[CONTENT WARNING]
> this chapter contains graphic violence
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After these past two battles, I thought I was starting to understand warfare.
I was wrong.
Chaos. It's utter chaos. So many things are happening all at the same time. Too many to keep track of. Blasts of fire, ice, and lightning of every different color, gigantic dragons barreling into each other fighting tooth, claw, talon, and tail, speeding quetzals and wyverns cutting arcs in the air as they fight for air control of the clouds, the landscape breaking and buckling and fracturing under the weight of these behemoths, a roaring and violent thunderstorm casting slanted deluges against the intense winds, and the total annihilation of anything alive as the fiercest clash I have ever witnessed rages on and on and on.
Vander told me that in war, we forfeit our lives the moment we step onto the battlefield. That's the price of admission. The blind ante. From there, everything we do after is fighting to take our lives back. I'm immortal, but that doesn't mean I can't be hurt, and if I do end up in that death-like state, the others will have to fight without me.
I can't have that. I have to accept the chaos. Embrace it.
With a sharp pump of my wings, I start climbing high toward the stormclouds crackling with lightning. Haunt warned me to keep my distance from the heart of it. He told me that this would swiftly become indiscriminate. When in battle like this, nobody can really tell who's who, and small dracos like me are liable to be swatted out of the sky by accident, if not on purpose.
And Plutoryl likewise explained that there's little to nothing that anyone, including me, can do to control what happens here. There is no predicting where the next firebomb will drop. There is nothing I can do if it ends up dropping on top of me. Except stay the Hells away from wherever the firebombs are dropping.
So I'm staying above them.
In and amidst the thick black clouds, I navigate my way westward by instinct as I careen through the lightning flashes to build charge. I'll have to make myself known to draw out the fast movers who've been sent to target me.
With a swift arc down and back up, I catch sight of Sharra and Klytios up here in the air with me, fighting against the aerial mages. I was intending to hit one of the dragons, but getting rid of their magical support sounds more beneficial.
I take a sharp breath. And then I dive.
My horns slam into the triskull hydra's dorsal plating with so much force they shatter from the impact. The sudden hit knocks him out of the air, and we both start falling from altitude alongside the rain. We're directly above the worst of it so I have to kill him before we hit the ground or we'll both get stomped by the dragons. With my hooks in, I start slashing my tail and snarling incantations. My dorsalblade buries into the side of one of his necks and red lightning stabs us both from above.
It recharges my magic, but he isn't quite so lucky.
Struck paralyzed, he goes limp beneath me.
Not that it matters. The next second, he's impaled.
Both of us are suddenly lifted by a brutal force from below. It catches me by surprise but I know it's a good thing, so I detach and start flying again, watching as he's tossed to the side and sent into free fall.
That's one draco scratched.
"Thanks for the backup!" Sharra calls out, the black and white wyvern's set of three long pointed horns slicked with red blood. "The quetzal next! Help Klytios! I'm going after the wyverns below!"
I haven't seen my hunters yet. One more kill sounds feasible. "Right!"
I go high, she goes low. Since I don't need a recharge, I redline directly to the next fight. Lightning flashes in the clouds and I catch sight of them through the pouring rain. A red and violet chromatic quetzal, Klytios, is taking on an orange radiant quetzal in a clash of tempestuous magic.
Ice smashes to splinters as fiery blasts break it apart, only for more to immediately form in place as the rain becomes Klytios's weapon. I add my magic to the mix on the approach, generating a half dozen clawing columns of red lightning that viciously rip the air from the clouds to the ground so far below. The six ruptures of ungodly thunder amplify one another, echoing over the world of Avi.
I sprint in from below and snatch hold on one of Klytios's horns with my talons, extending my wings in full as I condense all of my hatred into a furious roar directed toward the Heavens. He knows the same as I do. As a chromatic quetzal, he can wield all three elemental magics. The two of us simultaneously draw more lightning from above, which crashes into his horns and supercharges us both.
It's over just as quickly. In the blink of an eye, I cut a deadly sideswipe across the enemy's throat, and Klytios brings the thunderstorm crashing down. An extended discharge of his violet electricity makes the enemy quetzal char and curl up and fall from the clouds to Avi.
Two scratched.
"Fly! Fast!" he shouts over the rain, feathered tail sweeping to the side. "They're coming for you, Crimson! I'll help Sharra! Go!"
Another flash of the thunderstorm reveals them to me. Four. Four fucking pursuit amphitheres. I can't get to the clouds for a recharge. All of my energy was just spent on bolstering his magic. Without my electrical acceleration, I'm back to flying raw, as Zip calls it. No magic. No tricks. No assists. Nothing but wings.
