All birds cleared the sky, sun still high, still burning with an intense heat, feathers ceased raining down from above, blood flowed upon the suspended village, seeping down into the ravine, permeating the bones used to construct it, dismembered limbs, belonging to westerners, to drylurkers, and to undeads.
It be a small understatement to say that the nightbirds had gotten their feathers a bit ruffled from this whole ordeal, it had certainly been a challenge for Tilmiel and her girls, but as the corvid had thought, trials set by Loimos were always fair and it had made the nightbirds actually experience in something other than information gathering and assassination, which was always something that they had needed to go over.
When Loimos had first taught Tilmiel, he had not ignored direct combat, as obviously, she had a rather advantageous physique in that regard, down the line, as she herself gathered up the nightbirds, all had developed their own martial styles, they had just needed to test in an actual combat situation.
"I am surprised, I thought for sure your recklessness would get you a trip back to the mainland…" landing silently, she looked down at the vulture, who had definitely looked a bit taller earlier.
Laying on her back, Liotra was missing everything below the stomach, an entire arm, a hand, and had gotten her face caved in right down the middle, not to mention that the lower half that was lying around somewhere else had also been pieced up and was inoperative, even with the great advancement in undead resilience, most would have broken apart and gotten a free visit to The Graveyard.
"Don’t make fun of me, Tilmiel! This is just a bit structurally unsound… I can still fight" Liotra demonstrated this claim by lifting what was left of her body using the handless arm.
"No need to act tough, especially when you stayed on the ground for so long- You do realise that it’s already all over?" picking the vulture up like she was a bag, in the corvid’s huge hand, there was plenty of space for one to sit in.
Over the platform where the main show had occurred, all feathers that had fallen from the sky had been blown away, dozens upon dozens of nightbirds were laying around cleaved in half, a single stroke having defeated them, thankfully for them however, other nightbirds had dragged them away and stepped up in their place, against an overwhelmingly powerful enemy, they had done nothing but stall and switched places, leading to only a handful of total undeads being sent back to The Graveyard.
Obviously, this was mostly due to one of their core techniques allowing for swift retreat and evasion, although somewhat restrictive in its usage, the battle art that made them vanish and manifest with a burst of feathers was the main reason they had held out against the warking.
"What about Topi?" asked Liotra.
"Ah, I knew there was a bit of space for worry in that hollow chest of yours!" the vulture gnarled "But yes, she is fine, just got an additional hole in her chest now, just a trifling matter"
Right as she was being spoken about, the hummingbird appeared, moving next to the nightbirds that could no longer move, all were being lined up by those that could.
Others rummaging through dismembered limbs, trying to determine whose legs or whose arms belonged to who, although not expert on healing and mending, they could still sew things back together, a quick trip to a death force heavy zone should allow for separated parts to come together again and if not, then there was always the healing caste.
Missing a hand, her head and now sporting a gruesome hole in the center of her chest, the bottom-prowler had managed to catch the hummingbird by surprise once, digging one of its claw-like fingers right through, but it had been defeated in the end, Topi’s last needle still stuck in its body even now.
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The little undead covered in the dark, bluish blood of the monster as she approached her leader.
"None of you would have happened to spot anything that belongs to me?" she questioned, after such intense fighting and receiving extensive damage, everyone senses were rather wobbly at the moment, having lost too much death force from taking hits, they maintained that same awareness as long as they were fighting, but now that it was over, they allowed their death flow to go the way it was supposed to with the current changes to their bodies.
This was especially harsh on the nightbirds as they had never been damaged so extensively by livings.
"I think they both fell into the ravines" responded Liotra, Topi’s shoulders drooping.
"Great…"
As her two most trusted nightbirds exchanged a few words, Tilmiel payed attention to something else, a scene occurring in between the last two livings present, Alintair and Jaral Cribler, the former had successfully managed to prevent the corvid from joining the fight, whilst the latter had successfully managed to defeat many undeads, including Liotra, but still, even succeeding in their endeavour had not been enough to protect the Western Cliffs from death’s grasp.
Cribler had exhausted himself fighting to the maximum of his capabilities for too long, both his right eye and heart activated to the best of their strength, he had been powerful enough to single handedly defeat many of the nightbirds, but they had not even been trying to land any hit on him, clearly sensing just how much energy and focus the king had been expanding every second to maintain this state.
Alintair had kneeled right by him, lifting her king and lover’s head onto her legs.
"Alintair… Thank goodness you’re alright…" after his strengthened state ended, he could feel the hummingbird’s poison spreading through his body once again, the wounds that had closed slowly reopening, truly, he had not come close to mastering this power.
"Jaral… I truly hope those words are not lies, and that we may go on even if it’s as cold corpses…"
"Aah… I guess there is nothing else to hope for now, huh? Undeath is not a choice at this point…" he coughed, smiling as he grabbed Alintair’s hand.
She stayed silent for a few moments, clutching his larger hand in hers.
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"I am pregnant"
Cribler’s eyes shot wide open like his approaching death was a small suggestion currently.
"Wh- For real? That’s terrible- I mean, it’s great but right now?!" he tried to rise up but failed to do so.
"We had tried many times, and it had to be now? Fate is simply cruel…"
Alintair ran her finger through his hair.
"The undead told me that the child would still be born like normal, even in death… I- I am not sure what I think about it just yet but maybe it’s a good thing?"
"It is the best thing that could have happened to your family" standing tall right next to them, someone had just appeared out of thin air, voice colder than freezing waters, emptier than the void.
Like dominoes, all undeads, be they severely damaged or not, kneeled in the manner they could manage.
"General Loimos!"