Someone shouted from behind me. My first instinct was to turn around and see who was calling me, but my mind went right back to the last time I did that. In a flash, I summoned Aegis and whipped it around to protect myself. Then I summoned Mori and prepared for a fight just in case. Once I was facing the person who called me, I saw what looked to be three nobles and their beast familiars.

“That’s him your lordship. That’s the familiar who killed Omwell.” One of them said to the most decorated of the three. He was the largest of them all and had several grey feathers indicating he was quite old. The old one had many gold laces around his body, as well as large jewels that the other two didn’t have.

“Are you sure?” The old Neame asked in a gruff voice.

“Yes, Magistrate Gokhale,” the younger noble talking turned to me, “I will never forget that disgusting ape.”

The older Neame, Magistrate Gokhale, turned to me and began speaking. “Investigator Monken may have ruled in your favor, but it is inconceivable that a familiar could kill a high-ranking noble’s son and be allowed to live… I will rectify the situation.” As soon as he said that, his lizard like familiar reared up on its hind legs and opened its now glowing red mouth. It then dropped its body and shot a ball of fire at me. I pushed my shield out and moved behind it as much as possible, but the force of the blast still knocked me of balance for a moment.

“I need some breathing room,” I said quietly to myself and sent Mori away, then used shadow casting to summon Destiny. I threw it as hard as I could and flung it straight into the open mouth of the familiar as it was charging up another shot. It went down its throat and killed it, causing it to fall forward with a thud. “Destiny!” I called out and she reappeared back in my hand. The two lesser nobles stepped back in fear, but not the older one.

“Impressive, but that was just a Salamander, let us see how you handle my prized familiar. Egoes!” A magic circle formed on the ground between myself and the three nobles, and a large horse sized monster began to appear. It had scales, leathery wings, a short fat neck, and a long tail with spikes at the end. “Behold, one of the lesser dragon species… a wyvern.” The magistrate said smugly.

A freaking Dragon?! I screamed in my head. “SUMA!” I shouted. “I don’t care where you are or what you are doing, but you need to summon me now!”

“What? Why?” She asked through our mental connection.

“I’m under attack by three nobles and his pet dragon!”

“WHAT?” She yelled. “Okay, one moment.” Just as she said that the wyvern opened its mouth and sprayed fire at me. My shield blocked most of it, but my legs and elbows got burned bad.

“AHHHH” I yelled in pain and thrust my Destiny into its still open mouth. Instead of killing it, the wyvern backed up slightly then bit into the spear, shattering the wooden shaft and breaking off the tip; which it promptly spit onto the floor. The metal tip laid on the ground, glowing red hot. I tried whacking the wyvern with the shaft, but it didn’t seem to notice. “Mori!” I shouted and it appeared into my hand; taking the place of Destiny’s remains. I looked down, the metal tip had disappeared as well, leaving only smoldering grass where it had been laying.

“A new weapon will not save you, familiar. You die today!” He said and cast some kind of spell that enveloped all of us in greenish energy.

“Jake, get ready!” Suma said.

I smiled and laughed at the nobles, “Not today, bye.” I waited for a moment, and another, but nothing happened.

“Jake, something is wrong, I am trying to summon you, but nothing is happening.” Suma sounded panicked. The nobles started laughing.

“Did you really think it was going to be that easy? We took precautions to prevent your escape. A preprepared ritual meant to keep a familiar from being summoned away, we simply needed to activate it after confirming that Egoes would be enough to kill you!” The old magistrate boasted.

“Suma, he is using some ritual to keep me here!” I said.

“I am already on my way back!” She yelled. “Just hold on!” I swung Mori at the wyvern and caught it on the neck, leaving a gash but not killing it unfortunately. It let out a pained screech and swiped at me with its claws, which left puncture holes in Aegis, but not large ones, and knocked me back.

