The blackness of night surrounded a winged figure as it soared through the heavens above the Salyan Desert.
It was the harpy Haranne...
She cradled the Dark Scimitar in both hands, her mane of blond hair magnificently billowing through the cold, gusty gales present in the atmosphere. The vile sword itself seemed to dimly glow...
Thoughts of the past day raced through her mind as she flew towards the Forest of Illusion en route to the Mystic Ruins.
After the arrival of those two dark allies and their hostage, the harpy had received word of another small set of ruins being located somewhere in the northern Salyan Desert, though east over the mountains from the cities of Larpa and Dalton. As most of DarkStar's minions were already busy elsewhere, the blade itself decided to investigate the site.
Before Kuyo and her companions were ready to leave the Mystic Ruins, Haranne had already spread her wings and flew off. The wizard Ornah was busy making preparations for the arrival of another of those dragon crests.
The harpy glanced up at the Blue Star as she glided among the breezes. More memories flashed by.
The site itself was, in verity, very small and uninteresting. A metallic chamber was unearthed with a nearly complete but inoperative humanoid robot. A strange set of devices had apparently been 'guarded' by this silent sentry, but the Necro Knights who had unearthed them could not make any sense of them besides a single line of text upon each.
Haranne had felt a faint tingle from DarkStar as she read the inscriptions.
ORGANIC LIFE GENERATOR.
She glanced at the dome-like machines, noticing what appeared to be the shattered remains of a few strangely shaped bones atop one.
The Dark Scimitar spoke though her and ordered the minions to guard this place well. A retrieval sortie would be sent out the next day.
Haranne gazed once more at the inactive android guardian. With a frazzled tuft of scarlet hair atop its head, it seemed out of place when compared to the other machines that they had already recovered from the other ruins. It probably had a much greater intelligence than the others, and would almost definitely know the purpose of these devices and how to operate them.
Perhaps the wizard would know a way to activate the robot...
"It must wait," the harpy muttered to herself, suddenly shivering as DarkStar felt a presence nearby.
She flapped her large feathery wings and took to the air to see the shape of a dragon flying south of her position. It was headed toward Larpa.
"Ah, they must have detected the siege... the dark warrior's plan is working... but why do we feel so weak suddenly..." Haranne seemingly asked the Dark Scimitar. The blade's vile, yet attractive voice did not respond.
Night was approaching when the winged creature began to fly back towards her current 'home'.
As her wings tried to keep Haranne aloft, she felt herself becoming weaker and weaker with each passing moment.
She clumsily soared over the Illusion Woods with only the Blue Star illuminating the sky. Her body felt deathly cold underneath her dark armor.
Suddenly, a feeling of pain flowed through her form. The creature that was once known as Jan shrieked and descended toward the forest below. She crashed through a good number of branches that comprised the dark canopy of the wooded region and continued to plummet.
Not very far away, the Plantella whom Alisia and Leo had rescued silently strode through the forests, glancing at each tree as she passed it. It had taken a good deal of plant-based energy to remake those unfortunate trees that had been destroyed by the goblins' fires, and she had spent most of the day simply basking in the sunlight to nourish her body.
Now Plantella was looking for a nice morsel to devour before retiring for the night... preferably something goblin-related to teach the foul beasts another lesson...
The plant woman's head blossom drooped slightly as she wearily walked through her home. There was barely any rustling as her light blue-toned form walked through the grassy land beneath the trees.
Nearly trailing her arm vines along the ground, a set of two noises made her stop in her tracks. First, a heavy thump resounded from the close northeast. But more importantly (to her at least) were the evil yells of a goblin horde somewhere to the north. They sounded particularly excited...
...which normally wasn't a good thing.
Haranne shakily picked herself up from the dirty ground that she had slammed into and the voice of the Dark Scimitar moaned through her.
"Ohhhhhhh..."
On her knees, the harpy turned the sword over and stared into it, her brain hurting more and more with each passing moment.
