— Chapter 4 —
Oracle
The Nightwing was still feeling out of breath after what he'd just experienced, he accidentally killed his father… No, Blizzard accidentally killed his father… But he was Blizzard and felt everything that he felt, so his heart was beating fast because just a minute ago, he was on the brink of being stabbed by his own dad, the panic and shaking not stopping.
He felt something on his talons while he was distracted and focused on his own thoughts that at the same time aren't his. He looked down and saw a silver bowl filled to the brim with water, his eyes looking up towards his "voice of reason", but he had already quickly seated back down on his spot at the table, not looking at him.
Oracle began to quickly sip down on the cold, refreshing water, and it was at least helping him to calm down, so he emptied the bowl then looked at Blizzard.
"Hm… Thanks…?" Oracle muttered, but the Icewing barely gave him a side glance.
"I merely did that because it'd be an issue to talk if you're panicking after basically almost being murdered," he replied in a low tone of voice, staring at the scroll.
Oracle looked up to him for some moments, expecting the hybrid to say more about all this. And he must've read in his thoughts just that because he let out a sigh now.
"I had no idea that the ring worked like that," he said with a grunt. "I thought you'd just get visions in third person, not that you would literally be me… Reading my own emotions and memories felt extremely odd."
Oh, if the scroll had been as detailed as it apparently has always been, Oracle could imagine how weird reading about himself would be, so he gave a slight nod.
"So…" Blizzard said, talking slowly. "How did it feel? To be me when I was a young dragonet?"
Oracle was unsure on how to answer that, being the dragon that he's also currently talking to is such an awkward feeling, but finally he answered.
"... Depressing?"
That earned him a glare from Blizzard, who grumbled to himself for a moment.
"I suppose that if I were to condense my existence to a single word… Yes, I guess that would do…" The hybrid replied.
"And… So nerve wracking too, rarely there ever was true peace, even in the 3 more calm years, father's…. Huh I mean, Boreas' mind would never stop, there was that fear of him never being satisfied…" Oracle muttered.
Blizzard closed his eyes for a moment and nodded afterwards. "I'd never forget that in my life, although reading it all just makes these old memories all the clearer once more…"
Blizzard rubbed his own head then shook it as he stared at Oracle. "Anyway, there you have it, my sad and depressing backstory to explain my awful actions," he said in a deadpan tone. "And you know? Before I learned the truth, I just assumed I had a truly unlucky life. But with what I know? Most likely the suffering and my issues with my father were thought of by some human, thinking it'd make a good tragedy to read. Maybe with some "interesting" themes and parallels to Darkstalker's life too?" He began to trail off a little after his ramblings.
Oracle remained silent, he did pity Blizzard, it was impossible not to after experiencing his childhood. But as the Icewing rambled on about humans, he couldn't help but to think "Why me?"
And obviously, Blizzard ended up reading that thought as he looked at him with an impossible to read expression.
"Ah, wondering why exactly I'd even make my spell target random readers? Simple enough… I'm aware I could've brought in the actual author of my problems here, but there's a couple things that made me decide against it… First, it's the last spell I'll get to cast in my life, and at least the idea of a gift for my descendants was quite hammered into my mind, so I wanted an idea that could last for a long time so these generations could get an use out of it too…"
Oracle looked up to his face, and Blizzard had done the same, looking down at him as he kept talking.
"And then, lastly… Not only am I under the whims of some human, but there's also the fact that I might not even be an important character, a main one, anything like that. I could merely be a side character, or perhaps I don't even appear in these stories and normally I'd just stay here forever… So it's perfectly possible that I drew the short end of the stick by merely existing after the backstory that your kind made for the past with Darkstalker."
"And likewise, these "stories" over the years would've affected plenty of "unimportant" or "irrelevant" dragons. Like how easy it is to write about some apparently nameless dragon who died or got greatly hurt due to just being in the way of the "plot"? If it'll be like that for Pyrrhia, then it's only fair that your kind has to deal with randomly just ending unlucky."
Blizzard announced his ultimatum, and Oracle was left with his mouth wide open in surprise due to how absurdly over the top this new line of thought is, dear god…
"Think whatever you may want," Blizzard said coldly. "This cannot be changed, and it won't change. The spell is already done, and I gave away plenty of myself to get what I consider fair retribution on the ones that caused my life to be like this."
After saying these words he stood up and went towards one of the shelves around, his thin tail whipping behind him, and there he grabbed something on his talons and walked close to Oracle, presenting what this was.
His eyes widened when he saw once more the soul reader, and all these years later it still had that crack, so apparently the Icewing had never even bothered to fix that.
