Chapter 110

Nayali

The Intruder

She could feel it, the way the woods, her woods, became instantly agitated by a visitor. Monsters of all types had been creeping in over the years. At first it was the dragons and their spawn, then those insufferable bats with their odd venom. Each monster that entered was soon either forced to yield to the new laws of the land, or die. These were her laws, laws that were immutable, laws that were currently being defiled.

Nayali could feel the movement of the stranger, how they defiled her lands by flying over them. The Azani were always so brazen, every once in a while they would send in a lone scout to test her defenses. This was nothing new. She had dealt with encounters like this hundreds of times.

This time was slightly different, however. Normally the Azani scout would get to the part where the weird bat-like creatures would attack and they would flee. This one just dealt with the monsters with physical attacks, perhaps they are finally learning. Magical attacks, at least lightning based attacks do nothing against the bat-like creatures. Fire is mildly effective, in that it seems to disorient them for a moment. But the only true way to deal with the bat-like creatures is to chop them in half.

From what she can tell, the intrude is weak. Sure they are powerful enough to kill the creatures with one swing each, but normally Nayali can slice the rodents in half.

“Should we go, greet our guest?” Florijma asks, he has grown. Not in size, as she was already a large psychic dragon when they first met. No, she had grown in mental acuity over their time together.

“Yes.” Nayali said as she instinctively began to circulate mana throughout her body. By the time she had met her third cycle through her body, she had lift. Then by the fifth she had direction, then by the seventh she was taking off faster than any bird. She was on a direct collision course with the new intruder to her forest.

The figure was easy to spot, or at least they would have been spotted, had they not been invisible to the naked eye.

A talisman perhaps? Nayali wondered to herself about how the individual in question was able to hide their appearance. Still talisman or not, the being before her was in her domain. They were trespassing on her lands, which meant she could see and feel every movement.

She reached out for the location, trying to send a bolt of lightning, but was shocked to discover there was nothing to hold onto. Nothing for her mana to grab hold of and direct itself towards. Her heart beat quickly at the sudden thrill.

Badump.

For the first time she was being challenged in her own lair. For the first time she would actually have to fight with her sword. A faint smile crested her lips. She didn’t know what talisman the individual had, one that could both make the wielder invisible and unable to be targeted directly by magic but she was intrigued. It would be a worthy trophy for her, once she killed this infiltrator. Perhaps she would use this very item against the Azani, against her brother’s forces.

Shink.

Her sword was drawn from its scabbard in the time it took her to think about how to proceed. The blade held firmly in her hands caused a smile to fill her lips. She would duel an unknown invisible opponent in the air. In her past life such a thought would have shaken her to her very core. But now, after having reigned supreme over this region for so long she couldn’t help but feel alive at the prospect of a true duel. Especially as she wasn’t blind, not truly. As this intruder was in her domain, she could make out their entire body. They were a void of darkness in her otherwise impeccably bright forest. They were the shadow in a sea of light.

Closing her eyes, a smile crested her lips as she dove forward.

“Hyyah!” Nayali screamed out, her sword arcing gracefully through the sky. In her mind she saw the way the intruder turned to look at her. She could almost see the fear on their formless features. Then just as quickly as they noticed her, they were gone.

Swoosh.

Her sword arced through empty air. Her strike so quick that it cut through the air so quickly it caused a whipping sound to be heard.

Refocusing her mind, she found the figure a pace away, as if they had just side-stepped the attack in midair. The figure stood, tall and thin, clearly wearing a cloak of some sort if the outline she felt was any indication. To her surprise the intruder had no weapon. What she could have mistaken for a spear at first was nothing more than a long walking stick. The absurdity of why one would need a walking stick while flying was lost on her. Instead she felt anger fill her as she had just been made to look foolish. Worse, the trespasser was still in her domain.

She swung again, swoosh. This time a horizontal slash, only to find more air for her trouble. To her surprise the intruder just floated horizontally under her swing, before rising back to a standing position.

“You’re good. I’ll give you that.” Nayali said, as she prepared herself to strike again.

