Lei vs Cardon(Psycholor version)
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Yesterday's matches sure had a lot of buildup, but for today we have matches with such lengths that you can pretty much call them Epics. However, for today... In the blue corner, we have the "guy who's very insistent on being a vampyre despite having no pyromancy to speak of" - Cardon Voss! And on the red corner, we have the fully psychic 'expendable' of Nova Ordo - Rén Lei! 

Cardon Voss vs Rén Lei

 

Cardon stood atop the edge of the cliff, looking down at the lake below. With a sigh, he glared up at the sun. Ever since he had been given his visor, the accursed Sage Coalition had begun forcing him to go out and clean up their messes even during the day. While his skin might not burn anymore, it did not mean that the light was not painful for his eyes.

Off in the distance, he could see the food that he was forbidden from eating, the observers sent to ensure the outcome of this farce. It will begin when I enter the valley… those fools. Cardon had not been told very much, the Sages did not trust him in the slightest, one of the few intelligent stances they held. All he had been told was that there was a dispute over some business venture, and in typical mortal fashion, it would be settled via fighting.

“Go to Gizha Lake, fight the opponent you find there, and do your best to win. Do not cause harm to the observers sent by the local warlord.” Those had been his orders, and now someone was going to die. His heart burned at the indignity of being ordered around by mere humans. Still, to think it would wind up turning out like this, it’s beautiful in a certain way…

Cardon could remember the event that created this place; when the Pugilist Hero Gizha had smittenthe Demon God the force of his fist had blown away the terrain down to bedrock, the shockwave raising steep cliffs in an instant. That hero… he… he was special, for a human. One of the few mortals that had truly impressed him, Cardon looked at this lake as a piece of Gizha’s legacy.

And now he had been ordered to defile it with combat. There was little doubt in his mind that any battle he would fight today would do little to honor Gizha’s memory. The mortals of the current age were simply not strong enough. There were exceptions of course, that bitchy human girl had some impressive control of her mana, and the sea-kin was a testament to her kind’s affinity for water control. But the strong mortals of the present age lacked the dignity they had possessed so many years ago. The bitchy girl was well, a bitch. While the sea-kin had allowed herself to be blackmailed, without even trying to fight back.

Cardon let out another sigh and dropped down into the valley, landing on the soft white sand that formed the beach around the lake. Gazing out across the water, Cardon narrowed his eyes, hoping to find any visible trace of his quarry. An instant later, he jumped back and an arrow sailed past where he had been standing, tossing up a cloud of the white sand when it impacted some distance behind him.

★★★★★★

Lei lay on their stomach, eyes closed, unaware of their surroundings. Roughly forty five meters away, they were also in a fish. There was nothing in the rules about when they were supposed to arrive for a fight, so Lei had made a point of coming early. Of course, in coming early, they were forced to experience the anticipation of the duel to come. That was doing absolute wonders for their nerves and budding sense of trepidation.

From their submarine vantage point, Lei watched as a figure wearing some form of military uniform crested the cliff. They look human at least… they thought to themself. Lei kept watch on the figure through the fish’s eyes, watching as he observed the arena from his vantage point. Before long, he took a step forward and dropped off the cliff. Never mind, not human. I should have expected they would send a monster.

Indeed, the fall their opponent had just willfully experienced had been well over twenty meters, any ordinary person would have at the very least, shattered their legs. Lei expanded their awareness out away from the fish, and into a tiny speck of consciousness, a mosquito or gnat presumably. Either way, it could fly and that’s all that mattered.

Their opponent walked to the edge of the water, but no further, and began to scan the lake edge. From where they left their body, their opponent should be just on the edge of their bow’s effective range. Lei silently drew an arrow and notched it. They drew back, and held the draw position at halfway, ready to fully draw and loose the projectile at a moment’s notice. Manipulating an insect’s small ego was fairly easy, but it was still slightly draining. Lei directed the insect to close the distance to their opponent; they would need to get it within three meters of him in order to reach his mind. Lei reached out from the mind of their insect, and immediately felt sick.

Their target’s consciousness was vast, plain and simple. If the insect they had been using was a spark, then a regular human might be akin to a candle. Some of the more long lived races, such as elves could grow into a crackling fire. This man no, this monster, his consciousness was as a burning sun, dense and hot. Lei was overcome with a sense of vertigo at the sheer scale of this mess they had been thrust into. How… where… THIS is the kind of fighter the Coalition can prepare!?

Lei took a deep breath. There was no way they could connect to such a mind. Changing tactics, they directed the insect to a good vantage point and finished drawing their bow. One more moment to line up their shot with the point of view provided by the hovering insect, and then they loosed the arrow. Their bow made nary a sound as the string snapped forward, and the arrow, specially crafted as it was, hardly disturbed the air as it flew, emitting no more than a low whistle. But somehow, the opponent responded at the last moment, making a large jump to the side. Lei’s arrow sailed right past their opponent and impacted the sand several dozen meters beyond.

