Dragon(s)layer

24


Spyra vs Ignitia


Manhandling the new equipment was troublesome while in the air, so the Fallen tried to wait until Spyra and Ignitia had one of their 'Flight-Breaks' every few miles to play around with his new rig.

Taking the Handcannon apart and putting it back together was the trickiest bit. Its makeup wasn't just old: it was unique, a kind of setup that came from a world that hadn't adopted what would've passed as more traditional firearms technology across the greater Multiverse. For scope and reference, he had previously handled all kinds of "Oldie" weaponry and equipment to have some semblance of an idea of what he was doing. Things like muskets, bolt-action and lever rifles, and even Blunderbusses, had at various times in the past been in his hands on the eve of particularly hair-raising situations…

The Moles, in contrast to a normally clear cut and systematic historical pattern, had elements of their firearms that actually skipped some of that advancement bridge, but lacked in other departments. Brass casings were appreciable, lightyears ahead of some of the other locally slapped together crap he'd worked with in the past, but the manual revolving feed was a chore, something he would make do with, but found unpreferable. Handiness was also offset a lot by the thumb-latch sticking out the Handcannon's side like a little golden thorn. The sights were pretty solid. The weight was bothersome, but again, not catastrophic…

All in all, the unique tell-tale signs of yet another separately developing reality, all encased in a physical example of its prime and output.

Still, it wasn't his normal gear, by far… Which kind of ticked him off.

Damned Converters. It would've been better for everyone if they had shot him down over a place that actually had laser-rifles, and wasn't still stuck in the Stone Age.

At least there was plenty of lizard-poon to clap in the meantime, which was a serious plus.

"I haven't ever seen the engineers pack so much into such a tiny package." Ignitia commented, taking a sip out of the waterskin hanging off her hipsash belt. "The Moles have a bit of a greedy streak in them, minding their hearts, of course. They don't part with their assets so easily, especially with those who aren't dragonkin."

"I guess Starbrun's a charismatic fellow." He shrugged.

"Certainly he is, but I think it's a bit more nuanced than simply his advice to the engineers." She shook her crown. "A lot of confidence is being placed in you."

"It's a good thing I don't intend to disappoint." He glanced at her as he proceeded to take apart the gun once again, laying the parts with zealous care onto the face of a boulder jutting out from all the grass. "How are you feeling? You look exhausted."

"Was it so easy to tell?" Ignitia sarcastically laughed. "I'll admit to you something many of my colleagues might struggle to hear me say: I'm a teacher before I'm a soldier. I despise the actions of the front, and while I wish to defend my home and my people, I have always wished such could be done from behind the walls."

"I don't blame you. Violence doesn't solve as much as what many would call mundane action." The Fallen smiled. "And, you're secret's safe with me."

"I never figured you as one reluctant for a fight." Ignitia hummed. "There was an eagerness in your arm, at least, when I last saw you, ehm… working."

"I-I'll admit a bit to you too, I might… enjoy cleaning the gene-pool, just a bit, when the opportunity arises." He scratched at the joint and his pauldron.

"You have fought in wars before."

"Many."

"So you understand what it feels like to… to lose people."

"Unfortunately, yes." He frowned, laying the last piece of the Handcannon out before pausing, and then beginning the reassembly process. He liked the way the metals clicked together. A good gun snapping back into a whole was a calming activity between the storms for him. Though, it was good only in a sense in that it looked good. He still had yet to baptize it. "Which I'm sure you're aware is something that can't be fixed."

"Of course. I just want to believe that they're still alive." Ignitia clenched her jaw, sounding dour. "Why else would Cynder capture them if not for something they could only provide in life?"

"I know you're scared-"

"I'm terrified."

"…I know. But the only way you're going to get through today is by detaching yourself from them. That sounds horrible, yes," He held up a hand when she shot a cold glare at him. "but combat is hindered by exterior weight. If you're too busy drowning in fear, you won't see that errant axe coming for your head until it's too late."

"We both are soldiers today, Fallen. I simply wish I could step into the shoes, as it were, with the same readiness as yourself." Ignitia huffed. For some reason, the Fallen didn't take that as a compliment, but he kept his feelings silent, watching, as she hopped on top of one of the hundreds of boulders creating the greater rockfields around them. She swept back her crown and wings, her red and gold neck twisting gracefully as she surveyed the area.

Gigantic, empty grasslands and sparse woods were to the north, shorthanded hills dotted with spheroid trees and an old, rotting mill tower lurked in the south.

"Just ahead of the forests there, is Southern Avalar." She told him, her tail pointing the way. "It's sealed mostly from this portion of the Dragon Realms by foothills and a series of river rapids. We are in the middle of nowhere right now, putting it kindly."

"Was that amusement I detected?" He smirked.

"A little." She giggled. "This is where several of my best students come from. Out here, in the villages and draconic keeps that grid the landscape outside the walls of the major cities. Everydragon thinks its quality of amenities that determines the quality of the warrior, and yet…."

"I'm a country kind of guy myself." He twirled the Handcannon trigger-wise around his finger and caught it mid-cock with a metallic ch-chkk! "They're still alive, Ignitia, and we're going to find and get them back. I promise."

"You can't promise that... nobody can." She hopped off the rock and trotted towards him, a sad smile blossoming up her snout. She clenched her jaw when it threatened to quiver. "But thank you."

"I promised Spyra I would get her back to her folks, and that I'd get her to Warfang, and that I'd stop Cynder. If I can keep a loaded trunk of keeps like that, hell…" He sleaved the gun and nodded at some boulders. "Let me know when you're all rested up and ready to go. I'm off to practice."

"You seem skilled with these sorts of arms to begin with, what's it going to do for you, hmm?" She was joking, but she still startled the Fallen by stepping ever closer, and summarily running a paw down the silver metal of his arm-shield. Her talons hissed against the armor quietly, and she met his gaze shyly. "Or do you really just fancy boasting that much? You're so worried about my worrying: what about the risk you give yourself from your cockiness?"

"I can't help wanting to impress."

Ignitia flushed when he took up her claw and laid his other gauntlet across her breast, a bold move, almost as bold as such would've been, touching the chest of a human woman. He waited a second, to make sure she was reciprocating the contact, and then stroked up to her neck. He took her chin with his finger. The Guardian suddenly appeared mesmerized, amber eyes widened as her heartbeat picked up. She could feel the unnatural energies coursing from him as they flooded her veins.

"I know Spyra's a little offhanded by… well, the whole egg-thing between the two of you." He noted quietly. Ignitia deflated like a wilting flower for a moment. "But that'll never change who she is to you. And, it leaves you open in the market, so-to-speak. There are always other folks out there who will be willing to be your little hatchling, including those of the extraterrestrial and dashingly posh variety."

Fwooof~!

Ignitia's wings preened, creaking like opened sails. She was blushing so hard that she appeared the color of vibrant blood in the sun. The Fallen smirked and slid his hands off her as he walked away, leaving her trembling with butterflies storming in her belly.

"I'll look for Spyra too while I'm at it. She's probably wandering around, setting something on fire… or cursing at a tree."

The Fallen frowned as he hopped over the rough terrain and ducked around a cluster of dry ferns. The sun was luckily shielded by many gray clouds, so the rays weren't heating him up in his armor yet. Still, this bloody thing weighed a lot and it was stuffy. He peeled off several portions as he found a nice clearing ringed by rockland to spar with himself, leaving the plating in a pile in the grass as he unsheathed his new gladius, and began to practice strikes and parries.

His swordsmanship was a little rusty. He hadn't fought with a handled blade of such quality in a long time. His normal melee apparatus was more bluntly-styled and much more powerful, and the auxiliary blade in his suit was wrist-mounted. Roman-style slashing hadn't been part of the menu for a while.

Mid-swipe, a rush of air caught his attention.

The Fallen steadied himself and perked, noticing an amber flash spark out behind some boulders nearby. Scratching the beginnings of stubble on his chin, he tossed his gladius in the pile and started trudging over.

Only one thing that could be…

"-Fuck-!" Spyra barked. "-Come back here you little-"

Another rush of whipping flames.

The Fallen peeked around a rockpile and blinked when he saw the purple dragoness lunging all over the place at seemingly nothing. Every time she hit the ground, she'd scramble back up, breathe a cone of fire, scream a string of curses, and leap again.

What the hell was she doing?

"-Damn it-!"

"Spyra, are you alrigh-"

The Fallen screamed girlishly when a broiling sphere of fiery death flew in his direction straight for his face. The air cindered as he threw himself away, and the fireball slammed into a boulder with a crack of burning force.

He looked up and saw that a virulent flush had invaded the reptile's face. Evidently, she hadn't expected him to show up for her.

"…D-Did I hit you, Fallen?" Spyra started to sound concerned. He felt his heart sink when her tone immediately became blanketed in a sour undertone of disinterest. "…Mm, actually, you look a'ight to me. Those mad-reflexes of yours saved ya' as usual." She ground her fangs and turned away from him, snarling at something hovering over her horns. "…I certainly didn't hit you, you little powdery asshole…"

The Fallen gawked as he stood up.

It was a moth, flapping its most likely singed wings in panic as it made a break for a nearby line of foliage. Spyra growled and pawed the grass, casting him a momentary and angry glare as she allowed her impromptu prey to escape.

"Nothin' to see here, man, just me me me…" She mumbled.

"What are you doing?" He asked.

"Missing. Just like at the Guardian Temple." Spyra trotted around him. "Is Ignitia ready to go yet? We're never gonna' get there in time if her old wings keep giving out from elder-cramps or whatever the fuck she deals with everyday…"

"Her demons are less physical, I think." He rubbed the back of his head, and followed behind her as he checked himself for scorchmarks. "Is there a reason you've turned to murdering moths?"

"I'm-…" Her intent to snap at him faltered. She had to think for a second. "…training."

"Uhhhhhh-"

"It's a test! At the Temple of the Guardians! There's this- this –evil fireball thingie! And it zips around like a motherfucker, and it's impossible to hit and-" Spyra shook her head and smacked her tail off a rock. "You wouldn't care about it."

"Actually, I would. Very much." He jogged to put himself beside her. "How did your first training sessions go?"

"Terrible."

"Why?"

"Because they were terrible."

"…Alright, so… why?"

"Because I'm terrible, just- would you leave me alone? How many times do I gotta say it, man? You're in purgatory right now, so sod off." Spyra tried to walk away faster, nearly bounding. "If it isn't enough that I gotta' worry about this siege, and that I failed a toddler's level test in what is supposed to be the primer for my entire destiny, now I gotta' deal with you."

