The light of the trodden

The Praestigiae Reigns

Zandaria entered the room.
"You called, leader." Zandaria said, looking around in the cast room. This was the very same room where Shadow and leader fought and the blood stains were still there.
"Yes, Zandaria, my love. How are you?" Leader said, his body was glowing yellow. Every inch of him was healing, slowly but surely the leader was coming closer to absolute strength.
"I am fine, leader, although I do not like Oliver I have to be around him for you." Zandaria replied her head bowed in front of the leader.
"Ahhhhhhh, my love. You see you have to pretend to like him. He plays an important role in all this. I wanted to show you something that's why I brought you here." Leader gestured towards the window that overlooked the training grounds "Look, Zandaria. All my warriors, in perfect position. All of them devoted to me. A hundred thousand strong warriors all ready to die for me."
"Why do you train warriors and generals who lead without an army? I think it would be much better if we create an army. There's a big battle coming and you know it." Zandaria overlooked the grounds.
"Zandaria look at the mountain on the side." Leader said. A big pile of wood was placed on the mountain under a shed. "I just have to light it with my special arrow. Once lit, my army will be ready."
Zandaria looked at him with her eyebrows raised.
"Even if this special arrow thing is true, you did not need a 100,000 generals and thrice as many sub-generals for a small army of what one million or maybe 10 million soldiers." Zandaria protested.
"Even with this many generals I am always afraid that we might fall short." Leader looked over the training field "We might need more."
"I don't think you're listening, leader. We need soldiers, the General has defeated you once already and if our intel is correct then he has outsmarted you in the politics too." Zandaria looked at the leader who kept muttering "more generals... We need more generals..." Zandaria slapped the leader. The leader looked at Zandaria.
"Do you want a general for every 10th soldier?" Zandaria shouted at him.
"There are more than a 100 billion Soldiers waiting to be called out there, Zandaria."
****************
"There are leeches all over us." Boris tried to shake them all off. Magician clicked his fingers and the illusion was gone.
"Boris run, and just keep trying to find the Praesti-something guy." General ordered "Magician can't you do anything about these illusions, like make them go forever?"
"It's risky. I can try but as I see he is immensely talented. I would have to set up a whole dome on the island to uncover every one of his tricks and it would take a lot of time, giving him the power to put whatever illusion he wants on us. Illusions can get pretty nasty and if he's as skilled as a master he can even slow down time, giving me less time to muster all the magic I want." Magician explained, clicking his fingers at every illusion he could identify. Everyone looked at the General. General looked up.
"Everyone scatter. Be prepared to face any illusion. Just as the clouds cannot hide the sun forever, the illusions can't hide the truth forever. Be sure of who you are, no matter what anyone says or does. Disperse." General ordered. Everyone went off in different directions. Suddenly, out of nowhere a blue light came and the General barely avoided it.
'The shockwave attack Shadow warned us about, he's the eight best warrior in the army. Just a second late and that would've fried me.' General thought
General leaped at the source of the attack. General could see the branches swinging.
'Somebody's trying to get away without being seen'
General jumped up at the trees and followed Debrune. General caught every branch like he knew them as the back of his hand and swiftly caught up to him. As General reached for another branch, Debrune turned and General saw Iskander's face on Debrune's body. General clasped his hand on the branch but all he caught was thin air. General fell down and suddenly a hole appeared on the floor. General fell down in the hole.
****************
'This thing is crazy. These illusions are very obviously meant to distract me but the moment I turn my attention on the actual problem I know that this will bite me in the arse.' Magician thought angrily. Illusions were becoming more frequent and less diverse each time magician took the illusions down. Suddenly a shockwave came out of nowhere at him. Zane came out of nowhere and took the brunt of the shockwave on his shield.
"Thanks." Magician said. Zane looked ahead.
"Nolander, he's headed at you. Cut him off." Zane ordered, Nolander ran towards the trees. Debrune was crossing through the numerous trees while making a lot of rustling noises. He wanted them to follow him but suddenly as he was about to jump a row of trees in front of him came crashing down. He looked at the source and found Nolander with his fist raised and a tree stump in front of him.
'He did that with one blow of his fist?' Debrune thought, shocked. Then another blow landed on his abdomen
'Who did that?'
And another and another. Continuously a series of punches rained down on him as Nolander and Zane rushed to cover the distance between them and Debrune. Debrune leaped over the fallen trees and midair somebody body slammed him to the ground. In that instant, Debrune saw a frail guy, midair, with his fists red.
'He was obviously the one hitting me. Strength isn't his strong suit.' Debrune noted. Debrune flipped midair and landed on his feet, suddenly Nolander, who had just reached there, closed his fist and punched him but in a stroke of brilliance, Debrune pushed the punch away by diverting Nolander's fist. Nolander lost his balance and in that very instant, Debrune fired shockwave at him. A flash of blue light and Nolander crumpled like a piece of paper. Suddenly Debrune turned and fired a shockwave at empty air. Out of nowhere Boris appeared rolling on the ground after having lost his balance. Debrune fired another shockwave, missing by a narrow margin. Boris stood up. His leg was burnt at the ankle. He was just faster than most people now. Suddenly Debrune fired a shockwave at his right and Zane jumped up, smoothly avoiding it. Debrune fired three more at him midair and Zane gracefully flipped and turned midair and struck a perfect landing. Zane came up to Debrune and punched. Debrune raised his sparking, electric palm to catch the punch but as though he knew that Debrune would do that Zane swatted his fist away and kicked Debrune. Debrune raised his head, only to receive a hard, backhand slap, making Debrune spit blood.
