Screams.

They tore away at her mind as light and darkness swirled, wrapping and snaking around each other.

The shadows loomed around her, cold and eerie they tied about the light trying to choke it out.

The flames burned bright from within her, burning away at the black that also came from her.

Two dualities clashed, each part of herself.

Flowing out of her mind and body, forming out of her very soul.

Her senses overwhelmed, she watched as the light donning claws of flame slashed away at the darkness serpentining around it.

Pain, it filled her.

Air.

Air.

Air.

Feeling herself unable to breathe as the heat burned away at her as well.

Finally, once more she screamed.

Light and darkness dissipated away, each taking its corner in her mind.

Erika collapsed to her knees, as emptiness lay before her.

Colourless, a void, it presented itself before her thoughts.

As suddenly two pairs of piercing blue claws bashed against the emptiness, tearing through it and pulling the void apart.

The Fox stepped out of the nothingness, his eyes gleaming like the night sky as his many tails flowed behind him taking many a colour each.

The being took a step closer, the void around him pulsing out like distorted water.

As he did Erika surged back, closing her eyes as she bunched up in her own corner.

"You have no need to fear me, child." The Fox said, and Erika slowly reopened her eyes, landing them on the strange man.

With ears of a fox and many a tail of the same, his snow-white hair stood out the most amongst the empty void.

"It hurts." Erika said, as she glanced down at herself, her hands and legs were shaking.

Shaking.

Shaking.

Her very body distorted before her, shuddering in and out of form as if it couldn't decide what it should look like.

"I know child, but you inflict this pain upon yourself. The confusion, the insanity of your own dual nature..." The Fox kneeled down, levelling his gaze to meet hers. "Focus on me child, find comfort in another of form, so that you may regain a semblance of yours."

Erika looked at him, and slowly she nodded, though she wasn't sure if she actually had.

She focused on him, his steady expression, no longer the sly smile she was used to see him wearing.

His eyes, neither the blue or silver she had seen before, they were black and dotted with bright white lights.

His hair, a soft white flowing long, down to his feet as he lay down.

"Good, now remember yourself. Your past, think of a memory you hold dear." The Fox said, and Erika did so.

Her mind, immediately it found the memory.

As the very reality around her shifted and reformed, the memory playing out all around them.

A small child ran about a field of short golden grass, dotted by thousands of flowers of many kinds. Willful, playful, she ran across the field towards a figure.

Standing tall and proud, Erikathyr's form stood like a tower before her eyes.

Smiling down at her, his eyes glowing a warm golden as he gazed down.

Erika lost herself in his eyes, as her own then began to glow the same.

Suddenly a flame came from her feet, rising up her body, the child panicked. Stumbling about the dream Erika fell over as the blaze lit up the grass around her.

Fear.

Fear it took hold of her.

And the dream began to distort.

"Steady yourself." The Fox said, as he appeared behind her, his hand grasping her shoulder.

And the dream refocused, as Erikathyr stood over a younger Erika doing the same, grasping her by her shoulders he pulled her back to her feet.

"Steady yourself, Erika, the flame is a wild element. You cannot tame it by force and fear only feeds it further." Her father said, as the child glanced down at the charred flowers and grass around herself.

"I...I hurt them..." The child said, her tears beginning to flow.

"Indeed, but perhaps we can restore them?" Erikathyr offered.

"R-Really?" The child asked.

"If you're strong, you can." Erikathyr said.

"O-Okay." Erika nodded, wiping the tears away with her sleeves she kneeled down and began focusing on the burned plants.

For over a minute she stared at them, nothing happening.

Then she turned back to her father, tears once again in her eyes. "How?..." she asked.

Erikathyr stared at her for a moment before bursting out laughing, "L-Let me show you." He said, reaching down to her hand he pulled it down gently to the ground.

"Flame destroys, it burns, charrs and takes away energy from around its combustion to grow. Focus with me, let us do the opposite. Our hands, the combustion of power, but instead of taking..." Erikathyr explained, as Erika focused, feeling the energy coming from within herself and flowing down her arm.

She closed her eyes, not wishing to see if she messed up.

As the wind all around her suddenly picked up, a massive surge of energy coming down into the ground alongside her own.

Then, it stopped.

"There." Erikathyr said, and she opened her eyes.

Her teary eyes, they widened to their fullest as the field of colours before her shone under the sunlight.

The flowers had not only regrew, but a forest had burst out all around them, trees rising so high they seemed to touch the clouds as flowers, mushrooms and other life lay splattered around them and their bark.