Without speaking another word during this, Blizzard pointed it at himself, making the hourglass spin three times…
It stopped, white sand spilling down and filling over half of the bottom, about 55-60% was white, while the smaller half was black.
"As much as I wished against it during my childhood… I am not a good dragon," Blizzard said in a soft tone. "I am factually evil now, my soul is more impure than my father's. And these actions I've taken are evil as well, I am self aware enough to perfectly realize that, and the soul reader has shown me that too… But by this point? I just can't bother to care anymore about that…"
Oracle heard all that and he was already feeling yet more hope sink for his situation. Darkstalker, after everything that happened in the normal timeline, had looked at a soul reader and panicked because he always believed he was doing the best for the future in his own twisted way.
Blizzard? He had tried to be a good dragon and a good son, but circumstances led him to do terrible things as a dragonet by mistake, and when he killed his own father, that's probably when plenty of his hopes of being good began to shatter. And then the truth of the world just truly broke what was left.
The hybrid leaned down towards the scroll he was holding and let out a huff.
"Thank you for my own in-depth character analysis, I truly needed it," he said with a sarcastic tone.
"Is it wrong?" Oracle replied and Blizzard just looked down in silence.
As the hybrid remained silent for some moments, Oracle glanced a little to the soul reader on his black talons, actually seeing one of these gadgets of course filled his mind with questions regarding how it'd be and what it would show.
Sadly, it appeared that the Icewing had read these internal questions, as he suddenly shifted his talons and quickly pointed the soul reader at Oracle, who yelped in surprise as it spun.
It stopped, and he looked at it, unblinking as the sand spilled down… Mostly a lot of black sand, but then at the very top, white sand lined up the surface, covering the top. It was more than the first time Blizzard's soul was checked during the vision, but less than the second time right after he enchanted his father.
"Wha-Huuh…?" Oracle questioned, staring at these results.
"Huh, did you expect it to be all black sand? You think that highly of yourself, thinking that your soul must be as pure as your looks and personality?" Blizzard questioned.
"I-I… Just didn't expect that amount, and I didn't think it'd be all black either…"
Blizzard just shrugged at this. "Either you did some stuff back in your own world and that carried over… Or maybe you have been doing something wrong here at Pyrrhia…"
"Eeeh…?" Oracle questioned, trying hard to think what actions in just two weeks could've caused that.
"Oh well, that doesn't matter right now. And besides… I think our meeting should be ending rather soon, so for now, give back the ring," Blizzard ordered.
Oracle looked at the strange ring still on one of his claws, and so he brought one of his talons towards it to just pull it off… But he wasn't able to, he let out a small surprised sound and tried to pull at it again, to no avail.
"Oracle… I know that I made you physically weak, but not that much, you can take off a ring," Blizzard said with a baffled tone.
"I… Can't! It's completely stuck…" Oracle muttered.
The Icewing sighed and approached the dragonet, bringing one of his talons to Oracle's and pulling on the ring himself… He then scrunched his snout after failing to do so.
"What in the world…?" He muttered, starting to pull harder on the ring, which made the Nightwing yelp as he's basically pulling on his claw like that.
"What's with this ring? Why won't it come off?" Blizzard grunted, stopping after several moments of painfully pulling on his claw.
"W-Was there any other enchantment in this thing…?" Oracle wondered and Blizzard glared at the piece of jewelry for some seconds.
"A ring that won't come off… Only the Icewing royals would think of something as absurd as that," the Icewing complained then went once more to the crystal box where he stored Darkstalker's scroll as he grabbed it.
"This is just a piece of jewelry, not another living being, so hopefully this works even with the rules…"
Then he very quickly scribbled down onto it while muttering what he was writing. "I enchant this quill I'm holding to be able to bring whatever piece of jewelry it touches to my talons."
After writing that, the Icewing loomed over Oracle and then tapped the ring with the quill… Nothing happened.
"What?" The hybrid said with a surprised tone. "Not even magic?"
He began to scribble fast once more on the scroll. "Also enchant this quill to break whatever jewelry it touches."
He looked at Oracle after saying that. "I don't like actually needing to break one of these things, but if it won't come off… Besides, can always make a replica with this scroll…"
The quill touched the ring once more and… Not even a single crack appeared, which made the adult dragon huff.
"So some royal from thousands of years ago decided to make a ring of visions that cannot be taken off, and cannot be broken even with magic, what an amazing gift…" He then let out a tired sigh. "Fine, I think I have an idea to work around this at least…"
He wrote something for a third time then tapped the ring with the quill, and the piece of jewelry vanished with Oracle feeling nothing on his claw.
