by Aaron Oster
“Great. He’s completely nuts,” Roy said, letting out an annoyed huff. “Let’s get out of here. I very much doubt we’ll be getting anything out of him.”
“Leave this place,” the crazy man said, turning to Aika. “Before the demon’s pet returns!”
“Why do you keep calling him a demon?” Aika asked, her tone placating and calm, even as Roy contemplated murder.
“Who else but a demon could have sent that monster?” the man asked, his eyes wide in terror.
“What monster?” Aika asked. “The one who attacked this village?”
“Aye,” the man said. “And all the other ones.”
“What kind of monster is it?” Aika asked.
Roy had no idea why she was humoring this crazy person. They both knew it was some sort of Beast. That much was obvious. But by the way this man was screaming about demons and Roy of all people being responsible for its path of destruction, he would probably blame it on some made-up creature of myth, like the flying bunnycorn.
“A dragon from the deepest pits of the underworld!” the man screamed, his eyes going wide. “I can still remember it clear as day. I was sitting in my house, cooking dinner for the family…” He gestured behind him to the shattered house, where three sacks of flour with faces painted onto them sat around a half-broken table.
“I think that man’s brain may finally have rotted,” Geon said.
“I couldn’t agree more,” Roy replied sourly.
“I wonder how long it will take for that to happen to you.”
And just like that, he and Geon were once again mortal enemies.
“…you have a lovely family,” Aika was saying as Roy focused again on the crazy man’s story.
He gave her a crooked smile before continuing.
“As I said, I was cooking when a rush of strange villagers came running through, yelling and screaming about a monster. Of course, none of us believe them; they were from other villages. The tricky bastards probably wanted to steal our turnips! Anyway, they keep on their way and I go back to cooking. It was a rainy day, see, and…”
“Why don’t you get to the part about the dragon?” Aika asked, interjecting with a smile. “I’m really curious about it.”
“Right you are!” the man said, not in the least bit annoyed at her interruption. “I was just finishing up the dishes when the whole world goes quiet. Normally, there are sounds at night, rain or animals. The forest is never silent. So, I go to my window to peek out, and low and behold, a creature of the underworld comes plummeting out of the sky!
“It was massive, at least ten yards from nose to tail. It had gigantic horns and a spiked tail. It was too dark to see more than that, but when it opened its devilish jaws and rained green fire from above, it lit its underbelly in terrifying detail.
“It was scaled, heavy plating covering its entire body. I didn’t see much more than that before it swooped at the first house, smashing straight through it and eating Jeb and his wife. I wasn’t upset about that, mind you, Jeb is a right bastard, always stealing my cabbages and the like. He got what was coming to him. But that blasted dragon also destroyed his storehouse! Torched it to the ground with that nasty green fire. Now I can’t even get my melons back from that monster!”
“You were saying about the dragon?” Aika prodded, somehow being exceedingly patient with the insane man.
“Dragon? Oh, yeah. That,” he continued. “It flew back up after eating Jeb then went after some of the others, those who was screaming and running away. Torched them, too, left the bodies out on the street and everything. After that, it flew around for a bit, attacking all the buildings like it hated them because we all know how much demons hate buildings.
“I stayed down here, hiding with my family instead of trying to run. My roof was smashed in, but the dragon didn’t find me. I’ve been hiding down here for the last couple of days, just to be sure it’s not coming back. I was getting ready to come out when that demon came sniffing around,” he finished, glaring at Roy as though this were all somehow his fault.
“Which way did the dragon go?” Aika asked quickly.
“That way,” the man said, pointing southeast. “Toward the Ushi Clan. They think they’re so amazing with their big city. Think they’re better than the rest of us. But the dragon will kill them all, too, and then their radishes will be all mine!”
“This guy is nuts. Can we please just go?” Roy asked as the man began cackling madly.
“Silence, foul demon!” the man yelled before Aika could reply.
