling the interior of the chest with small, white glowing crystals, Jadekia closed it firmly. Seconds later the whole chest shivered and when she opened it up the dangerous residue of magic was gone.

 

"Narcane magic!" The Eternal Champion showed her distaste. "Arcane magic has its shadowy side but narcane is one of the very worst forms of arcane magic. Soul trapping, and the creation of soulstones, are aspects of the narcane."

 

Peter gave a mild grin. "We know! The Emperor has had both the Imperial Eye and Hand seeking out illegal soulstone alchemist workshops, smuggling networks and big collections of them. The Imperial Foot has spent a great deal of effort keeping up secret communications between the different operations."

 

Jadekia grabbed up a ring of keys along with some other useful items, including a well made magical musket-pistol with two barrels; it was a musket-duopistol. Duopistols were designed so that a user had more than one shot to count on. As she took up the magical musket, for a short moment she wondered if she had missed something important but then it was gone and it was time to move on.

Edited December 25, 2013 by Maharg67