Kage had leapt from the shadows with the expertise of a well trained assassin. He’d sunk his daggers into his target’s flesh… or that’s what he’d tried to do. He could almost feel the blades sinking in before he made contact, but his knives scraped against armor.
“Damn,” he cursed. There went the element of surprise – he should have gone for the neck. The man he’d tried to kill turned on him and started fighting for his life. Perhaps he knew that fleeing was not an option… perhaps fighting was the only real way out. If Kage had more time, he would have laughed. The punches screaming towards his face didn’t give him an opportunity to do that.
He ducked under the first punch, then did a bob/weave motion to the left to dodge the second. He was going to follow through with his own punch but his opponent was a speedy little fucker and forced him to dodge yet another punch.
“Okay, so we’re doing this,” Kage said, holding up his fists. More punches came at him, but instead of dodging he blocked them, absorbing them with his forearms. He found that they hurt a lot more than he thought they would. He felt the impacts from six or so more punches which numbed his arms enough to where he started to think that he was wasting his time blocking.
“Time to go on the offensive,” he thought to himself, dropping his center of mass and trying to shove his shoulder into the man’s middle. He hit true then transitioned that into grabbing him and slamming him onto the ground. The force he put behind his attacks would be superhuman. No mere man could lift something so heavy and so effortlessly. One had to be augmented somehow, whether by genetics or by surgery to achieve that sort of strength.
Kage took a long breath before grabbing hold of the man’s armor and lifting him up off the ground. He clocked his head to the side, built up power, then slammed his fist into the man’s face repeatedly. Of course, there was always room for error, blocking, and dodging. Something told Kage that this man wasn’t ordinary in the slightest. He might need special care and attention to be knocked out.
“Had enough yet?” he asked with a malicious looking grin on his face. A voice in the back of his head told him to stop playing with his food, even if it was fun.
The armored man was watching over the place as the sun slowly set and his armor caught the last rays of light. The structure behind him was a dilapidated one, built of old stone and wood, with all its windows shut and its roof sagging. Yet within its walls lay a very different story altogether. The building held a small group of humans who dared to challenge the authority of the aelves. A pitiful resistance. Misguided, desperate and dangerous.
It was decided that the rebellion had to be ended even if it only comprised a handful of people. The first of them died at Kage’s hand. Thirty years of life snuffed out in an instant.
A figure emerged from the doorway of the damaged building into the open area. There was something about the human that seemed greater than the desperate group the man had been a part of. Their simple clothes were marked by old, faded emblems and they raised their hands with the palms facing out.
Kage’s actions came to an abrupt halt in the middle of his stride. The sorcerer’s hand moved in a gesture that suggested they were taking hold of an invisible force. At the same time the dead soldier spasmed as blood from his wounds floated toward the sorcerer.
“They only sent one of you?”
The question was rhetorical because Kage wouldn’t be able to speak. The stolen blood turned crystalline before being sent right towards Kage’s stomach.
Having your body get suddenly frozen while being unable to do anything about it was a very surreal experience. Kage tried his best to move his arms and legs but they simply would not budge. And then there was the next attack that sent some kind of projectile that he could barely see because he couldn’t move his eyes. The attack hit him in the stomach and knocked him backwards a little, though he was still held still with that stunning effect his opponent had cast on him.
Kage couldn’t even get a witty retort out because his jaw was held tight. Feeling somewhat helpless, he closed his eyes and let his body go limp. The sound of many footsteps started to sound around the building as he commanded his undead troops to come in with backup. They quickly streamed into the building in an attempt to free their master from his restraints.
One such minion, piloted directly by Kage, threw an orb made of wooden spikes that was intended to bludgeon or maybe even kill the gaesterei that was holding Kage still. The other treants kept pushing forwards into other rooms, if they were able to, and tried to maim anyone else that was hiding. Kage had had his fun, but in the end he had a job to do. He didn’t need this operation getting out of hand, especially if there were powerful mages about.