Erika glanced up, the sunlight breaking through the treetops and shining down upon her, before she then glanced down.

Not even a single sign of burns had remained.

"Just as we can take life, we can also give it back." Erikathyr explained, pulling her up by her waist and onto his shoulder.

They both gazed at the forest around them.

"This power we have, my daughter, is no gift. Strong as you may one day become, abuse it not. We are Dragons, sons and daughters of the sky, and it is our duty to protect all innocence that lays beneath it, to slay all foul that puts it to harm, and to repay the depts we owe the land." He said, as she gazed out in amazement.

"Well done." Then broke through the Fox's cold voice, as Erika snapped out of her daze, having lost herself in the memory.

Glancing down at herself, she found her body child-like, small thin hands, short weak legs.

"The first step, as disappointing as it may first seem, is a step none-the-less." The Fox chuckled.

At that, Erika took a breath of relief, and the pain suddenly returned.

Reaching for her throat as the darkness and light swelled out from their corners, surging out at one another they came to clash.

As The Fox's hands grasped both, his own spectrum of light flowing out and holding each side at bay. "I'm afraid, you cannot lose focus, else it returns."

"What is...what is happening to me?" Erika asked, her breath returning to her as the Fox snapped his fingers, forcing the darkness and light back to their corners.

"Your soul, it is reaching out to you." The Fox briefly explained, glancing at the duality in each corner. "The Dragon." He mused, glancing at the blazing light, "The Aurei." He then said, turning to the vicious darkness.

"I dont..." Erika shook her head.

"You will." The Fox responded, "You have ignored half of yourself for long enough, and it has grown restless." He said, standing up. "Do you remember, the tale I programmed in that circle of runes, you had discovered out in a forest?"

Erika nodded, "The War of Gods. The one of Bahamut...Of Jinn and..."

"Ryujin, Xokith." The Fox finished, "What clashes within you, understand now that it is the blood of two very different beings. The children of warring gods. And unlike the wars of men and women who end shortlived, the wars of gods only end in the cruellest of ways."

The Fox approached her, coming to crouch before her. "You, are the child of both, yet such blood does not merge. No, it will forever clash within you. Like me, you are half natured, yet unlike me you are nothing new, simply both."

Erika once more glanced at the two corners, where her halfs lay forced aside.

"You are a half-blood, my child. The most dangerous creature in all of existence by potential. Just like the child of an angel and a demon, a Nephalem, you are the child of two primal bloodlines. You have heard, tales of the Nephalem, haven't you?" The Fox asked, and Erika silently nodded.

"Of course, you have. They are tales that span every reality. Depraved children of celestials and fiends, fated to destroy everything around them, and finally themselves. Even I know, with how long I've lived and how much I've seen. Nephalim cannot be saved." The Fox shook his head. "But you, I knew when I first saw you."

As suddenly reality around them warped, the scene of a dark land laying all around them as oceans of flame burned the air into crimson smog.

"A different time, a different place." The Fox said as Erika saw herself, standing before a monstrosity of pure white scales.

Broken.

Beaten.

Bruised and bloody.

She was older, stronger, yet there lay no hope in her empty eyes as she gazed up at the warped abomination.

As its massive claw gripped tightly onto a wicked blade of red aether, slicing down towards her.

"You died, then." The Fox said, as the scene paused. "Kidnapped by hell, broken and alone, yet you only gave up once. Never before, not once before, not until doom itself came upon you."

He began to stand, and the scene continued, as the blade of warping energy bashed down upon her dream self, the weapon tearing her to pieces. "This was to be your fate," The Fox said, "I disagreed."

And then there was darkness, it surrounded them, filling the space all around them as the light lay held in its corner.

"I saw you first there, I saw what lay within you."

"Failure?" Erika sighed, "I gave up, even if it was in the end, I still gave up. I still lost."

"No." The Fox shook his head, "I saw within you, what I saw within your father, within your mother." He forwarded his hand, gesturing for her to reach out to it.

"I saw what few have to offer." He said, as she took his hand and suddenly he pulled her up to her feet.

Glancing around at the flowing darkness, "And what would that be?" Erika asked, eyes narrowed, skeptical as always she met his hard cold gaze.

"I saw the making of a legend." The Fox said, "I saw a being who could install hope into others even during the most hopeless of moments. I saw someone whose determination pushed them to the end no matter what it was. There is no shame, in fearing the end when it comes to meet you. But you, you only feared it when it slapped you in the face. Time is now different, you are different, than that Erika who failed. But the stuff that is needed, that source which can push you to greatness."

