Deep in a peaceful forest deer graze in a small clearing, at once they all raise their heads, sensing something. A bright flash lit up the clearing, stunning the deer, leaving a single man in it's wake. Clothed in a long dark coat which had no sleeves to cover the dark brown skin of his arms, the man's dark purple eyes scanned his surroundings.
"I wonder where I ended up?" the man thought to himself as he brought the black katana he carried to his shoulder, "oh, looks like I interrupted dinner...I better go."
With a quick jump the man shot into the air, the deer darting into the trees as he did so. He hung in the air, rising instead of falling as he surveyed the landscape around him.
"Smoke?" he said to himself noticing a steady plume rising in the distance, "I guess it's time to go to work."
Turning himself in the direction of the smoke the man flew off toward, what he hoped would be, a place where he could do some good.
"Captain, we have a few dragons that have surrendered to us, shall we take them as prisoners?" an ape soldier asked as he approached his captain.
This was the third village this faction of soldiers had attacked. Their orders were to search out and eliminate any dragon settlements they came upon. Upon arrival at this village their archers had set their homes ablaze with flaming arrows and now they were taking advantage of the confusion and slaughtering the villagers.
"Kill them; our orders are to eliminate these villages along with their inhabitants, not to take prisoners. Now go." The ape captain said sternly, his armor already stained with the blood of a few dozen dragons.
"Yes sir!" the lower ranked ape nodded running back to where the dragons were. As the pain roars of the dragons rang through the air a wicked smile spread across the captain's face.
"Oh how the mighty dragons have fallen." He chuckled evilly wearing the same dark smile as he passed by a house that had been lucky enough to just now start burning.
While lost in his enjoyment of the dragon's slaughter the captain failed to notice a lone silver dragoness lurking in the shadows of the house. The dragoness took advantage and leapt from the house, tackling the captain off his feet, denting his armor. With an angry grunt the captain hefted himself off the ground to face the dragoness. She leapt toward him again, but with a well placed kick she was sent right back to the ground. By now a few soldiers noticed the attack on their captain and came to watch the event unfold, and before the dragoness knew it she was surrounded by apes.
The dragoness swung herself around and back onto her feet growling fiercely as she dodged the heavy blade of a soldier. Catching her mid-dodge the captain caught the dragoness by her tail and slammed her to the ground. The impact of the slam forced the wind out of the dragoness body, leaving her open as the ape captain kicked her in the ribs. The dragoness let out choked roars of pain as the captain went on to stomp on her, slowly breaking her ribs more and more with each blow.
"Did you really think that you, a notice lizard would be able to defeat me?" The captain asked the dragoness as he took her by the neck and choked her, raising her to eye level as he did. "Impossible."
Their great confidence now bolstered by their captain's sheer dominance over the dragoness, the ape soldier all began whooping and stomping the ground, cheering for their captain to snap the dragon's neck. The captain was glad to oblige as he slowly tightened his grip on the dragonesses neck, but stopped when he heard the sound of armor crumpling and the cheers of his soldiers stop. He loosened his grip on the dragonesses neck as he turned to see five of his soldiers dead, somehow crushed, a small hairless ape in a black cloak of some sort standing over their bodies.
"What did a small village like this do to make you burn it?" the small ape asked. It was none other than the man from the clearing, and the look on his face made it clear that he wasn't happy about what was going on. "Put the dragoness down."
"Who are you to give me orders?" the captain asked angrily reaching for his sword with one hand, but the next thing he knew his arm was spiraling into the air and the man was behind him.
The captain bellowed in pain as he dropped the dragoness and grabbed at his stump of an arm in shock. The man took this opportunity to bury his sword hilt deep in the captain's stomach. "Who am I, you ask? I'm shadow knights…" the man began as he then drew his blade up through the captain's body and out through his shoulder, "I'm the guy who killed you."
Blood spewed into the air and rained down on shadow while the captain's body fell, the horrifying scene stunning the soldiers. For a moment there was no sound but the cracking fires burning the homes behind shadow.
"H-he killed the captain! Get him!" one brave soldier cried as he drew his sword. The soldier rushed toward Shadow and brought his word down over his shoulder and when he heard the distinct sound of a sword against flesh a feeling of relief crept over him.
