by Eric Vall
Chapter 1
Fighting water demons next to a river definitely wasn’t my idea of a relaxing picnic.
“Why won’t they die?” I growled as one of the fifty water demons fell apart like jello underneath my claws, only to reform itself instantly. “This was supposed to be a chill day! Not interrupted by whatever the fuck these things are!”
These creatures were easily the strangest I’d seen since coming to the world of Inati. Some of them could almost pass for humans, but others bore the heads of horses and gills along their pale blue necks. Some of the water demons were even see-through, as if they were made up of nothing more than water, and would shatter into great big fat droplets before their bodies reformed. Others had more substance to them, almost like they were made out of flesh and bone, but their bodies were still as flexible and fluid as water.
The three dryads, with their hair and eyes brilliant shades of green, had been setting up the picnic while I’d been lounging in the sunlight in my dragon form. So, while we’d been caught slightly unawares when the demons attacked, it wasn’t like we were completely defenseless. Anton and Laika, two of the wolf warriors from the Blue Tree Guild, had come along as guards, but water was a weak point for anyone’s nose. It washed away the scent of both prey and predator, which lead to the ultimate escape or the perfect surprise attack.
Now, Laika held a sword in each of her hands, and she was a whirlwind of gray fur and hair as she mowed down water demons dozens of times after they rose up again. She was lithe, dangerous, and all toned muscles underneath her leather armor. Laika’s dark gray hair was tied up in a high ponytail, and her furry ears were erect as she growled angrily at the water demons.
Anton was a perfect gray haired shadow of Laika’s movements, and fire enveloped his fists as the bodies of the water based creatures evaporated wherever his attacks landed. The demons also took longer to reform after they were destroyed by fire, so it was giving us a little bit of an advantage.
But there were still a lot of bastards left to deal with.
A few yards away from the fighting glowed a barrier, and three beautiful dryad sisters defended it in cohesion. They didn’t allow any of the water demons to travel any farther than the riverbank, and any demon that tried was quickly and efficiently dispatched. Marina and Polina had their hands on the ground as thick roots emerged and lashed out at the water demons, and Trina spun in vicious and deadly circles as her dagger pushed back the creatures that had emerged from the river.
Inside the barrier were two small children with silvery blue hair and small horns on their foreheads. Ilya and his sister, Ilyushina, were survivors from a village attacked by summoned spirits. They clutched each other tightly now, and the little girl hid her face in Ilya’s chest at the sight of the battle.
Ilyushina’s whimpers reached my ears, and I slashed forward at the water demons with renewed rage. This was supposed to be a happy and relaxing moment for all of us, something to take our minds off the constant attacks and battles we’d all been forced through.
But these fuckers wouldn’t stay down. They just kept reforming and coming back at us no matter what we did to them. It was like they were gluttons for punishment, and every slash seemed to only drive them even further into a frenzy.
I racked my mind for a way to fight them. My claws weren’t doing anything to them, and they seemed almost unstoppable. There had to be some sort of way to stop them.
Suddenly, an idea struck me. Maybe pulling these demons away from the river would weaken them. I didn’t know if it would work, but it was worth a shot.
So, I pulled at the well of magic deep inside of me and latched onto the power of stone. A moment later, the earth around me hummed and sang as I dug my claws into the sandy ground.
“Rise!” I growled as I yanked at the rock beneath the sand and pulled it upward.
Stone pillars rose up from the ground and skewered the water demons that had separated me from the others. The pillars rose up for a hundred feet into the sky, and I could feel them as extensions of my own body.
On the spikes, the water demons writhed in what seemed to be agony, and triumph began to climb its way up through my chest. The sense of victory died quickly, however, when instead of dissipating into nothingness, there was a surge of cold energy, and then the water demons multiplied.
Rage burned through my blood as I stared up at the descending water demons.
Was there really nothing we could do to end them?
Fuck that.
I launched myself into the air claws first at the water demons that fell from the spikes. Their sudden multiplication was ridiculous, and if this had been a game, I’d say it was a shitty mod.
Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Alyona hold her own against a group of water demons. They had corralled her against one of the fallen stones of the aqueduct that lay in ruins along the river, but she was keeping them at bay with a defensive martial art style I hadn’t seen before. The fabric of her white dress was drenched and clung to the curves of her perfect body while she slammed palm strikes into the water demons. Her silver white hair swung out around her as she fought, and her amethyst eyes glowed with power.
I snarled and got ready to attack the water demons around the priestess, but then a sudden rise of purity in the air drew my full attention from the beasts to Alyona.
“Evan!” Alyona called out behind her as she ran toward the river instead of away from it. “Lead them back to the river, as close as you can to the water!”
Then the divine princess of Rahma dove into the river in one smooth arc, and her white and raven hair fluttered behind her as one of the water demons tried but failed to grab hold of her legs.
“Alyona!” I dove into the river after her and plunged into the icy depths of the raging current.
