Solomon Imbrex
Personality
Solomon will generally take charge of a situation. He is gruff and no nonsense, but is willing to listen to the ideas of those who he has found himself working with. He believes strongly in law and order and will snuff out any hints of chaos that threaten civilization. He is still willing to work with anyone whose goals at least match up with his in the short term, even if they may not agree in ideology or long term goals. While he lacks true empathy, he does his best to protect those who he has either sworn to do so or he believes will further his goals and despises wanton slaughter.
Beliefs
Solomon is a fierce believer in Asmodeus, even despite his disappearance and believes that Hell's ruthless order is the ideal system. Despite this he resists attempts by Devils to invade this plane, Especially without Asmodeus at the helm, as he believes that the material realm is the last place Hell should march on and that it should focus on the planes of Chaos and have the material plane willingly bend knee.
Story/Events
Mortal Potential
Solomon glares at the ashen sky covered in clouds of sand being whipped about by harsh winds. Solomon could not help the world in the fight against the Horsemen and their Daemons, but now his training is complete. He can finally be useful here, in the Ghostlands. Behind him is a mass of people of different occupations, motivations, and origins all called together by Anubis to try and help fix the ailments of the world. To help fix the cycle. Some of them were even brought here by Solomon.
When Anubis appeared asking for help fixing the cosmic balance Solomon knew he had to step up. This is a problem so serious that even Asmodeus has gone missing, whether it be to finally use the loopholes in the contract of creation to ascend and put things in their rightful place or to just fix this mess. Either way, Solomon couldn’t sit by while his god was at work. Especially not with the power he’d been graced with. His angelic heritage corrupted and turned infernal.
Solomon continued onwards through the biting winds and the sand boring into every nook and cranny. These discomforts were nothing compared to pains of chaos wracking the glorious order of the universe. Solomon was acting as an advanced scout. Thanks to Elorin, food was a non-problem, even if one tired of eating bananas every day. This meant those with little survival training, but good eyes could still help scout out threats and if they were small enough, eliminate them before they could hary the progress of the main army.
In fact, through the sands, the shambling corpses of a group of undead could be seen from the dune that Solomon had just managed to peak. Solomon studied the corpses. Several had dried flesh that only revealed the bones underneath certain parts that had sustained damage, the flesh otherwise mummifying, but there was one whose flesh was stripped clean and was wearing a breastplate and wielded a saber. It also moved with the most purpose, not simply shambling two and fro. This one seemed to be the leader.
Luckily Solomon noticed them before they had noticed him. He started speaking in infernal, “By the laws of Asmodeus I call upon you to fulfill your pacts that have been sworn to me. I call upon the strength of an Ashmede, the cunning of a Mnemor, and finally I call upon the radiance of Hell’s fire!” His voice builds as each pact is called and as the last pact is howled out and carried upon the winds a blinding radiance bursts forth from Solomon's form, the purple glow of Hellfire only making him seem the larger. With such a display his quarry notices him and the skeleton raises its saber towards this obvious threat.
The zombies crouch and run with surprising speed for the aimless shambling they had just earlier been displaying. But Solomon didn’t care, he too charged forth to meet them. His hulking form barreled through the zombies whose claws and teeth could not touch the man who seemed to know where every strike would land before it did. He reached the skeleton with his shoulder barreling into the breastplate knocking it backwards. As it stumbled Solomon took advantage of its unsteady footing and slashed through the breast plate, tearing gashes through it and knocking it off its feet.
Solomon could not rest yet however as the zombies he had ignored before came slavering and howling to meet him. Before many could reach him, Solomon was already meeting them with claws and kicks that burned and seared at the remnants of souls that powered these monstrosities. The flames dragging what's left of the souls down to Hell, traded on the soul market. Still, while Solomon was surprisingly quick and dexterous for such a hulking brute, he could not catch all of the zombies that rushed him. Some made it past the flurry of blows and flame and through the onslaught some managed to knick and scrape at Solomon’s flesh. But Solomon fought on and the wounds seemed to stitch themselves closed as claw after claw, kick after kick slowly thinned out the horde.
