No mana heralded her. In fact the aura that suddenly came crashing over everyone in the great cavern was a suffocating emptiness, a void of unspeakable darkness and silence. If Dalazog had exuded power and majesty, this creature exuded the opposite. A devourer of light and life, a creature that mocked strength itself and made the proud lie down in defeat without ever raising a weapon. She was the absence of value and meaning - the embodiment of despair itself. As she drew closer Coralia could see that the dragon was indeed a thing of aching beauty.

Her scales were a black that cast a shadow on darkness itself, wrapping a body so stunning in its perfection and seductive in its movement that any creature regardless of its normal predisposition was hypnotized by desire. Her great head was long and elegant like a finely bred horse, with deep purple frills extending from under her powerful jaws to the side of her head where spiraling black and purple horns grew like twisted lances. Coralia’s throat went suddenly dry as a bleached bone in the desert sands. The kobolds all immediately prostrated themselves in worship, while the dwarves and demons clutched their weapons tightly.

Dalazog walked out in front of the group and gestured for them all to back up as he began to return to his natural dragon form. A red mist swirled all around him, eventually taking the shape of, and then materializing into the mighty red dragon.

“Greetings, Frex. You look beautiful as always.” The dragon boomed in his natural voice.

“You flatter when you should beg.” The black dragon spat back, her words hissing like acid upon steel. “Who is this dragon you’ve dared to parade before me?” She pointed a long curved talon at Coralia as she demanded.

“She’s not a dragon- I know, it’s preposterous but I thought the same thing. She used Last Wish: Phoenix and returned in that form. You and I both know that spell returns you to your base state no matter what.” Dalazog explained as he approached his jilted former lover.

“The sin is no less, you drag lowly mortals onto my doorstep after your betrayal. I should crush your minds and send your souls wandering the ether for eternity.” The dragon was still vehement but Coralia was beginning to see the dramatic mood for what it was, after all she had been a teenage girl at one time too.

“I owe you an apology for leaving the way that I did.” Dalazog admitted. “I don’t regret ending our coupling, but fleeing the way I did was indeed juvenile and I am sorry for it.” Dalazog delivered a very rare admission of error with a slight tilt of his head.

“Juvenile indeed!” Frexxa spat, though her body language had softened considerably. “Why are you here with these...things?” She asked, gesturing with undisguised disdain at Coralia and her party.

“We are on a mission to thwart Maiphon, and restore order to the hells.” Dalazog answered earnestly.

“Impossible, Belithel was destroyed. He will run rampant for a thousand years once he breaks her final curse.” Frexxa snorted.

“When was the last time you saw the goddess with your own eyes?” Dalazog asked.

“You know very well when it was. All four of us were invited to her millennium celebration not seven centuries ago. That was when we...Ahem” Frexxa cleared her throat leaving the rest unsaid.

“First Knight, please if you would. The goddess should be introduced to another old friend.” Dalazog called to Elisif, who held Belithel tightly in her free arm.

Coralia nodded to her as well, and Elisif gathered her courage and approached the two colossal dragons. She soon stood before Frexxa, not daring to meet those lamplight eyes. With great strength of will, she sheathed her sword and moved the cloth covering Belithel’s face.

Golden eyes met green eyes and locked, sharing a moment that only those who knew true immortality and unlimited knowledge could share. Frexxa’s great eyes widened, and she looked with disbelief to Dalazog.

“How is this possible? I saw the final curse cast, and her body disintegrate through my scrying pool.” Frexxa asked taken aback by the revelations and consequences of it all.

“Her spirit fled to my womb and impregnated me.” Elisif explained. “I gave birth to this incarnation of her and we fled the hells, where Coralia found and sheltered us.”

“Forgive my earlier insults. The surrogate and guardians of the only respectable deity have my gratitude.” Frexxa said sincerely.

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The group, with Coralia in the lead approached the majestic Frexxa to return the respectful greeting.

“You are quite the odd thing, aren’t you?” Frexxa stared at Coralia with an appraising air. “Mana swirls, churns, and rages within you, a mighty sea confined to a tea cup. That stick you carry displeases me as well. It ill befits the guardian of the goddess of beauty.”

Frexxa waved a talon, tracing a glowing green rune in the air that Coralia didn’t recognize. An opaque portal appeared and Frexxa reached a clawed hand inside. She pulled forth an object and held it between two talons before Coralia.

It was a sword, in the hand and a half bastard sword style she favored. Its long blade was permeated with an enchanted blackness that would allow no light to reflect, or rather escape its surface. The crosspiece and pommel were made of some type of polished ivory and the handle was wrapped in finely woven black silk.

“A gift from a celestial suitor, I have little use for it.” Frexxa said. “He did not know its name, but it holds several enchantments, many of which I could not identify.”

“Its name is Kitten Kisses.” Coralia said solemnly to a sea of screwed up and shocked faces.

“Why in the hells...” Frexxa began but Coralia interrupted her.

“Because no one in the universe would want to admit they were killed by Kitten Kisses.” She finished triumphantly.