"Me, huh?"

"You! You hareming, interdimensional, portal-leaping-"

"-jumping."

"-Portal-jumping schmuck!"

Metal clanked and he rocked on his heels. Spyra was on her hinds and had her forepaws pinned on his chest, her snarl giving off wisping trails of soot as she leaned close and growled.

"Go on." She said lowly. "Try to crawl back to me. It's something you would do."

"Only because you're too important to me to lose." He laid his hands tentatively on top of her claws. "Ignitia's still got a little while before we take off again. Would you want to just… sit down near some boulders, and… talk?"

Spyra tore her gaze from him, her chops curling in all these weird angles as her mind tried to force her to scream at him, and her heart to throw herself.

"It can be about anything you want." He cupped her shoulders, making her flinch. "Or, it can be about nothing. We could just sit. Last night felt… empty without you in the nest too."

"Why not go sleep with the green-eyed half-breed, and her pet, nurse-dyke?" She pouted.

"'Cause you're my special spoon-durg."

Spyra looked like she had choked on something, as she suppressed a giggling snicker, forcing a frown, and turning her snout up at him.

"I-I am no longer your spoon-durg." Her brow twitched. The Fallen smiled, pressing the assault. "And besides, I'm the Purple Dragon. I deserve my own harem, all-things-considered. A chamber of hung-like-titans drakes with nice wingspans and sprawling chest muscles…"

"Mmmyeah, you could go with that, but none of them would have the glorious, ultra-powered goodness that is my penile blade of destruction." He winked. "If you want, I could make last night up to you, by… maybe… taking you behind those trees, bending you over a rock, and plowing you until your eyes cross?"

Spyra's eyes didn't cross (yet) but they sure as shit looked like glass as her gaze immediately snapped back to him.

She swallowed, sweat fleeing down her scaly brow as he burrowed into her with his usual stupid grin and fast-mouthed pickup lines.

No. Resist. You can do it, girl…

"I-I can think of better pastimes in a senior home." She sneered. "Hospice wing."

"You wanna' see if we can write our names in the cum-puddle afterwards?"

Spyra jolted in his arms and her mouth was sucked dry.

"N-N-Never." She stammered, but it really didn't come out forcefully at all, more like a pathetic squeak. Her body began to catch fire in a metaphorical sense. The dragon hadn't been aware of the tingling in her groin two seconds ago, or the itch in the base of her tail, or the undying need to growl….

He leaned forward and put his nose in the crook of her neck, sniffing quietly and sighing in content. Spyra gasped as a purr began to thrum in her throat.

"That girly dragon soap the Guardians use is right up your alley." He said. "You smell like flowers. It's pretty sexy."

Spyra's left eye faced in a different direction.

The Fallen muffled a surprised grunt when her chops suctioned over his lips. Somehow, against all things improbable, Spyra's face had transformed into a vacuum cleaner, and it was threatening to tear his jaw out.

His arms immediately slung under her wings, and he carried her to the ground before splaying her roughly in the grass. Spyra gave a pained moan and her tail lashed around his ankle. The Fallen started to undo belts and yank straps off, the last vestiges of his brand new armor being hurled away piece by piece. He stripped everything below the cuirass except his boots.

He grabbed her hips, hoisted her up, and yanked on the base of her tail, like it was a lever. She moaned again and her legs flew open on reaction. Flesh squelched as he dipped a hand low, gritting his teeth as he worked her.

"-I knew you'd come around." He breathed.

"-This doesn't- Ah-! –change- OooHhhhh-~ anything." She snarled. "It might just be the outside air gettin' to me, but don't think this means I forgive you! Y-You hear me? I hate you!"

The Fallen entered her with a wet pop. She batted her wings into the grass and reared her head back, crying out as he began to piston into her like a rabid animal, not even giving her time to prepare.

"-Y-You h-heard-m-m-me -Oh!- r-right?!"

"I heard you."

"I hate you! I-I h-hate-y-youuuuuohhhhhancestorssss….~" Her eyes crossed and her tongue hung out, each thrust jolting her and causing her head to bob. "Just s-shoot it all inside me…"

"Mmf. Inside."

"-d-damn it-! Fuck! Breed your dragon bitch, y-you man-whore-! Breed her-! Ooooooooohhhh-cuminsideme-cuminsideme-CUMINSIDEME-!"


{🐉}

Ignitia honest to the Ancestors thought she was about to eat her own leg.

Riding down from the rush of what had happened only gave her a taste of free-thought to consider how she felt. The unbelievable sensations of whatever kind of poisons radiated off the Fallen's skin had completely decimated her, and so now, she was pacing through the rocks and grass a shivering wreck, trying to ride down the crash of her high like a drug addict.

She knew that this wasn't normal behavior. She knew something about the Fallen was doing this to her.

But as time went on, she also knew that she no longer cared.

Aggravated firstly over what was happening to her, Ignitia found her temperamentality further stoked when she realized she was also angry because the human was out of her reach.

Acting like a hormonal youngling, the Guardian snarled and spat fire everywhere, venting her frustrations on rocks and grass, and transforming her surroundings into a veritable hellscape of scorch marks, and burnt vegetation.

"Ancestors damn me!" She howled, slamming her face into a boulder and sliding her forehead down the burnt surface. She grit her teeth and snatched her eyes shut. "No wonder Spyra went outside the species… t-this is… he's…"

"Oh my god, are you alright?" The Fallen gasped.

Ignitia tore away from the stone with a frightened yip, her tail curling behind her as she stood in a surprised sprawl.

The Fallen was walking with a bit of a limp as he glanced around at all the destruction and came to stand before her. He was dusted with dirt and his armor was grimy, plus, he was wincing and trying to rub at his pelvis through the harness.

"A-Are you alright?" Ignitia peered at him.

"None of us are okay, okay?!" Spyra cried, dragging herself from the same direction he had come. She was dirty too and the golden plating on her belly was noticeably flushed. "The only thing we got in common, sista', is that we can blame sky-boy over here, for nobody being okay."

The Fallen grumbled and rolled his eyes as he tried to preoccupy himself with play-cocking his Handcannon.

Spyra's tail whipped around as she glanced angrily between the two of them. She sniffed, used the leaf of her tail to itch at her crotch, and then shuffled away in a steamed spout.

"This changes nothin'." She called over her wing.

"What changes 'nothin''?" Ignitia quirked a brow.

"Jesus Christ, Ignitia, we fucked. I get that folks like to feign naivety, but, c'mon…" The Fallen limped in a separate direction. "I feel like you people have lived your lives as a cast in a children's game or something."

"O-Oh..." Ignitia glumly peeped, craning around and looking at her own hips for some reason. She pumped a flame out of her snout and grumbled like a displeased alligator. "Oh."

"Are we movin' or what?" Spyra shouted. "All these stupid rocks are starting to make me dizzy just lookin' at 'em!"

"F-Fallen, might I have a word with you before we-"

"...'scuse me, Ignitia." The human hadn't even heard her. He was too busy slipping the rest of his new suit on and arming himself. He shouldered past in a jog for where Spyra was, leaving the Guardian to stew in her own conflicted chaos.


{🐉}

The rest of the flight was… well, kinda' awkward.

Nobody spoke much, that was for sure, even as the rolling draconic countryside passed below and on the horizon. Spyra always flew ahead of Ignitia, not even casting the human mounted on her back a glance.

They went by a town at one point, a little settlement of dragons with stilted cottages and colorfully roofed and shuttered buildings made of stone and metal trimmings. There was a windmill placed like a buoy among a sea of cropfields to the west.

"That's Viamsholm." Ignitia quipped over her shoulder when she noticed him staring. "It's been around for the last five hundred and ninety-seven years. I hear the bakers there make excellent potato-bread." It was the only thing anybody said during the whole travel.

Hm, dragon-baked potato bread…

The Fallen squinted at some woodlands as he snatched a waterskin off Ignitia's hipsash and took a long swig.

Dragons made good food, that was a pretty Multiversal thing, barring a reality or two.

The Furies couldn't cook to save their own lives, he reminded himself. In fact, nobody back there really could, even the other civilizations. It was probably why the red one had enslaved a whole damned race to get her nourishment instead of just dishing shit up herself.

But still, dragon-baked potato bread…

Well, now he knew where to visit once he kicked Malefora in the teeth.

After the passage of another coastline, that was when they started to smell the war again. It started out tiny. The air changed a bit, like someone had long ago come through the sky with a gigantic wad of charred wood. He started to scan the forests and plains more attentively after that.

Next came the smoke.

Distant pillars of inky black stained the northern horizon like dark fingers. There were tens of them of varying height, though all were colossal, signs of them persisting for days and being lifted by wind currents.

"Is Oversight a wooden town?" He asked into Ignitia's earhole as they flew.

The Guardian sounded pained after she took a moment to answer him.

"No."


{Deadly Creatures OST: Widow Me This}


"Heads up." Spyra called over the draft. Both dragonesses gave their wings a kick as they passed belly-close the highest tips of some pine trees at the crest of a rolling hill.

The moment the woods rescinded below, they revealed a hellish sight.

The sounds of battle were an omnipresent, low-key ambiance, meshed with the occasional crack of artificial thunder and the screaming hurl of a cannon's shot. A walled settlement sprawled at the top of a mesa of coastal cliffs overlooking woodlands to the east and west, and a sea of grasslands to the south. All of it was touched by an immense coastline struggling up from the south. Rows of siege engines lye mixed in-use or idle as mobs of ant-sized infantry crawled across the burnt lands towards the city's gates up a jagged, road-licked hill. Most of the fires were billowing out from inside the city walls and not the greatest sources of wood from the surrounding forests.

The cold peaks of mountains lie past Oversight: the polar border of the very Dragon Realms. Somehow, despite the white-haze crawling off of them, the smoke stabbing through their visage like black cracks completely smothered their light.

The Fallen grimly held onto Ignitia's neck as he felt a very familiar haze settle into his guts.

War.

No matter where he went: it always looked the same. This place stank of death, and it was just as rotten as he remembered it being.

"Ignitia?" The Fallen winced when the wind caught a droplet of moisture and specked it off his face. He craned over, seeing that the Guardian was silently crying.

"Dayum', this place needs some remodeling!" Spyra flapped her wings and drew along their side, purple eyes scanning the destruction ahead. "So what's the plan? There's so many of them! How are we supposed to do anything?"