Gasp. The intruder gasped, a clear moment of hesitation on their part. Nayali didn’t know why they would gasp, or lose focus during the middle of combat, but she would take advantage of this moment of weakness.

“Hiyah!” Nayli grunted as she made a horizontal slash again, trying to cut the intruder in half.

To her surprise rather than dodging the intruder moved.

Clang.

She first felt the shifting of her blade, before she heard the redirect. Nayali had swung, but the attacker was so much faster, that they had managed to strike the underside of her sword in such a way that her blade was directed up and over the assailant. Worse, this left her core wide open, a fact that her opponent took full advantage of as the walking stick that had just been used to redirect her blade now slashed in and aimed for her stomach.

Clenching her stomach she braced for impact. Only to feel relief when the blow she was expecting never came.

Tap.

She felt the tip of the staff gently poke her stomach. A sign that she could have been struck had her opponent not held back.

“Grr!” Nayali snarled, enraged by the cowardly maneuver. She had never been treated in such a way since she was a little girl, first learning her forms at the hands of her brother. Then a thought hit her, her brother? It was odd, almost impossible to think of, but there was only one person who was so immeasurably powerful as this opponent before her. Someone who could have a talisman powerful enough to make them not only invisible but also untouchable by magic.

Opening her eyes, she looked and was surprised to see a familiar figure before her. While she had been expecting her brother, what she saw caused her to flinch in panic.

“You!” She snarled.

Somewhere during their duel the intruder had turned visible, had made themselves known. So many emotions ran through her mind all at once; fear, longing, anger. But the one that took immediate control of her mind was rage.

“Bastard.” She shouted, not quite believing her eyes. Part of her swore that this intruder had to be an apparition of some kind, one who took the form of someone she once cared for from her past. If that was the case she would make this intruder pay. The man she knew with that face could not fly, would never be able to fly again. So for some monster to come here into her realm and challenge her in such a way, then to smile at her with his face, it was too much.

Without even thinking she pulled at the dark mass of energy that she had built up insider herself, the one she was rewarded by the great forest spirit for taking unto herself. It still sat in her solid and stagnant, but she could wield it. She had wielded it. Her only time using it she had used it to strike at the very man who this intruder now dared to look like. An intruder who needed to die.

“Die!” Nayali screamed as she held out her hand and fired the dark pulsing energy that just sat in her body out. Now like the last time she used such an attack it was quick and unavoidable. At least she thought it was unavoidable given their distance from one another.

Boom!

The strike was true. Her bolt of death that had severed the meridians of a good man, struck this intruder who dared to wield the same face. The Azani must have done their research. This was likely a test of her brother; would she have the compulsion to strike the same man the same way twice? Of course she would, especially when she knew it couldn’t be the same man.

As the blast hit, a thought filled her mind. More of a fleeting memory, one that she had long since forgotten and discounted as never happening. The image of Lykan emerging from the ruins. The ruins that were not far from here. Ruins that she had been guarding ever since. Ruins where Lykan like a phoenix rose from the ashes of the reclaimed city and took off into the sky.

Pain.

Her heart beat once, then twice as she recalled the event. She remembered the moment as if it was yesterday. She had so long hoped that such an event happened and simultaneously didn’t happen. She hoped that it was true in that she wanted the man she so desperately cared for fly again, to once again regain his purpose. Yet, she also hoped that it wasn’t true as it would mean that she lost her one chance to go with him as an equal.

As quickly as the thought of the memory happened it passed in her mind. She was here in the moment, waiting for the talismans to fail after receiving such a jolt of unmatched power. She waited for the moment that her infuriating brother would fall from the sky. She waited for the mask to fall to reveal the true face of her brother. She waited, for the look of complete loss and devastation to fill his face as it did on him.

She waited.

And waited.

Yet, rather than hearing cries of pain. The man before her spoke with a voice that was both memorable and impossible.

“Huh, so that’s how they wove them together.”

Hearing the intruder speak caused a shiver to run down her spine. She had heard the voice before, she knew it intimately. At one point she would go to be imagining it speak to her. Now that she was close, this close, she could once again feel the bonds of the gods tying her to him once more.

“Lykan?” Nayali asked, her voice cracking as she looked at the boy who had not aged a day since she last saw him.

