Chương 24: Sky Herald

Andy opened his eyes to a dark forest. Pain and exhaustion flooded his mind. Golden eyes shone in the moonlight.

"He's awake." Andy heard Teeth send a message. Notifications awaited him. He blinked through the pain and looked through them. [CRITICAL HIT!] [PURIFICATION STRIKE: DAMAGE BONUS +25%] [ORGANISM DEFEATED: CHIMERA MONSTROSITY] [XP: +45 (PURIFICATION: CORRUPTED CREATURE, HIGHER TIER)] [XP: +20 (PARTY COMBAT] [XP: +15 (DEFENSIVE ACTION: TERRITORY PROTECTION)] [SURVIVAL BONUS: +5] [PARTY BONUS: +25%] [TOTAL XP GAINED: +387 NEW SPECIES BONUS +15] [CORRUPTION CAUSE: REMOVED] [CORRUPTION REMAINING: 18%] [HORN RESERVES: DEPLETED] [WARNING: LIFE MAGIC RESERVES AT 0%. HORN FUNCTIONS TEMPORARILY DISABLED. ESTIMATED RECOVERY: 4-6 HOURS.] [XP: 2839/3000] Gustave sent,"Acceptable. I will ensure the perimeter remains clear and will bring back nourishment. Get him water from the stream. I will return in eight and a half minutes." Andy tried to sit up but a weight on his side prevented movement. He opened his eyes. Teeth was sitting on him, " Stay still for a few minutes. I will be right back." He didn't have the strength to argue so he laid back and allowed himself to be taken care of. When he next opened his eyes Teeth had drug over a small bowl that Ranger had left behind. It was filled with stream water. As he started to sit up she was right behind him supporting him." Slowly, slowly." She continued to project at him. With her help he managed to roll up onto his side and once the stars left his vision into a seated position. Everything hurt. His head was throbbing. His injured back leg was matted with sticky drying blood and his mauled front shoulder was in bad shape. Purple corruption tinged the edges of his wounds making the skin around it necrotize and ooze. She nosed the bowl toward him, and looked at him. Her honey golden eyes were wide with fear." I'm okay, Teeth."" Don't call me that."" Okay okay. You always tell me not to call you that but I don't have anything else to call you." A small delicate, not at all sarcastic whisper flitted into his mind." Auri."" Auri?"" Don't make it a thing." He wanted to laugh but winced instead. At her insistence he took a drink of the cool spring water. It felt magical on his dry and scratchy throat. Gustave returned moments later. A branch with apples on it hung from his talons. He dropped it in front of Andy. Wind carrying it down gently in front of him. When Auri gave Gustave a pointed look he shrugged. Andy ate the apples slowly. After one and a half the exhaustion was weighing heavily at his eyelids." Thank you both," he offered to his party. He was shivering, either from magic depletion, or bloodloss, maybe both." I'm going to rest my eyes a minute." He curled up and fell asleep almost instantly. Ranger walked into the clearing the next morning and stopped cold. Andy a mess of dried blood, Auri curled up next to him. She began running towards him when she saw it. Nearby, the chimera, semi-tied to the ground in desiccated and snapped vines lay dead. Her hand went to her knife and a hawk from the branch above screeched a warning." Do not wake my friends." She of course could not understand that this hawk was sapient let alone talking to her, but she understood the warning anyway. She lowered her hand and took the long way around the sleeping quadrupeds. The author's content has been appropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon. Examining the chimera did nothing to set her mind at ease. This thing was horrifying, even dead. With the corruption burnt away she could see where the amalgamation had been stitched together. In absolute disgust she knelt down trying to understand this atrocity. The smell hit her and she retched. It wasn't the sweet smell of decay that she'd been around countless times in her life. This was pungent in an unnatural way. Old magic, ozone and copper mixed with necrosis and rotting organic tissue. Something that had been alive a long long time after it should have died. She made it to her feet and got three maybe four steps away before her breakfast came back up all over a nearby shrub. She stood there bracing herself against a tree when a warm muzzle pressed itself into her hand. She jumped. Andy had awoken when she retched and made his way over to comfort her. His horn was glowing, but dim. He was still in pain but the corruption had been purged by his passive healing overnight. He watched as his ranger put it all together. This thing. This monster had come into the clearing and attacked. These three beings had warded it off. Cuts in the earth where wind blades struck, divots and claw marks everywhere. It was a hard fought battle. Andy had charged the