A loud and freezing breeze swept across the field.

Two men and a beast stared at each other, until one of them lost the live in its eyes and fell down, covered in wounds and missing an arm.

A faint cracking sound echoed from the fallen beast, as the cores on its back and chest both cracked in pieces.

Pieces of rocks fell from its body, as its protection crumbled to dust after its life ended.

"Ooof! This was tough."

Nylon fell into the snow and sighed heavily.

They had just ended a long and arduous fight against another giant corrupted, a grey silverback gorilla with elephant tusks protruding from its mouth.

It had been a very tough fight, as the beast moved incredibly fast, and threw fast punches capable of breaking boulders effortlessly.

While Nylon focused on staying out of its sight and slowly attacking it from its blind spot, Elliott defended against every attacks and countered as much as possible. Enduring the beast's onslaught did a fair amount of damage to him.

"Elliott, are you alright?"

Nylon sat and placed his right elbow on his knee while looking toward Elliott.

"Frankly, I can't feel my arms and legs."

He said with a smile before falling into the snow.

"I bet. Thanks for enduring everything, I would've been unable to endure a second one."

"That's why I did it. At least, I've returned the pain tenfold."

They both looked at the large grey arm laying still behind them.

"You sure did. I don't think I've ever seen you draw your sword that fast before."

"I can feel my strength recovering slowly, that's why I was able to cut it off."

The cold snow helped their mind and body to relax. Their body temperature was so high steam formed above them, while the snow rapidly melted under them.

"Nothing broken?"

Elliott asked Nylon, remembering him enduring a single hit in his stead when he couldn't endure the pain.

"I'm good. You?"

"Besides some bruises, I'm good too."

A small silence happened after that, until Elliott sighed.

"We're really making progress. It's going to be a month since I've vowed to retake my land."

"..."

Nylon quietly listened.

"Aren't you curious? You've never asked why I even bothered to come here."

"It's none of my business. I followed along as part of a request from Orion. Though, I might ask as a compensation for my efforts."

"Haha~ Sure, that's something I can do."

With a smug on his face, Elliott grabbed his left shoulder and pushed on it, which made a loud cracking noise as his bone returned to its original place.

"Fuuuuu... Much better."

'He naturally cracked his shoulder back into place, didn't he?'

Just imagining the pain it could induce, Nylon frowned.

Feeling better, Elliott sat into the melting snow and stared in the distance. The storm hadn't cleared yet, so all he could see was the fast moving clouds and the incessant hail.

"You can call my ambition a matter of pride."

"Pride? Recovering your land is?"

He nodded.

"This place, it is all that is left of my mother's memories."

Unauthorized use of content: if you find this story on Amazon, report the violation.

"I used a very specific point of view when I told my story, but can you imagine seeing that with your own eyes?"

"The person you've respected all your life, the one who told you everything you know, simply vanishing in front of your eyes as if her life never mattered to anyone?"

"..."

Nylon sympathized with Elliott for a moment. Putting himself in the same situation, he couldn't bear the thought of seeing his father die unceremoniously in front of him.

"I do understand my father's work to avenge her. I do, but I can't acknowledge it. Mother would kill both of us if she knew what we have done."

Clenching his hands into fists, Elliott stared at them.

"In the end, this is my own pride that speaks. I want to make thing right, for our next and last meeting with her..."

Somehow, he could understand the meaning behind those words.

'In death.'

"She was proud of this land. Proud to live on this continent. Proud to have loved us. All we can do to honor her memory is purge the filth that is encroached on Cephaïd."

A quick thought escaped Nylon's mouth.

"What about that creature, that being, that killed her?"

He quickly turned his face toward Elliott after feeling an intense and breathtaking bloodlust.

"Even with her appearance, I won't hesitate to strike at it. I am of the same opinion, it needs to die. In a very painful and gruesome way."

"An eye for an eye. It should have killed us when it could, because we won't back down until it is crushed under our foot."

The simple thought made Elliott angry. He was unable to forget how powerless he was at the time.

"I see. You have a very deep grudge against it, that I understand. So what about your father, Miasma? He's doing, and had done, rather unethical things. You're trying to clean behind his mess"

Nylon changed the subject, as he couldn't endure the pressure anymore. Luckily, Elliott let go of his wrath and sighed.

