Book 8: Chapter 105: Chosen |
Viola immediately executed her favourite strategy to start a battle in such close proximity with a melee combatant. Divert and distance.
Before her feet even left the ground, a flurry of windblades already sailed toward Zeke’s torso and legs. They weren’t meant to kill him. Not really. They were sharp, but flimsy, designed to force him back, to make him evade, to buy her the precious seconds she needed to rise into the air.
That was how it should have gone.
Any sensible fighter would have dodged. Any tactician would have avoided taking unnecessary injuries at the start of a battle. Any guidebook would have advised it, and any instructor would have drilled that course of action into their students until it became instinct.
Maybe that was why Viola’s eyes went wide when Zeke stepped right into her attack.
He didn’t dodge. He didn’t block. He didn’t even flinch.
Her windblades struck bare skin.
Cuts opened across his chest, arms, midsection, and legs. Blood spurted instantly, the wounds far deeper than they should have been, the cutting power amplified by the fact that Zeke had rushed into the blades himself.
For a fraction of a second, Viola couldn’t understand what she was seeing.
And yet, maybe that was exactly why it worked.
Viola had just been about to take off when something clamped around her ankle. A firm hand. A human hand.
Zeke’s hand.
Panic surged through her. She kicked, twisted, and pulled, pouring more wind beneath herself as she tried to tear free and shake him off in midair.
Another miscalculation.
Zeke didn’t budge.
His body was impossibly heavy. He had to weigh at least several times what his lean frame suggested. His feet remained rooted to the ground like an oak, while she struggled in the air like a caught chicken.
Then she looked down.
There was no warmth in Zeke’s eyes. No mercy. No hesitation.
“…You ungrateful bitch,” he cursed, his voice carrying enough force to be heard from far away. “I offered you a way out, and this is how you respond?”
Viola froze for a heartbeat, her eyes meeting his.
Confusion flickered through her when she saw the rage on his face, made all the more terrifying by the many bleeding cuts she had carved into his body.
“Very well,” he said in that same voice. “If you desire to be my enemy, then you should learn what that really means…”
“Zeke… what…”
Before she could even finish, a brutal jolt tore her from the air.
The world spun. Her stomach lurched. And in the next instant, the grip around her ankle was gone.
Instead, Viola found Zeke’s hand wrapped around her neck.
Whatever protest she had been about to make was immediately cut off.
What followed was the most brutal beatdown of her entire life.
The first punch to her midsection broke at least two ribs and left her wheezing for breath. The second, aimed at her face, made her black out for several seconds and left her so dizzy that she couldn’t even comprehend where the next few punches had landed. All she knew was that when she finally came to, half the bones in her body were broken, bruised, or shattered, and her face was so swollen that even her own parents wouldn’t recognize her.
Without the will or strength to resist, she hung limply in midair, staring blankly at those cold, golden eyes that looked at her with nothing but disdain.
“Pathetic…”
Viola shuddered. The coldness seeping into her body grew stronger with every passing moment. It wasn’t just the pain. Or the loss. Or the fact that she was completely unable to fight back. Or the coldness in his eyes. Or the words.
It was all of it.
The humiliation, pain, and utter disdain had turned into a weapon that seemed to leech the very warmth from her body.
Viola’s eyes grew heavy as the daylight dimmed.
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And then, just when she was about to give in to the darkness, a voice echoed in her mind. She recognized it instantly. It was Zeke’s voice. But unlike that brutal, merciless man holding her by the neck, the voice in her mind was gentle, warm, and caring. It was the voice she remembered from their childhood.
“Don’t try to move,” the voice said. “I’ve broken most of your bones, but nothing that a skilled healer won’t be able to fix.”
Viola immediately relaxed. The mere fact that Zeke cared enough to explain this to her eased the knot in her heart to a degree she couldn’t explain.
“It’s likely not enough to get you sent home, though,” the voice continued. “That is why I’m going to leave you with a little gift.”
…Going home?
The thought sent a jolt through her addled mind. How long had she wished to hear those words? Hoped for the day when this ongoing nightmare would finally end? And now, Zeke was claiming that he could make it possible?
Through her bleary eyes, she saw his finger slowly closing in on her face. It landed on her glabella, the spot in the center of the brow.
“Don’t move and don’t struggle,” the gentle voice reminded her, and Viola did her best to follow. If this would actually allow her to go home, she would endure anything. Even torture would be acceptable.
But what followed was nothing like what she had imagined. Other than a slight prick on her skin, she didn’t feel anything.
The same couldn’t be said about the man holding her, however. She felt the hand around her neck begin to shake. Meanwhile, Zeke had gone deathly pale, with thick beads of sweat running down his face. Whatever he had just done had drained him far more than summoning his army had.
