Once upon a time, there was a Thirteen Element called... um... let's see... um... (abandons project.)
Anyways, here's my short story.
Futility
Have you ever heard a thousand voices gasp, all at the same time? It’s quite an eerie sound, I assure you, and that’s exactly what I heard just now. I gasped with my fellow Archangels, for I was just as shocked as they were. Before me lay a simply gargantuan army. Their soldiers spread literally as far as the eye can see; I could still see their stark, lifeless forms from beyond the horizon. What was worse, they weren’t even human, angel, or any recognizable life form. They were skeletons. And they completely surrounded us.
A gigantic army of skeletons charged in disorderly unison at my small regiment of Archangels pulled our swords in unison. There were about two hundred of us – not nearly enough to fend off the entire horde. We were barely even warriors – we were just a scout group, sent to investigate into the Rotting Plains, inhabited by disgusting Flesh Spiders and the like. Apparently, Morte had discovered our plans, and had summoned a massive skeleton army to stop us in our tracks. I had the feeling that he would succeed.
As the first skeleton rushed towards me, I feinted at its skull, causing it to recoil in defense. I twirled around, plunging my sword deep into his ribcage and puncturing his ghastly spirit from within. In one clean motion, I whipped the sword back out, thrusting it deep into the neck joint of another skeleton powerful enough to shatter its bones. Cleaving left and right, the sword in my arms became a whirling arc of pure light, slicing cleanly through savages in all directions.
As I scanned the scene with quick eyes, I realized that we might have a chance after all. The skeleton’s numbers were slowly fading, and my fellow Archangels were just as adept as I was in swordplay. One of them pulled out a bow and was sending light arrows careening into the skulls of our enemies; another was tending to the wounded around him, casting blessings of heaven to strengthen and bathing some in holy light in order to heal. We might have a chance after all. I continued my frenzied dance of destruction, swirling my blade around so quickly no skeletons even had a chance to touch me. Suddenly, I saw a sight that made my blood run cold.
Morte himself stood quite a ways in front of us, his hollow eyes penetrating deep within my being. I could feel my soul struggling to stay afloat even as he stared at me, his infested green cape billowing in the bitter wind, his worn, bony hands clutching his warped staff of death. He raised his staff, and in one guttural syllable, every single one of the skeletons were now equipped with a bone shield. As they quickly regrouped, they formed a single vertical line facing us – a veritable Bonewall. Morte let loose a savage howl that almost caused me to drop my sword. He screeched another sigil, and the skeletons charged.
I raised my sword and leapt at the nearest skeleton, flapping my wings ever so slightly to lift myself even higher. I dived, point down, at the skeleton, piercing his skull with crushing force from the top. As he perished, I pulled my sword out and sent it at another skeleton’s ribcage. The skeleton raised its shield in defence as my sword glanced off. The decaying bonebag shrieked maniacally, swinging a rotten sword at my wing. As I barely cut him down to size, I crouched down to heal my wounds.
The battle wasn’t going well after the arrival of Morte. Somehow, he had given all the skeleton soldiers enchanted bone shields. As my comrades cut down more and more skeletons, their shields seemed to grow larger and thicker. Soon, with only a couple hundred of skeletons left, they were nigh immortal – they had impossibly thick full-body shields. We didn’t even score a single more kill as the skeletons diabolically rounded us up. Their shields were just too powerful to handle. There was only maybe fifty of us left, and we could only hold on for so long against the invincible army.
Resistance was literally futile. For every furious thrust I made that somehow managed to destroy a skeleton, all the other ones just received strengthened shields. Soon, it was simply a rout. I dropped my sword – once a spinning arc of destruction, now an unwieldy and useless deadweight – and flew. It was my only hope. I flew higher and higher, faster and faster, hoping to avoid the same fate as my fellow Archangels as they were bloodily hacked down. But I was not to escape. Morte again rose his staff, and with one cruel note, a terrible Ivory Dragon sprang behind me.
Its horridly sharp claws paled in comparison to its jawbone full of the sharpest ivory teeth you have ever seen. It roared in defiance, sending a miasma of poison swirling into my face. As I felt the poison enter my system, my muscled weakened and my flying grew slower. It was futile, from beginning to end. We were going up against a simply massive group of skeletons, equipped with shields that only got stronger as you battered more of them to bits, and dragons so terrible they rivaled even our rare Golden Dragons. I was done. It was futile. As the dragon sent a hooked claw flying at my chest, I thought I could still see the hollow face of Morte staring deep into my soul as everything went black…
