After realizing that Tyler was no longer in the cave, James Hannigan immediately shifted into his panther form and leapt from the cave opening. Unlike Tyler, James couldn’t safely fly off of the cliff. Even so, that didn’t really matter.
James didn’t even flinch at the drop into the forest below, despite it being over 100 feet high. He was confident that a fall from that height couldn’t even leave him with a scratch, and so he made the leap without even looking below him. After about five seconds of free fall, James landed on his front paws and kept running. He was running at his top speed, because he was having a bad feeling. I swear, if that kid gets caught one day after hatching, I’m going to sneak back into the Winter Palace and kill him myself, James chuckled darkly.
It only took James about a second to catch the scent of cooking meat, despite him being miles from the scene. After that, finding Tyler and the captain was a simple matter of just sprinting in a straight line. Ugh, that idiot. He just had to cook his meal in the open, didn’t he?
James arrived in the clearing, only to see Tyler sitting nonchalantly next to an ashy, blackened spot on the ground. In his hands were two pairs of shiny, silver antlers, the ends dripping with crimson blood. Facing James was a somewhat familiar looking man with blond hair and icy blue eyes, standing confidently with a sword in one hand.
“Oh, you’ve gotta be kidding me. There is no way in Gehenna that you two were making friends. Well, now that you found us, I guess your lives are forfeit. I can’t let you spread information around,” James chuckled with an amused grin. Like the flip of a switch, that grin of amusement suddenly flipped into a feral smile.
The captain, who had looked so confident before, suddenly felt something that he had not felt in a very long time—fear. He was also somewhat confused. If this was the thief he was hunting for, where was the egg? And who was the kid at the fire for the thief to expose himself and protect him?
Either way, he didn’t have time to consider further. James was racing towards him at breakneck speeds, and he needed to defend himself or he would, without a doubt, die. He knew that with certainty. However, when the captain began to attack the large cat racing towards him, James suddenly moved around his opponent with a swiftness that surprised both the captain, and Tyler who was watching.
How does he move so fast? Tyler thought, dumbfounded. He’s much faster than me, even when I’m in my dragon form.
James, with unexpected brutality, began to slice the necks of the four human soldiers with his razor claws. It took less than a second for Tyler’s expression to turn from one of curiosity to one of pure, unbridled horror. What is he doing?
Tyler had seen death before, and not just his own. However, this was the first time he was witnessing someone kill another person. And not just that, but James was only killing them because they were in his way. Before Tyler could react, though, all four of the soldiers were on the ground. Each man had clean, even slits across their throat, and would spend the rest of their short lives choking on their own blood. Tyler then watched as James, with a murderous gaze, turned towards the captain.
“Now it’s your turn, pretty boy,” James croned while licking his claws clean of blood. In less than a second, James transformed into his humanoid form and charged towards the sword-bearing Captain of the Winter Guard. Before he could reach him, though, Tyler was already between the two opponents.
“James, stop! What are you doing?” Tyler shouted. James stopped and stared at Tyler for a moment.
“Kid,” he sighed, “this is a battle. Move aside, or you’re going to get hurt.”
“This isn’t a battle,” Tyler responded adamantly. “That,” he continued, while gesturing towards the dead bodies surrounding them, “was just a massacre. Why did you need to kill them?”
James sighed again. “Kid, I know you’re practically a newborn, but you’re too naïve. They came here to kill me and capture you. And, if I don’t kill them all, they will go back to the King of Winter and let him know that you’ve hatched, and then they’ll send more people. It’s a ruthless cycle that I’m trying to avoid.” By this time, the captain had come to a realization.
“You’re the dragon, aren’t you?” He said, while beginning to chuckle. “Hahaha, so you did hatch. Perfect! Now all I need to do is remove the thief and take you home. Maybe father will praise me then,” the captain muttered with a slightly crazed expression.
“See? I told you this was going to happen. Just get out of the way. You’re too weak to help me.” As Tyler heard that, he reluctantly moved to the side. He knew that he was being naïve, but things had been moving too fast. One of the real reasons he didn’t want the humans to die was that he didn’t want to accept the fact that he was no longer human himself.
