Thorne Stormfoot- The Wrath of Trantor

Thorne Stormfoot- The Wrath of Trantor

The people of Baywatch had always lived in peace. Their days were spent basking beneath the golden glow of the sun, their nights lulled by the whispers of the tide. Fishing boats glided across the waters, markets bustled with fresh catches, and laughter echoed through cobbled streets.

But that ever fragile peace was shattered when the Orcs came flooding over the hill.

From the north, the warband descended, a legion of bloodthirsty warriors, clad in rusted iron and bristling with savage weapons suddenly covering the hillside like ants swarming yesterday’s leftovers. Their war cries rolled over the hills like distant thunder, promising ruin, promising slaughter.

The town had no armies. No walls. No hope.

Until the storm answered.

A halfling boy versus a horde of savage violence stood alone at the edge of the town, waiting. Thorne Stormfoot, the Lightning’s Chosen.

The Wrath of Trantor.

The Orcs, enraged and eager for bloodshed, charged.

Their brutish feet crushed the earth, their weapons gleaming in the dying light. They came as a tide of muscle and rage, unstoppable, overwhelming. The pounding of their charge like a rolling peal of thunder.

But tiny, child sized, Thorne did not run.

He breathed deep, hair on his arms standing on end, feeling the storm within him, feeling the divine spark of Trantor ignite. Feeling himself touch, and then become, the storm.

The first Orc raised his axe to cleave the Halfling in two, but before the blade could fall, the sky struck first.

A bolt of lightning struck from the swiftly gathering clouds like judgment itself, blasting the warrior, and any others within arms reach, into ash and ruin.

The others, startled by the unexpected and explosive violence, hesitated. Confusion flickered through their savage faces. Where had the thunder come from?

Hesitation in battle is often costly. But today the marauders would learn that hesitation when facing a living Tempest was deafening. Definitive. Deadly.

Thorne lifted his palm toward the heavens. His voice crackled with power.

"You want blood? Then face the wrath of the storm!", he cried as he clenched his fist and pulled the very sky downward.

The clouds above split open, lighting and roiling with unearthly power, and the storm came alive.

Lightning rained from the sky, streaking down in seemingly endless blinding arcs, smiting Orcs where they stood. Their weapons turned to molten ruin, their bodies twisted into burning silhouettes before crumbling into nothing.

Thorne moved through the gathered, but now attempting to scatter even quicker than they had arrived, Orcs like a lightshow of destruction, faster than their eyes could follow, his form charged with divine energy. He weaved in bolts of electricity between the warband, every step sending jolts of power surging into the ground, cracking the earth beneath them, electrifying their bones and tossing their bodies carelessly about.

The Orcs who swung at him found their weapons shattered mid-swing, their limbs blasted away with impossible power.

The ones who fled found lightning chasing them, striking them down before their feet could carry them far.

The battle lasted minutes, only minutes.

And when it was done, the field outside the village was a smoking ruin, scorched bodies strewn across the hillside, blackened steel glowing and molten in the aftermath.

Not a single Orc remained standing.

Beautiful Baywatch by the Sea was untouched.

And at its gates, Thorne stood grinning and cackling with not a little madness still sparking in his eyes.

The people of Baywatch never forgot the night their town stood on the edge of destruction.

Nor did they forget the Halfling who stood alone, whose laughter rang out still audible amidst the thunder, whose hands held the wrath of the storm.

Some called him a hero. Some called him a legend. Some called him a monster.

But Thorne Stormfoot merely shrugged, the flash of madness never far beneath the surface of his eyes, "Trantor called the storm," he would say with a laugh. "I just danced with it."

And as long as darkness rose against Goodhollow's helpless, Thorne Stormfoot, the Wrath of Trantor, would ride the lightning, answering the call of battle again.