Arylos watched Vortex intently with his burning eyes, examining the Eikon with a hole blown open in its chest. As flames consumed their surroundings and as the sky fell, Arylos knew that the Eikon was weakened, but far from death. As the dragon lifted itself back up and howled at him like a rabid beast, he knew full well that while this was the end, it was only the beginning of the end. Arylos felt his body weaken as sore muscles atrophied under the intense strain as he secretly wondered if he had enough time left to finish off Vortex.

And yet Arylos could not confirm that Vortex was the only Eikon on Kaiyumi.

Arylos lifted his sword as the pain in his shoulders began to peer through the pain of Arylos’s wrath. He rested the sword on his shoulders as he popped his neck, letting his joints relax as best as they could. He had to tell himself to focus on one problem at a time; to focus on the Eikon standing before him and not waste energy on the possibility of another attacker. He had his target and he knew the threat had to be eliminated at all costs. He just had to figure out if the cost of this win also included the world he had come to call home.

Vortex howled loudly and charged at Arylos with a wide fang-filled mouth. Arylos was woken from his mental process and struck the Eikon’s face with his sword, knocking aside the massive metallic dragon. Arylos then took his sword for another strike but turrets on Vortex’s back opened fire on Arylos, punching holes into his paper-like body and spilling orange blood on the ground. Arylos quickly changed priorities and threw his sword at the turret, breaking off the muzzle of the weapon with a high pitched crash. Vortex came back around and roared at Arylos as the flames from inside its body gathered in its throat, fed by the air being sucked into the creature’s neck.

Arylos quickly turned to the side just as flames erupted from Vortex’s mouth, showering the ground where Arylos once stood in a sea of liquid fire. Arylos ducked behind a stone wall and reached out his arm and waited as his sword returned to his hand. He then began to climb over the wall, preparing to strike the dragon.

“Mahk,” Vortex roared in a voice that shook the air itself, knocking Arylos off of the wall and back down to the ground. Arylos quickly jumped back up just as Vortex turned around and rested its mechanical talons on the wall, crushing it beneath its weight as it crawled along the ground. It caught sight of Arylos again and hissed loudly like a serpent as the remaining engine on its back sputtered to life.

Arylos caught on and launched himself backwards with a heavy wingbeat just as the dragon snapped down, only catching the air where Arylos once was. Just as Arylos set his feet back on the ground, the engine on Vortex’s back roared as it pushed Vortex forward with a gaping maw. Arylos rolled out of the way just as Vortex crashed into buildings behind Arylos, screeching loudly as it dug itself out of the rubble. Arylos readied his sword as Vortex pulled itself out from the rubble, staring at him with burning purple eyes. Arylos watched as machinery on Vortex’s jawline folded into various places as a strange humming sound intensified from within Vortex’s neck and chest.

“Skohl’vir svjahl!” Vortex roared as the air carried the loud roar from Vortex’s chest. Arylos barely had enough time to react as an invisible force struck the ground, cutting off one of Arylos’s arms and a part of his wings as the ground broke beneath the weight of the invisible sword and gave way to a deep fissure carved into the ground itself.

“Fighting as a Reig now, shit sack?” Arylos growled as his arm began to grow back from the orange blood that poured from the wound.

Vortex hissed deeply like a snake poised to strike, keeping one hand close to its bleeding chest as it reached out with the other arm, grabbing the ground and dragging itself closer. “I am not ashamed of what I am nor what I have become, unlike you,” Vortex said in a deep growl as glowing red blood began to drip from its mouth and burn the ground where it poured onto.

“I don’t have an inferiority complex strong enough to throw away what I am, unlike you,” Arylos said while taking his fully formed arm and holding his sword with both hands.

Vortex laughed under its breath as its glare pierced through Arylos’s soul. “Then explain what you did to your people,” it said while continuing to laugh, the burning hot blood spraying from its mouth.

Arylos felt a nerve pop in him as he launched himself forward without waiting for his wings to fully heal, flying slightly to the side as he readied a powerful strike all the while Vortex continued to laugh. “Rex ’e seith’r!” Vortex shouted as the ground shook and large spikes of rock launched out from the ground, piercing into Arylos’s body and painting the ground with his orange blood.

“Rex ’e reik!” Vortex howled once more as the air roared with an intense energy. Before Arylos could pull himself off of the rocks, intense winds from above shredded his skin, hacking him to bits as he growled, feeling the pain of his body failing. Arylos’s growls turned to howls as flames from around him gathered into his body, feeding his veins with fire and reconstructing his body faster than the winds could destroy it. Before Vortex could stop him, Arylos pulled himself from the rocks and ran towards Vortex, striking the dragon with his sword that rattled its armor like a bell and left a large fracture in its neck. Arylos came back around for another attack as the flames gathered around him and he snarled like a wild beast.

