Awesome / The Chronicles of Ancient Darkness

Spoilers Off applies to all Awesome pages, so all spoilers are unmarked. You Have Been Warned!

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• The series is made from these. At least three in each book! And Renn and her archery and plain ol' badass-ery get quite a few. As does Torak and his spirit walking.

Wolf Brother

• When Torak is accused of stealing the Raven Clan's prey (due to a new law that was introduced at the clan meet), he points out the law of "Trial by Combat". He has to defeat Hord in combat to prove he's innocent, and the only rule is that he can't use fire. So he uses steam.
• During Torak's underground search for the second piece of the Nanuak, Renn and Wolf are attacked by the demon bear. When they hide in a hollow, the bear just starts digging them out "like wood-ants". Renn is about to give up until she sees how calm Wolf is and promptly readies her bow and steps out of the hollow.
  Renn: Fourteen arrows. I should be able to put in a few of them before it gets me.
• Then Wolf snatches the Nanuak and leads the bear away from Torak and Renn. Wolf doesn't know that Torak is The Chosen One, he's just doing this Heroic Sacrifice to help his friends.
  • And he manages to shake the bear. An Always Chaotic Evil Determinator with Super-Senses, and a normal wolf cub managed to escape it while carrying the MacGuffin. This is the animal version of Badass Normal.
• Fin-Kedinn faced the bear and lived. This man was in his thirties, by Stone Age standards he was already old, he is not a Mage or the Listener, but he faced a demon-possessed apex predator and lived.
• What does Torak do when he's trapped inside a glacier? He climbs out by using makeshift Wolverine Claws. Makeshift. Wolverine. Claws.
• Fin-Kedinn's Rousing Speech to Torak. It's not even a speech, just this:
  Fin-Kedinn: You can run or you can fight. There's always a choice.
• Everything about the finale. Even Hord, who was enough of a Determinator to follow Wolf and Torak to the Mountain of the World Spirit despite the same World Spirit forcing anyone who tries to turn back. When you consider how much effort it took for Torak to force himself up there, imagine how hard it was for Hord with his Sanity Slippage.

Spirit Walker

• A villainous one goes to Tenris who had everyone fooled.
• Wolf vs the tokoroths. Wolf wins offscreen.
• Renn shooting Tenris in the hand. From a boat. During a storm. While he's on the Crag and almost out of range.
• Torak takes a third option when he's cornered on the Crag.
  Tenris: You have no choice. You know that.
  Torak: There's always a choice. [jumps off the Crag]
• Torak snatches Tenris's masking charm. Cue a Karmic Death via Papa Killer Whale.

Soul Eater

• Torak spirit walks in an ice bear. Especially awesome since Torak has a bad history with bears. And that he could easily have been trapped in there forever. And he had the Heroic Willpower to control the bear via Thou Shalt Not Kill. A freaking ice bear.
• Wolf deliberately wanders into another pack's territory to get their help in saving the taillesses. That took a lot of guts.
• Renn with the Fire Opal. She's prepared to sacrifice herself to destroy it. And she's not corrupted by it despite the fact that the thing is literally Made of Evil. And is light from the eye of the Great Auroch.
  • She doesn't have to. Nef sacrifices her own life to destroy the Fire Opal to repay her debt to Torak's father who prevented her from committing suicide years ago.
    Nef: The debt is repaid! Tell your father when you meet him! The debt is repaid!

Outcast

• Renn's Magecraft is powerful enough to save Torak from Sanity Slippage despite Seshru's attempts to stop her. Even though she never wanted to be a Mage, she's a match for her evil mother.
• Torak and Bale team up to kill Seshru. First, Torak pretends to surrender the Fire Opal, only to shatter it with a rock. Then, when Seshru lunges towards the shards, Bale shoots her so that Renn wouldn't have to kill her own mother, basically Taking A Third Option and killing two birds with one stone.
• Aki standing up to his father. Doubles as Heartwarming.
  • Fin-Kedinn makes Torak his foster son and tells the clansmen that if they want to kill him, they'll have to kill him as well.

