Archimedes pushed himself to his feet as Gethra ran to his side, turning and putting herself between the assailant and the young man. "You know this pest?" she asked, drawing her bone greatsword. Archimedes shook his head. "Never met them in my life." The pest in question let out a shriek and swooped down over them, causing Archimedes to duck. Gethra swung and missed, and the thing cackled before landing a few yards away.

It stood tall, almost as tall as Gethra. It wore some sort of loose body armor, but its build was as if a raptor had been crossed with a human and given wings. It looked very reptilian in the face, with black and yellow eyes set into a skull with two spikes coming back from the crown. Purple black scales covered their body, the hands and feet ending in sharp and wicked looking claws and talons. The figure let out a shriek that split Archimedes’ ears, causing him to wince as he covered them.

"You!" the creature said, a harsh rasping coming from its mouth as it hissed. "Finally I have tracked you down, Archimedes Crypt!"

"Who the heck are you?" Archimedes retorted from behind Gethra. The creature flexed their wings with a smirk. "I am Xybrithe, the True Seer! I am here to claim what you have stolen from me!" With a howl, the draconoid launched themselves at Archimedes, only to be intercepted by Gethra. The orc brought her blade to collide with her foe, but Xybrithe caught the edge with her claws. The two repelled from each other and Gethra readied herself again. Archimedes again took a few steps back, not sure what to do.

"I've never met you before in my life. Let alone steal from you."

"Liar! Deceiver! Thief! Fraud!" The draconoid hissed, again dashing for Archimedes and the bodyguard intercepted. "I have been studying under the Great and Terrible Amuul-Kral for years! Waiting, biding my time, for the perfect moment to strike him down!" Xybrithe back-flipped away, kicking Gethra in the face as they did. Those black eyes burned with fury and hatred. "And you. You just came in, and stole my prize! Stole away his Magnus Exitio!"

"You talk too much." Xybrithe dodged another attack from Gethra, spinning and deflecting the blow with their tail. The impact caused the sword to fly back and wedge itself in the sand. Gethra followed up swinging herself back, gaining momentum then planting her feet and bringing the sword down hard with an overhead slash. The strike brought Xybrithe to their knees, their arms crossed above their heads catching the blow.

Amuul-Kral… Wait. That dragon? And what was a Magnus Exitio? He doubted it was anything in his bag. He didn’t have anything else. Except for the aura Gethra had pointed out.

Oh.

Oh dear. That’s why Xybrithe was going to kill him. They wanted the aura.

“Aw buckets.”

The draconioid repelled the blade and narrowly avoided a decapitating strike. With a hiss, Xybrithe took to the skies, stretching their wings and hovering over the two. Black eyes narrowed as their gaze burned into Archimedes, pointing the jeweled dagger at him from aloft.

"I know all about you Archimedes Crypt. I know who you really are. A fake. A sham. A phony. You no more killed the Great One than you are from this world or the next. I know what you can do."

The draconoid held out their other claw, and blackish green fire began to coil in their palm. Long tails of fire pulled from the air, twisting and coalescing until it was a shard of compressed flame. “And I know what you can’t do.” With a careless flick, the shard was sent towards Archimedes. Gethra turned and tackled him as the explosion landed near them, knocking them both off their feet. The bonesword was sent flying, landing in a smoldering pile of burning sands.

"Are you alright?" Archimedes opened his eyes and looked up at Gethra. The orc's hair had come undone and was loosely hanging to one side. He nodded, and she nodded back. "I'm going to try and distract the bat. I want you to run." Archimedes frowned. "What? But-"

"No buts pup." Her voice was soft, softer than he had ever heard her be before. "You can't fight this. Please just do as I say." The calloused hand on his cheek silenced anything Archimedes was going to say. Gethra pushed herself up, the sounds of fear and fire seeming distant. All around them the smoldering piles of burning sand were bonfires in the freezing cold desert air. The musty smell of glass mixed with sulfur was almost enough to gag someone. With a snarl the orc woman pointed at the flying Xybrithe.

