Thread: A War Arises *Medieval/Pokemon fic* (Chapter 3 is up! Please comment!)

It's the summer, and I have enough time on my hands to write a new fic. I've been working extra hard on this, so hopefully it's good. I'd appreciate some CONSTRUCTIVE criticism. I don't mind if you hate the story, as long as you give me some advice on how to improve. So, without further adieu:

A War Arises: Chapter One

I woke up when the room where I was sleeping was blown apart.

I saw the fire before I heard it, as the explosion had left a buzzing noise in my ears. As I looked around I saw a…

Oh, wow. I’m not a good storyteller, am I? I should probably start from the beginning. My name is John Drakkion, but you can call me Sir Drakkion. I’m the commander of the Knights of Arceus, located on my home island of Arcein.

The Knights have been at war with the island to the northeast, Raiark, for as long as I can remember. When I was a small boy, I heard stories from my father about the cruelty and evil motives of the Warriors of Darkrai. I remember, even back then I wanted to be a Knight…

But I suppose that I’ve gotten a little off-topic. From what I know, the Knights of Arceus went to war with the Warriors of Darkrai over some small territorial battle that escalated into a full-blown war. And now here I am, sucked into the midst of everything.

I guess I should get back to the story at hand, right?

So I looked around the destroyed room and saw a cannonball, still red-hot from being fired. Honestly, it was a miracle that the large sphere of iron hadn’t killed me.

Regardless, I quickly stood and surveyed my surroundings. I was in the small Fort Mespirit, which is right along the sea. The fort only has two walls, as the cliffs of Arcein protect two of the fort’s sides.

The wall that stood facing the sea had already been damaged, and as I watched a small portion crumbled to the ground. I sprinted for the wall and climbed up onto the part above the gate.

Several crossbowmen stood on the wall, firing at a boat that had landed onshore. Wait a minute, that wasn’t any old boat. That was the Dusknoir, the main battleship of the Warriors of Darkrai. And as I watched, cannons fired and took out a section of wall to my left. A man tumbled backwards off the wall, falling and most likely breaking his neck.

“Arceus help us,” I muttered, rushing down the stairs and taking the dead crossbowman’s weapons. Knights slept in their armor, but the cannon fire had destroyed my sword. Now I had a crossbow, several iron bolts, and a curved dagger with the symbol of Arceus carved carefully into the hilt.

I rushed back up onto the wall, where I could clearly see the Dusknoir beginning to unload. As I watched, dozens of men carrying bows and swords began to march in the direction of the wall.

“Oh, no,” I said. This wasn’t an attack. It was a full-blown invasion. The Knights in Fort Mespirit might be able to hold out for a bit, but after a while we would be killed. I could guarantee a total lack of mercy from these men. They would probably burn the fort to the ground and continue on until the Knights of Arceus had been completely eradicated.

An alarm bell sat on the top of a tower in the center of town. If I could get up there before the walls were destroyed, I might be able to signal for reinforcements before it was too late.

I quickly fired my crossbow into the crowd of warriors, taking out a swordsman located in the center of the crowd. He fell face first into the white sand, but the rest of the Warriors seemed unfazed. Why would they be? The Warriors of Darkrai were known for their strength.

And their total ruthlessness.

Without thinking too clearly, I vaulted over the side of the wall, landing on my feet. A wave of pain in my left ankle told me that I wouldn’t hear the last of this. I raced – or maybe I limped, I’m not too sure – towards the tower.

Inside the tower, there was a flight of spiral-shaped stairs that led to the alarm bell. Whoever built the tower must not have been a Knight, because the building was more built to look intimidating than to be easy to get to the bell. Several stone statues of Arceus sat on tall pillars, glaring down at me as if to say Hurry, or all of your efforts will have been for nothing!

Upon reaching the top of the stairs, I was met by the sound of several Blastoise firing away at our walls. By the sound of it, they were most likely on the beach. We had guard towers outside the walls, but either the structures themselves had been destroyed or the men inside them killed.

I rushed forwards and run the bell once, twice, five times in all. The sharp sound resonated through the fort, hopefully signaling our plight to anyone nearby.

And, thankfully, our cry for help was answered. Dozens of men on Rapidash burst into the fort, carrying deadly looking swords with the sight of Arceus clearly showing on the hilt. Their arrival rallied the men who hadn’t just arrived, and the wall fell apart just as the two armies clashed.

I saw a large cart of hay on the ground outside the tower and, hoping it would cushion my fall, I threw myself off the tower. The hay was soft as I landed, but I still suspected that I would need medical attention after the battle was over.

That is, if I survived the day.

