A few days after our conversation between Aria and me, she began to show progress in her training. She had clearly understood something thanks to our conversation. Her training didn't change much from usual. She spent part of it improving the circulation of her aetherium and the rest of the time, she meditated.
Meditation allowed her to increase her concentration. She was getting better and better at perceiving what was around her. After some time, during these meditations, she perceived microparticles in the air, all around her. As time passed, the quantity of particles increased, creating a visual symphony that only she could see.
According to her hypotheses, she described these particles as pure aetherium in the air. Until now, she had felt it, but now she could see it clearly. A few days were enough for Aria to be on the verge of regaining her powers. One day, as she continued to meditate, the particles of pure aetherium in the air that she perceived began to converge in a spiral towards her, creating a glittering vortex.
She felt a force invade her, a power she had never experienced before. And still with her eyes closed, she stood up slowly. From both ends of her fingers, she formed a giant circle, luminescent and vibrating with pink energy. A circle from which emerged a condensed and powerful ray that easily destroyed the wall in front of her, reducing the stone to dust in a spectacular explosion.
Thanks to all this effort and her unshakeable determination, after five months, she had regained her powers. Now that she had understood how her power worked and perceived better the world around her. A world that only she could see and feel since she was able to make pure aetherium converge towards her on her own, she was inevitably much more powerful and above all much more enduring.
At first, every time she used her powers, after only a few spells, she felt extreme fatigue and was exhausted. But now, she no longer felt the fatigue and was even able to cast dozens and dozens of spells without faltering. According to her, it was because she was using her powers unconsciously, without understanding how they worked, which tired her much faster.
In the evening, we celebrated Aria's success around a big dinner, with fruits, dragon meat and music, with Harris singing in a joyful voice. Only I remained now. And even if I made some progress and tried multiple methods, it remained very minimal since our arrival. The road remained long. Unfortunately, an event occurred that shook us and changed our daily life in the world Drakaryon.
One day, we woke up, gathered our things and set off. It was the day we had to leave and change shelters. It was a day like any other, as usual. Harris guided us, he was the one who had memorized the map of the surroundings in his head. We walked on this arid ground, under the burning sun, but we were used to it since it had been five months of our daily life. The crushing heat weighed on our shoulders, but we continued without complaining.
But suddenly, the ground trembled violently under our feet. A pack of earth dragons emerged from the ground. Dragons two meters tall with long legs, sinuous tails and small wings. There were about thirty of them. We immediately took a stance and prepared to fight, our hearts accelerating at the imminent threat.
Shinrei cried out, his voice piercing the chaos. "Be careful! These are Rochalys! They are known to be terrestrial dragons, but they attack in groups and have very resistant defense."
As for me, I stayed mostly sheltered and didn't see every day the diversity of dragons that inhabited this world. Aria had only recently begun to explore the outside world. But as for the three others, it was a different story. They had spent many moments exploring and seeing the different races this world had to offer. They therefore had a lot of information about the different types of dragons and had given them names, they were very valuable encyclopedias for our survival.
To be able to face all these dragons at once, it was essential that we had our powers. Fortunately, four of us had recovered them. We found ourselves surrounded by the pack, ready to charge at us and devour us.
Suddenly, they struck the ground with their paws, and pillars of earth emerged from the ground with pointed ends that rushed towards us. In a fluid and impressive coordination, Aria and Harris combined defensive attacks together. Aria created a shield all around us, her hands tracing runes in the air. Harris formed a sphere of wind that absorbed the earth pillars.
Their combined defense managed to absorb the simultaneous attacks of the dragons. Once the shields dissipated, without waiting, Kael struck the ground with a sharp closed fist that destroyed all the pillars surrounding us in one shot, the shockwave raising dust in all directions.
We separated on five sides so the dragons would be forced to disperse. It would be easier for us to each deal with small groups of dragons on our own. For the others, even if the situation was not the most favorable, it was not so complicated now that they had regained their powers and were stronger. But as for me, I had not regained mastery of my elemental aetherium. And every time I wanted to use them, I found myself overwhelmed by pain and paralyzed.
