Avatar Merlin
The cliffs of the Untamed Realm loomed ahead as the Swifter cut through restless seas. Spray lashed the deck, salt stinging the air. Merlin stood at the rail, armor gleaming, posture stiff with the weight of a knightly guise.
A small presence lingered near him. He turned, meeting the steady gaze of a young elf girl. Her eyes, though soft, held the same quiet strength he once saw in himself. In her hands, she clutched a chipped wooden knight, paint worn to bare wood.
"My parents were knights," she whispered. "I want to be one too. Like you."
The words struck him harder than steel. For a moment, the guise of "Merlin" faltered, and the man beneath remembered a time before shadows. Slowly, he knelt so they were eye to eye.
"Your parents would be proud," he said, voice gentler than he intended. A faint smile tugged at his lips, rare as sunlight breaking cloud. "Tell me, little one—what do you know of knighthood?"
She straightened, clutching the toy like a banner. "It's courage," she said firmly. "And protecting the weak. My father said a true knight defends with more than a sword—he protects with his heart."
Merlin's gaze drifted to the horizon, storms brewing where sea met sky. "Your father was wise," he murmured. "But knighthood is also discipline. To master a blade, you must first master yourself. To win battles, you must know when not to fight. The road is long and bitter." His eyes returned to hers. "Are you ready to walk it?"
Her small chin lifted, eyes alight. "Yes, Master Merlin."
The sea howled, gulls shrieked, but between them a fragile warmth bloomed. In her, he saw not only a child—but a mirror, reflecting the ideals he had once buried in shadow.
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Avatar iYoda
Far north, where the Elven forests ended in jagged cliffs and crashing rivers, another guise of the Dark Lord stood. Cloaked and hooded, he called himself iYoda, a name stolen from half-forgotten legends of wisdom and power. A mask, a joke, a taunt.
The Rapid River raged below, hurling itself into the endless churn of the Rapid Sea. Beyond its frothing mouth lay the horizon—a bruise-colored sky, and beyond that, a darkness deeper than night.
The Neverday.
It was no place, but a wound. A land where sun never rose, where silence listened and shadows pressed like a second skin. No elf had crossed its borders and returned whole. To most, it was terror. To him, it was invitation.
The Dark Lord inhaled, and the air burned with the taste of ancient magic. The Neverday was not his enemy. It was kin.
He remembered scraps of rumor: Goblins raiding from eastern mountains, Elven forts bristling with fear, watchtowers always lit against the northern dark. Yet knowledge was thin, scattered like bones. He wanted more. He hungered for it.
Summoning his minions, he watched one swell into a monstrous fish, black scales glimmering with sickly light. The creature's eyes burned like coals beneath the seafoam. With a whisper, iYoda mounted its back. The beast dove, dragging him into swirling depths.
Darkness closed in, suffocating and absolute. Yet to him it was no burden—it was a cloak, a lover's embrace. The deeper he sank, the more the Neverday's pull tightened, resonant and promising. Power throbbed just beyond reach.
What others feared, he would claim. What others called death, he would name dominion. And so he crossed the Rapid Sea towards the Never Day.
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Avatar Merlin (Salem)
Wind screamed past Merlin's ears atop Salem's highest tower, a banshee howl that set his heart hammering. Below sprawled not a town but a fortress, stone rising like clenched fists against the dark. Outer walls soared twenty feet, inner defenses climbed thirty-five more. A fortress within a fortress—defiance made stone.
Ships filled the harbor, disgorging troops in waves. Steel boots struck in unison, a living river marching northeast. Their destination stole his breath.
The Gallan Wall.
Two hundred feet high, stretching east for five thousand miles—a scar carved by human hands across the world. Not defense. Defiance. Every mile, a fortress. Every fortress, a sentinel.
His chest tightened. This was no skirmish of borders. This was war on a scale beyond comprehension—a stand against shadows that could consume everything.
At his side, Elves moved with lethal grace, blades flashing like dancers mid-step. Soldiers, yes, but also something more: a harmony of beauty and brutality. They poured northward toward the first of thirty fortresses they commanded, each a stone heart beating against encroaching night.
And beyond them, the Alliance—hundreds of races stitched together into a patchwork shield. Thousands of fortresses, a wall of lives stretched thinner than stone.
Merlin exhaled, dizzy. He, the Dark Lord, stood among them, cloaked in mortal guise. A witness, not a conqueror. The irony was almost laughable.
"Master Merlin." A young voice steadied him.
Maia again. She met his gaze with unflinching clarity. "Captain Ellis says we march for the first fortress."
Her words, simple as they were, carried the weight of fate.
"Thank you, Maia," he said, forcing composure. "We shall not keep them waiting."
They descended together into the sea of soldiers. Captain Ellis, weatherworn and scarred, met them with only a curt nod, command in his silence.
Merlin walked among the march, cloak whipping in the wind. Maia strode at his side, small yet unshaken. She was no longer merely a child to him. A question gnawed at him: pawn or spark? A piece to be moved, or a flame that might burn through his plans?
The Gallan Wall rose higher as they neared. Its stones hummed faintly, alive with old power. Empty plinths stood along the path, scars of the colossal Knights once stationed there. Only rubble and whispers remained of them now. Their absence was louder than presence, a silence heavy with grief.
Merlin's pulse quickened. This wall was not only monument, but graveyard. A reminder of giants fallen, and of wars still to come.
And here he marched—not as Dark Lord, but as Merlin, a pawn among pawns. The greatest game he had ever played was just beginning.