Rise of Fire: Dragons Reborn [COMPLETED]

Chapter 6 (E)

Edits: 1

She was running blindly, her breath nearly catching in her lungs with every footfall. She was so rushed she barely noticed the sounds of the ensuing battle growing ever nearer. She only knew that she was almost out of time; something bad was about to happen and if she wasn't fast enough her goddess's wrath would be immediate and terrible.

"Talia... Where are you? You need to hurry up the one dwarf is about to be killed!" Nico's voice only served to infuriate her. After all this time now he wanted to talk? As if the words he said could push her beyond her already strained limits. As if she didn't know already how short she was cutting it. She didn't bother to answer, instead choosing to conserve her mana.

Talia burst around the final bend in the road just in time to see what Nico was talking about. In a small clearing two dwarves were standing next to each other in preparation to receive a blow from a monstrous looking bear creature. She didn't have time to marvel at its extra limbs or glowing eyes, or even how many teeth it had. Instead she did what she did best, prepared for a killing spree with a wide grin and a surge forward.

A few steps before impact she cast a simple spell, her vision changed as her mask enveloped her face and her movement became more smooth as her proper killing clothes wrapped around her skin. Her hair tightened back into the braid she always wore during work as well. From there she reached down and drew her sword from its sheath before brushing past the two dwarves and planting her feet for a powerful swing. She made sure to secure both hands around the hilt like it was a bat, aiming directly for the creature's neck.

Up close and personal she could smell the fetid stink of its breath, the creature's mouth was open wide in an attempt to wrap it's jaws around her. It had only taken her a split second to arrive in front of it, she wasn't even sure if it was aware she was there yet, but that didn't diminish the danger of its fangs sinking into her neck, face, or chest. Or its four sets of front paws from raking out her guts. Her armor was made more for fighting humans, not monster bears with claws dripping black. She made a mental note to avoid the creature's claws just in case they were tainted by poison.

Just as it had taken no more than a second to intervene between what would have surely been a fatal blow to the dwarves, it took only a second for her blade to sever its neck and for the creature to melt into ash. She didn't even realize that she had ignited the metal of the blade with her magic until then, eyeing the flames as she took in the state of the battlefield.

It was almost worse than she had expected, the bear-creature was far from the worst monster attempting to slaughter the small band of dwarves. She counted behind her eight men, every one of them battered and exhausted with sweat dripping from what little flesh was exposed. She didn't know how far they had run but they would have never made it much farther in their ragged conditions.

"You... You're the Hound." The larger of the dwarves spoke as he stepped forward. Talia eyed him carefully, lowering her sword slightly as he approached. He seemed to be the leader of the band. The other men gripped their weapons a little harder the closer he drew towards her.

"Aye. And you're the lucky band of idiots who managed to convince my goddess you deserved my aid." She growled with as much hostility as she could muster. He wasn't flustered, instead he offered her a toothy white grin.

"Don't waste your time, idiot! There's a lot of enemies here, I'll come down and try to sneak the dwarves out while you hold off the majority of these monsters. Set up a perimeter, one mile in diameter. Get control of this fast or we're done for." She looked to the skies, wondering just where Nico was while he bossed her. His raven form circled high above as he assessed the situation. Based off the tone of his mental voice she knew it was grim, if he was uncomfortable than so was she. With a grunt she turned away from the dwarves and raised her sword again, summoning forth as much mana as possible.