KotLC: Eclipse (KotLC X Magnus Chase)

Chapter 15

Sophie's POV

I told them that it was not a good idea to put me on a battlefield.

Of course, they, being humans, didn't know that this could potentially smash my brain into billions of pieces, both mentally and literally, depending on how I die.

They herded me to what I assumed was the battlefield (they obviously had practice with this new recruit herding technique).

The battlefield was massive, almost as big as the grounds at Havenfield. There were several small forests dotted about the grounds, some small lakes for those who prefer naval combat, as well as two large, meandering rivers crossing through the battlefield. On the shores of these rivers were several small medieval-style villages and a few larger cities. The landscape was interrupted by hills and valleys, cliffs and ravines, mountains, and craters. In short, this was the best-looking ' I had ever seen (also my only one).

In the centre of the field, there was a small pile of weird reptiles. Magnus groaned when he saw them.

"I forgot that it's Thursday today," he tilted his head back, where I noticed a runestone pendant on his neck that hadn't been there earlier.

"What happens on Thurdays?" I asked.

Mallory grinned maniacally, "Thursdays are dragons."

"Dragons?" I asked, but was ignored.

"A lot of fun," Alex smirked, "especially when I get to behead Magnus."

"That was one time!" Magnus said jokingly.

"Still..." Alex turned to me, "his head was about to blow and take out about half this battlefield. It was legendary." She turned back to Magnus. "Are you gonna introduce Jack and Sophie or just fight without him? You know that he'll be annoyed if you don't." That sounded like a veiled threat to me, but Magnus just shrugged and took his pendant off the necklace.

As soon as he did that, the runestone changed to a floating sword with runes down the blade. Its blade glinted with a sharpness that could cut through almost anything. Naturally, I stumbled back, because taking a simple step backwards is too difficult for me.

Magnus stepped forward.
"Jack. This is Sophie. Sophie, this is Jack, also known as Sumarbrander or The Sword of Summer." He said, gesturing at both of us in turn.

Jack floated closer to me, making me lean away slightly from how close its blade was.
"Where is she?" He whispered to me conspiratorially, the runes on Jack's blade glowing in different shades of red.

I scrambled away from Jack.
"It talks‽" This caused my new hallmates to burst out in laughter.

"It? IT?" Jack's runes glowed an angry red, "Firstly, lady, I am a guy. And secondly, where is she?" He looked for a pocket, his blade coming far too close for comfort from stabbing me.

"Where is who?" I asked.

Alex was next to reply, all while smirking with amusement, multicolour eyes twinkling: "Do you have any blades on you? Like a sword, or axe -" she burst out in a brief bout of laughter, "in a pocket somewhere?"

"Uhhh..." I pulled out one of my new throwing stars, "You mean this?"

"No, no, no!" Jack's runes glowed blue. He was literally a disco sword. "She doesn't interest me, too blunt, if you get my drift." I had a feeling that he would have winked, had he had eyes.

"OK..." I reached for my goblin-made ones, "These?"

Jack floated closer with his hilt close to the throwing star, as if inspecting it closely. "I've never even seen a throwing star of this design in my thousands of years of life." He floated a bit further back. "How did you get it?"

I scrambled for a believable lie, "I... found them."

"Hmmm..." I didn't know if Jack believed me or not, you know, because he's a sword and doesn't have a face. "But no. Not these ones. They're weird." Jack floated a bit further away, closer to the rest of the group, who were watching with amused expressions.

That's when I remembered about Hope. "Do you mean Hope?" I pulled my dagger out of one of my other pockets.

"Yes!" Jack's runes glowed a hot pink as he floated closer again, "She's beautiful!" I decided not to question how he knew the gender of my dagger. "She's a bit short, though. Don't you think?" Jack asked.

"Well, she is a dagger." Alex pointed out, obviously trying not to laugh.

Jack inspected Hope some more.
"She's not as sharp as Riptide." His voice turned dreamy when he said the name. "Hope's also not made from Celestial Bronze, Bone Steel, or any other metal I recognise." He rotated away from Hope, presumably towards me.
"What is she made from?"

"I have no clue." I answered, Who's Riptide?"

Jack's runes glowed every colour of the rainbow as he tilted his hilt to the sky. "The girl of my dreams."

"My cousin's boyfriend's sword," Magnus jumped in. I took a second to process that sentence.

"Wha-" I was interrupted by another horn being blown

"Oh yes." Mallory smirked at me."This'll be fun," she pulled two small daggers out from nowhere.

I looked at the rest of the battlefield. In the centre, where the reptiles were, they had begun to start flapping about, breathing fire, and causing general chaos in the ranks of einherjar. T.J. and Halfborn let out a battlecry as they charged towards the reptiles that were apparently dragons, T.J. stabbing anyone in his way with his bayonet and Halfborn just wading through the swathes of einherjar, swiping his battleaxes and crushing the skulls of poor einherjar with every swing while laughing heartily. I just about felt like finding a hole to die and/or go insane in.

"How can they just laugh while killing everyone?" I asked, "Don't they feel bad?"

Magnus looked over to Halfborn. "Some do, but these battles are apparently here to desensitise us from the horrors of war, so we're ready for Ragnarök." He shook his head. "I don't generally kill people here in the battlefield, I tend to heal the injuries of our hallmates, you know, 'cause they do stuff like that,' he gestured to his friend, who had approximately fifty arrows sticking out of his body, but still fighting ferociously. "Jack is usually the guy who kills stuff."

"Yep." Jack cut in, popping the 'p'. How he did it without lips was beyond me. "Speaking of which, do you want me to kill that?" He pointed his blade somewhere behind us. I gasped when I took in all the scaly, scarred features of...

A dragon.

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1096 words

Hope you enjoyed this chapter!

I feel evil for putting a cliffhanger. 🙃

As always, if you find SPaG errors, please comment on them so I can fix them.

I have a question.
Should I add an OC to this story or not?
And if so, should they be an elf or einherji?
There are many more questions, but there's only one more I must ask:
If there's an OC being added, what would their name be?
(Only sensible and not rude names)

I'll try to schedule chapters for roughly once every week now. It might take slightly more or slightly less than a week between chapters.

Bye  👋
-ManicMohawk