Bertan`s quest by Michelle Tarynne (ereader android .txt) 📕

The King Cassess of the Short Sword was lost to the memories of his youth, recalling the way sky-boats had soared into the night sky on their journey to and from the Inner Block. The secret of the right elements composition that had enabled engines to work with enough force to raise the boats high into the sky had been lost the same moment everything else had been lost for Swords.
He knew all too well there was no way to uproot the Wall or to damage it at any place for, unknown to the younger Sword generations, the whole structure had been an integral piece of the Mine and the Inner Block itself. He discovered that purely by accident during his own work-time in the Inner Block. He wasted no time in his plans and preparations to consider tearing it down.
Cassess looked with a great displeasure at the coarse and unsophisticated machines the Swords had to use now to get over the Wall. Their current great inventors could never measure up not only with the ancients but also with the minds killed during the Skyfire Storm.
Forgoing its primitivism the catapults had been known and tested to work without a glitch. He watched as the first team of ten Swords had been preparing to board it the moment the fire subsided low enough not to fry them. A large sheet of strong fabric held by each of them slowed their descend enough so their bones were left intact. He hated how much the Swords had degraded throughout the times, how unreachable the ancients had become in their knowledge and talents. Nothing great about them anymore but their ever growing size.
"My Lord," Ash started timidly once he reached Cassess. It was about the same place and position the King had been at since at the moment of his earlier departure, still staring into the white flames. "We have failed to bring the kites."
"May you tell me why?" The King was too calm on the outside not to harbor a great uproar deep within, hiding it too well.
"The Royal City of Naam was deserted when we arrived. Everything and everyone had vanished." Ash looked right into the royal eyes.
"What do you mean vanished? That's not possible!" Cassess cried out loud.
"No person or slave had been present, but it seems most of the possessions were gone too. No signs of struggle could be seen." Ash explained, his disrespect and dislike for The King growing with every moment they spent in discussion.
"How is that even possible? We could not have been here long enough for the whole city to empty out." Cassess’ eyes flashed reflecting the white fire he was staring at mindlessly.
"I don't know, my King, I'm sharing what we witnessed only. The Unnamed decided to stay and investigate the unnatural state of things to ensure your safety upon the return to the City." Ash bowed his head to hide his disgust with the New King.
"Fine." The king closed his eyes and frowned deep in thought. "We have to wait it out after all. Just as you wished, Ash." He seethed through his teeth at the seemingly troubled and frightened Ash who started to retreat slowly.
As expected, Cassess did not really care about the City and its inhabitants and most certainly would not bother his mind with that riddle when the Wall, the biggest structure the Swords had erected, still waited to be breached and reclaimed.
"Look!" Ash called in awe, the King Cassess followed this command and smiled.
It was the moment when the fire-wells failed. Distrustful of the sudden luck Cassess hailed his troops to make no move. The Wall gleamed invitingly in the distance, like a mirage straight out of his dreams. It was right there, waiting for his arrival, urging him to reclaim his rightful heritage. Every Sword present by his side looked at him expectantly.
"Send one unit to reach the Wall. This might be another trap to seize our remaining troops," the King said cautiously.
"Yes, my Lord."
One of the silver guards took his order and ran towards the first unit. The first for glory or death. During the wartime, there was no real distinction between the two. For the glory often accompanies the death and doom. For a very long time nothing happened. No more fires blazed into the night sky. The first unit reached the Wall unharmed. Not a sound disrupted this first quiet victory. The Sword King, still wary, held his breaths close to his chest.
"Prepare the catapults for breach, all around the Wall at once, but start with every fifth machine to enter the fire zone," he whispered to the second silver guard. He was too anxious to fully embrace his luck. The horns blew, and his troops quickly entered the fire-zone with their machines. Every unit was at the ready to breach the Wall soon, and all of them were itching to start their march towards the Inner Block.
"Call upon the platform technicians first. They need to be among the first troops to cross the Wall, to fix the tracks for our use," Cassess commanded to his guards.
"Of course, my King."
"Send the breaching equipment just after the technicians. Those machines are too slow to send the whole army in time. Time is our enemy now," he said to his silver guards. Hope started to swell within every Sword core. The victory and reclaiming of the long lost Mines seemed at arm's length.
