Written by: Epicstu Wyyvernwriter

The Rain fell heavy upon the two locked in mortal combat over the fate of Aroamourne. Edward attempted to headbutt Pip, who dodged as the force from the attack pushed the air itself past him. Performing a flip over Edward, Pip poured water that had been blessed by his nameless God upon Edward for the third time during their fight. “That confirms my theory,” Pip chuckled. “Twenty-four hours must pass before Hell will return to you. However, you seem to heal at these moments as well. I have been keeping track.” Edward growled as Hell’s third attempt to return to him failed painfully. He punched the ground with his Blessed Gauntlet and a bolt of Zesrial’s lighting struck there creating a shockwave and sending Pip a ways back. “I don’t think I’ve ever spent four days on a single siege before,” Pip grinned, this fight entertained him. “Nor have I ever spent three days fighting the same adversary. Truly impressed, am I.”

The Fennec Knight and the Human WarPriest stared each other down. Their fight had put them about a mile from Aroamourne, and the village was to Pip’s left and to Edward’s right. “Why do you want these people dead?” Edward snarled at his opponent’s grin.

“They worship Death,” Pip replied. “I’m simply granting them that which they desire.”

“They do not desire Death,” Edward argued. “They only wish to thank the Dead of this multiverse for protecting all life, including theirs.”

“There is no multiverse,” Pip laughed and then his expression and tone became sour. “This is all there is, and I will not tolerate such farse. It is blasphemy to the doctrine I was raised on which is the only truth.”

Though Edward was no longer Hell, he retained his ability to know any lie he heard as well as the truth behind it. He looked into Pip’s eyes and saw that this was what he truly believed. “The most common of lies are those which the liar is unaware of,” Edward replied.

“What?” Pip questioned as his rage began to boil.

“It is not your fault. You are not telling your lie, but rather that of another,” Edward replied.

“What are you insinuating?” Pip said as he ground his teeth together and gripped his weapons tight.

“Nothing,” Edward replied. “I am telling you that your God lied to you. Unless not even he knows.”

“That is enough!” Pip rushed at Edward and met the Fox’s headbutt with his own. The Blessings of their separate God’s clashed with impossible force, and at that moment the rain stopped. It resumed immediately as Edward’s Blessed Gauntlet met with Pip’s Blessed Blade. Edward slashed the Blessed Short-Sword in his offhand at Pip’s gut as Pip quickly wrapped his Blessed Incense Burner’s chain around it and pulled it away from his body. He swung his massive Blessed Blade around his body, gaining momentum, before slamming it downward towards Edward’s skull. Edward caught Pip’s attack with his Blessed Gauntlet, and the two fought to overpower one another, their weapons now locked with each other.

*          *

Zesrial could feel the Warpriest’s God trying to push her down, yet she would not falter. She could not. At this point, if she let this nameless God win, she believed Edward would fall. For this Warpriest, without his God at his back, was in every way her Knight’s equal, but with his God came an unfair advantage. Then something caught her attention. A worried man was frantically searching for something that if not found would spell the reason for his worry. She had only noticed because it was love that worried him, and then she heard the screams of a soul that belonged to her. She was loosing, “Harrissa.” Zesrial knew, by name, all souls that would go to Heaven upon their Deaths, and this one was being devoured by the very God she now stood against.

“This innocent soul, or your beloved Fennec Knight,” the Nameless Living God spoke to Zesrial directly. “The choice is yours, Heaven.”

*          *

Michael searched frantically for a syringe, but much to his surprise he found none. He had rummaged through every building in the village but could only find dirty and rusted used syringes, none of which would work.“You there!” he shouted into the crowd of Elves watching and waiting from the gate to see who would return from the fog and the rain. Though they could not see the Fennec Knight’s and the Human Warpriest’s battle it could be felt as shockwaves swept towards them in rapid succession. Brilliant purple lightning fought foul colorless breath off in the distance. “Anyone! Please!”

One Elf turned, the rest could not hear him over the storm that raged on, “what is it Necromancer?”

“A syringe!” Michael shouted. “I need a sterilized syringe!”

“That shipment wasn’t supposed to get here until tomorrow, but with this storm, it may take them longer still,” the Elf replied. “Unless you want a dirty one.”

“Harrissa’s soul will be devoured if I do not have a sterilized syringe immediately,” Michael shouted. He knew the severity of Harrissa’s ailment all to well, “that damned breathe,” he cursed.

Zesrial heard him loud and clear. She could help him, but not without leaving Edward for a moment. “It would only be for a moment,” she thought to herself. She had become torn and knew not what to do. She was not sure if Edward could win without her.