"Now it's basically not even there, so with that settled… I believe that in a minute or two I'll get you back to the academy."
Oracle perked up at that, now this is sudden… But the thought of going back soon and sharing all this appeared in his mind, but Blizzard had read that just some moments later.
"Oh, small, naive, innocent, Oracle… You really thought that just now?"
"W-What do you mean…?" Oracle asked, feeling some dread upon hearing these words.
"Oracle," the Icewing said, glancing towards him. "Did you actually expect to casually stroll back to the mountain with all you've learned here?"
The Nightwing froze in the spot when he heard that, oh no, no…
"Even if I wrote here that you wouldn't spill out anything that you saw or learned here… I cannot outright control your mind, and I'd much prefer if my own character isn't constantly arguing against me within the confines of his mind."
That's when he pulled out a round, white stone out of an alcove, and Oracle recognized it from Blizzard's memories during the vision, and he quickly took a step back.
"Don't worry, I know better than my father. My wording will only take away this night's events from your mind, afterwards you'll happily keep enjoying the academy while changing the future for my story…" Blizzard said, going to a side of the table then bringing down his scroll while holding the quill.
"W-What in the world was the point of all this then!?" Oracle shouted at him.
"Oh. I simply needed you to come over to hand over the scroll, and for one other thing. And then I had decided that I might as well have some deep conversation with you to explain your purpose in this world before I put you back on your merry way after this intermission," he said with a shrug.
Oracle's thoughts were racing after hearing that. What should I do? I've learned so many important things here, like about that horrible Gift of Retribution… I can't just unlearn all that!
"Calm down," Blizzard said, not even glancing up from the scroll. "Nothing you learned here matters in the long run. You're very well aware that my gift cannot be stopped, so what would you do even if you kept that knowledge? Beg at Turtle to cast a spell to stop me? Not happening."
Oracle was shaking when he heard that. It's… True… What is he meant to do? He cannot fight back against magic like that…
"Oh. Also on the topic of magic… You like magic, don't you?" Blizzard said with an expression that looked unsettling to Oracle.
"Hm… The good kind, yes…?" He muttered, nervous.
"Well then… Before you leave, you'll get to do something amazing, you will cast an actual spell," the Icewing hybrid said, and Oracle froze in the spot after hearing that.
"W… WHAT!?" Oracle screamed in panic, there's just absolutely no way that Blizzard could make him an Animus.
"I made you able to give a prophecy despite not being moonborn in your backstory, didn't I?" Blizzard said with a bit of a smug expression. "I believe that likewise, I could just write the gene into you for a single spell."
Oh no, no, no and no… This… Is actually terrible! Although generally the thought of being an Animus would be rather promising… To be Blizzard's Animus? Casting anything he orders with his writing with basically no rules?
"Oh you're exaggerating… I have plenty of Animus things around me, so most likely this will just be the one spell you cast in your life," the Icewing replied.
"A-And… And what's that spell then…?" Oracle nervously asked, and was met with a smirk coming from Blizzard.
"Nothing too bad, merely something that'd help me kill two birds with one stone… And should be a quite dramatic moment in… A few months probably."
That sounded extremely ominous to Oracle, who was even more on edge now… And he saw Blizzard leaning closer to the scroll and lowering the quill.
No. Oracle's mind thought fiercely. He can't be allowed to do that. Not only can I end under his absolute control at any time, but now I can also just be his wish granter as he had used up his 2 spells? That's too big a risk, and no matter what he might do to me…
Blizzard's head quickly turned to face Oracle, his eyes glaring down at him, but at that same exact second… Oracle leaped forward and unleashed a burst of fire right upon the Icewing's side, hitting there and part of one of his wings, making him roar and recoil in pain as he dropped the quill.
I have to at least try to take back control.
The dragonet jumped up to the table and snatched the scroll on one of his talons before jumping off and starting to run, while at the same time getting the scroll into his pouch.
He heard quick steps coming from behind him, and then he gasped when a sudden blast of cold water hit his side and he was pushed towards a wall, right afterwards… Blizzard was standing in front of him.
"Well…" He said with clear annoyance in his voice. "I did not think you would actually attempt that so suddenly, thought you'd just keep shaking in fear."
Oracle gripped tightly the pouch on his neck, his eyes glaring up to the other dragon. "I… I won't let you control me anymore! E-Even less to be your personal wizard!"
"So you decided to throw fire at the one who brought you to this world you're clearly loving? I'm feeling offended here, Oracle," Blizzard scoffed.
