“This is your fate, little warrior,” Ana’Bree continued to whisper. “That’s what the ice sees.”
“It might be wrong.”
The fae laughed. This time, it sounded like the distant wailing of the wind.
“Water is never wrong, little one. It brings us into this world, and with us, it leaves.”
Hadjar looked at the ice disk again.
“Not today.”
“Not today.” She nodded. “I don’t see my hand taking your life, but I see it ending soon. Two, maybe three years from now... A cold, lonely death...”
Hadjar resolutely moved away from the floating ring of ice.
“Think about it, little one...” Ana’Bree stepped out from behind him. He saw his reflection in her eyes. “A life of war and suffering... Must it end in a lonely death?”
She waved her hand, covering the entire hall with rippling water. When the ripples subsided, he found himself standing near the stream he’d seen in the first vision. He saw his father cradling little Elaine and his mother combing his hair.
“Don’t worry... I’m here... Everything will be fine...”
“They’re waiting for you, Hadjar,” the fae whispered. “Take my hand and you’ll be with them. Forever. As long as the water flows…
Hadjar took a step forward.
They were waiting for him...
Another step.
He’d missed them so much...
Something warm slid down his cheek. Instantly turning into a snowflake, it fell and landed on the surface of the stream.
Before he took the final step, out of the corner of his eye, he noticed a reflection in the water’s surface. What he saw were the locks of someone’s hair. At first, he thought they might belong to Anise, but the shade didn’t quite match hers. For some reason, he felt like whoever those raven locks belonged to was waiting for him... And it was up to him if he returned to them or not. The reflection vanished as soon as it had appeared. But even this split-second of hesitation was enough for Hadjar to come to his senses.
“No!” He roared.
The meadow and the stream disappeared, and he found himself back in the middle of the hall with an angry Ana’Bree towering above him.
“My time hasn’t come yet, sidhe. I refuse to be a slave or a servant! Not as long as there are people in this world who need me.”
“You fool!” The fae screamed, making the walls crack. “Then I’ll force your fate to come sooner!”
She waved her hand again. Hadjar felt the ground shake. Looking down, he saw the snow-covered stones from the vision in the reflection of the ice.
Chapter 686
H adjar tried to summon his Call and the Black Blade, but he couldn’t even move. All he could do was stare at the crossbow in Ana’Bree’s hands.
“I would’ve taken good care of you, you absolute fool!” She screamed, loading her weapon. “But it’s too late for that now... Die!” She shouted.
The mechanism clicked and the bolt was sent flying in his direction, tearing through the air with a loud whistle. The light of the setting sun reflected off its tip. For a moment, it blinded Hadjar. Some might’ve said that this was for the best, but a true warrior always stared death in the face, without any fear or regret for the years wasted on pointless bloodshed. So, he stared into the eyes of his approaching doom just as calmly as he would soon stare into the eyes of his forefathers.
“Brother!”
Nero?
A massive explosion rang out behind him, taking his momentary blindness away with it. Hadjar saw the wall the balcony was attached to explode. Shrouded in shadows, Einen emerged through the hole. Encased in his ape’s iridescent light, he leapt off the second floor and landed directly in front of his friend.
“I’ve found you at last.” He whispered and waved his spear-staff. “River Serpent!”
The ape roared. Its armor flashed with a brilliant light. Holding Einen’s Spear-staff Spirit in its paws, it imitated Einen’s movements.
An emerald green ray of energy shot out of the tip of the spear-staff, forming the outline of a fin slicing through a stream. The ‘River Serpent’ struck the head of Ana’Bree’s crossbow bolt. There was another explosion. Einen, thrown aside by it, held out his hand.
The ape imitated his actions once more and wrapped its massive arms around Hadjar’s waist, pulling him to the side and toward the spot where the islander had been thrown by the explosion. Einen had pulled off his stunt just in time. The momentum generated by the clash of attacks was enough to pull Hadjar away from danger.
