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« on: November 01, 2011, 09:03:26 pm »
(cont'd)
“I see now,” I said. “So, now, since he won’t listen to reason, I’ll have to use force?”
The tigerman nodded. “That is it. Oblivion strictly believes that anyone who opposes even a single little detail to his goal is his enemy. Right now, you are in his way. Only you can find that key. He will beat you until you stop bleeding. But if he doesn’t find that key, you won’t be able to die.”
“But why? Why me?”
“Every key has a gatekeeper. And, right now, I am the gatekeeper. I cannot die until I pass the location of the key on to someone else. Then, and only then, will I die.”
“I understand.”
“However, there will come a time when I will give you the location of the key. It is your only hope of survival against Oblivion, who has long ago gone corrupt.”
I nodded. “Okay. So you’ve told me this. But how can I overcome this forgotten beast?”
“You need not worry. I will train you.”
“Okay, so, when do we start?”
The tigerman grunted. “Now.”
“Alright! What do I do?”
“Simple.” He pointed to the hut. “Make that hut collapse. With your little finger.”
I blinked like I hadn’t heard. I wasn’t sure I’d heard him correctly. “Excuse me?” I said. “You said break it down, right?”
“That’s right.”
“With my, um, little finger?”
“Right again.”
I shifted my feet uneasily. “I, um, don’t know how to…”
“Don’t know how to? Or do you just think you don’t have the strength to do this?”
“I don’t have the strength for this.”
“Wrong.”
As if to prove his point, the tigerman stood up, walked up to the edge of the hut, and tapped a particularly rotted part of the wooden frame. Instantly, the entire hut collapsed. I stared in amazement as a cloud of dust swept up into the air, scattering the birds and bits of wood in a mini dust storm. How could he have done it? I always knew Goul was capable of performing wonders on a regular basis, but I was still taken aback by the physical abnormality of the situation.
“Strength is a key point to success on the battlefield,” Goul said, stepping away from the debris. “However, strength alone cannot combat knowledge. You can’t destroy a whole entire building with just strength. No, you need the analysis and the thinking of the architect who designed the building. The one who knows its secrets. Its weaknesses.
“In order to defeat Oblivion, or any powerful foe in particular, you can’t rely on your own strength. However, if you can exploit their weaknesses, you will be able to bring them to the ground in one blow. Just like the hut.” He gestured towards the pile of rubbish.
Alright.
“But what if their skin is made of iron?” I asked.
“Drown them. Or melt them. Or suffocate them. All living things require air.”
“And if they’re already dead?”
“Burn them.”
“And if they’re dead and have a layer of iron skin?”
The tigerman snorted. “Melt them. I told you, everything has a weakness, no matter how you look at it.”
“And what if they’re immortal and invincible?”
The tigerman grinned. “Only God himself has such a power. The rest are all perishable.”
“But immortal on earth, I mean.”
“As I said before…”
He’d gotten me. I was trapped by my own words.
I shrugged. “Okay, fine. But how do I exploit their weaknesses?”
Training was a tough and long time for me. For a whole week, on the journey to Teurein, Goul taught me how to use my “sixth” sense. It was a power that blind and deaf people had easier way of obtaining. After hours and hours of non-stop training, I finally learned the art of “Reaching.” As its name implies, Reaching is a skill obtained mostly by dedicated swordsmen and magicians. It is the power to “see beyond sight,” and to “hear beyond hearing.” I instantly began to develop my sixth sense after I found out how to use it. I had no choice. Every night, Goul made me wander around blindfolded; looking for an inanimate object he’d carefully hidden somewhere. Sometimes he hid it in the ground. Other times, he hid it in a cave with water flowing through it. Each and every time, I found the object. I couldn’t believe it, but I always found the object. And, every time I did find the object, Goul would instruct me to find another object blindfolded. We would do this every night, and during the day I’d sleep for about five hours.
When we finally got to Teurein, I was so tired from the lack of sleep that I hit the ground of the hotel room we stayed in and slept for a whole twenty-four hours.
After I’d gotten up, I turned to Goul for further instructions. I was so used to taking orders from him now, and reported automatically to him every morning. It was completely habitual now.
“What’s our plan for today?” I asked.