The Skeleton who led these things managed to stand back up, though it didn’t manage to dodge the blow it got for its efforts. As Solomon managed to put down the last zombie the skeleton beseeched its patron for aid and its sword shined with the light of heaven. It then lashed out at Solomon, who, surprised by the display of divine magic, was cut and cursed as the holy light cared not for the blood of Heaven flowing through his veins, only for the taint of Hell that lay on his very soul. Didn’t expect to meet a hollow this close to the borders. It’s a good thing I called upon the pacts. Solomon thought to himself.
Solomon couldn’t let the hollow keep the momentum however and managed to parry the next sword strike, striking the flat of the blade with his wrist before it could come down between his neck and shoulder. Luckily the Hollow Skeleton was weakened from the two blows it received before and Solomon’s furious counter to its face cracked the skull to pieces and it lay broken before him. No time to admire the work. I wasn’t quiet. More will likely be drawn here.
Solomon looked back towards where the army should be, making a mental note of the location, and charged off with a battle cry, trying to draw the following undead on a chase rather than lead them back to the army.
…
Solomon spits some blood from his mouth. His wounds slowly healing after another fight. He looks over his squad. They are starting to get tired. One of them looks back at him, Darius, a grizzled veteran from the daemon wars, “These mindless undead are a little too well trained.”
Solomon lays his hand on a wound on Darius’s leg and a purple light shines out and the wound starts closing, “I agree. The tactics feel familiar though. I can’t quite place it…”
“Well if you can place it that would be helpful”, Darius laughs with a sardonic chuckle.
“I’ll keep thinking.” Solomon replies as he takes stock of the other 5 men. They are catching their breath while standing over the corpses of about 20 zombies. Then the communicator at his hip buzzes to life, “Please report your status.”
Solomon picks the communicator up. “Alive. We just dealt with another patrol. Closing in on objective location. Enemies are unusually coordinated. It may have something to do with the extraplanar activity reported here.”
“Hmmmmm” The voice on the communicator ponders in a husky grumble. “Continue with the mission and try to keep casualties low. I wish to ferry as few souls as possible.”
Solomon nods replying, “Understood.” He sighs, putting the communicator back at his hip and motions for his men to start getting read to go. He climbs the next dune to get a look at the location.
As Solomon gets to the point he can see over the dune he stops, wary for scouts. He peaks over the dune to get a look at his objective. A cave amongst the dunes, it’s rock black and shiny like obsidian. It’s well guarded. 2 groups of 10 zombies each have an alternating patrol around the entrance. They march in lock step each trying to cover blind spots and even searching the air for flyers. Solomon just watches the patrols for a bit trying to think of what could be happening. Then he realizes why these tactics look familiar. He read about these. *Shit* he thinks to himself. He walks back to his squad.
“There’s good news, and there’s bad news,” he states plainly looking at his squad who have gathered themselves back up for battle.
One of the younger soldiers speaks up first, “Well what’s the good news?”
“We’ve found the objective and I’ve figured out why their tactics are familiar.”
Darius looks Solomon in the eyes, “Then the bad news is what you realize..” He ponders gruffly.
Solomon nods, “It’s the tactics of the mindless of the legions of Hell. One of the Hollows must have summoned something.” Some of the squad flinch, “If we’re lucky it’s a Barbazu. If we’re unlucky… run.” Solomon states plainly.
“I will engage the Devil. Darius, you engage any Hollow threats and I’ll join you once I’ve finished my prey. The rest of you are going to attack the zombies. Fire at them from the dune and Darius and I will flank them and hopefully draw elites out of the cave.”
The squad salutes and they ready their bows as Darius and Solomon move to opposite sides of the dune. Once in position Solomon once again calls upon his pacts to gain strength and then gives the signal. The squad starts letting arrows loose at one of the patrols. The zombies immediately begin charging through the hail of arrows and despite their seeming single minded focus they managed to notice Solomon and Darius’s flanking maneuver and braced.
