“Calm yourself, Gwyndr! We can still win!”

“Are you daft, Elf?!” retorted the giant hawk as it struggled to resist the control of the elf mounted on its back. “That thing just slaughtered all but three of us in record time, and nothing we’ve done has so much as left a lasting blemish on its scales! This battle is lost, this war is lost, and WE will be lost if we stick around for much longer!”

“I… I have a name! You know it, too!”

“Irrelevant! Right now, you’re being a threat to the both of us, and therefore you get no name from me! Now, let’s get out of here!”

Before either of the pair could add anything else to the argument, they both were overwhelmed by the pained screams of another Forest Dragon as it had a massive chunk of flesh bitten out of it by the gigantic unnatural monster that had caused so much pain and death.

“Dear, Mother Nature!” screamed one of the few surviving members of their addition to the battle. “It- He- it just swallowed his whole leg! Pelvis and all!”

The shock of that information, along with the pained howl of the Forest Dragon was enough to convince the elf that his mount was right. He pulled on the reins and the two tried to fly away as fast as they could, but the speed of a hawk was, due its size, much, much less than one that was smaller. In terms of speed, while Hawks were faster than Forest Dragons, that was only when they didn’t have an elf perched on their backs.

Now the hawk and its rider moved along at a clip more suited to an old, early-model WW2 heavy bomber. It was still remarkably fast compared to most other flying things of its size and made of flesh, but not the blistering speed it could reach without a rider. This would be its undoing, especially as it needed time to reach that speed.

A few arrows whizzed by their heads as the remaining two elves tried to snipe the deserter, but they were quickly being left in the dust and they gave up on trying to kill them. Both of them felt like they had dodged a bullet, but they should have been more observant regarding their surroundings, as arrows were not the only things that had been sent their way.

The pressure of something barreling down on them from behind caused both hawk and rider to unconsciously look over their shoulders, only to see the mangled but still alive body of a Forest Dragon tumbling through the air towards them. In the distance, just before the wounded dragon made contact with them and ended both of their lives, they swore that they heard the unnaturally large undead dragon snicker in a show of cruel mirth.

…

“STRIKE!” roared a jubilant Pluton as the three soon-to-be-dead bodies tumbled through the air towards the ground. “At least, I think that’s what you’re supposed to say…”

His gaze switched to the remaining two pairs of hawks and riders, his reptilian lips parting to reveal long, steak knife-like teeth that glistened in the fading daylight. Obviously the two remaining Hawks and Riders were beyond terrified, and as such they were easy pickings for Pluton. The rest of the Arcfiran Dragons could wait, for he had two oversized turkeys to deal with.

With magic unlike what he had before this point letting him move faster than ever, he reached the stunned foes in merely a few tens of seconds at most, using one of his claws to grasp a bird and elf alike in a vice grip that they would not be able to escape. As for the other one, he decided to deal with it and its rider in a very different way. He may have wanted to devour them both, but the elf would do for now, and the Hawk would soon adorn Kain’s dinner table. Maybe he could ‘convince’ those new restaurant chains to put aside their differences and work together to create the best damn fried poultry that Mortis had ever seen.

As that thought flashed through his head, he decided that the bird in his ‘hand’ would also share the same fate, although the rider would need to die here and now regardless. A bit of magical mental manipulation was more than enough to rewrite the brains of these decently intelligent beasts, and the minds of the elves fared no better against him, unlatching themselves from their harnesses and then jumping willingly into his open maw.

“Urgh…” Pluton groaned as the mind-control wore off and the elves inside him became aware of the fate they had just consigned themselves to. “Too much of a gamey taste, too much dirt and grime, too many of those annoying, tasteless pieces of random vegetation…”

…

The Forest Dragons looked on in horror, as Pluton waxed on about the taste and texture of the things, of the people he had just casually eaten alive as if he was some kind of unholy and unnatural gourmand.

“You…”

The massive dragon merely turned to them and bared his teeth again, letting his mouth open just enough to show the inside of his maw, only for the sounds of meat and bone being melted to be faintly heard from within along with the screams of the dying.

“Such is the law of the Jungle - as old and as true as the sky; The one who shall keep it may prosper, but the one that shall die.”

To Pluton’s modified poem, the Dragons looked on in stunned shock. What the goddamn fuck was that abomination going on about?

…

Pluton noticed that the Arcfiran Dragons didn’t understand, but he also knew (thanks to the memories and knowledge of those that he had eaten up to this point) that they did understand, deep down. He just needed to… well… let’s say, ‘awaken their true nature’. Their ‘instincts’, so to speak.

He had eaten enough of them, enough of the things here, and to know that their current condition was a desperate holdover from something that was even more unnatural than he himself. All he needed to do was to, let’s say, ‘open their eyes’, so to speak. Besides, they did have a hidden, subconscious grudge against the bastard that made them like this, and if they all died by his hand then that bastard would claim a victory as the remnants of a once-great thorn in his side that he had enslaved vanished from the world forever.

Pluton had all night to break the chains holding them back, and, in a turn that even surprised himself, he wanted to do so. After all, which fate was more humiliating for such proud creatures?

To be slain in the unknowing bondage of another, or to be freed of your chains, made aware that they existed, and then be made to serve another master for all time?

Well, he would at least be able to inform them that their future master was far more willing to let them do what they wanted, and far more likely to respect their choices and freedom. And maybe, just maybe, this would earn him some more brownie points with Kain, furthering his own ambition of once again becoming Kain’s primary means of aerial transportation.