"We'll hit them from behind!" The Fallen shouted, pointing at the stringently-staffed siege engines lining the land below Oversight's cliffs. As he spoke, a black trebuchet screeched, and a flaming meteor sailed in a wide arc before vanishing over the city walls. "Take out their siege engines and throw the rear ranks into disarray!"

"That's a lot for two dragons and an' alien!" Spyra gave him a now rare smirk.

"For you, me, and Ignitia? It's a piece of cake." He shook his head. "All the fighting we did in the swamps was a warm-up. You wanted a real war, Spyra? There it is, you see it? It's right in front of us."

"Lemme' at 'em!"

"Ignitia, me and Spyra are going to attack first and draw the majority force, you'll idle, and you'll hit the response teams from the rear once the Dark Army's committed." The Fallen patted her shoulder. "Let's see if your Moles' smithing work holds up for me in the meantime."

"I don't like that plan: Spyra should be support!" Ignitia cried.

"Ancestors' tails, I ain't a hatchling!" Spyra snapped. "You both do whatever you wanna' do, I'm going in!"

"Hold on-!" The Fallen called.

"Wyverns!" Ignitia flapped her wings to slow down, pointed a talon ahead. The Fallen grit his teeth when he almost fell off from the sudden stoppage. He glanced around her neck at the sky ahead.

Undulating, worm-like shapes were zipping up from the Dark Army lines below. There were tens of them, and they were gaining.

"I got 'em!" Spyra shouted, looping onto her back to gaze at them, where she pointed past the dip of her wing at the ground. "You both start! I'll catch up after I clear the skies!"

"Spyra, no-!"

"Let her do it." The Fallen gripped Ignitia's arm. Spyra gave him a momentary, longing glance, and then shot through the sky like a bullet, soon vanishing in the clutter of smog and space. "She's the Purple Dragon, Ignitia. She has to do her job, and she does it well. She'll be okay."

"-I-I-…" Ignitia stammered over her own tongue. She shivered, bit down, and composed herself. "I know she will be."

"But she can only tie up so many at a time…" He mumbled.

"There's more of them." Ignitia nodded.

"…Crap." The smoke was working to clog up his eyes even through the wind, but all that soot still couldn't hide the amount of Wyverns zipping around the general area Spyra had gone to in the sky. Normally, the threat of plummeting several thousand feet to the world below wouldn't have been an issue for him in his normal gear, but garbed merely in a suit of medieval armor and his own skin...? All it would take was Ignitia giving one panicked loop or jolt to get away from a Wyvern, and he'd be catapulted off the saddle, like a fleck of white hot charcoal off the burning pile. "We have to land."

"Now?" Ignitia cried, craning over her own neck to gawk at him. "We're over the middle of an entire field line! I thought you were planning to land outside and attack from foot! Have you lost your mind?"

"I lost that shit years ago." He winked, tracking something past her flank as she glided through the haze. That'll do... Ignitia gasped as his weight shifted across her back. "See ya' down there."

"Wait- no-!"

The air whistled as the Fallen slipped past the dragoness' haunch, and plummeted like a silver and gold bomb towards the ground below. The drop would've killed him without some improvisation. Luckily, the Dark Army punks had been generous enough to leave a lot of infrastructure around.

The flank of a black, stone-like trebuchet engine gleamed under the heels of his boots as he landed in a slide down one of the support ribs holding the launcher's pulley aloft. Pebbles and dust scattered onto the earth as he rode the molten-rock making the banister like it was a ramp.

He landed in a roll, his armor clattering with his jerky movements as he made contact with the ground for the first time. The Fallen skidded to a halt, taking a second to breathe before standing up.

Five more of the siege engines towered straight of ahead of him in a sparsely grassed clearing. Before them, however (and much more concerning) was a cluster of eight or so lumbering creatures almost a head taller than he was.

They had gnarly crocodilian heads, beady little red eyes, and rows of snaggle-teeth in their black spittle-dripping maws. Shanty plates of crude armor slabbed down their painfully thin bodies, and each of them wielded a double-handed weapon of some variety, or shanty shields and blades.

Orcs.

One of the monsters seemed to consider him for a moment, perhaps curiously, before its dreadfully wide maw lopped open, casting a piggish shriek into the wind. The Orcs bellowed raggedly, slamming hilts to pauldrons and shields, before lumbering at him in a wave of stinking flesh and stained metal.

The Fallen sneered, and ripped his new toys off his belt as he jogged forwards to meet them. The gladius in the right hand, the Handcannon in the left.

Finally.

Some action.

An Orc swung. He rolled under its arm in a decent dodge, but he fudged the recovery, and staggered straight behind it, his own armor almost knocking him on his ass. He really needed to get used to the whole medieval-era weight distribution again…

Still, he had more then enough to cover up his sloppiness. The gladius penetrated and summarily burst out the other side of the Orc's throat the moment he looped back to give his opponent a proper second of attention. Its blood spewed outwards of the wound in thick globular and streaks. It felt like anything else's blood he'd spilled around here. It was warm and gooey, but it was colored black, like muddy ink.

The Fallen cringed as life-tar spattered up his arm and ran down to his elbow like watery molasses. He used a heel to slip the convulsing Orc off his blade and spiraled around to face his next opponents.

The Orcs came at him in a mob. He jammed out his Handcannon and yanked the trigger.

BANG~!

-The sound was deafening, it was like a crack of thunder going off right in his palm.

An Orc tossed over its own heels when the corner of its face and skull exploded in a misting cloud of chunky gore.

The Fallen cocked the gun up and blinked.

Huh.

Looks like the Moles back at the forge had been pretty spot-on with their expectations. If just one round could do that, who knew what it would look like when a Mole gatling gun was on full-auto spraying a pack of these guys…

Meat giblets.

He loved those kinds of weapons.

Steel screamed as he parried the flank of an axe and stuck the gladius through an eye when the Orc fell with the momentum. They were strong- strong enough to give his un-augmented arm a painful strain with every blocking hit -but not enough to be beyond his capability. He tore free from his victim, spun, and then carved open another's neck. He thumbed the barrel-latch, and the Handcannon barked again, an Orc flopping away with just his lower jaw and nothing topping it.

Clusters of Orcs were emerging from the surrounding area now, to reinforce their fellows, and at their feet were swarms of chattering, stout, green horrors wielding little polearms and blades.

Grublins.

So that's what the fuckers looked like…

They were hideous. Like, inside of someone's asshole hideous. And green. He hated shit that was green.

The first of the little goblinoids to reach him flipped away in a shrill shriek when he punted it in the face like it was a football. The cleated heel of his boot impaled it through the eyes and cracked its skull, and so it glided from him with a path marked by a twisting ribbon of oily blood from its ruined face. The Fallen spun a second later, and slashed outwards in a low hack with his sword. A trio of Grublins bleated loudly as black trenches spewed gore the moment they appeared as incisions across their faces.

Good thing I packed close to the tit.

The Fallen diced with his gladius and cocked the Handcannon. The moment the fighting lulled, in one deft movement, he slipped a new pair of shells out, fed them, and snapped the barrel shut.

Practice made perfect.

He threw himself back into the melee not even a second later.

Foot infantry were always the most fun to fight. They provided just enough of a challenge to make things interesting, but they were always so predictable, that the battle could easily slide into a trained motion of parries, slashes and hacks, like a bunch of puzzle pieces being fitted into allocated puzzle slots.

Tens of Grublins scurried over the dead, flanked by duos of armored Orcs, all of whom screeched and hooted in challenge. The Fallen killed them all without discrimination. Flesh squelched, bones snapped, the Handcannon barked, and only those who didn't lose their heads or throats in the first strike had the liberty of dying with screams leaving their mouths.

Black gore was soon caking the Fallen's armor, obscuring the beautiful craftsmanship with macabre schemes of victorious slaughter.

He trapped an Archer Orc's arm in the crook of his joint, and yanked his shoulder forwards, snapping the elbow like it was a twig. The Orc screamed, and the Fallen kicked out his knee, decapitating the freak the moment he angled prone. He snatched up the loaded crossbow from its claw, and shot a Grublin between the eyes right as the creature attempted to surmount him with an aerial leap, the little spear in its claws flipping away loosely as it tumbled to the ground, dead.

Surrounded and swamped, the Fallen then started using the weapon like a club, caving in another Grublin's skull with a wet crunch. The Handcannon was back in its sash. He no longer had time to reload. There were too many of them for that now.

But not too many for him to take on in general.

The Fallen felt a sting of glee as he butchered the Dark Soldiers, his training making up for whatever his armor could not. Even without his modern gear, the appreciation for the Mole craftsmanship he wore was palpable. A tiny glaive licked sparks off his ankleplate. An axe rung like a gong when he used his arm-shield to blunt the overhead strike. Blows that would've bitten through mail or steel held no sway against the golden master-crafted suit.

Still: at least these people could actually hit him. At least they could fight.

Ignitia hadn't been lying when she'd said they were a step above the Apes.

This was pretty fun.

The Fallen gave off a bellow as he slashed his way through a thick mob of Grublins, hacking them aside with each strike, his gladius acting like a machete through thick, bleeding ferns. A brief memory slid into his mind about two nights earlier, his discussion with Morinth, on the edges of the dragonfly village.

"So you enjoy killing?"

An Orc caught him across the chest with a half-assed swing of its axe. The aim was off, and so a hybrid of the blade and the flat made contact with his gorget, harming the Fallen's ears with the metallic ring of impact more than his actual body. The blow was still enough to knock his sword out of his hand, and it also nearly sent him to the dirt.

The Orc wetly burbled as it twirled the handle in its claws, chuckling, before it advanced on him, orbited around its ankles by scurrying Grublins.

One of the goblinoids threw itself over his sword, shielding it with its scrawny body as he madly grappled for the handle. Another latched onto his leg, and another his hips. The Fallen bellowed as he was dragged to the ground, and the Orc stood over the exchange, raising its axe, making to behead him.

That would be anti-climactic. I still haven't had sex with the Goth one.

The Fallen angled his shoulders, throwing himself away. The axe swung perpendicular to his carotid and pauldron, the Orc accidently catching one of his own minions in the face, as the Grublin over the Fallen's waist scurried up his back, it's amused giggles cut short with a slurping wheeze as the steel ate into mouth.

Realizing the error, the Orc yanked back, leveraging the human's shoulder to wetly detach his blade from the little corpse. The Fallen ripped off the other Grublin on his leg, throwing the annoying and short-statured little bastard away, before vaulting off a heel at the Orc.

