Darkness has fallen for the first time in the last ten centuries. The last time, the world was nearly annihilated and only around ten thousand humans survived. Now, as the remnants of a lost cause join forces with the evil, the last hope must be fou...
It ripped through his ears, tearing, cutting... and then he realized he no longer was being bombarded with shrapnel. He looked up and gasped. Gronkile's silvery white wings surrounded him and the other passers of the dragon riding exam. Outside the curtain of scales and wings, he heard buffeting winds, threatening to cut open the dragon's wings and slice them up with deadly shards from the explosion. They hurled towards them, and then they were silenced, and Preston realized that Gronkile's wings were not the only protection given by the air dragon: some how he was creating a shield of air encasing them in a protective bubble. The others stared, worrying, through the wing membrane, as the dragons were still outside. But then, over the howling wind, which was continuing much longer then it should have, they heard a defiant call from Tempestuous, followed by responses from other dragons and the sound of crackling ice as Glacider built and ice wall. This left them to worry about the next pressing issue: What was making the wind, and where had the explosion come from? All of a sudden, the wind stopped. Tempestuous continued roared, then someone- or something silenced him. Then it came. Antonio felt it first- the icy, black darkness hurling towards his soul and everyone else's. In the next moment, the others felt it, and finally the black pressure was felt by Preston. To him, it felt as though spears of ice were being jabbed into every part of him, and cold hands were squeezing his throat, lungs, stomach, and eyes with overwhelming force. He collapsed, and it took all his willpower just fighting to stay conscious. To the others, it was ten times worse, hitting their minds directly instead of via their senses because of the combined weight on them and their dragons. Some immediately collapsed, others, like the Gryphon Master, Amber, Bidshia, and Elaine, fought for a few seconds before most collapsed. In three seconds, the dark pressure and the being which created it had wiped out nearly every human and dragon. But though three remained standing; Bidshia, Elaine, and Preston, every conscious second brought them to the brink of death. Then, as quickly as it had begun, the pressure stopped squeezing them, and the remaining humans were elated. This was short lived. As a spark of joy entered their minds, a shadow appeared next to Gronkile's still-protecting wings, and the air bubble was ripped away. In an instant, flames- dark colored flames, seared his wings, and black metal spikes penetrated them. Elaine whipped out a dagger with a hilt shaped like a snake and positioned herself in a combat stance for the inevitable. Sure enough, the dragon moaned in pain and retreated to the sky, leaving the 3 weakened human children to fight what hundreds of dragons had lost to in seconds.
Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
Bidshia, even with the icy protection Glacider had left her found all defenses around her mind blasted away in a mental wave of heat. The same happened to Preston and Elaine, and they all instinctively covered their heads from it, knowing a simple, terrifying fact: whatever they were shielding their faces from, it had unimaginable power, and could attack on every level; mental, physical, magical, giving them a survival of about 0% if it tried to kill them. Preston came to his senses just fast enough to knock down the girls and dive under a rock. The painful jolt of being knocked over brought the others out of their heat trance and into the painful reality. As they ducked under the rock, which they now realized with dread was too small to provide proper cover, Bidshia peeked over the edge and her heart nearly stopped. The thing attacking them was, in fact a dragon. But it's pitch black color, darker than Tempestuous was not what terrified her. Not the fact that it radiated pain and suffering. Nor the fact that it had a face like that of a gorgon. Not even that every scale was filed into a wicked spearhead. It was its size and shape. The thing looked like a mutant, with the face of a gorgon crossed with a dragon, the body of a snake and wings, and the wings, spikes, and scales of a dragon. And it also happened to be a thousand feet long. Yard after yard of 300 foot wide ropy body lay on the ground, with the dragons below in some kind of stasis, and when it opened its cavernous mouth, with the light of a gargantuan white hot jet of fire at the end, and she knew it would be the last thing her eyes would ever see. Then, it blew, and Bidshia said her final prayers as the fire searing towards them, burning out the eye she had been peeking through... Then, over the monstrous, excruciating pain, she realized that if the fire blast bad fully hit, she would not be able to feel pain. With all the remaining strength she could muster, she opened the other eye. In her dim vision, she saw a tall man- or was it a child, she couldn't tell- standing in the open. She saw flames licking at them, but the tongues were blocked by a terra-cotta barrier. Then she realized what it was made of- earth. And only one person here, whose dragon was given to be Terran (earth-related) could have made it- but no, he wasn't strong, he had started with them... that was all she could think before her vision darkened and she blacked out. Calibri awoke to a fuzzy image of green and blue. As her vision cleared, she realized that the green and blue were trees and the sky, and she was lying on the ground facing up. After she overcome the grogginess enough to move, she pulled herself up. She was in a clearing, and not alone: lying a few feet away, she saw the others: everyone was gently lying down. Then she realized not everyone was there: Eli, the Gryphon Master, and the dragons were gone. At first, nothing came to her but fear and she imagined the worst; then her curiosity was piqued enough that she walked to the edge of the clearing and, with a deep breath, stepped out. She had barely walked a few feet when she found something: a trail, and a strange one: too large and well made to be animal, too rough and devoid of signs of tool use to be human. She stepped on it, and began to walk before realizing something that made her face palm herself: she was about to go on a weird path in an unknown forest away from the only place she was sure she was safe without anything to make sure that if there was something magically messed up about it she could make it back. After finding a piece of red, chalky earth that served as a good marker, she began to go again, this time with the chalk trailing on the edge of the trail. She walked on for a minute, then another, then 20 more; by this time, she was getting tired and thirsty, when suddenly the trail ended. She stepped into the trees ahead, which, to her surprise, led into a clearing. Then she looked ahead and gasped. In front was a gory sight: around a dozen cut up dragons, their dragons, lying down asleep while continuing to bleed, and on the edge was the Gryphon Master, slashed open and lying in a pool of blood. Calibri rushed over and to her dread, felt no pulse. He was dead. Then, part horrified, part disgusted, and part morbidly fascinated, she looked up. And in the center of the clearing, surrounded by bleeding dragons and holding a bloodstained knife, was Eli.
This end is quite shocking, but to understand you'll have to wait for the next chapter. Don't forget to vote and comment!