Cassess watched the troop units flying over the Wall with a twinge of jealousy. He would never admit his fear of flying, the real reason behind the plan to use the breaching equipment as ropes and makeshift elevators after the first troops reached the enemy lands. It was the only way he would be able to dig his feet into the inner Wall territories to reclaim them and he waited impatiently for that moment.
"Let's go," he finally commanded to everyone around him to follow.
The Fates granted him a moment of glory when he stood where the sky met the surface, the ledge of the Wall, the in-between place of his very dreams. He took a deep breath few moments later, digging his feet into the Inner Wall Territories to celebrate his victory, the very moment the Fates ceased to cooperate. The moment the first Swords reached the Inner Wall Territories. Unrest shook the surface, straight to the roots of their demise. It was the land, the Swords craved so much, that ceased to cooperate, breaking under their feet.
Overgrown bodies were thrown in the air to fly, gentle as stones. They were falling, like an unforgiving rain to the whimpering ground. There was a minuscule , almost imperceptible change in the way winds howled. Dryness subsided giving way to the unbearably humid stench.
On the outside of things, everything was going as planned. Dust was ever-present from the moment they touched the ground. The Dust was so thick that it shrouded the sky above, like a sandstorm born through unnatural means.
It was such a great mystery. How could the Swords hold such a control over this land, that it would strive to rebel against their brute strength and weight? The land would rebel in the same way the Axes had before. Suddenly, the only known thing was the unchanged space around. What used to be the curse of the worst kind, they welcomed as a blessing now
Unholy spirits left the caverns beneath, mingling with the Dust, rejoicing their freedom. The end was nearing and the Swords were blind and deaf to all of the signs around.
The biggest ones never heed any warnings until it's already too late and their fall is imminent. Should the Fates care for the stupid and for the too big to fail?
In the middle of the great sea of nothingness, lone, lost, and beridden cores sparkled with clarity, awaken in time for the last time before the end of that time. Time had changed in their absence, but everything else stayed the same.
The land of shadows turned into dust, so that it would never be called land again. It's still there, the deserts that grow into the freed space.
The Fates dictated the paths to take , supplied the words to utter, and inspired the unthinkable. Was it the Fates orchestrating that Sword minds grew wider and their will to resist weakened? Was it why the mad spirits had taked control of the Sword bodies in the way blood madness claimed the Axes?
The rain came down unexpectedly. The attackers didn’t think much of it, blissfully  ignorant to the fact that  not one drop of water fell from the sky within the Wall Territories ever since the  Wall had been erected. The Swords couldn’t perceive the abhorrent anomaly that rain represented to the land they re-walked and re-claimed.
Not one of them took any interest in the color of the falling water, nor they looked around to notice the clouds. The shapeless shadows were rising from the ground rather than travelling through the skies.
All that mattered was the victory. Cassess raced towards the Inner Block with the speed only the upgraded by the Axes platforms could achieve. He chose to ignore that fact, as otherwise it would mean he’d have to admire them.  Stupid and grand never give any credit to the ones that don’t belong with them.
He laughed when he finally saw the Inner Block dancing in front of his eyes in the distance. The Victory was his, the Wall breached and reclaimed, the land almost back into their hands again. There was only a small thing to do left, a formality, really.
By no means could it be a fair fight. Cassess was easily twice the Red Axe' size and even more of his strength. Even though the Axe King was armed in fearless blood madness, nothing could shield him from the Invisible Blade made to cut not only through the flesh and bone. Any metal anyone could ever think of was of no meaning as it stopped only at the stone. Back in the ancient times, there had been artifacts of stone skillfully turned into threads of armor. Artifacts like that none of the Swords could recall to existence ever again. Nothing and no one was safe from its power ever since.
"Finally, we meet, slave," he said leisurely, taking his seat right on the throne, mocking his seething opponent that was being crushed into the floor by his feet. "You know, you still can save your life to me. You do not have to die at this moment," he paused with a cruel smile, "All you have to do is to pledge your underserved freedom to me, to my kind, and become what you have always been, a slave to my will."
"Never!" Red Axe seethed breathing heavily, for the heaviness of the other King foot was crushing and cutting deeply into his chest. "We will be free in our deaths at your hands, never your breathing slaves!"
"Ah, at my feet you mean. I will kill you with pleasure. But be sure that you have never been really free, always full of fear at our shadows. Your inferior kind is and always will be slaves for us." Cassess raised his hand to give the final blow with his treasured Invisible Sword and cut the usurper's