Chapter 425: Enemies
The wind howled through the fissure, carrying faint whispers, not voices, but impressions. Regret. Grief. A lingering echo of something vast and dying.
He stared down into it for a long time, the golden glow of his irises reflecting against the mist. "This world has bled before," he murmured. "And maybe... this is where the scars remain."
Ashwing tilted his head, uncertain. "You think this is what’s causing the mana to vanish?"
"I think it’s connected," Lindarion replied. "Something woke up, or was disturbed. The balance is shifting again."
He stood, wind catching his cloak, and looked north, toward the faint green shimmer of Lorienya’s borders in the distance. "We can’t tell the council yet. Not until I know what this is."
Ashwing flapped his wings. "So, secret mission time again?"
Lindarion’s gaze softened. "Something like that."
The dragon grinned, fangs glinting. "I knew it."
They took to the skies once more, the fissure vanishing beneath clouds. But as they flew, the golden mark on Lindarion’s wrist, born from the World Tree’s blessing, flickered faintly, pulsing in rhythm with the wound below, as if answering a call he couldn’t yet hear.
And far beneath the surface, in the depths of that scar, something stirred, vast, patient, ancient.
Not Dythrael.
Not human.
Something older than both flame and shadow.
Something that knew his name.
—
The clearing ahead was wrong. The forest light dimmed in places where no shadow should have fallen, branches bending as though something heavy and unseen crept between them.
Birds had gone silent, and even the whisper of wind across leaves carried a strange static charge.
Lindarion stood at the edge of the slope, white hair stirring faintly. Ashwing perched on his shoulder, scales darkened to match the gloom.
The dragon’s small pupils narrowed. "I don’t like that smell," he muttered. "It’s... burnt, but wet."
"It’s corruption," Lindarion replied quietly. "Mana turned inward on itself."
Below, the shapes emerged, twisted silhouettes that might once have been beasts of the forest. Now they crawled, pulled forward by instinct rather than reason, their outlines blurred by the oily shimmer of unstable essence.
The soil beneath them sizzled faintly, and roots recoiled as if the land itself despised their touch.
Ashwing shifted his weight, claws tightening on Lindarion’s shoulder. "How many?"
"Six. Maybe seven."
"That’s not many."
"No," Lindarion said, voice calm. "It won’t take long."
He stepped down the slope. The air thickened, humming softly against his skin as the mana field adjusted around him. He didn’t draw his sword immediately, he simply extended his hand, fingers tracing a circle through the air.
Pale sigils flared for an instant, runes older than the empire of men. Light rippled outward, washing across the trees in a thin golden line.
When it touched the first creature, the shimmer around its body flared, and it howled, soundless and hollow.
The next breath came slow and deliberate. A faint pulse of lightning flickered around his wrist, followed by threads of water-light swirling upward like mist.
Fire gathered in the space between his palms, not raging but steady, compressed into a single point that glowed white-hot.
Ashwing’s voice in his mind was quieter than usual. "Show-off."
The first creature leapt. Lindarion moved only a little, an elegant pivot, a flick of his wrist, and the light expanded, a ripple of force that met the shadow midair. It dissolved instantly, scattering into a rain of faint sparks that vanished before they hit the ground.
The others surged forward, driven by the remnants of rage.
The prince’s eyes narrowed. He spoke no words. Instead, the air bent; fire curved into arcs of pure energy, lightning folded through it, and darkness filled the spaces between, swallowing noise and motion alike.
For a few moments, it was like watching weather break: storm meeting sun, tide against flame. When the flare subsided, only ash motes drifted in the glade, dimming until they vanished.
Silence followed, thick and heavy. The forest hesitated, then exhaled. Color returned to the leaves, faint birdsong resumed in the distance.
Lindarion stood among the fading traces of the fight, his cloak unmarked. He closed his hand slowly, drawing the scattered mana threads back into himself, careful not to disturb the living energy of the woods. The glow around him softened until it was gone.
Ashwing’s voice came again, a little more cheerful. "See? Easy breakfast."
Lindarion almost smiled. "Those things used to be alive. They belonged to this forest."
"Used to," the dragon corrected. "They’re better off gone."
He said nothing to that. Instead, he turned his gaze southward. The air there shimmered faintly, not corruption this time, but distance, the curve of mana that stretched beyond Lorienya’s borders. Something was stirring, something still far away but no longer content to sleep.
Ashwing shifted uneasily. "You’re thinking again."
"I always am."
"That’s the problem."
Lindarion let the silence answer for him. He knelt, pressed his hand to the soil where one of the creatures had fallen.
The ground felt cold, brittle. He could sense faint residual threads of distortion, the same signature he had felt in the caverns months ago, whatever infection Dythrael’s return had awakened, it was spreading in quiet lines beneath the earth. It hadn’t reached the World Tree’s heart yet, but it was creeping closer.
He straightened, brushing dust from his glove. Ashwing climbed down to the crook of his arm and looked up at him, wings flicking restlessly. "What now?"
"Now," Lindarion said softly, "we tell them the truth. The forest isn’t untouched. It’s just pretending to be."
They began the walk back toward the hidden city, light filtering through the canopy in shifting bars of gold and green. Behind them, the glade looked peaceful again, but in the air lingered a faint tremor of unease, as if the land itself remembered what had been undone there.
Ashwing spoke again after a while, his tone smaller. "Do you think it’ll keep coming?"
"Yes."
"Then why do you sound calm?"
"Because fear doesn’t help," Lindarion said. "Understanding does."
He touched the small creature’s head gently, a fleeting gesture. Ashwing didn’t argue further, though his tail curled around Lindarion’s wrist for reassurance.