Lei felt a chill run down their spine, as her opponent stared straight at their real body. A low, tired voice called out over the water, though its gravitas carried well in the still air. “I know you are there. I will never be hunted with such pallid methods as yours. Show yourself, so that we can end this.” Lei sighed to themselves, then cursed their own foolishness. Of course he couldn’t see me, my camouflage is perfect; there was no way he would have been able to figure out where I am!

 

Lei waited with baited breath, waiting for their target to lapse in focus. He’s just… staring at me. There’s no way he should be able to see, but… Lei could feel their heartbeat beginning to race, and the cold sweat beading up on their brow threatened to drip into their eyes. 

...

...Fucking hell, what is this guy? her target had remained perfectly still for nearly half an hour, with arms folded, merely gazing in Lei’s general direction. The degree to which he remained motionless, it was uncanny. Something about his demeanor, it sparked a sort of primal fear in their heart. I’ll have to go for it, he’s already proven that he can dodge my arrows when he doesn’t know they’re coming… I wish the sun would hurry up and set, this heat is getting a bit uncomfortable. Besides, I can move about more easily in the dark. 

Lei swallowed audibly, and forced their mind to focus. Controlling their breathing, they were able to maintain a sense of self in the face of what may as well have been an unfathomable abyss. Focus, Lei. Remember why you're here, what you did to get here. You’ve faced off with monsters and spirits before… Then again Fish, Silver, and several of their other past adversaries, while they might have been strong physically they had still been “normal”. Their minds might’ve been alien but the thought patterns were still familiar, the scale of the psyche, manageable.

After some hesitation, Lei reached out and established the link. Tentatively, Lei called out to their opponent across the psychic connection. After all, they needed information in order to figure out how to win. The best way to get that would be to try and distract them through conversation and hopefully goad out some sort of weakness, “Hello? I’m your opponent. I’m using telepathy to-”

“To speak to my mind. I would advise against that.”

★★★★★★

Cardon had been waiting for nearly half an hour for the human to move from where they were hiding. He could of course have made his way over to the spot the arrow had come from, and conduct a manual search. However it was possible that if he did that, the human would rabbit to another hole. This one seemed to be somewhat skilled at hiding themselves at least.

Just as he was debating the efficacy of the aforementioned manual search, Cardon felt a prick on his mind. He narrowed his eyes. This… this is a mental connection… humans of this era can still do something like that…? He was mildly intrigued now, though not enough to move from his spot.

After a moment, his patience was rewarded, “Hello? I’m your opponent. I’m using telepathy to-”

Cardon fired off a thought down the link, he didn’t need a mortal to explain itself to him, “To speak to my mind. I would advise against that.”

There was silence along the link for a moment, until the human finally responded, “So you are familiar with mind magic.” Cardon chose not to respond; this was getting tiresome. He uncrossed his arms, and began to walk in the direction the first arrow had come from. There was another prick at his consciousness, this one a bit harder.

Cardon spun around and grabbed at an arrow that was flying towards his thigh. As soon as it made contact with his hand, it dissipated into mist. An illusion then. So the mortals really do still have some skilled practitioners of Mind Magic. Cardon felt a smile begin to form on his lips. Perhaps this will be fun after all…

Another arrow came towards him, this time from up on the cliff. An illusion, or did the rabbit grow teeth? Cardon decided then to test the human’s mettle directly. Brazenly, he continued walking toward where they were hiding, ignoring the arrow flying towards him from the cliff. As expected, it dissipated into mist as it hit him.

Three arrows flying towards him now, one from the cliff, from out over the water, and one from the place the meal was waiting for him. Disappointing. Of course it would be impossible to have fired an arrow from the water, impossible for the human to have scaled the cliff without him noticing. Therefore, it could only be that they had not moved at all, and fired the arrow from their original hiding spot.

The arrow from over the lake dissipated into mist, the arrow coming down from the cliff likewise vanished. The arrow coming straight ahead, Cardon waited to the last moment, and leaned to the side allowing it to pass harmlessly. His knee exploded into bloody fragments, as the fourth arrow, that had been rendered nearly invisible, struck its target.

★★★★★★

I hit him! Lei was quite pleased with the result of their gamble, and it truly had been a gamble; requiring them to seemingly make a mistake and reveal their ability to craft illusions. First creating the image of an arrow coming from behind their opponent, then the arrow coming from the top of the cliff. Obviously there was no way that they could have made it up to the ridge in order to make that shot. The final touch had been creating four illusions at once.

The attack had been quite taxing, requiring them to maintain three fake arrows from three different directions, as well as remove one real arrow. Thankfully, it seemed that the opponent had more or less normal senses, so each individual illusion had been easy to craft. Lei could have tried drawing on the opponent’s memories of what an arrow might look or sound like, but they were leery of the thought of attempting to draw anything from such a vast mind, especially when he had demonstrated some level of ability with telepathy already.

