The Awakening of Gregori Rasputin – Text Update II
Much had to be done to prepare for the battle ahead.
Koschei was an Immortal.
To which dark god he received this power from he did not know, but there was one thing in his favor.
Rasputin was extremely clever and was confident that skill would prevail over Koschei's experience.
The study was unsuitable for their duel, due to the small size would constrain his ability to trade space for time and secondly because Koschei could have various unimaginable magicks hidden away or even in plain sight ready to come to his aid.
Only one room within this tower would do, the Observatory.
At the apex of the tower was a large doomed room, enchanted observatory designed to allow for unimpeded study of the heavens.
On the floor of the observatory was an intricate mural that was in reality the fabric of the spell powering and controlling the Observatory's functions.
Getting to work Rasputin began to subtly alter the magic woven into the floor, an act that would have taken dozens of normal mages months to complete.
But Rasputin was not a normal mage, he has past the Test of High Sorcery, something only a small fraction of the worlds mages take and much less pass. Most are scarred, some inspired and the remainder run from whatever fate or inner truth revealed to them.
Rasputin bended the Test to his will, showing him the truth of the universe and embraced it.
He gazed into the eyes of the personification of magic itself, a physical god taken form just for him.
If this wasn't the winds of fate propelling him and his destiny what else could it be?
And of course secondly he had the phylactery. A temporary boost in knowledge.
/***********************/
A single lone cold figure walked into the tower.
Koschei has returned.
Koschei the Immortal!
Koschei had striven for years to access immortality, the ability to remain alive forever ever increasing his knowledge of the magical arts.
Koschei's ambition had at the time proven too much for him, he was defeated by a wandering warrior cleric and cast down broken into a ravine that brought him at the edge of life to the shores of the White Sea.
Off the coast on an island only he could access he met his dark salvation.
A dark god with dark energies swirling around him was waiting for him.
There was an altar there long ago used and left abandoned to old pagan gods now possessed by the tinniest filament of this gods power.
He never knew its name, never asked, never will.
It offered him power and the chance to be there to rebuild the world in his image, to grant him the powers of a god, to take his rightful place as the arbitrator of all magic.
He only had to serve him and allow him into the world.
Koschei had accepted, granted the power to abandon his body for another. A trespassing fisherman oblivious to the island sufficed at the time.
But the spell to open the World Gate would slay a lesser mage, he needed the body of a mage who had passed the test, whose very veins were opened up and able to handle the vast magical energies to fuel the spell.
While Koschei could cast any spell he knew or could learn on his own in the bodies he took there was always something missing...
Koschei hadn't expected the Balrog to escape, nor did he honestly expect to find the handmaidens who followed it out. The balrog was unfortunate and was slain, but the fiends survived, by the time Koschei found them he was in good humour and spared them his wrath and had them teach the boy instead.
Now something though was amiss, the tower was empty but that was to be expected, it was closed for much of the year afterall.
Rasputin had passed the Test, this was also to be expected.
Something had changed in Rasputin's demeanour, more reserved, greeting him cooly but respectfully.
This was secretly worrying, if Rasputin decided to leave it would be troublesome to track him down... It was just about time to transfer bodies and he didn't have much to wait.
They had been walking, side by side, in near silence for much time that Koschei hadn't realized, since he was deep in thought he was being gradually guided to the Observatory.
Upon reaching the room it finally struck him that something indeed was wrong.
“Why are we here Gregori? I do not recall...”
“Choose your next words carefully Koschei, for they may be your last.”
Sputtering with rage Koschei was nearly speachless.
“Wha~t!? How DARE you utter such words to me!? I could destroy you in an instant! I picked you up from the rubble of your VILLAGE! I taught you MAGIC how dare you speak to me with such arrogant threats!”
“Saved me?” He laughed. “As far as I know you are the CAUSE of that incident, my family weren't even KILLED in it, my grandmother had died only last winter!”
Koschei was taken aback.
“How did you...?”
“The Test.” He answered.
Now it all made sense, it was always a risk he supposed letting Rasputin take the test, he had always suspected that magic itself was working slowly against him, subtly, the odd spell not quite working to his specifications but it was always hard to pin down, too many variables that prevented narrowing down.
But now it all made sense, during the Test magic itself must have spoke to Rasputin, giving him visions of the past and future.
“So now what?” Koschei asked, voice a deadly growl.
“Now I will destroy you, the magic wills it.” And with that up came Rasputin's hands drawing arcane symbols in the air or rather one symbol... An arc of brilliant white lightning leaped instantly from Rasputin's outstretched hand and into Koschei's chest blowing him away and into the wall.
Koschei was stunned as he slid to the ground rubble dropping next to him, he didn't recognize that spell and it should've been deflected by his defensive enchantments.
Rasputin raised up his hand for moment considering the spell he just cast; impressive. The first of his arsenal expunged from his temporary armoury.
