"Calm down Bone, none of it is real…" I told him as I rubbed the top of his head. Bone-lasher growled and slapped the space with a swish of its tail. A new scene came into That'swe were in a dark cave, not unlike the one that Dakarai, Astrid, and I were actually in.
Bone-lasher and I weren't alone in the dark. Tarrika was also there. He was huddled over something, crying by himself in the dark. It took me several moments to realize that what he was huddled over was the corpse of a sonic viper. Bone-lasher crept closer for an inspection we both realized that it was the charred corpse of the sonic viper that had been killed in the teachers office in the last vision.
Tarrika was crying over it while writing some kind of spell sigil around the corpse. He dipped his hand into a small bowl beside him and wrote out the multitude of sigils for the spell. I looked over what he wrote already and scowled.
'Revive…animate….sacrifice…fuck I can't make out the rest.' I thought. A sound somewhere else in the cave caught both mine and Bone-lasher's attention. We turned and saw a light glowing dimly down one of the tunnels. Bone-lasher walked towards the light source and the two of us nearly threw up at what we saw.
There was a steed lying on the ground, it looked like its throat was slit. More runes were cut into the evo's hide all over. It looked like ithad been prepared for a ritual sacrifice. It suddenly dawned on me what Tarrika was writing that spell sigil with in the main cave.
The runes on the steeds body suddenly glowed as a pale purple light shined in from the other cavern. I spurred Bone-lasher back into the other cavern in time to see a massive axiom spell sigil being activated.
"He's trying to revive his sonic viper!" I exclaimed.
Black tendrils shot out of the spell sigil and sought out the steed corpse and dragged it into the cavern, lifting it into the air. The tendril broke the steed down to blood and sinew then quickly broke that down too. Once that was done the same black tendrils condensed into a black sphere and floated down toward the sonic viper corpse stopping just above it.
Bone-lasher, Tarrika and I all watched with bated breath as the sphere lowered into the corpse and disappeared. Several seconds went by with nothing happening then suddenly a black aura enveloped the corpse blocking it from view. The aura lifted the corpse into the air and erupted into black flames.
We all watched with voted breathe as the tissue of the corpse started to reconstruct. Muscle and sinew reappeared as if it was never damaged. There was something off about it however, it's size an proportions were off. It was getting bigger with each passing second. It quickly grew to more my height and the flames around it grew intense. The skin of the sonic viper finally started to grow back from the tail upwards. When the skin fully encompassed the evo's skull its eyes opened and let out a thundering screech.
Tarrika and I both covered our ears while Bone-lasher visibly flinched. The sonic viper quickly flapped its wings as it slowly descended. The spell sigil on the floor disappeared and coated the whole cavern in darkness again as the sonic viper landed.
Tarrika looked up at his evo with tear stained eyes, a mix of hope and astonishment gleamed within them.
"Alpa…" Tarrika said softly. The evo blinked several times then finally focused on Tarrika. A look of recognition flashed in its eyes and it kneeled down until it's eyes was level with Tarrika. It folded its wings into a hood and then nuzzle Tarrika with its cheek.
"He actually brought his evo back to life…" I gasped.
[You again!] A voice boomed from seemingly everywhere and nowhere. The scene around us evaporated and a large expanse appeared before us.
"Tarrika I presume!" I shouted into the vast emptiness.
[Get out of my slave!] The voice screeched.
I felt my teeth rattle from the sheer power behind the voice. I glared at a singular point in the empty expanse, imagining that was where the sound was coming from.
"It's a evo! Not your damn slave!" I snapped back. A noise that I could only describe as a wild cackle echoed around us.
[Foolish Star keeper! Evo, slave, it is all the same! Now get out!] Tarrika snapped.
"Get fucked!" I snapped back and flipped the space around us off.
[You spoiled runt!] Tarrika growled. [You think you can stop this? I have been planning this for over a decade, I'm not going to let some star gifted bastard who's known nothing but praise all his life!]
I frowned and looked down at Bone-lasher.
"Is he talking about me?" I asked. Bone-lasher growled annoyingly and started swimming in a random direction snapping it's jaws at the emptiness as if it could injure Tarrika by biting the space.
[GET OUT!] Tarrika roared.
"How about NOOOOOO!" I responded. It suddenly felt like a vice was gripping my head that made ant pain I'd felt to this point feel like a slight slap on the wrist. I gripped my head and tried to fight against the pain.
My farm crystal glowed a vibrant red. I grabbed my crystal and focused more mana into it. I felt Tarrika's presence much stronger now and Bone-lasher did too. Bone-lasher roared rushed toward a odd patch of the nothingness jaw open wide. With one hand on my crystal and the other on Bone-lasher's nape to hold onto we smashed through a invisible wall into a new scene. Bone-lasher and I fell onto solid rock floor. We were now in another cavern however the walls were lined with a multitude of spell sigils.
My crystal was still glowing red and my head still felt like it was splitting into two but it felt more manageable somehow.