"T-That doesn't matter! You said it yourself… You're… Evil, so if I must try something to stop you, I will…"
The Icewing stared down at him for some moments, and that's when the dragonet saw something akin to amusement in his expression as he surprisingly stepped back while still facing him.
"Heh… I guess that I did make you this way, headstrong and determined when it truly matters despite your shyness and awkwardness, a good character trait, wouldn't you agree?" Blizzard said, stretching his limbs and getting in a battle ready position. "Now… Admittedly I might have read far too many scrolls with epic and dramatic encounters which may have added to my own flair…"
"So with my own creation standing up to me, how about this? Let us have a climactic battle since you're confident enough that you'd even throw fire at me… I say we duel for the scroll, if you win, you'll get to keep your own freedom until you die and the gift chooses another."
Oracle looked at Blizzard with a surprised expression, now that was the last thing he expected the grandnephew of Darkstalker to offer. But at the same time, it's a dragonet the size of a 3 or 4 years old vs an adult Icewing hybrid, who must be feeling rather confident about his odds, and this would be only Oracle's second solo fight with the other one being when he fought Sora a little…
And yet, Oracle cannot allow himself to back off from this challenge, it might as well be his only chance, so he gave the most fierce nod that he could.
"Very well, in such case… Our showdown will begin right now."
The two combatants stared at each other for several moments without making a move, observing their opponent… Until they both attacked at once.
Oracle was trying very hard to muster as much fire as possible within his body to release a fiery stream at Blizzard, but right then he had also opened his mouth and poured out a torrent of water, canceling out each attack as the water got vaporized and there was steam between them.
The Nightwing had a feeling that he'd done that right then just for a cool looking moment at the start, but didn't think much about it and leaped through the steam and towards the hybrid, who bared his fangs and snapped his mouth towards Oracle, who had assumed he might do something like that and made a sudden flap of his wings to propel himself upwards and right above the attack, then he basically dive bombed on the head right beneath him and grabbed on at the same time.
Blizzard grunted from this and began to move his head wildly, shaking Oracle a lot. Meanwhile he realized that even though his spines up here are much shorter than a regular Icewing's, they still hurt a lot and he got several cuts on his belly after few moments, so with a gasp he launched some fire at the top of the hybrid's head and leaped off along the momentum from the shaking to gain distance from the now roaring dragon. Oracle's claws are not exactly the longest or the sharpest to attack much with them, so fire should be the safest and strongest option although it tires him out significantly.
He winced after landing, pressing one of his talons on some of the cuts he gained, that was not a worth it maneuver given the damage he received as well, but nothing he can do but to keep on fighting anyway.
After shaking his head, the hybrid's eyes focused on the Nightwing, as he lowered his head, horns facing forward, and charged by running quickly at Oracle. He dived to a side to evade that attack, but even when the Icewing ran past him he'd lashed out his tail and slapped him, and even without any spikes there it still hurt as much as if he'd literally just got whipped. That made him flinch and gave Blizzard a moment to quickly turn and slash with one of his talons across his side, quickly cutting through and leaving bloody cuts over his black scales.
The small dragon howled in pain, but Blizzard raised a talon again and smacked him with the back of it, the force sending him back several meters and struggling to keep himself up, as he looked forward to see the Icewing just casually slowly walking closer to him despite the burn marks he had.
With the blood spilling from the cuts on his belly, coupled with these long slashes he just received, Oracle was already starting to feel dizzy but he took a deep breath to try to stabilize himself.
I can't end up knocked out right now… I can do better than this, I won't lose a fight so quickly again…!
He took a very quick glance around, and noticed he had ended near some alcoves after being slapped like that, he looked quickly and noticed a couple of bracelets that he recognized from the vision, Boreas had taken one before leaving. And he remembered now the function from when they were cataloging it: to be able to blend in with other Icewings.
Suddenly, Oracle made a dive for that alcove and reached forward with one of his talons, grabbing one of the bracelets.
"What are you-?" Blizzard was actually surprised by that action, and got interrupted as the Nightwing slipped the bracelet onto his leg.
Immediately he felt his body become extremely colder, an uncomfortable sensation he already had when he first turned into Cirrus. His scales shifted from black to white and his limbs grew while the injuries and the pain went away. Now Oracle was an Icewing about Winter's size, still smaller than the adult in front of him, but now this looked more balanced as he took a battle stance, raising his spiked tail behind him.
"Are you… Seriously planning to beat me as an Icewing?" The Icewing hybrid questioned with a baffled tone.