Koschei shakily raised himself off the ground and responded, gathering in a great breath of air and exhaling a piercingly loud wail of the kind banshees would use. This sound would be instantly deadly to anyone who heard it unawares.
Rasputin had no way of dodging it of course, who would? The spell was of the ninth circle and Rasputin could only possibly know of fourth circle spells at most...
Rasputin lurched backwards in pain but otherwise not dead.
A cascade of what appeared to be a glass like dome of material flickered around Rasputin and shattered into a million pieces before dissipating into nothingness.
Shaken Rasputin got back to his feet before unleashing a vast storm of missiles at first extending outwards for several meters in an upward direction before finally all turning as one towards Koschei aiming straight for his black heart.
Buying time Koschei clapped his hands to instantly teleport to the centre of the room where he awaited for the missiles to reach him. Raising his hands he spoke the words of power and broughly forth a shimmering rainbow coloured dome of energy intercepted the missiles with a pffzzt.
Rasputin had been fumbling in his robes for spell foci when Koschei left the protection of his dome with grim murder present in his eyes.
Snapping off a multisyllabic spell several molten fiery rocks exploded forth from the aether from his outstretched arms spiralling quickly towards Rasputin. Rasputin repeating Koschei's earlier actions and clapped his hands teleporting himself away, an impossible spell for his level...
But Koschei wasn't done, normally this spell would travel in an unchanging arc and explode on contact, with a wave of his hands gesturing quickly Koschei brought the spell back under his control and angled it towards Rasputin's new position.
Surprisingly calm Rasputin repeated the gesture, phylactery flaring green before growing dimmer than it was before and teleported once again less disoriented than before.
Curiously Rasputin changed the direction and faced the meteors directly waiting until the last possible moment before clapping once again green phylactery flaring-
-and the molten missiles disappeared and appeared in front of Koschei.
Boom.
Coughing and sputtering Koschei vacated the smoke moving more towards the rooms center, eyes watering and blinded.
“I'll rend your soul for this Rasputin! You will WISH you could die.” He continued to cough.
Rasputin grabbed the phylactery and held it up regarding it solemnly.
It was no longer glowing a vibrant green but was now a dead kind of dark, depleted.
“You are finished Koschei, the spell is complete.” He said, pointing his index finger Koschei.
“What!? What spell? I've been regarding you the entire time you have no time for any spell that could actually HARM me!”
“Incorrect assumption, all of this time with each movement I've been slowly activating portions of a spell I had hidden within the floor.” He gestured.
“It required two conditions to be met, one; that I deplete this phylactery gifted upon me by the personification of magic of its spells, I only had so many powerful spells to cast before it depletes and a portion of it was depleted just modifying the spells woven into this Observatory.”
He continued.
“The second that I exhaust you of YOUR spells.”
Impossible.
“I have only casted a fraction of my vast knowledge!” He objected.
“But you are standing within the circle.” He pointed.
The pattern on the floor Koschei had finally noticed had been subtly moving approaching the center for quite some time and just as Koschei had moved to try to clap once again to move from that spot.
He froze.
“What trickery is this!” He raged.
“My last spell from this crystal. Notice I had been pointing at you all this time?”
“No.” He growled, but it was futile. The final bit of energy had finally reached the central circle and exploded in a brilliant technicolour display of light and electrical discharges before finally materializing as a great ebony hand grasping within Koschei-
-and began draging from Koschei his soul, all of his knowledge, all of his spells and memories... Slowly slipping.
Lowering his arm Rasputin slowly approached Koschei.
“You! You can't do this! You cannot do this to me!” But his words were becoming fainter, his power was being drained.
“I can do more.”
Sighing heavily, Rasputin gazed into the cloud of magic, knowing that just outside his perception was that Personification, that physical god, regarding him.
“I'm sorry.” He said.
And Rasputin raised the phylactery and stabbed it into Koschei's chest piercing his heart.
The draining process sputtered and then for moment did nothing... Swaying for a single instant in limbo before finally making up its mind and began moving away from the cloud like portal and into the phylactery crystal. Glaring a bright sickly green light it began to be refilled of power, filled with more power than it ever was before.
Rasputin was draining the magical lifeforce of the being for his own purposes. Shuddering it closed off its connection to the world in an instant life or death decision to protect itself and the magic.
Koschei collapsed to the floor dissipating into dust, dead forevermore.
Rasputin held aloft his magic phylactery, filled to the brim with power and with one action stabbed it into his own heart.
And a new Immortal was born.
Elsewhere a portal opened.
And out stretched forth a eldritch being, human in shape and drabbed in purple robes, notable for his angular features and almond shaped eyes filled with memory.
It sighed.
He had startled a little girl who had been picking mushrooms nearby.
Too young to worry about the risks and dangers of talking to strangers she approached the tired figure and asked its name.
It looked around confused for a moment, forgetting his mission and his presence before regaining his wits.
“I am... Raenir Salazar. And I am a Wizard.”