Chuckling.

The intruder, Lykan, laughed. It was a laugh that spoke of peace and tranquility. A voice that by all accounts shouldn’t be.

She stared at the person before her. Momentarily dumbstruck from what her senses were telling her.

“You’ve changed.” He said, looking at her new hair and eyes. It took Nayali a moment to realize she had in fact changed, quite drastically in comparison to the changes that hadn’t happened to Lykan. Her hair was now ashen, her eyes the golden color befitting a priestess of the great forest spirit. Even her body had filled out in portions. She was twenty-nine now. While she had always been a few years older than Lykan, now the age gap was apparent. While the blessings Nayali had received would likely keep her looking this age for a long time, it was clear that the passage of time had seemingly completely stopped on him.

“Are you a Ghost?” Nayali asked.

Hearing the question, a long laugh broke from Lykan’s lips. He had long since grown used to the name many of the north had given him, the Ghost Traveler, and after hearing this he couldn’t help but laugh in amusement. At first he hated the name, but now if even Nayali was calling him this, then there might be something to the name after all.

“Are you hurt?” Florijma said, he had taken the time to sneak up behind the intruder. “Don’t worry, I’ve got them.” Florijma thought.

Before Nayali could do anything Florijma who had appeared from the shadows shot a charged burst of psychic energy right at Lykan’s back side.

Nayali reached out in horror, hoping to stop the attack. In her mind she saw so many different ways the next few seconds would play out. In one he would be struck and fall to his death. In another he would be struck and the relaxed face he portrayed would crack and fall away.

In all the possible scenarios of the future, Nayali had not been able to predict what would actually happen.

A pulse of energy filled the walking stick Lykan was carrying. Then just as quickly Lykan spun around struck the magic that was hurtling towards him. Normally striking magical energy with anything that wasn’t itself magical was foolish, it had do with the resonance of power. Normally objects made from the world would either pass through the magic if they were not the original intended target, or they would disintegrate upon contact. The power of the force much more capable, than the object’s material state. The less dense an object, the more one could expect the item to break. A metal sword might be able to withstand such a blow, but a wooden staff not so much. This was all a way to say, that when the two items collided the staff and the bolt of energy the outcome should have been apparent. At best the staff shatter into thousands of tiny shards and the rest of the energy bolt hurtled forward to strike Lykan in the chest. That is what should have happened.

What actually happened was something that would take Nayali days to fully comprehend. The glowing energy that surrounded the staff glowed brightly for a moment. Then the two opposing forces met for a brief second, before the bolt of energy that was supposedly untouchable was struck and flew back towards the one who cast it.

Smack!

There was an audible pop as the bolt of psychic energy struck the glowing staff and then rebounded back towards the caster. Fortunately for Florijma he had moved closer, causing the bolt to miss ever so slightly on its return path. What was unfortunate is that the return strike only caused the dragon to become enraged.

“RAWRR!” Florijma hissed out as he began surging forward towards Lykan.

Lykan for his part looked calm as he squared himself up to the onrushing dragon.

“Stop!” Nayali screamed trying to place herself between Lykan and her bonded companion. Yet there was an undeniable blood lust that came from Florijma as he drew closer to Lykan. Over their bond, she could read his emotions and suddenly she understood his cause for anger.

“He has killed hundreds of my kind. He has the stink of our death on his hands and soul.”

With that, Nayali’s senses merged with Florijma’s for a second. In that instance she saw his soul, she saw Lykan and found that it was covered in the blood of countless dragons of different shapes, sizes, and abilities. She saw the swirl of colors that marked his soul. That was one thing she had learned from her time, that dragons have a way of marking the soul of the one who killed them. It is a defense mechanism meant to distinguish friends from foes. Dragons who see the soul of a dragon hunter know to kill that individual quickly and efficiently. Seeing the amount of death on Lykan’s soul caused her to pause in fear. He had killed dragons recently and often, their marks on his soul clear for everyone to see. Everyone that could see the markings that is.

“No.” Nayali said, horror filling her voice as she turned to see Lykan square up his shoulders and prepare to strike at her only true friend.

“NO!”