It swung clumsily at him- still reeling from earlier -and he swept towards its legs. The Fallen yanked a spear out from the dead paws of a Grublin corpse, and he ran the Orc through the groin with both hands, flesh crunching as the speartip penetrated the thin leather gambeson protecting his victim's lower abdomen, black blood fled down the pommel and dripped from his hands. When the Orc doubled, he rose upward and head-butted him, their helmets crunching loudly. The once mighty Orc flipped onto its back like a suffocating fish, squealing and gasping as it clutched at its crotch on the ground.

An unfortunate fate, but quite deserved. You're too ugly to have used whatever's down there anyhow.

He roared until his throat became raw, using his foot to keep the offending Grublin's head down as he yanked at its legs, veins straining from his neck and arms.

Flesh tore and bones crunched. The Grublin started convulsing like a fish out of water as he ripped its legs raggedly out of their sockets in a gushing torrent of glistening, black blood. He threw the dismembered limbs in another Orc's face, and rolled to snatch up his sword from where it had fell.

Who's next?


{🐉}


{Ace Combat & OST: Eastern Wind}


Things already felt different, and it wasn't just because the whole fucking place smelt like burning stuff.

Spyra noticed a vibrant quiver down her wingline and tail as she sailed over the blackened landscape passing beneath her breast. She flexed her paws and unsheathed their hooked claws. The purple dragon took a brief glance back the way she had come, trying to pick out the Fallen or Ignitia, and failing to.

They'll be alright.

It was odd.

She was about to commit to her first battle outside of her own home, and all she could think about was her and the Fallen right now. The same mentality a hatchling had about the subject of growing up could be applied here. So many believed that you thought differently when you got older, when the reality was, you never noticed the subtle shifts over the course of years.

It had only been a month or so, and Spyra hadn't felt anything until right now, one of those things being about her anger.

It was lighter.

Maybe it was just the adrenaline…

But, having recently been with her mate, feeling the rush in her blood of worthy opponents on the approach: Spyra smiled and flapped her wings ardently.

This was what it must be like to be a full-fledged dragoness of the North. She liked it.

But, obviously, such pride was not shared by her attackers.

The Wyverns up close were as ugly as she was anticipating them being. They had snarling, goblinoid faces, and scab-red rows of scutes and scales protecting their limber, wriggling forms. They flew at her in a disorganized squadron of bodies. The closest one shrieked as the last bits of distance were severed. It swept its glider-wings and ascended. Spyra dived.

They met in a yin-yang of strikes. Spyra ducked her head and curdled her wings. The Wyvern screamed as its hooked claws swept uselessly over her head. She felt her skull shiver under the duress of a terribly strong impact, and the wet warmth of blood spewed over her scalp and flooded the hair-like ridges scaling down to her spine.

Spyra snarled, and corkscrewed her whole form, ripping her bronze horns free in a spray of viscera. She took the Wyvern with her and sent it flipping listlessly to the ground below, trailing a stream of gore from its ruined chest.

Fanning out her membranes to afford a levitative glide, Spyra swung down and avoided the cloven head of a Wyvern's weaponized tail. She swept upwards and showered the beast in a torrent of flame that vaporized the concentration point on its body and cauterized everything else. It didn't even shriek before falling as a crispy, large hunk of charcoal. She zipped like a purple bolt of lightning among its fellows, arms of Electricity flickering out and striking Wyverns out of the sky like she was a gigantic bug-zapper.

They fell from her, flickering lights dancing over their blackened corpses. For a few kills, as she ground through their number like chopmeat, things were made easy.

But then, her and another Wyvern collided chests, locking talons and snarling at one another.

Spyra heaved her forepaws' muscles and hefted the Wyvern's weight. It screamed in her face, exposing rows of uneven, crooked fangs and the depths of a horribly smelling, ichor-dripping throat. It tried to bite her across the head. She craned her neck back, almost entwining it with the Wyvern's, before returning, and sinking her teeth into its throat.

The moment blood started flowing over her tongue, she channeled Electricity, feeling the monster spasm and dance as streams of power zapped the life out of it. The blood started to taste different, like it was becoming the juice flowing out of a perfectly rare steak.

She spat the Wyvern free and sent the body corkscrewing by latching her tail's leaf against its flank and hurling it down.

Just like killin' Giant Mosquitos back home.

Spyra growled in approval.

The slash of a bladed tail caught her attention painfully as a bleeding wound was sliced through the flesh of her upper arm. The dragon roared angrily and snared her tail around the Wyvern's, yanking down and angling her throat, a cone of flames shooting out of her mouth and into its ugly face.

She ignited the monster's head in a howling, fiery whoosh, and swung it bodily like a pendulum, colliding it and another of its kin with a crunch of bone. The two soon-to-be-corpses plummeted.

Clear the skies, she mused over her own words, slicing, flying, zapping and frying. Easy easy.


{🐉}

Ten, fifteen, twenty…

Forty-five…

Fifty-eight…

Ninety…

Now this was getting a bit tiring.

Shit.

The Fallen cringed as an Orc twice his size, and with a pair of totem-banners jutting from behind its pauldrons, rushed him. It was an officer.

The beast smacked his gladius out of his hand with the dash of a handaxe. The Orc was wielding two of them, and came at him from the other side with a summary slash.

The human was forced to double back as the Orc pressed the advantage and ruthlessly applied pressure with constant jabs and slices, landing him several hits. One strike carved a rent into the Fallen's breastplate, and another ripped scales off the mail skirt protecting his belly.

Vaulting on a heel, the Fallen put his training to use, and threw himself, grappling the Orc's arm and throwing him to the dirt as he undulated and spun his form in a cartwheel.

The Orc barked and his axes went flying. The Fallen kicked him in the head, scrambled across his larger ribcage, and grabbed up his other arm. He aligned the elbow against his own shoulder and yanked horizontally, the bones crunching and daggering the Orc's forearm in a straight line on the wrong side of its joint.

He picked up one of the officer's axes and swatted away a pair of Grublins coming at him like they were errant flies. He mounted the Orc's chest, lost the axe by throwing it blade-first through another Orc's forehead, and then stepped low to kill his original target.

The officer screamed in his face, razor-sharp teeth gleaming dirtily as rents of spittle flecked onto the Fallen.

Ugly fucker.

The human gripped the sides of the Orc's head and aligned his thumbs with its eyes. He jammed them down and twisted the knuckles, pinning the beast as its screams hitched horrifically, and glistening, oily blood bubbled up around his fingers and fled down the sides of its angular helm.

Crnch~!

-The Fallen saw stars, and suddenly found himself flew onto his side. His vision- though blurry –enlightened him a second later, as he rolled onto his back to perceive what had happened

The Orc who had smacked him upside the head with a warhammer then tried to bring the weapon down and into his guts. The Fallen rolled again, and the hammer ate dirt. He righted himself, brought his arm-shield across the Orc's face, and broke its jaw, before diving for his lost gladius, lying under some of the bodies.

Then, once surrounded by mirth and bodies, the cluster of infantry penning him in exploded in a wash of fire, their screams shrill and echoing,, when Ignitia landed in their midst, and shattered their crisping bodies with a series of claws and tail-slashes.

"I was wondering where you went!" The Fallen laughed as stood himself back up, smiling at her, whilst he resumed killing. "I'm going for the siege engines! Care to join me?"

"Certainly." Ignitia called with a hot smirk. Together, man and dragon hacked and slashed their way through the tide, him, orderly and precise, Ignitia, galloping forwards, and crushing almost as many Grublins beneath her forepaws as she lit Orcs aflame.

"-Do they have any that don't need a large team?" The Fallen heaved when they met halfway in the heart of a field of corpses, some still steaming from her breath. He gestured to all the black trebuchet-like weapons in rows. "Maybe a cannon?"

Ignitia craned over his shoulder and spat a fireball across the field. An Archer rearing back with a crossbow popped like a flaming pimple from the hips up.

"Does that suffice?" The Guardian breathlessly nodded to the top of a rocky outcrop hill. There was a molten-looking ballista mounted on plated wheels, its curved face pointed for the city just ahead. "It's a Dark Army ballista. It can be worked with only two souls if need be…"

The Fallen's grin was manic.

"Wanna' see some fireworks?" He asked, jabbing a thumb back-forth between them.

"If you're offering to treat a lady to a show, how could I resist?" Ignitia laughed.

They killed a few stragglers on their way to the ballista. A Grublin sitting in the controls glanced over the spine of a black, stone-like throne, perhaps shocked, before the Fallen Handcannoned him in the face.

"I'll load." Ignitia huffed, nodding to the interior of the little setup beyond the throne spine. "The controls are too small for me, and you have more deft hands than my claws."

"How are we looking on ammunition?" The Fallen shoved the little corpse away, and climbed up a stalagmite meant to act as a ladder rung. He clanked into the throne, adjusting and wrapping his hands around a pair of dumbbell levers meant to activate some unseen mechanism to fire the barbed, black harpoon bolt mounted in the center of the curve. There wasn't even a line, or a knocking point...

Dark magic, he figured, running his fingers down the molten rock-like material making the siege engine's structuring. The amber cracks bleeding lava-light actually gave off intense heat to the touch, but strangely, not enough to burn him.

Ignitia grinned when she found a stack of barbed boltshots lying by the ballista's wheel. There had to be fifty or sixty man-sized harpoons just waiting to be fired…

"I think ammunition is in abundance, yes?" She peered over the outcrop. They had an overhead view of a whole sprawl of the Dark Army's line. Scatterings of infantry were still lumbering about or advancing towards the city. Rows of trebuchet engines and leftover siege towers made of scrap, wood and bound with molten-veins were everywhere. "It looks like they haven't seen us."

"How inopportune for them." He purred. "I sense a great deer of badassness approaching."

"They use these ballistas to fire on solid walls, so that means-" Ignitia matched his evil smile.

"Hell yes." He clapped his hands, searching around the dumbbell levers, before giving off an 'A-ha!' –of success. "Watch this."


{Half-Life 2 Ep2 OST: Eon Trap}


He cranked a pair of wooden discus wheels, and the ballista creaked as its curve dipped to align the loaded barbed head with a nearby trebuchet. The Fallen snickered, gripped the dumbbells, and yanked them backwards.

Shhh-CHKKK~!

-The ballista bucked and steel screamed.

The bolt smacked into the trebuchet's rear two-support banisters and snapped them, rock and all, in blasts of smoke. Grublins scattered, screaming, as the siege engine toppled and crushed many of them in a thundering mess of debris. Smog plumed from the disaster-site in a mushroom cloud.