Frexxa’s sudden burst of laughter rolled through the tunnels and caverns for miles around, and when she finally got ahold of herself she held up a claw.

“I can definitely see why she came to you. Belithel cherishes laughter above all else.” Frexxa said, suddenly in high spirits.

With the tense situation resolved, Frexxa escorted the party through her vast territory all the way to the southern tunnel that led to the outside world beyond the territory of the monsters. Needless to say no threats rose to accost them.

She relayed grim news to Coralia and Hurstag at the front of the procession as they marched. She had spent a great deal of time scrying her territory upon waking. A cataclysmic event to the northwest had jarred her from her long hibernation just days earlier. Her findings revealed that the many small outposts and communities of dwarves, kobolds, and other benign beings had been utterly decimated by the infesting and invading demons.

She had personally wiped out every last one that could be found in her own territory, but the damage had already been done.

Hurstag bore the news in grim silence, as did Laz and Peyo. Coralia changed the subject, and asked if Frexxa had any news from the human kingdom or the wider world.

“Nothing from the last decade. The world has grown droll and boring since the big war.” She replied.

Coralia had expected as much. With her defeat of the mana lamprey general and Agitha’s crew decimating their forces, the monsters would be licking their wounds for generations.

“Onigoro woke up finally. Oh and the Coral Titan also started its rampage forty years early! Those alone should make for some great scrying.” Dalazog chimed excitedly.

“The devil that once ruled the other five, and turned on Uniri herself? I like him.” Frexxa mused with a smile. “He’s a bit dramatic even for me though.”

Days passed without notice beneath the surface, with no celestial bodies to indicate the passage of time the group marched for much longer hours than normal.

For the natives of the underworld - the kobolds and ebon dwarves, this was a breath of nostalgia but also great sorrow.

At the edge of her territory Frexxa bid them farewell, but just as Dalazog had once done she plucked one of her scales and gave it to Coralia.

“With this I can keep an eye on you and if you should ever find yourself in great peril simply speak my name. I can teleport to this scale at will.” She said sincerely. The aloof black dragon found that she liked the human named Coralia Balfonse, and would watch her odyssey with interest.

Coralia took the ice cold scale graciously and tucked it away. “Your gifts are all very precious to me. Likewise if Frexxa the black should ever have need of a warrior, I would be gladly at her service.”

“Knowing the depths of your power I would choose wisely when to call in such a favor.” Frexxa locked her immortal gaze on the human, allowing the weight of that compliment to speak for itself.

With those kind words, they departed the dragon’s territory. They made their way south with the faint scent of far distant pine pulling them forward like a starving waif to an unguarded pie.

It was deep in the night when the roof of the wide tunnel suddenly disappeared and the endless star studded heavens appeared above them. With their eyes still adjusted to the blackness of the underworld, the panoramic landscape glowed beautiful and vibrant for miles. Rolling hills covered in oak forests dominated this place. Rivers and creeks meandered like veins of life in abundance. It was an inverted mirror of the harsh and forbidding lands they had escaped. Coralia felt a great sense of comfort that Frexxa stood between this delicate place and the portal that was no doubt belching forth thousands of demons at this very moment.

“How are we doing on provisions?” Coralia asked Mathael the following morning inside her tent.

“Running low, perhaps a week comfortably or two weeks with rationing.” Mathael answered honestly.

“Alright, then we need to find a good place near a river to stop and reload. This area will be rich in game and the kobolds can restock us quickly.” Coralia reasoned.

“It is a sound plan. I’ll make it so.” The demon was a former commander of many thousands of troops and was an incredibly effective delegator which Coralia found herself relying on more and more.

She could hardly believe that she was out of the forbidden range. This was still the wilds and very dangerous for normal civilized people but to Coralia and her hardened comrades it was a practical paradise. It was only a few short weeks to the border wall, where she was sure to find a tricky situation explaining her company of monsters, demons, and a red dragon of all things.

“I’ll just demand to see Agitha.” She resolved to herself. Her mentor would know what to do, even if the solution was knocking some sense into Vinia’s leadership.

She turned her attention to her new sword, laying it across her lap as she tuned her masterful senses toward it.

No wonder Frexxa couldn’t decipher these enchantments. She thought to herself. They were crafted from primordial magic which did not use words, runes, or any such identifying signature. Primordial magic was the unknowable force, such as what compelled the acorn to sprout, or the universe to suddenly devour itself and explode anew.

Coralia had only ever seen one other such artifact. It was in the collection of the Monster Hunter museum, a ring crafted from the bone of a Precursor, those deities said to be the parents of the current gods. At the center of The Tear was said to be the final resting place of one such being, betrayed by its children and cast into the mortal world.

The Ring of Enlightenment was so powerful that it was considered to be cursed, for once a mortal wore it their minds were pried open to the infinite truths of existence and summarily driven to instant insanity.

With that in mind, Coralia vowed to take great caution when wielding Kitten Kisses until she had determined the full extent of its power.