Chapter 3 :: Solstice, the White Dragon
"Your kind has come to ruin this land again," the dragon said deeply. When it breathed, clouds of mist came from its nostrils. "Humans, elves, half-elves. They all have no respect for the natural world anymore.""Dragon, not all of us may respect nature, but we can't go about eradicating everything we don't like," Martel said.
"And you are willing to do battle to protect those you barely know?" the dragon inquired.
"Yes," Mithos answered.
"So be it, destroyers of the land. You shall see what it means to face a White Dragon, a child of the gods," it said.
"Don't worry, Martel. I can handle him," Mithos confidently proclaimed. He held his crimson gem and called up his wings.
"Mithos, no!" Kratos yelled. Mithos took flight and drew the Starsword.
"Prism Sword!" Mithos thrusted his blade upward and let out a blast of rainbow light. The brilliant radiance engulfed the dragon as Mithos prepared to fly in for the last strike.
"Tiamat Strike," the dragon called, diving down from the light without a scratch. It seized Mithos with its claws and landed on the ground, tossing him aside shortly afterward.
"Divine Storm Blade!" Kratos tried his signature lightning fast sword attack, but the dragon batted him off with his left wing to the shore of the lake.
"What are you waiting for?" Mithos asked when the dragon had not finished him off.
"I sense... no darkness," it replied. The entire body of the beast turned into light and changed into the shape of an aged man with a long ash gray beard. "Solstice is my name. I am a dragon sent from our citadel of Exire to guard the natural world."
"So what was it that made you spare us?" Martel inquired.
"To selflessly fight for people you have only just met is a noble act. We dragons respect that. While we were supposed to protect the land, we were also taught to respect life. Perhaps, that is something that I could learn from you," Solstice explained.
"The mist is being dispelled," Kratos noted.
"Yes, that was the curse I placed on this place. However, travel will not be made much easier as it will take years for the clouds to clear."
Relieved to see the sky once more, the party returned to the village with Solstice. To be safe, they disguised him as an old man they had met on the way to slaying the dragon.
"I do not really enjoy this," Solstice said when Martel put a cloak on his back and pulled the hood over his hair. Out of nowhere, they heard a buzzing noise of a descending airship.
"It's one of those smaller airships we saw yesterday, but this time there's more of them," Mithos said. Around a hundred of Macerdon's airships flew above them, headed directly for the capital at Asgard.
"If we had not delayed, we might have been able to warn the capital that an attack was coming," Kratos said.
"It can't be helped. Anyway, we didn't even know about these airships until now. I don't regret saving this village," replied Martel.
"Let's hurry to Asgard. We may still make it before the attack starts," Mithos suggested. All of them ran in the direction of the airships, north to Asgard.
"Draco sectara siralas!" Solstice called. His body turned to light and he returned to his full dragon form. He lowered one wing, creating a ramp. "Mount me."
With Mithos first, Martel second, and Kratos in the back, Solstice flapped his wings and sped off at blinding speed. They stayed low to the ground so the airships above would not see them.
"How fast are we going?" Mithos yelled.
"Twice sonic speed," Solstice replied.
"Incredible!" Martel said, though none of them could hear her.
"Look ahead! Is that smoke?" Mithos asked. Thick black clouds rose from the mountainside gorge where the city of Asgard rested. Asgard, as the capital of the Delthis Empire, was more of a fortress city than a political capital. Embedded between two wedges of mountainside, the only entrance came from the Misty Plains to the south. A deep ravine created a chasm in which defenders of the city could hold out for months. Finally, a series of walls and trenches protected the path into the city on the southern side.