Quix the Devious

Sometimes death was necessary, an unavoidable pursuit in attaining the means to an end. Other times it was a struggle, a grinding effort that until it was fulfilled, one could never achieve the ultimate goal. But there were occasions that death and destruction could be fun, and Quix was all about having fun. Life was far too mundane and tedious, not having any fun would make it completely pointless.

Removing the great horn from his pack, Quix held it before him with both hands. The weight of it still surprised him now and he had to use a small glimmer of his power to be able to lift it into the air. It wasn't his greatest trophy and in truth, scavenging talismans from the dead in such a way had started to cause him an element of embarrassment and he tried to avoid it wherever possible. But, when you're dealing with powerful beasts, it was the only sure way to go about it. Safe was boring though, which was why you needed to have a bit of fun.

Quix looked down upon the small village at the water's edge. He could see children running between the huts and a small group of fishermen about to embark upon the lake. Feeling the mana build inside, he focussed it all upon the horn he was holding, a blue fuzz shimmering about his hands and tingling along his arms. There came the usual brief battle of wills, but with his totem in hand the creature couldn't refuse, and Quix pulled its essence through the vortex to appear in the sky above the settlement.

It beat its wings for a brief moment, surprise at the sudden change in environment quickly turning to annoyance, and then bestial anger. Screams drifted up from the village as people spotted the flying behemoth and began to frantically run about in panic. It was pointless though and only seemed to enrage the dragon further. Electric blue energy gathered about the cobalt scales, prickling and humming, eager to be free. And then it released its attack, jagged bolts of lightning shooting from its jaws and striking homes and people, incinerating them with indiscriminate fury and leaving behind the charred, smoking remains.

Quix grinned. Lightning dragons were quickly becoming one of his favourites. Quix had wandered the chaos realm for so long, he'd almost forgotten where his life had begun. Most of the memories only came to him in dreams now, flashes of images that were hard to connect and make any sense of. It was only when he came upon the Ravaged Void and rested by its black well that something stirred within him. It prompted a deep hunger for mana and he became obsessed with magic. Not only that, but the images he saw in his dreams became clearer and he witnessed great dragons. Some of them were native to the realm of chaos and some looked completely alien. Their nature appealed to him and demanded his attention, and so he remained by the void where over time his power grew, the vast emptiness filling him with potent energy.

At first he found that he could levitate and even consume fragments of time, taking it away from other beings and slowing them down. Soon after he realised the ability to interrupt projectiles inflight, as though an invisible hand had snatched them from the air. But what began to frustrate him was his capacity to summon. He could conjure up all manner of monsters and creatures from the ether but there was no elemental basis to any of them, and what he really wanted was to rouse the mighty dragon. The will of a dragon is strong though and try as he might, the task became impossible.

Quix flew into a terrible rage and destroyed the makeshift home he had made around the Ravaged Void. Enticed by the bright flashes of destructive power that he had cast, a void dragon came to him, curious and fascinated by his magic ability. However, the dark fury that had consumed Quix would not leave him and when the dragon came near, he set about it with his knives. Because it was only young and due to the power that emanated from him, he quickly over came it, killing the pitiful beast with no remorse. He didn't stop there though, his anger demanding that he take a trophy from the being that refused to be summoned by his will alone. Cutting the fangs from its maw, he created a gruesome necklace. But his ire wasn't sated though and so he gouged out its eyes, tasting some of the power that lay within.

He soon found that having crafted these talismans', his capacity to summon was enhanced. He could now call forth the Void Dragon at will, the grisly totem amplifying his ability. With the realisation of this obscene turn in events, Quix set out immediately in a quest to gather as many tokens as possible from the dragons. Whether it meant raiding their nests, scavenging from corpses or killing them unawares, he didn't care, and always managed to walk away with his prize.

Of course when the Chaos Rift was established and a doorway to the new world opened, Quix was eager to visit the Splinterlands and find new dragon trophies to add to his collection, expanding upon his already lethal repertoire of monsters.