I stood shakily and drew my knife, watching idly for a few seconds as we pushed the enemies back towards the beach. I threw the knife into the heart of a Warrior who’d broken past the two armies, and smiled as the symbol of Arceus embedded itself in the man’s chest.

I sprinted for the body and pulled my knife out of the man’s corpse, letting out a prayer to Arceus for his soul. Enemy or not, all men deserved fair judgment after death.

I rushed into battle, firing my crossbow at the nearest enemy’s face and hurling his knife into the chest of a swordsman who was about to kill one of my fellow Knights.

“Surge forward!” I commanded. “Push them back to the beach and destroy the Dusknoir!
Seeming reassured my confident voice, the men and I pushed the invaders back onto the cliffs surrounding the beach. It was only here that I realized my grave mistake. The entire army was exposed to the cannon fire of the Dusknoir, and one good shot might be enough to turn the tide.

“Fall back!” I yelled. “Not next week! Now!” I bellowed when the men didn’t respond immediately.

We rushed backwards just in time. The Dusknoir’s cannons fired at a weak spot in the cliff, and the entire edge crumbled and fell about thirty feet onto the sand.

“It’s time for a final push! Take no prisoners!” I ordered. The army moved as one, fighting off the significantly damaged Warriors of Raiark with relative ease.

“Now summon the Blaziken and burn the Dusknoir I said. What was left of the wall’s gates opened and about a half dozen Blaziken rushed onto the beach, launching flame onto the enemy ship. Unfortunately, the ship pulled away just in time and avoided the worst of the fire. On deck I could see a frenzy of activity as the remaining crew struggled to put out the flame.

“I think this is a victory,” I announced to my fellow Knights. However, I turned and saw a man rise for the heap of dead Warriors. He coughed and blood spattered onto the ground.

“You’ve won the battle,” the man said in a raspy voice, then coughed out more blood. A half dozen men rushed forward, but I glared at them and they stopped.

“You haven’t won the war,” the man continued. “Our plans have nearly come to fruition, and then none will be able to stop us. You men will call out to your silly Arceus, but none will be answered. And on that day, you will realize your mistake.” The man collapsed onto the ground and lay still.

“What plan?” I yelled, but as soon as I uttered the words I knew it was useless. The man had passed on; you could see it in the calmness of his face and his blank eyes. I turned back to the men.

“I’m afraid we aren’t finished here,” I said in a grave voice. “The Warriors of Darkrai are obviously planning something huge. And we will not rest until they are stopped.”

“Yes, sir!” The men’s shouts cut into the relative silence of the beach. But in their voices and eyes I saw a group of tired, injured men.

My only hope was that the now-dead man had been lying, simply trying to intimidate us. Of course, that was all, and I needed to put it out of my mind for now. But even then, somewhere in my head, I knew this wasn’t over.

Wow great start!

I really like how action-packed you made this right off the bat. That is definitely one of my many weaknesses: starting strong. Too often, I drag things out and take too long getting to the action, but you clearly are very good at starting your fics with good attention-grabbing content.

I also like how your main character seems to be a born leader. It's interesting because the majority of fics I've read are more "coming of age" and are from the perspective of a timid, unskilled MC who must grow up over time. I like that you have chosen a different route.

Finally, I enjoy the level of description and dialog and how you balance the two. Overally, this is a great start!

Please, everyone if you're going to view the thread, take the time to comment, It would mean a lot to me. That being said, thanks for the comment, Legacy.

Chapter Two

The cliffs loomed far above the sea, jutting out into the sky and daring anyone to try to climb their sides. This was exactly what I did that pitch-black night, with only a small lantern to guide my way up the rocks.

It was a bitterly cold night, and the wind sliced through my armor like a dagger piercing a man’s heart. My fingertips were beginning to go numb, and the constant crashing of waves against stone.

I’d been sent in a small wooden ship over miles of water to the island of Raiark, along with about a half dozen other men. Our spies had discovered that the Warriors of Darkrai were hiding supplies and weapons inside a cave system in the cliffs long ago, but anyone sent to destroy these supplies never returned.

Our job now was not to go after the supplies, but to find and bring back the Knights who had come before us.

That is, if they were still alive.

As I reached the top of the cliff, my lantern was extinguished by a particularly nasty puff of air. Cursing, I pulled the stick of iron out of my pack and hammered it into the ground. The sharp piece of metal had about a hundred meters or so of rope tied to it, and this rope was what I lowered silently down the cliffs. I soon felt a tug on the rope and saw a sphere of light ascending up the cliffs. Five others soon joined it, and the breathless group of Knights hauled themselves over the edge a few minutes later. I could hear their wheezing and faintly see them all wiping sweat from their brows.

