The Apprentice

[furo]

As it was accustomed yearly, the Lightning Kingdom ruler had traveled to the Molokai orphanage, located in the quiescent town of Taivas, near the southern end of the kingdom. In the Molokai orphanages resided the children whose parents had died as casualties during the Molokai Battle I in 3394 and Molokai Battle II in 3407, and Kaminari Raiden would visit them once a year without fail. This was due to her being a Molokai orphan herself – she’d lost her father, and the predecessor of the throne, in the second battle, when she was nineteen years of age, forcing her to unlawfully take rule of the kingdom, as it was stated in the testament he had written before going to war.


Rumor had spread like wildfire across the southern region of the kingdom that the ruler herself visited humble and unassuming Taivas, and ever since, Kaminari had decided to choose haphazard dates to travel, in order to remain undisturbed.


The tepid fog that climbed out of the waterways at the bottom of the chasms and teemed in the air was healthy for Kaminari’s lungs, who usually roamed around among the walls of the castle and modern edification of the capital city. It was like a gift to only hear the soft steady sound of water cascading down from the great heights of the valley.

A couple of hours before dusk, as Kaminari and her two escorts exited the orphanage building and headed towards the carriage, she could detect the lightest of noises, camouflaged by descent of currents in the waterfalls – a crackling snarl. It was very faint, stealthy.


She identified it. It was coming. A Quoloth attack; they hadn’t occurred in Taivas in decades. The ruler knew she was too far to react when it jolted from its shelter in the cave concealed beyond the waterfalls, and she did not manipulate the proper element to fend it off.

 

[Hexed]

Rai lived in a quiet an undisturbed village situated between several mountains and waterfalls a while away from anything else, the boy worked for an old man who'd once trained many people for the war, including Rai's own parents, but had decided to reside in the village after quitting his work and creating a dojo in the small town to train residents in martial arts. There really wasn't much more to do but that, and so it kept a lot of the people entertained and gave them a chance to socialise with one another and create friendships. He enjoyed his work, just helping out around the place was fun, and since he'd been here awhile he understood how everything was supposed to be.


In the second of the Molokai battles Rai had lost both of his parents, he hadn't had anyone to turn to at the time and didn't favour going into an orphanage. It was around that time that the old man appeared, he offered the boy a place to stay in exchange for helping him out, which Rai eagerly accepted.


He didn't mind, after all it was quite fun work, and he got to see a lot of different people move in and out of the dojo. He'd hear people talking about things that were happening outside of the town, that's how he got most of his information, running around and listening to others, it was very interesting to hear what was going on outside of the town. He'd never really been anywhere else, there had never been an opportunity to do so, and so he didn't know much of the outside world.


On this day Rai was travelling back from the forests that surrounded the area, he'd been told to collect some sort of herb. The boy didn't quite understand what it did, but apparently it was very important to collect, he had to do this same thing around once and month and so he had a set route, which he always followed.


It was when he was returning back to the village that he saw something strange, a woman was walking to a carriage, it looked as if she'd just been to the orphanage, he wondered just who she was...it wasn't often that they got visitors in this area...


Rai heard a noise and turned, a Quoloth? What was that suddenly doing attacking people? Of course he saw the direction it was headed and immediately thought to react to this. Dropping some of the herbs he was holding he raised an arm, raising a pillar in front of the Quoloth, even to just slow it down for a second, or of course the more favourable option was that it head butted the pillar.

 

[furo]

Kaminari remained alert to the approaching crackle. She could not let the townsfolk become aware of the danger, otherwise they would panic and the lizard-like beast would be startled by the hustle and turn even more hostile.


“Sir Lagomar, give me trees, around that bridge; hide that waterfall from the town,” The ruler ordered one of her companions, and he followed without question. The escort soldier was to obey, even being unaware of the hazard. The Nature-manipulating soldier brought two large trees around the bridge crossing beside the waterfall, sinking its roots onto the wood underneath the bridge. The visibility of the cascade from the town was partially blocked; Kaminari trusted that there weren’t any occasional onlookers. She hadn’t caught many villagers in sight.


