The frantic use of magic suffused the cavern as they got to work, altering the terrain to be unpredictable, to act like a trap. Quinn immediately enabled her mana and energy filtering ability so she could top off everyone with the ambient energy around them so they didn’t go into whatever this thing was with less than their best possible chance.

Malakai kept watch, being still unable to use his magic. Quinn couldn’t help but be worried about him.

“Will they know to come through here?” Geneva asked, her voice soft.

“How do you mean?” Dru was completely and utterly distracted as she asked, concentrating instead on her work.

“Know about the illusion that covers the place.” The Firionas Fae said, her tone irritated.

Quinn couldn’t blame her. None of them felt prepared. She didn’t even know anything about this other cosmicisodracus. Another aunt, apparently? But she could feel the power already climbing up with them, approaching them, infecting the atmosphere just beyond the hibernation area.

Dru paused for a second. “They’ll know. She’ll know. Dro is... well, she’s going to know, and that’s all there is to it.” A shudder spread down the dragon’s spine.

“Wouldn’t it be better for you to go full on dragon?” Eric asked gruffly, providing little lava traps all throughout the cavern as he went.

“Not enough maneuverability in enclosed quarters. Dro won’t be in form either.”

“Couldn’t they just blast through?” Mal asked from the doorway.

“No... too many protections around these peaks. My siblings have been known for practical jokes about their entire existence. None of us go to sleep without the best possible charms available.” Dru said it like it should be common knowledge, and while Quinn did her best to help with all the preparations, she was a little out of her depth.

“The book!” She suddenly thought of it, even though the attack was imminent. Quinn turned to Dru. “We need that book. They can’t get it”

Drukala blinked at her and pulled it out from what seemed to be a dimensional storage hanging in midair. “Keep this safe. Get it back to the Library.”

“But we need a door...” Geneva’s voice trailed off as an almost deafening crash resounded from the outside.

“You’ll need to open one.” Dru said, muttering under her breath as she began to cast a strange glowing orb in her hands.

Jasper cleared her throat. “I’ve got this. Just need to make sure you can keep me hidden.” She sounded a little raspy perhaps, but still indubitably herself.

Quinn leant on that. They all knew what to do. Who to fight. Or something like that.

“Incoming.” Malakai ground out through clenched teeth. “One morphed dragon, about 4 Aracnios, and two sedimentites. Not to mention a lot of shadow warriors.”

Finally, they breached the massive arch that was transfigured to look like part of the mountain.

Even Quinn could feel the very fabric of the cavern they stood in as it warped and warbled and then finally shattered into a million pieces as it gave way and let the shadows leak into the room.

It was difficult to track the latter, as Drukala also had some of her own. Those, however, had a slightly iridescent sheen as opposed to the inky nothingness of the others. It set her on hedge and Quinn had to rip her attention back as one of the Aracnios lashed out toward her as it came into the cavern.

“Oh little sister...” The voice leaked through the entire area, rebounding off the cave walls, reverberating right down to Quinn’s soul.

She could see the effect it had on Drukala too, but the younger dragon just steeled herself, bravery leaking through to Quinn as the fear was practically dispelled.

Taking that as her sign to move, Quinn initiated her shielding spells. Weaving them in and out of each other. Taking bits of earth, bits of wind, pieces of granite infused like liquid onto the skin of all her comrades. She’d learned a bit since her last big fight. And keeping everyone safe was her new mantra.

The focus solidified for her, snapping into place. She set a replenishment affinity at creating, repairing, and activating to pull from the ambient mana instead of her own reserves, and then she had her complete focus back on the damned seven foot tall arachnid in front of her.

Hal fought off to the side, taking on the two sedimentites. His hulking frame was able to make pretty quick work of their attacks, putting him on a more even footing with them once he’d fought them off.

And luckily, Jasper and her rituals were protected from their attackers by his chivalrous person. Or perhaps he was simply doing what needed to be done. Either way, Quinn was proud of him.

She sunk her power into the floor, coaxing the rock to work with her just as the Aracnio stepped forward. The rock cracked, giving way beneath its foot and her opponent stumbled forward with Quinn dodging lithely out of the way. Ony to realize that she’d backed straight into some of the strange inky black shadow figures that had come with this Dro person.

And then Drukala and her sister joined the fight too. Quinn was too preoccupied with the shadows and the attacking Aracnio in front of her to be able to pay too much attention, but she could barely make out what Dro looked like. It was more like an absence of light, of person, or everything. It felt cold every time the cloudlike person passed by her. Not quite like a shadow, and yet... more than.

Stolen content warning: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.

Quinn’s sensory net cast wide, feeling as Eric and Geneva lead both shadow and Aracnio’s on a merry chase, giving Malakai plenty of targets to practice on as they did so. Some fell prey to lava, others disintegrated as they came in contact with traps Geneva had set, and more yet fell to arrows that Quinn hadn’t seen Malakai use before. The only thing she could take solace in was the fact he wasn’t using magic. Her net was attuned to it, and she’d know.

Oh, how she’d know if he went against his healing regimen.

She could still sense the magic building from where Jasper was performing her door creation ritual or whatever she was doing to allow them to pass in through to the Library again. Stupid damned door requirement. Why couldn’t she just teleport them all home in an emergency Librarian move...

But her thoughts were cut short when her Aracnio attacker performed what looked like a capoeira style leap toward her with sharpened legs fanning out in all directions.