"Yes. That's what I'm planning to do."

He sat with both arms on his knees, and looked above him.

"Does he not understand that mother would berate his actions? Maybe he knows, and it's because she's not here anymore..."

"She was his everything."

The two men sat in silence for a few minutes, simply contemplating how a man's despair lead to suffering for others.

"We should move. From what I can tell, only a few giants remains. We've also cleared most of the corrupted beasts of the region."

"You might be right, there are less and less random attacks. This is a good thing isn't it?"

Elliott nodded.

'It helps in finding the source of the constant corruption. And I think I know where it is.'

He thought.

'We still haven't found what fell in the region. This is probably related to the corruption at large, so we need to continue carefully.'

They both stood up and wiped their bodies of the snow stuck on them.

"How many giants do you think there are remaining? Four or five?"

After giving it a quick though, Elliott shook his head.

"Less. We could see the southern mountains in the distance earlier, and we've went through more than half of Cephaïd already."

"We've removed more than half of the storm just by killing three of them. With a little chance, we only have three more to deal with."

Relieved, Nylon dropped his shoulders, which began to hurt. He smiled, and stretched them.

'This is a kind training I would have never experienced. I bet Orion will be jealous.'

With a few more giant beasts remaining, they continued on their journey, this time, going east.

Toward the very place where everything began for him and his father.

~

"This is proceeding at a very good pace. I like it."

Miasma looked at the army of chained humans in front of him. Controlling Layla's body like his own, he pointed at one of them.

"You, you need a little bit more corruption inside you."

"GrrrRrrrR!"

The broken man glared at him with his red eyes, and growled. It tried to free himself from the chains, to no avail.

"Oh, please. Stop resisting."

Miasma approached the man, and shoved his index finger inside his stomach.

"Here, eat."

A wave of dark energy traveled from his arm, and into the man. He thrashed around as the energy took hold of him, and slowly, resistance stopped.

"Good."

Miasma removed his finger from the corrupted man's stomach and wipe it on the man's clothes. The idea of getting blood on his own clothes repulsed him.

Layla's eyes began to glow a dark purple hue, as they looked over the corrupted.

"Hmm~ This one has a core alright. This one is forming, and this one is... having a rejection."

He approached the one rejecting the corruption, and without a second thought, killed the man with his own hands.

With a powerful punch, he broke the core inside his chest, and made him crumble to dust completely.

"I have no need for defects."

...

The only moment Miasma stopped was to force more corruption inside a human, or to end the life of a defective corrupted. When his round was done, he entered a peculiar room with an empty container, which was previously holding a being inside it.

"How do you feel?"

He asked a thing who barely responded, covered in clothes that hid all of its body. It sat motionless in the corner of the room.

"..."

"I had forgotten, those vocal cords aren't going to work anymore. I don't even think you have the will to think."

"I've once again created a wild beast. This is funny how history repeats itself."

He thought of a similar being he created a long time ago.

"I will mold you into the perfect corrupted, just you see."

Miasma smiled wildly, showing all of Layla's teeth. A very unnatural smile appeared on a stunning beauty.

"Well, for now, I have better things to do."

"I just caught something interesting, and I've never managed to corrupt one before. This is going to become my masterpiece."

"Hahaha~!"

With a maniacal laugh, he walked out of the room and locked it.

"Yes! A very special toy. A true giant."

His eyes glowed red, as he entered another room. Inside, a winged creature was chained.

Its wings were tightly held in place, its mouth chained so it couldn't attack, and its body completely sealed, making any kind of movement impossible.

"I have never experimented on a dragon before! What a find that was! Right, my lost friend?"

The brown dragon showed fear. It couldn't move, it couldn't talk, and in front of it, a terrible being smiled at him.

It knew, in the depths of its mind, that it was the end. The moment the corrupted dome was established, it knew it wouldn't be able to escape.

Even though it tried to fight back, in the end, it lost to Layla's magic, and was captured.

It regretted going out so far of the nest, though it was too late for that.

Miasma, from this day onward, entered a frenzied state as he experimented on the poor dragon. This lead to the birth of the first corrupted dragon.