Guild Wars 2

Transcript from overheard conversation on Ground Zero for the recent Pact fleet crash. Confidential to Pact members only.

“You what?” Myrie’s voice was strained, though with terror, exhaustion, or fury, no one could tell. The airman in front of her cowered, eyes white-ringed with fear.
“I’m sorry, ma’am, but I couldn’t stop her! You know how she is — and quite frankly, she unnerves most of us.”
“It doesn’t matter if she unnerves Primordus itself! You know that Nettle Viridia — perhaps one of the Pact’s most dangerous necromancers — is untrustworthy at best! And you just let her dive into the biggest, most unstable explosions of free-drifting, corruptive magic in Tyria?!”
“We tried to stop her! We even had some of the charr and norn hold onto her, but she was like a wild animal, biting, clawing, and slashing at anyone who got too close! She kept insisting that she be let down to inspect it — something about the scientific rarity or something — !”
Myrie had stopped listening the moment she heard the asura declare the necromancer’s intentions. Of course she would declare her interest to be something scientific, perhaps even beneficial, but anyone who truly knew the pale-skinned, green-headed sylvari would be wiser to a more sinister side that she tried — and often succeeded — to conceal. Although immensely powerful, her hunger for knowledge and magical prowess led her to take paths which most would shun. She was known to dissect living creatures to study their pain, drink the blood of unfortunate victims to determine their diseases and metaphysical capabilities, and had even been rumored to be the serial killer known as the Smiling Death, an assassin who ruthlessly brutalized her victims often as a warning for those considered too corrupt to live. It was only by the threats of power or knowledge greater than hers that Nettle had been kept in check, and Myrie knew that if she managed to get a hold of the ancient Bloodstone magics, there was very little chance that the necromancer would return with any scrap of morality or sanity intact. She returned to her senses, grimaced, and looked down from the ship’s crash into the blood-red rubies emitting their ethereal crackling below.
“Don’t let anyone get too close to the bloodstones,” she ordered, stepping onto the metal railing of the ship. “If they try, kill them. We can’t risk their corruption, even if the explosion has already passed.”

Below. Below was where the magic dwelt, where the sylvari could open her sharp-fanged maw and breathe it in like a snake tasting prey. She ran her tongue over a cut she had sustained from a human — White Mantle, she thought — and mused on his strength. He had been unusually powerful, but his mind seemed fractured, as if the red flickering lights from his eyes, a sign of corruption, had stolen his sanity. She sneered. Weakness would lead to that. She was stronger, fed on the knowledge of the ancients and the blood of their descendants. Bloodstones were for necromancers — of this she was certain. The only obstacle in her journey was the location of an active spire. Most of the magic had been released in that cataclysmic explosion which had driven so many of the Pact’s remaining forces insane. If she could find one, surely she could bridle its power. Then she could be free — free of the mesmer who threatened to burn her mind to cinders for its curiosity, free of the elemantalist who kept her spells at the ready, as if she could kill her if she tried. Free from those bleeding hearts and their irritating affections. She ran her tongue over her lips, and her eyes widened. Magic. It was stronger here. She drew a deep breath in through her nostrils and follwed the scent.

It led her to a spire of glittering bloodstone — a towering shard larger than the ship it had destroyed — and one which was bursting with energy. Her lips sliced upward into a smile. Finally, the power she needed was in her grasp. She reached a hand forward … and stopped. In the back of her mind, a strange, quivering sensation screamed at her to step back, move away, and run. She frowned. Was that really fear? Fear was for the weak. She snarled at her indecision, steeled herself, and reached forward. Consequences be cursed.

The magic burst through her eyes, through her nose, through her mouth and ears and through the space in her body where the leaves overlapped to form her coherent whole. Through it all, she thought she heard an unearthly wail — hers? — but it didn’t matter. Nothing mattered. Her back was arched, head flung back as her body formed a circuit with the stone, and for an eternity, she thought she would stay that way. Then, finally, her hands released it. She crumpled to the ground, hands on her knees, and nearly vomited. Spots of red danced before her eyes, but no matter how hard she blinked, they did not leave. Then, slowly, Nettle started to laugh. It was a low, content sound which started off quite normally yet did not end that way. As she stood shakily, her lips formed into a feral snarl of a smile.
Corruption be cursed. The power was worth it.