It did not help. Solomon barreled into the zombies that braced for his charge. They flew back into their fellow zombies creating a disruption in the line that Darius took immediately, making swift swings with his scimitar cutting the zombies legs out from under them. One of the zombies tries to sink its teeth into Darius as his attention is turned elsewhere, but Solomon palm strikes the zombie’s head, knocking it away before it could harm Darius. The group of zombies had only just been thinned when another surged into the fray, but Solomon didn’t care about the Zombies. His eyes turned towards the cave as a large red figure with a black, serrated glaive steps out of the cave's mouth.
“Someone has the nerve to attack my base of operations”, the devil growled.
“Men, charge the zombies. He’s mine!” Solomon shouts as he dashes through the horde of zombies, earning himself a few bites and claws from zombies he ran passed heedlessly, but they didn’t matter. Only the Barbazu.
As he closed on the Barbazu it lashed out with its glaive. Solomon was quick, but not quick enough as he tried to sidestep the glaive only to manage to turn the blow into a graze. But that was enough, pain lancing through Solomon. The cuts of a Barbazu’s glaive did not heal as easily as the other wounds that had already begun to start to close.
Solomon threw his body weight into a swipe knocking the Barbazu back against the obsidian walls of the cave entrance. It grunted as it slammed against the wall and dropped its glaive. It wasn’t to be deterred however as it rushed back to meet Solomon, dodging his claws as it came into range with its own bared and ready to disembowel its foe. Solomon managed to avoid the disembowelment, but it’s flurry of blows managed to find some openings in his defenses and as the last claw hit, it shoved its chin forwards, it’s beard coming to life. Solomon saw that one coming at least and managed to dodge it and repaid the Barbazu in kind, slashing it across the face opening up deep wounds and cornering it back against the wall.
Solomon’s claws were unrelenting as he brought his claws down on the Barbazu in quick succession. The devil weathered the blow, blocked by a wall of stone on one side and a wall of meat and claws on the other. It knew an opening would come sooner or later and it was paid for its patience for, as Solomon went in for what he thought was the killing blow, the Barbazu saw the slight change in his stance and the small opening the windup would take, dropped low, and shoulder checked Solomon during the wind up. As Solomon reeled back, unbalanced by the unexpected move, the Devil rushed forth managing to slash open Solomon’s right leg and left shoulder with its claws as it went for the throat with its beard.
Unluckily for the Barbazu, while its beard managed to connect, the wound was superficial as Solomon managed to step back at the last moment. What’s worse, it had sustained too much damage when it was against the wall and it couldn’t resist as Solomon took the Barabazu by the throat, slamming it to the ground, and ripping its still beating heart out of its chest.
Solomon took a bite out of the heart and raised his trophy high. His men cheered as they finished up the last of the zombies. Solomon nods to them. “Good job. You held your own well. Time to check out the cave.”
Solomon walked into the cave. The bright light shining from his body illuminated the way, the purple luminescence mixing with the shining black stone to create strange light patterns tesselating throughout. The front of the cave was mostly barren, but when he got deeper in Solomon found a room that had some furniture brought in. There were bookshelves, though they seemed to have been cleared of their most important books. Though Solomon shoved some half burnt scrolls in his bag. However, what was most interesting was the summoning circle. Solomon knelt down to inspect it.
As he looked, Solomon grabbed the communicator at his hip, “Anubis, this is Solomon, do you copy?”
After a period of silence, the communicator flared to life buzzing out, “I can hear you Solomon.”
“Good. I found the source of the disturbance. Seems a binding ritual was performed here. I don’t know how widespread this could be. But someone performed a binding ritual on a Barbazu and was using it to train the mindless undead similar to how they train Hell’s mindless legion.”
“That’s troubling.” Anubis seems to be silently pondering the new information for a few moments, “Make sure to bring back everything you can. We’ll have someone look into this.”
“Understood.” Solomon puts the communicator back on his hip and starts collecting everything left behind.