The floating black crystals around the figure were devoid of any reaction to the purple illumination. In fact, they were simply just there. Dark like an unending abyss which lures you.
Hamoutan could hear his heart throbbing and feel the rush of blood to his head. The mud on which he was kneeling felt like a furnace. He could see a few crystals revolving at an unnatural angle, while some just floated. They seemed to have no structure at all, no pattern.
He could see clearer now, the purple smoke gradually receding into the background. The thing's background.
He looked into the hollow sunken eyes of the Scholar. They were missing from the mask. One could say that he had no eyes, but Hamoutan could feel the eyes on him. Almost as if every single crystal in the air were his eyes. All watching him, and him alone.
A thousand needles pricking his body, of various thickness. That was hardly a way to describe the sensation.
'..No way. Not now.' Hamoutan thought and clenched his locket tightly. Enough for the edges to pierce his palm.
It drew blood which was rose red. Which dripped onto the greenery around him.
"Do you.. remember me?" said Hamoutan. His grip tightened.
He could feel the air around him growing thicker, heavier to breathe, but he stood up reluctantly. His stance widened, the air rushing to his sides. The locket barely hanging onto the clutch of his palm.
There was a movement in the dark crystals in the air now. Not the movement of the crystals, but something inside them. Every opaque surface now reflected something. The dark surfaces now swirled with white circles on them, erratically flashing onto the suspended crystals in the air.
"Answer me." Hamoutan gritted his teeth, a flurry of lights and the dense air rushing through around him.
The white circles began to focus onto the center of each of the things floating in the air, zooming in and out, their size bulging and decreasing.
They began to move around, move closer. Closer to Hamoutan. They began swirling up and around him, as the figure stood there motionless.
"Answer me!" Hamoutan screamed out, ripping the pendant away from the chain in a swift motion, his blood spattering against the ground, the rose crimson against the muddy green.
The loudest sound after that was the whimpering of the Mosalli. The crystals slowly started returning to the Scholar and surrounded him.
The Scholar saw a wounded man screaming out to fate despite his circumstances, despite not being in the position to ask any questions.
But all Hamoutan could see was an enemy, and hopefully soon enough, a corpse.
A low-pitched growl, almost mechanical, escaped from the Scholar. Almost like how a razor blade cuts into a slab of rock during construction, its edges constantly rubbing against the thick slab in a flurry as it tries to break it down. Almost a screech.
A single crystal moved. Then another, then another. They began rearranging themselves so fast Hamoutan couldn't process what was happening.
"You—" Hamoutan was cut off as a huge block of crystals appeared directly before his eyeline.
The words read: 'No.'
The crystals close to his face fell to the ground immediately. Then began dragging themselves quickly toward the Scholar, scraping against the rotten leaves on the ground, drenched in the crimson blooddrops of Hamou.
"I do not remember who you are." The Scholar finally spoke. His voice sounded as deep as a well with an echo, with the metallic resonance seeping through.
Hamoutan bit his lip, blood gushing down his chin. His hands shook uncontrollably as he gazed into the white mask of the Scholar.
"You don't remember…?"
There was a nod of acknowledgment from the Scholar. His crystals now all back to him, floating around, casually cutting through the fog.
"The Massacre. Does that ring a bell?" Hamoutan let go of the locket and looked directly at the Scholar instead of its eyes. "The Massacre at the North. You and your allies ravaged our region. Took everything from me."
The sound of the crystals cutting through the air in non-linear motion, and the gushing of water through the nearby streams were louder than the response.
Hamoutan looked at the crystals now diagonally rearranging themselves, one in the place of another, and then another, back and forth, left and right.
"No." The voice answered.
"I don't even know who you are."
The staff, which had stationary hand-like structures at its pole end, made out of blunt stone, spiraled toward the inside. The hands were mangled like groups of ants fighting for survival, all crushed into one single pole. They looked torn and gray, almost like they were burned while they were alive.
Suddenly, the stationary hands started writhing. As if in a cage, they started twisting and grabbing each other. Their fingers scratched everything they could grab hold of, as if they were breaking themselves down and forming again.
