Pov - Celestia

“Wait, what is a Dragon Kin?” I say while fixing myself to be upright, while my eyes are locked on Tavarious, not the battle just starting. Though I soon realize that Tavarious is out of it, muttering to himself and all, hell, he isn't even conscious of me saying anything. I then crawl my way over to him while making myself as small as possible, so I don’t gather the attention of the fearsome Dragonkin, but I don’t think I have to worry about that anytime soon because from what I see Arthur and… it? They are just staring at each other. Finally, reaching Tavarious I tap him on the shoulder causing him to freeze up. Not even a flinch to show that he is about to counter-attack me, but I pay that no mind as I whisper to him, “What is a Dragon Kin?”

Tavarious seems to realize that it is me, then he pauses as if to register the words I have just spoken to him. After a second or two, he responds with, “A monster.” Fear came off of his voice in waves, eyes still fixated on the Dragonkin.

Though I don’t really understand what he means, of course, it's a monster that's kinda the point of why we are fighting it, is it not? So trying to put my confusion into words I ask out to him, “Ok I knew that but what is it, and are there any weaknesses for Arthur to exploit.”

Tavarious blinked, processing what I just said for a moment, then for the first time his eyes turned to me in utter bewilderment. He then opens, and then his mouth then closes almost immediately afterward, he then closes his eyes for so long that it can no longer be considered a blink, he then opens his eyes once more, and he says, “Dragon Kin is as the name implies creatures that hold the blood of dragons within them.” he then stops what he is saying as if that explains everything.

Whispering to him once more, I ask, “And exactly how strong are dragons?”

He looks at me as if it were a slap, then says as if explaining to an idiot, “Who the hell taught you? No, wait, that doesn't matter for now. Dragons, I mean true dragons, not the ones with lower rank or defused bloodlines, are Divine class monsters.”

“Ah, that's bad, is it not?” I say without thinking, only wondering what rank the Dragonkin in front of us is.

Tavarious looks back with a whirl, eyes showing the intention to scold me, but before he does, he seems to realize that I’m just mumbling myself and turns away with a huff. Realizing this only after it happened, I turn back to the standoff, trying to get my own miserable blunder out of my mind.

All my thoughts stop as the Dragonkin speaks in a language I can understand, his voice deep and commanding, “My name is Fus, and my men were commanded by the great spirit to capture that man,” as he says that he points out his claw-like fingers to Tavarious, but before I'm able to comprehend any of it he continues, “Since they failed and had to notified me, I must do it to save my own face towards the great spirit. So I will let you go only if you hand that man over to me.”

Arthur's gaze then becomes angry as he shouts out, “I will never hand over one of our own to you or whatever this great spirit nonsense is!”

Fus then also gains an angry gaze, “Your insolent words have insulted the great spirit, so now I’m not only fighting for my own honor but also for the great spirit’s. So now I will not only shatter your sword but crush your boastfulness.” And with those words, Fus comes towards Arthur at a speed almost unimaginable and with a blink he is right in front of Arthur, swinging his sword that is glowing in a light brown that shows mysteries without an answer to subjects that I have not even begun to think about. Though what I see does not really matter to Arthur as he begins to glow in a faint golden brilliance, swinging his sword to counter Fus’s when their blades collide it is Arthur who is sent flying back. Arthur then stabilizes himself in the air to land on his feet and for the first time, I see Arthur with a look of complete seriousness on his face, he doesn’t even look towards me in worry.

Arthur then drops his shield by cutting the strap with a quick and well-practiced swing, as he is cutting the strap he raises his hand and chants out so fast that it goes in one ear and out the other. Though his chants end soon as a sword of light is in his hand, glowing faintly even though it is made of light, it is not as if I can’t see it because it's not just a faint outline of a sword but a true one with each detail in full view. The sight of the sword of light doesn’t at all matter to Fus who is charging forward without a care. Arthur also reciprocates as he swings both blades at different angles and speeds, though none of this finesse matters to Fus as even with the one blade he parries and counter-attacks Arthur with ease. It's so bad that it looks like Fus is teaching him. Even I without any sword experience can tell that Arthur is going to lose this if he doesn’t have anything to turn this around.

Arthur must have noticed this fact as well because he attempts to do a light jump away to gain some space, but while he is still in the air Fus rushes towards him. So Arthur must intercept Fus while still in the air, and this does not go well because just blocking the attack sends him flying away from us. Fus seemingly forgetting that his target is Tavarious, not Arthur chases after him out of sight.

I stare in the direction they went, wondering how things are going for Arthur and the precarious situation he's in. I’m quickly brought out of my musing though with Noel grabbing onto my shoulders and saying, “Let's just get out of here while we can, I have no goddamn idea when those two are going to be coming back… and I don’t want to be here and find out who will come back.”

Hearing her say this, I realized that it is not productive to just stand here and watch the fight. So standing up with some struggle, I ask softly, “So where are we going to go?” After saying it I realize how obvious it is and quickly say out flustered, “Yeah, the exit right.”

Noel looks back at me while helping Tavarious get up, she mumbles to herself something unintelligible for a bit then her eyes focus on me as she says, “Yeah, we're going to go at a fast pace because we don’t know how long Arthur can keep that thing occupied.”

Letting out a sigh after hearing that, I slump my shoulders, the fatigue never truly leaving me, but since it's a matter of life or death I hope the adrenaline kicks in and helps me make my way through it somehow. So picking up the pace, Simmons and I start to do a poor imitation of a run as we follow behind Noel and the hurt Tavarious, who seems to be in a better state of running than the both of us combined. How does he do it, he should be tittering on the edge from all that blood loss, and I know that I didn’t heal him enough to be able to run like this, maybe I'm just overthinking it who knows? Even though I’m thinking that I still glare suspiciously at Tavarious wondering if he can heal himself or something.

I suddenly hear a destructive sound behind me, I don’t really know how to describe the sound besides just being destructive. That does not bother me, what bothers me is the fact that I have no clue what is going on behind me, so hedging my bets I take a quick peek behind me and what I see shocks me, beams of hyper-condensed light are being shot out in ever which direction to cause heaps of damage everywhere. Well, maybe not heaps because no real explosions are going off like in the stories, but all the beams are doing is just leaving deep burn lines in everything they pass or well almost everything, as I see one beam split into fractals. I have no idea what did it, so I only really put my bets on the subject of the relatively unknown power of the Dragonkin Fus.

At this point, though, my mental abilities have fallen into the dirt as I’m no longer able to think about things, exhaustion creeping in on all sides. I feel like I can vaguely hear something coming from Noel's direction, but it just doesn't click in my tired mind.