Past

Chapter 18

His wings were tired from the flight before but he knew that it wasn't the time to think about it, not when there were threats against the people he cared about. He thought that he would be one of the last of the council members to arrive but it looked as though the ones who had to stay behind were in the battle. He could see rows of admins with enchanted bows sending flaming arrows towards the attacking intruding admins on the ground but you could see that they weren't able to do constant firing since they were wary of hitting the council members. A similar statement could be said for the watchers who were hovering somewhere between the attacking and council member watchers flying high and the admins on the ground. Although they were using magic instead of bows to attack the flyers.

Not all of the watchers were in the sky and not all admins were armed with bows. Some of the admins not on the fighting lines had their screens opened trying to restore the damage to buildings and removing the arrow entities that did not reach their intended targets so they would end up harming anyone that they weren't meant to. The rest of the admins were teleporting whoever they could to protected servers. The remaining watchers were using protection barriers on all of their allies and on nearby people that hadn't yet been teleported away.

Xelqua saw Aris with his long dark brown hair once again held up in a bun. He could see a few more of his watcher council members approaching in his peripheral vision. He had his blade extended and was going for a surprise attack on Aris. He had his sword raised ready to slash it through him but in the few seconds it took for the blade to start its descent down he felt a hard pressure pushing against it. He saw deep purple magic swirling around his sword and he looked and saw up with the same deep purple magic flickering in his palm.

The air grew cold around him as Aris head turned around to look at him. The lower half of his face looked different but he couldn't comprehend how since he needed to think fast. In a split-second decision, he balled his non-sword hand into a fist and punched the mask off of his opponent. Now that he no longer had his mask on and Xelqua could now see his eyes, which he realised was a first since all the attackers so far had masks on. He expected his irises to be a shade of purple but they were black and his purple instead had an indigo glow. From his pupil small cracks which shared the pupils' colour spread throughout the iris and his sclera, which was the same black as his irises. What sent more chills down his spine was that the cracks, still the same colour, keep going across his face. They went up his forehead and down his cheeks. He didn't know if some cracks and the black eyes were there during his first fight but the fact that his brain noted down that something was different about Aris' lower face and that he remembered where his mask went down, made him sure that the cracks had spread.

"Hello again young one," Aris said smiling but with the addition of the cracks it seemed so much more menacing, which in turn made Xelqua's insides feel scrunched up, "It's good to see you again,"

Xelqua was scared, but he also knew that as long as the other council members were either here or close. He also knew that Aris was the only one to give away information last time so maybe- just maybe he would be able to get more information from him this time. His voice croaked as he said, "What happened-?"

"Well after your fancy friend in the mask had us chained, and after painfully having to get out of that situation and getting a lecture from on high we got given another chance, so now you must die," Aris said still with a big grin on his face.

Xelqua then narrowly missed a fireball that was flung past his head, it wasn't sent by Aris and the fact that another one didn't follow made him think that it was a random shot from another battle that missed. He couldn't focus on that though since Aris just kept coming with the attacks. It was a flurry of magic mixed with blades which meant that Xelqua could barely think about offence as he had to keep his defence up.

He was losing and he knew it, he was doing better than last time, that was probably thanks to how Aris couldn't use watcher vision to see ahead, but he was still struggling. He felt the strength get drained out of him with each shield he raised and which blade met his. Then everything froze, everyone was frozen. Those who were flying were now suspended in midair. He could still look around which meant that it was some weird freezing spell that he never heard of or seen before. A glow came from the middle of the battle and he looked towards it and he was speechless.

The glow was coming from the High Leader. She wasn't flying or frozen; she just seemed to be floating in the air. From her back instead of two wings she had four which he heard stories of but he always thought they were just stories. A bright purple halo was floating above her head, which was also unheard of. One of her hands was already raised and had a light violet glow coming from it. He assumed that the magic in that hand had everyone suspended. Her other hand rose up and it sent small purple flickers towards him and the other council members. He was able to move again.

The members of the council pulled back their blades and one after another a burst of light signified the death of all of the opposing attackers. It seemed that slowly everyone started moving again, though it seemed that the non-council members were surprised that the attackers were dead which made him think the spell was more complicated and powerful than he thought...

WC~ 1052