beast, entangled it, and gotten hurt. She knelt in front of him and looked at his horn, his dim, recovering and half-charged horn. It was still the first thing she looked at. Even if it was depleted, barely glowing, even limp and spent. She spoke a word. One word, spoken in a tone that Andy imagined meant describing something that had exceeded their limit of understanding. He still couldn't understand her but her expression, the way her eyes shone with unshed tears, the way her hands framed his face and touched his flickering horn with so much care and tenderness, for all of that he had a guess. Magnificent. Or something like it. Something that meant, even after what I've seen so far, you are more than I understand. She ran her hands down his neck, down to his shoulder. His wound had closed but remained raw, angry and red. The fur stripped away from the scar tissue. Andy felt the pressure of her hands and the warmth of the contact. Her heartbeat again. Fast, strong and still in sync with his. From her rock, where the fox had once again taken up residence, she sent, "She looks different today." And she did. There was an aura about her that seemed to radiate with magic. Her expression was not one that she'd worn before. This was beyond wonder, curiosity or professional fascination. This was the expression of a woman who believed Andy was more than a horse. She stayed all day. A cloth tied around her nose she used the vines and some ropes to tie up the remains of the chimera. Far from the water she dug a hole and lined it with a powder that Andy was unfamiliar with. It was foul smelling and made his nose burn. With Andy pulling they drug the remains into the hole and she covered it up, marking the grave with rocks. Between tasks she lavished Andy with attention and apples. She spoke to him all day. The tone of someone who was simply talking aloud because they didn't know what else to do with their mouth. A nervous energy that even hard work wasn't expelling entirely. By evening when she had finally left, (Reluctantly) Andy was sitting beside the river. His horn was back to sixty percent capacity. His wounds were still healing. He reached out to his friends, his party, and that was when he'd finally noticed. At some point, over night or perhaps during the day while the chimera was being disposed of Gustave had evolved. [PARTY MEMBERS: 4] [1. PROTO-EQUINE (MAGICAL BEAST) - TIER 5 - ROLE: TANK] [2. SPIRIT FOX (VULPINE ADEPT) - TIER 5 - ROLE: DPS] [3. SKY HERALD (RAPTOR ADEPT) - TIER 5 - ROLE: RANGED DPS] [4. TIDAL CRUSTACEAN (SESSILE) - TIER 3 - ROLE:???] [PARTY BONUS XP: +25% (CRUSTACEAN DOES NOT MODIFY BONUS)] [HERD BONDS: COMPANION (VULPINE ADEPT), COMPANION (RAPTOR ADEPT), ACQUAINTANCE (TIDAL CRUSTACEAN)] From his branch Gustave was obviously larger. He'd doubled in size from a small hawk to one that bent the branch beneath his weight. His plumage still bronze and gold now shimmered with starlight. Electricity cracked at the tips of his wings. His eyes, still a brilliant yellow now too, looked like liquid lightning just beneath the surface. They shone. Andy inhaled in surprise." Gustave! You look incredible."" Of course I do, Andrew. I am very disciplined and self-care is extremely important." Andy sent back amusement." There is nothing funny about self-care. Keeping one's feathers pristine is essential for hitting maximum potential."" That's exactly right pony-boy," Auri (he was still getting used to her name. Auri. Aurrrri. It sounded right, it fit her. Secretly though, he still liked to teeth, so smol and cute) chimed in with her usual level of sarcasm." You might want to try a bath sometime. Maybe you'd run faster."" Hey!"" Is for horses I've heard." Andy took a moment to compose himself. Puns and bad humor was his thing. He would not give this to her." Too late, pony. You hide your thoughts and feelings about as well as glass hides skeletons." Andy pouted." I am not stinky… And I'm not that transparent." Later it would occur to him that for a fox who claimed to never be around humans, she seemed to indicate that not only did she understand glass, but that she was familiar enough with it to turn it into an analogy." Well…" Both Gustave and Auri said in concert. The rest of the evening passed like that near Barnacle's rock. The four party members laughing and carrying on and truly enjoying that none of them was alone anymore. [SPECIES: PROTO-HORSE (MAGICAL BEAST)] [PURITY AFFINITY: ACTIVE] [VIRGINAL STATUS: MAINTAINED] [CONTRIBUTING FACTOR WEIGHT: 23%] [PARTY MEMBERS: 4] [HERD BOND: COMPANION (VULPINE ADEPT)] [HERD BOND: COMPANION (RAPTOR ADEPT)] [HERD BOND: COMPANION (SESSILE)] [SOCIAL BOND: SIGNIFICANT (HUMANOID, RANGER-TYPE)] [XP: 2839/3000] [GALLOP EFFICIENCY: 94%]