Listening to: [url]https://youtu.be/UuEPKvs0QV4[/url]



"Die and Join ussssss!"

Eclipse had seen enough. Several things were now clear. One, that the ancient snake creature had no life of its own and was being animated by a large number of possibly equally ancient, spiteful spirits. Two, his allies were brave and held every intention to take down this creature, but their motivations were strictly personal and devoid of sympathy. And three, that this battle was beginning to go south. 

*Bam!* The snakes head appeared to ricochette off of some kind of faintly visable, translucent shield that Eclipse had manifested with his left hand. The shield rang with an eerie magical sound before returning to silence and complete invisibility around the paladin. Eclipse stood with a fierce look in his blue eyes under a furrowed white brow, his lips pursed. His sword took on a faint, warm sun-colored light. The doubt he had struggled with only moments ago appeared to melt away in the face of adversity as he kept the image of his deity alive in his mind. 

Eclipse quickly steadied himself as his shield absorbed most of the impact from the snake's attack. The golden cavalier was attempting to circle around behind the thing and Talændrel looked like he was trying to drag the snake away from the boat to no avail. The white knight didn't have any long range guns or any special tricks he could use to get through those scales, and he knew that if he fell in the water, he'd be completely useless. Hence, in hope and trust, the knight reached out with his perception to read the hearts of those around him. 

In doing so, Eclipse found that the spirits, all the lost spirits in this realm, all had something in common. All of them, in life, had been ruled by darkness, by fear and closemindedness. One might think that the gods had been cruel to them, that they had been cheated, denied, and abandoned, and by listening to their rants it would indeed appear to be their case, but the truth was otherwise. Hell, as pitiable as its denizens were, had a reason to exist. All these spirits wanted was to share in their suffering, to claim what was not rightfully theirs, and to live in denial. None had ever once sought for truth in honesty in their mortal lives. And now they dared to deny others from seeking truth, to drag as many as they could down to the same eternal fate as they had in cruelty. Thus every hero who passed through this valley was a target, a respite to delight in shared misery. 

"Righteousness guild my sword." Eclipse said to himself as the snake reared up for another strike at him. His blade struck forth into the serpent's broken, scaleless mouth, piercing what he sensed was the combined source of all their evil wills, that goddamn tongue.