She could barely hear DarkStar speak in her mind.
"We have passed... too close... to my bane... I am not... prepared... not awakened sufficiently to combat. And my brother... has done... very draining process... even affected us at this distance."
The blade paused.
"Master?"
DarkStar continued, "I need complete rest... your mind must be freed to think on its own in that time... but I will maintain my influence on you."
Haranne responded, "I understand, master."
"Place me in the ground in this clearing... rest as you will... we shall continue our journey... tomorrow."
"Yes, master."
As DarkStar grew silent, the harpy raised the black blade and jammed it point-first into the soil at her boots.
She stepped away and watched as it performed one more task before it began to 'sleep'. A small flash of light manifested around the Dark Scimitar's handle and resolved itself into four octagonal shapes... Xevians.
Each mirror began spinning rapidly as they surrounded the sword. As they rotated faster, the blade soon seemed to vanish along with the Xevians themselves. It appeared that the magical reflections that each was casting were now effectively rendering both the mirror creatures and DarkStar invisible via an illusion.
Haranne stared into the spot where the sword actually stood and waited.
Without warning, she felt the dark clouds in her mind diminish... and another presence seemed to take over... Jan's own intellect seemed to merge with the harpy's and fight for control. Haranne suddenly felt like a new person... a mixture of her old and new selves... but the darkness that had been implanted into her brain was still present and dominant.
Though Jan wanted to, she knew that simply flying off would not be possible unless she could put some distance between her body and the evil sword... but that couldn't happen either with DarkStar's presence still governing her.
Haranne looked about at the pitch black clearing. Her somewhat enhanced eyesight was not able to detect much in her area so she began to chant and hold up her palms.
A strange orange light came into existence above each and took the form of a small fiery bird. The light emitted by each illuminated the clearing, enabling her to see that the trees densely surrounded the area. The only real openings were to the north, where she could barely make out some sort of small stone structure, and to the west, from which an uneasy breeze blew accompanied by the rustling of leaves.
Not feeling very tired, the harpy explored the area to the west first, finding nothing but another clearing with openings in nearly every direction.
Her pointed ears twitched slightly as Haranne could barely make out a faint murmuring in the distance.
She summoned more minute flaming birds and set four within this clearing as both guards and lanterns. Sighing slightly, the female trotted back into the area where DarkStar was hidden and called forth four more to light each opening in pairs.
Haranne began to sweat from both the heat that the birds emitted and the strain of spell casting as she created another pair of avian fireballs to accompany her north.
She wiped her brow with the back of a hand as she found herself in front of a desolate little building to the north. A statue of the goddess Althena stood next to the entryway, as did an empty equipment chest. A fresh smell permeated the air.
Haranne left two more small guards at the statue's side and warily entered, finding a small vestibule with doorways to the left and right. A crumbling stone sign on the bluish-colored wall was barely readable.
"Spring of Althena," the harpy read aloud to herself.
She trotted to the eastern portal and watched as her tiny fire bird companions flew towards the center of a beautiful chamber.
"Wow..." She trailed off as she looked throughout the now illuminated room. The moderately large room was adorned with stone columns and a few sculptures of dragons. Two of said carvings emitted unending streams of gleaming fluid into a wide basin that composed much of the center of the room. A thin marble walkway encircled the large spring of completely clear and clean water.
Still dripping with sweat from her flight, crash and exploration, the spring looked very inviting to the somewhat dusty harpy. At this time of night, there would certainly be no visitors (particularly this deep in the Forest of Illusion) and even if there were, her guardian phoenixes would insure she was not disturbed.
Haranne began to strip. Without a shiver, she unbuckled her shadowy armor and removed her bracers, tight black pants and boots. Leaving them in a pile near the doorway, she placed one foot into the waters to test them. The bathing liquid was soothingly cool and the harpy began to walk toward the far end where the statues were situated. The marble making up the floor of the spring's bottom felt completely smooth under her feet as the water reached up to her knees.