“If I were a demon like you say, I’d already have killed you,” Roy said, feeling his left eye beginning to twitch.
“As long as I have this goddess here with me, you cannot harm me, foul beast!” the man spat. “You will be banished back to the underworld where you be-!” The man was cut off as Aika smacked him across the back of the head, knocking him out cold with little effort.
She caught him before his head slammed into the ground, then gave him a light shove, allowing him to fall back into his half-wrecked home, where he landed in a heap of tangled limbs.
“I think that’s about all we’re going to get out of him,” she said, getting to her feet and brushing her pants off.
“So, you think he’s as crazy as I do,” Roy said, smiling now that the man had been silenced.
“He’s definitely crazy,” Aika said. “But think about what he said about the Beast for a moment. A massive creature that flies in the sky, rains destruction from above, and burns people and buildings to ash.”
“Yeah, it sounds like a dragon,” Roy admitted. “Thought it would have to be at least an adult, maybe even in the Gold stages if it’s flying. That alone makes it extremely unlikely.”
He had personally faced a juvenile dragon back when he’d been forced to fight for the entertainment of the Inu clan. It had been a terrifying experience, and they hadn’t so much won as survived, finishing the fight by killing off teammates instead of facing the monstrous beast. He didn’t like the idea of having to face a beast that powerful, especially when he knew he couldn’t beat it.
“You’re forgetting one crucial thing, though,” Aika said, crossing her arms.
“And that would be?” Roy asked.
“That we’re going after Doragon,” Aika said grimly.
Roy’s jaw went slack as Aika continued speaking, making far too much sense for his liking.
“Before your mother told us who he really was, I always thought Doragon’s name was just that, a name. But what if it isn’t just a name? Doragon is a Beast, and in the old dialect, Doragon means dragon. What if whatever mind is in charge of his body now has forced him into a bestial shape?”
Roy crossed his arms, staring into the distance where he was now sure the monster was headed. Aika continued talking, her logic swaying him where the crazy man’s words had not.
“What if,” Aika continued, “the monster tearing through all of these villages is the exact same person we’re looking for?”
“Well, that would certainly be convenient,” Roy said. “Though for our sakes, I’m really hoping that isn’t the case.”
If what the crazy man had said was true and Aika’s theory was correct, they’d soon be facing off against a full-fledged dragon. One who clearly had a taste for both destruction and human flesh.
16
“I think I can see smoke in the distance,” Aika said, slowing to a jog as she released her Movement technique.
They’d passed through a couple more destroyed villages over the last day and a half, and if the crazy man was to be believed, they should soon be reaching an actual city. At least, they’d be getting to whatever passed as a city in these strange lands.
Roy slowed down as well, peering in the direction where she was pointing. His eyes, now better than hers, picked up the smoke with little difficulty, rising in cloudy waves.
“We’re still way too far out,” Roy said, narrowing his eyes. “That smoke has to be miles away.”
>
“Which should tell you how large that fire is if we can see it all the way out here,” Aika replied.
It was a very rare sunny day, the clouds having briefly shifted aside earlier in the morning to give way to the sun. However, as the day had passed, the clouds had slowly drifted back. If it didn’t rain before nightfall, Roy would be shocked.
“At least the rain will stop it from spreading,” he commented.
“Come on,” Aika said. “If we hurry, we might be able to catch that dragon before it gets too far from the city.”
Roy let out a low grunt, then took off after her, cycling his Essence into a Movement technique and trailing her by only a bit. It was a discovery he’d made only recently. While he could easily outstrip her using his Qi technique, he could almost keep up using just his Essence, which showed the staggering difference between Purple and Red-Belts.
As a Purple-Belt, there was no way he’d have been able to keep up using just his Essence if Aika were at Blue.