"Heh, you know your fight." Debrune wiped the blood from his mouth.
"No, I just know you." Zane replied, his fists raised in a defensive position. Debrune raised his hand and fired a shockwave at Zane. Zane stepped to the right and the shockwave swerved to the right, just as it was about to connect Zane leaped left.
"You certainly know my every trick, even the ones I didn't tell anyone. You can read my moves. This fight is already lost." Debrune remarked and fired a shockwave at Boris and Boris turned at stumbled, Zane appeared before him in a flash holding his shield and bore the brunt of the shockwave. When he looked up, Debrune was gone. Zane sighed.
"I'm tired."
*************
'I've been falling for nine minutes and it doesn't even feel like I'm falling. This is certainly an illusion.' General thought trying to be upright. 'But I still can't get myself straight.'
General removed his sword and slashed the air above him, he landed on the ground but the illusion of falling in a hole remained. On his waist he found a rope, which had been enchanted to feel as if it didn't exist.
'He's clever. The illusion of falling makes me unsure on my feet and obstructs my vision, therefore I cannot see who I'm attacking.' General thought walking a few steps on each side to be sure
"Hello, General. I saw you here." Came a familiar voice.
"Navigator is that you? Weren't you on the boat." General yelled.
"Well yeah but then I felt a very strange presence and then I saw a man of a built that was very obviously fake and you following him." Navigator replied.
"How can you be sure I'm not him." General asked.
"I can feel your imprints on the earth and you're of the exact height and weight of the General, I can feel it." Navigator replied. General smiled. The tables were about to turn.
*****************
Lionheart, Alex and the beast trainer were trapped in a maze when they seperated. The beast trainer led the way with his dogs sniffing the way out. Suddenly, Shadow teleported there holding some glass vials.
"Miss me?" Shadow threw an empty glass vial through the walls. "He was just messing with you by placing trees at the exact place where you tried to burst through the walls."
"You mean, Iskander?" Lionheart asked. Shadow rolled his eyes and walked through the walls, everyone followed. Suddenly a shockwave came from below, straight at Lionheart, Shadow pushed him out of the way.
"Our challenge is more difficult as I feel that both of them are here. Debrune is pointless by himself but with another person it's a whole different story." Shadow said, pocketing two vials. Beast trainer whispered in his dog's ear and the dog ran off in one direction.
"My dog smells a human." Beast trainer said, very quietly. Everyone followed the dog and as soon as someone can in sight Alex hurled a stone at him. The man, who was sitting on top of the maze wall, dodged.
"Lame. I just ditched the General and you guys aren't much of a threat either. Guess I'll just finish you like this in teams." Iskander laughed.
"Sure why not? Especially when there's a dog sitting behind you." Lionheart smiled. Iskander hurriedly turned and fell, at the same time, Lionheart rushed forward but Shadow pulled him back, and then a shockwave shot out just in front of Lionheart. Had Shadow not pulled him out he would have been dead by now. Iskander fell through the ground and disappeared.
"Damn it." Shadow cursed "If only Debrune wasn't there."
"What does Debrune want exactly?" Alex asked.
"He wants to kill me and claim that he's the sixth in the whole army. That would make him the king of the lower section and that's the highest honour that anyone can get aside from being one of the top five." Shadow let go of Lionheart and formed a sword out of nowhere "But why do you ask?"
"I'm a scientist, Shadow. I defeat the enemy by knowing him. Watch." Alex filled her lungs and yelled out "DEBRUNE!! LISTEN HERE. WHY KILL SHADOW AND BE THE KING OF THE LOWER SECTION WHEN YOU CAN KILL ISKANDER AND BE ONE OF THE HIGHER SECTIONS."
Iskander hiding behind a rock looked at Debrune.
"Don't listen to her, Debrune. With Shadow gone you can be the king of the lower section." Iskander whispered. Debrune turned and looked at Iskander.
"Did you think that I'm that manipulative, Iskander? I'm not going to turn on you." Debrune quietly said. Iskander smiled
"Let's kill those idiots."
**************
Debrune stepped out of the illusion.
"You're right. Why am I working for Iskander? He ditched me here and ran off to save himself. I'll help you." Alex looked at Debrune suspiciously. Suddenly General emerged from a wall.
"Come on I know the way out of here." General said and then he looked at Debrune. "Have you captured him or has he captured you?"
"He wishes to come to our side." Lionheart said.
"Okay. I'll allow it but if you so much as move a muscle against us I'll kill you." General said. He rushed out of the maze. General still didn't know where Nolander, Zane and Boris were. With the Navigator leading the way, everyone got out of the maze. Suddenly the whole island turned dark. So dark that nobody could see one another. Suddenly out of nowhere Shadow started laughing.
"Fools."