The wind blew pleasantly against Adan’s feathers as he flew up high enough for the air to thin. Tendrils of arcana helped support his flight, despite the altitude, and it warmed his small body, insulating him from the deathly chill. His eyesight, as a member of the Ib’honara Tribe, was sharp enough to distinguish the hand signs Lieutenant Coinoch made from nearly two longstrides down, and more than a league distant. Well, barely. The hand sign was unmistakable: land and report.

He angled his wings, twitched his tail feathers, wrinkled his nose reflexively to adjust his aviator’s goggles, then angled downwards to dive. His plumage pressed flat against the side of his head as he sped down at an angle that would let him land on the lieutenant’s side. The rest of the recon platoon, half-strength at twenty, was arrayed around the man. Well, except for the other Ib’honara scout, the young and fresh out of the academy, Private Mesme Rivera. That fellow was coming in from the south as opposed to Adan’s north.

From up there, Adan could still see Duskfoot Guard, one outpost amongst a chain guarding the Republic against the tide. Of course, as he got closer and closer to the ground, the Wastelands, the Guard was concealed by small hills, trees, and the curve of the land.

With a powerful backswing, he shifted himself from diving position to hovering in a split second, staying just a pace off the ground and a couple of paces left of the Lieutenant. He landed adroitly and saluted, his wing pinions folded back to reveal his claw-tipped hands.

“Lieutenant, sir!” he yelled cockily, something he would not have done had he seen any Twisted Beasts nearby.

Coinoch gave him a side eye, grunted in annoyance, then just shrugged. The entire platoon was mounted on Steeld, mechanical steeds enchanted by arcana and powered through the rider’s Weaving skill or through En Shards. The latter use was decadent, however, as each one of those things cost more than a month’s rent in a respectable apartment. Arcana Weaving only occupied a bit of one’s intrinsic circles anyway, and every military officer, NCO, and recruit was expected to keep one vacant for versatility.

“What did you see?” the lieutenant asked, but he paused when Private Rivera landed beside Adan. “What did both of you see?”

Adan let Rivera answer first, and while that worthy spouted his report, he inspected the rest of the platoon. Considering that they were freshly put together, and Adan spent most of his time in the skies, this was one of the few times he’s had the chance to inspect his fellows.

Perhaps it wasn’t so strange, but the twenty-man platoon was split into four ethnic groups. Humans, Sha’ledras, Durandir, and the varied beastkin Tribes. The Ib’honara, which was what he and Mesme were part of, was overrepresented, actually, but reconnaissance patrols should always have a good aerial scout. The other three beastkin were a mix of A’sungit, wolf, Tigris, tiger, and the odd Ahas, snake.

Hmmm, he still hadn’t memorised everyone’s names. He should get to it at camp later. The one he did remember, aside from their human commander, was the Durandir woman who was second in command. Sallah Harding was short and stocky, just like every Durandir ever, and it was only the presence of obvious breasts, and the name of course, that clued him in that she was female. Her glorious red hair curled around her jaw and flowed down her chin, which made distinguishing her head hair and facial hair that much more difficult. Ah, she kept her upper lip bare, though some Durandir women didn’t bother. Or maybe they were just flabby men? Adan couldn’t really tell.

Anyway, Rivera finished his report to their relatively young lieutenant. Coinoch was the second youngest member of the group, with Rivera being the youngest. The Sha’ledras had perennially young faces, but those long-eared folks took a long time to mature and weren’t allowed into the military until they hit thirty, at least.

“Corporal Ortiz, your report?”

“Yes sir,” Adan said semi-casually. “Clear to the north and east, of course, but I saw a migration several leagues southwest.”

“Migration!” Coinoch gasped, mirrored by several of the others. Heh, it looked like Rivera missed them. The young Ib’honara was too focused on what was near.

“Yes sir. I make out more than a thousand Twisted Beasts. Herd type. It looked like they were coming from their spawning nest and were heading towards Republic territory. Bearing north-northeast. Moving slowly.”

Coinoch looked towards Sergeant Harding. “Recommendations?”

The older woman, who was at least two and half times the young lieutenant’s age, and had shown great wisdom in asking for advice from one of the veterans, said with a shrug, “What kind of herd? Horned slowfoot, or fleetfoot?”

“I recognised their base shape. Bicorns.”

“Stupid beasts, then,” Harding said, “and slower than these.” She tapped her toe on the Steeld’s side. Unlike a real one, the construct mount didn’t snort, rear, or otherwise acknowledge the gesture.

The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.

“Strike and flee?” Coinoch mused until he caught sight of Harding’s pointed glare. “Very well, let’s lead those things to the slaughter.”

Adan grinned, then launched himself back to the air, followed swiftly by Rivera.

___________

“I don’t want to leave the Wind Darter behind,” Yuriko said with a sigh. The ambient Chaos was so thin that the runescript lines inside the sloop were barely operable. Consequently, all of the sloop’s energy needs were being provided by her regeneration. It was not a sustainable way of travelling, and even if she tried to fill the Darter’s Animus storage, that was barely enough to fly for more than a minute.

Gwendith held Yuriko’s hand. “I don’t want you exhausting yourself.”