The problem in me persisted since our arrival and I still had not found a solution. But during these five months, I had not wasted my time. Even if my training to regain my powers had not advanced much, however my hand-to-hand combat abilities had become unparalleled and I had perfected my mastery of my aetherium within me. So I was content to dodge and land a few hits. But even if I managed to beat some of them, I could never have beaten them all because of their defense.
Aria was surrounded by four dragons. One was throwing mud at her and another was projecting pillars from the ground, while the two others rushed straight at Aria. She formed two circles to protect herself from the mud and pillars. Just before the two dragons rushing at her reached her, she created a circle on the ground. From this circle emerged a ray that propelled her into the air in a graceful movement. This allowed her to dodge the fierce charge of the dragons.
Once in the air, circles formed just below the dragons and suddenly energy vines appeared, immobilizing the four dragons on the spot, binding them like invisible chains. And still in the air, at the same time, she formed four circles and projected a pink crystal charged with energy towards the immobilized dragons. The impact was felt by huge explosions on the ground and the attack wounded them and knocked them down, leaving them lying and lifeless.
On his side, Harris had to deal with eight dragons. He created whirlwinds of air under his feet to move, his feet barely lifting off the ground. He approached the dragons easily thanks to this and clinging to them, he executed very violent wind gusts that propelled the dragons far away. The remaining dragons did not let themselves be defeated and hurled rock projectiles towards Harris.
Harris managed to counter them with fluid arm movements. He created wind blasts that deflected the projectiles to the sides, each gesture becoming more controlled and precise. He even managed to use the wind to bounce the projectiles back at the dragons. He launched himself into the air, and once in the sky, from the ends of his hands and feet, he sent compressed air projectiles at the dragons. The terrain was being destroyed by explosions and craters that formed the longer the battle lasted.
After this rain of projectiles, only two dragons remained. Harris, with a fluid movement of his hand from bottom to top, sent a dragon into the air. Then, thanks to his mastery of the air, he made the dragon levitate and threw it at the last one still standing. Ingeniously, he used the defense of the Rochalys to defeat the defense of another Rochalys.
As for Shinrei, there were six dragons that followed him. Despite all the spikes, pillars and multiple earth projectiles that the dragons threw at him, he easily dodged them all with his speed. His movements were a deadly dance, each step propelling him at superhuman velocity.
He approached the dragons one by one and overwhelmed them with hundreds of punches and kicks simultaneously, his strikes becoming a blur of movement. To succeed in piercing their defense, Shinrei took advantage of the fact that their defense was only external and used these piercing punches that inflicted internal damage, where the defenses were not useful to him. Without the slightest difficulty, Shinrei dealt with and easily defeated the Rochalys, leaving them unconscious on the ground.
Kael was the one who had the most dragons to face. He attracted towards him two of the dragons that were following me to help me and combined with the seven following him, he had to face nine dragons on his own. But thanks to his superhuman strength, it was no problem for him to breach their defense. He absorbed without the slightest difficulty all the earth projectiles that were sent to him by sweeping them away with his hands and kicks.
Then, with punches, he knocked out the Rochalys one by one without the slightest difficulty, each blow resonating like thunder. He even managed to defeat five of them with a single punch on the ground that created a shockwave throughout the surroundings, defeating the surrounding Rochalys. On my side, I managed to defeat one as best I could and put the other two in a position of weakness, which helped Shinrei finish them off quickly.
Everything seemed to be returning to order, but suddenly, a howl echoed in our ears, a piercing and terrifying cry. We turned our heads to the sky and caught sight of a long and thin dragon with enormous wings covered in dark red, almost scarlet scales. The noise of the battle had attracted this dragon, a Flamescourge that flew through the air and was known for having a breath of fire that melted everything it touched, turning stone into lava in an instant.
