"I take it everything worked as we'd hoped, then?" Miko asked, his voice as monotonous as it had been to this point. Although… maybe Kano was just imagining it, but he swore there was just a hint of approval in his voice.
Instead of answering directly, Kano turned to the nearest tree stump. He raised his hands above it and clasped them together - his magic sparked to life, both arms wrapped in lightning.
"Lightning Dragon's Jaw!"
Kano brought his hands down on the stump and watched as it splintered apart. Lightning broke off from his hands, shooting out around the impact.
"It'll take some practice to get back to where I was, not to mention learning to use it with my other magic, but…" Kano flexed an arm and smiled. It still sparked with leftover electricity. "Yeah, it worked out better than I could have hoped. Thanks, Miko. I owe you one."
"It's my duty as your guildmate," the redhead replied matter-of-factly.
"Well, possible guildmate, technically," Kano quipped, still examining his hands. He clenched them and, after a moment, willed the sparks away. He might have a difficult time willing away all the magic now, but at least he could actually use it.
"I'm rather confident in your abilities. You may not be used to your draconic magic, but you did say you were a cage fighter before Amethyst found you. I don't have too many concerns. If I may, though, I recommend caution. We don't know what other side effects you may bear from essentially forcing your magic to resurface."
"Well, when you put it like that…" He stopped, sniffing the air. That was an odd smell - cat? Wet cat, specifically, but there was something else about it, too. "Random question. Are there a lot of cats along the way to Hamstead?"
The Thunder Dragon Slayer tilted his head. "Not to my knowledge, although that's far from my field of expertise. Why?"
"I smell wet cat s'all. Smells funky, though," he answered with a shrug. He couldn't quite place what was odd about the smell, though. Whatever it was just smelled… strange, like it didn't belong. It put him on edge a bit, but maybe he was just paranoid.
"Gate of the Dragon: Dracos!"
Kano's head snapped in the direction of the noise - the same direction the smell seemed to come from. "That sounded like Seren!"
"Indeed, and it sounds like he's using his summons. That's concerning. Hurry to them, then. I'll make my way shortly."
Kano didn't need to hear that twice. He was going to run, but he knew they were a ten minute walk away. It would be draining, but getting to them faster would be ideal. He looked up to the sky and, for a moment, imagined himself there. He blinked, and when he opened his eyes, he was above the treeline.
His jade gaze quickly found the way they'd come from, back towards the road, and so began the exhausting process of teleporting himself.
"This juvenile fear of yours really needs to be put to bed."
"Claws hurt, Dracos!"
A sigh escaped the woman's lips. In front of Seren and Silas stood a tall woman with long, blonde hair. A red dragon tail and draconic wings sprouted from her back, with armor formed around them. Despite the undoubtedly strong scales that cover her tail, her plate armor extended to a tail guard, metal plates strapped across its entire length. Better safe than sorry, one would suppose.
She held a broadsword aloft in her hands, the blade polished to perfection as she stared down their foes - werecats.
For what it was worth, Seren was usually quite brave. He wasn't one to let his spirits do all the work, even if they were his physical superior. He fought alongside them, helped where he could. However, right now he was in the air on a platform of fog courtesy of the broody-looking boy with the umbrella. "They're no different from any other werebeast!"
She sighed as she saw a holographic interface pop up over the cloud. Seren's secondary magic, Archive, was a wonderful tool. It helped to be able to provide information on the fly. He would still help, at least, despite his fears.
To buy the wizard time, she twirled her sword in-hand, then sliced through the air. What followed was a crescent-shaped wave of fire. Most of the werecats were dextrous enough to evade her blow, but a few were too slow and were caught in her flames. "Roar of the Silver Star Dragon!"
Seren confirmed that vulnerability a moment later. "Okay, I got all my information on werecats pulled up! They have exceptionally good eyesight, hearing and smell - on par with a Dragon Slayer's. Because of their fur, they're very flammable, and their tails can be a pretty good point to target! Cutting it should mess with their balance, otherwise pulling it or stepping on it can trip them up!"
Dracos held her blade aloft with one hand, using her free one to touch the tip of the blade with her index and middle fingers. She ran it down the blade, and it slowly lit ablaze. "Razor Fire Claw!"