Quinn’s dragon scales flashed, solidifying in a shot of blue armor, staving off the entire attack and she stumbled ever so slightly as they melted back into her skin, showing off iridescent scales that blended in with her own coloring. Except she can feel an interested purr emanating from across the way where Dru and Dro are fighting.

“What have we here? A little Cosmico? How did I not know about this?” Dro’s attention waned for just a moment, giving her baby sister the chance to get a really solid attack in.

Blackened blood, or at least some sort of black liquid flew out from a wound that seemed to be drawing in all the darkness.

Dro spat. “How dare you! I will make you pay, and you will tell me how you had a child.”

Drukala managed to get out of the way, barely, and Quinn went back to focusing on her own attacks.

A thought brushed across her mind. Focus on your own fight. We will get you back home. Drukala’s voice was smooth like velvet as it glided across the front of her thoughts.

It wasn’t that Quinn relaxed, but she focused her attacks more readily, deeper. She fought with cutting wind, melding several air affinities together, making the wind harder to stop. Its pinpoint accuracy, focused on chopping the bladed feet of this Aracnio off. She was only thankful that it wasn’t one of the handful of aracnios she’d actually met in her life.

Her mana and energy replenishment abilities continued to drain from the ambient mana and replenish the mana of her expedition party.

And Jasper’s mana continued to build.

It took Quinn back for a moment to when Escadril opened the door when they went to find Kajaro. Back when he was still alive. Before that rotting tree killed him.

Just another reason to fight, just another reason to save the Library.

Dro and Dru’s clash was fierce, and the rest of the fights carried on around the perimeter. The dragons were fast, diving for each other, scratching, biting, with the occasional drip of flame melting something before it regenerated. Which reminded Quinn to push a healing charm into effect over all of her friends. She had to protect everyone as best she could.

Geneva screamed and Quinn couldn’t afford to look back, but she heard Eric yelling something and knew Geneva would be okay. Quinn pushed more power into her shields, replenishing life force and energy. She’d know if one of them were hit badly.

“Stop it!” Dro screamed at her sister. “You are no match for me! Just give me the damned book already. You weren’t supposed to have it.”

Quinn cleared the surfaces of her mind just in case someone could scan her mind to find the location of the tome. That wouldn’t go down well for any of them.

“Why are you doing this?” Dru on the other hand, didn’t scream. Her voice was calm, collected, filled with a sadness so poignant that Quinn could barely stand it. She couldn’t imagine how it might feel to have family and then suddenly be on opposing sides of a fight. Imagine having to try to convince your sibling that every life deserves to exist, even if chaos magic would otherwise consume them.

“The Library was a mistake. One we have to rectify.” Dro sounded suddenly so defeated for just a second. As if she was tired.

But Quinn had a feeling it wasn’t real. That it was a ruse.

The rush of fire through the middle of the cavern proved her hypothesis.

Quinn’s next wind blade finally took out the third leg, and the Aracnio fighting her began to fight furiously. It spat at her - something that sizzled against the ground when she dodged it. Quinn gulped. Glad to have avoided it and scared to be hit by it in the future. It only fueled her need to escape this.

The next attack clipped her side, and while her scales rushed there to protect her, she could feel the rend it caused in her skin, as it separated. Even as blood began to trickle down her side. Still, she sent a tendril of healing that way. To knit together, to congeal, to heal and keep it in place.

Affinities required so much to function seamlessly. Quinn wasn’t sure what she’d do if she didn’t have access to all of them. Her breathing felt ragged, slower to her now, even though she tried to gasp it in. Another wind blade hit the back leg of the Aracnio and it pitched forward. That same blade took out two shadow creatures behind it too.

Quinn glanced around, noticing that Hal was almost done with the second Sedimentite. Geneva was hidden next to Malakai, nursing her side as Eric still leads the others on a merry goose chase, and that Jasper is almost done with the door.

Not many of the either of the shadow armies remained. They seemed perfectly adept at ripping each other apart.

Dru appeared to be okay. Several gashes down one of her sides leaves trickles of blood dribbling down. Quinn reinforced the healing regeneration shield and the protection shield around her, feeding more power and energy into them.

Dro’s eyes flashed back to Quinn, focusing on her and rendering her immobile for just a heartbeat. “You!”

Luckily, Dru took that moment to viciously attack her sister, breaking the hold on Qunn in the nick of time, so that only Quinn’s calf was caught by one of the last legs of the feebly bleeding out Aracnio she faced. Another tendril of healing to her wound and Quinn was about done with this.

Her energy was starting to wane. Literally. While she still had substantial resources, it was below 50% now.

A roar rang out behind her, and she turned, coincidentally avoiding the attack of one of the shadow army behind her. Only to see Dro partially transformed into what looked like a mini cosmicisodracus. About the size of two horses together.

Dro roared again, spewing fire directly in front of her, and Quinn reacted.

Motioning with her hands, she slammed a shield between the two dragons, instantly reflecting some of that flame back on the attacker. Dro screeched, rolling on the ground to put out the flames engulfing her own body. Flames of her own making.

But Quinn wasn’t quite fast enough and neither was Dru.

Drukala screamed in pain as parts of her hair burn and some of the skin on her face melts even through the scale barrier that sprouted up.

Suddenly, Hal is by Drukala’s side, stopping the fire, placing himself between Dru and Dro.

For a second the crackle of fire as it peters out on Dro is the only sound in the entire cavern.