The Flamescourge approached and opened its mouth wide. It unleashed its powerful and fearsome fire breath on us, a wave of heat so intense that the air seemed to undulate. Harris quickly stepped forward and created a wind barrier to protect everyone, his hands trembling under the force of the effort. Unfortunately, the dragon's fire being more powerful than Harris could contain, he was in a bad position, his face sweating with effort.
But in desperation, Harris cried out with all his strength, his piercing voice resonating above the roar of the dragon. "I will not fall! Not this time! I am not the same as before! Your fire will not defeat me, you stupid dragon!"
His feet firmly planted on the ground and with all his strength, Harris, with multiple movements of his hands all around him, created an enormous tornado tens of meters high, a true destructive wind column. A tornado that absorbed the fire, which created a fire tornado just before Harris dispersed it in the air in a spectacular explosion of flames and wind. Although the task seemed difficult, he succeeded in defeating the destructive breath of the Flamescourge, his body almost collapsing from exhaustion.
The dragon, in shock, lowered its guard, and Kael immediately took advantage of it. Aria, making stair-like structures appear that Kael used to rise into the air, then he jumped and struck the dragon with full force on the head, which violently projected it to the ground in a devastating impact.
All the dragons seemed defeated and on the ground, but as we recovered from the events, a wave spread throughout the surroundings, a wave that came from the west, invisible but like a terribly powerful and evil energy that we felt it. Just after this wave passed, all the dragons that were on the ground got up and were much more furious and ferocious, their eyes shining with a new rage. And underneath the ground, a giant Rochalys emerged, an alpha, because it was ten times the size of normal Rochalys, its scales glittering like polished granite.
We felt the situation becoming critical. The muscles in my body tensed, fear overwhelming us. We decided to flee. A chase began between us trying to escape and the dragons chasing us. As we fled far away, we caught sight of a huge crack in the ground that fell so low into the ground that we couldn't see the ground below, just the abyssal darkness.
Harris, while we were running, asked us, taking the lead with assurance. "Keep running then jump! I'll handle the rest!"
We all ran straight ahead despite the crack in the ground in front of us, then we jumped into this same crack. Once we jumped, Harris created a wind gust coming from below that made us rise up and pass to the other side of the crack. But as we continued to run, Aria stopped abruptly, her feet firmly planted on the ground.
She began to create dozens of circles ten centimeters at the ends of her fingers, condensing them into one, shining with a blinding pink light. Then she placed her spell on the ground and suddenly, all around the dragons following us behind, dozens of circles appeared and suddenly, dozens of rays struck them with full force from all sides continuously, which knocked them down. After all the hits they had taken, Aria's attack was the last straw for the surviving dragons.
We were relieved because everything was finally over, and we ran towards Aria to hug her and rejoice in our victory. Our smiles had to be radiant, our relief palpable. But in the distance, I saw the alpha Rochalys get up as best it could, even though it was having trouble standing. And just before collapsing to the ground, it threw a huge rock at Aria.
"No!" I cried out, realizing the danger before anyone else.
But the alpha Rochalys' attack missed its target and hit the cliff of the crack. But that was enough to weaken the ground which began to collapse, the rocks disintegrating and falling into the void. The ground near the crack collapsed with Aria on it, on the verge of falling into infinite darkness.
I ran as fast as I could, my legs burning with effort. I grabbed her hand and counterbalanced her weight with mine, my muscles contracting under the superhuman effort. I put her to safety on solid ground, while I fell into the crack in front of the helpless gazes of the others. I saw the despair and horror on the faces of Kael and Shinrei as they cried out my name, Harris reaching out his hands towards me.
Silently, as if resolved and relieved that I had succeeded in saving Aria, I let myself fall, unable to do anything in the darkness of the crack. The darkness engulfed me as I disappeared from the eyes of my companions, falling while hearing their voices fade away from me screaming. "Nozomi!"