The roar echoed forth with a might that could not be described.
Black blood dripped out of Dorian's ears as he turned around in surprise, his hearing temporarily reduced to a simple ringing noise. His mind was sluggish, his thoughts clouded.
He turned around, looking blearily at the Traveling Ice Waterfall. The falls was currently wavering, meandering back and forth at the force of the mighty Aura.
Dorian's hearing gradually restored itself. He blinked as he cleared his vision, looking back at the Red Portal.
"The King Class Grakon returned early!" Arial swore, her eyes flashing. She turned to look at Dorian.
"It's almost ready!" Arial called out to him, her voice filled with urgency as she waved him over near the side of the portal.
Dorian winced. Her voice grated in his still-healing ears. He walked up to a spot a few meters away, standing next to the Red Portal.
The red portal was glowing, bright light emitting from it. It seemed to have destabilized somewhat, however, the force of the King Class Aura messing with its internal energy. Chaotic, red splashes of energy sloshed around within it, looking dangerous.
The powerful King Class beast seemed distracted by the Shades and the waterfall behind him. They should have just enough time to escape, he thought, his heart pounding, a mixture of excitement and fear.
"Is it still good to use?" He waved his hand at it, trying to force himself to think clearer. The oppressive Aura that was reigning down on him made it hard to concentrate.
"Yes." Arial walked up next to him, nodding her head.
THWUCK
An intense, burning sensation punched through Dorian's chest, one that combined with a feeling of pure, unadulterated agony.
Dorian looked down in complete shock.
A pure, golden blade of light was stabbing out of his chest, pulsating quietly.
He turned to look to his right, where Arial was standing.
Her hand was on the grip of the blade that had pierced into him.
WHOOSH
THUD
Dorian flew several meters away, the blade stabbing into the ground and holding his body still. Black blood burst out of his mouth as the piercing agony ripped through his mind, searing into him. His hands trembled as he tried to clutch at the blade, and were subsequently burned.
The pain was so overwhelming that his mind seemed to reject it, and his body became numb. A burning sensation spread throughout his system, almost completely paralyzing him.
"W-w-why?!"
Dorian threw up more blood, his entire body shaking. His vision grew blurry, making it hard to see.
"I-I helped ssave you."
"Why?"
"Why?"
He looked at the humanoid Lightsworn Fox, his hands falling away listlessly. He coughed, his chest trembling,
"Why?"
Arial walked over, looking down at him. She waved her hand, causing the blade to fly out of his chest. The burning sensation began to fade as the blade was withdrawn, but the grievous injuries remained. His body remained paralyzed, unable to move.
Arial shook her head,
"You are far too sweet for this world, my dear Dorian."
In the background, another powerful yell shook the air, though this one less impactful than the previous one. The blind Grakon King seemed to have engaged with the Shades, a battle that would no doubt be brief considering their differing levels.
Arial knelt down, stroking his forehead gently.
"I didn't want to hurt you, but, well, desperate times call for desperate measures. With the Portal like this, it will barely take one of us away safely. More than that risks sending us into the boundaries of chaotic space, to a destination unknown." As she spoke, she turned briefly to look at the red portal. It was still destabilized, but seemed to be, very slowly, becoming less chaotic as time went by.
"But…" Dorian wheezed, his chest heaving,
"Yo-you didn't have to attack me. You could've-"
Another coughing fit interrupted his words, black blood spattering out,
"You could've just left." He glared at her, anger filling him as he tried to get over his shock. A fierce, resentful fury that raged in his heart.
Arial gave him a small smile.
"My dear Dorian…" She traced one of her fingers gently across his cheek. Each finger had a small claw at the end of it, wrapped in white fur.
"You seem to be under the illusion that I am a good person."
She stabbed the tiny claw at the end of one of her fingers lightly into Dorian's cheek. A small trail of blood dripped down his face. Dorian couldn't even feel it, his body in a terrible state.
His mind was in shock, making thinking difficult.
"Bu-but the evil Shades c-chasin-chasing you-"
Arial put a finger over his lips, shaking her head.
"Evil? My dear boy, the Church of Light is many things, full of self-righteous, holier-than-thou, Priests and arrogant warriors, but, if nothing else, they hold true to their calling. They are far from evil, even to members not of the Shade race. Though, the same can't quite be said of their dreadful Shade King."
"No-no. The-the corpses, they ki-killed t-the expedition, humans and vamp-" Dorian sputtered, his mind trying to understand the situation.
"Ohhhh, right." Arial smiled, and then shrugged guiltily, her beautiful sing-song voice tinkling out,
"That was me."
Dorian just stared at her in disbelief,
"N-no, the corpses were fresh, they had just kil-" His mind went back to the scene where he had discovered the dead bodies.
All of them had been freshly killed, at least only a few minutes dead, according to Ausra's estimates. There was little room for error, not with his powerful eyes and meticulous Soul Spell Matrix Genie. He also vividly remembered seeing the Shade named Jasper rudely throw one of the dead bodies down.
"Oh, were they?" Arial shrugged, turning around once more to look at the slowly stabilizing Red Portal.
"Well, this is a land of the dead. Death operates oddly here. Corpses decay at a very distorted rate, sometimes fast, sometimes painstakingly slow." She stood up, shaking her head as she looked at Dorian.
Dorian's eyes flashed.
The corpses had all lacked Soul Spell Matrixes, something he would normally expect to find on a recently killed body. Further, as his mind focused on his jumbled memories, he realized that all the bodies had been covered in vicious burns.
Burns that could only come from some type of fierce weapon, giving off powerful heat.