Dracos slashed her blade out in front of her each time one of the beasts dared to try and close the distance.
Silas twirled his umbrella, then raised his free hand. "If they have enhanced senses like the others, then I suppose a smokescreen would hinder us a lot more than it would them. Very well."
Vapor shot out of the boy's palm, and began to enshroud two of the werecats. "Expanding Fog!"
Dracos noted that once both werecats were hit, they began to slow down. The fog lived up to the spell's name, as after it made contact it started to slowly expand across their entire bodies. Once it had, they stopped moving, but she could still hear the sounds of them struggling. Not a finishing spell, then, but one for crowd control, to disable specific targets.
"According to this, it's a form of lycanthropy - felinethropy, I guess? Either way, they're probably people subjected to this. Try not to hurt them!"
Good enough for her. Not including the two beasts the other wizard had disabled for the moment, that left eight of these werecats. She planted the tip of her sword into the earth and stared down the remaining monsters. They stayed there, in a silent showdown, for five seconds. Then ten. At the sixteenth second, two of them charged her. Dracos ripped her sword from the ground, and it cleaved through the air as one of the creatures hit the ground just a moment later. The dragon ensured the strike wasn't a fatal one, so that stopped her from painting the ground beneath their feet red. Along with probably being the more moral choice, it had the added benefit of her footwork not needing to be modified to account for any viscera she may have otherwise spilled.
The second lunged at her, but the dragon outspeeds the cat on even its worst day. She ducked beneath its gnashing claws and fangs, allowed it to sail over her, and at the last moment grabbed its tail. She threw the creature onto the ground, and with one slash ended its struggle.
A third thought to rush her, but a quick sidestep and shoulder check knocked the creature off-balance. She swung at it, severing its tail.
She sniffed the air briefly, and despite Seren shouting a warning about two more trying to flank her, the Dragon grinned. It smelled like another would enter the fray…
A bolt of lightning lashed out from the sky, striking the foes behind her and leaving the thick scent of ozone in the air around them, especially potent to her nose. As she struck her tailless target with the pommel of her broadsword, her eyes chanced a look back at their latest arrival.
Kano Stroud smiled as he landed, lightning still dancing across his entire body. He glanced around, to better survey the scene around him. Seren was up in the air, with Silas still on the ground. Shia was off to the side, observing, and a woman he didn't recognize next to him. Given her draconic appearance, however, and the fallen werecats that most certainly weren't a result of his arrival, he could take a gander that this, then, was Dracos.
"Figure we can have proper introductions later," the Lightning Slayer said with a wicked grin. "I haven't gotten to do this in seven years - gotta make up for lost time!"
His enhanced hearing picked up movement to his side. Kano back-stepped just in time to see claws pass by where his face had been not even a moment prior. Whew! Thank goodness for those draconic senses! The grin he wore previously had yet to falter as he pulled back his fist. Lightning enveloped it, and without missing a beat he launched it towards the werecat's gut. "Lightning Dragon's Iron Fist!"
The werecat's body spasmed as Kano's fist connected with it, and the beast was sent flying back, toppling into one of its charging pack members.
The fire along the dragon lady's blade died down as she held the weapon by its blade. He'd never quite seen someone use a sword like a hammer, but as she brought it down upon the prone werecat, he couldn't deny its effectiveness as the beast was swiftly rendered unconscious. Not one to be outdone, and with his fist still sparking with lightning, the Dragon Slayer rushed towards the last beast. He jumped into the air, the lightning coating both arms now. He brought his hands forward, clapping them together. "Lightning Dragon's Thunder Clap!"
A burst of lightning shot from his hands, impacting directly into the final werecat and its body shook for a moment before it joined its kin in collapsing on the ground. Kano fist-bumped the air as his body sparked, the occasional discharge leaving his body and harmlessly zapping the ground.
"Ghost Limbs."
Kano looked in the direction of the voice as he saw two giant hands made of mist. They lashed out, grabbing what looked like two werecat-shaped clouds. His eyes glanced to the origin point, where he saw Silas, arms outstretched. An extension of his own arms? He watched as the boy slammed the clouds into the ground, and when he retracted his fog arms, two unconscious werecats were left in his wake.
