Kneel Before the Adzarch

Goleil could feel his heart pounding in his chest. His blood rushed through his veins and carried a strange power he didn't quite understand. It surged and fell like the tides but was unpredictable.

As he rushed towards the dozens of knights, he could feel something click in his mind, like enlightenment. Time seemed to slow, and his senses sharpened as he directed the energy circulating through his body towards his eyes and ears.

He watched as blue vestiges began to curl off his adversaries' bodies as they circulated their mana to their maximum.

Inwardly, Goleil chuckled at his insanity. Barely a day or two ago, he couldn't even fend off four krodian knights, and now he dared to challenge over sixty?

And yet, he couldn't help look upon these sixty brave champions, men who had trained their entire lives, as nothing more than squires.

He moved like lightning. He was upon them before they could barely speak a word.

The knights were still in groups of three. When he arrived at the first group, he threw the brick at the first man, caving in his helmet from the force.

The scent of fresh blood assaulted Goleil's nose as he kicked a crater into the next man, sending him crashing into another group of knights.

Ty'Bral chuckled. "You won't win this if you limit yourself to merely physical attacks."

"I'm aware," Goleil said, "But I have no idea how to project my mana into a spell!"

"Figure it out, or you're probably going to die."

Goleil gritted his teeth as he fought, trying to keep to the outsides of the quickly regrouping knights.

"Form up together! Quickly!"

"No, maintain your groups but clump together!"

Goleil grabbed a knight by the arm and threw him across the Colosseo like a rag doll, landing in the uprights like a sack of potatoes as the Lords and Ladies of Redvale cheered for their champions.

As he fought, Goleil understood his power more and more. He felt as if with each heartbeat, power pulsed through him, circulating along with his bloodstream.

Unbeknownst to him, dark red curls of energy began to escape from his body as if he were some dark god.

Ty'Bral raised an eyebrow.

Goleil picked at the edges of the group and had taken ten of them before the knights finally regrouped under one man. The short but powerful knight was clad in gleaming armor and wielded a greatsword.

He stuck within the group's center while all the knights had formed ranks in a circular formation, protecting all sides.

His dark brown eyes stared into Goleil's golden ones as the battlefield became still.

"What will you do now?" He whispered.

Goleil stalked around the massive formation like a panther, searching for weak points and finding none.

He sighed. "How annoying..." He said.

Goleil closed his eyes.

He used the chaotic energy within as if it were mana, searching his own body. With each heartbeat, his understanding grew.

Goleil could feel that although power circulated with his bloodstream instead of the mana circuits, it operated on very similar principles. The mana core stored the body's mana; if that mana was enough, it could be projected outwards in a spell.

If the eldritch magic operated on the same principle...

The knights held their breath as they stared at Goleil's unmoving body.

"...What is he doing?" One asked.

"How am I supposed to know?"

Tyria frowned. Would he give up so soon into the battle? Perhaps she had overestimated him. Perhaps he needed her help-

Suddenly, his aura exploded. The dark red firmament that had been confined to his body had been released, raging around him like a blood storm.

Goleil chuckled, and the very air reverberated with power. He opened his eyes and within his golden iris' were red flecks.

"I've done it..." He whispered as he looked at the tempest around him. Although he could barely control its power, he could feel it in everything he did. Even his voice was a weapon.

He locked eyes with the man leading the group of remaining knights, and in his eyes, he could sense fear. It was a primal one, the kind that prey feels when a predator is near.

Goleil gathered some of the eldritch power in his throat and spoke.

"Kneel!" He commanded.

Silence befell the Colosseo as the cheers immediately ceased.

Instantly, the man prostrated himself before Goleil. His helmet slammed into the ground as he desperately tried not to be perceived as food.

But he was not the only one.

The other fifty knights crumpled to the ground, the scent of urine and sweat thick in their nostrils. They violently shook as they dug their bodies into the ground, trying to get as low as possible.

The uprights shook as countless Lords and Ladies fell to their knees.

Mord found himself with a bottomless pit in his stomach, feeling a fear he'd only felt once before. Tears pooled in his eyes as he fell to his knees.

Gwen gasped for breath on her hands and knees, feeling as if Goleil had just caved in her breastplate once more. The hair on her neck stood up, feeling like the Sword of Damocles loomed overhead.

Erikson immediately fell unconscious, and Tyria was once again brought to that dark room where she had seen Goleil's anger once before.

'This... shouldn't be possible...' Ty'Bral thought as he fell to his knees. 'I am nothing but a fragmented piece of his mind... so why am I affected?!'

He struggled to look up at Goleil and attempted to rise from his knees.

Upon laying his eyes on the Sun Guard, his vision darkened. But for those few seconds, he saw not a man but a monster.

When Ty'Brals vision returned, he was standing on a dark plain, with endless fog around him.

But something was different, wrong. Ty'Bral felt he was being watched by an omnipotent being and hadn't bothered to conceal it.

Ty'Bral shivered and peered into the fog when two golden eyes opened within the fog, the rest of the body concealed by the darkness.

Before Ty'Bral could react, he felt like a massive hand was gripping him, making it impossible to move, speak, and breathe.

The pressure increased, and its sheer might expelled the air in his lungs. His eyes went bloodshot, and his tentacle-like appendages swelled dangerously as the pressure became too much to bear.

He pleaded with his eyes as he could feel his life slipping away.

'This can't be the end! Please! I beg of you!"

The pressure disappeared, and he fell to the ground gasping for air.

The shape within the darkness spoke, its voice like a grating of nails on stone.

"Kneel before the Adzarch."

And suddenly, he was back in the Colosseo, kneeling before Goleil.