With a quick sidestep and rotation to the right, Templar Champion Escarosht the Ardent dodged the bladed club of his opponent. He let himself fall back, getting more distance between him and the Saurus warrior before him.
Seraphon were still a mystery to him. So advanced, yet so primitive. A lot of wasted potential.
As an Enlightened Aviarch, he immediately knew its fighting style. Brutal, raw, direct, without much finesse. Prone to openings.
His polearm shot out, penetrating the Saurus’ thick hide at his shoulder. The beast cried out in pain, and its grip loosened.
Amongst its own kind, it was a respected warrior, judging from the tattoos, primitive jewelry and ritualistic scarring – here though, it was sluggish and simple. Escarosht quickly turned the blade in the Saurus’ wound and pulled out before the beast could bring his club down on his spear.
The foreseen movement sufficed for the Templar to stab deep into the Saurus’ neck, cutting through its carotid artery, causing a bloody end for the guard, who collapsed before him.
Making sure he was dead with a quick stab deep into his eye, Escarosht entered the temple.
The temple that had served as the hideout for the group of Seraphon that had insisted on harassing them these past few days. They had not been interested in diplomacy, as was to be expected – but they had also had been so foolish as to make it their mission to hinder the Templar advance towards the inner lakes, where remnants of Nurglite forces converged.
The Seraphon laid ambushes, traps. The jungle was deadly in their path. The Seraphons’ magical abilities had been impressive indeed, inconspicuous vines spontaneously coming to life and wrapping themselves around Tzaangor, strangling them.
It had been a hard battle to track them down to this dark spot of the forest, into some overgrown, long-forgotten ruins where the Seraphon had made their home.
Once they had had nowhere to run anymore, the Seraphon had been slaughtered.
Now, it was only the temple itself left.
As Escarosht entered, he found only a single Skink priest kneeling before an altar bearing a dark green gem; the Templar immediately recognised it as a cyclestone shard.
The Skink turned around, its head askew. It seemed ancient, and, looking in its past, Escarosht knew it to be true.
“It is done, then.” It rasped. It was obviously exhausted, at its end.
“So be it. I will face my dead with dignity.”
“Do you deserve it?” Escarosht asked, imitating the voice of someone from the Skink’s past, someone special to them.
“You brought this on yourself, Tik’acu-cochi, and on your kin, with your stubbornness.”
The lizard’s face was hard to read, but he suspected the unexpected voice pierced its calm in the last seconds before its head hit the stony, vine-covered floor.
The cyclestone shard pulsed with arcane power in his hand as he stepped back outside.
His troops had already gathered together the surviving skinks into holding pits. Pyres of celebration were erected, and soon, the skinks would burn upon them, to the Glory of Our Burning Saviour.
Templar Champion Escarosht hoped the next attempt at diplomacy would prove more fruitful.
