Chapter 60 Uh-oh.
Isaac burned through his reserves as he kept Kahtesh cloaked in his shadowcloak while using his death flames to keep fatigue away from himself and Lenna. If they were going to be in for the long hall then Isaac wanted to put off exhaustion for as long as possible. He just hoped that the dragon would succeed and not fall prey to whatever tricks and traps the enemy mushroomancer might have up their scaly sleeve. ‘Good luck little buddy.’ Isaac silently wished his familiar.
—
Kahtesh dove in towards the ugly guy with the big stick and opened his mouth right before they would have collided. Thunder rolled and the part of Isaac’s shadowcloak that covered the head of the little dragon was blown away. Light flashed as a lightning bolt covered the handful of feet between Kahtesh and the mushroomancer in an instant. The lightning kept going until it hit the stone behind the mushroomancer and sent stone shrapnel flying in every direction while scorching the area black.
The dragon’s open maw clamped onto the fishman’s head and his momentum took both of them to the ground in a tumble of bone and scales. Kahtesh rolled and flipped using his wings to make sure he ended up on top of the tasteless meal. Kahtesh usually wished he could taste things but this time he was glad that he couldn’t. Something about the ugly guy made him think that he probably tasted bad. That wouldn’t matter though as Kahtesh was already trying to gather enough mana in his rune to fire another lightning bolt into the not tasty meal.
Kahtesh’s vision was unlike most creatures as he no longer had real eyes. Instead he had these two small orbs of death flames that seemed to take their place and attempt to fulfill their function. Kahtesh saw everything in rough outlines and sometimes that led to him being unable to properly perceive things. This had no effect on him when it came to living creatures however as he could see their souls. He could see their shape and he could see their core. He could see their mana pathways to some extent as well and that was how he was sure that he had clamped down on the ugly guy’s head. Kahtesh was starting to get confused however because usually when something’s head was being crushed by a dragon’s jaws there would be thrashing and screaming. Not this time.
The power building in Kahtesh’s rune had almost reached its climax when suddenly the dragon was ripped from the mushroomancer and held aloft half a dozen feet back. He still had half of the ugly guy’s face in his mouth but there wasn’t any blood anywhere. Kahtesh opened his mouth towards the ugly guy to launch his lightning bolt at it when suddenly, a rope with a mana pathway through it wrapped around his face and forced his mouth closed. ‘Uh-oh.’ The little dragon thought immediately before his own lightning bolt blew out his front teeth and some of his jaw. Lightning and bone shrapnel fired out from the dragon in a hail of death that would have killed half a dozen normal Ori-Masa.
Kahtesh felt his face being put back together by his master’s magic but the progress was slow. His master didn’t know that he was hurt so he wouldn’t give Kahtesh more of his death flames to heal him. Kahtesh realized as the battered, broken, fired, and shredded body of the ugly guy started to twitch and snap back in place that he may have messed up. In the little dragon’s defense he had only ever encountered enemies that could be bitten or fried. The last time he had come up against something that neither would work on his master had sent him back to the shadowy nest. Kahtesh struggled and thrashed in an attempt to free himself of the weird rope with mana pathways in it to no avail. After a half a dozen seconds of thrashing he realized what the problem was. The rope was not really rope. It was connected to the ugly guy and seemed to be reaching out from his feet. The ugly guy’s not-rope had stabbed into all of the surrounding ugly guys and was draining some kind of energy from them.
Kahtesh realized exactly how bad his situation was when he watched the ugly guy regrow everything that had been destroyed. His bones reformed and scaly skin grew back to cover the exposed muscles and bones. The lack of blood was strange but Kahtesh had no idea why the ugly guy didn’t have any blood. For all Kahtesh knew, some people might not have blood. If Kahtesh would have had a throat that worked and saliva in his mouth he would have swallowed hard but as it stood he could only stop in place in horror as he accepted the fact that he was completely helpless. There was only one place left for Kahtesh to turn to but he had no idea if it would work. ‘HELP!’ Kahtesh tried sending back through the invisible mana tether that connected him to his master. ‘MASTER HELP!’ He pushed with all of his little consciousness. ‘STUCK!’
This tale has been unlawfully lifted without the author's consent. Report any appearances on Amazon.
—
Isaac staggered back as a feeling slammed into his chest unlike anything he had ever felt before. A feeling of helplessness and terror and a desire to be saved. He unconsciously grabbed his chest and his face contorted under the emotional assault. “Isaac?” Lenna called from beside him. “Isaac! Are you alright?”
