No matter the direction, no matter where he looked, the burning fields were crawling with ranks of people who wanted him dead. He even saw flashes of healing light amongst the enemies. If he wished to win this war, he would target them first, but the idea was as foolish as it was arrogant.

But winning this impromptu war wasn't his goal.

Leyla's figure began to shrink in the distance as she made pace north without stop, none of the spells reaching the altitude she flew at or fast enough to catch her unprepared.

"Thanks for waiting!" he shouted, knowing damn well he'd gone unheard. Silver lashed out and gored an attacker rearing up for a massive swing. Yet the attacker, a man with countless scars and little armor, growled and redoubled his attack, eyes blazing with madness. "This feels familiar."

The Evils back in the school fought similarly, with a reckless abandon akin to what Hollywood thought the zombie apocalypse would be like. Maybe this was that in reality, but with superpowers and in the supposed afterlife?

Whatever the answer, Aiden ducked below the second attempted blow and closed the distance. Silver split the man from hip to shoulder as Aiden barely dodged another volley of ranged attacks. they didn't seem to care much about whether they mutilated their own people in the crossfire, he noted.

"Die monster scum!" Isaac's wet dream stepped out of Aiden's shadow and stabbed with two sickly green and violet coated daggers. "Die so we can be free!"

"I'm not a monster, dickhead!" Backstepping to keep a range advantage and away from the poisoned weapons, Aiden raised a hand and commanded the air around the man to freeze. He would accept no more movement from the wanna-be assassin. "Nice try though."

His attack missed.

In the brief moment before the air froze, the assassin slipped back into the shadows, his eyes promising death.

"Pain in the ass." It was time for Aiden to get some distance from his new friend and hoped the appearing and disappearing from shadows bit had some kind of reasonable limitation and wouldn't let the assassin track him too far.

He kneeled low and tensed, feeling the power of his recently enhanced body. He'd always seen things like this in movies. Might as well give it a shot himself.

When he leaped, he flew. His hops would make an NBA player jealous as he propelled forward, counting on his durability to keep him in one piece as he landed. If anything, his alacrity struggled to keep up with the speed in which he exploded forward and the accompanying wind resistance trying to spin him head over heel.

Arrows whizzed past him, and he made sure to keep himself from turning himself into vulnerable target practice. Normal target practice though, he'd let them try that. Gave him some time to practice his favorite thing too: not dying! There was never enough practice with not dying, as the unlucky few squishy healers learned very quickly.

Did he need to kill them?

No.

But the vengeful spite made him feel a little better. He hoped his pettiness wouldn't bite him in the ass later on, but he didn't let it weigh on his conscience too much. He'd given them enough chances to make amends and explain anything at all.

His high speed propulsion started very clumsy, and he'd even learned that crashing into people that fast did not meet his expectations of "a fun time". Now he had to be sticky with some random assailant's blood and look like an actual monster as he fruitlessly fell behind Leyla's trail.

By now, she was so far ahead he couldn't even see her anymore. If it weren't for Blizzy guiding his path and leading the way, he would have no idea if he even followed after her at all anymore. Too many of his crash landings turned him upside down, rolled him all around, and shook him up.

Enough crash landings later and he got the hang of things, much to his satisfaction. Now he could chase after Blizzy without feeling like a shame to her great visage, soaring high as she glided forward and bounded into the next.

Each time she landed, their assailants charged, and she showed them a blizzard dragon was not to be looked down on. Teeth, a crown of very sharp horns, claw, and more than enough magic to make them regret their choices carved a path forward until the next bound. Every so often, she'd even enjoy a snack, and Aiden purged the images from his memory just as fast as she swallowed down grown men and women.

Impressive, really. Even if gruesome. His conversation with Kyriall came to mind, and his morbid curiosity questioned whether she would gain anything meaningful from the surprise buffet. Hopefully.

No matter how far Aiden ran, all of Valhalla looked like how Halla should. A hellscape, well developed and maintained as such. The amount of questions grew into an angry hunger as he looked around in awe. Leyla had implied the first scene, an illusion she'd so viciously dismantled, was what Valhalla traditionally looked like. The tranquil tribalism promoting a closely knit community of comradery, compassion, and everything Aiden thought Valhalla wouldn't be.

You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author.

So of course the loudest question he wanted to answer, what happened here, pushed him onward so he could not only find Leyla but also sate his curiosity and determine how the situation changed his mission.

Because no matter what he'd heard about Xenith, the situation he saw made it a hard sell to paint the picture that she was a ferocious, merciless dictator queen. Could she be the reason things ended up this way? Sure. He wasn't too sure things wouldn't end up similarly if he were to kill her most loyal and elite warriors to empower Leyla to kill Xenith for revenge.

Maybe he was a hypocrite, having come to thrust the realm into chaos to block out the upper realm for good, but the fact he wasn't the one causing this mayhem and carnage to fester doubt within Aiden.