When she reached the more elaborate end, Haranne proceeded to remove all that remained on her body, a short cloth shirt made of black material and a small waistcloth-like bottom.
With a sigh of relaxation, the harpy spread her wings and sat in the water.
Plantella hid amongst her trees as she watched the goblins wildly dancing around a large fire.
The short green creatures were bellowing in their guttural native tongues. Off to one side stood a trio of golden-skinned monarch goblins. Also near the circle of flames sat a group of five large creatures, each similar in size and strength to the goblin warrior Squat who had fallen to Alisia Dragoon, who were greedily devouring some rotten-looking meat.
The plant woman had been around the goblins long enough in her life to understand their language. They were 'singing' for assistance in their upcoming battles... the celebration was a declaration of war.
Near the five grotesquely large goblin hunters lay heaped a pile of strange weapons. They had no blades and didn't resemble any type of bow she had ever seen before. The devices seemed to be made of a strange metal and looked similar to cylindrical clubs with holes on one end.
She translated what they were saying in her mind... and her green eyes opened wide as she heard their plans.
One of the king goblins raised his staff and spoke loudly.
"As that cult has done nothing except kill our kind (in one way or another) we are breaking off all ties and declaring war on both them and the humans! With these powerful weapons that we have 'acquired', we shall be unstoppable in our conquests!"
Another of the shriveled monarchs continued, "We shall cleanse our forest and the surrounding areas first... including that accursed plant spirit. These will be our woods alone!"
Plantella muttered softly.
"I in trouble."
She was indeed in trouble. It turned out that earlier that day, several goblin messengers had journeyed to a meeting place designated by the cult of Zophar. They whined about their failure the previous day and the massacre that occurred in the forest afterwards. The creatures demanded some form of compensation or assistance from the priests and warriors... and then threatened them. The cult reacted calmly... silently slicing a number of the messengers in two with blades and spells. However, the sect's group didn't expect the amount of them that were in hiding.
The little miscreants assaulted the cult's representatives and retreated after stealing a group of weapons from the Fly-Boys... projectile weapons which were definitely not the usual issue for the winged warriors.
The goblins had broken their ties with the cult, yet Ornah had decided to leave the misguided (and moronic) monsters to their fate... they would probably be exterminated in one of the upcoming periods anyway.
Now that they were on their own again and with 'superior' weapons, the little imps were ready to destroy everyone and dominate Lunar...
The plant girl's leafy hair shifted slightly as another cold wind blew through the forest... accompanied by a scream. The nature spirit and all of the goblins turned their attention to the east... where a bunch of running figures fled south.
"Fresh human meat," one of the hunter goblins announced, seeing a group of humans rushing past, yelling wildly. They were mostly compromised of children, except for two older women and a single uniformed man with a sword. On their tail was a herd of ten Albino Baboons... which promptly stopped in their tracks and ran back the way they had come from upon seeing the horde of VERY violent gremlins.
The five larger creatures leapt to their feet and grabbed the bizarre cylinders, yelling war cries and whooping loudly. A few of the regular sized goblins joined the chase, though it took a pair of them to carry each of the remaining weapons.
The remaining monsters continued their war dance as Plantella looked after the hunt.
Though she was still certainly wild, the blue-colored woman had been changed slightly by her experience the previous night with the two helpful humanoid strangers who had rescued her, including the 'nature guardian'. She felt like following the running humans... though not to have as a meal. The goblins that endlessly threatened her existence could serve that purpose just as well...
She broke into a run and followed.
The guard called Roy couldn't believe how horrible his luck had been that day as he puffed while he ran through the dark woods.
First that horde of monsters had gathered at the south gate... fortunately Lord Leo had shown up to vanquish them.