Isaac was assaulted by the feelings again but this time the desire for him specifically to save someone hit him harder than the rest. “Cover for me.” Isaac told her and stepped back so she could work. Isaac was taking deep breaths as foreign feelings reigned in his heart. The feelings hit him again but with the phantom feeling of being tied up, bound in place, hopeless and alone. Isaac had to fight down the emotions as he felt himself start wanting to hyperventilate. He could feel the direction that the emotions and feelings were coming from. “Kahtesh.” Isaac said through gritted teeth. “Fina!” Isaac called to ensure he had her attention. “Take my spot!”
“What?!” Esk shouted from the battle line.
“Why?” Lenna questioned. Fina, who saw what state Isaac was in, nodded and moved to fill his spot while drawing her sword and slamming her free hand onto the spine of it.
Lenna made space as Fina spoke a quick chant. “Blaze, blaze like a moth in a flame.” Fina’s sword erupted in flames and she cut down an Ori-Masa. “Ancient embers alight anew.” She followed up her attack with another spell chant and gestured forwards like she was commanding an army. A dozen small embers appeared around her before shooting forwards into the Ori-Masa horde.
While Fina was chanting, Isaac said only one thing before disappearing in a quick burst of shadows: “I need to save my dragon.” He followed it by sending a thought to his dragon: ‘I’m on my way.’
Isaac appeared above the horde of fishmen and started falling. His height advantage gave him a quick look at the oncoming horde and the state that his dragon was in. The mushroomancer had an entire network of hyphae reaching out from him and connecting him to every other Ori-Masa within almost thirty feet. He was sucking the nutrients out of his own men to fuel his mycelium growth. The hyphae grew stronger and thicker as they wrapped around Kahtesh and tried to pull him apart.
Isaac teleported again and appeared right behind the mushroomancer. “Trash corpse pieces scatter.” Isaac heard the fishman say. Isaac winced at the horrid raspy voice and wretched speech pattern.
Isaac swung with all his strength in an attempt to cleave the little fishman in half. His sword stopped halfway through and Isaac had to yank it out while jumping back. A dozen hyphae snapped and wrapped around the area he had just inhabited. “This would be a lot easier-” Isaac began and teleported in front of but slightly off to the side of the mushroomancer and hacked through his exposed arm. “-if you just died for me.” The arm fell free before a strand of hyphae shot out of the severed arm and latched onto the stump it had just fallen from. Isaac carved through the mushroomancer another half a dozen times while teleporting around him but all his efforts were amounting to nothing. Hyphae kept endlessly reaching out to pull the fishman back together.
Kahtesh started squirming again to get free but the hyphae weren’t budging. The noise did give Isaac an idea. An idea that he generally avoided. Mostly because he hated to lose. Isaac teleported around Kahtesh and sliced through the hyphae holding him in place. Isaac didn’t care if his blade scratched Kahtesh. He didn’t have time to be careful. They needed to leave before the mushroomancer could finish putting himself back together. Kahtesh didn’t care if his master cut him either. The dragon felt no pain and he knew that any injuries he had would be burned away in a matter of moments.
Isaac started boosting himself and appeared behind the dragon. The mushroomancer started shaking his head to clear it after Isaac had shredded his brain and eyes multiple times over. Isaac grabbed his dragon by the tail and took a step while swinging with all of his might. ‘Go to Lenna!’ Isaac sent the dragon as it was tossed into the air.
The entire cavern stopped for a moment before every single Ori-Masa turned to face Isaac regardless of what they were doing. The feeling of death energy wafting off of him painted him as a target. Every dark creature wanted to bathe in the power that they instinctively knew would heal and strengthen them. The hyphae around Isaac’s feet moved in a blink and started wrapping themselves around his ankles.
“No.” Isaac ordered the mushroomancer. “You don’t get to feed on me.” He knew that his words would reach the fishman as he had focused specifically on conversing with it. The mushroomancer staggered back in surprise as shadows pushed out of Isaac’s pores and shoved the hyphae away from him enough that he could teleport away. Isaac appeared back with the rest of the team and turned around to catch a gliding Kahtesh as the little dragon threaded the gap between the tops of Lenna and Mark’s heads and the ceiling. The little dragon slammed into him and they both fell backwards. Isaac hit the ground hard and Kahtesh looked down at him. “Yeah, yeah. You’re welcome.”