“Kalndahvok!” Vortex howled as the words rang out like a shock wave that struck Arylos’s body. As the blast hit him, Arylos’s body began to convulse as a raw and searing pain hit him all at once like hot needles that pierced every inch of his skin. Arylos gasped in pain as he slowly fell to his knees, dropping his sword and gasping for breath as his body began to fight some invisible attacker.

Vortex saw Arylos stop dead in his tracks and laughed as it crawled towards Arylos. “You forget what I was, Titan; the king of this world, the dragon that burned this world three thousand years ago, the very Reig you sought to stop. You forget that my very name itself brings all walks of life to its knees.” Vortex continued to laugh as it approached the broken Arylos, muscles twitching in response to the magic as he watched Vortex with hurt eyes.

“And now I have brought the Titan to his knees as well,” Vortex continued with a laugh that Arylos recognized well. “You are afraid of something, and you let that fear get the better of you. You have to win; you won’t let yourself lose out of fear of losing. You fear death, you fear defeat, you fear what I will do to this world once you can no longer defend it.”

Arylos clenched his teeth, unable to speak as he watched Vortex, rage building in his eyes. He ordered his body to obey him yet he could not shake the pain that dug into himself like thousands of rat claws digging into fresh meat. “You were wrong about devolution but you were right about one thing,” Vortex continued as its laughter coughed up more blood. “If a species becomes stagnant and complacent, a select few will rise up and empower themselves. These insects have become just as complacent as we were; how much longer before someone like me rises up from amongst them? How much longer before you are forced to put down another monster like myself?”

Arylos’s wrath settled down for a moment as he understood what Vortex was suggesting. “N–...N-Nerseis,” Arylos squeezed out from clenched teeth.

“Tyranny? No, he was a product of your creation; nothing more,” Vortex said as it continued to laugh and moved forward, peering into Arylos’s wrathful eyes. “However one amongst them had done well to turn Tyranny against you,” it continued while the purple glow of its eyes flashed brightly.

Arylos’s face slowly softened as he remembered the Eikon he found and cut down after returning from Inamura. He remembered how the Eikon did not fight back, how it pleaded. Arylos’s horror became plain as he realized just what Vortex was telling him; it was too late for Kaiyumi, the infection of the Eikons had already spread long before this battle.

“Now you understand, Titan,” Vortex said with a laugh as it saw Arylos come to terms with what Vortex was telling him. “You cannot win, you cannot change fate; you cannot change the natural order of the very world you seek to protect. You were the ones to uphold the natural order, and now we will finish what you started.”

Arylos began to growl and clench his teeth, fighting back against the pain that wracked his body as he saw Vortex open its mouth as flames gathered in the mechanical depths of its throat. As Arylos watched the machinery spin, he felt his anger return to him, flooding over him like a warm tide of blood. His growling turned into a blood-chilling scream as his sword hummed and rushed back to his hand. Arylos broke free of the torture and ran his sword into the roof of Vortex’s mouth, holding the creature’s head tightly as Vortex began to scream loudly, flames spurting irregularly from its mouth and blowing holes in Arylos’s fragile skin.

Arylos bit through the pain as he kept his sword in the Eikon’s head, running all of the flames in his body through his arm and into his sword, burning the Eikon’s head from the inside. The air was filled by the sounds of Arylos grunting to keep Vortex in place as the Eikon continued to scream. Arylos could feel his ears begin to bleed as the ear-piercing screeches ruptured Arylos’s ear drums, yet he gritted through it, intent that the Eikon will not get back up.

The Eikon let out one last roar as flames burst from its mouth and nostrils, blasting holes in Arylos’s knees and torso. Arylos lost his grip on his sword and watched as Vortex lifted its head up and roared loudly in a deep bellowing growl before turning into a deep hiss as the humming sounds within the Eikon’s body began to wind down. Arylos watched as the Eikon’s head slowly came back down and landed just before Arylos and the Eikon let out one last gasp for air before falling quiet save for deep shuddering breaths and hisses as machinery struggled to stay alive in its burning skull.

Arylos felt his legs regain their strength as he slowly crawled back up to his feet and gingerly approached the dying Eikon as liquid rock and metal poured from its mouth, burning the ground and letting out a stench Arylos could only attribute to rotten eggs when this close. He examined the Eikon, eyeing the dim purple lights of its eyes as various machinery hummed, trying to get the Eikon back on its feet yet the creature stayed down as if it was defying its body’s orders to get back up.

