Eidolon Interloper

Chapter 1

The sobs of the young girl echoed throughout the empty halls Hyrule Castle. The King of Twilight, Zant, stared down at her in distaste as she was wrestled onto the pedestal in front of him by two Shadow Beasts. The Hylian girl was merely a spirit, just like all of the other clueless humans in the town he had shrouded in Twilight. Unlike his own superior Twili race, humans could not survive within the Twilight without reverting to formless shades of themselves. Only creatures of Twilight and other spirits could touch them.

If he could have avoided it, he would have loved to ignore the foolish Hyruleans completely and focus his efforts on stealing the light from the remaining Light Spirits, spreading his empire to the few corners of Hyrule still free from his shadows. He wanted nothing to do with these sniveling creatures of the Light World. However, today he was on a vital mission, one given to him directly from his god.

Master was rather displeased about being unable to find some old adversaries of his. According to him, these "Sages" were missing, and the all-powerful being that granted him power wanted them found. Zant was not one to question his liege but he suspected that these sages were somehow involved in his god's banishment to the Twilight Realm. Zant was pleased to have been given a task that would help in finding and getting revenge on the fools that dared to challenge Master's power.

Unfortunately, his god believed that these Sages could be hiding in a legendary realm known as the Sacred Realm, which was incredibly difficult to reach. Zant had scoured the Hyrulean Royal Library for any spells that might be able to get him into this mysterious realm. It took ages, but he finally came across a potentially promising ritual. It required the descendants of those who had sealed up the realms—a descendant of the sages themselves. Luckily, the castle's historians had also kept record of the lineages of these sages, and he was able to locate one of these descendants in mere hours and bring them to the castle.

He sneered as the girl whimpered in front of him. What a pathetic creature. Nonetheless, she would serve her purpose as an essential component of the ritual. He allowed himself to feel some excitement; it had been far too long since he'd had the opportunity to commit magic of this caliber.

Zant summoned dark power to his fingertips. The ritual was rather clear on what needed to happen to this descendant.

Chanting the incantation, Zant raised his arm and shot the dark power at the girl's body. The magic was heedless of her intangible state and rushed through her body, leaving her shrieking in horror. He could not stop the satisfied smirk that sprung to his face as pained wails filled the room. Finally, the screams dwindled and Zant released his spell, watching the girl's form drop lifeless to the pedestal.

At first, nothing happened, causing the usurper king to frown. He was certain that this ritual would open some sort of gateway to this alternate realm.

But then, sure enough, a glowing green portal appeared above the Hylian girl's body. Zant laughed darkly, stepping forward, eager to find the Sages and destroy them in the name of his god.

…The last thing he expected was for a glowing teenager garbed in black to come shooting out of the portal and crash into the wall behind him.

oOoOo

Danny was having a rough day. After arriving late to school courtesy of the Box Ghost (who had raided a moving company and was throwing boxes onto the streets, and Sam insisted that someone needed to stop that monster from littering), he'd failed a quiz in first period math (which, of course, he couldn't study for thanks to Klemper deciding 3AM was a reasonable time to try and make new friends), then he'd been assigned partners with Dash in chemistry (which led to him not only learning absolutely nothing but also going to his next period with new bruises), and then no less than four ghosts had interrupted his lunch and subsequent gym class. When he arrived home, he was prepared to do nothing less than collapse on his bed and ignore all of the homework he'd gotten for the day and hopefully catch up on some sleep.

Of course, that was when his ghost sense decided to go off.

Groaning, Danny had transformed and found Skulker in his parents' lab, stealing one of their weapons. Danny had no idea what weapon it was or what it did, but he was pretty sure he didn't want Skulker anywhere near it (and probably didn't want the weapon anywhere near him, either). He'd chased Skulker into the Ghost Zone, exchanging blows and the traditional witty banter, when one of Skulker's blasts had sent him flying backwards… into a Ghost Portal that had suddenly opened up.

Danny had crashed into a wall on the other side of the portal. Shaking his head to clear it, he stood up, preparing to jump straight back through—

Only in time to see the portal close in front of him.

Great.

"Who are you?" a deep, slightly muffled voice demanded.

Danny blinked, taking in his surroundings full for the first time and noticing… some extremely strange people in the room. If you could call them people. Two dark, twisted monsters with enormous shield-like heads were situated to his right, their unnaturally long limbs highlighting their inhuman stature. And in front of them was a tall, imposing figure dressed in elaborate armor and a bug-eyed stone helmet.

"Did Halloween come early?" he mumbled, glancing around. The room was completely made of stone, with a single wooden door opposite him and a small window without glass on the left. Outside of the window he saw several rooftops and towers, shadowed against a sunset-laden sky; it seemed like he was quite high up in an old-fashioned stone building. It actually reminded him a bit of the level he and Tucker had completed in Doomed a couple nights ago that involved running across castle rooftops.