Ignitia cheered and the Fallen laughed.

"How long you think we can keep it up before someone gets up here?" He grinned.

"When wanting: one eager must find out." Ignitia stood on her hinds and shoved another bolt into the curve's feed. "Do it!"

Shhh-CHKKK~!

"Aim it to the left! Look at how they lined up that row!" Ignitia frantically pointed with her tail as he sluggishly reangled the curve, the discus wheels creaking again and again. "Hurry, Fallen, hurry!"

"I've got it. I've got it." He mumbled, jerking the dumbbells back.

Shhh-CHKKK~!

The bolt punched through the banisters of three trebuchets in a straight line. The engines collapsed in moaning roars, crushing most of their teams and scattering the rest. The screams of tortured metal and cracking stone echoed across the hellscape around them with plaintive volume.

"It's like shooting fish in a barrel." He joked. The Fallen turned an eye to her as Ignitia shoved another harpoon into the feed slot. "Did you see Spyra on your way down?"

"No." The Guardian's excitement dampened for a moment as she shook her head. "She couldn't have gone too far though… I-I hope…"

"Peace, Ignitia." He fired the mechanism after a quick readjustment of the curve. "That girlie can take care of herself in a place like this just fine…"

Shhh-CHKKK~!

A siege tower fell into its own basing as the bolt punched through and out the other side. Another bolt took out a trio of black catapult-like engines. Explosive ammunition had been lying nearby. Some of the debris hit it, and the cache cooked off with a brilliant series of fiery clouds and flashes of light. Flaming bodies were hurled like dark, crispy confetti.

Ignitia laughed at the destructive display, grabbing another bolt in her teeth as she pranced back to the curve's feed. Her eyes went wide, suddenly, and the harpoon rolled out of her mouth.

"Fallen!" She pointed to the far flank. "Turn around! Aim it that way! Quickly!"

He didn't ask what-for, trusting the Guardian's judgment, and started cranking the wheels. He glanced over the throne setup's rim, blinking at what he saw lumbering up the side of the outcrop towards them.

"What the fuck is that?" He grunted as she loaded another bolt. "A Golem or something?"

"It's a Troll!" She breathed, running around and joining him at the latch-release. "Aim for its head! Their bodies are almost impervious."

"You got it."

The beast was the size of a small house. It ran on all fours, with stubby rear legs, and beefy, rock-like fists. Its shrill, squeaky roar echoed out of its fanged mouth, and the ground began to quiver as its massive fists galloped it closer and closer.

The ballista coughed, and a bolt whipped out.

It tore into the Troll's mossy shoulder and burst out the other side. The beast screamed, but it kept coming. The ground was now shaking.

"Give me another shot." He squirmed in his seat, fists turning white on the dumbbells. Suddenly, the armor he'd been given felt like it was made of tin-foil.

Damn it, he missed his gear.

Ignitia was visibly terrified. She almost dropped the next bolt before sliding it home and running back to stand beside him, as if being in proximity to the human would make the situation any better. Her claws gripped his shoulders tightly: she was prepared to yank him from the throne, and fly off with him if the Troll reached them.

"Rear your neck up, you fuck." The Fallen snarled, oblivious to her peril as concentration strangled his attentions. "Come on."

"It's too close-!" Ignitia shrieked.

Shhh-CHKKK~!

The bolt punched through the Troll's head, popping the cranium open, and throwing brain chunks and bits of skull in the rivulets of blood that followed. The monster tripped over its heels and tumbled mid-way up the hill with a pattern of thunderous crashes. It came to a stop a little ways off from the nose of the ballista, kissed by dust, now a giant, twitching corpse.

"You're right…" The Fallen let go of a breath he didn't realize he'd been holding. "too close."

Ignitia suddenly gave off a shrill squeal, and the Fallen felt the upper portion of his body become crushed in the heavy grip of forepaws.

"Oh, that was exhilarating, and terrifying, and insane, and-! Oh, that was the most fun I've had in months!" The Fire Guardian laughed.

"Ignitia. My neck."

The dragon gasped, realizing too late that not only had she sounded like Volteera, and had hugged the Fallen in a half-nelson, but she practically had her snout shoved in his face through the helm's visor too.

"I'm sorry!" She squeaked, releasing him and standing erect on her hinds, a maddened flush bleeding across her snout, and her wings and tail started twitching.

Jeez', she really really does smell like cinnamon… even when she's covered in sweat and other people's blood.

The Fallen felt an excitement bubble in his chest despite their surroundings.

Hell, he'd fucked in a battlefield already once in his time here…

"P-Please don't mind my excitability, t-that was unprofessional…" Ignitia shivered and fell back to her fours. The poor Guardian had to turn her snout away in some vain attempt to hide the crimson impossibly showing through her already red scale tone. "-Ahem, what I meant to say before, was g-good job."

The Fallen blinked, his fingers drawing slowly up the Guardian's bronze-plated throat and ending at her chin. Ignitia went bug-eyed and almost stumbled face-first into the side of the ballista's throne setup when he gently tugged her forward.

"Now there's a side of you that I'd love to see more of, my red-hot, smexy derg-nugget."

Fwoof~!

Ignitia creamed her tail, stuttering over her own words. The Fallen then noticed something between her horns, and his look of intrigue vanished for one of horror.

"Oh fuck- lookout-!" He shrieked.

"W-Wha-?!"

The Fallen threw himself out of the throne setup and tackled Ignitia across the chest.

Man and dragon tumbled into the dirt right as something thin and black whipped over them in a blur, and shredded the center of the ballista in a scream of metal and rock. The weapon crunched inward and sprawled down the hill in two pieces, rumbling the earth as it rolled all the way down.

The Fallen craned his head up and sneered. There was another ballista set up on the edge of a hill nearby, manned by a gaggle of cackling Grublins, some of whom were dancing on top of the weapon and pointing at them madly with stout swords.

"Little bastards." He growled.

"F-Fallen…?" Ignitia's voice came out as a muffled peep. She had cupped her snout with her paws, the blush now feverishly blaring.

The Fallen glanced down at himself and blinked. He was laying on top of her, armored hips snugly placed between her thick thighs. Ignitia was caught between trying to hide every obvious change in her person. Thusly, she was engaged in a strange grabbing-dance. She grabbed her face when she started flushing, she grabbed her chest when a felinoid purr started to rumble in her breast…

Oh, if the moment weren't so important…

"We can discuss the possibility of introducing you to my dragonslayer when this is over." He grinned, patting her hips. "But for now, what do you say we-"

"AAHHHHHHHHHHH~!"

Something zipped through the air and slammed into the human's armored flank with a crunch of metal.

Ignitia noticed that despite the object being very loud, blurred and otherwise unrecognizable: there was no denying of its color.

Which was purple.

"If it means that I have to get in a fuck every time you go and grab some cheap-ass floozy for me to be the favorite, then so fuckin' be it!" Spyra screamed at the top of her lungs, the Fallen gagging, cross-eyed, as she strangled him with her Grublin-bloodied forepaws and smacked his head into the dirt. She released him roughly (released being a kind description for dropping his skull into the dust) and then spiraled her angry gaze onto Ignitia, who was mortified, and shivering as she peeled herself off the ground. "Back off, cougar! He's mine! You get him afterwards!"

"*cough-cough* -w-well… that was exhilarating…" The Fallen rubbed his neck and started to sit up. "…Glad to see you're in one piece, Spyra. Me and Ignitia are doing crimes, want in too? Woah-woah-woah, waitasecondwhatthefuckareyoudoing-?!"

"Shut up." Spyra snarled, biting, clawing and yanking at the straps and scale-mail over his hips. "Get this off."

"Wait, wait- No. No that isn't how this works! We have to break the siege first!" He complained. "Victory-fucking's reserved for afterwards!"

"No, first, you shoot your kids down my throat, and then in my egg-hole, then we break the siege…" Spyra snarled. He paused.

"While that idea sounds amazing, I'm covered in blood, you're covered in blood, and forgetting the important battle for a second: I'd prefer to not get Grublin-AIDs thank you very much-!" The Fallen placed his hands on Spyra's horns and started to shove her off. "Ignitia! You're the voice of reason all the time, help a brother out here-! Wait- NO-!"

Spyra yipped when a finned, crimson tail smacked into her face and sent her rolling. The Fallen didn't even have a chance to blink before Ignitia pinned him, and she started yanking and biting and clawing at his armor to get it off.

"Have you all lost your collective fucking minds?!" He howled.

"Yes indeed they have!" A duplicate of himself appeared around the corner of a boulder, giving a thumbs-up and wink.

"Fuck off, Conscience!"

"This will go much better for both of us if you simply sit still, Fallen." Ignitia muttered, her amber eyes wide and wild as she ripped and yanked at his belts in a supernatural episode of manic determination. "J-Just get these blasted breaches out of my way. Right now, please."

Spyra then attacked from the flank. Her and Ignitia went sprawling down the hillside in a tussle of dragon limbs and wings.

When they reached the bottom, they slammed into the base of a trebuchet, and the siege engine collapsed inward with a blast of smoke and debris, its destructive death-screech echoing across the land.


{Halo 4 OST: Push Through}


"Stick it up your tail, grandma, the human's mine!" Spyra howled when the two 'nesses rolled out the other side of the fiery cloud, their elemental make-ups rendering them nigh-impervious to the flames licking off their bodies and wings. "I saw him first!"

"With respect, my student, you should appreciate the wants of your elders!" Ignitia snapped. She fanned her wings out from behind her back, smacking Spyra across the face and chest. The purple heroine went reeling into the air. "I am the Guardian of Flame! Sentry of Warfang! Technically, you're under my authority, seeing as you have no rank in our structure!"

"Rank this!"

Spyra flipped like a top. Her leaf-blade caught Ignitia in the cheek with a loud crack! –and the Guardian rolled through the dirt.

"The Fallen's mine!"

"We shall see, youngling!"

Ignitia hurled off the ground and collided with Spyra's breast. When they reached the ground, the slippery 'ness uncoiled from the Guardian's grip. They landed roughly, Ignitia grabbing her by the tail at the last second and throwing Spyra with the weight of her fall.

Spyra flew into a squad of Orcs and sent the infantry flying from the force of the impact. When the Dark soldiers who survived attempted to surround her, they all died in a flash of lightning, their blackened cadavers dancing away in plumes of soot.

Spyra emerged from the chaos wreathed in a glowing sphere of pure Electricity. Ignitia swallowed.