"you look like you did something of value, why?" shadow asked looking the soldier in the eye.
"wha-How can you still be standing? Even a dragon would have fell to a blow like that." The soldier blurted, shocked.
"do I look like a dragon to you?" shadow shot back as he removed the soldier blade from his shoulder and tossed it to the ground. "Shadow cannon"
A dark aura appeared around shadows hand as a beam of energy surged from it, burning through the soldier and the majority of his comrades behind him. In the wake of shadow's attack only their molten armor remained.
"The rest of you leave, now. Unless you think I have time to play." Shadow ordered, turning to the gravely injured dragoness. The apes didn't even have to process the order and ran, dropping their weapons for the sheer fear of shadow coming after them.
Shadow could tell by looking at the dragoness that she was in terrible shape, her breathing was very faint and carried with it a sort of gurgling sound, blood was pouring from her mouth, and her eyes were dull and glossy. Shadow knelt beside her to better assess the damage she'd taken. "Your…shoulder…" The dragoness wheezed turning her head slightly.
"Already healed, you should be worrying more about yourself. All of your ribs are broken and I think your lungs are filling with blood." Shadow explained lightly resting a hand on her chest. "I think I can heal you, but I can't save your house."
"no…"she dragon cried weakly, trying her best to move, turning her head toward her house. "my baby…inside…"
"What?"
"Please…hasn't…hatched …yet" the dragoness pleaded helplessly.
"Damn it!" shadow thought as he ran into the house. There was nothing too complex about the home as he entered excluding the maze of fallen beams creating blazing walls that blocked other rooms. Aside from that the home was becoming increasingly unstable and more and more of the roof was collapsing every second. Shadows chose his steps carefully, moving slow to avoid causing a vibration that would shake a portion of roof loose enough for it to collapse. He made his way through the building smoke from the flames into another room. Nothing, the same went for the second room he found himself in. choked by the heavy smoke shadows crouched down, rolling out of the way as a beam collapsed above him. He then found himself in a third room, and much to his surprise this room wasn't too bad off. None of the ceiling had collapsed and the smoke was thinner in this room.
Then he noticed as small bed like setup on the ground formed by a bunch of mats, ontop of which lay a lone silver egg. With a satisfied smnile and a cough to clear his lungs shadow grabbed the egg and examined it.
"Looks, okay, now to cut my way out before- damn left my sword outside." He though as a loud crack sounded above him, "Screw it the house is done for anyway."
With a firm grip on the egg shadow aimed his arm at the wall, "shockwave." He muttered sending a powerful blast of force though the wall, blowing it to pieces. With the sudden loss of support the roof gave way, but not before shadow and the egg were safely out of harm's way. Shadow made his way around the burning remnants of the house back to the dragoness' side; he opened his mouth to speak for a moment but quickly closed it as he realized the dragoness had died while he was in the house.
"I knew this was going to happen." Shadow shook his head as he knelt down .
"so did i."
Raising an eyebrow Shadow turned around to the spirit of the dragoness standing behind him. Her spirit had a beautiful; appearance, untouched by the physical abuse her body had gone through while alive. Her silver scales coupled with the ghost transparency almost all spirits had made her seem like a mere illusion, a trick of the light, but shadow could sense that she was real.
"Would you please take care of my child for me?" she asked, taking a step closer. Her icy blue eyes filled with hope and her expression calm and peaceful.
"I'll …do what I can. What do you want me to do with your body." Shadow relied glancing back at the dragoness' battered body.
"Thank you, I'm sure my child will grow to be an excellent dragon in your care. As for my body a simple burial would put me at ease." The dragoness nodded, smiling.
"Wait, what's your name? And what should I name your kid?" shadow asked quickly as the dragoness began to fade from sight.
"My name is Sarah…" she said happily, her voice echoing as she disappeared, "and I'll leave the name up to you."
With a deep sigh shadow turned to Sarah's body, hefting it onto his shoulder. He then located his sword and picked it up as well. With the egg held tight against his chest he began walking away from the burning village. As he did, the first few drops of a rainstorm began to fall, "how fitting, the downpour after a tragedy" shadow thought glancing from Sarah's body to the egg. "And this was supposed to be a vacation…" shadow laughed softly to himself as he broke into a run.