And then, his gaze moved to the center of the room—where he noticed the unmoving body of a young girl on a raised pedestal, blackened wounds visible beneath singed clothes.

"Wh-What happened to her? Did you do this?" he gasped, unable to stop the wavering in his voice as his stomach churned. He'd heard, from other denizens of the Ghost Zone, of cults that would sacrifice human lives in hope of gaining favor from powerful beings within the Infinite Realms. He'd never thought they were real, nor that he would somehow be the one summoned.

The two ghoulish black creatures ambled forward slightly, but the tall figure held up a hand for them to stop. "Interesting," the figure noted, his deep voice rasping and with a note of curiosity. "You are clearly not from the Light World, or you would have dissolved into a spirit. What are you, child?"

"I asked you a question first, tin-head!" Danny growled, his hands lighting with ecto-fire. He was proud that his voice did not shake that time as he pushed down the sick feeling in his stomach, focusing instead of the overwhelming desire to protect this girl, whoever she was, whether she was still alive or—no. He wasn't thinking about that.

Danny could not see the figure's eyes under his mask, but he got the impression he was staring at his hands. "I've never seen power such as that. Are you one of the Sages, perhaps? Or a servant of theirs?"

"If you're so interested in this power," Danny snarled, "how about you come over here and try to take it?"

The being seemed to ignore him and lowered his hand. "I am interested in learning more about this creature," he said. "Detain it so that I may study it."

"Hey, if anyone's a creature here, it's—woah!" Danny quickly leapt to the air as one of the beasts swiped at him with surprising speed, its long fingers curled like deadly claws. He had no time to rest as the other descended upon him instantly, lashing out as well. He rose toward the ceiling, hoping that these beasts could not somehow fly, and fired an ecto-blast at one of them. It hit it point-blank range, but to his surprise, instead of stopping it, the monster merely shook its head and briefly glowed a strange blue, its body becoming almost see-through before snapping back to normal.

Weird.

I need something stronger, he thought, charging up another ecto-blast in his hand. He was forced to turn intangible as the first monster straightened. When it stood on two feet, it was horrifyingly tall, easily managing to strike at his boots. Fortunately, its claws sailed straight through him. Danny focused on the blast, pouring as much of his energy into it as he could. He needed to make sure it didn't completely drain him—after all, he had Mr. Tall, Dark, and Ugly to deal with over there in the mask—but it had to be strong enough to do more than make his opponent stumble. Finally ready, he fired it as the dark beast went in for another swipe.

It hit the monster with a satisfying impact, launching it across the room where it slammed into the wall. Danny was pleased to see it crumple to the floor. He turned his attention toward the second one, prepared to do the same thing with it. Much to his shock, the beast instead raised up onto its hind legs and let out an unearthly shriek.

The bestial sound echoed ominously off the stone of the room, seemingly amplified a hundred times over. Gasping in pain, Danny covered his ears. He wondered if this is what others felt when he used his Ghostly Wail.

Annoyingly, the masked man seemed entirely unaffected by the sound.

When the scream was over, Danny tenderly removed his hands from his ears, preparing to do battle with his single remaining opponent again. Unfortunately, his bad luck was not about to abandon him as he watched the crumpled creature on the other side of the room jerk briefly before rising, with absolutely no signs of damage on its body.

Danny blinked. He didn't expect them to be immortal!

They charged again, but Danny was beginning to panic. Distracted by the newly revived creature, he did not realize as the other one came up behind him, managing to secure a gash on his left leg with its claws. He hissed in pain. There was no way he was going to be able to deal with enemies that could seemingly resurrect its dead friends with ease. He needed to leave and regroup.

He turned toward the tall figure that seemed to be in charge. "This isn't over!" he shouted—immediately feeling stupid, like he was Technus or some equally overdramatic foe of his. His hands glowed again, but this time an icy blue. As one of the beasts swung at him once more, Danny let out a stream of ice aimed at its legs. The beast let out an inhuman snarl as the blast successfully froze it to the ground, keeping it temporarily trapped.

Before the other monster could attack, Danny swooped down toward the girl. He noted that something about her looked odd—why was she shimmering, and why did her body look so faded? —but he paid it no heed as he lifted her up. He fired one last spike of ice at the remaining free creature to hold it back as he took the girl into the air.

And with that, he flew out the open window of the stone room and into the unknown.

A/N: I haven't written a multi-chaptered story since like 2013 but I'm here to do my best! This was supposed to be a oneshot, but it sort of grew into a huge thing that I now expect to have 15 chapters.

This story is fully plotted out and the next two chapters are already written, so you shouldn't have to wait TOO long. If I haven't updated in about a month, feel free to send me a message and ask me where I am, okay? Motivation is my biggest problem with writing and nothing motivates me more than comments from readers! :)

Thanks for reading, and I'll see you next chapter!

Words: 1,971

Published: June 2nd, 2020