The cry emerging from Spyra's throat was that of a banshee's. Ignitia felt her scales roasting when the orb touched her and exploded in a static cloud of force, cooking alive an entire mob of Grublins that had been gathering around her. Spyra landed before her and started swiping.

"Let's see whatchyu' got, grams-!" She howled. "This'll teach ya' to watch me rattle around some dipshit arena, chasin' a fuckin' sprite-!"

Ignitia snarled as the Electricity coursing through her veins caused her to jolt and twitch. She parried Spyra's blows with her wrists, or locked talons and dragged the connections off into their flanks. She tried to catch Spyra with her tail, but the purple dragoness rolled under the swipe and sprung.

She flew past Ignitia's neck and dragged her wing across the Guardian's face. The blow cracked out like a punch and caused Ignitia to preen on her heels like a horse.

"See that?! Old age musta' rusted up the joints!" Spyra cackled. "You're outta' the game!"

"I. Am. Not. OLD."

Spyra was there one second and was gone the next.

A fireball spat from Ignitia's chops caught her in the breast. There was a flash of light and a bark of thunder. Spyra flipped like a spiraling thread of debris for over twenty feet and ended her journey painfully: smashing through the roof of a storage tent. The structure buckled and collapsed in a blast of fire and smoke, killing a score of nearby infantry.

Suddenly, the flames whipped and a purple missile came streaking back out, like a flaming rubber ball rebounding off a wall. Spyra bellowed and landed in front of the Guardian. The very earth buckled and cracked, a crater crushing itself into existence as a wave of lightning shot out in a spreading ring. It fried Orcs and Grublins, and caused a catapult to cave in on itself, adding to the scene of carnage. It also hit Ignitia, and sent her cartwheeling backwards.

The fire dragoness caught her fall via her wings, flapped them, and was on top of Spyra again instantly. Spyra zipped in a zig-zag and dodged three consecutive cones of spat fire before leaping. Ignitia swatted her away like she was a fly, having only a second to growl victoriously, before an arm of Lightning shot her out of the sky.

She fell, trailing soot, and landed on the flank of a catapult. The siege engine buckled and the loaded dish-arm jolted westward. The restraints snapped, and as the weapon collapsed into a flaming heap, the lit firebrand loaded in the brazier was launched in a hellish arc. It ended its journey nearby in a brilliant explosion, hitting a platoon of Dark infantry advancing towards the gates of Oversight.

From nearby, the Fallen cringed as he continued working.

This wasn't the original plan, he thought, slashing an Orc across the throat and vaulting the corpse over his shoulder. But I suppose it's doing what it needs to do.

As the two mighty dragonesses effectively beat the piss out of one another in a hormonally-driven, whirlwind of a stupor, all of the attention was going right on to them, and in addition, the level of destruction they were causing was most appealing.

It's a good distraction at least…

"-And yet another one caused by the Spear of Truth, too!" Conscience appeared, fully bedecked in the same golden suit of armor as he ran beside him. "Think of all the power you wield with that thing! This really has become about something else other than finding a ticket home!"

"Now is not a good time." The Fallen snarled, heaving as he rolled a firebrand into the rest of the pile and hopped back.

"You're the one who questioned if you even had a home."

"I do!" The Fallen barked, beheading a Grublin, and shooting a Handcannon round that punched through another three of his fellows. "I just take it with me!"

He fired the second bullet at the firebrand pile, and ignited it.

A gigantic explosion rocked him back on his heels and drowned the world in amber light. The pile cooked off the pile next to it, and the one after that and then some, ripping apart each catapult they were originally intended for one after another.

Just a few more of those, and the rear will be crushed.

Right as he locked blades with an Orc, he and the monster heard the rush of flame and glanced off to the right. The Orc screamed like a girl, and the Fallen almost shit himself.

The combatants held one another and ducked to the dirt right as Spyra flew by wreathed in fire. She landed in a cluster of tents with a burst of flame, and soon the whole hovel was burning. A minute later, Ignitia flew over and threw herself into the flames after her. Another explosion, an angry roar, it was the Guardian this time flying away with a very angry purple menace latched onto her gut.

"Damnation. Can you believe I've slept with the purple one?" He looked at the Orc laying over his chest. The ugly beast blinked. "Hell, I might just get under the tail of the red one too, but, uh, the last thing I need right now is a therapist to listen to my sexy problems one and two."

He craned the Handcannon up and shot the Orc through the face, before rolling the corpse off.

"Despite the hiccups: I love my job."


{🐉}


{Legend of Spyro: The Eternal Night OST: Dreams}


"-'ve always wondered how dragons could be so audaciously prudish and amazingly obtrusive to take offense to such things. It isn't like personal space and bubbles matters when you're participating, being one with and so eagerly utilizing such services as a dancing hall. It was for the political elite too, in addition, and of course! We didn't need invitations, little things on slippages of parchment, paper and-"

Cynder was about ready to crane her tailblade over and slit her own wrists.

Unfortunately, she needed those to tie up the rest of the chains.

Metal clunked as the final link went into place, and the seals began to glow ardently with powerful magicks. Cynder blinked against the glare and huffed through her chops, taking a second to turn her dreadful, pale gaze up just a bit, so that she was level with Volteera's yellow snout.

The Guardian of Electricity was currently chained up on a duplicate platform to Cyrila's, all the way in the mountains above Oversight. Yet, she was chattering away and glancing around at everything with bashful interest, like she was on some leisure trip, talking the damned horns off her own grandmother or someone similarly too senile to know when to tell the hyperactive hen to shut up.

"-As it was, it was an unimportant, meaningless interactivity, but to know the untimely truth and sole reason for the rejection was that he was presently courting another was much distressing to me in my younger years! Ignitia was already a Guardian, and Terradora was off fighting, and Cyrila hated me so I didn't have a clue or inkling or standing notion to where she was! I felt so trapped! Ha-ha! ….A-Actually, I still do many days at especially later times, evenings, nights, hours of darkness…" The Electric Dragon's eyes went glassy and she looked through Cynder at something only she could see. The black dragoness' eye twitched, and for a moment, she thought the unbearable tide of vocal murder had ceased.

Then, Volteera blinked, and her mouth didn't even take a second to rev up before exploding again.

"You've shared some degree of conversation and communication and basing with my sister, Ignitia, so you'll have to excuse, pardon and understand my assumption that a small, tiny or quarter-portion of informatory senses might be allowed in our-"

"If you do not shut your mouth this instant, I'll ram my tailblade up your ass, and twist it to shut your mouth for you…" Cynder jammed their noses together with an enraged growl. She shouted. "Like you're a fucking sock-puppet!"

Volteera sucked up her own chops and blinked with wide eyes. When Cynder reclined with a tortured sigh and sat on her haunches to claw at her temples, the Guardian cleared her throat and glanced at both her wrists, which were restrained on either side of her chest. She started drumming their talons on the metal of the platform, appearing to be in thought.

"…I see." Was all she muttered.

"Oh, you see? Thank the Ancestors, I thought no one could!" Cynder sarcastically cackled, slapping her claws together and clenching them tightly under her chin as she smiled manically at her. That smile was then instantly wiped away for a grimacing sneer. "You think you can see, Guardian? You see nothing. You're just as blind as you were a few hours ago living your insipid life outside my clutches."

"…Forgive me, Cynder, but I wasn't talking about your reasons for action. I hardly think that any dragon could understand, appreciate, comprehend, or deduce what goes on in your mind."

Cynder went to open her mouth, and then shriveled, like a swiftly dying flower thrown in bleach.

Volteera glanced at her with a sheepish smile.

"I've always seen what ails those who come into contact with me, or brush paths with me or-" The Guardian coughed. "-I was taking note of your current disposition and mood."

"…Really now." Cynder chuffed, crossing her forepaws and letting her elegant tail curl around her haunches. "That's very interesting. Maybe you could elaborate on your findings without using fifty sentences and the next two hours. If you want an observation from my eyes, Guardian. Honestly, I don't feel petty when I say to you with honesty that I hope my words gnaw at your damned guts."

"T'is something I have suffered the predations, and conquests, and unwanted attentions of since my conception. Your belittlement, and harshness and venom is nothing in comparison to the last thirty years." Volteera sounded like she was trying to polite in her rebuttal. Cynder would've normally laughed, but…

"Oh, Volteera…" The black dragon turned her head away with a pained huff. "…Brush off whatever you will, and I know you would never be given a reason to care, but know this in addendum: you refusing my Mistress' offer all those years ago pains me with the lost opportunity."

"Opportunity?"

"We have so much in common." Cynder shivered. "Ugh, that tasted fouler than I thought it would…"

Volteera blinked.

Then she started laughing.

"What." The Cloud Ripper stood up and snarled. "You think this is funny?"

"-N-No-! Not at a-all-! Ha-!" Volteera calmed her hysterics, still smiling as she cleared up her throat and spoke again. "What is very brazenly worth such lighthearted lamentation is your naivety."

"….Naivety?" Cynder lowered the threatening stance of her wings. Now she was smiling too. "…Ancestors, you fooled me. I thought you were going to say something witty."

"But it is true."

"Yes, I've suddenly realized I have no time for this." Cynder whipped around, her paws whispering through the grass as she began to depart. "Enjoy your stay, Volteera, it'll be the last moment you'll be able to lay down anywhere ever again. I appreciate the chat."

"But, Cynder?"

"Good. Bye."

"You erroneously forgot my gem."

Cynder screeched to a halt at the edge of the grotto, her blackened form meandering to turn and glare over her own wings.

Volteera grinned with all her fangs and nodded at the empty cup smelted into the foot of her prison-pedestal.

"You most obviously and clearly need my Mana for some cantankerous, devious and ultimately fruitless endeavor. How else do you plan on acquiring, sapping, extracting, and appropriating said energies without the use of the gem?"

"…It isn't cantankerous." Cynder growled, trotting back over and casting her gaze to the flank.

A small, hunchbacked and hideous creature scurried over, holding up a duplicate looking crystal to the one currently residing with Cyrila in the mountains.

The Fly-breed Grublin buzzed its little wings, jumping away with a yip of fright when Cynder roughly snatched the gem out of its claw.

"Begone, filth." She spat, and the Grublin and gaggle of its fellows zipped into the afternoon woods surrounding the clearing, sounding like fat, impossibly large bumblebees on the move. "I hate those things."

"Did you not play a role, a part, or a chance in creating them?" Volteera cocked her head as Cynder gripped the gem in her jaws and crossed back over to her.

