"A god who's stepped down from his own throne? Hahaha! I couldn't ask for a better opponent!"
All five of Takhisis's dragon heads were laughing. She was genuinely delighted. To think she'd answered some random summoning and stumbled upon such a fool—a god who had voluntarily abandoned his divinity just to prove a moral point.
Horus, the second son of Osiris, Lord of the Underworld, had never quite fit in among the gods. His elder brother, Anubis, had long coveted their father's domains, so Horus had been forced to carve out his own path.
Over the course of his divine life, he'd pieced together a few minor godly mantles: Sky, Protection, and War.
Among them, Protection was his main aspect, the others fragments of authority at best.
War, for instance, already had its own patron deity. Horus merely possessed a qualification to inherit the title—one shared by half a dozen others. Only if the God of War fell could one of them ascend to fill the void.
Takhisis had no interest in the sky or in protection, but the domain of war? That caught her attention. It was one of her future primary mantles. To encounter it now, in her demi-divine stage, was an incredible stroke of luck.
The idea thrilled her—but reality was less forgiving. She couldn't quite overpower Horus. Both of them were demigods at this moment, but her body was only a projection in this world, while he was fully present. Worse, he'd burned away his divine foundation, meaning he no longer feared self-destruction. He was fighting at full strength—blood, mana, and madness.
She was the more skillful fighter, but his endurance and energy dwarfed hers.
"Girl, lend me your aid," Takhisis called out, her voices overlapping in strange harmony. "You can have one of the spoils."
Thea was, at that moment, busy arguing with her unicorn companion. The little creature's sense of purity couldn't stand the sight of the corrupted Dragon Queen, and Thea was terrified it would seize control of her body and charge in to start a holy crusade.
When she heard Takhisis calling for help, she quickly soothed the unicorn in her mind, whispering calm, coaxing thoughts until it grudgingly fell silent.
Only after feeling that subtle nod of permission did she fly over to the Dragon Queen's side. She dipped her head slightly—polite, but not submissive.
"My Queen, I will assist you."
"Target his head," Takhisis instructed. "He's no longer divine flesh. He can be wounded—and killed."
Thea curled her lip. Yeah, no kidding. Who'd aim for his feet anyway?
Still, she followed the lead. From a safe distance, of course. Melee against a blackened demigod radiating corruption? Not a chance.
She became the perfect ranged support, firing streaks of golden light while the Dragon Queen pressed the assault.
Takhisis fought with ferocity, her instincts and combat intuition far beyond Horus's. He had rarely known true battle, and it showed. Her attacks whittled away at his ochre-colored barrier, while Thea's beams flickered in between, scoring the shell with hissing marks of light.
But as the fight dragged on, Takhisis grew impatient. The summoning was nearing its limit. Thea's mortal-level ritual couldn't sustain a being of her rank for long; her time in this plane was slipping fast. If not for her main body desperately maintaining the portal in her own world, she'd already have been banished.
"Damn it!" she roared, unleashing another volley of chaotic beams. It wasn't about saving this world from some so-called "false god." She simply couldn't stand watching her prize slip away.
"Girl," she barked, "do you have anything else?"
It clearly pained her to ask. Prideful as she was, she hated turning to a mortal for help—but desperation left no room for dignity.
Thea, of course, did have one last card up her sleeve. And she'd never reveal her final move until absolutely necessary.
She whispered her plan directly into the Dragon Queen's mind through a pulse of special energy.
Takhisis froze. Ten dragon eyes blinked in disbelief. Her five heads turned toward Thea in unison, expressions ranging from outrage to amusement—as if weighing whether to swallow her whole or roast her first.
After a long, tense moment, she ground her fangs and gave a curt nod.
"Fine. Let's do it."
Thea could barely contain her excitement. Yes! Dragon Rider! A future main god as my mount!
If words could describe her joy, they'd probably just be "so damn awesome."
She murmured the transformation spell. Her body expanded, towering to ten meters. The Dragon Queen, meanwhile, shrank herself to a more manageable three hundred meters. Balance achieved.
"My Queen, I'm mounting," Thea said cheerfully, enjoying every word of it.
Takhisis's five faces each twisted differently—annoyance, disdain, resignation—but none of them happy.
"Come, Arthas," Thea called inwardly. The unicorn spirit merged its essence with hers once again. This time, they would forge the ultimate weapon — the unicorn horn itself, the perfect tool to pierce divine shields.
Ordinarily the horn was half a meter long, but against beings of this size it was barely a toothpick.
Pooling their power, they forged a forty-meter spear—pure silver-white, glowing with sacred light.
Thea vaulted onto Takhisis's back, positioning the dragon lance between her red and white heads. The five-necked beast made visibility a nightmare, but she managed to find a decent angle.
Takhisis felt utterly humiliated. Having a mortal perched between her necks felt like having a thermometer wedged under one's arm—awkward in ways words couldn't capture. But she endured. The prize was worth it.
The scene was absurd: a radiant knight astride a demonic dragon, charging together at a corrupted, half-fallen god.
"Horus," Thea called, voice steady but solemn, "yield. Your eternal life should not be wasted here."
But her lips weren't moving—her unicorn had taken control, speaking through her. The creature still felt genuine sorrow for the fallen god.
Horus's voice answered, weary but resolute.
"Come then, young human. I have no regrets. I am tired… If I fall today, I will not curse you for it."
In the shared mindspace, Thea blinked.
"Wait—he can see there are two of us?"
"Of course he can," the unicorn replied dryly. "So can that dragon. Honestly, how are you still this clueless?"
Even in the middle of an apocalyptic battle, the bickering continued — light and dark, rider and mount, goddess and mortal — united by chaos, charging into legend.