Lei’s fears aside, the fact that the target’s senses were nothing special was in and of itself somewhat frightening, as it indicated a high degree of battle experience; determining the position of an archer from only a single projectile’s trajectory was no small feat. Lei notched another arrow and stood up; this would reveal them to their opponent of course, but from a standing position they could fire much faster. With the target now rendered imobile due to their destroyed knee, Lei was hoping to outpace their ability to dodge with sheer volume of fire.

Besides, they had hidden a secret in that last attack; the final arrow had been special. With one of their prepared poisons coating the arrow that had destroyed his knee, the target should now be feeling extremely dizzy, coupled with his missing leg, and he should be struggling to even remain upright, let alone be able to dodge or avoid the attacks.

As they rose up, Lei paused for just a moment. Their opponent was not reacting at all how one might expect somebody whose knee had just been eviscerated to react. Rather than rolling about on the floor in agony, their opponent had leaned forward, shifting his center of gravity to his good leg. What’s more, he didn’t look even remotely pained. In fact, he was smiling. Not a happy smile, but rather the thin smile of someone who had seen or experienced something exceptionally infuriating. Indeed, for the first time since the start of their game of cat and mouse, Lei was receiving signals of an emotion other than boredom; namely, cold fury. Cold fury, and for some reason shame. The taxing application of her mental talents for the previous trick had already pushed them one step towards the limit, lifting some of her emotional guards, as a result, Lei felt a shiver run down their spine.

Lei took a deep breath, and began to rapidly fire their remaining arrows. To keep Albino, entitled so due to his pale skin and red eyes, from becoming complacent, Lei mixed in a handful of illusory arrows among the more traditional projectiles. Watching on with slight satisfaction, Lei breathed out a sigh of relief as arrow after arrow impacted their opponent. But that relief was short lived; Albino, though his body jumped at each arrow’s impact, remained on his foot. Like a man possessed, despite the numerous arrows piercing his flesh, he would not fall.

What was more, Albino began to limp, slowly, unsteady on his damaged legs. Limping towards them. Inch by inch. It was then that Lei noticed something else; his blood was boiling. No, not from anger. Albino’s blood was literally boiling. Wherever it happened to splash, a few moments later it would begin bubbling, and then burn away leaving the ground untouched. As he limped towards her, Lei noticed as well that he was limping in such a way that kept the damaged portions of his uniform in shadow.

“A vampire…” inadvertently, Lei sent their conclusion down the mental link. Such was their surprise at seeing such a rare creature.

“Wrong. Not a Vampire.” Lei had not realized that they had sent the thought along the link, so receiving a response startled them, causing them to loose the next arrow before properly aiming. Until this point, Lei had been aiming around Albino’s legs and abdomen, attempting to incapacitate him. Even the servants of the Coalition deserved a second chance at life. Their misfired shot, however, went high such that it would pierce Albino’s heart.

Lei’s first thought was regret, assuming that their opponent was about to meet their death. However their second thought was surprise, as the opponent stumbled forward with purpose, and the arrow impacted their collar instead. But if that had caused surprise, what Albino invoked next was pure fear. Reaching up, he gripped the shaft of the arrow in his collar, and pulled it out, “You can have this toy back.” That said, Albino tossed the arrow into the air, where it curved towards where Lei was standing.

Lei let out a short yelp of surprise at the absurdity; Albino was still a little over thirty meters away, and yet had been able to get the arrow to fly towards his target with pinpoint accuracy. Lei dove to the side, off balance, and skidded along the ground. Forced out of cover due to the unexpected attack. At least it isn’t moving as fast as if it had been fired by a bow. Lei’s thoughts were met by a sharp pain in their leg. Looking over in shock, Lei observed that the arrow had seemingly changed course mid flight and penetrated their thigh. What? Some kind of telekinetics? Lei snapped their head up towards Albino, barley managing to keep the pain from being visible on their face.

Meeting their eyes, the opponent smiled. “The sun’s getting real low… and you’re out of arrows.” Indeed, Lei’s hand brushed the quiver and found it to be empty. Their eyes snapped back to the target, and they watched as he began removing the arrows one by one and snapping them all in half, as if to say that he didn’t see the need to throw them at Lei. The entire time, he simply stared at Lei, unblinking. His eyes clearly looked down on them as something… lesser.

Lei felt a shiver; they only had a few moments of day left before the sun dropped below the cliffs and light no longer entered the valley. They reached for their blade and gripped the hilt, their hand shaking slightly. Why did I agree to this...? To make matters worse, in their moment of hesitation, it became apparent that the arrow wounds they had inflicted on Albino were beginning to close, slowly but surely. Even the exploded knee was now mostly restored.

Some primal intuition was tugging at Lei, pushing them towards a conclusion of despair. I can’t win in melee, not against an opponent who can shrug off arrows like that. My only chance would have been a mortal wound with the bow, but even then would I have been able to kill him? I should have listened to Cemile; this tournament is a death march. 

There was only one way out, but it was a massive gamble. If it paid off, then Lei would be able to claim victory. If it failed, then it was practically a certainty that they would never see their loved ones again, judging by the man’s cold gaze. 

