Malefor scrutinised the glowing rock. He was, of course, fully aware of the inherent dangers of dark crystals; many times had Infernacus, the Fire Guardian, lectured him on their unstable nature. However, he had no choice. No other crystals were as powerful, and as long as he worked alone, he would need as much power as he could get, despite the vast concentration it took to ignore their foul temptations. He sighed. Not much longer now. He had escaped being corrupted by their dark influence thus far, and his plan was almost complete.
Malefor supposed he owed one thing to Ankine; if not for him, he wouldn't have realised his...destiny. His purpose. After Ankine had died, he had fled to Tall Plains, fearing he would be held responsible, and it was there he had seen the mysterious carvings. It had all become so clear to him. Why else would he be able to master Elements none had seen before? Why else had their never been anybody like him? They had told him; reminded him constantly throughout his youth, that he would be the one to save their world. And he would.
The carvings at Tall Plains were familiar to him; he'd been shown ones like them many years before by Amperon, the Archive Master at Warfang. Back then, he'd been a tiny dragonet, and had been terrified by the monstrous creature depicted; a creature of stone devouring the world. Those he had asked about it had no idea who had built it, or why it had been built; all they knew was that it created life by destroying it.
At last things had made sense. The world had to be...renewed. It would be renewed. He was the savior of Dragonkind; he had been born to save the world, and now he would give it a chance to begin anew; even if it was to be achieved through such destructive means. There was no other way. It was a ghastly task, but it was his sacrifice and his alone to bear for the sake of the world. And yet, the worst thing of all, Malefor thought, was that nobody would ever know it.
Malefor shook his head. Enough of those thoughts, he had work to do, and he wouldn't get anywhere if he lost himself to despair. The dark crystal glowed behind him, almost invitingly. He turned, and shattered it with his tail, his eyes closed as he concentrated on keeping his mind clear as the dark energies flowed into his body.
The crystal dissipated, its force spent, and Malefor exhaled deeply as he felt his new strength. One final barrier stood in his way to unleashing the Destroyer. The last few carvings in Tall Plains had been missing, yet, he knew exactly where they were, for he had walked past them many times in his youth in Warfang. The “treasure hunters” who had raided this site had returned to Warfang’s Archives with only the most vivid carvings of the Destroyer, not realising that the incomprehensible messes of runes and images of destruction together detailed the process of reawakening the automaton.
It was time to return to Warfang.
*
The burst of energy the dark crystal gave Malefor was enough to get him from the Well of Souls to Warfang without needing to stop to catch his breath. However, in his crystal-fueled haste to get to the Archives, Malefor had failed to consider the possibility that his “old friend” wouldn’t see things the same way as him.
“You're insane, Malefor!” the elderly electricity dragon yelled at his former pupil. “How could you believe for an instant that…that...”
“It’s all there, Amperon,” Malefor said calmly. “Written in the old scrolls, inscribed on the ancient tablets…the texts are very clear on the matter. You should know this; you’ve studied them as well as I have.”
“But…but…to destroy the Dragon Realms…” Amperon stammered. ”Why, it’s unthinkable! It’s Abominable!”
“Don't be a fool, Amperon!” Malefor growled; his teeth illuminated by the lantern hanging from Amperon’s wing spur. “It's everything you ever told me! My scales, my elements...you said it yourself many years ago, Amperon! The world is flawed, and I would mend it!"
"A savior!" Amperon bellowed back. "I said you would save the world, not destroy it! Have you gone mad, Malefor? After everything the Guardians taught you-"
"Wasn't it 'my destiny' to protect dragonkind?" Malefor shouted over him. "Wasn't it 'my duty' to save the world, to end misery and suffering? Even you know with destruction comes rebirth! It is the cycle of things, Amperon! It...it has to be!" Malefor stopped, aware he was stammering. Regaining his composure, he spoke again. "I will do this, Amperon."
“I…I won’t let you”, Amperon found himself saying. Once he had placed all his hopes in this dragon; he had been so sure that Malefor would be the one; the legendary dragon the ancient texts spoke of. “I’ll fight you if I have to,” he said; his body instinctively moving into a battle stance.
Malefor chuckled. “Amperon, you and I both know that you're no-“The elderly dragon cut him off with a quick blast of Electricity that caught Malefor across his snout. Malefor snarled and launched a wall of fire towards him, which Amperon barely managed to avoid, leaping to one side as they bore down on him. The flames continued to the end of the Atrium, where they ignited two of the immense banners that hung from the ceiling.
Amperon knew that Malefor was right; he was no match for him. The best Amperon could hope for was to keep the purple dragon engaged in battle long enough, and hope that in the meantime another member of the Archive’s Night Watch would arrive and alert their situation to the Guardians. Still panting, Amperon forced a smile. “Using Fire against an Electricity Dragon, Malefor?” he chuckled. “I thought you were smarter than that! Or were all your Elemental studies here a waste of time?”
Malefor retaliated by unleashing a hail of Ice towards him, forcing Amperon to take flight as the shards tore at his scales. As he prepared to attack again, Malefor leapt aloft, hovering in front of the vast mural on the Atrium’s dome. With his attacks too weak and no good defence available, Amperon launched himself towards Malefor, planning to knock him out of the sky. As he did so, he saw Malefor's head arching back; jaws open as a purple energy began to emerge from the depths of his throat. Amperon slowed, his concentration fading. No elemental energy he had ever heard of had such a colour. Malefor had at last discovered his Element!