"WIth how weak you decided my body should be? I'll take any advantage I can get," Oracle replied coldly, then lunged forward with now actually sharp serrated claws, that made the other Icewing back off, but Oracle followed his attack with a leap, and with a quick movement of talons he slashed at a side of Blizzard's face, just barely missing the eyes.
The larger dragon staggered back for a moment as blue blood leaked from his face, and now his expression had turned more serious and angered, then without any warning, he blasted chilling water towards Oracle's head, pushing him back with the pressure.
Oracle tried to retaliate with frost breath when that attack stopped… But he basically threw a bit of sparkly fog in front of him which didn't reach Blizzard at all, whoops, right, first time actually using this breath weapon…
As he completely failed to use the icy breath, he noticed the other Icewing inhaling deeply, and now actually noticed the sounds going up his body, so assuming it meant yet another hydro pump was coming his way, he quickly brought one of his forelegs in front of his face…
Terrible mistake, because Blizzard had done something differently this time, still firing out water from his mouth… Which was steaming, and Oracle's eyes widened as he let out a pained scream when the boiling water hit his foreleg and splashed a bit on his face as well. He did not think Blizzard would be able to heat that up, and it hurt!
His opponent took advantage of the moment while Oracle dealt with the pain of having been thrown boiling water, as the larger dragon grabbed his head and brought it down against the floor with a loud thud, making Oracle feel out of breath after that.
Then when Oracle fell to the ground, Blizzard suddenly moved his talons towards the Icewing's snout and pressed tightly against it, claws wrapped around it.
And Oracle realized right away what he was doing, the same thing that Sora did to knock him out, of course Blizzard had read that fight and thought he absolutely should beat Oracle the exact same way for drama or whatever, at least that's what he thought.
And also of course, Oracle began to struggle, but the difference in size and strength made struggling rather hard to do, especially with Oracle being belly down on the ground so he couldn't quite attack upwards as well while pinned down.
His vision was starting to get blurry, he wasn't able to breathe… But he couldn't just lose to the exact same tactic twice…!
He thought quickly, and realized there was a method for quick escape considering his circumstances, so he moved one of his talons towards the foreleg with the bracelet which was quickly pulled off.
The change made Oracle as small as always, which meant with the sudden shift, the talons holding him lost a lot of their grip as he slipped past and now with him being able to move his head, he faced straight up and barely managed to let out a short fire plume there on the Icewing's stomach who growled in pain, then the growling intensified when he tried his hardest to stand up quickly and bring his horns straight to the stomach above him, piercing through as cold blue blood splashed all over his face.
But right as Oracle was feeling like he was getting an edge in the fight, Blizzard moved his head to look straight down, his blue eyes storming when they looked at him as his mouth opened and fired out a short stream of extremely hot water straight to his face.
And for the second time in just a few days, Oracle felt a burning sensation all over his face, not even a tenth as truly bad as getting shot with literal venom, but still so extremely painful as he closed his eyes.
Blizzard pushed him down, dislodging his horns off his body as Oracle fell to the ground while still screaming in pain
A black talon was raised and punched Oracle right on the top of his head, and with all the previous pain and the dizziness from earlier blood loss, he dropped the bracelet still on his talons and lost consciousness.
Oracle awoke the next morning in his cave, yawning as he rubbed his eyes. He felt very tired and sleepy, odd considering last night he had gone to bed rather early, and yet it felt like he barely slept for a few hours.
Oracle's mind was most likely still rather active through the night given the recent events, working with all the newly acquired information, so that might be the cause of this sensation. His voice of reason spoke, and as always that sounded extremely logical to the small Nightwing.
The dragonet looks around, until it gets decided who his clawmates will be, this cave is only his at the moment since Icicle is not present. After making sure that nobody's nearby, he opened the pouch he'd been carrying since his first day at the academy and grabbed the scroll.
Just for safekeeping he checked it quickly, with their Magical Court being a thing now, it means that spells made with the scroll can't ever truly get too bad, but it's still worth checking in case anyone had taken it during his sleep.
He saw nothing new, the last spell still being the magical basin he made recently. Feeling satisfied with that he put the scroll back into the pouch then walked out of his cave to begin the day, there's still a lot about the future that he'll have to help the others with, but at least after having access to these spells? He was feeling confident on the idea of everything ending alright.
PART TWO
LOOSE ENDS
Author's note: Alright, some props to Oracle for actually faring well enough in a 1v1 to actually last about 3 pages.
And even though part 1 ended already, don't think that'll mean this fic will be significantly shorter or such, there may be some less chapters by the end I suppose? but words wise I'll guess it should still be around there.