Adventure of crystalious 1

The ward channel bucks beneath the snow-covered shelf. Blue cracks race toward the command ridge as Cryos lands hard, Crystalious mounted, Rimebreaker burning against his injured hand.

Behind them, Warden Maelis strides through the blue-lit breach with her sword drawn. The unstable passage folds and unfolds around her boots, shedding sparks into the night.

Hunters surge from the watchfires, forming a hooked cordon around the exposed command ridge. Their lanterns flare together, forcing the ward pressure back toward Cryos and the breach.

The elderly hunter, an elderly man with a lean, weathered build, a gray beard, and a dark fur-lined coat over layered winter gear, lifts his hooked sword, and the cordon advances through whipping snow. Behind him, a black command stone pulses beneath the ridge, drawing the ward pressure into itself.

Crystalious swings Rimebreaker in a great arc over Cryos’s head. Blue-white fire tears from the blade, racing outward across the snow toward the hooked cordon.

The energy wave strikes the hunters’ line and throws them from their feet, shattering their formation. Lanterns tumble dark as armored figures slide harmlessly across the ridge.

The elderly hunter remains standing near the ridge, braced behind his hooked sword. Around him, the fallen hunters struggle to rise while the black command stone pulses wildly.

Cryos surges forward through the scattered cordon, wings driving snow across the ridge. Rimebreaker’s fire remains raised above him, its energy still humming through the ward channel.

Crystalious launches from Cryos’s broad back and lands before the pulsing black command stone. The impact jars his injured palm against Rimebreaker, tearing the bandage and sending fresh blood across the blue flame tattoo.

The elderly hunter drives through the scattered cordon, hooked sword raised, while the command stone throbs beneath Crystalious’s shadow and pulls the ward pressure into its fractured surface.

Behind Crystalious, Maelis meets the hunter’s charge in a ringing clash of steel. Cryos spreads his wings across the ridge, blocking the remaining hunters as blue fire gathers along Rimebreaker’s edge.

Rimebreaker descends toward the command stone as the violent urge surges through the ward, repeating inside him: “Kill, kill, KILL.” Crystalious follows the strike without wavering.

The blade crashes into the black stone. Blue-white fire floods its fractures, then splits the command stone from crown to buried base as the ward pressure tears free.

The hunter’s hooked sword rings against Maelis’s guard behind him. The elderly man stumbles as the collapsing command magic throws snow and dark sparks across the ridge.

The fractured stone caves inward without burying the ridge. Blue wardlight races through the snow toward the breach, and the hunters’ cordon collapses into confusion beneath Cryos’s outspread wings.