Then the horrifyingly huge lizard had appeared. He knew he had no chance of defeating (or even touching) the beast without being ripped to pieces, so he tried to bravely save a group of young people by escorting them away from Takkar. Roy felt terrible about those who stayed and died, but the man was certainly too scared to do anything but flee for his life. Those who joined him were mostly small children, except for a pair of middle-aged women.
Earlier that evening, he and the small group of survivors had settled down to rest just north of the Illusion Woods. They hoped to wait there until the city was safe again or some more escapees arrived. Unfortunately, one of the smaller boys, who barely understood the carnage that was going on back home, wanted to explore the forest. Against the guard's warnings, he sneaked off and entered the woods as the others ate a small dinner. Roy ran inside the edge of the wooded region and fortunately found the child simply playing nearby.
That was when the latest incident had started...
As the other children chewed on their little meals, a horrible loud roar was emitted from the north, but the magnitude of it made it seem like it was even closer than Takkar. The young ones, overcome by fright, bolted into the woods to follow the guard, soon followed by the two adults.
When they were all inside, the whimpering children's loud voices attracted a hungry group of Albino Baboons. The huge simians scared the children with their sharp fangs. Roy was about to engage them (in a fight he'd most likely lose) but the youths had already started running to the south. He had no choice but to follow and make sure they didn't run into any more trouble.
And now he was being chased by a hunting pack of goblins... how could it get any worse?
Beads of water dripped from a pale glistening leg as it was raised parallel to the surface of the spring fluid.
Haranne felt extremely relaxed... and even forgetful of DarkStar... as she placed her elevated shimmering foot atop the bent knee of her other similarly shining leg as it jut out of the water. Her wings soothingly spread as she cupped a handful of the pure water and let it drain through her hair, then down her back and chest. The tiny drops flowed smoothly down her lithe form and back into the clear liquid.
Her eyes were closed as she continued to bathe her body in the comforting spring water. She lay against one short wall of the basin and spread her arms in a stretch. Even the silent battle for dominance in her mind seemed to quiet down... Haranne savored the total peace that she was currently experiencing...
"Help!!!"
The voice of a child awakened her from the serene stupor. The winged woman slowly sat up, wondering why a young person would be around in such a dark, dangerous place. However, her comfortable setting gradually brought her to try and ignore it... why should she care?
On the northern wall of the spring structure hid the group of children and their few guardians. The goblin hunters were still chasing them, but the youths were already too tired to go any further.
"No matter what approaches, let me handle them while you run again... you should have enough time to get through while they're held up with my sword," the Takkar guard ordered to one of the women as he readied himself. The female nodded.
Sounds like pounding drums and wild screams of delight surrounded them from every direction. The thumping became louder and louder as the seconds passed, yet they couldn't see anything approaching due to the complete darkness that enveloped their huddled, frightened forms.
In actuality, the five warriors and the handful of 'normal' goblins were scattered and approaching from a variety of directions.
One pair of green dwarves somehow found a way through the labyrinth of trees and ended up at an opening in the western spring room. Both were no longer snickering with evil delight, rather the weight of the strange new weapon they toted was tiring both of them out.
Haranne closed her eyes again as she continued with her extremely sensual bath. Soaking her naked frame in the transparent pool, she barely noticed the approaching sounds from the doorway to the south. The two small fiery birds that were guarding her had flown toward her figure simply to provide warmth as she bathed.
"Hubba hubba... look at that body... not bad for a human-type, eh Torg?" murmured one gruff voice across the chamber.
"Yeah Glorg... *puff*... can't decide if we should eat her or bring her back as... *huff*... the spoils of war," the other vile beast responded.
The pair of hovering creatures screeched in warning. Haranne's ears twitched beneath the wet strands of her blond hair and her eyes snapped open.
The harpy's eyes opened wide at the sound. She sat up with a slightly shocked look on her visage.
"YOU DARE!?!" she screamed, wrapping her wings around her body. She pointed one dripping finger at the pair of surprised goblins.
