Military Camp of the Church's Army

[Llanwyn Siannodel]

Season of Winter, Era XV P.F.

The camp housing the Archprelate, Paladins and the Church's army was simple enough, a makeshift town of tents and wooden structures. Housed in the majority of the long tents are soldiers. Their tents, strewn together in long rows, create makeshift barracks housing dozens per row. These tents go on for hundreds of yards, housing the entire army, its Magi, siege equipment, etc.

At the head of the camp sits four large tents, roughly the size of two story houses. These tents house the Archprelate and his most trusted advisers, as well as, contain space for meetings.

Some NPC information for the sake of keeping abreast of things: Number of soldiers present: In full force, 7,000. Breakdown of soldiers: 2,000 highly trained soldiers (swords, maces, spears, etc.) 5,000 less trained soldiers Breakdown of Battle-Magi: 5 Master Magi 20 Adept Magi 100 Apprentice Magi 200 Initiate Magi Also Present: Paladins, depending on the TS, anywhere from 12 to full force.

(ooc: numbers from GDC and Thoth)

[Llanwyn Siannodel]

First Brightening of Camp, Winter, Era XV P.F.

A flash of light and a man appeared to everyone present in the meeting tent. Those with swords took arms, but Llanwyn waved them down when he recognized who it was. The man, a Church of Faith magi, knelt on one knee immediately and handed Llanwyn a folded parchment letter with a wax seal of his own office. Llanwyn opened it and read it immediately, then nodding to the mage, he spoke to the others present.

Secrets : Your Excellency, Excuse me for a lack of formalities, but this is Ariella writing you from your own office. An airship has landed in the Prime Province and something is definitely awry. I alerted his lordship the Regent of its presence and his reaction leads me to believe you should return as soon as possible. Ariella

"I must return to Prime at once, I will send news of the happenings and be back as soon as possible." Then he mentioned for Lauryll, a female katta paladin to come with him and he and the messenger teleported back to Prime in a flash of light.

[Fidelis Meridius]

TS: Mid-Winter, current era.

IC: The winds of war caught the nose of a wolf...

Tresses of hair and cloth rippled off armor and skin. The winter wind thrashed a pegasus and it's riders about as they sliced through the early brightening sky. The binary system of Telath had just barely begun to show any sign of existence as the Wolf of Jorel raced over the countryside.

Fidelis and Havina had been patrolling the wilderness near Hiems for several cycles, and they had come to know the location of troop locations quite well... Now it was time to make his presence known.

At great altitude, the pegasus glided left and right, swooping back and forth as its master leaned over its flanks. With a stern visage, emerald eyes studied the landscape below. Until finally they found their target. In the returning light, it was nothing more than a few small shapes that made up the tents and buildings of the camp below. With a smirk, Fidelis pulled the reigns of Blackwind as he lurched upward, then turned sideways, and began a dive towards the earth.

"Let's let them know we are here... Leave them a gift for me!" The warrior jeered. Havina noded as she pressed herself closer to the Jorelite; her slender arms grasp tightly around his waist. She was pleased to finally have found her Wolf, and finally she was the Thorn she was meant to be. Her blank eyes held a bit of a twinkle just before she closed them and entered clara only seconds later.

The Master Necromancer easily make her connection to the infernal planes, and conjured forth her fill of Vis. With divination, the Oracle of Jorel shaped her spell. In her mind, she was weaving Summon Horde, a spell that would pull undead straight from the Umblat. It was nothing special, your run of the mill unliving. She sought for the most basic, so as with her abilities she could draw forth as many as possible... Right in the camp of the Church's Army.

As the dove towards their target, Havina opened her eyes and released the spell on the ground below. Moments later, the entire camp should have been littered with undead skeletons, seeking to mindlessly chop limb from limb.

At incredible speed, the pegasus pulled off from its dive, before stretching its wings as it veered around the camp. Circling the area, well out of the average archers range, the Wolf and Thorn watched like vultures. They were only staying long enough to send the message: Jorel had a new champion... And he was in town.

[Palacrisis D Jones]

OOC ~ peer- modding this piece of action with permission from the GDC.

