The Elementalist Tales: Wind Blade
Hey everyone! So, here's the link to the main page if you haven't read it yet.
This tale was based off of a champion request, so, as I said on the main page, I WILL take requests for champions to be in a tale.
Alright, that's all I had to say. On to the tale!
“Come on, Riven, you’re so slow today!”
Her brother’s taunt made her bristle, and she yelled back, “Shut up, Yasuo! I’m letting you win today because you were complaining that I’ve won the past twenty times!”
Yasuo shouted something unintelligible, but Riven had an idea of what he’d probably said, and grinned.
“That the best you can do?” she asked.
Not waiting for an answer, she increased her speed and caught up to her twin. He gave her an annoyed expression, but she ignored that and told him face to face, “Well, if you’re going to insult me for letting you win, maybe I won’t let you win after all.”
Then she shot forward, leaving Yasuo cursing in her wake. She wasn’t at her top speed, but she was still moving fast enough to hear the wind whistle past her and feel a refreshing breeze.
Riven and Yasuo were twins – fraternal twins, but still twins – who happened to have the same affinity. Most twins had different or even opposing affinities, but then again, considering that their parents were both air elementalists, maybe it made sense that they both aligned with air.
Looking back at her brother, Riven had one of her joking are we even related? moments. Her brother’s dark brown hair and light grey eyes couldn’t be more different than her platinum blond locks and light chocolate irises. However, they shared a very similar aspect of the element of air – they could directly control the winds, and use the air to enhance their weapon strikes. A part of controlling the air was using it to transport themselves and others, and of course, the naturally competitive twins had turned that aspect into a daily race.
Speaking of weapons … Riven lightly rested her hand against her sword belt ensuring that her relic-weapon hadn’t fallen off. The one time it did, she’d retraced her entire flight path, scouring the ground for it. Luckily, she’d found it, but if she hadn’t, the consequences would have been terrifying. The sword had been with her family for generations, and she didn’t want to be the generation that lost it.
A reflection of light off of a mirror distracted her from her thoughts, and she recognized their finish line. The first few times they’d raced, there was no finish line marker, so they’d argue for what seemed like hours over who technically had “finished” first. Once Riven had come up with the idea of a mirror as a marker – no one would see it from a distance, since it was flat against the ground, and the reflection of light would only be visible when they drew close – the arguments had become fewer and farther between. But there was still the occasional, “I got there first! No, I did!”
Riven shook her head, clearing her mind, and then plunged for the mirror. She heard Yasuo call something out to her, but she ignored him and slammed feet-first into the ground just past the mirror.
Before she could celebrate her victory, however, Yasuo gracefully landed next to her and whispered, “Be quiet! There’s something nearby.”
Riven immediately dropped to the ground and drew her relic-weapon. The blade was shattered into three large pieces and a few smaller shards, and to an unknowing observer, it appeared to be held together by magic. That was somewhat correct – as a relic-weapon, the sword had elemental energy, and a long time ago – no one remembered exactly when – someone had tried to break it. But the weapon contained too much elemental power, and that power held the pieces together, even after the blade was broken. Riven guessed that by holding itself together with air, the weapon no longer could channel as much elemental power as it had been able to before. However, by no means was the power left in the blade small – Riven knew that if she needed to, she could harness enough power to shatter fortresses.
She turned her head slightly so that she could see her brother, who was crouched beside her, his own choice weapon drawn. Yasuo had always been jealous that his sister had been favored for the relic-weapon, but after all, it had been passed down through their mother’s family for generations, awarded to the oldest daughter on her thirteenth birthday after she received extensive sword training. And since Riven was the older twin by a matter of minutes … the weapon was hers.
“I still don’t understand why you got the weapon,” Yasuo joked. “After all, you’re so sloppy with swords.”
“It’s my birthright, you jerk,” Riven replied, but in no way did she mean her words as an insult, and Yasuo knew it.
“Also, your katana isn’t all that cheap either, Mr. Fancy-Weapon.”
Yasuo chuckled under his breath, because while he wanted to laugh, he could sense that the something he’d sensed earlier was getting closer. He had no idea what the thing was, and that worried him. He’d never sensed anything like it before.
