The Rising Sun: Episode 4 by J Hawk

bones and took an
enormous leap forward. He felt himself land over Redgarn, and the
two of them crashed to the ground, rolling over each other. The
crystal slipped off Redgarn’s grip and went bouncing feet away from
where they lay in a tangle.
     
    Mantra ignited his sword and plunged it
towards the man beneath him.
     
    Redgarn’s eyes blazed, and Mantra was thrown
off by a sudden invisible force. He hit the wall of the corridor
behind him and Redgarn jumped to the side, his hand reaching for
the crystak…
     
    Mantra gave a wave of his hand, and the
crystal went skittering a few feet off the Xeni’s grasp. Redgarn
cast an angry glance at Mantra. Before he could leap for the
crystal again, Mantra ignited his blade and launched over him.
     
    The two of them wrestled amidst the rumbling
and the blasts all over them. Their swords twirled at a wild speed,
clashing violently as the duo snarled and dodged, jabbed and
slashed at each other. Both aiming to kill … sparks burst all
around in the air, as their swords met again and again.
     
    The plague crystal lay on the ground by their
right, waiting for one of them to strike the other down. Once and
for all.
     
    “When we’re done here,” snarled Redgarn, as
the two of them broke from the duel and prowled around the room for
a brief second. “The only thing remaining of you and your senile
brotherhood will be ashes. Our eight thousand year battle has come
to an end. Today it ends.”
     
    “The battle was always over, old friend.”
Laughed Mantra. “You won – eight thousand years back, when you
destroyed what we stood for. When you destroyed Sirengard
and its Kingline.”
     
    “And now,” said Redgarn. “I’ll finish the
job. I’ll destroy you. All of you. Our conflict has flown off the
edges, and today – it returns down to earth.”
     
    Mantra laughed as they continued to cross the
room in a circle, locked in a deep glare. “This battle will be
anything but down to earth, Redgarn.”
     
    A long pause fell between them as Redgarn
considered his words. His lips parted in a grim smile. His voice
rumbling in a soft laugh, he said, “You are absolutely right. Let
me prove you so. Let’s take this battle,” He held his hand out
slowly, as though raising something invisible. “to the skies …”
     
    A magnum shudder ripped apart the entire
place, as though of an earthquake. Mantra was knocked off his
feet.
     
    __________
     
     
    As Zardin prepared to send a furious jab at
Ion, it happened.
     
    An untamed quaking seemed to erupt across the
entire temple: the walls, floor and ceiling rumbled angrily, and
the two of them were thrown off balance. Ion felt himself land
sideways on the wall by the right, his sword almost slipping from
his grasp.
     
    What in the world’s happening?!
     
    __________
     
     
    As though hit by a volcanic quake, the entire
structure seemed to vibrate with menace. The Nyon temple’s very
mild grounding, and the anchors rigging it to the earth were
blasted off by a furious invisible force. The noise of the blast
left a loud roar to resonate across the vast green forest. The
shattered remains of the grounding went soaring around the temple
in a circle. And the temple itself, now quaking harder, slowly rose
off the ground…
     
    The gigantic structure floated off the
ground, rising higher and higher … The structure’s outer covering
rippled in fury, and chunks of the temple’s outer walls were
sheared off, flying off to join the circle of debris soaring around
it.
     
    The ancient structure rose higher and higher,
leaving the ground forever … climbing further and deeper into the
realm of the skies … hundred metres … two hundred metes … three
hundred … four hundred…
     
    The temple’s outer walls were crushed at the
might of the invisible force wrapping around it. Crumpled in giant
chunks of debris, they came soaring off to join the flow of
circular wreckage around them…
     
    Five hundred metres … Six hundred