LSRO: Chapter 111 - Rather Specific Afterthought (Patreon)

Soooooo

This one isn't a cliffy

But I had fun doing this chapter. Fight scene is definitely still rough, but the bones are decent.

Hope you enjoy it!

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Chapter 111

Rather Specific Afterthought

Quinn wasn't entirely certain how she pictured drake's before. Sort of part dragon, massive, with wings attached to its little forearms, like a defenseless flying T-Rex. But whatever was coming towards them was not what she'd imagined. It approached, screeching loudly, from a mouth that looked like a cross between a crocodile and a dinosaur. It was probably close to the size of an elephant, yet it had four arms and another sort of arm like a pterodactyl that was attached to a portion of its wings, with a little claw at the end of it.

From the look she got, it seemed more fierce as it approached. It wasn't nearly as large or bad as she'd assumed, and right then appeared to be fueled by rage at having its companions killed. She momentarily relaxed, which was a huge mistake on her part. Quinn realized this as soon as the thing opened its mouth, which she thought was to screech again, but instead, it let out a wall of flame. 

The fire jettisoned toward her. Hot, lethal, and dangerous.

Instinctively, she shot an ice wall up in front of them at the very last moment to dive away with the rest of her party. Or in this case, Malakai because the other two had already absconded. Their flight wasn't hampered by mana and energy limits. 

The ice wall existed only for a split second before exploding apart into melting ice shards and a mist that shrouded the entire section of the street. The fire stream barely missed her as the flame shot by, singeing part of her outfit. She glanced down at the sleeve, making a mental note to learn a mending spell as soon as possible.

There wasn't much time for thought as she and Malakai scrambled for purchase behind one of the sturdier and thicker stone wall remnants of the city.

"What were you doing standing there?" Malakai asked, even as he wedged himself out of their secure place while the Drake was wheeling around to make another run down the main street and loosed three arrows in quick succession, straight up at the creature. One of them, from what Quinn could tell with the way the thudding arrow hit its target, definitely found purchase in something soft. Hopefully a joint. The creature screeched and for a moment Quinn's ears rang.

"Just what were you thinking standing there until the flame almost hit you?" He asked again, glancing down and glaring at her.

"To be honest, I wasn't really thinking," Quinn said, as the creature wheeled around in the sky trying to spy its prey. But Quinn and Malakai had hidden themselves fairly well and Aradie and Eric were nowhere to be seen. Quinn probed outside of their hiding spot, extending her senses, glad to see that Eric and her owl were doing fine. They were getting ready to ambush the massive sky creature when least expected.

Malakai was fiddling with his bow. "I guess that's how the entire city was burnt to a crisp," he mumbled.

Quinn nodded. "Now that would be an accurate assessment. I don't think it was the salamanders. They didn't really spit fire so much as lava. Well, maybe they just melted the rocks."

There was a silence that Quinn found extremely unnerving all around them. She peered out from her hiding spot and for a few seconds, there was no sign of the drake.

"Did it go away?" He asked hopefully.

"Not bloody likely," Quinn said. "I mean, would you? It's obviously seen us. It knows we're here. It's not just going to go away. I don't think it's big enough to swallow us whole, but it could probably bite us in two if given the chance. And, it's probably a lot cleverer than we give it credit for."

"Because it's hiding and waiting in and lying in wait for us," Malakai said.

"Exactly," Quinn said. "Of course, it could also be scouting and trying to come up with an alternate approach. Because when would retrieving a cookbook be easy?"

Malakai snorted a soft laugh. "When you put it that way..."

Quinn frantically searched through the arsenal of knowledge that she'd absorbed from way too many books already in the Library, trying to figure out exactly what it was that she could do to contain their assailant's power. Suddenly, the drake was there again, back at the entrance to the city, or at least where Quinn assumed the entrance to the city was. It was taking a long run-up to swoop over the entire street area. Probably over the entire city. Even if it was smaller than she'd originally thought, its flames seemed to have an extremely large reach.

This time Malakai boosted himself out of their hiding place, doing that strange double jump he did, aiming his bow while in the sky down onto the drake. Aradie and Eric flew in tandem, equal laser eyes from the owl, and what looked like brimstone searing into the joints of the massive flying creature. Those joints were one of the only weak spots she could see apart from the eyes. And those were protected by a pretty formidable eyebrow ridge.

