Durus Flamma

From The Heretic Knowledge Vault

Revision as of 01:24, 19 April 2007

A type of weapon used by the elves; magically sharp, with some curious properties. Melrin tries to dissect Sarine with one during the big ambush scene in Thranel, and almost succeeds, but "close" doesn't count. Understandably, Sarine takes offense at this breach of etiquette; Durus Flamma blades are only supposed to be used for ceremonial combat such as duels, which Melrin didn't bother to challenge her to. She manages to smuggle the by-then-late Melrin's Durus Flamma into the chambers of the Elven Council to reinforce her point that whatever happened in Thranel wasn't exactly by the book. (One must admire the sangfroid of council members Ameurin, Famair and Skena when they see this nasty, disemboweling thing in the hands of a skilled and unhappy fighter; they barely blink an eye, although they do concede the point to Sarine.)

Apparently the material for the blades was first created by the dwarves, who couldn't use all its potential and it seems as the Rinkai were the ones that later came up with the weapon design.

"First off they were actually called 'Durus Flamma' blades by the elves; 'Lancea' just refers to the spear/halberd/naginata type weapons the majority of the Ensigerum use.

Basically, the elves really like swords. So one day an elf dude says, 'I want to make a sword that's even better at cutting stuff'. After a bit, he creates a crystal that vibrates at an incredible rate when magical energy is channeled through it, then he shaped it into a blade. As he hoped, it worked very, very well at cutting stuff, but it had a couple of problems.

First, while the crystal was nearly unbreakable when it had power being channeled through it, it was rather fragile when it was inactive... so a long, narrow sword blade made out of the stuff would break/shatter/crack/chip very easily when 'off'. This was then fixed by coming up with an enchantment that would cause a blade to condense into a much smaller, and more durable shape when it wasn't being used. As a result, the very early fixed blade type of Durus Flamma swords became extremely valuable and are considered collectors' items due to how few were made and how even fewer still remain intact.

The second problem was a bit more serious.... When an elf channeled energy into the sword to keep it active, for some reason, it caused the elf's senses to be greatly magnified. They were increased so much, in fact, that it actually became difficult to concentrate on fighting while using one. Imagine trying to swing a sword around while strobe lights are flashing in front of your eyes, air horns are being blasted right in your ears, and electric shocks are going through your skin. However (and I say this only to avoid the inevitable speculation on it), humans and some half elves do not seem to suffer these effects to the same extent.

It is this effect that kept the weapon from ever really being used for any sort of conventional combat by the elves. However, somewhere along the line it started being used as a weapon for duels since the weapon's effect, while still quite detrimental, actually would add an extra level to the fighting. With the weapons, the match was no longer decided just by which person was more skilled with a sword, but also by which had the greater degree of focus and concentration.

Now, as all forms of violence between elves was and is illegal except for officially sanctioned duels, duels were quite popular back in the day... or at least they were thought to be popular. They were popular enough, at any rate, that most elves would have a Durus Flamma sword and know enough about it to at least use it, simply so they could say they could... even if they never actually fought in a duel.

As their popularity grew, the weapons got a lot fancier- artfully crafted decorative hilts, blades that came in different colors besides the crystal's natural purple, the blade's condensed form being made to take a specifically designed shape instead of just looking like a rough chunk of uncut crystal, and even matching regular metal swords made to go with the crystal weapons were all common modifications.

Eventually the weapons also managed to pick up a certain sort of revered status, and certain rules were adopted that stated they could only be used for dueling or ceremonial purposes. Eventually all this meant that pretty much every elf was taught how to use one simply because the weapons were thought of as a part of the elven culture just as much as the language or other such things, and finely made Durus Flamma swords were often given as gifts between elves.

Needless to say, Sarine already has one of her own (purposely made to have similar hilt designs to her short swords, no less) and I've even drawn her with the thing before."