I do not own Legend of Dragoon or any of the characters.
New Problems
Albert spun around his target, slashing it across the back before stabbing at it, embedding his spear in it just right of center. He'd lost a couple of steps the last year. Focusing on ruling Serdio and raising his son with Queen Emille had taken up too much of his time for him to get much actual training in. And he hadn't used his Dragoon Spirit since the final battle against Melbu Frahma, or at least, the flight home after it.
He pulled his spear free of the training dummy and sighed, just as Emille walked into the room, hands both holding her enlarged stomach. She smiled knowingly seeing him shirtless, dripping sweat, and with a half-dozen training dummies needing replacing.
"That letter from Cade really got you worried, huh?" Emille asked.
"Cade wouldn't be investigating something, or worried about a shadow, if it wasn't serious," Albert said.
"Firstly, he said it was shadows, plural, and secondly, didn't you tell me he used to sense them all the time before meeting Dart and the others?" Emille asked, walking over and kissing him.
"I'm pretty sure him sensing Soa's plan before it had even begun to end is proof enough to believe him by default," Albert said.
"Or, it was a one time thing," Emille said. "I think you're giving too much credence to his shadows."
Albert sighed, smiling, and kissed her, remaining there until the door of the training room burst open, Minister Noish sprinting in, pale and panicked.
"What's going on?" Albert asked, already hurriedly dressing himself and pulling his armor on.
"We're under attack, Your Majesty!" Minister Noish gasped. "They're everywhere!"
Albert sprinted out of the training room and up to the castle's balcony, only to stop, his jaw falling slack as he whitnessed the scene before himself.
"What are they?" Emille asked, slowing to a stop beside him.
"I don't know," Albert shook his head as he watched the things attacking Bale slaughter his people. "Emille, get our son and get out. Minister Noish, go with her. Take a detachment of soldiers, but don't expect them to be enough if you're attacked. Protect my family."
Minister Noish nodded and ran after Emille, who hadn't bothered to wait past the instruction to find their child. Albert turned back to the front and trasnformed for the first time in so long, then flew out to meet this new threat, which instantly moved to meet him in the air, several dozen at a time. He swore, focused, then greeted his foes with a Wing Blaster. It did nothing. He ignored his lack of immediate success, and instead tore into the things with his spear. He couldn't understand what they were. Even calling them creatures seemed wrong.
Each of the identical opponents were shaped like a floating torso with a long, silver point replacing their legs. Their hands were replaced by curved, silver blades as long as Albert's forearm. The blades stuck out from the end of their wrists, but rotated fast enough to shred whatever they pierced. The things shoulders were large like pauldrons with spikes sticking up off of them, then five red gemstones set into them starting in the front, then wrappind around to the back, the crystals in the center of each shoulder the largest. Most of the things' bodies were a deep blue, with the bottom spike and claws silver red spots or lights on its ches and just above the spike, and black around the red stones on its shoulders. However, the two most disturbing things about the beings were that they were made of some form of metal and nearly impossible to pierce, and that they were headless. In place of that, they had a short, conical spike with an odd disk around the center of it.
The things didn't even seem to be alive. When he managed to drive his spear through one, there were no organs, proving the metal was body and not armor. And no wound would stop the things, except for damaging a metal cylinder inside of their chests with glowing white glass strips along the sides reaching from end to end. It seemed to be their core, but their bodies were so hard, and there were so many of them, that Albert struggled to target them. He was aware that the chaos below him wasn't ending at all, but he focused on his own battle, trusting his knights to evacuate the city without him needing to give the order.
He spun around one as it drove its hands at his back, and it instead tore into one of its fellows. It made no show of having even noticed, instead continuing to pursue Albert, along with the dozens of others around him. Finally, Albert had managed to focus his Magic Energy enough, and the world around them turned green. A few seconds later, his summoning was complete, and the Jade Dragon's cannon fired a massive blast of Wind Magic. Unlike his own Magic attack, this blast ripped the Jade Dragon's targets apart, scattering their pieces into the city below. However, as the Pocket Dimension around Albert faded, he looked up, only to see what looked like rain. Except, he realized at once that this rain was metal, not water. Hundreds, maybe thousands, of the odd beings were falling from the sky. He began to focus, but even as he did, one of the beings stopped itself and the appendage in place of its head pulsed. A moment later, a bolt of bright blue lightning flashed down from above. Albert's vision flared white, agony ripped through his body, and then he was falling into darkness.
