The Fall of The King

Releasing the Paladins

Chapter 13

Artur stood up with a smile on his face as Elene cut the rope binding his hands, what surprised me the most was that she didn't hit him once while he talked to her in sarcastic remarks. I was going to question why till she finally snapped on him, "Artur I really want you to shut your useless mouth, I swear if my sister wasn't in love with you I would've killed you by now!" Artur recoiled from her venomous words, but then he quickly returned to his aloof demeanor. He Then turned to see me and began walking in my direction while saying, "So your the fated one huh? Well I believe you came to me in a dream, and no I don't say that to everybody. In that dream we were fighting together, everything felt so amazing and it seemed like we were invincible. I want to join you, but next time you throw your spear please hit the bad guy." He said all of this with a smirk on his face, but I just stood wondering why I visited the dreams of these people. I never even seen them before in person and I somehow could meet them in a dream. Artur was a tall man, and his blonde hair was long and held back in a ponytail. It seemed off on his large frame and heavy masculin features. His face seemed to hold an arrogant look and yet somehow remained humble in appearance. After speaking to me he quickly walked to the rest of the paladins and made one joke after another to lighten the mood of the warriors, then he helped the paladin that Elene knocked out get back up. Soon we were leaving the room, after Artur found a suit of armor and took some weapons from a few willing paladins. Artur then returned to me as we walked out and said, "So you ready to fight some possessed soldiers? I've been hoping that I can just sit back and watch you guys fight, my looks don't seem like an effective weapon against demons." I only looked at him with a glare, he just smirked and walked up to Amicia who was walking next to me. "So whats a young girl like you doing with a ragged group of men? I could get Elene to give you a suit of armor to represent the paladins." Amicia looked at him with a puzzled look. "I chose to travel with these men and I have no intention to join this merry band of demons anytime soon, so please spare me the arrogant charm." She said this with a small amount of venom in her words, and Artur looked like it hurt him but he soon recovered by saying, "Milady you wound me and my fellow knights with those words, we arent all demons, but my devilishly good looks might make you second guess yourself." She gave him another irritated look, and then walked off to where Ilorten and Roan were walking. Artur then returned to talking to me, "Well I can tell shes got a thing for you, not many women resist my charm that easily." I looked at him with a questioning glance and he chuckled and said, "Man either your blind or just terrible with women. She hasnt been more than an arms reach from you since I've seen you two, which usually means she either has feeling for you, or you told her not to leave your side." I looked at him with another quizzical glance, but my reply was quickly cut off as several demon paladins ran our way. They charged with incredible speed, the paladins around me barely had time to register the oncoming group. Ilorten set the hall ablaze, hoping to burn them but they just leaped through the flames without a moment of pause. The demonic paladins held long swords that seemed to curve upwards and end in a twin point, a new weapon I had never seen before. Artur let out a short battle cry that seemed to get all of our paladins attention and then they quickly flew into a battle formation, they all held tightly in the shape of a triangle with Elene at the tip and Artur next to her. The charging warriors continued to run at as while they burned, the smell of burning hair and skin seemed strong but they never seemed to halt the charge. As they approached I saw that all of the formation had drawn spears and now held them pointing towards the charging group who would impale themselves on them if they didn't veer from the charge. Soon the charging group neared the formation, and they quickly leaped into the air in unison. The leap took them above us in seemingly a perfect leap that would land them all within the center, but Another grunt was sounded by Artur and the paladins lifted the spears. Each spear caught a leaping warrior through the stomach, but they continued to fight on the spear as though they weren't harmed by it at all. Artur then let out another noise and the paladins charged the wall, placing the impaled warriors onto the wall. Amicia then ran to each warrior and then before she placed the necklace on them removed the spear. The warriors seemed to heal almost instantly and then returned to normal, almost fainting from the sudden control over themselves they have been granted. The warriors then bowed before us, but quickly fell from their knees as Elene knocked them to the floor. I then walked to Elene and asked her, "Why must you beat your faithful warriors, you treat them so harshly and they do nothing to you. They could easily return the pain you cause them, but they don't out of respect. They deserve more than punishment all the time." My words made her seethe with rage. "I'm sorry there, but last I checked you wouldn't know anything about running a group of warriors who have existed long before you were even a thought. I'm hard on this group because they need it, if I let up on them do you think they would be this good of a unit?" "A good unit can function without a constant reminder that they will be beaten regardless of if they win or lose." Ilorten quickly replied with a serious look on his face. "He may not know what its like to lead an army, but I do. I have ruled more men than you could ever imagine, I have raised an army from nothing and I know that beating them solves nothing." Elene looked at Ilorten with rage, but seemed to resign her comments and walked off down the hallway by herself.