Quinn, on the other hand, realized that more ice or water was only going to create steam when it clashed with fire... or smoke. Thus nobody would be able to see a thing. So she chose to try and suffocate the fire by pulling the oxygen out of it. She knew how to do it in theory, but wielding the ability was a lot more difficult than she'd anticipated. The first time she pulled fire to her hands and screamed. Luckily, she'd been wearing gloves. They weren't completely flame-repellent, but they hadn't burned her hands to a crisp at least.

"Damn it," she said. "Okay."

Working with live flame wasn't the best. She felt far too vulnerable. She tried again, and this time managed to stave off some more of the fire, but it backlashed into her hands again and went up her left arm this time.

"Damn it!"

This wound required her to use healing magic on her arm as the skin had been blistered. She grit her teeth while it healed and then applied regeneration once again to make sure that none of the burns were sticking.

Back in the hidey-hole they had carved out, Malakai was panting for breath. Streaks of red ran down his usually white sleeves.

"Did you get hit?"

"Yeah, kind of," he said, still gasping for air.

The drake was taking its time to scan around before taking another pass at the street. It had obviously figured out where the perpetrators were who'd killed all the salamanders. Or maybe it was just hungry for live barbeque.

Quinn shook her head at Malakai. "No, you don't just get sort of hurt. How did you do that?"

"Some sparks hit me on the way down." He shrugged, like it was no big deal.

"Well, at least you can heal yourself, somewhat. Look, I've got to figure out exactly what it is I can throw at this thing," Quinn said. "They're immune to mind magic, right? Dragons are immune to mind magic."

"Dragons are," Malakai said, as he exerted healing magic onto his arm. "Drakes are from the same family, though, so we've got to think they'll be at least somewhat resistant."

"Well, yes, that's a good supposition. Where are Eric and Aradie?" Quinn asked, as she wracked her brain to figure out something she could do.

Aradie flashed a picture from high atop a still-standing stone structure where she was watching from the shadows to see where the drake would attack from next. From what Aradie was projecting, it seemed the creature wasn't as highly intelligent as Quinn had anticipated since its attack patterns appeared to basically be burning everything close to them until... well, it burned everything.

"Okay, so mind magic's out," Malakai said. "You've got ice?"

"Yeah, but that creates too much steam when it contacts fire." Quinn pursed her lips in thought.

"Good point," he said. "Okay, so ice and water are out. What about air?"

"I'm trying, currently, to suck the oxygen out of the fire so that maybe it doesn't, you know, flame?" She looked up at him, since he was still standing.

Malakai frowned at her. "Well, that's a great idea, but, Quinn, why aren't you just using your gravity abilities?"

Quinn blinked at Malakai, remembering how she commanded the miasma drones in the filtration chamber to drop to their deaths. Why couldn't she command this massive elephant-sized one?

"So, the thing about the gravity stuff, the drake's a lot bigger than the miasma flies were. I'm a little nervous about, you know, trying to bring somethign that large down with my mind." She sounded a lot more confident than she felt.

"But, Quinn, it's not with your mind. It's magic," Malakai said, poking his head out to watch where the drake currently circled their little street area. "Awesome magic that should be able to force a flying creature to the ground and make it easier for us to battle it."

"Oh," Quinn said. "Well, let's see."

This time, Quinn stepped out from their hiding place while Malakai leapt up to one of the stone walls to fire at the creature. Quinn felt open and exposed, standing in the middle of the street, as anyone would. But the only way she knew how to execute the power was to face her target and use hand gestures while she focused the power into a word. And that was something she couldn't do from behind stone walls. She just had to time it before it decided to attempt to singe her into tiny ashes.

The creature was approaching, screeching loudly. It was large enough that maneuvering any lower to the ground would cause massive maneuverability issues. Which was probably why it hadn't tried to perch in close and fry them, because its wings would get caught on every bit of stone around here.

She could see it breathing in, getting ready to let out a massive stream of fire. She held out her hands and crushed them into fists while she said, "Gravitas."

At first, it looked like the drake had a massive hiccup, and it sort of bumped in the air as if it accidentally hit a speed bump too fast. The fire that was supposed to be a stream seemed to engulf the drake itself. Not that that made any damage happen. One of the keys to wielding fire, is being mostly impervious to its damage. It seemed to make the drake angrier if the scream was anything to go by.

Quinn aimed again. "Gravitas," she said, her voice deeper, putting more power behind it, feeding it with more of her mana and energy combined. 