Jorels Postmen

IIC~ The postmen of Jorel were just a little late, the delivery they threw into the camp of the Church of Faiths military wing was deadly vicious and lacking in any emotion that could be interpreted as merciful. The hordes of undead numbing close on a thousand plucked from the banks of the River Umblat and sent to wreak havoc on the 7000 men of the church found only 700 men. The vast numbers that Archprellate Llanwyn Siannodel had marched down to Sheria had dwindled to a small force charged with assisting the clean up of Sheria after the war ! The rest of the church’s army was well on the way back to Diana.

However a parcel delivered late is still a parcel whether the recipients of the gift want it or not, the postmen of Jorel always deliver but not always on the right date! The surprise attack worked perfectly the camp was peaceful in the early dawning of a bitterly cold morning a few camp fires were being charged up for hot drinks a few freezing sentries their arms folded around their chests marched their duty watch glancing enviously at their brothers still wrapped up warm in their tents.

They died quickly and painfully as the disparate undead slaughtered the guards but undead are unreliable where a living trained soldier might have attempted to kill silently undead were more direct in their attacks and as a consequence the screams of the dying alerted the rest of the men who poured from tents in various states of undress.

The Archprellate had left behind a valuable resource ten adept Thaumaturges skilled in healing and the use of the essence of life. They might not add up to the power of the “Thorn” on the Pegasus but they were trained and disciplined. Facing undead was one of the many hazards of the life of a churchmen and tactics were deployed, soldiers grabbed spears and stood in a bristling circle around the adepts whilst they sought clara their aim the single spell that they all shared Wrath of the Holy a deadly wave of righteousness anathema to the undead.

The spell shattered the massed ranks of advancing undead sending half of a thousand back to the River Umblat. Not victory by any means it would take the freezing adepts nearly five minutes to regain a common clara The soldiers would have to stand against the undead whilst the magi recovered clara and there were no longer many CoF military left. The charge of the undead had slaughtered nearly half of the 700 whilst they struggled to grab weapons and trousers.

The battle was evenly balanced and barely a quarter candlemark had passed since the Wolf and the Thorn had arrived at the camp.

Fidelis and Havina had been forced lower to the ground and even in the heat of battle there is always one soldier who will look up and see a huge warrior mounted on a rare Pegasus .A finger pointed skywards and a call went out, if any survived this day the sight of Fidelis would haunt their dreams of a darkening.


Above the circling Pegasus nature was turning as nasty as the raging fight on the ground .It had been coming for brightenings it was in the air it was in the cloud masses that were building up ….snow! Heavy wet and white and in copious quantities, record quantities. It began to snow the wind whipped it up into a blizzard and it started to fall. As the first wave of undead attacked and the church mages responded the ground beneath the combatants feet was turned into a slushy mush of blood and mud .

The weather conditions would merely be treated as uncomfortable by Fidelis after all he was the wolf of Jorel and what was a little bit of snow to the warrior who had slaughtered his way across the empire? However it was not entirely clear how the Pegasus would react to great clods of heavy wet snow landing on its wings .The visibility air side was down to near zero shortly after the soldier had spotted them.

The postmen of Jorel could fly away but no postman who delivers such a big parcel would ever think of riding away without getting a receipt from the customer!

[Llanwyn Siannodel]

Blood and fear, sweat and the screams of his fallen men filled the nostrils of First Lieutenant Cross. He was one of four first lieutenants still alive after half of the 700 had been brutally and easily slaughtered. Each of them had commanded one hundred men just moments before, but now they each were lucky to have fifty men left in their companies. Cross eyed the approaching undead, those walking through the snow and dust left from their fallen undead bretheren who had been repelled by the church magi. He felt his blade, heavy in his hand it seemed... it was the cold sneaking in, they were all feeling it.

"Archers!" a man yelled. First Lieutenant Cross looked to his right to see who the man was, immediately identifying him as First Lieutenant Kelk of Theta Company. "Kelk, I didn't see it, what do we have up there?" Kelk looked at him blankly and then back up at the sky, shielding his eyes while the snow came down upon his cheeks. "Something in black, on a horse, that's what I say at least."