Cade stared at Bale in stunned silence, Rose hovering at his side in equal shock. Bale was still on fire, and a building collapsed as they watched, but the castle had been obliterated, and corpses littered their field of view. Some lay outside the city, some were along the city's wall, others lining the street, and yet some locatable only as a splatter of blood on the ground or a wall. The bodies that were still mostly together had been ripped apart somewhere on their torsos. Most were around where the heart should be, but others were in the abdomen, one shoulder or the other, an upper leg allowing the victim to bleed out. Even a few heads had been shredded into oblivion. The knights of Basil were almost worse, because their armor had clearly not helped, and their weapons were often lying around them in countless pieces.
"What the hell did this?" Cade asked.
Rose shook her head and the two flew forward, sweeping low over the city as they searched for survivors. They found none until the castle. In the scortched, obliterated ruins, they found Albert. He was wounded, burned, and barely clinging to life, but he wasn't yet dead. Cade landed beside him instantly and holding out both hands, pure white Magic Energy shining from his palms, healing Albert. After a few moments, he stirred, groaning before coming to. In an instant, he leapt up, readying himself to fight, only for his legs to buckle, Cade catching him just as Rose landed beside them.
"What did this?" Cade asked.
"Machines," Albert rasped as Cade set him down against a chunk of debris. "Flying weapons of metal and magic. They reminded me of the Laptos of Zenebatos, bit these were far more advanced and made for one purpose. War."
"Where did they come from?" Cade asked.
"They fell from the sky," Albert said. "Even as a Dragoon, my spear could only barely pierce their metal bodies, and their claws passed through my armor like it was leather."
"Impossible," Rose said. "Even Virage couldn't make such easy work of a Dragoon's armor. Only the Dragon Buster could."
"What do they look like?" Cade asked. "And where did they go?"
"I don't know where they went," Albert shook his head. "One of them used a spell, I think, and I was struck by lightning. If it hadn't been for that talisman of protection you gave me with the letter, I'd have died, but the talisman broke. As for what they look like..." He raised a hand, pointing.
Cade and Rose both turned, seeing four curved blades sticking out from under a chunk of rubble. Cade blasted the rubble with a sphere of Magic Energy, obliterating it, and he and Rose stared at what it revealed. A machine like a disconnected torso encased in blue metal. He and Rose glanced at each other, then drove their swords down into it to either side of the hole Albert's spear had left. Thanks to the enchantments Cade had placed on their blades, both passed through the body with about as much resistance as a normal blade would have with the average human's armor. Not easy, but not impossible. Cade's newly rebuilt Magic Sword, however, passed through the body like it was cloth, so he wasn't overly concerned about his ability to fight them.
"You've made upgrades," Albert said.
"Yeah," Cade nodded, running his finger over Albert's spear, placing the same enchantments. "We need to find out where they went. Rose."
"Right," Rose nodded, taking his left hand instantly as he rested his right on the destroyed machine.
Cade closed his eyes and images flooded his mind. He saw Albert fight the creatures. He saw the second wave arrive. He saw Albert fall. And then, he saw them leave. By scattering in every direction like a ripple in a pond after a stone's been dropped into it. He swallowed hard, opening his eyes and squeezing Rose's habd as the after-effects of searching a Shadow for the source slowly faded, namely pale clammy skin, rapid, shallow breathing, and a racing heart bordering on failure.
"They scattered," Cade said. "Everywhere."
"Why?" Rose asked.
"They're searching," Cade said.
"For what?" Albert asked.
"Us," Cade said. "The ones who stopped the Virage Embryo. They have no emotions or intelligence, only commands. They left you for dead, Albert, because without me you would have been."
"Where are they going next?" Albert asked.
"You misunderstand," Cade said. "They scattered in every direction, like a ripple in a pond. They're going to search everything."
"Then they'll find Dart and Shana first," Rose said.
"I'm not concerned about them," Cade said. "Dart's Divine Dragoon form would be able to clear himself and Shana an escape route. Speaking of, your wife."
"She fled for Kadessa," Albert said.
"We'll find her first," Cade promised. "Then we'll going to head for Lohan. We should be able to find Meru there if we hurry."
Albert nodded and Cade lifted him before he and Rose took off, speeding away from the ruins of Bale.
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