Kano clapped. "Good work team- ow!"
As the dragon slayer clapped, he recoiled as he ended up zapping himself with his lightning. "Well, I sure hope that isn't permanent."
"Judging by the smell," an unfamiliar, feminine voice said. Well, perhaps not entirely unfamiliar - he had yet to put it to a face, but he heard her casting magic while he was racing to catch up with he looked in the direction of the voice, he was met with a rather pretty woman in armor, with red horns sprouting from her head. He didn't miss the wings and tail she sported, either. "And the magic, I can figure you're a Dragon Slayer?"
"That's me - name's Kano. I heard Seren summoning you - I take it that makes you Dracos? I'd offer to shake your hand, but I'm apparently zapping myself, so…"
"Quite alright," she assured him, her expression neutral, with perhaps a slight hint of approval. Or was that recognition? "A pleasure to meet Seren's new friends."
Speaking of Seren…
"Silas! You can let me down now buddy!"
"Oh," the fog wizard murmured. "Right."
The platform holding the Celestial Spirit wizard descended slowly, until Seren was safely deposited onto the ground. Kano, though, noticed what appeared to be… screens of some kind, hovering around his body. "What's all that?"
"Oh, these?" Seren asked, golden gaze glancing over to the screens. "It's my Archive magic - I can store a whole lot of information here! Everything from different kinds of magic, dragons, gods, Harley Jensen's best-sellers, and all kinds of monsters I've read about!"
One of those wasn't quite like the rest, but he supposed the point was made. "Sounds pretty useful. You got any stuff about these cat things?"
"Oh yeah! They're called werecats - like werewolves but…" The purple-haired wizard shivered. "Cats."
"Wait, so does that mean they're people?"
"Uh, according to this, yeah. They should've transformed back once they were knocked out," Seren pondered, a hand on his chin as he mulled over the possibilities. It seemed to not be necessary, as a moment later the werecats' bodies began shifting and glowing. "Oh, looks like it's happening now!"
"They're naked."
"Yes, they are!" Kano turned his head away. "Silas can you, uh, do that fog thing?"
Meanwhile, back in Port Hanshen…
Varric Lomadieu exited off of his personal airship, five individuals in tow. One walked alongside him, while the others marched behind the pair, two to their left and two to their right.
"You're sure?" Varric asked the man walking alongside him. They looked to roughly be the same age, but Varric knew he had walked this earth more than twice the length his fellow did.
"I remember it like it was yesterday," the man assured him.
"Good," Varric said coolly. "That vile beast dies today."
He walked through Port Hanshen, undisturbed by the looks and murmuring around him. It wasn't often Varric visited the city anymore, but today was different. Today he was on a very important mission.
However, that mission wasn't in the city itself. Oh, no. Varric and his cadre ignored the city- the only reason they'd truly stopped there was because there was nowhere safe in the forest to land.
Once they reached the outskirts of Port Hanshen, where a sprawling forest began, Varric took to the trees, followed closely by his small squad. After about an hour of travel, leaping from branch to branch, the enhanced senses of his unit always on the lookout, they quietly came to a stop as they approached the start of a clearing. And in that clearing was Varric's quarry.
A maroon-scaled dragon, the monster's body was pelted with wounds it had neglected to tend to and, what allowed them to follow it here, was an enormous gash in its left wing. It had almost been sheared off entirely, but it hung on by a thread. Varric was ecstatic to have this dragon before him.
He motioned with two fingers forward - the four guards that had been flanking them leaped into the air, their obsidian armor reflecting the afternoon sun, before they descended down upon their prey. The first of the group began to spin itself around mid-flight.
"Dragon Slayer's Secret Art: Indestructible Heaven Piercer!"
Using its magic, the now-revealed Slayer's lower body turned into a single, large blade made entirely from diamond. The maroon dragon looked to the sky in surprise - a moment too late, as it was met with the blade into its back, ripping apart its scales and tearing into its flesh.
The great beast roared and lumbered at the strike, recoiling downwards, only to feel an intense burning in its flank.
"Hell Flame Dragon's Roar!"
From a mouth it lacked, the second of the red-visored Slayers launched a torrent of flames into the Dragon's flank.
