Trying not to think about it, trying not to think that this might be the end for Vylon, I grit my teeth. I cast aside the thought that whether or not Terrorzin shatters him, Vylon may be lost to us forever. I charge headlong into the most dangerous aura in the world, right behind his frozen form, closing the gap in blazing speed. Literally blazing, backed by Lil’s plasma-hot flames.

There’s a thing about us Can’Z’aasians. Y’see. What doesn’t kill us? Makes us stronger. And what does kill us? It makes us stronger than that. I might be exaggerating just a tad. But hey, I’ve had more lives than most.

So when I say, Lil’s plasma-level fires hurt like hell, but I’d gladly take it for a million hours, for the chance to rescue Vylon? I mean it. I know I’d come out the other side, the stronger for it, even if only because I carried that love for a friend, that much longer, and had them in my life, my heart, and my soul, for that much longer.

We engage, in the most reckless, foolhardy, stupidest thing we could possibly be doing. I make certain Lil knows not to approach close enough that Terrorzin could lunge and catch him in his aura. Y’see, I need Lil—out of everyone on the planet—I need Lil more than anyone, to not get hit by this aura.

Licking my lips, as I dehydrate in hellish flames, I move at the speed of lightning to intercept Terrorzin’s attack on Vylon. I move through his aura that can freeze anything, even the normally cold-immune Ice dragons under his command. I move, my near-cold-immune flesh simultaneously frosting over, my near-heat-immune flesh simultaneously roasting and melting. I move in a realm of fire and ice, an impossible heat attacking an impossible cold.

Why am I thinking about this? Because, well, I love my friends. To death and back. And if that’s what I have to risk, to keep them? Then I will. To death and back. Sometimes, sometimes the risks are terrifying, and the decision is hard to make. This was one of those times. But I made it anyway. I made this decision, and I’m sticking to it.

Lil’s flames are not balked by Terrorzin’s aura. Any other flame would be. Lil’s flames follow me in to his aura, covering me. They melt cellular layers from me, but I persist. Parts of me break down on atomic levels, but I persist. I can’t see anything through the blaze, nor even detect anything with my thermal senses, but I persist. The only thing guiding me forward, is my love for my friends and family. Well, that and my silent sonar senses, which thankfully make me aware of exactly where Vylon is, and exactly how close Terrorzin’s attack is.

As Terrorzin looks on, slightly horrified that I’m still able to move as I’m dashing through his aura, bathed in Lil’s superheated flames, he quickly leans into an attack against Vylon. Obviously he’s hoping to shatter him before I arrive. I’m not having that. Not at all. Manifesting my Honoris Causa, I catch the foreclaw of one of the most powerful beings in existence, I catch the foreclaw of Terrorzin, the Ice of Rage. I catch his attack with one clawed limb of my own.

Snarling, I roar into his face, “Heh, nice try! Now. Try again Terrorzin. Pick on someone who can fight back! Me, Reggie Shellcracker, a Hero of the Order of the Onyx Dawn, an Archmage Aliased Schism, the Void Dragon Honoris Causa!”

With my offhand, I gently push Vylon away towards my tail, then with my tail, I grip his frozen form and slide it outside of Terrorzin’s aura, still within Lil’s flames. When the force behind Terrorzin’s attack falters, I almost tumble forward. I can see the cool calculations going on behind his rage and beneath his fear.

I can also feel something that sets my soul at ease along my tail. Vylon’s heartbeat. He’s encased in ice that’s magically impenetrable to even the hottest of Rayilelian dragonfire. Lil isn’t Rayileklian though, so I grin wickedly at Terrorzin. I’m more than meeting his gaze. My eyes lock with his, a madness overtaking my countenance.

I play into the crazy. I lean heavily into the hysterical, unbeatable hero. I play on the fear that I instilled by challenging him earlier, and escaping. The fact that I had the gall to appear nonchalant when he had me by the throat, he’s now calculating. He’s thinking, “Was that upstart whelp invincible this entire time?”

Pressing his buttons, I growl, “Face *me* Ice of Rage! Someone who doesn’t fall prey to your cowardly aura! Prepare to meet your fated end, this the year of your death prophesied so long ago! Be it at my hands, in this very moment, that I wrest the life from you and drink of your dragonforce, or in one week, it matters not. You will fall!”