Lei inhaled sharply and grabbed their chilli bomb. Shutting their eyes, they tossed the bomb at Albino. Hopefully, and banking on the fact that he wouldn’t bother dodging, the bomb would be able to buy them enough time. Lei then dove. Dove into the seemingly infinite abyss that was Albino’s psyche. As their awareness of their body faded, they heard a chilling remark in an almost gleeful tone. “So you can even do that! Well then, maybe not all the mortals of this era are a lost cause. Come! Come inside and struggle! Struggle for your right to exist!” It’s easier than usual, as if… as if he isn’t resisting my intrusion at all… The implications of that thought shook Lei, giving Albino the first move in the coming mental battle.

★★★★★★

Lei opened their eyes, then opened them wider in surprise. They had been expecting to be on the back foot, but not to such a degree. Normally, when first engaging in a Psycho-Pneumatic Domination, the mental battle would start in a vast white empty void with a black floor and sky. From there, both participants would begin manifesting mental constructs and projecting torrents of psychic energy in a bid to outdo the other.

That was not what had happened here. Lei found themself in a foyer of an opulent mansion. Frankly, it seemed reminiscent of the western style residences Emperor Meng, who had caused Lei to flee their home country, would build off the backs of slave labor. If anything, it was even grander. Fine paintings and tapestries adorned the walls, with furniture that looked to have cost more than a whole village back in Jingzhu.

Lei looked around the room for any sign of Albino’s thought avatar; since they didn’t recognize any of the structure they were in, it could be assumed that Albino had managed to seize immediate control of the mindscape. Given the magnitude of his psyche though, that much was to be expected. Lei glanced down at their hand and, in their head, conjured an image of Cemile and Zheng’s face. Drawing on the desire to survive and see their wife and brother again, Lei manifested a psychic copy of their bow into their waiting hand.

There were two doorways in the foyer, one of which would lead outside if this were a real home. The other was at the top of a large staircase that sat central within the room. There were an additional two doorways on either side of the foot of the stairs, however these were boarded over. A stark contrast to the rest of the room’s opulent nature.

Lei looked between the two doors, and then made their choice. Ascending the stairs, they approached the large double door and pushed it open. Swinging open on silent, well oiled hinges, they emerged not into a hallway as one might expect. Rather, into a room that looked a bit like a parlor. Sat facing the doorway, holding a book was a young child. A boy with black hair, pale skin and red eyes.

Lei hesitated in raising their bow; while the child was superficially similar to Albino, this was clearly just a boy. Normally, a person’s thought form was directly comparable to their most true self. To alter a mental avatar to such a degree was likely impossible; you would have to lie so convincingly that you believed it yourself. Doing something like that would be tantamount to personal suicide, whatever resulted would no longer be you, or atleast not truly you. For someone like Albino who had such a grand consciousness, his identity should be strong enough to cause his thought form to appear as an Adonis Demigod, not a harmless child. It’s likely a manifested memory… but could he really do that to the extent of creating a living entity…?  In that case, I’ll just have to dispose of it.

As they drew back the bow, the child looked up at them and cocked his head to the side, “Who are you?” Lei stayed their hand. Manifested memories shouldn’t be able to interact so directly like this. That meant that this child was Albino, but that didn’t make any sense at all given what they had seen so far.

Lei hesitated, then lowered their bow. I might be able to learn something. With such reasoning, they approached the child. Slowly, so as not to cause fright, Lei came to the child’s side, “My name is Bai Bao, what’s your name?” the child tilted his head. “I’m Cardon!”

Lei nodded, “And what is that you’re reading, Cardon?” Gleefully, the child picked up the book and showed the cover. The book was titled “The Shepherd Boy”, a title Lei was unfamiliar with. Just as they were about to ask for more details, as a way to potentially gain trust, the boy Cardon stiffened.

“Is something the matter?” Lei asked the boy. In response, he extended a finger and pointed in the direction Lei had come from. Turning around, Lei beheld a figment of abject terror. Vaguely reminiscent of a wingless bat, two long fangs stretched from a grinning human mouth. What should have been it’s wings were instead two skeletal arms, each a size too large for the creature’s body.

The creature held still for a moment before crouching down. Lei recognized the pose from all of the hunts they had embarked on. It’s preparing to pounce. Lei swiftly drew back and fired an arrow. The psychic projectile flew straight and impacted the creature. The blow was however, glancing. The creature, whatever it was, had defenses created from something stronger than Lei’s current desire to survive.

Lei could enhance their attack by using a stronger image, however at that moment, the creature lunged. Lei threw themself to the ground, causing the creature to fly over the top of them. Out of the corner of their eyes, Lei saw the boy running through a doorway and out of the room. As much as they loathed the idea of leading the creature towards the boy, Lei needed time to manifest a stronger weapon. They grit their teeth and lunged at the door, slipping through it and out into the sunshine.