Oath Breaker

• Torak's Sherlock Scan of the site of Bale's death. A Scarily Competent Tracker at his finest.
• Wolf saves Torak from Thiazzi by starting a stampede.
  This was what one wolf could do!
• How does Renn gain the respect of the Auroch Clan? She pretends to be a full Mage by speaking Raven and summoning a "spirit wolf" with a "spirit bone".
• Thiazzi gets a villainous example. In his disguise of the Forest Horse Mage, he tricks all the Deep Forest clans into thinking that he has come to a consensus with the Auroch Mage. With orator skills and carefully selected lies, he unites the warring clans against the Open Forest. Pretty impressive to trick four highly fundamentalistic and distrustful clans to embrace each other as brothers-in-arms.
  • Before that feat, Thiazzi presents the speaking staff of the Auroch Clan as the proof of having spoken with the Auroch Mage. He returns the staff in token of trust while the Aurochs point their spears at him. Even Renn who has every reason to hate Thiazzi has to admit his daringness]].
• Torak invents horseriding to get to the sacred grove and rescue Renn from Thiazzi. That is all.

Ghost Hunter

• Darkfur being a Determinator after her cub is slaughtered.
• Pebble, the last surviving cub, surviving the High Mountains on his own.
• Dark saving Torak from Eostra's dogs.
• Wolf vs Eostra's dogs. Despite the dogs being huge and pure evil, Wolf wins.
• We finally see Wolf being a demon hunter. And it is epic.
• Torak spirit walks in Eostra, only for her to be more strong-willed than anything he has spirit walked in before and trap him inside her. And then he manages to escape with what appears to be The Power of Love after even Heroic Willpower failed.
• The Walker. When Eostra is bringing the Soul Eaters back from the dead, she summons the last unidentified Soul Eater — Narrander. And this happens:
  Eostra: …Narrander… Come forth
  The Walker: Narrander comes. Your spell is flawed. It holds the hair of a living man.
  Eostra: Narrander died. He died in the great fire.
  The Walker: Another died! He should have lived! The Walker ends it now!
  • When only Eostra remains to deal with, the Walker uses his Magecraft to summon the Hidden People of the Mountain to destroy the Eagle Owl Mage.
    The Walker: Hidden Ones. Hidden People of the Mountain! The Walker calls on you! Rid the world of this canker! [the Mountain starts trembling] The Walker calls on you! Let the jaws of the Mountain snap shut! Rid us of the Soul-Eater for ever!

Viper's Daughter

• Renn pretends to submit and prepare a spell to set Naiginn's demons souls free under the ice mountain, but she takes advantage of his demon weaknesses and ignorance regarding Magecraft. While preparing a raven-mask, she makes sure that she's between him and a crack to the Otherworld, knowing that he'll avoid looking at it and thus fail to see what she's doing. Once the mask is ready, she steps in a ray of daylight, reveals that the mask actually represents the sun, and blows mammoth ash in his face. A Guile Hero at her finest.
  Renn: Not raven but sun!
• Renn and Torak working together to take down Naiginn who threatens to shoot Torak if Renn won't come to him. Renn rushes towards a volcanic mound that's about to blow up, forcing Naiginn to leave his high ground and run after her. Then Torak, whose right arm was dislocated by Naiginn, throws slingstones at Naiginn with his left arm. As the mound bursts, it sets the slingstones ablaze before they whip around Naiginn's throat. As he staggers through smoke, he's apparently finished off offscreen by a mammoth's spirit.
  Torak: You put a leash on her! I've done the same to you!

Skin Taker

• Even while being captured by Naiginn who wants to put him through horrible pain, Torak gives the ice-demon a "The Reason You Suck" Speech in which he dismisses Naiginn to be ultimately a weak demon.
  Torak: Even if you're right — if Renn's death and Wolf can't help — what then? You think I'm going to beg for my life? Is that why you're keeping me alive? You need me to tell you you're the greatest, most powerful being in the Forest — instead of some ugly little demon who scuttled out of a hole in the ice. Everything about you is a sham. You can dress up in all the bearskins you like, but you'll never have the power you say you have. I'm the spirit walker. If I become bear, I do it for real. […] I'm the spirit walker, not you — and you can't stand that! I have the power you lack. […] You'd like me to be scared. You need me weak. Truth is, you're the one who's weak.
• Renn and Dark performing the rite which brings the First Tree back. Armed with the best bow she's ever wielded, Renn shoots four special arrows in the sky, and Wolf's howls keep sending them impossibly high.
  • Torak spirit walks in a bear and drives Naiginn off, allowing Renn and Dark to finish the rite in peace.