The little green humanoids barely got a chance to cry out before the two mini-phoenixes soared at them. Set aflame instantly, their thrashing forms collapsed... but not before they actually got a shot off.
The harpy ducked under the waters, cursing in her mind. Gritting her teeth, she raised her head and leapt to one side of the room. The explosion had already occurred, leaving one dragon statue without its head. The gaping hole in the northern wall let a chilly draft into the once perfectly relaxing springs.
Two more fiery birds manifested from her hands and took flanking positions at her side as she heard the voices again.
"Please help! Anyone!"
A tiny rage was burning inside Haranne by now... she quickly grabbed her shirt and waistcloth and slipped them over her supple dripping body.
The rage was intense within her frame... she felt extreme heat throughout all her limbs. With her long wet mane slapping against her bare shoulders, the fervor within was building almost to an eruption.
Suddenly, she heard horrid laughter... followed by the same sound emitted by the goblins' weapon... then, only the weeping of children among the drumbeat of the goblin hunt.
The explosion created by the blast wounded Roy. His long sword clattered against the wall that prevented the other humans from escaping the area.
"The hunt seems to be over... rare and bleeding or well done, little cousins?" asked one of the larger goblins as he pointed his projectile weapon toward the huddled survivors. All of the gathered miscreants guffawed in laughter.
With the dark shadows of the forest surrounding him as he knelt on the grass and dirt, the brave guard clutched his damaged arm close to his body.
"Leave them alone! Take me instead!" he shouted.
The hunters ignored his plea.
"This is almost too easy... we'll be able to conquer all the settlements easily with this type of power!" shouted another of the tall creatures.
The children cried in fright, helplessly staring face-to-face with death.
Plantella, almost out of breath, doubled over and peered around a nearby tree. She felt like doing something to at least attack the goblins and remove the exotic weapons from their possession. Self-preservation was very important to the plant spirit... She whipped the vines that were 'wrapped' around her arms to the nearest trees and shook them. A shower of spiky thorns immediately began to fall amongst the goblins accompanied by a rumbling. Only one of the monstrous creatures was felled though. The monsters looked around wildly to find the source of the strike.
Haranne's rage was barely under control as she peered through the new opening. But the insanity of the dark cloud in her mind was suddenly eclipsed by the mere sound of the children crying...
...Jan's consciousness took over... she couldn't allow monsters to harm small children... the harpy's body was in her power now, at least for the time being. The black fog retreated to the corners of her awareness and she moved quickly to the charred goblin corpses in the chamber. Her powerful, yet limber arms snatched the fallen Pulse Vulcan (which she had already recognized as being a weapon from the various ruins) and left her other clothes and armor sitting at the stone floor.
With powerful strides, she ran across the walkway, her feet slapping softly on the ground. The phoenixes trailed her drenched hair and feathery wings.
The goblins shrieked in anger as another of their number was killed abruptly. A pair of strange flaming birds set a hunter aflame. The warrior's weapon fired straight up and created a gaping hole in the forest canopy above all of them.
The light of the Blue Star pierced the darkness around the children. A few of them looked up with hope as they watched the pair of fiery birds proceeded to fly about wildly and antagonize the goblin party.
"Die, filthy creatures!!!" a voice shouted as a figure emerged from the smashed portal in the wall behind the escapees from Takkar.
The smaller goblins screeched in horror as the shadowy person... who happened to have quite a large wingspan... opened fire with the same type of weapon they possessed. Many of the nasty dwarves were either shocked or incinerated by the speedy onslaught that the creature performed. The rest retreated to the north.
Snarling with fury, the remaining trio of goblin warriors separated and fired back as the figure was revealed in the flickering flames emitted by the pair of burning birds. It was a lightly clothed female harpy who was certainly not hesitating in trying to reduce them to ashes.
The guard Roy yelled a warning to the bizarre woman as he crawled toward one of dead goblins nearby.