"Get your scaly crag riddled hide down here and fight me like a woman!" Gethra bellowed, stalking towards the draconoid. Her eyes glowed a hazy red color, and the veins in her arms became more pronounced. Xybrithe cackled and swooped down, landing yards away from her. The green-skinned warrior charged, lunging and lashing out with a savage punch. Xybrithe merely sidestepped, avoiding the following strikes just as easily.

Archimedes rolled to his knees and looked at the fight, his heart pounding in his chest. He wanted to run. He wanted to help. He wanted to do something. A cold pressure in his pocket pressed against his leg, and he had an idea. It worked on the big dragon; it should work on this, right? He pulled out the d20 and ran behind a rock, peering over at the fight. Gethra was still swinging wildly and Xybrithe was still dodging all of the attacks. Archimedes let the dice drop.

{16} The punch whiffed. The following punch was batted away harmlessly. {14} Another miss. Gethra was a capable fighter but Xybrithe was just more powerful. They weren't even trying to fight back. {18} Gethra's fist collided with a laughing Xybrithe's jaw, and knocked the tall draconoid back. The scaled creature pushed themselves back up, rubbing their jaw.

"I actually felt that. I'm tired of playing games." {15} The claw still connected with Gethra, and the force was enough to send her flying back towards one of the smoldering piles. Archimedes glared at the d20 in his hand. "Ya know now would be a really good time to be on my side." he said, and dropped the die again.

{3} His eyes flicked up to Xybrithe who was charging, claw reared back and ready to strike. Gethra rolled to the side, the razor sharp talons striking the sand where she had been. For every roll, he made at least, twice as many movements happened. He had to make them count. {11} Gethra threw another haymaker, but it was blocked and Xybrithe locked their arm around hers. The draconoid twisted, and effortlessly threw Gethra across the dune towards a flaming pile of glass. {4} The orc landed right at the edge, avoiding being impaled on the jagged spikes.

This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it

"Come on!" Archimedes hissed under his breath. "I need a chance right now!" {13} Xybrithe chucked another flame shard at Gethra, but this one went wide, exploding behind her. And that's when something strange happened. The die glowed for a moment. It hadn't before, as far as he remembered. In fact, he hadn't used the die all that much over the last two weeks. As Gethra pushed herself to her feet, her hand reached out. Archimedes let the die drop. {17} Her hand connected with something sticking out of the fire. The hilt of her bonesword. Xybrithe summoned another shard and threw it at the warrior. {8} With a swing of the sword, Gethra deflected the blast, sending it into the night sky. The shard exploded overhead, illuminating the area for a brief moment.

The sword, once merely sharpened bone and cured leather, was now covered along the edge in dozens of spiky shards of jagged glass. Once free from its molten sand pit and exposed to the freezing night air, the glass seemed to crystallize, going from a half liquid translucent to a smoky black opaque. The spikes solidified and grew longer, sharper and far more wicked looking. Xybrithe narrowed their eyes at Gethra, who was panting, bleeding, battered, and angry. The draconoid flipped the dagger in their claws, looking at the weapon in the orc's hands before stowing the dagger away.

"Enough of this." Two whirlpools of fire began to form in their claws, gathering more and more flames than before. "Time to die, green skinned savage."

"HEY!"

The overwhelming presence of death and power suddenly washed over Xybrithe, causing their knees to buckle. A feeling of panic and dread gripped their mind, and primal fear began to creep its way in. Their eyes went wide, the slitted irises narrowing to a hair's width. They jerked turning and looking in the direction of menacing aura. She saw the human, hood up and cloak billowing in the desert wind. His eyes burned with a furious fire that belonged to the lords of war. His fist was clenched and his teeth was gritted in a smirk of triumph. Xybrithe blinked, and the rational side of their brain clicked in. It was just the Aura. It was just this whelp using their Master's power, their stolen power, foolishly. It caught them off guard is all, the whelp was no threat. They knew this.

And yet the human had this cocky grin on his face. They had no time to question it, as in the sudden break of concentration, they had forgotten about the orc. Gethra roared, bringing the blade down and sinking it into the draconoid's back. The glass spikes didn't shatter, but pierced the scaly hide as if it was made of butter.