Using Essence instead of Qi forced him to work harder, pushing him to find new ways of incorporating Essence, ways he hadn’t even thought to use previously. Additionally, he believed that leaning more into Essence would help him discover both a Full-body and Full-area technique using the lesser form of energy. Despite his rapid growth, he wasn’t even considered a Master, as he’d yet to learn a Conqueror technique using Essence. Annoyingly, that was something that Geon was beginning to hound him over.
To say that it was uncommon for someone at his level to not even be a regular Master would have been putting it lightly, and since learning to use the superior energy, he’d almost been exclusively using Qi. Now that he was growing stronger, Roy could see the use in not wasting the harder-to-form energy, conserving it for when he might actually need it.
They ran on, weaving between trees, having left the path to take the shortest possible route to the city. Thunder began rumbling overhead again as clouds moved in far faster than even Roy might have guessed. In mere moments, the sun vanished, hidden behind a thick bank of darkening clouds.
The light grew dimmer and dimmer as they ran to the point where Roy had to wonder if night had fallen. Additionally, a very distinct green tinge began to mist in the air as Wind Essence gathered at an alarming rate.
“What in the world is going on here?” Roy asked, watching the Wind Essence gathering in several areas.
“How should I know?” Geon asked. “I spent my entire life underground.”
Lightning began to flash across the sky, but this lightning was like none Roy had ever seen before. Instead of a brilliant flash of white followed by a burst of Power Essence, this lightning was nearly black, leaving a burst of silver Weakness and black Darkness.
“Have you ever seen anything like it?” he asked aloud, briefly tapping into his Qi to catch up with Aika.
“I’ve never even heard of weather behaving this strangely,” Aika replied, her neck craned upward as the sky grew even darker. “Do you think we should stop and look for some shelter?”
Roy narrowed his eyes, peering to the nearly invisible column of smoke that still rose to the sky. It had mostly dispersed by now, blown away by the ever-increasing winds. Whatever was about to happen, Roy had a bad feeling about it. He didn’t much like the idea of being trapped out here when whatever this was hit. The city in the distance would probably be built to handle the coming storm, though.
“I think we should speed up,” Roy finally said. “We might be able to make it to the city if we hurry.”
“I don’t think I’ll be able to,” Aika said, watching the Wind Essence grow in density and the odd-colored lightning flash brighter and brighter.
“Hop on my back then,” Roy said, remembering the times when Aika had snagged him, dragging him out of harm’s way with her superior speed.
Aika hesitated for a moment, then nodded, allowing herself to fall back a bit and move behind him.
“Ready?” she asked, the two of them maintaining their current speed, as slowing down would waste valuable time.
“Ready,” Roy said, extending both arms outward.
A second later, he felt Aika slam into his back, both her arms and legs wrapping around him. His hands moved quickly down, grabbing her legs just above her knees as her weight settled into him. He might once have staggered or been tossed off his feet. Now, though, his Red-Belt strength prevented him from even feeling Aika’s landing, let alone any weight from her slim form.
Roy didn’t need to tell her to hang on as he tapped into his Core and flooded his channels with Qi. His Shockwave activated with a dull whoomp, his body flashing forward in a streak of golden light as the ground beneath his feet dented a bit under the force.
Only a small amount of energy leaked as he ran, his Qi’s efficiency having gone up even more since his advancement to Red. Using his Essence technique barely damaged the ground anymore, though it was still a good deal louder than his Qi technique.
Aika’s grip on his shoulders tightened a bit as he sped up, pushing his technique as far as he could at this stage. The increase in speed wasn’t anything incredible — he was still only using Qi, after all — but at his current pace, there was no way Aika would have been able to keep up. Not for long, anyway.
He ducked and dodged between trees as the sky continued to darken, the presence of green, silver, and black soon blanketing the entire horizon.
“You might want to run a bit faster,” Geon said as thunder began rumbling once more, this time sounding distinctly different than usual. “I don’t know much about storms, but I don’t really think you’ll want to be outside for this one.”