His hesitation cost him dearly. All other noise was drowned out as the energy erupted from Malefor's maw, tearing across the room where it slammed into the ancient Archive Master, striking him full upon his chest. A look of wonder briefly shone across his features, before his wings gave out and he fell through the air. He was dead before he hit the floor.
*
Malefor landed softly on the tiled floor of the atrium, the echoing rumble of his breathing the only sound in the vast chamber. Barely a tail-length away the broken body of Amperon lay sprawled across the floor, the ceremonial collar around his neck burnt black by the force of the Convexity that had struck him.
And yet he felt no remorse. Malefor regretted that Amperon had needed to die, but - he abruptly realised - the cause was of no importance. Amperon would have been one of many who would be swept up by the Destroyer when he succeeded in renewing the world. It made no difference. In killing him, Malefor thought, perhaps he had spared the elderly Dragon a fiery death.
He looked to his side. The banners he had struck with his fire blast were almost completely consumed and the flames were already spreading to the wooden support beams. Once he would have rushed to douse the flames with a cold breath of Ice, but now he didn't care. He had more pressing concerns. Besides, better the secrets of the past remain lost to the world, lest another Dragon recognise his goal and set himself up as a thorn in his side. Such an act would only delay the inevitable and result in unnecessary suffering for all those who would oppose him.
Malefor ducked his wings and entered the Hall Of Carvings, emerging shortly afterwards with the precious carvings safely held under one forearm.
Voices were echoing in the atrium from the smaller halls now, as Dragon and
Mole alike was roused from sleep and came to realise what was happening around them. Warfang's Archives Were Aflame.
Malefor did not look back, but he paused briefly as he prepared to take flight. "Rest in peace, old friend," Malefor said to the air. "Illuminus your spirit to take." With that, he leapt aloft, flying towards the centre of the great dome.
Moments before he would have collided with the thick stone, Malefor launched a volley of Earth at it, fracturing it and the frescos that ran across it into hundreds of harmless fragments, before exiting the burning complex through the hole he had made.
--------------------------------------------
(
http://amcalmaron.deviantart.com/art/The-F...Draft-283970238 )
This is the second of two fics that have been languishing on my computer for a while now. In my opinion, this one's the better of the two, mainly because there were plenty of draft lines to work with.
Originally, this was going to be Ignitus as the Chronicler reading the book about
Malefor's life, leading to a series of short scenes involving Malefor and Amperon(one of my characters; along with Ankine;
http://amcalmaron.deviantart.com/art/Spyro...2F13729591&qo=8 ), beginning with Malefor arriving at the Archives in his youth and learning about the Destroyer, and culminating in the destruction of the Archives in his adulthood. The final scene would have been Amperon's ghost alone in the ruins, and deep inside the earth "...the faintest echo of what had been Malefor" realising that Spyro, not him, was meant to save the world. Unfortunately, I couldn't think of enough scenes to fill up the earlier part, and I came up with a new plot point that deviated from the main story too much, so I rewrote it to show just the end instead. It's a bit clunky, but I'll fix that another time.
I tried to show how Malefor could have become descended into evil. It seemed odd that a character could go from being a savior in their youth to someone determined on destroying the world, and then I thought that perhaps Malefor truly believed what he was doing was right. As I suggested here (
http://amcalmaron.deviantart.com/art/Spyro...erger-251273609 ), If he grew up as the only dragon of his kind (perhaps even with prophecies surrounding his destiny), he might have come to think his fate was tied to the Destroyer, and that he was meant to destroy the world so it could be repaired and begin anew (the prophecies surrounding Spyro and him are a bit confusing...). He could have gotten worse from there, as if everyone would die as a result of the Destroyer being activated, it could be logically (and quite darkly) said that it didn't matter who died from then on.
One thing I wish I'd still been able to work in was a scene in Malefor's youth where Amperon tried to get him to discover his unique element (later revealed as Convexity), which he thought must exist. In it, Malefor inadvertently launched a fire blast at Amperon, who moves in time, causing the fireball to ignite a banner on the wall. The whole thing would have been a parallel to the scene in the Archive Hall Atrium, except that nobody extinguishes the flames.
<i>"Oh, the tapestry!" Malefor yelled, gesturing at the wall. Amperon turned his head to face it, and saw that the sudden burst of flame had ignited an old wall hanging. Had he been an Ice Dragon, he would have simply put the blaze out with his breath, but having no such ability, he instead resorted to wrenching the hanging from the wall and trampling it under his feet.
Before long, the fire had been extinguished and the hanging reduced to a charred ruin. Amperon looked from this to Malefor, who was regarding him fearfully. "I'm sorry," he ventured. "I...I didn't mean to-"
"Ah, it's nothing important," Amperon muttered, waving a talon dismissively. This didn't seem to reassure the young dragon, so he added, "It's not a relic or anything; it's just something one of the librarians added. I've been meaning to replace them, actually." At this, Malefor brightened visibly.
"I think I understand what you mean. That didn't quite feel like...fire.”</i>
Malefor and Legend Of Spyro copyright...is it Sierra?
Amperon copyright me.
Infernacus copyright WolfofSorrow (
http://wolfofsorrow.deviantart.com/ )
Illuminus copyright Rattlesnakedefender. (
http://rattlesnakedefender.deviantart.com/ )