The group of soldiers were in a large circle surrounding the magi as they concentrated best they could to regain clara in an effort to finish off the undead. And while some of the men were fully dressed, many weren't... still only wearing part of their clothing and currently shivering both with cold and fear. Cross looked to the sky and could barely make out Fidelis on his horse with what looked like someone else... the snow was coming in thick now, it seemed the clouds were falling upon them.

"See if you can't bring that thing down!" shouted Cross, "But have them aim away from us!" Kelk nodded and motioned for six archers to fire at the black object above, making sure if they missed the arrows would not come straight back down on the soldiers around them. "Fire!" he yelled.

Meanwhile... First Lieutenant Lessor was a bit annoyed with the whole damn mess. "I swear to the gods men, if you die I will come to the afterlife looking for your asses to kill you again, you hear me?!" He looked at the encroaching undead, "You sons of bitches! You're about to get a faceful of my fist with a sword attached!" He screamed because partly it rallied the men, but also because he was just pissed at the audacity of these skeletons walking around... didn't they know they're dead? "Men, raise your swords and done your shields... no spears, no arrows, take off their heads! Let's smash this horde back to the darkness!"

[Fidelis Meridius]

At first glance, the Jorelite's countenance reflected his disappointment. His endeavors in the region were somewhat late, and he found the camp only a tenth of its original size. But as the undead began to brutally and mindlessly hack its way through the camp, the man's lips creased a wide smirk. Success was imminent from the looks of things

But, soaring across the winter winds, the duo and winged beast soon found themselves between chaos from above and below. Half the skeletal warrior's fell under the blast that rocked the forces of evil. Searching for the source, Fidelis' gaze found the fortified group of desperate men below.

Thinking back to the end of the original siege of Narim and the battle in Arium, Fidelis reminded himself the danger of remaining airborne over a battlefield for too long. Arrows and spells often had come extremely close to ending the warrior's reign of terror, but not this time. He wouldn't take his chances, especially with the foul weather brewing over the landscape; covering everything in dense white flakes. But he still had one more thing to do, and then he would leave the Army of the Church to fend off the remains of the unliving force below.

"One more thing before we depart. Let us crush their spirits!" Fidelis howled over the wind to his Thorn. ""This time I want you to wait as long as you can to cast..." The high priestess raised no arguments to the human as he steered Blackwind around for one more pass. As he veered down towards the formation, the pegasus picked up speed once again. Like an angel of death they sped towards the Aetherian soldiers who fought desperately for survival.

Reaching to his side, Fidelis pulled one of the ardentium blades from its sheath before holding it in a presentable position by his shoulder. Catching the glint of the blade with her eyes, Havina was alerted to the warrior's true intentions. Tightening her grasp around the Wolf, the necromancer closed her eyes and quieted her mind. Once she began [/b]meditating[b] it took a matter of seconds to achieve clara.

Once her mind had made the journey into the astral plane, she connected herself to the plane of death once more and channeled forth her rather large fill of the necromatic essence. As her mind closed the connection to the astral plane, her mental thought was back in the material world, and they were still careening towards the force below.

Tethering her vis to the mana she had pulled forth, the master began to conjure the spell in her mind. Abjuring forth the venomous necrotic acid, her evocation of the spell was complete. She had formed an Acid Blast that she had manipulated slightly to spread more like a ring than a giant cloud or blob. If anything, in her mind, it was more of a defensive spell, aimed to strike everything in a 360 radius, but not the immediate vicinity below them.

Finally as death ran rampant, and cold made even the bravest bone shiver, the tide of evil had finally swelled into one utterly destructive strike. Muscle and flesh pulsed with anticipation as a war cry rose up from the chest of the Dark Knight. Raising his blade, the warrior pulled back on the reigns of the pegasus just before the immediate collision. With a violent flap, onyx wings spread wide slowing the trio before dropping in to the deck. Simultaneously the pair acted, Fidelis sent his slash downward towards the skull of the lieutenant that cursed and shouted to rally his men. He would cleave the bravery straight out of the heart of any warrior as he spilled the soldier's brain-matter. Havina on the other hand, released the spell sending a blast of acid raining onto the forces around her; magi and swordsmen alike would writhe in agony as their flesh and sinew dissolved into the smell of death.