The water of the river was strange. A deep chill emanated from it and curled into my bones, and I could feel my core temperature drop almost instantly. This wasn’t like the time I’d dived into the lake in the cave where the Blue Tree Guild had found me. The chill of that water hadn’t bothered me in my draconic body, but this was like I’d jumped into a glacier, and I was completely exposed to the elements.
Even my lungs seemed to seize inside of my chest as my heart began to beat sluggishly. I knew what these were symptoms of, but it was the first time I’d been affected so badly in my draconic form.
How had hypothermia set in so quickly?
I lifted my head above the water and searched for the priestess on the surface, but I couldn’t find her.
A bright blue light grew within the depths of the river, and I knew the light had to be coming from Alyona. Thrumming waves of purity emanated from the light, and the water demons flinched away from it. I didn’t know what she was planning on doing or how it would help defeat the water demons, but I could drag them back into the river for her and trust that whatever she was planning would work.
With one flap of my massive wings, I was airborne, and then I used my tail to sweep as many demons as I could into the river without throwing the wolves or dryads into the water.
My comrades had heard the priestess’ shout and seemed to be as confused as I was, but they worked quickly in driving the water demons back into the river.
The dryad sisters pushed the wall of roots closer to the water, and with it, the water demons. Laika and Anton rushed off in opposite directions to form a three sided enclosure and block off any route of escape, and then Anton formed a wall of flames that flickered and licked at the running river. Laika’s swords alone were enough to drive back the water demons, and her blade was quick and sure as she landed heavy blows that pushed back even the turbulent waves of th
e river.
I blinked, and for a moment I thought I could see the swirl of energy and power coalesce in Laika’s hands as they gripped the hilts of her swords.
My lips curled back in a grin at the sight, but it fell quickly. This plan seemed counterproductive in my mind, since the water demons would be stronger when surrounded by more water.
Then the blue light beneath the river exploded like a supernova, and I squeezed my eyes shut as a wave of purity washed over me. Instantly, the bodies of the water demons came apart and splashed into the settling waters of the river, and I wanted to roar in triumph, but then I saw something that stilled the victory in my throat.
Even though the water demons had been hell bent on attacking us just moments before, relief was visible on their faces as their bodies slipped away. I blinked in confusion, and then I thought I saw a group of spirits hover above the surface of the river before they faded into the sun’s light.
“Everyone all right?” Laika called out as she shifted her stance and kept her eyes suspiciously on the water.
“Our picnic was ruined!” Trina groaned as she fell back on the riverbank.
Polina grimaced as she too flopped on her side and came face to face with a waterlogged basket. All of the food inside of it was now soaked with water, and much of it had crumbled into pieces.
“It could have been far worse,” Anton grunted as he sat down next to the pouting dryads.
I barely noticed their conversation as I flew over the river and searched for any sign of the priestess in the water.
Alyona still hadn’t come up for air.
I flapped my massive wings to gain some altitude again, and then I circled above the place she’d dove into, but I couldn’t see or sense anything on the bottom of the deep river. The waters had been crystalline blue before the water demons attacked, but now the surface was dark and murky. It was as if black dye had been poured into the river, and it obscured everything.
“Come on, come back up,” I muttered to myself as I continued to flap my wings.
“Why hasn’t Milady come back up?” Marina shouted as she peered nervously at the river and then back at the barrier around the two Asuras.
“She’ll be fine.” Laika clenched her jaw and tightened her grip on her swords. “She has to be.”
Fuck this, I wasn’t going to wait around anymore for Alyona to come back up. What if she’d somehow gotten hurt and needed our help?
I swooped into the river and focused my power so I would take on my smaller human form. It would be easier to search whatever crevices made up the riverbed if I wasn’t a huge dragon, and the transformation into my human body was swift.
The water wasn’t glacial cold anymore, thank god, but the inkyness that had taken over its color had yet to dissipate. I could barely even see my hand in front of my face as I swam deeper into the darkness.
It was like the river was never ending, and I didn’t realize how deep it actually was. From the riverbank, it looked like it was maybe fifteen feet deep, but now that I was inside of the water, I knew it was much more. There was a sudden drop off in the center of the river that came down at least another fifty feet.
My lungs burned with the need for air, but as I directed my healing power toward myself, the pain came to a stop.
I didn’t take the time to wonder how or why healing my lungs had actually worked or made it easier for me to keep searching through the river. I needed to find Alyona. Even her immortal body could feel pain, and the thought of her drowning over and over again wasn’t a pleasant one.
My more animalistic instincts took over, and I swam deeper until I reached the bottom of the river where a faint light glowed. I followed the light, and it led me to Alyona.
The priestess sat on a smooth rock at the bottom of the river bed, and her hair floated up all around her face. Cradled in her hands was a pearl that glowed through the darkness of the river, and the light grew steadily until it was almost brighter than the sun.
I swam toward Alyona and winced at the brightness of the light. As I got closer, I even had to squeeze my eyes shut against the onslaught. When I finally did reach her, I cracked one eye open and saw she was so focused on the pearl in her hands she hadn’t even noticed me. I quickly pulled her into my arms and swam upward to break the surface of the river.
The two of us gasped for air as we emerged, and the raging currents of the river began to calm to a languid pace around us.