“You… dare…” the wet death rattle that escaped Xybrithe’s maw was the last sound they uttered before falling to the ground. Gethra stood, panting, the red mist around her eyes slowly dissipating before she too fell to the ground.

"Let's get some help over here!"

Archimedes ran from his spot over to the collapsed Gethra, kneeling down next to her as people from the caravan were getting the wagons back upright.

"You didn't run." The black haired woman said, laying in the sand as Archimedes checked her wounds. "I told you to run. Bad pup." The human chuckled as he pulled her arm over his shoulders and helped her stand. "I was never known for being an obedient child. I don't see how that would be any different now." As they started to hobble away, Gethra reached back. "My sword..."

"I'll get it for you. Let's get you to the wagons." After getting her to a safe spot and made sure someone would tend to her wounds, Archimedes turned and headed back to the corpse of Xybrithe. He glanced at the d20 in his hand and grinned, tossing it up and catching it. He would have to do some testing, but he had a hunch on how the die worked. The numbers never repeated themselves until all 20 was used up. Then it 'reset'. Which, if it was THAT specific in how it was used, he was already thinking of ways to manipulate the rules. "This is very interesting indeed.," he said, kissing the die for good luck and putting it back in his pocket.

Archimedes walked up to the sword still sticking out of the draconoids back and grabbed the hilt. It was stuck good and deep, and he had to work at it to get it loose. When he finally managed to yank the spiky blade out, he noticed something. The satchel around Xybrithe's waist.

"I mean, of course you loot the body." he said to himself, setting the sword down and rummaging through the sack. In it, he found many gold coins from the dragon's lair, a couple glass vials with different colored liquids in them, a weird looking key, and the dagger. Archimedes transferred the vials and key to his own bag, then he took the dagger out and examined it. Up close, it had a very wicked design about it, with a Kris style wavy blade. One edge was serrated sharp, and the other had jagged looking teeth to it. The cross-guard resembled flames that guarded the knuckles with the grip itself being an open dragon's head. At the base of the blade was embedded a brilliant green gem in a perfect triangle.

The whole dagger struck him as curious. Xybrithe had never used it once in the entire fight, just pointed it and waved it around before chucking fireballs at them. So what had been the point? Archimedes tapped the gem with a finger a couple times. It made a nice tinkling sound.

Establishing astral chain.

image [https://static.thenounproject.com/png/579270-200.png]

The world around the man suddenly melted away as he felt the ground beneath his feet vanish. Archimedes was falling, and as he did the heavens fell with him. Black skies gave way to purple galaxies; stars were born and died in a matter of seconds around him. He felt the force of a black hole consume him, crushing his very essence until he was atoms in space. His consciousness floated in the cosmos, the very concept of him being reduced to cosmic light.

His being stood before a megalith, a massive stone construct the size of a skyscraper and made of a shimmering black material. The once almost eldritch expanse of space was replaced with an infinite white plane, the sky a nebulous grey that somehow seemed even bigger than the obelisk. He felt insignificant in the presence of the gigantic pylon.

A tugging at his arm drew his consciousness down. He saw a light glowing from his hand, a brilliant white laced with every other color in the spectrum. He felt his hand move, touching the light to the base of the megalith. A huge shape began to form on its surface. A pyramid? But as the triangle formed, it branched out again, making more until it was the unmistakable shape of the face of an icosahedron. No sooner had this registered in his mind, than a line began to carve itself of the obelisk. As the line moved, it would stop create another shape, and continue upwards. A pentagon, two kite shapes inverted, two triangles making a diamond, a square, and finally at the top, another pyramid. And unlike the dull grey carvings of the other shapes, this one was a brilliant green color.

"Astral chain connected."

The voice was feminine. It reminded him of the voice he heard before his encounter with the dragon. But this one was a little different. It sounded smaller.

And right behind him.

He turned, and looked down. There was a young looking girl, in a dress that looked like it was made of black silk that came to her knees. On the fringes of the dress were that same green color that almost seemed to glow. Her skin was pale, and she wore her large amounts of hair up in two pigtails. Her hair, and her eyes, were also that same gem shade of green. The girl adjusted her glasses and smiled up at Archimedes.

"Hello Master."