Once all the warriors readied themselves we walked through the rest of the building, clearing any paladins we found and reverting them to normal. We then returned to the training rooms and went back down the tunnels, once we were in the tunnels a loud explosion erupted. The explosion rocked the caverns, and then the ceiling above us began to fall in on itself. We rushed back to the door, but suddenly the ceiling fell before me, splitting the group in two. I was on one side with Roan, Artur, and half of the paladins, while Ilorten, Elene, and Amicia were on the other side of the stones. Soon the shaking halted and the stones stopped falling. I then heard Amicia's voice through the stones. "Are you guys alright over there?" She called out with fear rising in her voice. "Yeah we all seem to be fine, how are things on that side?" I heard Amicia let out a sigh of relief and then I heard Ilorten reply, "We are all alright on this side, but we still need to meet up in the next building. We have access to the next place, but you guys will have to make it back to the surface. Be careful Kai, those demonic soldiers obviously aren't worried about dying or tearing the place apart to kill us. Above all else we need you to live." "Don't fret Ilorten, I have no intentions to die anytime soon." I replied, Ilorten gave off a small chuckle and replied saying, "I know you don't, but that doesn't mean the demons have the same intentions as you do. We need to go, but we will meet you guys in the training room." Then I heard the trample of their feet as they ran through the tunnels to the next building, then I turned to see the paladins climbing up the ladder back to the room we came from. As soon as I climbed up to the room I heard Artur saying, "Well they certainly want us dead, I wonder why they would try to take such handsome men from the world." he said this while putting a hand on my shoulder. I chuckled at his words, and began to walk from the room. The large training room seemed to be falling in on itself, and the whole building seemed to be groaning with the weight of itself. We quickly ran through the building, barely making it out as the building finally crumbled in on itself. I checked to see that all the paladins with us were alright, and then we began to make our way to the next building. Then suddenly a loud shriek sounded from behind us and when I turned I saw a frost giant standing there, its eyes flaring a dark red as though flames were sprouting from them. Aaron had obviously meant it when he said he had bigger things to turn. The creature didn't charge as the previous frost giants had done, it seemed to walk up to us with an incredibly large stride. Quickly Artur let out a cry and the paladins grouped into a circle, all drawing two swords and holding them in an X in front of themselves. The giant didn't seem to notice the formation and as it finally got near the formation Artur let out a sound that must've meant charge, for each paladin charged the beast using the twin swords as a multi-faced weapon, never breaking the X shape they held with the swords. Soon the beast had lost its legs entirely and was completely gutted, the giant hadn't even put up any sort of fight. Something didn't feel right about it all. Then suddenly the building we were supposed to meet the others in exploded, everything falling in on itself. We all rushed to the building, but it seemed as though nothing could have survived that explosion. I only looked at the flaming building hoping that they all weren't dead.

My heart filled with dread as my mind began to trail into the thoughts of losing all those paladins, Amicia, and Ilorten. Then I heard a groan from my right and I turned to see it was Elene. She looked as though her arm was broken and her armor sported several cuts that went deep, but no blood poured from them which meant she wasn't in going to die unless her arm was more than fractured. I ran to her and asked what happened. She looked at me and said, "Your brother, he just slaughtered most of my soldiers and took your friends. He didn't think twice about trying to kill me, he might have done more than break my arm if I hadn't been trained as well as I am." Artur then picked her up and slung her over his shoulder as though she weighed nothing at all. "Well it looks like we have a tough choice as to where we should go next." He laughed this as we all looked towards the last building we had to go to. "That's the building we usually eat in, maybe this is all just an elaborate scheme to get us to have dinner with him." I looked at Artur as Elene quickly said, "I swear if my arm wasn't broken I might strangle you." Roan and I laughed as we began to walk, but the jokes weren't clearing the worry in my heart. What did my brother have planned for us when we arrive in that building?