The veins flew all the way down to the shaft. The more and more they scratched, the more the color of the blunt gray turned into a pomegranate red.
"Out. Of. My. Way." The Scholar said as one of the hands tugged onto his hood, scratching its surface.
Hamoutan took a step backward seeing the Scholar and his airborne accessories moving his way.
'I must face him. Here, now… I will kill him.' Hamoutan thought.
"What about all the lives you took? Were they all meaningless to you?" Hamoutan wielded his blade, as tiny as a flower. His hands trembled holding the blade, watching the approaching menace.
The Mosalli clung to his hair now, almost freezing.
In a quick move, Hamoutan got down on one knee, as the Scholar was now beside him. He ducked a flurry of crystals and kicked with his left leg. The Scholar attempted to block it with his staff.
Hamoutan turned it into a feint as he then struck with the blade in his right hand, directly onto the rectangular white mask. It left a small scratch below the eye of the mask.
Hamoutan could feel the grip and pressure of his leg being crushed under the weight of something. Multiple hands wrung and wrapped around his ankles from the staff as they gnawed at the flesh with tiny mouths on their palms.
Hamoutan screamed. He kicked against the grip, and then again. He scratched the mask over and over again with the blade, dealing virtually no damage, as the Scholar stood there motionless.
There was no escaping it. He was caught in a trap. Tears flowed from his eyes, just as blood from his feet. The crystals surrounded him from every direction, their paper-thin surfaces glancing directly at him from above, below, left, right, wherever possible. The white circles inside the crystals, that Hamoutan assumed were pupils, became dilated and started shaking intensely.
"Stupid." The Scholar groaned, his voice unpleasant and screeching. "Let me show you how pointless it is."
The Scholar unveiled his left hand from his robe, a bony white exoskeleton, which barely looked human, immediately choking Hamoutan.
'Fuck. No. I must not…die.'
"...Not working? I see. I see now." Suddenly, a flash of light ensued.
The last line of defense of the Mosalli.
The Scholar screeched, his voice sounding like a block of metal being cut at high speeds against rocky terrain. Almost like a machine motor beginning to run.
Hamoutan fell to the ground unable to reach his senses due to the sheer pain and shock. The screech, however, reached farther than it needed to.
The Scholar was on his knees, his eyes being exposed to the full sensitivity of the Mosalli.
"A Bred Warrior. Rare for these packs." The Scholar slowly got back up.
The light from his staff illuminated the surroundings, the fog slowly returning.
Krosch ran toward the direction of the screech. The boy was not something he could compromise on.
'If word gets out that we're escaping this way, the 'Nightingales' will be onto us quicker than we can get away! Not with all this loot!' Krosch thought as he ran toward the screech, his Brokmane daggers unsheathed in his hands.
The smell of an open cherry blossom filled his nostrils as he walked closer to the purple fog. His eyes blurred as he let the dagger's crimson shine guide him. The fog was so dense that he could feel the prickles of a thorn as he walked through it. Almost like there were knives.
Two steps behind.
He heard it. He turned behind in a quick motion. Two steps to his left. He turned left. Battle formation ready with his double daggers.
A piece of fabric breezed past his leg, as he quickly turned and gave it a wide slash. It slashed through the fog.
Nothing.
Krosch held his daggers out at full arm's length and spun around quickly, returning to his battle stance immediately, clearing the fog.
But there was nobody. But he saw something.
He walked toward it. He walked closer and closer. He finally recognized it.
"What the fuck?"
A single leg, with torn flesh at multiple parts, broken toenails, and rose flowers growing through each and every crack of it, with the blood seeping through in the same red color as the rose all throughout its surroundings. There was no stench; in fact it smelled like flowers.
Beside it was a piece of white wood, ripped from something which was whole.
Krosch looked up at the sky and glanced at the two moons now barely visible during the fading daylight. One blue and the other red.
The red moon pulsed once, pulsating in the sky, its heartbeat massive, as Krosch could visibly see the crater widening. The blue moon rotated ever so slightly, changing its trajectory of travel.
Krosch gasped.
One of the Abyssal Ones had begun moving.