Einen’s power, as expected, hadn’t been enough to so much as put a scratch on the bolt, but it did manage to change its trajectory, making it whistle a hair’s breadth past Hadjar’s ear, break through the wall, and disappear somewhere in the depths of the monastery.
The two friends rolled across the floor. They halted once they slammed into one of the pillars.
“What took you so long?” Hadjar croaked.
“I was admiring the architecture,” Einen responded in the same hoarse voice.
“Are you two done?”
Three more heads peeked out of the hole. Activating their defensive Techniques, the Dinos siblings and Dora walked over to the duo.
Raising her warhammer, the elf conjured a silvery glow that took the form of a giant maple leaf around her. Tom reinforced her Technique by using his ‘Thunder God’s Armor’. The silver leaf was so tiny compared to the gigantic breastplate forged from lightning. When the two merged, the leaf became the armor’s emblem.
Anise followed her brother’s example and activated the same Technique. But instead of forming another piece of armor, she poured her energy into Tom’s creation, making it glow with such a bright light that it left zigzag-shaped scorch marks on the floor. The lightning couldn’t melt the ice, but it could burn through its surface layer.
“It’s not enough.” Hadjar tried to get up but then stumbled back down almost immediately.
“There you are!” Ana’Bree held out her hand. An ice spear instantly formed in her palm. “Good, that means I won’t have to go looking for you!”
“Ha, it doesn’t even have any energy!” Tom said, sounding haughty.
“Damn it!” Hadjar croaked. “If she hits us, we’re dead.”
From what he’d seen of Ana’Bree’s power, he had no doubt that she’d be able to skewer them all with the spear.
Anise seemed like she agreed with him. She grabbed Tom’s wrist just above the bracelet. Hadjar suddenly realized that that was their spatial artifact.
“What are you-?”
“We’ve completed our objective,” was all she said.
She was suddenly holding what Hadjar had once thought was a spear, but had turned out to be a six-foot-long arrow, the tip of which had almost killed the Spirit-golem. The arrow’s shaft resembled burnt wood.
“A Fire Archer’s Arrow?” Ana’Bree staggered back and then hurled her spear with a mad cry.
It flew from her hand with such speed that the wind pressure the spear created left deep gouges in the walls and the ground as it whizzed toward its target. The furrows in the ground were so deep that they could’ve easily served as a riverbed.
Without hesitation, Anise released the arrow. The artifact burst into a bright flame. Just like the spear, it left deep marks in its wake, burning rather than slashing the surface.
Their collision resulted in a massive explosion and a whirlwind of such power and overwhelming energy that it both burned and froze the air as it tore apart the floor and the walls. It spiraled toward the sky and broke through the roof, letting in snow and wind. A rain of fire and ice showered the heads of the dumbfounded cultivators.
Drops of boiling water and freezing rain struck the armor and its emblem. The combined defensive Technique barely managed to hold back the aftershock of the powerful collision. The vortex raged for a good five seconds and then subsided, leaving ruins in its wake.
The armor was almost completely
destroyed, and the emblem was gone entirely. Only a few lightning bolts remained suspended in the air above them, forming a net.
Anise fell to her knees, unable to believe her eyes — Ana’Bree stood amongst the ruins without so much as a speck of dirt on her.
“Impossible...” she whispered, her hands trembling. All color had drained from her face. Dora and Tom were equally as pale. “But father said that... He said... He said that the Fire Archer’s Arrow is powerful enough to destroy half of the Imperial Palace! How is this possible?!”
Dora’s eyes darted around the hall in alarm.
“Who... What is she?” Tom asked. He bit his lip so hard that it began to bleed.
Only now did they truly comprehend the power of the thing that the Heads of their families had sent them to find. Hadjar couldn’t believe that someone had been stupid enough to send children after a being that could defeat an Immortal with a wave of her hand.
Ana’Bree was walking toward them, her appearance changing with every step. Ice covered her skin, forming armor. Dogs made of snow emerged from the ground all around her and howled.