A weapon just like the glowing sword of light that Arial was holding.
He had never actually seen any of the Shades kill any of the humans or vampires there. Only seen them moving some of the bodies, and one of them praying for them.
His mind reeled as he realized his mistakes.
Dorian looked at her, not knowing what to say.
She looked away from the red portal and slowly stared at him, biting her lip. The glowing pool of red energy had just stabilized to a point similar to how it looked when they first arrived.
"Blame me all you want. My life is a cursed one anyway. Cursed to be forever alone, cursed to be hunted by those stronger than me. Cursed to live in fear, constantly fleeing. Without a family. With no one at all." For the first time, the cheerful facade she wore twisted as her voice filled with emotion, her hands trembling.
"What could you know of that? Of my pain? Of my eternal loneliness?" She continued to look at him silently, her voice vicious. Her entire body shook, small tears appearing in her eyes.
"There is no being nice in the 30,000 Worlds. Justice does not prevail. Good does not win in the end." She shook her head, clenching her hands into fists.
"The mighty rule, while the weak give way. That is the law of this land."
A moment passed.
Arial regained control of herself, her smile returning as she wiped her face.
"Well, it looks like it's time for me to go!" She stretched her hands.
"Thanks for bringing up the idea to visit the planet Magmor! I was getting a bit bored playing around in the land of the Shades, looking for the legendary Ascension Ruins sounds like it could be fun." She shrugged.
"I didn't kill you, I only left you injured after betraying you, so don't haunt me when you're dead." Arial jumped backwards, singing out her last words to Dorian as her body vanished into the glowing red portal.
"Byeeee~"
A bright, red flash of light echoed out as Arial disappeared, leaving Dorian alone.
The paralysis that had gripped his body gradually began to fade. He went into overdrive as his body tried to restore the horrid injuries he'd suffered, ones that had sapped an incredible amount of energy from him.
"ARRRGH!"
A faint scream echoed in the background, just barely audible over the crashing waterfall of ice.
Dorian's heart was plunged into guilt and rage as he slowly forced himself into a sitting position, throwing up blood once more.
The dark tentacles in Dorian's mind that had spread fully began to writhe as his thoughts grew unstable. The memories he had forced to the back of his head, intending to deal with later, began to surge forward.
A flurry of emotions rushed through him. His mental state, already unstable from the previous fight with the Shades and the strange, new memories, shook.
Dorian looked at his trembling hands.
He was too kind.
Time, and time again.
Had he learned nothing?
Was he going to keep repeating his mistakes? Over and over?
The air around Dorian shook as his soul trembled, reality itself warping with his mental state. The air around him began to darken.
Dorian's body transformed, his Ifrit form changing into his Berserker Demon form, a body that had strong regenerative properties as well as a much higher durability, ones that would surpass his current, and help him heal faster. Raw, furious anger forced its way into his mind as he transformed.
BOOM
A shockwave had slammed into him, flipping over his badly injured body.
The frothing Traveling Ice Waterfall that had been raging down split in two as an enormous, hundred meter long sword completely separated it, a sword that locked into place on stone outcroppings that had been hidden in the doorways on each side of the bridge. A large pathway across the bridge formed as the blade settled.
Dorian stumbled to his feet, clutching at his chest. The paralysis that had gripped his body was mostly shaken away, but the rest of his injuries were still potent, especially the searing hole that was only now healing in the center of his chest.
thud
thud
thud
A deathly form appeared, at the entrance of the large, circular room.
The body of a mighty, undead Grakon, standing about 3 meters tall. It was casually carrying the bodies of the 6 Shades in its right arm. One of the Shades appeared to be near death, while the other 5 were still miraculously alive but badly wounded.
The Grakon paused, its face turning slowly in Dorian's direction. The white wrapping around its eyes seemed to flutter briefly as it looked directly at him.
At the same time, the dark tendrils that had spread throughout Dorian's mind from a hidden part of his soul, many days ago, continued to writhe with abandon, warping his thoughts. Tendrils that had been warping Dorian's thoughts from just before he killed those hunters that were torturing that deer, all the way to now. They pierced through his brain, through to his very soul itself.
And then transformed, swallowing his mind completely.
In the deepest recess of Dorian's mind, a faint, ancient voice whispered towards Dorian's subconscious,
'Perfection... seek for it... in chaos.'
As darkness was taking Dorian's mind, however, a small, tiny beam of light shot into Dorian's soul, wavering forth from an unexpected source. From the quiet, resting soul of William. This beam of light buried itself in the core of his mind and soul, vanishing within.
'Kindness…' Dorian's was unaware of these happenings as his eyes turned bloodshot, the air around him taking on a dark, heavy edge.
'Kindness is weakness. Only through strength can I achieve my goals. I tried kindness.'
'I gave it my everything. And it failed me.'
'No more.'
Dorian closed his eyes slowly.
'No more.'
'Condense.'
'Warning! You can only maintain this form for roughly 87 seconds before internal dissolution! It is recommended to revert from this form immediately!'
He ignored the warning from Ausra as his body transformed, condensing into the unstable, but powerful Condensed Berserker Demon Form.
As his mind settled, Dorian felt a kind of inner peace surround him.
The thousands of memories that had jostled into Dorian's mind instantly exploded forth, and melded, perfectly transforming into his own memories, becoming a key, core part of him. They filtered into his thoughts, no longer invasive memories from another man. But, instead, real memories that Dorian felt as his own.
He opened his eyes and crossed gazes with the blind Grakon.
And slowly, ever so slowly, a smile appeared on his face.