‘You’re a dragon now,’ a sinister voice whispered in his ear. ‘You should just stomp these annoying ants out of existence.’ Tyler shook himself to disperse his thoughts, and turned towards the raging battle that was happening between the two apparent powerhouses in front of him.
James was absurdly fast and agile, but he had relatively little attack power. On the other hand, the captain was powerful and skillful, but fairly slow.
James was still in his humanoid form, wielding dual knives. Each strike he made was blocked by the captain's expert blade, though, causing sparks to fly with each heavy collision of blades. Neither combatant seemed to be able to get an edge, though, even after almost five minutes of battle.
How is this kid so skillful? the captain thought to himself. I know he’s not human, but he’s still much younger than me. The captain was so focused on blocking each attack, he didn’t even have time to use his blessing of Winter to attack. Additionally, he could only focus on the opponent in front of him, and had lost track of Tyler’s position some time ago.
Suddenly, the captain felt a presence behind him. However, it was too late to react before he was hit in the back by a pillar of purple flames.
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“Thanks for the assist, kid,” James murmured before stabbing his left dagger into the captain’s stomach.
Tyler sat down with a thump, breathing heavily. He hadn’t expected to be able to attack another person so easily, but it had surprisingly been just as natural feeling as breathing fire. Am I going to become a killer? Tyler thought gloomily. Wait, since I helped James kill someone, aren’t I already a killer?
“Come on kid, let’s go. By the way, you never told me your name, so I’ll just call you Blackie,” James said, his playful grin once again etched onto his face.
“…Blackie?” Tyler muttered dazedly.
“Yeah, Blackie. You know, cause your scales are black?”
“Um, sure. Go ahead. Just know that it isn’t my name,” Tyler responded lazily.
“Well, what is your name then?” James demanded curiously.
“I don’t know yet. Only a dragon can name another dragon,” Tyler said, knowing that it was true but not knowing how he knew it.
“Hmm. Well, in the meantime, I’m going to call you Blackie.”
“What am I, some sort of pet?”
“No, it’s just a good name!”
“Well, maybe I should call you Blackie. You are the cat, after all.”
“Hey, that’s derogatory! And anyways, I have a name. Ok, Blackie?”
Tyler simply groaned, and stood up. At least his mood had lightened. Tyler could have told James his real name, but he didn’t want James to have any clue that he was some kind of reincarnation.
Also, the name Tyler didn’t feel quite right anymore. Perhaps because this life was different from his old one, or maybe it was something ingrained into his instincts. Either way, he didn’t want to be called Tyler while in this body.
“Come on, Blackie. Let’s loot these corpses!” James announced with a bright tone that didn’t fit the situation. Tyler simply shrugged and moved to help James.
“Wow, look at these swords! These are brand new, state of the art Arcblades. Pretty sweet, eh?” James said, nudging Tyler with his elbow.
“What’s an Arcblade?” Tyler asked in puzzlement.
“Here, let me show you,” James said while taking the sword off of one of the dead soldiers. “Arcblades are weapons meant for people who can’t use blessings, magic, or qi—humans, mostly. Plus, they’re worth a pretty penny if you sell them to the right crowd.” James twisted a glowing crystal sitting at the pommel of the sword. As he did, rainbow-white light—mana—began running through thin engraved patterns carved along the blade.
“The mana circuits on the blade are powered by the mana stone at the hilt, so instead of filling the blade with your own internal mana, all you need to do is twist the stone. And here, watch this,” James said excitedly. Once a sufficient amount of mana had been imbued into the blade, James swiftly swung the sword through the air. From the end of the blade came a large arc of rainbow mana, which then flew forward and hit a tree, felling it in one slice. “And that’s why they call them Arcblades,” James added with a mischievous look on his face.
A moment later, the mana stone on the pommel cracked, before bursting into tiny pieces that dissolved into the air. James sighed, then sheathed the sword once again.
