The Keepers of Chaos: A Vault of Hell

Herod Westwood: XXXII

"Who..?" Herod croaked as he pushed himself to his feet, he had taken blows before and this.. This was a shallow cut, Herod looked down at his injured side to see the cut was not much more than half an inch deep and an inch long barely grazing the segments between his studded leather armor. In the distance Herod watched as the figure rotated until it was fully facing him, its hood still drawn, however the sunlight gave him a view inward, he kept his blade leveled upward its point five feet from the figure's chest, Herod shook with the pain of whatever that knife was.. his brain moved slowly but it still was able to work out what was going on. A dagger was in the figure's hand dripping with small droplets of Herod's crimson red blood. Under the hood he saw the figure's purple eyes not as deep as Markos yet.. It held a similar amount of psychotic behind them. The figure's face was slightly masculine and had a blue tint like that of a drow, its mouth upturned in a wide grin.. The same grin Herod had seen in his vision before. The drow stood without a word or whisper as Herod watched the dagger and arm carefully just like he was taught when sparring with swords. He leveled Vulity at him panting trying to catch a breath. Should he attack? Herod wondered. The figure seemed to make no movements and breath in no air as his chest stood still unlike Herod's which rose and fell rapidly.

In an instant his eyes grew cloudy with a fine black mist as it unfurled Herod saw the city of Waterdeep around him or at least what was left. Piles of mangled dead bodies laid before him collecting into a mound of corpses nearly fifteen feet tall and impossibly wide in every direction. His breath hitched in fear as he was unable to make out what was before him. The city burned with a rainbow of different colored flames scorching the surrounding buildings. Herod grimaced as he heard the screams of town's folk all around him in every corner of the city screams of pain, agony, and fear. He reached to his side but found Vulity was not there, instead she was floating on his shoulder. Her three tails occasionally knocked into his head playfully. The presence of his Hexblade gave him more confidence in this.. Horrorscape.

'We mustn't fail Herod..' Vulity's soft voice came far more serious than it had the last couple days. As Herod saw the pile of bodies become mounted by two cloaked figures. On the left a young drow man with long silver hair and purple eyes, his chiseled face covered in claw marks and scars. In his right hand sat the dagger, the same one he had seen the one he had been stabbed with. The dagger's handle looked like that of a spider's leg with a wrap around it similar to a rapier's guard. Its blade.. No.. blades were long forming an arc like two lines spreading out from its base before coming back in on itself an arced parabola. It was grey in color with silver backs and red blood dripping from every corner of its length. At the foot of this first figure laid hundreds of banners atop the bodies the banners held holy symbols: the churches of so many religions Herod could barely keep track, the church of Tyr, the order of the gauntlet, the church of Selune, Order of the Blue Moon. Herod could see each banner was covered in an array of blood and guts as they rolled around the mound of corpses under the smiling drow. To Herods right he viewed the second figure he was unable to determine their gender, they seemed.. Feminine and was around the height of a girl. They had long colorless hair with a fully blacked out face, all Herod could view were two purple dots, eyes that shook Herod to his core. Was it Markos? He asked himself, no.. the.. Half elf wouldn't do this.. Herod studied the figures Eleven ears and looked around him once more at the utter destruction of the city. 'They will destroy everything.. Whores.. They are truly sluts for power we must destr-'

A sharp laughter cut Vulity's words off echoing around the city like a knife against granite. Herod felt fear fill him entirely; the figures on the hill moved to step forward as if they were to fly to him in attack. They never got the chance. The sky was filled with a green energy, mist filling the air as the vision before Herod was literally trampled. He watched as a deer the size of a boat descended, landing on the vision, his hoof stomping it away. Herod grinned as he saw the figure of his beloved god.