"Stone Dragon's Earth Pillars!"
The third sent a pair of stone pillars from the ground itself into the Dragon's burned flank, piercing melting scales and entering flesh.
The dragon let out a cacophonous roar, and retaliated with an attack of its own. Vile acid spewed from the dragon's mouth, covering the Stone Slayer that pierced its hide.
Or, it would have.
"Sound Dragon's Shield!"
The fourth of Varric's soldiers stomped its foot and outstretched its hands - and he could see the soundwaves rippling the air as it repelled the attack. The acid slid off of the shield and harmlessly onto the ground.
"Acid," Varric observed plainly. The man next to him, however, noted an unusual hint of cold satisfaction as the Wizard Saint spoke. "A useful magic type, I believe it will be very beneficial. This trip is proving more worthwhile than expected."
Ignoring the horrible pain of its wing, the dragon began to take flight, but was stopped once again.
"Diamond Dragon's Sword!"
The little muscle and bone still connecting the two halves of its wing were severed by the first Slayer, causing the Dragon to stumble and fall.
Its spiked tail lashed out, striking the Stone Slayer and causing it to be smashed against the ground. However, none of the usual fleshy insides left it. Instead, the Slayer sparked before exploding, bolts and other bits of machinery showered the landscape. Most notable to Varric, however, was the still-preserved Dragon Lacrima that rolled across the ground.
He spoke again, this time projecting his voice across the clearing. "Help me disable him."
He dropped from his tree, striding across the ground and towards the dragon. His dreadlocks, long as they already were, began to lengthen, snaking across the ground as though each lock had a mind of its own. One lock wrapped around the lacrima, pulling it back to the Wizard Saint.
"Do you know how long I've been chasing you?" He asked the dragon, as deceptively strong locks of hair writhed into the earth, before breaking out below the dragon and forcing it to the ground.
It opened its mouth to prepare a breath attack, but Varric's Diamond Slayer was quick to fix that. The automaton shifted both hands into one, large spike and drove it through the dragon's maw and into the ground, then adjusted it so it clasped around the creature's entire mouth like a muzzle.
"The answer is quite some time," he answered for the dragon. "Thank you X1," he added to the Diamond Slayer. Then, his gaze turned towards the Hell Flame one. "X4, please retrieve this dragon's heart, but wait for the right moment."
Varric looked into the dragon's eyes, the only thing between them being his signature sunglasses. "Now, normally I'd say I take no joy in this, but I won't lie to you. The pain I know this will cause you?"
He heard fire, and the dragon snarled loudly, only kept from defending itself by Varric's bodyguard's magic.
"I'm going to enjoy it, very much."
A synthesized voice spoke from below the dragon.
"Councilman Lomadieu, objective in-sight. Awaiting your signal."
"Good," Varric murmured. He glanced away from the dragon and removed his sunglasses. He could feel the beast try and tug at the impossibly strong hair binding it, but alas there was far too much of it. Like the depths of Hell he intended to drag the wyrm down to, his grasp was unrelenting. "Now then, look into my eyes and this will all be over."
At first, the monster didn't oblige. That was alright, Varric would make it.
More hair snaked across the Dragon's scales, before eventually coming to rest around its head, and forced the beast to look into Varric's eyes. The resistance began to fade…
"Now, X4."
The struggling was over.
Varric released the dragon, and his three remaining soldiers came to him, following him as they exited the clearing. The councilman put his glasses back over his eyes before he turned to his guide. "Excellent work Dimitri. Please arrange to have my new set piece transported back to Era. I'll handle the report on the effectiveness of the Fourth Generation Slayers."
As Varric and his three remaining slayers left, the dragon's bleeding heart in tow, Dimitri turned back into the clearing, where now there sat a towering stone statue of a dragon.
A/N: Well, much sooner than the 6 months both the last chapters took at least. I'm not quite sure how the fight scenes will read out for y'all - I hope they're fun, it's just not something I'm used to writing on my own just yet. Please give me your honest thoughts, and if you've ideas to improve on it I'm always open to criticism.
I also forgot to do this last chapter, so:
Shanhara Sanguine was submitted by Red Reef here on FF.