Haranne emitted a screeching battle cry as she dove underneath the counterattack. Her flexible form hit the dirt and rolled past the figure of the armored man. She returned fire and found her weapon suddenly blasted from her grip.
Plantella entered the clearing as the strange creature's final attack was successful in connecting with one of the hunter's heads... showering the ground with bloody chunks (and very little in the way of brain matter). The children shrieked at the two new humanoids that were fighting the goblins. The sight of blood caused a few of them to hide their eyes...
...the view of one of the green-skinned hunters ready to aim his weapon at the defenseless humans again made the rest of them follow suit.
"Hold it or the kiddies vanish!"
Neither goblin warrior noticed that Roy had stealthily reached one of the dropped shooting weapons and was aiming it toward them. He only hoped that the first button he'd push would cause the thing to fire. There wasn't enough time to try them all...
The harpy and her flanking phoenixes froze in their tracks... but the plant woman didn't. Her arm vines whipped along the ground and tripped up both warriors as each fired. One blast nearly clipped Haranne's head while the other shot went straight up and disintegrated more of the unfortunate trees.
Plantella growled in anger at the damage to her home and wrested the cylinder from the second hunter's arms... then strangled him. Haranne grabbed the fallen long sword as the first fighter rose to his feet, ready to fire again.
The goblin was certainly surprised when a beam of energy slammed into his weapon and caused it to explode violently. Roaring in pain as several pieces of shrapnel pierced his hideous form, he glared at the courageous guard. He looked back at the harpy, cackled and then unbuckled a nasty axe from his belt.
He swung the blade far too high... and it proved a fatal error.
The winged woman's sword seemed to ignite with flames engulfing it as flew in a deep, wide arc. She shrieked a few incomprehensible words as the blade easily and swiftly cut through the goblin's frame and weapon. The severed halves dropped to the soil, the top part still gurgling curses as blood oozed from its mouth and severed torso.
Plantella nodded at Haranne and Roy and proceeded to bring the sickening corpses out of the clearing.
The harpy let the sword drop to her feet... a split second before a bunch of children rushed up to her and latched onto her knees and legs, sobbing in gratitude.
She didn't know what to do, other than just stand there.
The guard slowly got to his feet.
"Some sort of winged girl and one of those wild plant spirit creatures... actually saved us? I don't understand it..."
"I'm grateful for the assistance... though I may not express it later... when I'm not myself anymore," the harpy sadly said to Plantella.
"No, I thank you. You help remove danger goblin weapons. You also save young humans. Good heart, me thinks," the plant woman responded.
They were currently all within the western spring chamber.
"You should be safe here for the night. Travelling should be safer in the day... I would accompany you, but I fear I will not still be here in the morning."
Roy nodded.
"We are certainly thankful, ah..."
"Call me Haran... Jan... never mind. I'll sleep in the other chamber... good night," she said briskly, hoping to return to relaxation (and hopefully sleep) in the eastern spring before the black clouds of DarkStar dominated her mind again.
Confused, the uniformed guard nodded as she turned and left.
Plantella accompanied her part of the way.
"You say strange things before. I no understand."
"Please... you don't have to understand," Haranne responded, "I have to continuously fight something worse than those goblins... myself..."
"Huh?"
The harpy closed the subject.
"No one is safe around me... please, watch the humans for this night... and see if you can assist the injured one... I must be alone."
The nature spirit shrugged and nodded then walked toward the smashed opening in the north wall of the east room. She looked back to see Haranne smash the remaining cylindrical 'blasters' with a single fire bird, then settle restlessly on the pile of armor that she had left there.
Plantella continued outside the structure to feast. She would then return to heal the wounded man with the inherent healing energies that flowed through her natural magic.
This had been the second extraordinarily strange being she had met in the past two days... it must have been a sign of things to come... but would her forest home survive such events?
Haranne, meanwhile, experienced a great battle in her dreams that night... one that would return and haunt her as long as the Dark Scimitar controlled her...