“What is that?” I gasped for air as I nodded at the glowing pearl in Alyona’s hands. “It’s like you were in a trance down there.”
“A spirit stone,” Alyona replied as she gently held up the pearl so I could see it.
The pearl still glowed, but it was no longer the intense light from earlier. It had calmed down and only gave off a faint glow that could almost be mistaken for a simple sheen.
I was curious about the pearl in Alyona’s hands and whatever she’d done to the water demons to make them disappear, but I didn’t trust the river.
So, with one arm wrapped tightly around the priestess, I swam toward the riverbank where our friends waited for us. Then we stumbled onto the sandy shore and collapsed on the warm sand.
“Milady, are you all right?” Laika knelt down and looked over Alyona’s body. “The water demons, how did you banish them?”
“I hope you made them suffer,” Trina muttered as she looked at the ruined food. “Our picnic is over before it even started.”
I couldn’t help but let out a laugh as I looked around us. While there had already been rubble along the river thanks to the ruined aqueduct, the earth had been completely torn up by the fighting. I could see scorch marks from Anton’s flames and the holes left by the dryads roots, not to mention the deep gouges caused by Laika’s swords.
Ilya and Ilyushina recovered quickly, with the stamina of children, and they wandered closer to us as they began to gather seashells.
“They’ve already suffered enough, those poor spirits,” Alyona sighed as she lifted the pearl, and sunlight glinted off it. “I led them toward the light they’ve been looking for all this time.”
The pearl shimmered in the air before it disappeared from view, and the hair on the back of my neck stood up. It wasn’t the feeling of spatial magic, but something stranger. I stared at where the pearl had been in Alyona’s hands and noticed a glittering sheen on her skin.
Before I could ask her what happened and what she meant by light, I sensed we had company, and I looked up to see a familiar face.
“What happened here?” Julia looked down at all of us from the top of the crumbled aqueduct and furrowed her brow. “It looks like you’ve just had a battle. Were you all sparring instead of having a picnic?”
Julia was one of the Elders of Hatra. She was a striking woman with pale blue eyes that pierced through everyone she spoke to and light brown hair tied in a loose ponytail.
Next to her, a young Fox Demi-Human stared down at us with wide eyes as she pushed her dark blue bangs out of her face. The fox was Afra, a teenager I’d met in the farms of Hatra, and I was surprised to see her with an Elder so far out of the city.
“Water demon infestation,” I wryly replied from where I’d collapsed on the riverbank. “It’s weird because I didn’t sense them the first time I flew over the river. They just appeared out of nowhere and attacked us. Has anyone ever been attacked by them before, or did we pull the short straw? ”
First, I had no idea about the angry crimson dragon that lived in the canyons near Hatra, and I’d ended up flying in that very direction. Now, it had been a horde of water demons intent on, well, none of them had actually talked to us. They’d just started rampaging and trying to rip us apart, which was a good enough reason to fight back against them.
After facing down stone giants and two armies, I wasn’t about to get done in by a walking jellied puddle of water.
“It’s not quite accurate to call them demons,” Alyona said as she lifted one of the black braids off her face and
rolled over to look at me. “They’re the souls of those unfortunate enough to have died violently in water, people who have been unable to move on to the netherworld.”
“There’s never been water demons here, though.” Julia frowned as she looked between all of us and the ravaged riverbank. “Not even after Hatra was destroyed. We’ve never been warned away from the waters of this river.”
“Well, you’ve been warned now,” I replied as I let myself fall back onto the warm sand. “You pretty much just missed all the action by seconds.”
“A pity then,” Julia said wryly as she glanced around at all of us. “It seems like you all had great fun.”
“Yeah, right,” Trina snorted and glared at the river. “They came out of nowhere and tried to rip us apart.”
“Generally, that’s what demons do.” Julia sat down on one of the shattered pieces of the aqueducts that had once brought this very river to the center of Hatra. “They aren’t quite friendly, even on the very best of days.”
“You weren’t attacked by stragglers, were you?” My brow furrowed as I looked between the two perfectly dry women atop the aqueduct. “Also, I thought you were going to stay behind in the city, did something happen? Is everyone okay?”
“Everything is fine, I was just accompanying Afra.” Julia placed her hand on Afra’s shoulder and glanced over at the nearby rubble. “She wanted to collect some herbs by the river, and I needed to compare the aqueduct ruins to some schematics.”
“There are a lot of plants growing by the river that can heal and be used as food,” Afra chimed in as she pointed happily at some of the plants near the water’s edge. “They’ve been hard to keep alive inside of the city because of their growing environment, and they would die quickly each time the miasma came. I’m hoping now that the miasma hasn’t been attacking, we can grow them inside the city. Elder Julia, do you mind if I start?”
“Of course, dear,” Julia chuckled fondly as she plucked a leaf from Afra’s hair.
She waved Afra off, and the girl dashed away to collect some of the plants by the riverbank. Then Julia placed her hand in the air in front of her, and I sensed a small wave of power as she pulled out scrolls from thin air.