Passion (Book 1 of "The Fantasy of Life" Series)

Chapter 31

Ashanaya

Everything had a red tinge to it as I saw an enormous dragon flying above Hope. The dragon was the one from the mountain, Simdagun, it was terrifying, and certainly much larger than the statue. It's colours were yellow, brown, green, with it's horns slightly yellow but mostly white. It shifted until it was invisible.

My perspective shifted until I was seeing the world through the dragons eyes. I saw it zoom in to Kel, running through the street clutching something to her chest as human guard chased her. It followed her for a few moments, scanning her and watching over her every move, it did something else but I couldn't really tell. It flew to the Evenura, zooming in to me, then Valen near me, we were out in the field, practicing with my bow, but it looked like it was from months ago. It did the thing again.

I began to understand what strange thing it was doing, it was selecting us, choosing us for whatever sick thing it wanted.

It flew deeper into the woods and zoomed into York, he was kicking around a rock then he got bored with it and said something I couldn't hear, the rock grew in size then burst, it selected him. Then it went to another human city and zoomed to Cullen, he flipped through a small book shaking his head at each page then after a while giving up and he started weeping over the book. The dragon selected him.

The dragon continued to choose people I didn't recognise. An elven woman living in a human city, a human man wandering through the woods, a kindred, the same kindred that was showing us all of this, Shirajiin, three nymphs living in the same forest, though one was a water nymph living in a nearby lake. The last one it chose was a druid, which was very strange. I stared, though the vision was slightly blurred and everythng was redder than it was supposed to be, I'd never seen a druid and I was curious. She was tall, about 5'10, with long wavy blond hair with brown roots. She had blue tattoos along each side of her face, they were just below her high cheekbones and started thick then got thinner. Her eyes were grey, she had angular features, and slightly pointed ears, she was very beautiful. She was very filled out, much more than an elf or even me. Her fingernails were matte and cyan, and she had a long elegant dark blue dress on with tall black high heeled boots on. I could tell she was very powerful.

There was something strange about her, something made her feel so familiar.

It didn't choose Marhara, or even look at him, strange.

The vision jumped forward suddenly. It showed, one by one all of us turned Ashen. All of us with jagged scary features, black hair and red eyes. Though we weren't like the normal Ashen, we were more like Valerie. We each looked very evil and extremely scary. It was eerie, we each had a devillish grin. For some reason Kel's disturbed me the most. All of her features lookedd wrong, the evil look didn't suit her.

The dragon flew over the same places again, but this time scenery was burning, all of it, and in the middle were each of the people who were from there, laughing and killing anything living in our path. It was all so surreal and it scarred my mind.

One specific place stuck in my mind. The Evenura, Valen was alone, I was no where in sight, and I watched the tents, the mountain where we held the ritual of the dead, and the old oak tree burn. The fires grew slowly becoming more and more devastating the the area around.

I remember Kel, walking through the streets of hope, beating people down with bottles, burning down homes of the poor. She lost all of her values.

Cullen was throwing money into the fires, beating all of his younger siblings and he shoved an indoctrinary into the back of his older brother's head while spitting on Wilhelm's remains.

It sifted through each and every one of us, showing us losing all of our values, destroying the things we loved, we killed the people we were trying to protect. I couldn't understand why I wasn't anywhere to be seen.

The view zoomed out slowly until it showed an overview of the entire continent, I was giant, looming over it, punching down and laughing maniacally.

"There's no hope of winning this fight. You should give up." An echoed voice called out to me.

You should give up.

You should give up.

You should give up.

You.

Should.

Give.

Up.

I screamed. I screamed louder than I've ever screamed before and all of the vision drained away around me, leading me back to the forest. Where the kindred stood ahead of me, and everyone around me, their normal selves, all looking astonished. I fell to my knees.

"Well, that was all you needed to see, I'll be on my way now." Shirajiin's wings spread and she lifted from the ground, beginning to fly away.

"San Jakoth." A bright beam of light chased after her and grabbed her by the leg, keeping her from going any faster. "You're staying right here you ugly voshk, I will end you."

I looked back at York, the beam of light shot out from his hand, and he stared at the kindred, furious.

She smiled at him. "Very well."

She spun around and flung him away in the other direction, then flew at him. "How about a little one on one?"