“The only problem is that the energy in the mana stone eventually runs out, causing that to happen. It’s ok though, the stones are replaceable. We can still sell these swords.”
Tyler, who had watched the whole thing with his mana-seeing dragon eyes, stood for a moment with his mouth agape. Then, he closed his eyes, focusing inward on the mana flowing through his heart and spreading through his veins. Can I do the same thing? Tyler wondered, slowly influencing the mana in his body and causing it to collect in his fingertips. With a slash of his hand, he released the pent up mana into the air, causing another arc of pure energy to fly through the air. Unlike the slash from the sword, the mana was somewhat… wobbly, as if it was unstable. Nevertheless, his attack was no less destructive. Once another tree was laying on its side, Tyler fell to the ground while breathing heavily.
“That’s hard to do,” Tyler said aloud, causing James to let out a nervous chuckle.
“Of course it’s hard to do, I don’t think I’ve ever met someone who can do that besides you. Minus the Professor, actually. Not only that, but you’re only a day old. Oh, I so need to get you to Junction city. The Professor is going to love studying you!” James said with a warm smile.
Something about that didn’t sit right with Tyler, but he shrugged and continued to help James loot the corpses. They ended up taking four coin pouches and four Arcblades from the regular soldiers.
“How does this money work?” Tyler asked James while rolling a fat gold coin across his knuckles.
“It’s very simple. 10 bronze coins to a silver coin, ten silver coins to a gold coin. There’s also osmium coins which are worth ten gold coins, but there aren’t any here.”
Tyler nodded, then took half of the coins they found, put them in a coin pouch, and tied it to his waist.
“We’ll sell the swords once we get to Junction city,” James declared. “I know a place where we can get a good price.”
“By the way,” Tyler started, “how did you transform with clothes already on during that fight?” He was referring to when James transformed from a panther to a human, but didn’t need to put on clothes because he was seemingly already wearing them.
“Oh, that. It’s a Battlesuit.”
“A battle suit?”
“Yeah, a Battlesuit. The Professor invented them. It’s a set of clothes made with complex circuitry that enables them to transform when I do. You probably didn’t notice it, but while I was running here in panther form I was wearing a pendant necklace around my neck. All I need to do when I transform is push a tiny bit of mana into it and I’m all set. How about this: when we get to Junction City I’ll ask the Professor to make you some.”
“That’d be great,” Tyler said with a grin. “I already hate having to change my clothes every time I transform.”
James and Tyler had finished looting the four soldiers, but the captain’s body had remained untouched. Tyler moved towards the blond corpse with curiosity in his eyes.
“ I wouldn’t touch that sword if I were you,” James warned without turning around.
“Why not? It looks valuable.”
“Oh, it is. In fact, that blade is much more valuable than everything else we just looted put together. However, it’s a Cursed Blade.”
“How is it cursed?”
“I don’t think it’s really a curse, but that’s what they’re called. Either way, it’s the kind of sword that chooses its own wielder.”
“How does that work?”
“It is somehow imbued with a blessing. That one seems to have been imbued with a Blessing of Winter.”
“Hmm. What happens when I touch it?” Tyler asked, his curiosity growing rather than being expelled.
“It will either choose you to be its new wielder, or it will try to harm you. And, since you don’t carry the Blessing of Winter and you just helped to kill its previous wielder, I don’t doubt which one it will pick.
“Well, I’m going to try and pick it up. What’s the worst that could happen?” Tyler chuckled. He reached downwards with his right hand and firmly grasped the beautiful longsword by the hilt. As he did so, though, he suddenly felt a sharp, burning cold sensation in his palm.
“Ouch!” Tyler shouted as he tried to pull his hand away from the sword hilt, but his skin was stuck to the freezing grip. By complete, sudden survival instincts, Tyler imbued his left hand with mana and swung downward. Before he could change his movement, an arc of brilliant mana cut clean through his wrist.
James stared at him in shock. “What the… you just cut off your hand!”