If not him, then who? Who had done this? And for what reason?

Those were the questions he wanted answered. And considering the rapidly approaching sky high monolith glowing with a violently red portal at its base, he hoped to get those answers sooner rather than later.

Quite the mystery.

—

As Aiden drew closer, the density of enemies coming outward multiplied by magnitudes and he found a place to hide so he could observe—burned down village ruins nobody seemed to care about scoping out again.

They swarmed out from the red portal into Valhalla in waves, like possessed hellions, and started fighting anything that they couldn't identify as an ally. Sometimes, that meant even themselves.

Even with his confidence, Aiden didn't have the durability to wade into a literal army of otherworld battle-crazed warmongers that made even the Valkyr look tame. That was saying something, truly, as both Leyla and Veletya were something to behold.

More pressing, Leyla hovered overhead, and he couldn't make out any emotion or intent on her face from this distance. No amount of peeling his eyes forced his alacrity into being any better than it was. For as tempted as he was to signal her to his position and maybe question her about what they'd walked into, he knew better than to drag the whole army toward him after he'd found a safe place to lay low for a few moments so he could catch his breath.

All he could do was bide his time and hope that she didn't rush in and get herself killed, and by proxy, him. Who thought sharing a soul with a deranged, battle-crazed winged woman was a good idea?

For as much as he joked, he wouldn't trade their bond for the world. However, it did make moments like these very stressful.

He took stock of himself and his shoulder. All the leaping and bounding and fighting had irritated the wound there, but it hadn't been too deep. Despite that, the wound reminded him these people, whoever they were, couldn't be considered the same as what he was used to. Even if he considered only their individual ability, any one could give the next strongest fighter in Zion a run for their money. Anna might be able to win, but the rest?

Doubtful.

That was saying something, a very dangerous something. Did he have more to worry about than just the upper and void realms? This was a literal invasion into Valhalla, the supposed afterlife, after all.

Will Earth ever be safe?

That question made his heart skip a beat and the back of his neck sweat. Everything he had done and planned to do was in the service of that goal, to keep Earth free and safe of the influence of whatever messed up universe they'd been sucked into. The more and more he found out, the more hopeless and impossible it all seemed, even with Midrath's Authority and the supposed backing of the Ruler's Throne.

What if whoever orchestrated this attack on Valhalla came to claim the Ruler's Throne from me? Could I stop them? As much as he wanted to think he could, he had zero confidence. This... What had Valhalla sacrificed to resist even this far?

A chilling realization stilled him and hitched his breath. Since coming here, he hadn't seen a single Valkyr fighting against the invaders. In fact, he'd seen more Valkyr back in Zion than he did now.

His head spun, and he desperately wished Leyla would come to him or the secrets of the situation would open up to him, because there was no way in Halla he was walking out there himself to approach the giant stake in the ground with countless runes flashing and lighting up everything in a myriad of colors.

As much time as he'd spent copying the runes over in Arkayan's egg dungeon, Aiden had never seen a rune shine a color outside of the familiar baby blue. But everything in the rainbow was represented here on this massive stake piercing deep into Valhalla's ashen ground. A curiosity for sure, but the entire bottom quarter buzzed red. Red runes, red portal?

Correlation and causation weren't the same thing, but without any more hints, he'd take an educated guess and move on to his next priority: where had Blizzy run off to?

A quick tug on their bond, and he had his answer.

"What is she doing?!" Of course his dragon companion was rushing face first at the angry army that wanted to kill them, eyes locked on something Aiden couldn't see. "Shit."

He gripped Silver's handle tight as he smacked himself a few times. Everything about what he was about to do told him not to. Every part of his desire to survive and not have holes poked or carved out of him screamed at him to stay still and wait a little longer.

But Olivia was right, his specialty was rushing face first at things.

And so he followed after Blizzy. The sky shifted to a freezing blizzard as he unleashed a torrent of power from where it coiled tightly, a rigid flow of eminence. The snow started, a subtle and soft thing. The chill followed, numbing and quiet. His death moved in creeping waves as the ground beneath his feet froze on impact, his very existence becoming an embodiment of tundra.

No longer did he find mirthful spite in watching healers try to save those that got too curious and too close to his frost. Blizzy continued to lead the way and carved a path forward that he followed. If not for her, the resistance he met would likely be overwhelming, but a violent dragon wading through your army at the first sight of Valhalla? Aiden couldn't imagine the impression left on the angry invaders was one of cuddly affection and playful adoration.

Anywhere snow or ice touched, he spread death. It became an afterthought in seconds, plucking each life like he would harvest strawberries or blueberries in the springtime. Unlike when the juices would stain his fingers, the only stain left behind by each death was a reminder he had become proficient in surviving.

But would it be enough?