Yasuo’s control over the wind also gave him the ability to sense people and animals near him, like a predator would use the wind to determine where its next meal was, or as prey would to detect danger. Riven had this ability as well, but Yasuo’s version was stronger. Even though they had the same abilities, their levels of control over each respective ability varied. For example, Riven could carry objects – including herself – through the air faster, but Yasuo was better at using air for quick, sharp elemental strikes. Hence the katana – it enhanced that fighting aspect of Yasuo’s powers.
Finally, Riven couldn’t take the waiting anymore, and lifted her head up off the ground just a small bit, wanting to see what the creature Yasuo had sensed was. The sight stopped her cold, and she sucked in a sharp breath.
“What is that thing?”
Riven’s best description of the creature was that of a rocky mountain golem – the thing almost looked like a living piece of rock, but with four legs, a draconic, spiked head, and paw-like feet. But even more startling than its appearance was the layer of elemental earth magic covering its skin, protecting it.
As she watched, the earth near the creature flattened out so that the beast could walk in a straight line over level ground.
“Did … did that creature just use elemental magic?”
Yasuo’s question brought Riven back to her senses. She glanced over at her brother, who was staring incredulously.
“I think it did,” she finally replied after a few moments.
Riven moved to sheath her relic-weapon, since she didn’t think the beast had noticed them – after all, the path it had just carved with elemental power wasn’t headed in their direction. But as she moved her weapon, the tip of the blade scraped against the ground, and the magic within it, being of air and contrasting with the earth, amplified the noise, so that it echoed out towards where the beast was standing.
Riven froze, not daring to move her weapon another inch. Meanwhile, Yasuo cursed and drew his katana.
“I told you your vulgar language was going to get us into a fight one day,” Riven taunted as the beast turned in their direction and roared a challenge.
“You’re the one whose weapon has a mind of its own and just attracted the beast’s attention,” Yasuo countered, just before the beast used elemental magic to carve a path straight towards them.
Riven didn’t want to sacrifice their current perch to the beast’s magic – after all, the twins used it for more than just a finish line – so she plunged off the cliff and let the air carry her towards her target, screaming a battle cry.
Yasuo shook his head, watched his crazy twin jump into battle for a moment, and then followed with a cry of his own.
And as the two raced their opponent down the freshly-carved path, the beast roared in answer, and lumbered forward to greet them.
“I don’t think we’re actually doing any damage to this thing,” Riven yelled to her brother.
Yasuo dodged another blast of earth magic, stabbed towards the beast again with his katana – the attack bounced off of its rocky hide – and shouted back, “Yeah, I agree with that statement!”
The beast roared before Riven could make another comment and swung a thick leg right at her. She rolled under it and called to Yasuo, “I think we need to use air to dispel the elemental power the beast is cloaked in! Then we can probably get a hit in.”
Yasuo thought about it for a moment, and then replied, “Let’s try that.”
He then darted back a few paces to give himself room, and then performed three swift, straight strikes in the same direction. As he completed the third strike, a whirl of wind charged forwards from where he stood, raging towards the beast that controlled its opposing element.
Unfortunately, the whirlwind did not actually throw the beast into the air, as Yasuo had hoped it would, but he saw some of the beast’s elemental energy dissipate. Good, so our elemental powers do work against this thing, he thought, and then yelled to his twin, “That works!”
But what Yasuo didn’t realize was that the beast had changed its focus from fighting off the warrior that tried her best to strike it down to the lone figure standing a few paces away with his guard down. So, before Riven could call out a warning, the beast charged right for Yasuo.
It slammed into him before he could jump out of the way, and Riven could swear she heard something crack. Her brother’s scream of pain caused her vision to go red, and she made a decision that would haunt her forever.
“Sacrifices must be made,” she breathed, as she merged her power with the energy within her relic-weapon.
The sword glowed green with Riven’s magic, but she didn’t stop to ponder the color. Instead, she dashed forward and swiped her blade in an arc in front of her, cutting through the beast’s protective covering of elemental power like a hot blade through butter.
The beast roared in pain, and stumbled back a step. Riven repeated her previous move, this time swiping back the other way. Once again, the beast was forced to back off, and this time it seemed to be considering running away.
But Riven wasn't letting the creature go anywhere, not after it had harmed her twin.
“No looking back,” she muttered, her eyes glowing the same green as her relic-weapon.
She darted up onto a large rock and jumped towards the beast, swinging her sword with all her strength and screaming a final cry.
