Ayorthians like Areida hailed from a place teeming with Dragons.
Areida's parents were skilled Dragon hunters and tamers.
They taught her well.
After a quick wardrobe change, Areida joined Ella and her party as they hurried off towards Sir Edgar's Dragon Base in the mountains.
Partway through their journey, two members broke off from the main group.
"Slannen, I need you to hurry back to the forest and gather as many Elves and Giants as you can," Ella laid out her plan. "Mandy, can you fly him there?"
"No problem." She handed her Benny. "Take care, my love."
It was already sundown when Ella, Areida, and the Witches reached their destination.
Sore, out of breath, and drenched in sweat, they couldn't afford to rest.
Not just yet.
"Benny," commanded Ella. "Show me the Dragons."
Areida was shocked when she saw the vision.
"Those poor Dragons," she remarked, witnessing the handlers keeping the great beasts chained and muzzled in their stables.
"We need to save those creatures." Areida told Olga.
"No," Olga shook her head. "Too risky. If anything goes wrong, we'd be trapped inside with them."
"We'll need to seal up that entrance," Hattie pointed at the camouflaged hole in the mountain. "Meanwhile, someone needs to sneak inside and make sure everyone and everything inside falls asleep."
Olga handed Ella a yellow flask. "There's a ventilation shaft feeding fresh air down into the mountain. Find it and drop this inside."
"Sorry we're late," came Mandy's voice.
Everyone turned to see the Fairy carrying an airsick Slannen underneath her.
She set the Elf down, who took a brief pause to void his stomach.
"We managed to recruit some extra help," Slannen gestured to the large group of Giants, Elves, and...
"l was gonna ask you how you'd like to be eaten," rumbled Nish. "But if it's Edgar you're after... " He looked over his shoulder, grinning at his Ogre companions. "Count us in."
"So what's the plan?" enquired Mr Koopooduk.
"Stay close to me and step where I step," were Areida's instructions.
Ella jumped down from the tree and followed behind her friend as they climbed up the mountain.
There, at the top, was the gaping hole they were looking for.
Ella pulled out the yellow flask Olga gave her, but now wasn't the time to use it.
Down below, at the foot of the mountain, Olga saw that the girls were already in position.
She turned around, facing the Giants who were lugging massive boulders in their arms.
"Launch!"
Mr Koopooduk, Brumhilda, and all the others spun around while holding their boulders in front of them.
A few dizzying revolutions later, the Giants all released their grip.
Several dozen boulders sailed through the air, arcing towards the entrance to the mountain.
Hattie and Olive each stood on either side of the entrance's cavernous maw as the boulders rapidly plummeted towards them.
A good chunk of them were headed off target.
"There's our cue, Olive!" shouted Hattie. "Go!"
The two Witches simultaneously activated their magic.
The boulders immediately slowed and all drifted into place, completely sealing up the entrance.
Ella and Areida could hear the guards and Dragon Riders inside descend into a panicked uproar, mixed in with the cacophony of spooked Dragons.
She broke a special seal on Olga's yellow flask and dropped it down the ventilation shaft, which was quickly covered by a sizeable stone rolled in by Areida.
They slumped on the ground, back to back in exhaustion.
"Did we... " panted Areida, noticing the sounds fading away. "Did we do it?"
Ella pulled out Benny. "Show me the Dragons."
Their hearts sank like lead when they saw that six Dragons and their Riders had somehow managed to avoid the sleeping potion.
Already, they managed to blast a few holes in the rubble.
"Olive, on your left!" grunted Hattie, straining to keep her magic up as she scrambled to plug up any new holes made by the Dragons trapped inside.
"I'm trying!" shrieked Olive, but for every hole she managed to re-seal, two or three more opened up elsewhere.
A furious Dragon violently thrust its head out through one of the holes.
"Oh my gosh," breathed Hattie.
She and her sister jumped out of the way, seconds before a fireball exploded where they once stood.
Olga saw the six Dragons appearing through the holes in the rubble.
"We need covering fire!" she barked at the Ogres.
Nish and his Ogres, highly adept with the sling, were already in position.
What they lacked in terms of brute strength compared to the Giants, they more than made up for in precision and rate of fire.
The Ogres twirled their loaded slings once overhead, then loosed.
The Dragons were taken aback by the flurrying onslaught of melon-sized rocks zinging towards them.
Specially shaped for increased accuracy, the Ogres' rocks hit their mark.
With a furious roar, some of the Dragons ducked back inside while others managed to let off a few blasts.
Nish's follow-up barrage quickly silenced them.
"Incoming!" Mr Koopooduk yelled out a warning, as the Dragons' fireballs streaked towards them.
Luckily, Olga was there.
She used her magic to dissipate them all harmlessly.
"Mum bought us some time!" said Olive, peering down at the foot of the mountain.
"It's not gonna last long!" shouted Hattie. "Quick, we got to seal it up!"
As the Witches got to work, an ominous boom swept through their bones.
New cracks appeared in the rubble.
"What's happening?"
Benny's vision showed them the six Dragons concentrating their fire onto a single point.
If they keep this up, very soon they'll...
The entrance to the mountain blasted open, showering the vicinity in dust and falling stones.
Hattie and Olive's magic deflected any and all dangerous debris endangering them, but the thick dust cloud they were enveloped in quickly disappeared with the mighty wingbeats of Dragons.
Everything happened so fast.
But even so, Ella managed to keep up with Areida.
"Follow me!" screamed Areida, sprinting towards the edge of the mountaintop.
Ella followed, now lacking time to even think about anything.
They ate up the distance to the edge in a few strides.
"Jump!"
It just so happened that the Dragon they landed on was at the very tail end of the formation.
The other five didn't see them.
The combined weight of two women abruptly crashing down on top of him literally knocked the wind out of the Dragon Rider underneath them.
After they tossed him off, Areida managed to take control of their Dragon.
The mighty beast pumped its gigantic wings hard, speeding towards the five Dragons already in front of them.
A/N
I had a lot of fun coming up with this scene, inspired by how Asami Sato, Bolin, and General Iroh II took out the Equalist Airbase in the Legend Of Korra episode Endgame.
It was brilliant of Olga to use the Giants and Ogres as artillery support.
That woman's a tactical genius!