Roy didn’t need Geon to tell him that this storm was bad news, especially when the first natural Qi began to form in the air. The Wind Essence, which had been condensing and increasing in ferocity, was suddenly joined by the heavier, purer form of energy strands of shining green Qi drifting into the air.
It wasn’t long before the Weakness and Darkness Essences began to generate Qi as well.
“Run faster,” Aika said, leaning in to yell in his ear to be heard — the noise had grown to near-deafening proportions.
Roy really didn’t think he needed to be told that this storm was bad news, and he fought down his aggravation with both Aika and Geon as he dug deeper, reaching for his Full-body technique. In an instant, his body was cloaked in the hexagonal plating, small sparks of power flickering over his skin.
He was happy to note that the lines that traced over him encompassed Aika as well, not skipping over or tossing her off his back as he feared it might — not that he told her of those particular fears. His speed increased many times over as he began burning off a tremendous amount of Qi, using even more than usual as he was forced to push through the escalating pressure of the wind.
Trees passed in green blurs as he twisted and ducked through them. All the while, the rumbling thunder grew, sounding almost metallic and so strange in its pitch that he had to wonder if some great Beast was flying overhead.
The first sign of something happening came when a massive cloud of Wind, Weakness, and Darkness Qi suddenly clashed, the three energy types coming together and battling for dominance. Thankfully, it happened some ways off, something for which Roy was extremely grateful.
The energy types battered and slammed into each other, generating more of the strange lightning. The howl of the wind rose higher and higher, and then, a twisting cloud of Qi began to form. It was at least a half-mile across, flickering with dark electricity. The most terrifying part of it all was when instead of repelling one another, the Qi types blended then slammed into the ground.
There was no slow descent of a funnel. One moment, the energies were clashing and howling, thousands of feet above. The next, a funnel cloud made of mixed Wind, Darkness, and Weakness was tearing into the forest. Even here, miles away, Roy could feel the force of that storm. It only made him run all the faster as he noticed it was moving.
It wasn’t coming toward them, than
kfully, but the level of destruction that funnel-cloud caused was enough to convince him that he didn’t want to be anywhere near one of those when it struck. The speed of the cloud was bad enough, but its sheer scale and destructive power told him that he wouldn’t stand a chance of surviving something like that.
“Hey. I just realized that I do know what this is,” Geon suddenly said.
“And?” Roy asked, not wanting to take the time to argue with him about it.
“I believe it’s called an escalating tornado,” Geon said. “Someone I ate once saw one. They form naturally like this in some areas, though the woman I ate never actually saw one this bad. The escalating part happens when multiple different Essence-types clash and mix. Being above ground near one of these is pretty dangerous.”
Seeing as the type of energy clashing wasn’t just Essence, Roy wanted nothing more than to get underground. However, seeing as neither he nor Aika were Earth Artists, that option wasn’t open to them.
“Oh, yeah. One more thing…” Geon said, trailing off as lightning began flickering just over Roy’s head.
There was a bright flash, and Roy let out a screech as the jagged bolt slammed into the ground just inches from his face, causing him to leap to one side and a good ten feet up.
“The lightning in these storms has a tendency to hit squishy things. Like you,” Geon finished, making Roy want to do nothing more than scream.
17
Roy’s mad dash through the woods only became more desperate as a second funnel cloud came slamming into the ground just a quarter-mile from their current position, and of course, made a beeline straight for them. Roy could hear the crunching and shattering of trees as they were torn up by their roots, the powerful Qi of the storm ripping them to splinters in mere seconds. He could hardly imagine what something like that would do to them.
Lightning flashed and Roy leaped again as a bolt slammed into a nearby tree, reducing it to a smoking pile of ash. No smoke lingered, wafting away by the powerful winds buffeting him from all sides as the tornado closed in on them. He could feel Aika’s arms and legs tightening around him as she looked back, but seeing as the wind was howling by now, she didn’t say anything.