The blade tore through the armored skin, through the muscles, through the blood vessels, through thick bone, and the beast’s head collapsed to the ground.
Riven landed on her feet, covered in the creature’s blood, bending her legs to absorb the impact. She stared at her weapon, confused as to how it had suddenly been able to tear the beast apart, but then shrugged the thought aside. At least she could kill these things.
But then the roar of not one, but three angry creatures warned her that there were more nearby. She watched as they slowly lumbered into sight – the first smaller and more agile, surrounded by a shield of air, the next bearing molten armor, leaving charred ground in its wake, and the third followed by slowly flowing water.
Riven knew she should run, but her body was no longer fully her own. She had done what she had always been warned not to do – merge with the relic-weapon. Its power, even diluted when the blade was shattered, was too strong for even the best elementalist to control, and whoever tried to tap into the power would be taken over by the weapon’s ancient warrior-like awareness.
“I know my purpose,” Riven said.
Yasuo, who had finally managed to push himself off of the ground, saw his sister standing alone, soaked in blood, and facing off with three more of the creatures.
“Riven, let’s get out of here!”
She ignored his warning, not turning back to look at him, so he didn’t see the change to her eyes.
Yasuo carefully put his weight on his broken leg, testing whether or not he could stand on it. But clearly that wasn’t going to work. He collapsed to the ground with a shout of pain.
Yasuo’s cry gave Riven the leverage she needed to wrench back control of her body for a moment. In that moment of clarity, she saw her options. She could stand, fight, and likely die against three elemental beasts – that’s what she decided on calling them – or escape with her brother and warn the queen of what was coming.
Another noise from Yasuo made the decision for her. But she knew that in order to get herself out of there, she had to somehow break off the connection between her relic-weapon and her own power.
As the three creatures drew near, clearing wanting to kill her for dispatching one of their own, Riven swung her blade out in an arc as a warning for them to not come closer. But, much to her surprise, the merged elemental magic burst from the blade in a cone, slicing towards the elemental beasts. The water and fire beasts were sliced to pieces by the attack – what was left of them fell to the ground. The air beast, however, took no damage, and was merely shoved back a bit.
Huh, so it’s easier to kill them with opposing elements, and impossible to kill them with the same element, Riven thought. Releasing the elemental power in the blade had severed the connection between her power and its own, and now she was herself again. Her eyes had returned to their normal brown color.
She darted to her brother and called on the air to carry them both to safety. As they fled, the twins heard the last elemental beast roar in fury, and Riven could have sworn it was promising revenge.
Since Yasuo wasn’t putting any weight on his leg, his mind was clear enough of pain that he could aid Riven in escaping. But what he didn’t understand was how Riven had killed the beast, alone.
“How’d you do it?” he managed to ask as soon as they were out of the beast’s sight.
Riven paused, knowing what her brother’s reaction would likely be, but then said, “I merged my power with my sword’s.”
Yasuo was silent for a moment, but then, to Riven’s utter amazement, he didn’t start yelling. Instead, as calmly as he possibly could, he told her, “I’ll yell at you once we warn the queen. But we have to warn her first.”
This was the beginning of the elemental beasts’ invasion. Not long after Riven and Yasuo, still covered in blood, tell their tale to a worried Lux and Garen, the creatures began to attack, destroying villages and leaving nothing living in their wake. Yasuo and Riven were among the last line of warriors at the castle, and they both fought tooth and nail until their last breaths.
Yasuo’s tornadoes kept the beasts from grouping up, making them easier to pick off. But in the end, he was killed by a rampaging air beast – quite possibly the one the twins had fled after killing off its companions. Rumor has it that when Yasuo fell, Riven merged all of her elemental power with her blade, and never looked back. She tore through the creatures' ranks before she was ultimately brought down, but not until several air elemental beasts managed to trap her and wear her down.
And when Lux saw the twins finally fall alongside her brother, leaving her the last human standing, she unleashed her power in a massive attack, obliterating all but one of the elemental beasts.
You know the story of that final fight. And this tale told the story of one of the last days before it.
Thanks for reading! Here's the link to the main page again if you need it.
Just a heads up that I may not be able to release the next tale on time next week - after all, it's a crossover event, so I'm going to take my time to make it the best it can possibly be.
Thanks again, and see you on the Rift! (Hope you enjoyed the ARURF madness the past two weekends!)
