Beast Gacha System: All Mine

Arkai’s eyes rolled up into his skull as he gripped the armrests of the co-pilot seat, his jaw clenched so tight his fangs ached. The helicopter had banked, dropped, and spiraled in ways that defied every law of aviation he had ever learned.

Eastiel, meanwhile, piloted the thing like an action movie protagonist, one hand on the collective, one hand on the cyclic, his lion tail wrapped around the seat strut for balance, his golden eyes blazing in madness.

"JUST BECause..." Arkai spat and quickly controlled his voice, "Just because you spent a summer learning to fly at fourteen, that doesn’t make you an immortal, you crazy—"

"Ah, we need to quickly catch up with Cecilia!" Eastiel spat back.

The helicopter touched down with a jarring thud that rattled every bolt in the frame.

Arkai’s stiffened body began, slowly, to relax. His wolf ears, which had been pinned flat for the entire descent, lifted cautiously. The rotors were still spinning down, the noise still deafening, but they were on solid ground.

But his relief didn’t last long.

"Huh?! That’s Oathran!" Eastiel slapped Arkai’s arm so hard the wolf yelped.

But seeing his free hand pointing toward the sky, Arkai’s head snapped up.

Through the helicopter’s windshield and the swirling chaos of the vortex, he saw it. A massive white shape, falling. Tumbling. Wings torn and scales scorched, blood streaming behind it like a comet’s tail.

Oathran. Their brother, falling from the heavens like a star that had burned out.

One glance at each other, pitch black wolf eyes meeting golden lion eyes, and both men were already leaping from the helicopter before the rotors had fully stopped.

"Sand! Fluffy sand! CUSHION! CUSHION! CUSHION!" Arkai’s voice cracked as he ran, his boots pounding against the rooftop gravel, his wolf ears pinned flat by the wind of his own speed.

"Wind magic! Howl up! Howl up! NOW!" Eastiel shouted back, his lion legs propelling him forward in great, bounding leaps that carried him from one rooftop to the next.

They ran toward the falling trajectory, two beastmen sprinting across the skyscraper rooftops while the sky tore itself apart above them.

The white dragon fell, and fell, and fell, and they were the only ones running toward him while the rest of the world ran away.

"ARRWWOOOOOOO!!!" Arkai threw his head back and howled, calling the wind to his aid. His magic erupted from the howl, a roaring updraft that screamed upward toward the falling dragon, a column of spiraling air meant to slow his fall.

"He’s going to fall on that building!" Eastiel quickened his pace.

"No—the parking lot behind it—" Arkai pointed, his arm shaking.

Both rushed toward the trajectory, their lungs burning, their legs screaming. Eastiel’s earth magic ripped into the surrounding area as he ran, his palms slamming against every surface he passed.

Concrete and gravel and asphalt transmuted in his wake, softening, shifting, transforming into a massive, billowing cushion of the softest sand he had ever conjured.

It spread across the parking lot like a blanket, wide enough for a dragon’s wingspan, deep enough to absorb the impact.

Arkai got his wind magic surge ready once more. He took a deep breath, and— "ARRWWOOOOOOO—ah?"

But as they charged right under Oathran’s shadow, something changed.

The dragon’s fall... slowed?

"I-I didn’t know your wind was this strong, Brother..." Eastiel panted, his lion ears swiveling with confusion.

"I don’t think... this is my..." Arkai blinked, his wolf senses reaching out, tasting the air, feeling the texture of the magic that now enveloped their brother.

Arkai and Eastiel stood frozen at the edge of the parking lot, their chests heaving, their magic still crackling at their fingertips, and watched the impossible happen.

Oathran’s massive body, tons of white scales and tattered wings, hung suspended in the air above them. The updraft from Arkai’s howl still spiraled around him, but it was not the primary force holding him aloft.

Something else wrapped around the white dragon like invisible arms, cradling him with a tenderness that no wind magic could replicate.

Then they saw her.

Cecilia floated toward them. Her arms were outstretched, her palms open, her fingers spread wide as though she were reaching across an impossible distance to touch her husband’s face.

Her blonde hair streamed behind her in the wind, and her eyes were glowing.

Her telekinesis—

The mana poured from her steadily. There was no strain on her face, just urgency and worry.

Arkai had felt her power at the dam firsthand. He remembered it vividly. She had produced potions from empty air and he himself had drunk it.

The liquid had burned down his throat, flooded his veins with borrowed mana. The surge had made him dizzy, almost sick, his body reeling from the sudden overload. He had been barely able to contain it. If he had been less experienced, less disciplined, or less desperate, he might not have been able to help her at all.

But this mana was different. This didn’t feel sterile and cold like the potion’s borrowed power. It didn’t feel like something external. This felt personal. It felt like... Cecilia.

It was as though her very essence had become something tangible, something that could reach across the void and catch a falling star.

"Eastiel..." Arkai reached out and grasped his brother’s shoulder, his claws dimpling the fabric of his shirt. "You didn’t... bond with her just now, right?"

Eastiel shook his head slowly, his golden eyes fixed on the sight above them. "No..." He swallowed hard, his voice barely a whisper. "This is..."

Pure human mana.

Humans were never supposed to wield magic unassisted or unbonded. They couldn’t produce mana unborrowed. This was the realm of gods. A power from a soul that had awakened to its own divinity.

The dragon descended slowly. His massive form, torn wings, scorched scales, the jagged stump of his shattered horn, floated down through the darkness like a feather settling onto still water.

The sand cushion Eastiel had conjured received him with a soft, billowing sigh, grains of transmuted concrete shifting and molding around his weight as though the earth itself were making room for him.

Cecilia landed beside him, her feet touching the sand just as Oathran’s body began to shrink.

The transformation was slow, slower than usual. The great wings folded inward and dissolved. The serpentine tail retracted. The scales smoothed and paled and became skin, bruised and streaked with dried blood both red and black.

Within heartbeats, the Dragon Lord was gone, and in his place lay only a man, battered and broken.

Arkai and Eastiel reached them a moment later, skidding to a halt in the sand, their chests heaving. They dropped to their knees on either side of Oathran’s crumpled form.

"What... happened to him? Was he... up there the whole time...?" Eastiel’s voice was barely a whisper, his golden eyes wide as they traced the roadmap of wounds across his brother’s body.

Gashes that had barely begun to heal. Burns that still shimmered with the faint, sickly residue of corruption. Bruises so deep they looked like storms trapped beneath his skin...

Arkai’s hands moved, pressing against Oathran’s throat, his wrist, his chest. His wolf senses reached out, reading the thready pulse of his brother’s life force. His frown deepened with every beat.

"This... definitely looks like he hasn’t stopped fighting for weeks." He said, voice tight. "No rest or healing. Just... battle after battle after battle."

Cecilia gathered Oathran into her arms, cradling his head against her chest. His face, even in unconsciousness, was creased with pain. His breathing was shallow, each inhale a whisper of effort.

She pressed her lips to his forehead, right where his shattered horn had been, and closed her eyes. "Forgive me... Oathran..."

It was her fault. But she would fix it, in any way she could.

She looked up, past the edge of the parking lot, past the dark silhouettes of the evacuated skyscrapers, to the rooftop where two gods were.

Above them, the massive creature still lurked in the churning clouds. Its obsidian scales caught the lightning in rhythmic flashes and its body coiled and uncoiled through the vortex like a serpent guarding a treasure no one was meant to touch.

The distant roar was muffled now, but it was very much still present.

There was no way.

Cecilia frowned, wanting to shake her head, whispered, "Are you asking us to defeat it, dear gods?"

"Do you want to try?"

A voice suddenly came from behind her.