"I didh not." The Cloud Ripper muffled, spitting the gem out and sliding it into the opening. "Such offenses might find blame within the claws of my Mistress, and her dire workings of evolution and crossbreeding. I can't say I prefer them over my own soldiers, though, their expendability is commendable. There, Volteera, now your coffin has its final nail. This will be the last time you will ever see me."

"A feat soon to be gathered, accomplished and met, one you seem less than eager, or with purpose, or gusto to leave behind." The Guardian smiled briefly, flexing her blue wings against the chains. "You have your own reasons for this mission you have undertaken. What happened down south?"

"I lost." Cynder grumbled. "Doesn't everyone already know that for god's sake?"

"They do, but I hardly, impossibly and frankly refuse to think so of your purpose for kidnapping me. Might my last wish be to have clarity, clearness, a possible definition for my reason of demise?"

"Why does it matter why I'm killing you? You're dead no matter the reason."

"See? See? This is why we are not alike. This is why I laugh, and scoff, and boorishly rebuke your earlier proclamation." Said Volteera. "You want an end through hatred and anger. I wanted an end through desperation and solitude and sadness. Why I am always apart, different, saved and all from being like you is for the good I seek to keep alive, and protected, and whole."

"Wanted?" Cynder quirked a brow, feeling no satisfaction, surprisingly, when the confidence in Volteera's expression shattered like glass. "Nobody ever just tries to want something like that."

"Y-You're right." Volteera gave the first angry expression Cynder had seen from her outside of battle. It wasn't much, but for someone as bubbly as the Guardian, it might as well have been a sign of the impending apocalypse. "A fact I am certain, and positively and undoubtedly confident in saying that you know all too well, emerging in the ruination, and massacring, and wholesale slaughter of infants-"

Cynder punched her in the mouth.

The Guardian sputtered and yanked against the chains, her head roughly jolted away and leaking fresh blood from the nostrils. Volteera spat on the metal and shivered, remaining silent.

"Fuck you, Volteera." Cynder stomped closer and gripped the Guardian's blue crown, yanking her face close to her own and sneering. "Fuck. You. I think the insanity of all this will turn out to be: that if there is a draconic kingdom of heaven in the sky, and a hell below that, I might just find all of you down there in the latter with me. Wouldn't that be a treat? I know it would be. And for your information: I wish you had laid down and died twenty-five years ago. The world would've been bettered for it, and quieter too."

She threw Volteera back down and turned away. The gem hummed and Volteera gasped as a vibrant, yellow glow began to light up the clearing. The gem started to sap away her energy sluggishly.

"I wish that too." Volteera weakly mumbled, curling up like a dying spider.

"Then we are alike." Cynder spat, pointing back at the pedestal with her tail. "Make sure nobody interrupts the ritual. If you see interlopers: kill them. If the human arrives, capture him at all costs, or I'll kill all of you that are left."

The Orc grunted and hefted a battleaxe on its pauldron. More Grublin Flies materialized out of the shadows and zipped around the clearing.

Cynder spread her blood-red wings and took to the sky, not even glancing back at the pitiful creature she had just murdered twice.


{🐉}

He certainly looked important…

The Fallen sneered and dragged his gladius out of the confines of the Orc's chest cavity. The bulky creature's eyes rolled back and it collapsed into the dirt, the thick bands of armor obscuring its emaciated body clattering like a bundle of pots and pans.

A road of bodies traced where he'd begun the latest excursion and where it had ended. The cluster of tents stood whispering over a collective of corpses. Lots of Orcs had been here. Ones wearing flaunting totem posts and officer's helmets. The campsite had a huge flagpost bearing a black and red banner at its top flapping in the breeze. He'd sent it toppling into the command tent and then had set it all on fire just to make a point.

In combination with the dragon-lady duel going on, the Fallen had been able to systematically slaughter over six command posts of what were obviously members of the leadership echelon of the Dark Army here. Those losses, and the platoons he'd butchered during the trips, all equaled to something he'd say was pretty catastrophic. Blunting the rear was the first bit of business, and as far as he was concerned, there were no siege engines left that he hadn't blown up, shot full of holes or set aflame.

From the top of the wooded hill, the shattered remains of the Dark Army's campsites looked almost relieving. Carpets of dead lie everywhere, tents and engines burned, and the skies looked clear enough, thanks to Spyra.

Turning his gaze to the walls of Oversight, the Fallen took off his helmet to wipe sweat and black blood off his face before pressing onwards, his muscles screaming, and the handful of lacerations he had suffered aching.

The Moles had done fantastic work. He could remember quite a few blows that the plating deflected that would've outright killed him had he been bare of it. An Orc had batted him in the chest with a two-handed hammer. A crossbow bolt had slid down the inclined flank of his helmet in a near-miss for his face. A few Grublins had caught him out in the open and started throwing spears.

Maybe the furry little guys aren't so bad after all.

The journey towards the city gates was devoid of action, though he did have to hike through mounds of corpses he and the two dragons had created over the last three or so hours. They hadn't liberated the city yet, but they had effectively removed the entirety of the Dark Army's artillery advantage in one fell swoop.

He looked around for Spyra or Ignitia and discovered that he could not pick them out anywhere. It was concerning, but at the same time, he needed to get inside the city.

I'll find them.

He proceeded up the winding, cliff road leading up to the city gates. It was strewn with dead Grublins and battle damage. He had to crawl over the fly-infested remains of a Troll that had taken a cannonball to the face and was sprawled over the path. The whole thing smelt horrifically of death from beginning to end. He remembered years ago that it was the same smell that used to make him sicken.

Somehow, after so many warzones, it had stopped impacting him, at least enough so that he could operate in its thickness without difficulty.

Smelling the dead and making the dead gets easier and easier…

"…Yeah, so too does letting the soul slip." The Fallen grumbled, scanning the upper walls cautiously as he approached. He missed his real armor. His harness had boosterpacks that could've gotten him up there in a jiffy.

Now, here he was prancing around in some medieval getup with an army of Orcs shooting fire up his ass.

If the battle damage hadn't polluted everything, he would've taken note of the beauty of the draconic architecture. The gateway arch had a pair of siege towers whose fronts facing the road had been sculpted to resemble a pair of glaring dragon heads. Their eyes were murder-slots that archers could take positions in.

"Jeez'… and there I was a few days ago, thinking these people were sheltered."

The grand square past the toppled gate doors looked like hell. Corpses were everywhere. A beautiful fountain and a pair of statues had been utterly smashed. The variety of storefronts and buildings sealing in the block had been shot full of holes, knocked down, were on fire, or a combination of the three.

Many of the dead were Moles and dragons.

He checked the walls again, grunting when he saw how empty the defense palisades were, and knelt beside the corpse of a blue-scaled drake. His chest had been breached right through a silver-colored cuirass, and blood was leaking out of his fanged mouth. A quarter of his face had been sloughed off from the cheek down, probably from a Morningstar or a maul. The Fallen closed the only eye that hadn't been shredded, and stood back up to survey the rest of the block.

He killed a trio of Grublins looting trinkets off the dead, and ended the misery of another six or seven as he perused the mounds of macabre mass. The groan of a tired voice caught his attention, and after rolling over a deceased Earth Dragon, he found the beaten, bloody form of an Orc, still breathing, little red eyes glaring at him hatefully from the street's cobble.

The Fallen raised his Handcannon for its face, but paused when he saw the finned helmet it wore, and the totem-poles jutting out from behind its pauldrons.

"Hoo-man…" The Orc spat blood, its voice deep and ragged. "…Dark Master… kill you…"

"Maybe she'll try, but there's one thing certain here: you aren't going to."

He slid out his gladius and tapped it on his kneeplate.

"Tell me who and where the highest ranking commander in your army here is, or I'll saw off your foot and make you drink the blood from the stump."

The Orc sat up on the street, a claw over a series of slash-wounds across its stomach, and it started chortling.

The Fallen laughed with him, and then knelt and proceeded to follow through on his threat.

After a minute, he became used enough to the screams that he stopped wincing when they became ear-piercing.

After the second foot and a hand, the Orc started talking, quick enough too before the blood-loss made him fade.

"Urukal… Besieging the castle square." The Fallen followed the sounds of fighting as he departed the ruined square. "I'll put his fucking head on a pike and piss in his mouth. Maybe not in that exact order."

He had to slaughter his way through a few wandering bands of Grublins. He carried a severed, moss-like head around from one of his victims for a few blocks, and used it to get the jump in a few fights, tossing it into the middle of the squads to scare them before leaping in and slashing them all to death.

Eventually, he found a battalion of Grublins led by some Orcs taking cover among a warehouse yard or gathering in a mob at the foot of a pair of stairwells leading up to the city walls.

There was a beleaguered unit of Mole infantry and some dragons. They were trapped on the section of the wall above, engaged on the stairs and from two directions as both towers gapping their section had been taken.

The Fallen started out by butchering his way through the warehouse yard. The late afternoon sun blared through the sooty heavens and shown rays down that appeared to gleam off his golden armor in what would've been a beautiful day had the place not been burning.

Decapitating an Orc, he stomped on a Grublin until it died and then hurled himself into the rear of the ranks attacking the stairwell. An Electric Dragon scythed through the mob with a bolt of lightning, and a pair of Ices froze the front ranks at the top because of the Fallen's distractive efforts. When he slashed his way to the top, a batch of terrible-looking Mole soldiers were there to greet him.

"Didn't know the capital started recruitin' Apes." A Mole grunted as he ripped a glaive out of the twitching corpse of a Grublin. "No other way you coulda' gotten that armor from our lads down there."

"I'm not an Ape, what the hell are you, blind?" Probably not the best thing to say, but he was recovering from slaughtering an entire battalion. His patience was thin, damn it.

"Partially." The Mole pointed at the goggles perched on his snout. "Hell all if we're wearing these things for anythin' else."

"Where's your commander?"

"Mind helpin' us clear the top of the wall first there, super-fighter? We can talk then."

Fifteen minutes later, the Fallen found himself surrounded by a Wing, mixed from at least three different units that had been mauled earlier in the day. Five Ice Dragons, a trio of Electrics, two Earth and a handful of Fires. It certainly made for a nice rainbow effect.

"You're the Fallen?" The only officer left was one of the Ices. He was missing an eye. Judging by the blood drying on the dressing covering it up, it had been lost within the last few hours.

Tough bastard.

"Yes." He wiped his gladius off on a dead Orc and nodded. "Is this your whole unit?"