Excuse me? I was on the second floor though? Clearly, the memories had been connected in a somewhat haphazard manner. So Albino is good, but not perfect. The boy Cardon was ahead of her, sitting against a stump and reading his book again. Lei approached him and asked the obvious question, “Cardon, what was that thing?”

The boy Cardon raised his eyes from the book and shook his head, “What do you mean? That was also Cardon. Everything here is Cardon; he’s just the scary Cardon.” Lei blinked. If what the boy was saying could be taken at face value, that would mean that Albino had splintered off slivers of himself, and was allowing them free reign in the mindscape..

So he isn’t controlling them? But then why are the memories connected seemingly at random? If he was focusing on control I would get why the landscape was haphazard, but if he’s just letting them wander, the landscape should be more refined… That would only mean he’s not focusing at all… in which case… Lei felt true fear for the second time since the start of the fight. Cardon was very likely focusing the majority of his attention outwards, away from the mental fight. He likely intended to win the battle in the physical world, where Lei was unable to move at present.

And I can’t get out without him agreeing to it! They looked over at the boy, who had gone back to reading his book. Their only option was to get Cardon to agree to let them out. Clearly the monster Cardon would not be open to negotiation, wherever it was. That left the boy Cardon. Lei nodded to themself and went up near the boy. First, I’ll need to establish some sort of rapport.

“Cardon, what is this place? I don’t think I’ve ever seen this before.”

The boy paused, looking up from his book, before answering, “A good place! Everyone is free, and there are very few monsters.” Right, not exactly what I wanted.

Lei pursed their lips and tried another question, “That’s good to hear, monsters are scary. But what I want to know is, where is this place?”

The boy paused and after a moment of thought, answered; “That isn’t exactly the right question.” Picking up his book, the boy turned and walk behind the tree stump. Lei went around the otherside in an attempt to find him, but the boy had vanished, leaving them alone. Great, now I lost my only lead. I could go back into the manor, but then I would most likely run into that monster again… actually, where is that thing at…? It was strange that the creature had not followed them out of the manor.

In the distance, as if on cue, Lei heard what sounded like a warhorn blare. This was followed by the sound of hundreds, nay, thousands of footsteps matching in time with each other. Lei glanced around, making sure the monster was nowhere in sight, and took off towards the sounds.

Cresting a small hill, Lei bore witness to two great hosts formed up in front of each other in a valley. One seemed to be made up of Humans, Dwarves and Elves. The other was made up of all manner of demonic beasts, monsters and fiends. Standing at the forefront of the demonic horde, Lei could see a figure they recognized as the Demon God. Wait, if that’s the demon god… then…  the boy’s words came back to her. “That isn’t exactly the right question.”

Lei looked across the valley and beheld the two hosts as they collided with each other. The question… the right question wasn’t ‘what is this place’... it’s ‘when’. This memory, this memory is of the formation of Gizha Lake! But if he can remember that, that means there should be a Cardon here somewhere… Lei scanned over the battlefield, looking for the figure of a tall white man. Far in the distance, she caught sight of such a figure standing under a tree, arguing with a human.

Just as they were preparing a plan to attack the Cardon, the air seemed to shimmer. Lei looked on in horror as the human stepped away from the Cardon and towards the figure of the Demon God. That’s Gizha the Pugilist. Realizing what this memory was about to entail, Lei turned and began to run. A few moments later, a blast of hot air threw them forward and slammed them into a rock.

Lei’s consciousness flickered and their ears were ringing from the impact. Pulling themselves up, they checked their body quickly to check how much damage they had sustained. Strangely, they were still entirely themself, absolutely none of them was beginning to be taken over by Cardon’s figure. That basically confirms it, an attack like that should have, in all honesty, won him the fight. He’s not interested in the mindscape at all, he’s focusing on his body in the real world… Then why go to so much effort with the mindscape? He could just as easily made a small room and locked me in it… 

Lei picked themself up and grew a pair of wings, drawing on their memories of living life always running and seeking freedom; these wings were a testament to the desire to fly free. Jumping up into the sky, Lei flew back towards where the crater had just been formed by Gizha the Pugilist. Lei looked down from the rim of the crater, bearing witness as water flowed up from the earth and filled the basin. Standing on a small island that would eventually be submerged in the future, Lei could see a Cardon standing over a human’s body. The human was in exceptionally bad shape, clearly dying.

As they watched, Lei saw the adult Cardon offering something in his hand to the human, but being rejected. The Cardon nodded, and stepped back. As the human’s last vestiges of lifeforce faded, the Cardon looked up to the sky and howled. Swiftly, his clothes began to rip and tear, his arms elongate, and his head took on more bat like qualities. He’s becoming the monster Cardon. Lei knew better than to stick around. Their only recourse was to find the boy Cardon and somehow convince that fraction of the vampire’s psyche to let them leave.