“Junsereig,” Vortex said softly in a wavering voice as sparks flew from its throat. “Are you proud of what you have done? Do you really believe that you are doing the right thing?”

“I do what I must; I can’t let myself waste time figuring out if something is right or not,” Arylos said while letting out a deep breath, feeling exhaustion come to him as he fought back against it.

Vortex thought about Arylos’s words as its purple eyes slowly moved to focus on Arylos, the various lenses trying to keep the Titan in focus with the fading light it had left. “And what if you chose the wrong side?”

“There is no ‘right’ side,” Arylos said, beginning to wonder if the Reig within was coming back to the surface. “The choices are either everyone dies, or mostly everyone dies. No matter what you or I choose, a lot of people will die anyway.”

Vortex pondered Arylos’s words as its eyes moved back to the burning city and the falling sky, the machinery in its eyes whirring softly as they struggled to move. “And if you win, all of us will die,” Vortex said as it began to understand the state of their war.

“And so I cannot let you win,” Arylos said while clenching his fist, confident that even if his path wasn’t the right one, it was the one he needed to take.

Vortex continued to consider Arylos as it watched meteors continue to fall. The machinery of its mouth struggled to move as it let out a high-pitched sound, an echo of the screams it made from earlier. Arylos looked around as along with the screech, he could hear the muttering and footsteps of other Eikons in the rubble with many climbing over buildings and looking down on Arylos with their purple eyes and human bodies barely holding on with threads of muscle.

“And yet I cannot let you win either, so I will do what I must,” Vortex said in a deep growl as its eyes turned back towards Arylos. “That’s what makes us different; I have the strength to die with my people. If that is what I must do, then I will not hesitate.”

Arylos glanced back towards the surrounding Eikons as he watched many of them run off towards the mountain. Arylos instinctively took a step forward to chase them before stopping himself and looking back at Vortex who was emitting a low clicking and humming sound. Arylos knew exactly what Vortex was telling him to do; Vortex was the horde’s relay point and so the only way to stop them was to kill Vortex. If Arylos could not finish Vortex, he took the chance that the horde would find and kill the survivors.

Vortex was manipulating Arylos, forcing him to kill a horde of Eikons for the possibility that a few humans may survive. Vortex was putting Arylos’s determination to the test, forcing him to wipe out a species for a handful of humans who may not even be alive anymore. Arylos felt the conflict as he wondered how many Kaiyumae got away. Before long, he nodded and gritted his teeth before reaching into Vortex’s mouth and pulling his sword out. He lifted his sword as flames danced along the scratched blade as Vortex’s eyes slowly focused on the sword.

Arylos had already made his choice when he killed his people.

Without any further words for the Eikon, Arylos ran his sword into Vortex’s eye, warranting a low and quiet screech as his flames burned the Eikon from inside its skull. As Vortex screamed, the Eikons surrounding them began to fall to the ground, convulsing violently and clicking in strange mechanical noises. Arylos gritted his teeth and pushed his sword deeper into the Eikon’s skull as flames began to pour from holes in the dragon’s armor as the plating began to crack and turn red. Arylos found himself growling in tune with the dying Eikon as flames poured from Vortex’s other eye yet the creature was still alive.

Arylos’s growl turned to a howl as he twisted the blade in the Eikon’s skull as Vortex began to twitch and click violently not unlike the Eikons around Arylos. Arylos’s howl turned louder as the flames in his body slowly began to tear at his own skin and his sword turned red hot like the Eikon’s armor. Arylos felt warm tears of orange blood drip from his eyes and he began to roar louder as Vortex’s lava-like blood poured from the cracks in its armor and started to burn Arylos’s hands. Finally, Arylos felt his sword snap at the hilt and he lost his footing and fell to the ground in front of Vortex and watched as the creature continued to convulse for a while longer before the machinery inside it went quiet and the creature remained still and a deathly silence fell over the air.

Arylos took shallow breaths as he looked at the hilt of his sword, still smoking in his ashen hands as skin began to flake away from his hands. The orange Titanic blood within him began to cool off and revert to the black sludge that filled his veins prior. He couldn’t move or think as he watched the clouds above turn from a bloody red to an ashen gray. He watched a single snowflake fall from the burnt sky and land on his cheek, its loving cold gracing him for a mere second before it melted from the heat of his body.

As the snowflake melted, Arylos felt his mind melt with it as he sank quietly into the loving embrace of the darkness he craved since birth.