Upon the sucess of the onslaught, the Jorelite planned on wasting little time leaving the area. If any men were capable of surviving, they'd be scarred forever, and the church would no longer be able to ignore the man who openly warred against them... Pulling on the reigns once more, thundering wings would carry them back into the air, and away from the destruction below.

OOC: Prob a bit cluttered, if something is confusing at all, PM and I'll do my best to clarify better :P

[Palacrisis D Jones]

A rather emotional Lieutenant Cross was busy issuing orders in the swirling whirlwind of battle and blizzard, the wind was howling as it picked up intensity whipping a white world almost horizontal across the camp. Fortunately for the lieutenant his archers had the prevailing wind at their backs unfortunately for him the visibility was down to nigh on zero . The archers loosed off more in hope than expectations.

Fidelis would have heard rather than felt the passage of the arrows as he circled the camp, the archers were good and one or two arrows passed close to the black warrior and his companion one struck the edge of the Pegasus’s wing and glanced away drawing blood but hardly incommoding the wonderful creature but in driving snow and high winds rider would notice that his mount had suffered a slight injury.

The thaums of the CoF had recovered their clara and another volley of Wrath of the Holy shattered the remaining ranks of the undead sending them back to what ever pit of Aeternia they had come from. A weak cheer rang out from the remaining troops but not for long!


The followers of Jorel were bent on dramatic vengeance and they delivered each in their own way, the necromantic spell Acid Blast was her chosen weapon, a bell like convocation of pure death designed to spread out and fall across the circumference of the battle field injuring and maiming all within its compass. The spell worked as it should have done as delivered by a master of her dark art. The acid blast spread out and began to fall towards the CoF’s troops the fact that undead still might survive was not something that appeared to have crossed the dark postmen of Jorel ‘s collective mind, undead were mere minions of the dark gods will and expendable as any soul.

However !…..what the necromancer had seemingly forgotten was the storm like winds driving snow across the battlefield. If the essences of death were evoked into the form of acid , the deadly mana had to act in the physical world like its mundane namesake ….droplets! Droplets magical or other wise are effected by wind the shape conjured by the “Thorn” lost its shape as the elements of nature buffeted the droplets. Chaos rained down on the soldiers of the CoF it was in effect raining acid and they fell screaming and rolling in snow blood mud scratching at their faces in agony blinded and scarred breathing acid mixed with snow into noses and lungs they died in agony. The effect of the Thorns spell was as she expected but not the control she expected of herself.

Cross was still screaming orders as the slightly wounded Pegasus landed and Fidelis quicker than thought had attacked the soldier with his deadly blade it was a killing stroke normally but in the press of battle a man screaming with his hands to his acid blasted face fell on top of the lieutenant as the blade fell. The acid blasted man already dead but not knowing that in the last thralls of agony took the blade on his neck and a severed head spun across the battlefield.

At the same time as the sword fell the wind bearing acid droplets caught Jorel’s postman, Fidelis would remember this brightening his face would be pocked marked with burns from the acid snow mix. His Thorn the architect of the spell hiding behind his broad back would be unscathed, the Pegasus was lucky apart from a bleeding wing tip it was undamaged.


There was nothing to prevent the warrior and his companion from gaining the skies again and riding away he had dealt a terrible blow to the church’s forces and the survivors about ten in number would remember this day forever. Lieutenant Cross was alive and he would bear the sad news of the brightenings encounter back to the Archprellate. If the postman had wanted to deliver his compliments to the Church of Faith in person he had succeeded but at a cost, his pockmarked acid burned face was now known and could be described to one and all.

What the archprellate would do with this information was a matter for him but Llanwyn was not Aerienne he could forgive …but not yet!