Lei ran for what felt like multiple days and nights, though after the sun had set on the first night it had remained down. Numerous times, they had heard the monster pursuing them in the distance and been forced to redouble their efforts. If this kept up, then their mind would collapse before they got anywhere. While in a mental battle, the thought avatars did not need to eat or sleep, but prolonged activity would drain their mental energy. I probably have about two more “days” of energy left.. Assuming I don’t get pressed into a fight.

Lei had been running or flying the entire time. Everytime they tried to take a rest, the monster had made its presence known behind them. Either with a distant roar, or showing up just within their range to detect it. Forced to continue moving and unable to pause and try and recover a bit of energy, Lei was nearing their wits end with this game of cat and mouse. The few times they had tried to fight, the monster had deftly avoided or simply absorbed their attacks. This confirms that it’s a figment of pure instinct, it’s too sure of it’s own existence to be anything else.

The environments had been extremely varied. Once they got away from the Gizha Crater, Lei had entered a sort of swamp. Inside the swamp had been swarms of foul blood sucking flies. Rather than the bombastic mental battles Lei was used to, where the opponent would draw on their emotions and desires, wants and needs, it seemed like Cardon was drawing on his very nature itself. Giving in to the most raw version of a himdelf, fighting on pure instinct.

Lei had at first tried to double back and leave the swamp environment, but the monster had shown up. It wouldn’t enter the swamp, but it tracked them from the edge. It was as if Lei was being ordered to keep moving forward. Lei considered trying to fight past the monster, but opted to just keep moving instead; they wanted to conserve their mental energy for when they found the real Cardon or the boy Cardon. The fact that it would not follow her into the swamp was a bit odd; if it was purely instinct then it should only want to feed. Lei was too anxious to give it too much thought though.

With nothing for it but to press forwards, Lei braved the swamp. They drew on the feelings of disgust that the mosquitos were generating and manifested a film of mucus over their exposed skin. It wasn’t pretty, but it was sufficient to prevent any of the bugs from slipping through.

In all honesty, the Swamp was just unpleasant. Lei felt trapped and stifled as they navigated it. Occasionally, a submerged branch would catch at their boot and pull them down into the muck, “What kind of feelings would allow him to bring forth a place this fucking infuriating!?”

Lei’s enraged shout echoed through the still fetid air, and they received no response. Sighing, Lei forced themself to calm down and proceed. Thankfully for their sanity, the edge of the swamp soon came into sight. Lei laughed in spite of themself, so pleased to be finally free of the stifling atmosphere.

After walking for some time, having not manifested wings to conserve energy, Lei arrived at the next landmark on their trek; a small town of sorts. Lei entered the town and began to search for any signs of the monster. The town was eerie and entirely devoid of people. Seeing as the monster didn’t seem to be anywhere nearby Lei took a moment to explore. It wasn’t like the town was devoid of any form of life; there were a few animals running around. But the people had seemingly vanished. A few of the houses even had food still out on the tables.

A cry sounded from outside, and Lei turned to see the monster standing in the doorway, glaring at them, with Saliva dripping from its mouth. Oh fuck me! Lei dove backwards as the monster lunged at them, barely managing to get through the window as the monster’s claws grazed their leg.

Lei bounced up and turned around, the town had changed completely. It was now fully populated, though the people were wearing archaic clothes. Still, they continued to go about their business as normal, completely ignoring Lei and the monster, which was now scrambling to get out of the window.

Lei turned and darted away, seeking to distance themself from the threat posed by the creature. I just… want to get out… Lei could feel despair, sadness, and regret over their choices starting to well up. As they rounded a corner, Lei slid to a halt and looked in disbelief. The village was once again empty. I… I was just here, I mean, it was empty when I got here, but then there were people? What the hell kind of manifestation is this!?

Lei grimaced and checked where the monster had hit their leg; the skin had turned pale around the wound, a color very similar to Cardon’s own. So he’s finally decided to start taking control… is his goal to torment me!? That fucking thing should have been able to do a whole fuck of a lot more than just make me a bit pale!

They darted down a side alley as they heard the roar of the monster in the distance. Lei growled to themself and ducked into a doorway as the monster padded down the street just in front of them. How did it get over there so fast…? After waiting a moment to be sure it was gone, Lei stepped back out onto the street… and saw a deluge of people, all of them wearing clothes unfamiliar to them, though it was different from the clothes the last group had worn. Another millenia… another civilization. And these will be gone just- Lei blinked -like that. Indeed, all of the people were gone.

Wait, whose thoughts were those!? That wasn’t me! I don’t remember any other civilizations other than the current one!? Lei fell into a panic as they realized that the monster’s blow may have struck them much deeper than they originally thought; only a true immortal would think of entire civilizations as a “fleeting occurrence.”

Lei shivered, and glanced around, noting that the monster was nowhere insight. At some point, more people had shown up, once again in unfamiliar clothes. They grumbled, and weaved their way through the crowd towards the far end of the village from whence they entered. Every few minutes or so, the people would vanish, only to be replaced with a new set soon thereafter. In total, Lei counted six “civilizations” before they reached the village edge. As each vanished, they grew increasingly despondent and melancholy, as if the world were passing them by.

