Ascension of the elder

"Well it wouldn't be these idiots."

Kyle had manipulated the wind in the surrounding area to limit the amount of noise released but a small amount still slipped through and shortly another troop arrived. When Kyle saw these men he decided to change tack and rather than continue with creepy kids he created the illusion of a man in a mask watching them from the distance.

"Hey who are you and what are you doing here?"

One of the sentries challenged the illusion; the illusion simply stepped back and around a wall. The sentries all rushed up and jumped around the corner to be met with...nothing. This confused them as he only had seconds before they arrived and there shouldn't have been enough time for him to run or hide.

The men spread out in teams of two and begun to search the area for the intruder. As they began to range out further and they lost line of sight with each other Kyle caused the illusion to reappear at certain points drawing the men closer to the locations where 'steel lotus' were waiting.

As the men were captured Kyle had an epiphany or maybe a divine intervention. Even the act of capturing these men could be used to scare the others so Kyle quickly found Faye and told her that during the capture they should use their shadow skills and their imagination to make it scary and to let a couple from every group escape to spread the fear.

Faye quickly disappeared to tell the members of 'steel lotus' the updated order while Kyle returned to his campaign of terror.

Under the new orders Kyle watched as the first team approached the ambush location. As they passed a shadowy building the shadows themselves seemed to have come alive and formed tentacle like appendages which grabbed one of the men and dragged him screaming into the shadow.

The man with him saw this and stepped forward but didn't want to approach any closer so instead he screamed and ran away much to the amusement of the members of 'steel lotus' who were in hiding nearby.

And they began using their imaginations trying to outdo each other in the scare factor. There where shadow squids, something that looked similar to a venus flytrap and Kyle's personal favourite a shadow woman who had a scarily wide mouth with razor sharp fangs reached out and grabbed one of the men.

As they were away from the arrays 'steel lotus' could use more magic than Kyle could in his illusions meaning they would have more versatility but due to being in this less advanced world they lacked imagination.

Once this new batch was taken or scared to the point they dropped their arms Kyle moved onto his next prey. This was a wandering squad who were checking the perimeter but with two teams already gone there was now a break in their defensive line.

As the team was walking forward they saw a figure approaching from the distance so they continued moving forward with their leader in front.

"Who goes there?"

The leader called out but there was no response so they continued to approach as the figure got closer as well until the leader could clearly see the figure. It was a mirror image of him, he waived his arm and the mirror image did exactly the same, lifting a foot it copied him.

"Hum must be a mirror, but why would they have such a large mirror in this place."

He said turning back to his men who were still staring forward with scared expressions. The leader quickly turned back and realised something his men weren't reflected but this realisation was overshadowed by his mirror image which was now sporting an impossibly wide grin.

As he watch in horror the grin spread further when suddenly the head split open revealing thousands of sharp fangs and eyes in places there should be eyes and a huge tongue whipping around looking for a target.

"Eeeeep!"

"Mommy!"

"Let's get the bloody hell outta here."

"Run away."

This was the response from the team who were now running for the hills along with their leader but all that awaited them was the shadows of 'steel lotus', including one who seemed to have a fascination with flying rodents as using their shadow they formed a giant bat which grabbed one of the men before being hauled back up by her comrades.

This was going well so he headed to the next group, the girls who were watching had decided to double down on their training so they could do things like this as they had learnt a couple of types and merging them like this was their next stage.

His next target was a single man who was in one of the sleeping chambers. Kyle had picked him up using his soul sense and had something special in mind for him so he made the sound of a man screaming and cast his illusion just outside the door.

"What in the blazes is going on here?"

The man grumbled as he opened the door with force not paying attention to what was going on until the sight in front of him made him freeze. In front of him was a pair of young female twins holding hands and wearing simple dresses.

In this instance there was nothing creepy about them beyond there being young twins in a scary mansion with armed mercenaries around the place but the man reacted in probably the most sensible way anyone had ever reacted in a situation like this.

Before Kyle's illusions could do anything the man stepped back and slammed the door and Kyle was sure before he had retreated back he heard the man say.