“You dare,” she said, a six-tailed whip appearing in her hand, “to bring fire into MY house?!” Snow and ice swirled in the air, turning into spears that hovered behind her. “You dare defile these halls with flames?”
Hadjar turned to Einen.
“Give me your slingshot,” he said.
The islander opened his eyes in surprise, but complied with his friend’s request.
“I’ll freeze your very souls!”
Ana’Bree swung her whip. Hadjar quickly loaded the slingshot with the splinter, pulled back the leather strap, and let go.
Unlike the arrow, it didn’t burst into flames or become a stream of roaring fire. It didn’t turn into a ray of the dawn sun, nor did it transform into the inferno of the fire dragons.
A small piece of wood simply whizzed through the air and pierced Ana’Bree’s torso. Blue liquid spilled out of the wound and onto the floor. The fae dropped her whip in disbelief and collapsed to her knees. With trembling fingers, she touched the wound on her chest.
“Ash?” She asked the void.
The wind began to blow and she disappeared along with a snowstorm. All that remained of her was a small, blue crystal, which Hadjar immediately recognized was a Core.
That was what they’d come here for.
“You,” whispered the howling wind, “You... Nameless... Descendant... Don’t trust... Anyone...”
The hall was silent once more.
Hadjar sighed. I hate schemes and plots! And intrigue too! All of it!
Chapter 687
H adjar waved his hand and the Core, which lay some hundred yards away, disappeared into his spatial ring. Silence reigned until Tom suddenly drew his blade and held it to Hadjar’s throat.
“What is the meaning of this, you filthy commoner?”
Lying on the floor, Hadjar looked up with indifference at the blade almost touching his carotid artery.
Without hesitation, Einen kicked up his spear-staff and, pressing a hidden button on the shaft, sent the spear point flying at the young man’s chest. He stopped it a hair’s breadth away from its target. Anise, in turn, drew her sword and leveled it at Einen’s side. Only Dora still kept her weapon behind her back.
“Put the sword away, Tom,” Hadjar said calmly. “It won’t do you or any of us any good.”
“Only if you give me that Core!”
Tom pressed down on his blade, drawing blood. That was the domino that toppled the rest. Einen sank the tip of his spear into Tom’s chest. Hadjar stared at the crimson droplets falling to the floor. Contrary to popular belief, aristocratic blood wasn’t blue and the blood of the islanders wasn’t as azure as the waters, but also red. Anise had plunged the tip of her sword into Einen’s side with a hiss.
“Why should I?” Hadjar asked in that same, flat tone. His question and hollow delivery unsettled Tom. For a while, he stared at him as if he were seeing a ghost.
“It’s ours!” He roared.
“Tom,” Anise began soothingly, but her brother wasn’t listening, his mind too clouded by rage to comprehend reason.
“Who do you think you are, you lowborn bastard, to claim the Core of a sidhe? One equal to an Immortal?”
“What?” Dora asked.
Immortals, even in Dahanatan, were considered to be the figments of drunken bards’ imaginations. A fairy tale that had come from the depths of the ancient world, a tale too horrible to even think about.
Hadjar looked at Tom. In one sentence, he’d told him more than he had during their entire journey so far. He was now aware of the fact that everyone except himself and Einen had known where their group was going and why. He also realized that the rector, in accordance with the Emperor’s orders, had purposely designated that level limit. Which meant...
“Decater’s tomb was just a smokescreen, wasn’t it?” He asked a little sadly.
Anise, shocking both Hadjar and Einen, sheathed her blade.
“Enough of this. Darkhan, that Core is vital to the Empire’s efforts. There’s a war coming and-”
“So, that’s why you need it,” Hadjar interrupted her. “The Emperor, using the magistrates and the Clan Council, sent three disciples to fetch him a bauble. That’s why they needed the key and the map, wasn’t it? Not to help the students grow stronger, not at all... But to enter Greven’Dor.”