After leaving the village, Lei passed through another small forest and skirted the foot of a massive mountain before arriving at the gate of a large cemetery. Thankfully, they made it that far without once seeing the monster save for at a distance, silently warning them not to alter course. I probably have about a day left of energy before I’ll just lose by default. Fuck This! 

“Come out and fight you coward! Are you a Vampire or a leech!?” The only response Lei got to their inane outburst was the sound of the wind whistling through the iron bars of the fence and rolling off of the granite tombstones.

Lei clenched their fist and forced the tears that were threatening to spill out back down. Taking a deep breath, they moved onwards into the cemetery. The monster had, for lack of a better word, trained them to always take the most direct path; it wouldn’t get in their way if they took the most obvious route. At this point, Lei was beginning to wonder if they hadn’t actually been killed and sent to some kind of hell rather than engage in a mental battle.

As they walked through the cemetery, Lei lost count of the number of tombstones after the first hour. There were just too many of them. They had tried to read the names, to see if there were any hints about where this memory was or was going, but the majority of them had been either illegible, or in a language Lei simply didn’t know.

After another hour, Lei got the impression they were being watched. But, no matter where they looked, they couldn’t spot anything. Knowing better than to wait idly, Lei continued advancing, slowly and cautiously. Occasionally, they caught glimpses of movement out in the fog of the cemetery. 

For some reason, the phantoms in the fog caused Lei to feel extremely unsettled, like they were surrounded by the voices of the damned and the dead. Lei found themselves quickening their pace, eventually reaching a full sprint. Much to Lei’s surprise, their desire to escape the cemetery continued to grow, to the point where it became strong enough to forcibly morph the legs of their thought avatar into those of a wildcat. Now running, skipping, and jumping past the tombstones, they made quick progress. Until they tripped over a loose piece of cobblestone and landed flat on their face.

Lei picked themselves up, and heard distant giggling as if from a young girl. Dusting themselves off while nervously glancing around they prepared to continue their flight out of the cemetery, then a sight caused them to freeze in horror. While most of the names had been illegible, ahead of them were a group of tombstones full of names they recognized.

The tombstones were in the style of Lei’s home, and upon them were written the names of Lei’s family. They stumbled forward on shaky legs, caressing the stone as they passed them by, “Musa… Mom… Dad…” Lei stumbled, but caught themselves on a tombstone bearing the name of Emperor Meng. Strangely, even after all that bastard had done, something about seeing his grave was still deeply saddening. As if a piece of themself had died as well.

Lei stumbled onwards in a daze, tears beginning to sprout on the corners of their eyes. They passed graves for all of their friends and rivals of the Academy, the great teacher who had taught them the secret martial arts of their clan. People from the village that they had known. Acquaintance from Nova Ordo, and then, enshrined on top of a small hill under a large yew tree, a single large stone bearing two final names.

“…!” Lei stumbled forward and collapsed to their knees; the final stone bore the names of Cemile and Zheng. SOme distant part of them was shouting that this wasn’t real, it was just a figment of the mind drawn up to torment them, but Lei was too drained to listen. Utterly broken, Lei forgot about controlling their emotions and cried freely. As if to rub in their fate, the graveyard began to age rapidly. The older stones first, the various grave markers crumbled and grew overgrown with foliage and lichen.

Lei scrambled to pull the brambles away from the graves of Cemile and Zheng, but to no avail; time marched ever onwards. Eventually, the graveyard had vanished completely. But time did not stop, and as if to say it was time, the forest faded into a vast plain. In the distance was a hut with a smoking chimney and lit interior. 

Sitting some distance away, illuminated by moonlight, was the monster. Watching. Always watching. Lei glared at it, but the message was clear; “Go that way”. Lei turned and stumbled their way down the indicated path, too tired to care what lay ahead, they simply wanted out.

Approaching the door to the hut, it swung open before them, revealing a scene of the boy Cardon standing before an old woman who was seated in front of the hearth. 

The woman was watching the boy Cardon warily, “And what do you want, breaking into an old woman’s house like this?”

The boy said nothing, but approached the woman. Extending out his arm in a rapid motion, he pierced her through the chest. The woman gave a startled cry, as blood ran out of her mouth in a trickle. The boy turned and faced Lei. They could see anger in his eyes, though it did not seem to be directed at them. If Lei did not have so much experience with emotions themself, they might have missed it. Hidden behind the anger, there was also shame. Lei approached the boy and knelt in front of him, “Cardon, what was that for?” After all that, this is where I finally find you? What the fuck is even the point…?.

The boy shook his head, “An order. Couldn’t refuse it.” Lei was confused, vampires fed on the mortal races; some would say killing a human, elf, or dwarf was only second nature to them, and given what they had witnessed of the monster Cardon, that seemed to hold true for him.

“An order? To kill that woman? Not because you’re a vampire?” The boy snarled and pushed them away.