“Is something the matter, your majesty?” The second escort enquired cautiously, noticing the discomfort in the ruler’s scowl. Kaminari did not reply, but kept her eyes towards the white frothiness of the cascading water. The two escorts were most altered when her majesty began drawing away, stealthily approaching the twin trees intersecting the bridge, signaling the soldiers to stay in place.


Soon enough, Kaminari was surrounding the trees, grasping onto the trunk firmly in order not to fall to the chasm. Once she reached the other side, she was surprised to meet a large rectangular rock pillar. Whoever was its builder and whatever its purpose, it wasn’t going to be enough to stop the savage behemoth. It had luckily yet not pounced, remaining in the stealth, right behind the pillar. Kaminari was facing the Quoloth; it could smell her, and she could hear it. She didn’t particularly fear being harmed, but rather fretted for the safety of the townsfolk.


The growling escalated in decibels.


The next jolt was faster than what Kaminari expected, considering the creature’s size. With a vigorous bellow, it leapt over the pillow, and its body drooped from the other edge, its hind legs clawing at the rocky surface to jump across to the other side and pounce onto the woman.


Kaminari reacted quickly; she shot bolts across the wooden surface of the bridge to enclose the base of the pillar, thus the Quoloth would be zapped no matter which side it reached. With the purpose of forcing the beast to tumble down the opposite side, Kaminari fired a strong beam of electricity towards it. The Quoloth bawled, deterred, by the sharp currents of energy coursing its body, but afterwards, it didn’t waver – it didn’t flinch. The behemoth kept ceaselessly clawing at the opposite side of the pillar to propel itself forward, and it was close to succeeding.


The ruler took fright.

 

[Hexed]

With the pillar that Rai had created he only hoped to halt the beast for a moment or two, it was better than anyone getting hurt over there. Then he could come up with a way to stop it before it got into the village correct? The people didn't need to be bothered by such a beast, their town was quiet, and such a thing hadn't happened in such a long time. In fact it was a surprise even to him, there must be some way to stop it from getting any further right? There were lots of ways, he just had to think of the most suitable.


Then trees started to move, they blocked the path between the waterfall and the village, who had it been that had done that? He suspected that it was one of the three that had been standing in the beasts path just a moment ago, maybe they had a plan? Surely he should help out then, there was definitely a way he could do that. They also seemed to want to keep the Quoloth from getting any closer.


He put down what he was carrying and silently started to move himself forwards, the quieter he could be the less likely the beast was to turn on him. He edged his was towards the trunks of the trees, making no noise with his steps and keeping his eyes on the creature at all times, he couldn't afford to be surprised in this sort of situation. Sticking one hand out to the side he felt it make contact with something, it felt like a tree at least, perfect. The boy edged his way along, stopping a fair distance away, but close enough to accomplish what he wanted to.


It was then he move forwards his other hand, but seeing that the Quoloth already had a target he paused and looked up. That woman, she was trying to stop it? It seemed she was giving it quite the effort as well, shooting the creature with lightening, but that didn't seem to stop it, it sti wanted to come forwards, and it was very close to using his pillar against him. Well, he could fix that couldn't he? After all he created it, if he couldn't destroy it then what good would that be?


Rai shot a bolt of lightening at his own pillar and then balled his hand up into a fist, the pillar started to collapse, looking like it would do so on top of the beast. He didn't stop there however, in fact he proceeded to created two more behind the animal, crushing them also. It was a strange series of attacks really, he was using the ground to create the pillars that he then crushed in hopes of landing on the animal. However he couldn't guarantee that that would be enough, he'd have to try harder wouldn't he?


Taking a step forwards he shot two bolts of lightening at the Quoloth's back legs, before rupturing the ground slightly underneath it, he wanted to move the animal and set it completely off balance, though he wasn't going to let it move all that much. Just after he created whither pillar to the right side of it, then to the left, then behind and crushed then all at once. It would be quite the impact if it landed, a heavy load for sure.