"Bone-lasher go!" I ordered. Bone-lasher roared and ran down through the cavern. We passed almost a few dozen of spell sigil and in my pained state I wasn't really paying much attention to what the runes in the sigils said.
The cavern lead into a long dark tunnel that seemed oddly familiar. It took several moments before I realized why it looked so familiar. My eyes grew wide as we excited the tunnel and Bone-lasher skidded to a halt. We found ourselves standing over the ledge that Astrid and I were looking down at the ascended earlier.
Tarrika was standing in front of another large spell sigil, he was older now. No longer a young boy but rather a older man roughly in his sixties. In the center of the spell sigil was the revived sonic viper. It was chained to the ground, fighting desperately against the restraints. However it wasn't the only one inside the sigil. There were three humans inside along with it.
They were all men wearing military uniforms. I squinted until I saw the insignia on the sleeve of one of the soldiers. They were Niger soldiers. Tarrika walked over to the sonic viper and patted its head. The evo recoiled at his touch and tried to open its mouth to screech at him but there was a rope of light wrapped around it.
"Calm, you cursed thing. You've done well to serve me but now I require more. More sacrifice…" Tarrika said, his voice dripped like molasses. He turned and yelled to another figure deeper in the cavern. "Raziri this better work!"
Raziri walked out of the shadows and approached her father. She scowled and pulled a knife out of her dress.
"Don't worry father, I studied all of Lulu'nala's notes. It will work…with my modifications." Raziri replied. She smiled wickedly and walked up to one of the soldiers and pointed the blade to his neck. He cried and tried to scream but he was gaged. "All we need is a live subject."
With a flick of her wrist she made a small knick in the soldiers neck, not fatal but drew blood. She repeated the process with each of the solders then walked over to her father and smiled wickedly.
"Everything is ready father." Raziri said.
'What does all this have to do with my grandmother…?' I thought.
The scene shifted in an instant similar to someone flipping a page in a book. We were outside now somewhere in the Sahara. I looked around and saw two figures standing in the distance. Bone-lasher hurried over to them. As we got closer I recognized on of the people.
"Grandma Lulu…" I muttered as Bone-lasher came to a stop. She was much younger, a few years younger than she was in hers and Grandpa's wedding picture. She was standing in front of a young man. It only took me a few more moments to realize it was Tarrika, now the same age as Grandma Lulu.
"Do you really have to go Lulu'nala." Tarrika asked. Lulu'nala scowled and flicked Tarrika on the nose.
"Can't you call me Lulu just once before I leave Tarri?" She asked with a fierce expression. Tarrika looked away and sighed.
"You know I hate being called Tarri Lulu'nala." Tarrika said.
"And you know I hate being called Lulu'nala so we're even Tarri!" Lulu'nala growled and turned her back to Tarrika. Tarrika reached for Lulu'nala but froze and put his hand down.
"You don't really have to leave you know." Tarrika said softly. Lulu'nala sighed sorrowfully then looked at Tarrika over her shoulder.
"If I stay I'll be married off to Dwarm'mumu. My father already paid the dowry. Its best that I leave." Lulu'nala said. She turned back to him and grabbed his hands. "You could come with me."
Tarrika's eyes grew wide and he snatched his hands away. He shook his head adamantly.
"To the outside world? No! I can't…" He whimpered. I expected Lulu'nala to look sad or mad at Tarrika's answer but she was surprisingly calm, like she'd expected it.
"I'll go alone then…bye Tarrika." Lulu'nala planted a kiss on Tarrika's cheek then turned and walked off into the vast desert. The sand behind Tarrika started to shift and the modified sonic viper rose behind him.
"Follow her Alpa, make sure she gets somewhere safe." Tarrika said. The sonic viper flapped its wings and flew high into the sky and circled above Lulu'nala as she hiked through the near endless expanse.
The scene shifted again and Bone-lasher and I stood once again on the cliff of that cavern staring down at the ritual below us. Raziri smiled wickedly as Tarrika started casting the spell. The blood the sigil was made out of glowed purple as the soldiers started to scream bloody murder.
Blood gushed out of the nicks on their necks and collected above the chained sonic viper, their bodies shriveled up like dried raisins as they were drained of not only blood but all fluids from their bodies.
I felt a sudden lurch in my stomach as Bone-lasher made a loud retching noise like it was about to throw up. I patted it on the head.
"I know, that's fucking nasty…" I muttered in agreement.
When the bodies were drained they fell to ash and blew away into the wind. The mass of blood and fluids then turned into a spear and jammed into the evo's skull. The blood filled the evo's body and new purple sigils started forming on the evo starting at its head and trailed down the length of its body.
The sonic viper thrashed violently and broke free of the steel chains holding it down. It slammed it's head on the cavern floor and shattered the rope of light letting our a horrendous screech that blew a hole into the cavern ceiling. Massive rocks fell down from above narrowly missing Tarrika and Raziri. It was then that the true horror of the spell began.