“Not a Vampire. A Vampyre, the originals.” Lei felt her heart jump into their mouth. Vampyres were thought to be a myth. At the very least none had been seen since the dawn of the present civilization. How did the Coalition get a living myth to work for them? 

Either way, they needed to recover from inadvertently angering the boy; he was likely their only way to get free. As soon as they reached that conclusion, Lei realized what had been going on. Cardon had been testing them, showing a taste of what the hell of eternity looked like. Pointing out that in the grand scheme of things, a tournament like this didn’t matter. One day the Sages, Arc Trading, Nova Ordo, Iberia, Jingzhu, everything would be gone, and only a few beings would remember them.

Having realized that Cardon was asking their answer to that question, they composed themselves and opted to show their resolve. Lei nodded, “I apologize for my ignorance, I never thought I would have the honor of meeting a Vampyre; your kind have not been seen in the world for a very long time.”

The boy Cardon cocked his head. “It hasn’t been that long though? Maybe a few dozen centuries.”

Lei balked at the clear disconnect; they had never had a conversation with an ageless species before, but if they were all like this then they could see why elves had such a snobby reputation. Still, that did not answer why such a being would fight for the Coalition. To sate their curiosity, Lei pressed the boy Cordan for more answers, “But why work for the Sage Coalition?” The boy Cordan shook his head.

“I don’t want to!” Stamping his foot, he shouted. The overblown reaction that differed greatly from what they had seen so far took Lei by surprise.

Hesitating for a moment, they pushed onwards, “Then why did you?”

The boy glared at them, “Because they forced me to! I don’t have a choice, not after that bastard’s spell!”

Suddenly all the pieces fell into place. The Coalition stooped to enslavement magic. Nova Ordo would love to get this information, we could probably make use of it… I have to survive first though. Taking a deep breath, they pressed on with a gamble, “What if I could help you break free?” Hesitating a moment longer, Lei ultimately decided to show their sincerity. They strained a mental image of compassion, empathic sadness, and willingness to make personal sacrifice in order to achieve their goals. Above all, they strove to impart the idea that even if it was transient, the present was still worth something. They drew on their memories of family and friends, all the good times shared. They were rewarded by the environment flickering briefly, for just a moment, the hut disappeared and the two of them found themselves in a large flowering meadow.

But then Lei collapsed forwards, their mental energy all but spent, and the environment collapsed back into the hut. The boy Cordan looked down at Lei, who lay on the floor barely able to keep their eyes open. Seeing his gaze, she felt overcome with a sense of calm; there in his eyes, the anger and shame had faded. Replacing it was a sense of compassion, understanding… and something else they could not place.

The boy Cardon looked down at them and shook his head, “You can’t help me.” As he spoke, a blastwave of energy formed around him, blowing away the environment and leaving only a vast white void with black floor and sky. Standing a little ways away from them, was a large double door, near which stood Cardon, as he had appeared in the real world. The exit… but if he’s just giving it to me, then that means… “I lost.”

Cardon nodded, “Aye.” Lei opened their eyes, to find Cardon had reached them, and was holding them in a tight embrace. They tried to struggle as his fangs closed on their neck, but no matter their effort, they could feel their strength failing. Lei cried, tears of grief as pictures of Cemile and Zhang entered their mind, as the light began to fade and their hands hung limp and useless at their sides, a fleeting thought darted across Lei’s mind. I… I could have just surrendered… And then everything was dark.

★★★★★★

Cardon savored the blood as it went down his throat. He could feel his power increasing with every sip. Of course they struggled, but now that he had managed to start drinking, they were growing weaker by the second. Before long, they had collapsed in his embrace. Drinking much more would prove fatal.

Cardon released his opponent. Thinking back over the mindscape, now that his psyche was unified again, Cardon thought back to the events that the now fainted human had experienced inside his mindscape. Of course, the connection went two ways; while they had been running around his memories, he had sent a figment of his own to idly peruse theirs. What he had found therein, was a shockingly sad story of rejection from friends and family, finding love only to be chased out of their country, but always with the drive to overcome and a hopeful future.

Cardon recalled the human’s, no, Lei’s final moments at the end of the battle before he allowed her to leave. She had fought until the very end to survive and escape, to see their family again. Of course, Lei had no way of knowing that he was planning to spare them in the end. Up until the final hour, Lei had fought against their fears and continued working according to their ideals. Even when they realized they were being led around by the nose, Lei had not given up, choosing instead to face forward and try to escape under their own terms. It was a sentiment Cardon could respect.

“Thank you, Rén Lei of the Opened Mind.” Cardon rummaged around in Lei’s belt pouch, eventually finding a small vial containing some form of liquid. Dumping it, Cardon used a nail to slice his own wrist and fill the vial up with his blood. He then replaced the vial into Lei’s pouch. Given what he had seen of their own past and current life, he knew that there was no chance at all of his gift being accepted, however to offer it was the greatest honor a Vampyre could give to former food. Eyeing the observer in the distance, Cardon kept his silent vigil until the doctor arrived to retrieve the mortal.

 

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