“Darkhan-”
“Anise!” Tom seemed to have no intention of putting away his own sword. “We mustn’t explain anything to him!”
Einen, confused by how calm Hadjar was, put his spear-staff away as well.
“What’s the point anymore?” Anise asked. “He already knows everything.”
Hadjar, Tom’s blade still held at his throat, rose to his feet and dusted off his old, tattered clothes. A gift from the villagers from the Valley of Streams. Once again, he was grateful for this subtle reminder of who he actually was — an outsider. “Getting the key and the map set a chain of events in motion that awoke Ana’Bree from her slumber. As for the rector and the magistrates... They aren’t playing fair.”
“It’s quite devious,” Einen said, peering at them through half-lidded eyes. “The level restriction has made it so you three are probably the strongest people currently running around the Wastelands.”
“The two of them,” Hadjar corrected him. “I’m not on their side. Don’t forget that we’re their rivals, my friend.”
“I won’t.” Einen said and looked at Dora, who averted her eyes by looking at the floor. Only a fool wouldn’t have realized that she’d been in on this all along.
And Einen was no fool.
He looked away from the elf and walked over to Hadjar. Standing by his side, he pointed his spear-staff at Tom.
“When were we supposed to die?” He asked.
The only response he received was silence broken by the howling wind coming in from the hole in the floor.
“When!”
For the first time in years, Hadjar heard his friend shout. Einen, who’d always been as calm as a rock, looked broken. He was clutching the shaft of his weapon so tightly that his knuckles turned white. His eyes were wide open and inhuman, devoid of everything but the flames of rage.
“You wouldn’t have died,” Dora finally said, voice strained, “You’d just have been badly injured and-”
“Tell me!”
“-our clans would’ve made sure that you lived out the rest of your days in honor and prosperity befitting a true warrior.”
Hadjar chuckled. She obviously knew what would’ve actually happened to them if they’d lost their abilities. After all, in about seven years, he would succumb to the poison that her aunt had given him.
The second thing that Tom had inadvertently revealed in his rant was that the Empire not only knew that the Immortals were real, but also about the fae and the rules by which they existed. The Immortals and those like them couldn’t mess with the li
ves of mortals.
But, as with any rule, there were exceptions. For example, the Immortal he’d met in the desert had erased a part of his memory. And Ana’Bree had used her willpower to control him like a puppet. This could’ve been the end of his journey had his allies not intervened. Then again, perhaps that was exactly what Ana’Bree had wanted. After all, if the Laws of the Heavens and the Earth had truly separated the Immortals from the mortals in every way, then the former would’ve disappeared. Even ants, if there were enough of them, could paralyze and devour a lion. If the Immortals had been denied the right to defend themselves, then the mortals could’ve easily marched over to their homes and taken them down.
“Tell me, Dora, how does this differ from a warrior’s death?”
The elf said nothing.
Einen closed his eyes.
“Such a fate is worse than death,” he whispered.
“Einen, I swear, we didn’t mean you any harm!” It might’ve been Hadjar’s imagination, but a drop of melted snow seemed to roll down Dora’s cheek. “But they... They ordered us to do it. We can’t disobey them. That’d be treason!”
For a moment, the hall was silent once again.
“I thought we were friends, Dora.” Einen’s voice was calm once again, which was more frightening than if he were yelling.
“We still are, Einen!”
“You’re right.” He nodded. “I understand what you’re saying. I even accept that you couldn’t have done anything differently. I’m still your friend.” The elf breathed a sigh of relief. “But you aren’t mine.”
“What... What do you mean?”
“I already have a friend. One that went against the entirety of Underworld City to help me. A friend who sacrificed his life and went to fight a monster on his own just to help me. Just like he’s helped me, stood by me, I shall do the same for him. I’ll always be there for you, too, but I’ll never expect you to be there for me. I’m your friend, Dora, but you’re a stranger to me.”
Dragon Heart: Land of The Enemy. LitRPG Wuxia Series: Book 8 Page 21