Shadows & Sorcery #47
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This week we discover the might of the Sword of the Stars, we make our way through the Drowned Outskirts, we discover the strange power of the Crucible Crypt, we get a visit from a Witch of Winter, and we take a trip to the City of the Sword…
Sword of the Stars
From the cave mouth they saw it fall. It left a streak in the air, like a length of nebula bridging the earth to the heavens. Curiosity had led the small band of clayskins to the cave where they had slept and struck out to hunt--it was a fine territory worth defending. Now that same curiosity led them from the solid safety of the rock walls and into the sloping plains. Hefty axes with meticulously carved heads never left their grip as they stalked out to the site, though there were no animals about. Dust hung heavy in the air the closer they got, and even small stones seemed to be suspended, gently floating as if in a pool of water. The land around it was decimated, caved in for a fairly long way, but that sky-coloured streak never broke, and it led them at long last, beast-skins pulled tight for warmth, to the source of the devastation.
It looked like a spear, but thin, and had an edge like an axe the whole way down its length. It was a little uneven, wavering, jagged. It looked a shard of the night sky itself, black and shimmering with cerulean, amethyst, and gold along its length--an astral iridescence. The point which stuck outwards from the ground was thinner than the rest, and this is where their leader held it. It was frigid to the touch, but rose to a numbness neither hot nor cold. As it was drawn from the earth, they saw then it tapered to a wicked point, far sharper than anything their flint and oak could produce.
They were returning to the cave to examine the thing more closely when the attackers came upon them. Stoneskins with fangs and tusks, a bestial breed, likely they'd come out of the cold hills to inspect the event too. Hoots and hollers made in threat and mockery were returned with barks and hard stares. Each one of the stoneskins was eyeing the star relic. Its bearer, the clayskin leader, stepped forward with a puffed out chest, wielding the artefact as if it were between club and spear. One thing they'd noticed is that the relic seemed to drag itself through the air in whatever direction it was moved, making stopping it somewhat difficult. This might be an advantage.
A stoneskin came forward. The enemies circled each other. The stoneskin struck first with a club indented with shards of black stone. It was easily dodged, and not a second later did the leader rush in with a downward arc. The star relic felt like a great heavy rock plummeting, and it didn't stop until it hit the ground, clean through the stoneskin's arm. A howl of shock and pain was met with an upward slash that tore through the belly and chest of the savage, making him choke and fall back, clutching the ragged wound. The clayskin leader had to brace to not fall back with the weapon, for weapon it had suddenly become.
The battle was short as the stoneskins cowered and flailed about in meager defense. Tools and skins were taken, and bruises nursed as the clayskins cheered long into the night, savouring fermented fruits and meats caught with the aid of the star relic. It won territories as the clayskins banded together under its power, it passed from hand to hand in battle, cowed enemies, impressed allies, and it wouldn't be for thousands of years before it and its countless imitators would be known as that most noble of weapons: the sword. The distant children of the clayskins still rule their ancestral homeland, and a body of myth to rival the most ancient gods surrounds that primal sword of the stars.
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