Then it hits me. The realization of why Terrorzin wanted *them* not just the broodmother conglomerate, but the tear to The ‘Twixt. Why he hasn’t already just made a life for himself in the ‘Twixt. He’s still missing one piece. I’m a possible solution for that missing piece. He doesn’t have a half-fae to get to the ‘Twixt. He might have been banking on using a ritual that sacrificed the rest of his conglomerate broodmother to try to enter it without one at the last minute of the last day of the prophecy. Doesn’t matter either way. He’s not getting to the ‘Twixt, now, or ever.

I begin laughing right in his face as I roar, “You utter coward!” and I fib a little as I add, “I sealed it, and now there’s no way to access it ever again! I blew up Stormspire atop the one in its bowels, sealing it forever, and I sealed the one in your vault! You don’t have a realm outside the time of Rayileklia to escape your portent anymore! A simple prophecy, one laced with delicious irony. You die by year’s end! Your scriers know it, you know it, and the date fast approaches!”

That’s exactly the push I needed to get Terrorzin to freak out. The fact that I know what his portent says, and why he was keeping his conglomerate close in the way he was. He wanted the tear to The ‘Twixt close. He wanted to be able to bail out by year’s end, and live endlessly in a place where Rayileklia’s time won’t pass. Suddenly he assumes that the reason I was there, the reason the ‘Twixt tear is gone, is because I meant to keep it from him.

I had absolutely no idea that I might be doing that when I went there. But he doesn’t need to know that. Pondering, I quip, “Hey, Ice of Age, or, y’know, Rage, or whatever. You’ve probably never felt cold before, huh? FFS.”

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A curiosity almost breaks through his fear as Terrorzin’s eyebrow quirks at my acronym. It’s short lived though. With that, I unleash my own immunity-piercing cold, my Flash Freeze Storm. I’ve only got a one to ten percent immunity piercing application of my cryokinesis, but it’s enough that he felt it. Terrorzin, the Ice of Rage, has felt cold for the first time in his life.

It’s almost too good to be true when I watch as horror sinks into Terrorzin’s eyes from all sides, a frost creeping over him. For good measure, I ping him with a couple of frosty rays, empowered by the Frosty Fel. It’s obvious he felt them. My smile only widens into a full Cheshire grin, hauntingly visible, the only thing visible of my Void Dragon form from within Lil’s flames.

That grin seems to be the last straw. The grin I left him with when I left him trapped in the vault temporarily. The grin of someone audacious enough to be unbothered when the tyrant king of dragons had them by the throat. The grin of sheer lunacy of someone who knows no fear. Or at least seems like they know no fear. The grin of someone crazy enough to try ice magic on an Ice, the eldest, most powerful Ice on the planet. The grin of someone who can succeed, where it should not even be possible.

The coward actually flees from me, roaring, signaling for his troops to return to the fore. Our luck in this moment is beyond astounding. To see Terrorzin fleeing, shouting in the way a child begs their parent for aid, from his horde. It’s impossible to have happened, yet it did. He calls out for their aid, for them to re-engage us as he makes all haste to the west. But he drew them all back, so we’ve got a good few minutes, maybe even an hour or more to re-stage our defenses.

Just to make sure he doesn’t decide to double-check if I’m really invincible, just to make sure he doesn’t actually try to face me, to make sure he’s fleeing, I thunder-shout, “Run home little king! It’s not long now! Your days are numbered! Your throne cardboard, your kingdom a house of cards!”

He drops his aura as he runs away, so that he doesn’t freeze his own troops, or use up more dragonforce. That coward will not be coming to the front again at all during this segment of the war. He’ll be keeping his entire army between him and me, as long as he can. As long as his troops don’t report my death, as long as I’m alive on the battlefield, Terrorzin will want no part of it. This is the best possible outcome I could have hoped for from such a reckless, suicidal action.

Vylon’s insistence bought us a type of win we could not have gotten otherwise. I wouldn’t have had a position set up, in place, to know exactly where Terrorzin’s Latent aura would be active, without taking advantage of this chokepoint, and the shield. I couldn’t have had Lil prepped anywhere else, but right here, right now. I wouldn’t have had the split seconds of hesitation as Terrorzin focused on shattering someone else before I got to him.