“A familiar that relies totally on tools and physical strength to fight, I guess I should not be surprised. You are the familiar of a low-class wretch who barely passes as a fifth level support mage.” Despite his words I don’t think he expected Mori to be able to hurt his wyvern; his voice had lost its pride, and was now much colder and more calculating. “Egoes… kill him.” The wyvern growled and took another swipe at me, but I quickly stepped back, dodging its attack. It spun around and used its tail to knock me off my feet, causing me to hit the ground hard. Rolling out of the way, I barely avoiding getting burned as it sprayed where I was lying with its fire again. The wyvern then attempted to crush me with its tail, and it would have to if I hadn’t thrust Mori up into its path; forcing it to reel back and stop its attack or get stabbed. I scrambled to my feet and backed up out of the range of its claws and tail, and tried summoning Destiny. I wanted to try throwing it at the wyvern from a distance, but as soon as it appeared, the metal tip fell to the ground at the exact spot the wyvern had broken it earlier.

“Good to know, bad to find out.” I mumbled to myself and resummoned Mori. I tried thinking of a strategy, but the wyvern didn’t give me the time, its attacks very quick and in succession. It took everything I had to just keep myself from getting cut in half or burned. It would be a massive understatement to say that I was grateful for Aegis.

“I am almost there Jake, hold on!” Suma yelled. I thought about trying magic, but I needed to focus to do that, and this wyvern wasn’t going to let me close my eyes and imagine a fireball. It reared up and came back down with a thud, I expected another spray of fire, but instead was greeted with a huge blast that threw me back and knocked Aegis off my arm, breaking my arm in the process.

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“AHHHH!” I yelled grabbing my now broken arm; my elbow had been shattered.

“This is for my son.” The magistrate said and the wyvern towered over me, readying another blast of fire. I thought I was dead, and readied myself for the pain, but instead of dying I heard Suma yelling.

“Fly Crimson Bolt!” A bolt of magic fire hit the wyvern square in the head, sending it toppling over. Suma landed between me and the wyvern and immediately cast a spell that started healing me. She wasn’t able to do much, but she was able to mostly fix my elbow before the wyvern got up and prepared to attack again. “I am so sorry Jake. I should not have left you alone.”

“I’m fine, let’s just get through this.” I said and grabbing and tossing her into the air so we could retreat from the wyvern. We were able to make it out of the green energy field, but the wyvern and the nobles still pursued us. The wyvern was big, but it was too slow, so we were able to stay ahead of it, but the lesser nobles had familiars of their own, and they were not as slow. Some kind of hyena thing bit my leg and caused me to trip, but I stabbed it with Mori and started running again. Suma was dealing with the white cat like familiar of the other lesser noble by staying too high for it to reach and shooting fire at it. However, she underestimated it and the feline familiar jumped straight up twenty feet and caught Suma on the wing with one of its paws. She fell down and hit the ground; I jumped in and stabbed the familiar before it could get to Suma though. “Suma! Are you okay?” I yelled as I picked her up. She didn’t respond. I started running again, while holding Suma, but was cut off by a wall of fire made by the magistrate.

“Nowhere to run you low class piece of trash.” He sneered. I considered charging through the flames, and almost did, but that might have hurt Suma more than she could handle. I looked at the nobles, and I was filled with so much anger, they had burned me, broken my arm, and tried to kill me. All that is one thing, but Suma was nonresponsive, she might have been dead, and all that anger and pain did something… it started pouring out as magic. Before I knew it, I had enveloped the area we were all standing in with my own field of navy-blue magical energy.

“I’M GOING TO KILL YOU!” I bellowed. The navy-blue magic that had been emanating from me began to swirl violently like a tornado. It was so strong that the nymphs had to land and huddle on the ground behind the wyvern. The wyvern itself seemed unaffected by the tempest and prepared to spray its fire at Suma and me. I summoned Aegis and raised it to defend us, but it had been punctured so many times that fire would still make it through, even if only a little. I threw it on my back and held Suma close to my chest as an added layer to protect her. I didn’t mind getting burned as long as she was safe. The wyvern launched its attack and I prepared for the burning pain to hit me, and it did… kind of. It burned, but not from the heat, it was absolutely freezing! I turned to look back at the wyvern and saw it clawing at its own mouth, which was now frozen over. “Inversion…” I said to myself. Seeing my opportunity, I put Suma down and covered her with Aegis, then I summoned Mori and slashed at the wyvern’s neck again, this time the wound was deep, and based on how much blood there was, I hit something important. But it didn’t go down right away, it took a slash at me with its claws, and without Aegis it left a deep wound, but not fatal. It was moving slower, probably because it was cold and that it was cold-blooded.