"Finally," I huff, easing into freefall. "A challenge."
The instant I'm inverted I tear my claws through the rain. At full extension, my wings rip at the air. With my legs back, my neck straight, and my tail pointed, I sprint toward the surface of Avi faster than the rain can fall. It's as if it's rising up to me as I dive. My heart is again in my throat. Nerves have welled up and started to bleed through my veins. I'm both terrified and thrilled. I fucking love a good race. But the stakes are higher in this one than they ever have been.
I buzz right past Haunt on the way. I know he sees me.
Time to put this scheme of ours into motion.
It takes bravery. Courage. And a little stupidity.
But I cut into the warzone.
Staying low to the sundered ground, I weave through the dragons' legs as they crash against one another in open combat. The titans hardly notice me, but I dash from left to right, slipping beneath friend and foe, cutting between their sightlines, swinging arcs around their necks and tails, puncturing straight through their magic so fast it can't hurt me, all in the hopes that my pursuers can't hack it like I can. At these speeds, all it takes is one wrong move, one failed adjustment, one heartbeat's hesitation, and they'll be dropped like flies.
When I finally breach from the death trap, I slow by a touch and careen along the flat plains, stealing a look behind me. A short huff of amusement jumps out of me. Four when I went in. Three when I came out.
I pick up the pace and dash into the Overgrowth. Navigating these treacherous vines is second nature to me by now. My mind clears and I simply fly by instinct. Up, down, through, below, across, above, left, right, it all flows together into one mindless–
Something slams into me from above.
The thorn vines greet me like a soft featherbed. My senses are addled and I'm tossing and rolling so I don't know which way is up, but I see the gray wings and shimmering silvery snake tail of an amphithere tangled up with me. Not a chance they caught up to me. This one was tailing me from up high.
Damn it. So that's where the fourth went.
I'm not afraid of the one. I'm afraid of the four. I need to get this draco off me as soon as possible. But even with my hooks, claws, and teeth in, I can't get away. His tail is binding around me, constricting my legs and wings so tight it hurts. Shit. I need to do something. Fast. The other three aren't far behind.
Stillness. Quietude. Tranquility.
Even in chaos… Even in violence…
She tells me to think of her.
I see Umbra. In mind.
She's waiting for me.
Rose vines snag the silver amphithere and rip him off of me. I whisper death as my black magic takes hold. The vines rush and whir as their thorns saw and shred him apart, drenching the Wretched Overgrowth in fresh blood which joins the rain falling down upon me. They form something like a cocoon that thrashes around while he continues trying to fight against them. I don't wait around to see it go still, continuing my flight with haste.
I did it. I used black magic. I used strong black magic.
My triumph is muted by the horrors I have witnessed.
The horrors I myself have committed.
No matter the cost. No matter the cost.
Even if it means abandoning all morality.
Soaked in blood, drenched by the rain, sickened by the fact I feel no guilt or regret for the lives I've taken, I make my final desperate sprint with all that I have left in me. I did my part. I'm tired. And I'm afraid. Of them. Of myself. Of everything.
I want her. I need her. Now.
She's waiting. She's waiting.
I'm scared but I know she'll save me.
I have never felt so protected.
When at last I reach her, I nearly burst into tears. Bolting into the clearing, I submerge into the thicker undergrowth and latch onto the giant red dragon hidden beneath it. The very same moment, she rises from the shadows and the vines part before her and the instant the amphitheres race into sight she snaps her jaws shut on one of them, slices another in half with her tail, and takes her claws through the third.
Dead. They're dead. I'm safe. She saved me.
"Ahh…" She exhales a long sigh as her head turns. The amphithere in her maw is writhing. Trying to escape. Through her clenched teeth, she murmurs, "Yours, my little rose. If you desire it."
"N–No…" I bury my face in her scales. "No… Please…"
A gut wrenching crunch sounds across the clearing.
There. It's over. My part, at least. I'm so tired.
"Mmm. I feel you… trembling. I don't smell your blood. I do smell your fear. Your weariness. Your heartache." She nuzzles me with her snout, head big enough to swallow me whole. "Fear not, Crimson. The fight is all but won. And you, as always, delivered victory to our cause. You've done well. Come, my little rose. It's time we went home."
"Pl–Please… I… I need a long bath…"
"A bath. Of course. Right away, my love."
Umbra slashes open a portal to the Hells.
My love, she said to me. I am her love.
Dissonance. To think, amidst so much bloodshed…
How strange that I'm able to feel so happy.