Sky Empire SONNAC (open to change)
ARTIST WILL HAVE FULL FREEDOM ON PANEL AND PAGE DIVISION UNLESS OTHERWISE SPECIFIED.
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Full panel showing the Imperial District of the Kingdom. Huge angry crowd outside the palace gates. A couple of guards are being tortured (be creative XD). A vague figure of a huge man in white approaches the gate, pushing people out of his way.</i>
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Show interior of Imperial palace. Levia Guards stand guard along left and right walls. Show throne in centre with old King Renaud XI on it, rubbing his forehead, deep in thought.
Show red cross on white tunic of Templar.
The king looks up with hope.
Show Templar (from behind. Short cropped chestnut hair. Huge build. Unarmed. Hands tied behind back and head held high. King on throne in background.</i>
King (weary look): “Grandmaster Payens, you could not have chosen a more suitable time”
Payens the Templar Grandmaster (sneer): “I would have arrived sooner still if not for the fuming crowd at your doorstep. What ever did you do to make such enemies of your own people, King Renaud?”
King (disgusted look): “I will tolerate your tone for now, Grandmaster, for I cannot get through this without the help of you and your steamknights. The horde outside is singing a chorus for my head on a spike, even after all that I have done for their wellbeing. Give a dog a bone and he bites your hand in return.”
Payens (mocking): “You forgot the singing for your head part.”
King (defeated): “I beg you, please do something about this. Scare them off, go cause an explosion somewhere, make an example of two or three, I don’t care. Just get them off my back.”
Payens (serious): “You don’t care. Maybe that’s what’s having you here in the first place.”
King (furious): “You may be Grandmaster of the Order of the Templar but while you are still in Sonnac I am king, and as your king I demand you to go quell that rebellion by any means necessary!”
Payens (obsviously unshaken with stern look).
Payens walks out: “A king, certainly..but one soon to be without a kingdom” (King with shocked look in background).
Scene changes to the streets of Sonnac where peasants are burning high-class houses and doing all sorts of muderous stuff to people that are dressed comparatively well. Show a few soldiers being beaten up with pickaxes and other such farm tools.
After a few small shots on the scene, show a huge explosion in a nearbly mansion and then surprised faces looking towards it.
Show redcross on white mantle again, fluttering if possible.
Show a squad of Steam Knight Templars (3-4 in focus, the rest diluted into smoky background).
Show full panel of massacre of peasants by the knights – stabbed with sword, head cut off, mashed with maul, trampled on face, choked, torched with flamethrower, flung across, you name it.
Show a few more shots of the massacre and then fade to black.
Fade back from black showing ruins and remains of the scene with lots of dead people (no dead knights).
Show a knight bowing over a pile of dead bodies with blood all over his tunic and holding a sword weakly in one hand. He has light hair and skin with a sincere look on his face.</i>
Knight: “I may never sleep again.”
Another knight comes up behind him. The knight’s brother with the same complexion but longer curly hair and better built.
Knight2: “Relax, Everard, we were just following orders. These people never had it good to begin with. You knew you’d see such a day as this when you joined the Order.”
Everard looks up at the other knight, his eyes filled with tears: “Not this, brother Berard. Not this.”
Berard rests a humongous arm on Everard’s shoulder: “The guilt will pass. Duty is honor.”
Everard: “There is no such thing, brother. This was a job for monsters and demons; soldiers at worst. But we are knights! And not just knights, but those of the Order of the Templar, knights of the Living God! Whatever one may say, there is no honor in killing, but this... this is not even killing. This is murder. What were we thinking? What have we become? These souls will never find peace; they’ll be waiting to drag us to hell!”
Berard pauses and then looks down at the dead bodies: “Calm down. If ever that day comes, I shall gladly burn for every life that I took here on this day.”
Everard: “Promise me that we will pay for this someday.”
Berard raises an eyebrow with a hint of a smile but sees that Everard is serious: “You never fail to surprise me, little brother. But yes, I promise you. We shall suffer greatly for the shameful act that we have done here today. If not, I shall see to it myself.”
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