Durosh sighed, a sound barely audible amidst the screeching metal and the terrified screams of the crew. His brow furrowed, not from fear, but from the utterly inconvenient timing. He had just finished sweeping the path. The thought of all that work being undone, of mud and debris splattering across his pristine porch, was far more irritating than any existential threat.
“No,” he murmured, his voice level, deadening the resonant tremor in the plunging hull. “Absolutely not. My petunias are just coming into bloom.”
He cast a glance towards the ground, where Vankar stood, a tiny figure beside the immense, shadowy mass of Bumbash. The dragon, previously content to nap, had stirred, a low rumble vibrating from its chest, sensing the imminent destruction of its favorite napping spot.
“Vankar! Bumbash!” Durosh’s voice, though not raised, cut through the din like a honed blade. “Catch the squishy ones. And try not to make too much of a mess.”
Vankar, whose face had been a mask of conflicted agony—torn between his veneration for Durosh and the inevitable demise of the ship’s innocent crew—snapped to attention as if struck by lightning. He locked his gaze onto the scores of panicked zealots tumbling from the tearing framework. They were screaming, flailing, their holy armor useless against the unyielding pull of gravity.
“As the Architect wills!” Vankar roared, abandoning his stance of serene contemplation. His twin blades, ‘Whisperwind’ and ‘Sky-Shear,’ sprang into his hands, not with a flourish of aggression, but with a fluid, almost gentle motion. He didn't raise them to strike. Instead, he plunged them into the very air before him.
A ripple, like heat haze over sun-baked stone, emanated from Vankar. It expanded, not with the concussive force of his usual devastating techniques, but with an ethereal, almost invisible grace. The ground beneath his feet remained untouched, but the air above shimmered, twisting. He began to spin, slowly at first, then faster, his swords a blur of silver-grey light.
“Blade-Weave of the Gale’s Embrace!” he intoned, chanting in measured cadence. The wind, which had been whipping fiercely around the mud hut, seemed to obey his command, coiling around his movements. Wisps of atmospheric energy solidified into translucent strands, like an impossibly fine, yet incredibly strong, gossamer net. It stretched, expanded, growing larger with every rotation of Vankar’s body, until it formed an enormous, quivering expanse in the sky, directly beneath the plummeting crew.
The armored crusaders dropped like stones, striking the unseen barrier. There was no impact, no jarring halt. Instead, they were met with a yielding softness, a gentle deceleration that cushioned their descent. One by one, they piled onto the vast, invisible trampoline, their screams turning into gasps of bewildered relief as they bounced harmlessly, like startled sprites caught in a giant spider’s web. Vankar, sweat beading on his brow, maintained the impossible structure, a single-minded focus on catching every last soul.
Bumbash, meanwhile, had uncurled. Its vast, shadowy head tilted, watching the falling figures with mild curiosity. When an especially portly warrior bounced too high and tipped toward empty air, Bumbash merely extended a massive, leathery paw. The warrior was scooped mid-air with gentle precision, then set back onto the invisible surface. Bumbash let out a soft rumble, a sound that shook the very dust from the mud hut’s roof, but caused no harm.
Up above, Durosh gave Vankar’s work a nod of approval, then turned his gaze to the plunging, weaponized flagship. Its numerous eyes, now burning with a furious magenta light, were locked onto his hut. Its entire form shuddered with malevolent power, a single-minded destructive intent.
“Fine,” Durosh muttered, adjusting the sleeves of his simple tunic. “If you want to be rude, I can be rude.”
He spread his hands, palms open, facing the descending monstrosity. There was no dramatic incantation, no flare of power, no visible aura. He simply stood there, an ordinary man in an extraordinary situation, facing down a world-ending weapon with the casual demeanor of someone about to catch a stray ball.
The war-hull shrieked, metal shearing against metal as hijacked radiance surged along its ribs. It was a hammer, poised to crush. It was a spear, sharpened to pierce.
And then it hit Durosh.
Not with a crash, not with an explosion. It simply… met him. The impact, which should have vaporized continents, was absorbed. The kinetic energy, enough to shift tectonic plates, vanished into his outstretched palms. The malevolent magic, intended to scorch and obliterate, was drawn in, like water into dry earth.
The warship shuddered. The magenta light in its eyes flickered, then dimmed. Its metallic hide, which had been bristling with corrupt power, began to dissolve. It wasn't breaking apart; it was unmaking itself. From the points where Durosh’s palms touched its massive, armored head, a shimmering cascade of iridescent dust began to pour forth. It wasn't destructive. It was beautiful.
Billions of motes of sparkling light, like a nebula born anew, peeled away from the titanic construct. The armored monstrosity, moments ago a harbinger of doom, dissolved into a silent, glittering shower that drifted down like cosmic snow. The roar became a whisper, then a sigh. Its bulk melted away, leaving only the memory of its vast shape in the air, etched in ephemeral light.
Within moments, nothing remained of the vast, weaponized behemoth. Only Durosh stood, arms still slightly extended, looking as if he’d simply dusted off a particularly large bookshelf. A fine, shimmering layer of cosmic glitter settled on his hair, on his shoulders, dusting the ground around him. It sparkled harmlessly, then faded into nothing.
With a soft *splat*, something small and slimy landed in the perfectly swept mud at Durosh’s feet. It twitched. It was an obscenely bloated, pale-grey leech-like creature, no larger than his thumb, pulsating faintly. Its single, lidless eye, previously burning with the Pontiff's fury, now held only a desperate, shriveled fear.
The creature squirmed, weakly attempting to burrow into the damp earth.
“W-what… what are you?!” it squeaked, its voice a pathetic, reedy sound, utterly devoid of its former bombastic arrogance. “You… you absorbed it all! The very essence of the Sun-Core’s fury! The faith of a thousand generations! It’s all… gone!”
Durosh looked down at the pathetic thing, then at the minuscule smudge it had made in his clean mud. He sighed again, a deeper sigh this time, already thinking about how to clean it up.
“Me?” he asked, his voice flat, devoid of any grandiosity. “Just a homeowner.”
He then nudged the squirming leech with the toe of his boot, carefully, so as not to track anything into the house. “And you, little fella, are definitely not allowed on the porch.”