*          *

Edward and Pip locked attacks multiple times in rapid succession, each impact sending them both back as they rushed toward one another for the next clash over and over again. Trees broke and rocks shattered as a battlefield was forged through their mortal combat. One last time they rushed at each other, Edward utilized the six-inch retractable claws on his paw-like feet to keep himself from being pushed back, and Pip’s nameless God pushed at his back to keep the Warpriest from being pushed back as well. Using his Blessed Gauntlet and the pommel of the Blessed Short-Sword held in his off hand Edward unleashed a flurry of punches. Pip met every punch with his massive Blessed Blade. Edward landed a right jab to Pip’s gut and followed through with a headbutt and then attempted a left jab. Pip, though dazed from the headbutt, deflected the left jab and smacked his Blessed Incense Burners across Edward’s face. He followed through with a mighty swing of his Blessed Blade and Edward ducked, dodging the attack. Then he launched himself with all his might, headbutting Pip in the gut and sending the Warpriest flying back. Pip stumbled dropping his Blessed Blade but managed to hurl the chain of his Blessed Incense Burners at Edward, wrapping them around Edward’s neck. With one fluid motion and all his strength, Edward pulled Pip to him and, “Iron Ram!” headbutted him to the ground. Pip fell face first to the earth. Edward put a foot on his left arm, utilizing his six-inch retractable claws to hold it in place. He then grabbed Pip’s right arm with his other foot and removed it from its socket. Pip let out a yell of great pain. Then, only for a moment, Zesrial left Edward, and at that moment the Incense Burners, which were still wrapped around his neck, filled his lungs with the foul breath of Pip’s nameless God. Edward lost all strength, backed off a few steps, removed the chains from his neck, and fell to his knees.

“What is the matter, Hellion?” Pip grunted as he returned to his feet, his right arm dangling uselessly from his shoulder. “Has your Goddess abandoned you? That is the difference between your Goddess and my God.” He flung his still Blessed Incense Burners around Edward’s entire body as the breath of his nameless God surrounded the helpless Fennec Fox, and he swung him up and then down into the ground repeatedly. Then he walked to his downed opponent and began to choke him with the chains still wrapped around his neck. “My God will never abandon me!” Edward could not breathe and could feel his soul slowly being taken from him. All became dark, and Edward Dimir died. Then the moment ended, and Zesrial returned with a bolt of her lightning that separated her Fox from the Nameless God. Pip, having been knocked to the ground by the force of Zesrial’s lightning, stood back up. “You are too late,” he said to the angel who held the dead Fennec Fox in her arms. “His soul belongs to my God now.”

“No!” shouted an enraged voice from the depths of Hell. “He belongs to me!” Frozen and Ashe, the twin chained Wyyvern Daggers of Hell, came from below and wrapped themselves around Edward, burning and freezing him with fires both hot and cold. Edward’s soul cried out with great pain as his body, and his soul were both pulled down into Hell.

The rain fell harder than any rain had ever fallen in the history of the Wyyvernwriter’s Multiverse. Then Zesrial turned to the Warpriest, “your God cannot save you now,” she said as her lightning shattered the Warpriest’s weapons and broke his armor apart. Pip cried out in pain as he was struck with a neverending stream of lightning forged in the wrath of Heaven herself.

“Wait!” Michael shouted. Zesrial did not stop. “Please, it is not his fault. His God is to blame.”

“My Fox is Dead!” Zesrial shouted in pain, anger, and sorrow. “I will take this one’s soul from his God and remove it from existence! Hell’s weeping and gnashing of teeth would be too good for him.”

“This is not what he would want!” Michael urged.

Then the lightning stopped, and Pip’s God was no longer with him, Zesrial had stolen his soul and held it in her hand. Then she turned to the Necromancer, “You dare assume what my beloved would want after it was you and your beloved I left him for.”

“It was you,” Harrissa ran out to them panting, she had run all the way from Hagur’s Tomb. “It was you I saw, you who pulled my soul from the darkness.” Then she saw that the Fox was gone and she knew what must have happened. “I am so sorry,” she fell to her knees and wept for the sacrifice that was made on her behalf.

“You made the syringe?” Michael asked. From her own metallic feathers, Zesrial had made the syringe. She looked at the burned Satanic symbol in the ground that had pulled her beloved’s soul from the jaws of the nameless God. Then she looked at the soul in her hand with unmeasurable anger. Michael stepped closer cautiously.

“Away with you, Necromancer!” Zesrial screamed. “I do not know who you are.”

Harrissa ran to the angel that had saved her, and though Zesrial tried to drive her back with her lightning Harrissa would not let it stop her. She pushed through it no matter how much it hurt her because she knew the Angel’s pain. She cried as she wrapped her arms around Zesrial. “Please,” she begged. “His God has left him, let his soul return to his body.”

“You would beg for the soul of the one who has fought his entire life for the eradication of your people?” Zesrial asked in confusion and anger.

“It was his God that made him this way, I cannot blame him for it and neither can you,” Harrissa argued still holding Zesrial tightly as the lightning continued to strike her.

She was right, and Zesrial knew it. She ceased her lightning. “That same God is on his way here now,” Michael interrupted. “Do you not see his constellation in the skies?” Zesrial looked up and even through the thick black clouds of her sorrow and pain she could see it. She could see him, and she began to know fear. “We do not have much Time, three days at best,” Michael urged. “I have already set a plan in motion, but we need to prepare just in case he does not make it here before the Nameless Living God does.”

Zesrial looked down and knew that Edward’s soul was, at the very least, protected from this nameless horror of a God. Then she smiled at the Elf that belonged to her, returned Pip’s soul to his body, and caused him to fall into a deep sleep, “tend to him, he is your responsibility now.” Harrissa did as she was asked and, with the help of two others, carried Pip’s body back to the village. Then Zesrial turned to Michael. “Whom have you summoned, Necromancer?” Zesrial asked.

“Are you Zesrial?” Michael asked in response.

“Yes,” Zesrial replied, “but how do you know my name?”

“I have summoned one who was created by your hand,” Michael replied. “Or rather will be in a Time far into your future. A Lich Lord called Reaven.” Zesrial knew not the name but saw that Michael spoke the truth.