Now, I’m not going to sugarcoat those cliffs. They were a pain to climb, but whoever ran the military from Arcein’s castle had assigned me a group of total novices. They were all seemingly in their late teens or early twenties, and their armor hung a bit too loosely on their bodies.

“And why did we climb the cliffs instead of taking the road?” one boy, probably around nineteen, asked me.

“Because the road,” I hissed, “has soldiers and supply wagons heading up and down it as we speak. Which means we must not speak.”

“Well, who put you in charge?” the boy asked arrogantly. I had an urge to pitch him into the ocean and see if he sunk. Instead, I turned to glare at the incompetent Knight.

“Give me your lantern.” I said quietly.

“Why?” the boy asked.

“Do it. Now.”

Muttering, the boy handed me his only light source. I threw it off the cliff.

“What was that for?!” the boy asked.

“To shoe you why stealth is so important right now. If we are caught, our enemies will not hesitate to throw you off the cliffs instead of the lantern. Now let’s go.”

Now, don’t get me wrong. I don’t usually snap like that. But this Knight – no, this boy – had been testing my patience the whole time, as if he wanted to see me get angry. But now the boy finally seemed to understand the danger we faced. He trudged along, head down, not making a sound.

After about fifteen minutes of walking and one more cliff to climb, we reached the cave entrance. It was surrounded by a small amount of trees and shrubbery, and in the daytime it would be impossible to see from the ocean. Right now, however, the entrance was brightly lit with torches that gleamed with fire.

I guess they don’t expect anyone to try and make it up the cliffs at this time of night, I thought. Still, somewhere in the back of my head I knew it might be a trap. There were strange-looking bumps scattered around inside the cave, but I dismissed it as poor building and signaled my men to move into the cave.

Once inside, I could see farther back into the tunnels. They seemed to go on endlessly, branching into more and more passages. It was like a maze. Then it hit me. Someone had to have a map of the complex, or else how would anyone get around inside it?

There was a young Warrior down farther back, with his back turned to us. I signaled for my fellow Knights to stop, and I crept behind the man.

Just as I reached the Warrior, he turned. Before the man could draw his sword, I had taken the weapon, covered his face with a thick and dark cloth, and pulled him over to the edge of the cliff.

“Do you have a map?” I hissed, forcing the Warrior onto the ground.

“Don’t kill me,” the man said in a muffled voice.

“Cooperate, and maybe I won’t,” I replied. “Now, do you have a map?”

“Yes. Just let me up and I’ll get it out-“

I shut the man up by slamming his head hard against the ground. “Search him” I told the two Knights who stood closest to me. They did, and we found a small silver key, some coins, and a small, folded piece of paper. I unfolded the paper and was met with a hastily scrawled diagram of what I could only guess was the cave system.

“Now, reach for the first stone down,” I said to the man.

“What?” he asked.

“You’re going to climb down these cliffs, and when you get to the beach you will climb back up. Okay?”

Grumbling, the still-blindfolded Warrior began to climb down the cliffs. When he was halfway down, the boy Knight from earlier rushed forward and shot his crossbow at the man’s skull.

It was a direct hit, and the man tumbled down and most likely died. I turned to the boy.

“What was that about?” I asked, resisting the urge to slap him.

“I thought that was the plan the whole time,” the boy responded.

“No, it wasn’t,” I responded wearily. I’d had enough drama already, and we still had an entire cave system to explore.

This time, however, we were in for an unpleasant surprise. As I scouted ahead and rounded the first turn, headed for the area marked Holding Cells on the map, steel bars slid down on both ends of the hallway.

Well, now I knew what had happened to the other Knights. I tried to cut the bars with my sword, but it was no use. A Sharpedo probably couldn’t break these bars.

I heard a noise to my left and saw a man standing on the other side of the bars, flanked by a dozen Bisharp. A Butterfree, strangely, fluttered in the air.

“Well, what do we have here?” the man said. “Sleep Powder, Butterfree!”

Purple spores drifted form the Bug Pokemon’s wings, and immediately I began to feel tired. No, I had to fight the urge... to… sleep…

I collapsed on the cave floor, unconscious.

Ooh good suspenseful ending with the sleep powder. The little things you do in your writing like personifying the mountains in the beginning, as well as the comment about him trying to fight the sleep powder. The first person pov takes some getting used to but you make it work. Great job :)

Updating with Chapter 3.

Chapter 3

When I woke up, I was lying on my back in a small jail cell hewn straight into the rock of the cave. On three sides were roughly cut stone walls, and the final side was formed by several large iron bars. Strangely, the bars ran side-to-side instead of up and down.