"Everyone who isn't lying down there in the streets and square." The dragon grunted, casting his gaze down at the sprawl of the city below. So much of it was on fire… "I'm Acirek, captain."

"Did any other units survive?" The Fallen pointed at some distant movement on the nearby defense walls and towards the castle in the center of the city. It was fat, the center bailey sprouting a trio of stout spires and a sealed squarelot of structures to its south. "And is that the capital building?"

"Most of the survivors made it back to the castle, but we think there's a few trapped on sections of the wall. Yes, that's Castle Crownhorn, Queen Lilith is there, along with one of the Guardians."

"Where is the Guardian?"

"We're not sure. We were being led by Guardian Volteera and Commander Meskfog, but she vanished and Meskfog's dead."

"Volteera's been captured by Cynder." The Fallen pointed with his sword. "The defeat at the gates was a complete overrun?"

"How do you mean?"

"Did you all scatter or not?"

"Scattered."

"God damn it…" The Fallen tugged at his bloodstained, sweaty jaw and tried to think. He was tired. His limbs were on fire. "…Captain, organize your unit and start gathering in the square. I'm going to send you reinforcements."

"But, there's a flight of Wyverns controlling the skies, and the Dark Army is constantly funneling in through the square! It's gone!"

"The Wyverns are dead, and everyone out there," The Fallen nodded over the merlons looking out over the coast. "I sliced their blocks off. The Purple Dragon is here, as is Guardian Ignitia. Your reinforcements have come, so now it's time to get your shit together and haul ass. We're taking Oversight back."


{🐉}

Spyra swatted weakly at Ignitia's face, and the Guardian panted as she dragged her tail over her chest in what was supposed to be a fierce strike.

Exhausted, the two dragonesses collapsed on top of one another in a heap, heaving, and panting, letting their collective sweat mix.

"…I-I… wha'?..." Ignitia moaned. "…W-Where am I...? S-Spyra? Spyra! A-Are you hurt?! What happened?!"

"…Just a scratch…" Spyra genuinely grumbled, glancing at the various bruises and lacerations speckling her flank before laying her head down on Ignitia's chest and shutting her eyes for a moment. "…Did he touch you?"

"W-What? Who?" Ignitia held the sides of her head and rubbed tenderly, so shocked and confused that she didn't even know what to do.

"The Fallen. Did he touch you?"

They met gazes and Ignitia's mouth flapped for a moment.

"…y-yes…." She eventually squeaked.

"Then that's what happened."

Ignitia furrowed her browline and went to say something. The crumble of earth stopped her and she glanced around to take in their surroundings.

Her and Spyra were lying in the center of a blast crater. There was a trio of Dark Army designed trebuchet engines burning nearby and there were dead Orcs and Grublins everywhere, many of them burning and/or scorched to charry blackness as well.

"…It's his touch. He has… powers or something, I don't fuckin' know…" Spyra wiggled her talons and huffed over Ignitia's chest plating, looking like she was angrily sleeping. "…You musta' gone crazy, with him sittin' on ya' like that, and so… I've been crazy, and here we are…"

"What are you saying?" Ignitia held onto her shoulders. "Spyra?"

"We threw each other around or something, I guess." Spyra used her wrist to wipe some stray blood on her snout away and spat over Ignitia's flank. When she noticed the Guardian's horrified expression, she wing-shrugged. "No biggie'. When I was small enough for him to actually have a chance, me and Firefly used to kick each other's asses as kids."

"My hatchling!" Ignitia shrieked, making Spyra sputter and scramble madly when she embraced her and squished her against her chest. The Guardian was crying hysterically. "I-I'm so sorry!"

"-Step off, lady-! Damn it- Ignitia-! Lemme' go-! It's fine-! I forgive! I forgive! Peace among dragons!"

"I-I did it again!" Ignitia wailed, completely oblivious to Spyra's complaints as she rocked them both in the dirt. "I acted irresponsibly! A-And put you in harm's wayyyyy….ohhhnoo….." She sobbed.

"Ignitia!" Spyra angrily sang, finally tugging free and leaping off. "Damn, Ignitia! Give a 'ness some space, will ya'…?"

"I don't even remember the last few minutes! O-Or hours!" The Guardian flew to her feet, only refraining from embracing Spyra again when the purple heroine hopped back and hissed at her like an angry crocodile. "I'm so sorry-! I'm-! I-I feel feint… I feel-"

Spyra flapped her wings, attained even height with the larger dragoness, and promptly smacked her across the face.

The poor Guardian looked like someone had just murdered her pet gerbil, and gripped the slapped cheek with both forepaws. Her eyes were wide.

"Get it together, dude! We're in the war now, 'member?" Spyra barked. "Listen, I get we made a doozy, and just batted each other around like balls of yarn and shit, but we have to save that city! The Fallen's probably already inside! And what about Terradora? They both need help!"

Shellshocked, all Ignitia could do was blink and give a little nod. She still hadn't let go of her snout.

"Alright, good!" Spyra turned on a heel and hopped to the top of the crater, glancing around and sneering at all the corpses, she spread her orange wings and turned back to her. "We can talk apologies later, but right now, fly!"


{🐉}

"Head for the square, there are two captains already waiting with their units for you, we're assembling a response army, and we're going to attack the main force inside the city, go!"

"Go to the main square! Three units are there already, we're preparing a counter-attack! Hurry!"

"Oh shut the fuck up and just go to the main square! We're taking the city back. Just go. God damn it…"

The Fallen collapsed on the ground and stared at the sooty sky, blood and sweat running in rivers off of him and his armor.

As the last dragon flew off, and the last Moles marched down the stairs, the walls became empty, save all the corpses. The Fallen lounged there as his body shrieked. He couldn't even speak. He was so thirsty, that he was almost willing to kneel and start drinking some of the dead's blood puddles. He couldn't feel his arms, and his Handcannon had run out of ammunition. His breastplate was compromised by an axe strike, and one of his pauldrons had been shredded at the lower chin.

Isn't this just grand… He hacked and coughed, closing his eyes and trying to imagine the inside of his cuirass was made of nesting sheets.

The Fallen made a wheezing noise. It was supposed to be a laugh.

Nesting…

Most humans would just say bed.

He supposed by this long point in the journey of his life, he had been thoroughly dragonized. It wasn't like he could help it. After all, he talked with them, lived with them, fought beside them, fought against them, had sex with them, and so forth…

What I need is… is….

"Water? Food? A bandaid?" Conscience strolled by, hands behind his back as he smiled down at the defeated warrior. In contrast, he just looked divine, armor undamaged, face not caked with gore. "One of those regen-injections?"

"….a good… pair…. Of boobies."

The Fallen held out his hands in a cupping motion at the sky, letting them fall back down, his gauntlets clattering on the brick of the wall.

"…nice… dragon boobies… I'd like that…"

"You're so close, my friend. So so close…"

"….h-how….?" The Fallen frowned, and closed his eyes, forcing himself to just stay still and breathe. He was still seeing blades falling and swiping inside his eyelids. "….Conscience… I feel like I'm dying…"

"You know what dying feels like, and this isn't it." Conscience knelt and dusted his breastplate off, clicking his tongue at the rent torn through the left breast. "This is probably one of the most anticlimactic places you could give up."

"…T-This city… is infested…" The Fallen whispered. "…N-No matter how many survivors…. I save…. you and I both know that it…. it isn't enough."

"It is enough." Conscience smiled, jabbing a thumb at the sky. "You've got them."

"Fallen!"

Spyra landed, claws clicking on the wall as she bounded over and gripped his flank, making him wince.

"Fallen, are you hurt?" She cried. Ignitia landed just behind her, cautiously stepping closer with that same, shocked expression still on her face. "Talk to me, man!"

"…Not hurt…" He wheezed. "….just… tired…"

"The main battalion is assaulting the castle…" Ignitia swallowed, glancing over the back of the wall towards Crownhorn over the small sea of rooftops. "Why didn't you go there, Fallen?"

"…Survivors…" He pointed at the other side of the city, to another section of wall. "…Trapped… remnants on the walls… was gathering… response force…"

"That's a good idea." Spyra glanced back at her. "If the main square fell and some of the guys there didn't get whacked, we could mass the survivors and use them in the final push."

"Then that is our job." Ignitia spread her wings again. "You are uninjured, Fallen?"

"…yeah." He forced himself to sit up, sounding like a teetering tree as he slowly rose, gripping Spyra's wings for support. "…I'm okay. Let's go."

"Woah, no way, dude, you look like you're about to pass out. I'd say, uh…" Spyra grinned at some of the bodies. "…you did pretty good for today. Let the girls handle this one."

"Together, this time." Ignitia smiled warmly, and then frowned again. "…Despite whatever shame it might later entail… Fallen, collect yourself and make for the castle, the Dark Army is gathering in the courtyard and are trying to break down the main doors. If they get inside…"

"…That's where the population has been evacuated to." The Fallen finished for her, nodding as he stood up on shaking legs. "They won't have enough soldiers inside to stop them. If they get through the doors, all of Oversight will be slaughtered."

"How many units did you find?" Spyra stepped back. "Gimme' a rundown, Fallen, what we got to work with."

"Maybe a hundred? I didn't count." He pointed back towards the gates. "Three or four officers. It isn't enough. The detachment outside the castle is double that. I was only able to get that vague amount, and some names out of the prisoners I found…"

"Prisoners?" Spyra glanced around. "What prisoners?"

"Indeed." He tiredly smiled. She laughed.

"We'll gather the remainder of the soldiers, and I'll direct them for the castle. Spyra-" Ignitia paused, but remained resolute. "-the moment we liberate the last of the survivors, head to the castle ahead of us, so you can buy the defenders some time. Use everything you have."

"You got it!" Spyra wagged her tail. "The Fallen can take the streets, maybe by the time he gets there, he'll have recovered some."

"…I'm fine." He shook his head. "Enough talking, both of you, we have to move quickly."

"Good luck, Fallen." Ignitia lifted off. "-We'll talk about those hands of yours later…"

"Yeah, you're in trouble, by the way." Spyra smirked. "I reckon all three of us have some dirt we gotta' talk about when and if we get out of this in one piece. Oh, and P.S: I still hate your guts. Anyway, buh-bye now…"

She vanished into the sky with a burst of wind. The Fallen watched them both go, snickered, and started limping for the stairs.

"…Let's hope I don't take a tumble…"

He tripped four down and landed on his face.

It was a good thing he had solid armor…


{🐉}