Even so, she could vaguely make out the satisfied smile that had emerged on his face. A moment later, Viola felt a heaviness grip her entire body. This was different from the coldness that had invaded her earlier. It felt more like the peaceful pull of sleep after a long and hard day of work.
The last thing she heard before she drifted off was that same warm voice.
“Sleep tight, little Vi.”
***
Zeke grit his teeth one last time before callously throwing Viola’s sleeping form to the ground. He couldn’t allow himself to be any more gentle than this. Otherwise, the painstaking effort of putting on this entire show would have been for nothing.
Thankfully, she would feel none of it anymore.
He gave one last glance to her crumpled form, wondering how she would react when she found out what he had done, and… how she would react when she discovered the true nature of his gift.
Only time would tell.
Zeke turned around, not wanting to linger any longer.
He had already spent more time on this matter than he should have, and the situation on the battlefield was growing increasingly critical.
His horde was already being contained. Now that the Legion was taking them seriously, they could easily hold back such mindless creatures. And they didn’t have to do so for long, only until their heavier units arrived. He could already see several groups of Wind Mages disengaging from their battle with the Alexandria. Likely, they would be the first to be sent to reinforce the front against his Blood-Shades.
The time to hold back was over.
Zeke walked to a nearby pile of corpses. His eyes landed on the face of a young, half-elven girl. She had been one of the berserk elves who had been unlucky enough to die even outside the previous barrier. It seemed she had been trampled to death by her own kind in the desperate rush.
What an unfortunate fate. Even in death, her face was still marred by the same hatred these poor souls had felt in life. Whatever Magic had been used to put them in such a state seemed to have endured until the bitter end.
Zeke’s eyes left her face and trailed over the several other nearby corpses who had shared the same fate. Or more precisely, he focused on the blood still held within their bodies. Under his urging, it began to rise from their pores, forming a red vapor that soon gathered into a floating puddle several times the size of his body. Only when there was nothing left did Zeke open his eyes.
The first step was complete. Now, for the truly risky part…
After a deep breath, Zeke rammed a finger into his own chest, piercing skin and flesh. He struck almost at the center, veering only slightly to the left. It was the exact spot where his heart was located. Then, from the open wound, he extracted a single drop. It didn’t look like anything that belonged inside a human body.
It was a single drop of purely golden liquid.
“Careful with that, whelp,” a voice in his mind cautioned. “That’s not something to play around with.”
Zeke smirked at that. Now, the Dragon was finally willing to talk. “If you know a better way, now’s the time to speak up.”
The Dragon paused for a moment. “…A better way? How can I know if there is a better way when I don’t even know what you are trying to do in the first place? I am just warning you that Dragon’s Blood is not something to be used lightly.”
“Lightly…” Zeke chuckled. “Which part of the current situation makes you think I’m playing around?”
“The fact that you are about to use it on an unproven spell,” Khai’Zar responded. “After already using one drop on that subordinate of yours, you can’t have many left.”
Zeke nodded. “It’s the last one.”
Khai’Zar remained silent for a moment. “You’d better think about what you’re about to do, then. This one drop represents years of effort. It could allow you to fully Dragonize if you used it on yourself. It holds more than enough power to allow you to escape from here.”
Zeke didn’t even have to think before shaking his head. “I know myself too well to fall for that. And so should you. If I consume that drop, I will never flee. Whatever strength it gives me, I will use to fight until my dying breath.”
“That would still be preferable to wasting it.”
Zeke’s smile turned wry. Out of everyone to doubt him now, it was particularly ironic to hear these words from Khai’Zar.
“Didn’t you say that the ancient humans relied on nothing but their will to conjure marvels out of thin air? Wasn’t it they who defeated your forefathers and exiled them from this realm?”
Zeke slowly extended his finger, carrying the golden drop toward the floating puddle.
“Torchbearers, you called them.”
His finger lightly touched the puddle, pushing the golden drop inside. It didn’t behave like any liquid should, resisting the merger with supernatural power. Like water and oil, the two types, despite both being nominally blood, seemed to be completely opposed to each other.
“Those people were nothing like the humans of today,” Khai’Zar argued. “You can’t expect to follow in their footsteps simply because you want to. They were special. Chosen…”
Undaunted by those words, Zeke pushed even harder and finally forced the drop of draconic blood into the floating puddle. Despite having added only a minuscule amount, the pool turned golden, only slightly dimmer than the drop had been.
For a moment, it fluctuated violently, as if it had a will of its own. However, a sharp command from Zeke’s mind made it calm down instantly.
“Then let’s find out,” he said slowly. “If I am chosen, too.”
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