Chapter 37: The Duel of Stone and Blight
Varg's charge was not the clumsy rush of a warrior, but a surge of unnatural power. He moved with shocking speed, his crystalline axe leaving a trail of green light in the air. The ground itself seemed to wither where he stepped, the grass turning black and brittle.
Alistair stood his ground, his feet firmly planted on the soil. He didn't try to match Varg's brute force. Instead, he flowed with the attack. As the axe swept toward him in a decapitating arc, Alistair dropped to one knee and slammed his palms into the earth. A wall of solid rock, rough and jagged, erupted between them. Varg's axe bit deep into the stone with a shriek of tortured crystal, sending cracks spiderwebbing through the rock but failing to break it.
"Hiding behind more walls, spirit-talker?" Varg snarled, yanking his axe free.
"I am using the tools I have," Alistair replied, his voice steady despite the adrenaline coursing through him. "You are the one using a crutch."
He pushed his will into the ground beneath Varg's feet. The soil turned to liquid mud, attempting to swallow the corrupted Graxian. But Varg simply laughed, a harsh, grating sound. The mud around his boots sizzled and hardened into more of the sickly green crystal, giving him a solid foothold.
"Your tricks are useless against the true power of this world!" Varg bellowed. He stomped his own foot, and a wave of corrosive energy shot through the ground toward Alistair. Where it passed, the healthy brown earth turned to a glassy, poisoned slag.
Alistair leaped back, the corrosive wave missing him by inches. He could feel the land crying out in pain from the violation. This was worse than the slow creep of the northern blight; this was an active, aggressive poisoning.
He had to end this fast. Every second Varg stood on the land, he was killing it.
Changing tactics, Alistair went on the offensive. He didn't summon spikes or walls. He focused on the very air around Varg, on the moisture in the fog. He pulled it together, compressing it into a dozen fist-sized hailstones of pure, hard-packed ice and launched them at Varg like cannonballs.
Varg swung his axe, shattering most of them, but a few got through, pounding against his swollen chest and shoulders. They didn't cut him, but where they struck, the pulsing green light in his skin flickered and dimmed for a split second. A grunt of pain escaped him. Pure, elemental force, untainted by the planet's energy, could still hurt him.
Seeing an opening, Alistair pressed his advantage. He charged forward, this time not away from the axe, but inside its reach. As Varg brought the weapon down in an overhead chop, Alistair sidestepped and grabbed the haft of the axe with both hands.
It was like grabbing hold of a live power line. Agonizing energy, cold and vile, shot up his arms. He cried out, but he held on. He poured his own power, the clean, steady energy of the planetary core, down the haft and into the crystalline axe head.
A violent conflict erupted within the weapon. The green corruptive energy fought against the blue-gold planetary power. The axe head began to vibrate violently, emitting a high-pitched whine. Cracks appeared on its surface, leaking both green and golden light.
"No!" Varg roared, trying to wrench the weapon back.
With a final, desperate push, Alistair channeled all his remaining strength into the axe.
The crystalline axe head exploded.
The blast threw both of them backward. Alistair landed hard, his arms numb and smoking, his vision swimming. Varg was hurled back into the line of his Reanimates, shattering two of them into dust.
Silence descended, broken only by Alistair's ragged breathing. He pushed himself to his hands and knees, looking across the field.
Varg was also rising. The explosion had torn his right arm off at the shoulder. But no blood flowed. Instead, thick, green energy bubbled from the wound, slowly forming the shape of a new, clawed limb made of solid light. The Reanimates around him stood motionless, waiting.
He was wounded, but not defeated. The corruption was healing him, remaking him.
Varg lifted his newly formed, glowing claw and pointed it at Alistair, his voice a distorted whisper that carried across the field.
"You see? You cannot kill me. I am beyond your understanding. This land is mine to reshape."
He then turned his gaze toward the walls of Vance Haven, where Alistair's people watched in horror.
"But they are not."