For a moment, I was puzzled as to why I was here. Then I remembered what had happened in the cave before I blacked out, and shivered. I had a feeling I was about to discover exactly what had happened to the Knights of Arceus who had come into this cave before me.

Outside of my cell was a somewhat large room, made of pure rock with several wooden supports holding up the ceiling. Seeing as the cave entrance had no supports, I guessed that this room was extremely far down, maybe even below the sea. That might also explain why no Knights had escaped back to Arcein.

All of my weapons had been taken from me, but for some reason they’d left my armor on. Well, at least that might be a step in the right direction.

Unless it was so impossible to escape that the Warriors of Darkrai hadn’t bothered to take my armor.

A Warrior with two Gallade trailing behind him walked up to my cell with a key and proceeded to unlock it. That was strange. The Warriors of Darkrai used Pokemon in their armies too, but they usually used Bisharp. Gallade were normally used in the Knights of Arceus.

“It’s time for you to meet the executioner,” the man said, opening the door and grabbing my wrist to keep me from running. That was weird, he sounded much younger than most Warriors. Looking back now, I figure that I was either still groggy from the sleep powder or that I was being unusually thick.

The two Gallade grabbed my arms, and I was carried down a series of long, labyrinth-like passages. Eventually we reached a ladder that stretched up higher than I could see, up and up beyond my line of sight.

“Up you go,” the guard said, and the Gallade let go of my arms. Now I was sure I knew that voice, but I wasn’t sure that was a good thing.

“You’re the Knight from when we were climbing the cliffs,” I said, stifling a laugh. Now that I’d figured it out, it all seemed so obvious.

“About time you figured it out,” the Knight said, taking off his Warrior armor and pulling out a sword. “You’ll most likely need this.”



“So, where are we going?” I asked several minutes later, as we climbed the seemingly endless ladder. Several rungs had fallen off the ladder, and I had to scramble up the sides and pull myself up.

“Up into Raiark Castle,” the boy said.

“You’re kidding, right? I asked, bewildered. I might as well be going to get executed, if we popped out of this cave system in the middle of Raiark Castle, the home of the royal family.

“Yes and no,” the other Knight responded, laughing. “This ladder leads into the outer courtyard of the castle, with an exit leading to the cliffs right next to it.”

“So we pop out of the cave, hoping there are no Warriors nearby, and make a mad dash for the cliffs?” I asked. “You seriously don’t see any problems with that?”

“I though you were supposed to be the commander,” the boy said with a trace of his old arrogance.

I sighed, frustrated. “What time is it, anyways?”

“Don’t worry about that, gramps. It’s about midnight, twenty-four hours since we started climbing the cliffs.”

I reached the top of the cave and found a rough, circular crack in the rock. An experimental push showed that the rock was moveable, and I moved the rock before stepping up onto the ground.

The first thing I registered was fresh air, and I breathed a few times to get used to it. Then I saw the castle walls around me, and the stone pathways leading through what I figured was the courtyard.

“A little help?” a voice said from below, and I reached down to help the other Knight up.

“What’s you name, kid?” I asked in a hushed voice.

“First of all, I’m not a kid. Second, my name is Jack.”

“And your age?” I replied.

“Nineteen.”

“Then you’re still a kid, by my book.”

“Look,” Jack said, sounding irritated. “I just rescued you from prison and led you through several miles of confusing caves, all to rescue you when I could’ve just taken the others and gone back to Arcein. Do you think a kid would’ve done that?”

“Fine, then,” I responded. “I won’t call you a kid. Now let’s go before someone hears us and alerts the guards.”

We ran for the far side of the courtyard, which had a door that Jack assured me led to the outskirts of town. Upon reaching the door, however, we discovered it was locked.

“This would be a nice time for the two Gallade you had following you earlier to show up,” I said. “How did you get those, anyways?”

“Oh, them?” Jack asked. “They were in the cell a few down from yours. I’m guessing they’ll escape later.”

“Of course you are.”

“Just cut off the lock, will you?”

After we’d managed to break through the door, I found myself on the other side of the wall. A large group of trees blocked my view, but I could only guess that the cliffs lay beyond it.

Just as we entered the woods, a bell sounded behind us.

“They figured out we were here,” Jack said. “Hurry.” As if I needed to have him tell me.

We sprinted through the woods as the ringing of bells became more faint, until I couldn’t hear them anymore. But still we continued running, until we came to the edge of a cliff.

“Ready to climb? I asked, and Jack nodded. However, when we were just about down the first cliff, a voice sounded beneath me.

“Drop your weapons and stay still!”