Lessa came from the Kingdom of Vivendi in a world far removed from that of ours.
Her father was a duke, but her promising future ended abruptly when her whole
family was killed by a neighboring lord who seized control of the land. Lessa was
the only one to survive. Though she was determined to take revenge and reclaim the
land that is her birthright, she never found the opportunity. She left to explore
the land in hopes of finding a future for herself and returning with more chance.
What she found was that the whole kingdom was plunging into darkness as crime and
corruption spiralled out of control. Eventually she joined Vivendi's greatest
fighting force, the dragonriders, who were recruiting to fight the unrest. In her
squad she met F'lar, a young lieutenant who decended from a long line of
dragonriders. F'lar and Lessa worked excellently together as a team, and by their
abilities they were rapidly promoted.
During this time the kingdom had sunken deeper into shadow. It was discovered that
the demon king Olbaid II was behind the unrest, and by now his hellish armies have
begun open assault on the borderlands. Vivendi's army rapidly lost ground, and
Lessa was worried for the fate of her people. When her unit had to stop to
recuperate from injuries, Lessa bid F'lar a farewell and took to the air and
explored the realm in search of answers once more.
Lessa searched for the entrance to Mount Taerra, where a weapon of legendary power
was kept. After searching long and hard and losing all track of time, she finally
found the hall inside the mountain and entered, hoping the legends were true. Her
footsteps echoed through the empty hall lined with stone pillars until she reached
its end, where a simple stone altar stood. It was empty. It seemed to her now that
the legends were nothing more than fairytales. She studied the altar carefully. It
had runes scrawled across its surface but they were gibberish. She read them
through twice but nothing inspiring came of it. She let out a resigned sigh and
turned to leave, mumbling the runes aloud from memory as she walked towards the
exit, but as the sounds excaped her lips they suddenly took a life of their own.
Countless voices, deep and booming, sounded in unison from a source that seemed to
span all of space at once.
"The mortal that climbs Mount Taerra
and takes the Sword shall die
once he goes down.
The mortal who wields the Sword
shall not live to walk
the lands of Vivendi.
For the Sword is the Blade of Gods
to be used to sever the soul of Time
and signal the Ending.
It is not made for mortal hands."
When the echos died down feeling returned to Lessa's body. She spun around and saw
on the altar a simple steel longsword. She ran back to the altar, but as she
reached her hand to touch the sword she felt a sudden pain. "Damn it!" Lessa
bellowed. She came all this way and she would not leave empty-handed. She sat down
on the steps leading up to the altar and pondered hard. As legend goes, the gods
of her world were always true to their words, yet as things were going her kingdom
will be destroyed within days.
After a while she came to a decision. She sprung up and grabbed for the sword.
From somewhere in the room, an elderly male voice said, "You know they really
meant it when they said those words." An unseen force slowed her movement and the
pain searing through her arm made tears come to her eyes, but she pushed forward
with her arm until her knees buckled and she can hardly see through all the pain.
Then it stopped suddenly and the sword was in her hand. She made towards the exit,
where a man in white robes holding a gnarled staff stood. He smiled gently, his
eyes questioning her. "I must save my people," Lessa explained simply. She mounted
her dragon and took off towards the battlefield.
The sword had changed. Its hilt displayed bold runes and its blade burned with a
brilliant white flame. Lessa smiled. "Now at least I can leave this world in
style," she thought. Lessa circled above the raging battle. Oblaid's army had
reached the gates of the royal castle. Lessa was still flying at Mount Taerra's
elevation but even from her height she could see Oblaid, a massive brute with hide
of smoking red stone wielding the double-ended black spear Nerf. Olbaid sensed the
massive magical fluctuations from the Blade of Gods and called a challenge to
Lessa.
Lessa smirked and accepted his challenge, but instead of swooping down, she
extended her arm and dropped the Blade of Gods. All the while Lessa's dragon had
been communicating with F'lar's, and as the blade plunged towards the earth,
F'lar's dragon positioned itself right below. F'lar caught the sword in his right
hand and charged Olbaid. The sword's white flame grew to engulf all of F'lar and
his dragon, turning him into a blazing streak of fury. Olbaid had never seen such
power in his entire existence. He raised the black spear Nerf to counter Flar's
blow too late, and his head was swiped clean off his shoulders. It steamed as it
spun through the air in an arc and crushed several demon soldiers when it landed
unblinking. Hope multiplied a hundredfold in the Vivendi army and they rushed from
the castle to charged the demons down.
Lessa never saw the end of the battle, but F'lar had come into the hall on Mount
Taerra and informed her that it went well. From the entry F'lar's dragon let out a
grunt to complain about the weight it was carrying. The two humans laughed and ran
to relieve the dragon off its luggage. The warning will come true, they were going
away from the world but they still needed a few personal items.
"So how did it go again?" asked Flar, looking down at the once again plain-looking
sword on the altar. Lessa dutifully repeated, "The mortal that climbs Mount Taerra
and takes the Sword shall die once he goes down. The mortal who wields the Sword
shall not live to walk the lands of Vivendi. For the Sword is the Blade of Gods to
be used to sever the soul of Time and signal the Ending. It is not made for mortal
hands."
The gods of Lessa's home world were true to their words ofcourse, but they were
reasonable and awarded courage in mortals. Lessa's dragon had never flown down
since she had taken the sword from the altar, and F'lar had not dismounted until
he landed in the hall just now. The guardian of the Sword had talked with the gods
and they have agreed to take F'lar and Lessa to another world, where they can
continue their lives. Even now he was patiently leaning on his gnarled staff and
watching the two.
"We're ready," Lessa told the guardian. He stood up straight and waved his staff
through the air and a shimmering portal appeared between two pillars of the hall.
Lessa beamed a smile to him and waved as she followed Flar through the portal.
"Welcome to Nilgiri, Lessa!"
"Welcome to Joran, Flar!"
"They've got to learn to pronouce your name," giggled Lessa. "Well then, let's
find an Inn to store our stuff and start exploring."
(c)Smathi Charanasomboon
Character names and story inspired by Anne McCaffrey.
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