[Llanwyn Siannodel]

It was a dark day for the Church of Faith army, well... for the 700 that were present. The true might of the church army would come to hear this news, but what the Archprelate would command of them was anyone's guess at the moment. He was not Aerienne, not the sweet, maybe naive archprelate the church had been lead by. His forgiveness was a long reach, but it was not infinite and Llanwyn's sword was sharp. If he saw this as an act to react to, he would, and he likely would. The question was, how would he?

Cross sat in the snow, the sound of men screaming as their bodies were eaten away around them trumpeted his ears like booming marching drums. How had it come to this? They were left in Sheria to assist with aiding the countrymen. They weren't the highly trained fighters of the more elite battalions. They had children and wives, and now they were too few to mention.

He tried to stand, the world around him a spinning blur. His knees were weak, and he staggered as he took to his feet. He could see the black mass in the near distance. And as his vision focused, he could see his face. The man who had attacked them, he had been burned. Somewhere in the back of Cross' confused mind, he grinned for the pain the man suffered. This black figure had taken his men's lives, he was happy to see him suffer if only a little.

Cross turned and saw dozens of men taking their last breaths. The acid had killed quickly, leaving him, a handful of mages and a few soldiers alive in a nightmare that only moments before had been a crisp winter brightening. He gained his composure once more in only a few seconds and scuffled over to a survivor near by. "Ready yourself," he said to him in a breath short of air. He did not know what else would come if anything else. He picked up a sword off the ground and readied his shield.

[Fidelis Meridius]

OOC: A lil short and sweet...

Forces of order and chaos clashed once more as the skirmish was beginning to end as quickly as it started. One spell followed the other as the undead fell under the spell of light as the acid rained beneath the Jorelites.

Perhaps the Master Necromancer's spell could have been better. Perhaps she could have just summoned a daemon to vanquish all of their foe's. Instead, she punished the Wolf for her choice of subtly. Next time would be different, for she vowed in her silent observations behind Fidelis, that she would not make the mistake again.

The acid melted the warrior's flesh in small spots across his face. The smell of burning skin and hair steamed from his skin as he cut down his target. Releasing a gutteral roar, the warrior declared his small victory over the party beneath his feet. The roar soon turned into a laugh as he Wiped his visage along the sleeve of his right arm. The abrasions opened themselves up more, as the warrior wiped pieces of flesh from his countenance.

The pain surged through his face and body, but it was not mortal. And pain was something the warrior had learned to endure long ago, and in far greater amounts. In fact, the sensation was bitter sweat to the Jorelite as he basked in the horror of the scene. Pain was one of the few feelings within the swordsman that was all but purged from his existence, and therefore to experience it was quite fickle: It told the warrior he was still alive, and invigorated his soul, but simultaneously destroyed his body.

If two people could descend from the sky and destroy the lives of hundreds, even enduring the pain of their own attacks, then what else were they capable of?

As the injured pegasus carried the scarred Wolf back into the sky, the warrior squinted as he sought to find his way to the snow back to the safety of his camp. They now had even more work to do. The Jorelite would need to find an old friend if he was to save his form from existing in such a disgusting state for the rest of eternity, and there was much more planning to do before he made his next move against his foes.

One thing was for certain: Dark times lie ahead for the Church of Faith.

[Palacrisis D Jones]

Epilogue

The aftermath of the battle would reverberate long after the events themselves. The unnamed dark warrior and his companion had dealt a devastating blow to the ranks of the CoF.

The violence had been casual unemotional and clinical. Fate had intervened to scar the servant of Jorel his face might be repaired by the skills of arcana but deep in the his soul would he harbour a glimmer of doubt that the Wolf of Jorel had finally bitten off more than he could chew.

His challenge to the church was clear direct and unequivocal, the reply from the second largest organisation in the empire would be as direct. An attack on the men left behind to help the poor citizens of Sheria in their terrible winter of discontent was not only an attack on the church it represented an attack on the regent himself because was not regent Milo also the head of the church?

Fidelis could fly away lick his wounds and plot the next encounter with the church but the next time they would be ready to face the Wolf of Jorel. Allies and help would be drafted in to find name and destroy this anathema to the peace of the realm.

The next chapters of this story will be most interesting !