"Nope."

With the door shut Kyle used his soul sense to see what the man was doing and sensed that he was grabbing everything he could lay his hands on and was barricading the door.

Well that was impressive Kyle thought before continuing on. Kyle was selecting smaller groups but he would soon run into the larger teams and he was thinking how to deal with them. So for the next couple he let their screams of terror reach the larger groups.

His illusions for these small groups included a man who looked like a plague doctor but moving in a juddery fashion, a woman in a white dress but he caused the light to flicker and die before coming back and each time the light came back she would be closer or further with no rhyme or reason.

Kyle was concentrating more on the human form as if he created really monstrous forms the men may just attack them as they had fought against demon beast regularly.

Shadow hands from the walls, people in patient clothing which was surprisingly similar to that worn in our world. Kyle was using everything he could think of. One of the groups managed to dislodge a mana crystal as they were panicking which made a number of the defensive array drop.

Rather than just directly attach Kyle continued with his house of horror but now he was also including his sorcerer abilities which were largely based around telekinesis. Objects began levitating and were thrown around the place.

Kyle was moving closer to the large group in the main hall and he had been saving up his masterpiece for these gentlemen.

Within the great hall the main bulk of the merc force were cowering with each other. Some of the men who had been left to run had made their way to the main hall and spoke of what they had seen.

"This place is cursed we should never have come."

"I don't want to lose my soul."

"I want my mommy."

This was a situation they had never heard of before, if it was a physical enemy they would fight to the death but something like this was beyond sword and shield it was a question of their very soul.

As they were lamenting their decision to come here in the first place all the lights in the hall died down leaving barely any light to see by. Suddenly there was a flash of red light and looking towards the source they saw a figure relaxing in an armchair with a glass of wine in one hand and a book in the other.

"Well hello there."

The figure said but they weren't paying attention to the figure rather they were looking at the pair of large horns on his head.

"W-w-who are you?"

The leader of the mercs said to the figure before him.

"Well I have many names but you can call me Bob."

"Bob?"

"Yes Bob."

"Why are you here Bob?"

"Well you disturbed the spirits of this place and they want revenge and I'm simply here to watch the show."

Kyle had decided to put this figure in to create a mythos around what happened today and you always need a narrator to explain what was happening.

As the demons words fell from the different entrances the figures Kyle had been using to terrorize them began to appear.

"Are they going to kill us?"

"Oh no they are merely here to watch the one you need to worry about is just over there."

The demon pointed to a currently empty archway, all the men couldn't help but turn their heads to that direction and as they waited with bated breath a sound of metal being dragged could be heard. What was coming after all the horrors they had seen what new level of hell was coming.

The noise got louder and it was like nails being scraped along a chalkboard making them all shudder. Finally a figure appeared around the corner and came into the low light of the hall. It was a figure to instil terror into the stoutest of hearts and break the strongest of wills.

It was a.....clown and not just any clown it was a mutant dwarf clown with broken black and brown teeth. The sound they could hear was the sound of a rusty cleaver sword being dragged behind this nightmare fuel.

"Oh what new hell is this?"

"Who comes up with this stuff?"

"Oh crap!!"

"I think I already did!"

"Hehehehehe do you want to play a game."

The clown spoke in a voice which matched its appearance, it sounded like multiple voices were overlapping each other giving it a weirdly otherworldly sound while still sounding horrendous. All the men stepped back while the clown stepped closer.

For every step the clown took the men took one back until the clown seemed to want to change the game.

"Booo!"

That was the final straw as the men broke and ran, there is nothing funnier in any world than seeing a group of 50 men running from a dwarf clown who is chasing them while waiving a giant kitchen knife above its head while shouting things like.

"Don't run I won't hurt you."

Or

"You're only making it worse."

The girls were rolling around when they saw this until Miranda saw Kyle wasn't laughing and wasn't even smiling.

"Kyle what's wrong have you noticed something?"

Clara and Elena also noted Kyle's strange expression and flew closer, Kyle looked at them with dead eyes before he spoke.

"Clowns are no laughing matter."