Phantom Ddraig: The Blood Of Kings

Chapter 17(V2): Vanguard

Chris swore upon his own dead grandparents that he would never drink alcohol again. It was not just the incident with Pyrrha which soured his mood, not the fact that he had apparently been sleeping for a whole damn day and missed their departure from Hephatan. All of that would be bad on its own and would have had made him swear this oath.

The thing that truly had him pissed was the post hangover headache that still lingered in his mind. It had reduced from the pounding pain which assaulted his brain when he awoke but that prickly sting was just as irritating.

It stuck with him through out the entire meeting with the Hephatantian high command when discussing their strategy. No matter how much water Chris down through the meeting, he could not fully subdue it and that left him feeling truly irritable.

A problem which wasn't helped when he saw Pyrrha again, leading to both him and the elf pretending to not see eachother. Ursa's nagging followed by Thor and Hamanymu's teasing did not help matters and Chris was tempted to lash out at his friends, but he knew that he owed them for having followed him as well and saving both him and Pyrrha from their drunken desires.

He found himself with a bubbling storm of irritated rage which he could not aim at anyone on the boat, but a target was found on the island multiple kilometres away. He could almost make out it's protruding outline at a distance and something within him beat in anticipation at the possibility of unleashing everything inside him on the unfortunate rebels holed up there.

The Viper sailed at the head of this ten battleship armada. It might have seemed like an overreaction to send an accumulated number of fifty thousand troops with large battleships to bring the rebels to heel, but everything that they had uncovered in investigation of the rebels said otherwise.

This island had been stocked up and slowly filled by Lunar Empire loyalist for close to two years. Every piece of weaponry that they not just owned, but were able to corruptly sneak through the country came here and that was without mentioning the multiple communications with pirate mercenary bands that had been discovered in the homes of the over thirty thousand rebels who had slipped out of Hephatan after their failed take over.

Anyone who said that this would be an easy fight was sorely mistaken and if they weren't careful, that island would be their grave.

"Ddraig." he heard a voice which he had not heard in a long time behind him. He was tempted to keep his back turned and ignore Theseus Troezen, but the Fae's voice was too close and regardless of how much Chris did not want to interact with his enemy, he had no choice.

He took a deep sigh before he turned to face Theseus, wondering what mocking insult would flow past the Fae's mouth. Their eyes locked and Chris had to fight off the natural instinct to wince as the pain in his forehead sharpened in anticipation from the headache that Theseus would no doubt leave him with.

"Troezen." Chris responded. Their tension remained solid for a few seconds before Theseus took a deep breath and uttered out some words which were like a slap to Chris's face.

"I would like to apologise for my previous behaviour, it was unbecoming of me."

For a second Chris forgot that it felt like a needle was being driven into his skull as he looked at the Fae who had never had a good thing to say about him since they had first met. He wondered if this is was some kind of joke which would result in Theseus leaving him some "witty" remark.

"Ar... Is this a joke?" he carefully asked around to see if any of the thousands of men and women on the deck preparing for their land were acting in a suspicious manner.

Theseus's face twisted into an annoyed scowl as he snapped back. "Of course you nitwit. I am simply trying to make peace with you. Take it or leave it, I don't give a single damn."