The tigerman shook his head. “Exercise is cancelled for today. Let’s go for a walk around the city.”
Now, when I first entered the city, I paid it no mind, because it was already night and I was deadened by my lack of sleep. But now, with the sun up high in the sky and people all around, I finally got the feeling of awe which I’d been missing out on that other day.
Teurein was a port city. It wasn’t like Lagdon. It didn’t have the “fortress” look which Lagdon portrayed. It didn’t have that rough mixture of people from all over the world.
It was almost like one whole massive village.
There were markets everywhere. People were selling what they could sell and buying what they could buy. Merchants and traders set up shops and tents all over the “city.” But what struck me wasn’t the amount of people or the size of the city.
It was the people.
They were the friendliest people I’d ever met. I’m not even exaggerating. I must’ve received over forty “good-morning’s” or “how are you’s.” It seemed like I was a family relative of everyone; people talked and started up conversations with me wherever I walked.
It took Goul and me about three hours to finally get to the market Goul’d been looking for. It was an old closed-down market put up for sale, except only no one was buying it. The area the building was built on was very unattractive; no merchant would even go near it.
“Inside,” Goul gestured to the old worn-down wooden door. I followed him inside. There were a few broken tables and chairs lying about, but other than that the place was empty. Goul went to the center of the room, and kneeled down on the floor, as if searching for something. Then, I heard a loud click. Instantly, a panel in the floor swung inwards, leading into a small room lighted only by the fire of two torches. I followed him down into the room. On the far side of the room, I saw an opening to a tunnel. The smell of death hit me almost as soon as I saw the opening.
“Here it is,” Goul said, pointing down the tunnel.
I blinked several times, trying to see beyond the veil of darkness. I tried using my sixth sense, but I could detect nothing beyond what my own eyes could see.
Goul, however, gestured into the tunnel again. “Inside.” He said.
I followed him down into the tunnel. The tunnel seemed to stretch on for miles and miles through the darkness. The fog was very thick and heavy, and the musty air began to clog my nostrils. The only light from the torches flickered and then went out. Silence around us. All but the pattern of our footsteps as we descended further into the tunnel.
“That’s strange,” A guard whispered. Night had descended upon the city, and all was calm. The two soldiers who stood guard by the gateway were inspecting a large hole in the wall; one big enough for one large man to come through. That was strange, because the two soldiers had been standing around all day, and had never seen or heard anything out of order, and they’d only just discovered the hole.
The other soldier nodded. “Look at the edges! No hammer or pick could make such an entrance into even a cottage in so short an amount of time.”
The first one glared at it. “I suspect sorcery. Should we report this?”
“Nah. Let’s wait until Garrison gets back first. He’ll know what to do.”
“I don’t understand,” I whispered quietly, surveying the plains of darkness around us. “Where are we-?”
“Hang on,” Goul said suddenly, shifting forward as if ready to pounce on someone. “There’s something out of place.”
“Where?” My eyes inadvertently darted ahead of me. Squinting into the fog, I could make out a small figure at the far end of the tunnel. Goul started forward slowly. I followed behind him, my heart pounding. I didn’t know why, but sweat dripped from my forehead. And as we drew nearer, the figure appeared to grow larger and larger, into the shape of...
I hesitated to go any further. The figure remained still. And then he spoke.
The hairs on the back of my neck stood as I recognized the voice.
“What took you so long Goul?” Vorak asked. “Did you bring my nephew along like you said you would?”
“Aye. That I did.”
I rubbed my eyes. I couldn’t believe what I was seeing. Here was the same Vorak; the Vorak whom I’d known all those years before. And now…and now…
“I never knew you were an elf too,” I said.
He laughed. It was the same hearty laugh I’d heard all those years before of working with him. And here he was! Alive! And an ELF! And my uncle! I always believed that life was full of surprises, but this was one of the best ones I’d received so far. I didn’t know why, but I felt honored, in a way, to have Vorak as my uncle.
I lieks it!!!
personally it adds excitement to the whole story 
There's only so much hours in a day.
I can't take all the credit, though, for thinking it up. One of my friends suggested that I make Oblivion a good guy with good intentions gone bad. The other-Lagdon being an elf-I got it from reading off of Eragon.