“We can’t just leave the Wind Darter. It’s…well, it's our last resort to return.”

“Yet the practicalities of the matter dictate that we abandon something that only weighs us down,” Heron said softly.

Yuriko glared at him and Heron ducked his head apologetically. Why was he acting so meek now?

The corner of Heron’s eye twitched and he glanced at her with some heat in his gaze. Much better.

“We cannot leave the Darter behind,” Yuriko decided. “For one, it is not ours to dispose as we will, but the Empire’s.”

Gwendith snorted. “You need to brush up on Imperial Law, my dear. In cases such as this, where the Agent is isolated and possibly in enemy territory, equipment detrimental to survival should and must be discarded and concealed for possible future recovery. Failing that, destroyed.”

Yuriko’s eyes twitched. “I’d still rather not abandon this. We can make it work.”

Gwendith and Heron exchanged glances then shrugged. Gwendith sidled up to Yuriko’s side and purred, “Yuri, it’s really your choice, and…” her voice became sultry, “I really appreciate having a room to unwind in.”

Heron’s face was flushed, but not as much as Yuriko’s.

“S-so what are you arguing the contrary for?” Yuriko muttered.

“Just to make sure you’ve considered everything and won’t have regrets,” Gwendith said, “And besides,” She gestured towards their surroundings, “There’s hardly anywhere to hide the Darter.”

“I guess it was a moot point.” Yuriko sighed.

“Hardly,” Heron said. “At least now you have a firm decision.”

With a nod, they broke their council and Yuriko returned to the helm. Her Anima spread out and examined the atmosphere, and she was more than intrigued.

There was quite an abundance of Radiant energy floating around, though it was close to noon. The Radiant Sun reappeared almost as soon as they left the Sea, and it shone down with all of its power. The Luminous Moon also appeared at night, though it was only a sliver of the crescent then. Tonight would probably be the first night of the Dark Moon and the iarvesh level would probably plummet to zero.

Yuriko had little trouble regenerating Animus. She could draw in the Radiant energy, or use the one her Essence produced, and convert it to Animus. Heron and Gwendith had more than a little trouble, with their external reserves nearly impossible to regenerate. There was still enough ambient Chaos to squeak out a thin stream of Animus from it. Saki and Ryoko were the worst of the lot. Their regeneration had practically gone down to zero, and while the two Chaos Lords weren’t bleeding out Chaos, they were somehow able to take in some kind of energy and convert it. Neither of them was sure what it was, but their reserves refilled even slower than Heron and Gwendith’s.

All of those problems were solved with a simple device, the regeneration cube. Each of them had at least one, and Yuriko could fill the cubes with her Animus, which denatured over the course of an hour thus allowing the current bearer to absorb it. The storage for each varied, but they were between fifty and a hundred lumens. The Animus would be as dense as the attuned user needs it, though if Yuriko put in photonic Animus, it would take far more lumens to fill the cube.

Her current regeneration was hovering at around a thousand lumens a second. Her Radiant cores, scattered throughout her body, converted excess energy into Animus. The potent energies flooded her body and out into her Anima, where she fed most of it to the ship. She could probably push her regeneration more if she needed to, but knew that pressing too much would weaken her, albeit only temporarily. Not that her techniques needed to use much Animus nowadays.

Decision made, she pushed the sloop towards the moving line in the distance. The ground was barren but was by no means flat. The mountain wall they descended from stretched across the distance, north to south according to the movement of the Celestials.

The land sloped downwards towards the east, but there were more than enough hills and valleys, ravines and cul-de-sacs to break the uniformity of the land. And perhaps she was mistaken, but off in the far distance, it looked like there were trees.

The moving line looked to be five or so leagues away. The Wind Darter puttered steadily towards it. After they descended far enough, the curve of the land concealed her target. Still, they kept to their original bearing.

Wind Darter hovered just a bit less than a pace over the ground, and Yuriko used her Animakinesis to push them along rather than wasting Animus on using the thrusters. The Chaos gathering sail might have been able to use the breeze to add to their propulsion but it was blowing directly to the west and she didn’t know to adjust the rigging and mast to compensate.

Soon enough, the moving line finally gave them details when they went over a valley.

“Monsters,” Ryoko gasped. The handmaiden was taking her ease on deck, having finished preparing dinner.

She wasn’t wrong, though. The creatures moving in the distance varied in size and shape, but they all looked menacing. And hungry.

The creatures looked like an amalgamation of a lion and a bear, with body protrusions all over the body. Some had long tails tipped with stingers, some had more than two pairs of legs. Some even looked like they were crossed with centipedes. But one and all looked like carnivores, and as soon as Yuriko and the other saw them, they were seen in turn.

A large group broke away from the pack and rushed towards the Darter. They were less than half a longstride away too.

Well within easy range of her sunblades.

But just as she was about to conjure her weapons, she paused. Gwendith and Heron were poised eagerly on the railings. Devotee was cracking his knuckles and Desire had a twisted grin on her face. Even Saki, who was normally impassive, had an eager look behind her eyes. Only Ryoko was frightened.

She sighed. Well, everyone needed to blow some steam. Yuriko leaned back and simply waited for the creatures to come to their doom.