This time, a fiery burp escaped it. Sadly, it was pinpointed directly on Quinn, exploding about two feet from her ear. Her head rang. Her hair singed. And she was oddly irritated by the fact that she'd just lost a few really nice curls.

The drake was even closer now, attempting again to get ready to roast her. But Quinn reached out once more, made her fists and yelled this time, "Gravitas," as she punched the air beneath her with her fists.

This time, it was like the air around the creature warped, and it plummeted directly down, not angled at all, straight into the cobblestone pavement beneath it. Falling forty or so feet with gravity pulling it down, mean its wings couldn't fight against the tug and bashed into the remnants of buildings on its way down, bones snapping as it did so, until it lay in a heap on the ground, feebly trying to push itself back up with a broken wing.

Quinn gasped and fell to one knee, her shoulder hurt on the same side that she'd had the shot of fire explode. She glanced at it and realized the pad her owl usually sat on had been obliterated and her whole shoulder and upper arm were a mess of gooey crimson flesh. It took all her willpower to retain her stomach contents.

Aradie swooped down onto the other shoulder, hooting gently as she did so. All of a sudden, there was a glow around Quinn as Aradie healed her.

Quinn blinked, suddenly feeling a bit groggy. "Wow, you can do that? You could have told me. I know, I know, I didn't ask."

Aradie let out a sound that sounded much like a chuckle while Quinn watched Malakai and Eric go to town on the injured drake. Eric used his superior speed and agility to hit the drake before it could even react, and Malakai's sword attached cleaved into the thing like it was butter. She almost felt sorry for it being grounded and out of its element. It didn't take long for it to be defeated.

Quinn sighed. "That really hurt." She'd never been so glad to have learned a spell like regeneration before in her life. She was pretty sure it had saved all of them more than once.

Finally, with the creature dead, Quinn sat herself down, all sooty, tired, and beat up. She wasn't the only one.

"Good thing we have magic," Eric said, activating a cleansing spell. 

It was an odd sensation to have all of the soot lifted from her skin, but at the same time, it felt pretty good.

Quinn glanced around. There were a lot of dead creatures around them, and with all the burned flesh thanks to Mr now dead drake, there was an ugly smell lingering too. "I was going to say I am famished after using that much magic, but my stomach just turned. So, let's just eat a couple of energy balls and fine that damn book."

This time, when she brought up the map, it was easier to locate the book. It appeared to be in one of the buildings in the center of the city. Quinn studied it, trying to figure out exactly how to get there from where they currently were.

Aradie hooted.

"Follow you?" Quinn shrugged. "Okay, lead on, let's go and get that damned book. This one has already taken much more time than I wanted it to."

Quinn kept her senses stretched out, wary of encountering another drake. Despite Aradie's healing, her shoulder still hurt badly, and she didn't think she'd be up for any type of potential physical combat any time soon. They worked their way through the surprisingly ordered streets toward the center.

"Looks like it might have been a town hall at some stage." Eric mused, his eyes flashing brightly. 

Just like every other structure, it didn't have a roof, and only had one doorway. Quinn frowned. "We could have come through right here."

Malakai shook his head. "Pretty sure this was the drake's nest. Library won't drop you into danger if it can help it... or unless its sensors are being obfuscated."

"That's a rather specific afterthought." Quinn murmured as she delicately stepped through and into the main chamber. "On the bright side, we can leave from here."

Her senses still extended, Quinn still felt uneasy, even though apart from rodents and other wildlife, there didn't appear to be anything else around them. The main hall was large, like a lobby and her map led her right to the middle of the room.

Quinn frowned. "There's no book here." Her head was starting to throb in time with her shoulder.

"If you'd get off that stone under your feet, I think you'd be enlightened." Eric drawled as if he'd never been so bored in his life.

Quinn moved and glanced down at the big cobblestone. It was maybe two feet squared, so really more of a brick. Malakai nudged her aside and crouched down, drawing a dagger to clear away the soot and dirt around the edges, leaving a clear, if thin gap. He then hefted his fingers in and lifted, Eric coming to help him leverage the brick out.

Underneath, in a small cavity, nestled alongside some old jars of long-dusted herbs, was the book.

Quinn reached in, dusted it off, and hugged it to her chest. She grinned at the others. "Two down, and two to go."

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Weeeeee slowly closing in on the end of the second book... slowly... hahahaha

Much love

KT