I needed Lil to be at nearly fully-powered “Solar” for his flames, to withstand Terrorzin’s aura. Only Lil’s mother, my wife, Kinzul can withstand Terrorzin’s aura on her own. I had to endure a hellish agony, and carefully keep within range of Lil’s flames the entire time, and keep him out of range of Terrorzin’s aura.

I’m quaking, vibrating, shaking, and probably still breaking down on the molecular level. Thankfully Lil stopped breathing on me when Terrorzin’s aura dropped. Still… I took some serious damage from that. Parts of my *soul* ache and feel charred. I don’t think I would have lasted more than another few seconds under Lil’s flames. This was the perfect storm of circumstances to be able to pull this off. We owe it all to you, your bravery, your insistence, and your sacrifice Vylon.

His heart’s beating in there, but can we safely thaw him in time, before it stops? He’s a Gold, so he’d normally be heat immune, so Lil’s fire won’t vaporize him instantly or anything, but it will still superheat his scales, hurt, and possibly injure him, leaving him with burns, something he’d never have had before. Only Lil’s fire stands a chance at rescuing him, but Lil’s fire is also the only one that might kill a Gold.

Despite my not having given the order, Shiz comes trouncing up, rushing, hooting and hollering. My Thunderer friend lets the whole world know that the Ice of Rage just ran away from Reggie Shellcracker. A cheer goes out from various points within the canyon.

Blushing and chuckling, I shake my head ruefully. It’s probably pretty darn good for morale, but I really don’t want to take credit for this. I want Vylon safely thawed, and home, before we celebrate.

Because if he isn’t, if we can’t, then, to me, this was still a failure. Sniffling, I choke back a sob. Flicking my head towards Vylon, Lil nods, and he carefully drags Vylon far away from the front, from the chokepoint, in order to attempt to thaw him. A task only Lil, of anyone on the entire planet, could possibly do. Only Lil is suited for this task, my best pal, My Heart, Sun, the Star of the Onyx Dawn. I can’t help shedding a few tears of pride, at having the best best buddy in any world.

When Shiz lifts me and chucks me in the air in celebratory fashion, I wince and wheeze, more sore than I let on, more injured than I’d let on. It takes every bit of willpower not to scream out in agony at the rough handling. Thankfully, he’s on one or more of our telepathic wavelengths, so he gently sets me down, blushing in chagrin as he rubs the back of his head ruefully. I elbow him playfully, despite the size difference.

Phooph. We need our defenders back in place. We’ve bought enough time at Chokepoint #2 that we can abandon it, but I have a feeling we’ll be abandoning chokepoints faster and faster come tomorrow. Terrorzin is going to be plotting and planning. He’s going to give us the worst of what he’s got, to try to overwhelm our defenses.

I don’t want to recall Shaylon and Boetah from Chokepoint #3 though. If they can rest in their Latent forms, and be all that much sturdier and more powerful, when we do have to give up Chokepoint #2 tomorrow, then our fallback to Chokepoint #3 will be all that much safer and more successful, and we won’t have to give up so much ground that we skip it. They’re going to tap in to their dragonforces for healing.

Most of us are going to be tapping into them for healing actually. Something that had been locked away from dragonkind for centuries. When Terrorzin has a fresh wave of horrors sent our way, they’ll be facing a refreshed and ready Onyx Dawn. Kinzul’s timing of the unlock was… The timing was— the timing.

Another thought hits me. Kinzul was positive that the date we have to engage Terrorzin on is October fifth, whether in the valley, or at our doorstep. I need to check with Nala, if the current calendar is the one Rayileklia has always used. If not, Terrorzin’s portent might be sooner than the end of December.

Right now, it’s late on September twenty-ninth. Kinzul was planning to engage Terrorzin on October fifth. There’s been a few things she’s been hiding. Did she already know? I mean, she’s old enough, she’s the eldest being on the planet. If Rayileklia ever used another calendar, she’d know. Does that mean that she knew when she decided the date of the engagement? Because that’s the end of the year?

Is it possible, that October fifth falls on what once would have been year’s end? Harvest time, being the start of a new year? The thought has me grinning. Terrorzin, cowardly tyrant king of dragonkind, has no choice. Something, somehow, slays him in the next week, if my surmising are correct.

I really shouldn’t be grinning so hard. Oh what a terrifying thought. What a wicked world we live in.