The Fox raised a fist, clenching it as it shone a bright gold, he planted it on her chest, right where her heart lay.

"You were born with that, and nothing can ever take it from you. Something so bright, it outshines the pride of a Dragon. Something so warm, it burns an Aurei's will. Something so frigidly solid, it is untemperable by even a god of Spirit Beasts." He smiled, "You may be akin to Nephalem, but you need no saving."

She gazed down at his fist, her eyes shaking as her heart raced. "I will save myself."

"Why?" The Fox then asked, as she once more met his gaze.

The fear, the insecurity and sorrow, faded to the corners of her eyes as hope burned out from their core.

"Because I am Dragon." She said, and the light began to burn away at the darkness.

"Again, why?" The Fox asked once more.

"Because I am Aurei!" Erika bellowed, and the darkness began choking the light.

"No, again, why?" The Fox pressed.

As she clenched her fists, his words flowed through her mind, filling the void in between.

"Because..."

Then both halves came to a pause, each stopping right at the middle of her view.

The Fox before her, nodded, and her vision went.

Then, she re-opened her eyes.

Cold, her clothes drenched in sea-water, she lay face up on a ship as Gray and Celest stood over her.

Distorted booming sounds filled her surroundings as they slowly grew clearer.

Clearer.

And Clearer.

Till the next woke her right out of her daze, cannon fire piercing her ears as she flew up into sitting causing both Gray and Celest to jump back.

"You're awake!" Gray mused, "Oh great luna I thought you were going under!"

"You were out cold..." Celest added.

Breathing heavily, Erika shakily pulled herself to her feet, taking in her surroundings as three demonic ships moved to surround them, whilst the rest, even one of the pirate's, slowly sank into the depths.

The situation bleak, as all hands scrambled on deck, whilst the enemy quickly gained on them.

Erika moved to the back of the ship, through the crowd of pirates, merfolk and her own comrades.

Past Gray and Celest,

Past Teijil and Drun,

Past Dust,

Past Zen,

And finally past Fang, as all of their glances were caught by her.

As she grabbed onto the ship's railing, "We won't make it, they're gonna catch usss!" Fang shouted.

"Ahh we're dead!" Bjorn groaned.

"No." Erika interjected, "We're going to catch them." She said, gazing at the ship directly behind them.

Right then, the words the Fox had whispered into her ear at the shrine came to her.

Like foolish wisdom reaching out to a fool on a fool's errand.

"Don't run, if you cannot. Make them run, instead." She mused, a smile growing on her lips.

"Slow down." She said.

"What?" Bjorn snapped.

"You fuckin what?" Fang blurted.

As she suddenly turned to the rest of the ship. "Do you wish to live? To survive in this cruel world who's out to have your heads!? Do you wish your children, and their children, to survive this ordeal!?" She bellowed out as cannon fire from the enemy ship's chase cannons began hitting the water right behind them.

All turned to meet her gaze. Sorrow, fear and despair had taken a hold of most.

"If you cannot light up your hope, I will light it for you, damned souls of this damned ship! If you cannot carry your darkness, your fear and despair, I will carry it for you!" She roared out, her voice filling the sky.

Erika turned to Fang once more, "Slow down the ship."

And their gazes met for the second time today, one piercing through the other. "Woman, you're crazy." He sighed, shaking his head.

"I like it." Fang chuckled, grinning wildly as he turned to his men. "Raise the sails!"

"No." Erika said, "Prepare to board." she then told everyone before returning to Fang. "Prepare to drop anchor."

Turning her gaze then to the enemy ship behind them, just as a cannonball flew past her, barely tilting her head to the back as it blasted right past it, originating from the flanking ship to their left.

"They cannot witness me, from there. We'll go to them. Get the elderly and children on the rowboats!" Erika mused.

"Fine! Prepare anchor!" Fang said, his thoughts meeting hers, as her plan now unfolded in his own mind as well. "Prepare to board them bassstardsss!"

Then, a voice pierced through all, as men and women, villager and pirate alike scrambled aboard the ship's deck.

It reached the demons, it reached beyond.

"Behold me." She bellowed out, "Behold the first chapter!"

As weapons were drawn.

Sails were raised.

Enemies enclosed.

And an anchor was dropped.

As her eyes flared alight, a gold surrounding her left, and a sky blue her right.

"Behold a legend's first breath."