“Kill him already!” The magistrate ordered from his little huddle. The wyvern huffed and started to sway; it must have been getting lightheaded from blood loss. This time when it reached out to slash at me, it was like it was swimming in molasses. I dodged to the side and brought Mori down on its wrist, severing its hand entirely. It screeched and threw its hand and head up in pain, which left the perfect opening. I thrust Mori straight into its throat, finally killing it. The nobles looked as if they had just seen the grim reaper himself… and if Suma was dead, they may as well have. I ran to Suma to check on her, forgetting the nobles for a moment. Part of me hoped they left… another part of me hoped they did something stupid and gave me a reason…

“Suma...” I said gently shaking her. I saw her eyes twitch and the slight up and down of her breathing; she was alive.

“He… he killed a wyvern…” One of them said, it was one of the former lesser nobles. “How? How is that possible?”

“Shut up!” The magistrate snapped at them, “Just summon more familiars, we will get him! He is injured, he cannot go on much longer.”

“But sir… he… look around… can’t you feel it?” The other noble said sound terrified. “It’s Chaos Magic, it’s like he is some kind of Viking… or demon.” I hadn’t noticed yet, but the energy I was emitting wasn’t going away, it was still pouring out of me, but it was no longer swirling around.

“I do not care if he is the Chaos Dragon himself, now summon your familiars and kill him!”

“But sir, we don’t have any more familiars...” One of them said. I stood up, just as the magistrate scoffed at the lesser nobles and began summoning another of his familiars. It wasn’t a wyvern this time, it was a Borog. That was fine with me… I had taken the last couple of moments to focus my magic and imagine a spell of sorts. Well, calling it a spell might be an exaggeration, it was really more of a wild idea. I compressed my magic down as far as I could and made it as dense as I could hold, then I imagined it shooting out at my opponent like a bolt of lightning or a beam of light. It was all focused in my hand, so all I had to do was aim it.

“Some pitiful spell will not save you. Borogs may not have much in the way of life force density, but that makes them more resistant to life forces attacks and spells that effect the body. This is where you finally pay! Ojeg, attack!” The Borog lunged forwards, however, it was straight into my spell. I didn’t want to cast an effect, I wanted to create the equivalent of a high-powered water cutter with magical energy. I let loose the built-up mana all at once and it tore through the borog’s entire body in an instant, as well as several boulders and trees behind it. From the front of its skull to the back of its hindquarters, was a clean three-inch hole through the length of its body. It crumpled to the floor with a disgusting squished thump.

The magistrate stepped back in horror, “No… that is not… no...” The magistrate let his words trail off for a moment, but then erupted into a sickening laugh. “HAHAHahahaha… Well, if you want something killed correctly.” He raised his wingtip to the sky and an enormous ball of fire formed, “KILL IT YOURSELF!” The other two nobles cowered behind him, both of their eyes transfixed on me. I looked around; the inversion magic was still filling the area… that fireball wasn’t going to work.

I didn’t even try to stop him, I let him build it up as much as he wanted. He hurt Suma, so I want him to feel like I do at this exact moment. I want him to feel the frustration and rage I was feeling knowing that no matter what he tried it wasn’t going to work on me. “Go ahead.” I dared him. “I won’t even try to stop you, but know one thing: when your fireball fails, my sword won’t.”

He seemed shocked for a moment, then screamed as he brought the ball of fire down around me. I have to admit, it was the coldest thing I have ever felt in my entire life, and the most mind-boggling experience. To be completely engulfed in flames and feel cold was odd to say the least. Once the flames cleared up a bit, I watched as the magistrate’s pride and sadistic glee vanished and was replaced by absolute horror at the sight of me standing completely unharmed. “My turn then, or did you wanna try something else?” I asked mockingly. The two lesser nobles immediately flew away, the magistrate however stayed. I don’t think it was bravery though, I think he had just lost hope and had resigned himself to die. He fell face down on the ground and began to sing. I ignored him and walked over to check on Suma again, she was just beginning to regain consciousness.

“Did- did we live?” She asked.