Chapter 27: Time To Get To Work

Minutes before the battle against the Grand Wyvern, high above in the endless indigo of the night sky, where the full moon hung bright and treacherous and the stars whispered their quiet, desperate pleas, the tension thickened in something frightening by each breath.

Molly rode upon Nom Nom’s back, a confused furrow creasing her brow as she turned over the Phragon’s words in her mind. Her eyes, half-hidden beneath the generous hood of her black robe, stared at the space between Nom Nom’s ear nubs without truly seeing it. ‘Do you really mean what you just told me?’ Molly said inwardly, her confusion deepening with each heartbeat.

Nom Nom flew with haste, her broad wings cutting through the night air in powerful, rhythmic strokes. She replied, her mental tone carrying a heavy gravity. ‘Yes. Everything I said is true. Someone is opening a passageway to the underworld, with plans to awaken something very dangerous, and we Phragons are the sacrifices to open the gate.’

Molly’s confused expression bled into worry the longer she dwelled on the revelation. Nothing else would be more suitable for gaining access to the underworld than a Phragon. They were spiritual beasts born from the very essence that represented the world, and their existence itself was a gateway to the realm beyond the physical.

And that knowledge was precisely what made Molly’s heart drum faster against her ribs. Her gaze dropped to the back of the creature she rode upon. ‘How long has it been going on? And how much time do we have left?’

Nom Nom thought deeply for a long moment, the silence stretching between them filled only by the whisper of wind over her wings. She shook her head. ‘I don’t know how long it’s been going on, but based on my calculations, I’ll say that everything had already been planned and set before we Phragons got here.’

At those words, Molly’s brows knitted together, a frown tugging at the corners of her lips as the phrase ‘planned and set’ echoed through her mind like a stone dropped into still water. Before she could spiral into deeper confusion, Nom Nom continued.

‘And for how much time is left, that… that would be very hard to gauge also, because I couldn’t feel the formula responsible for creating the passageway to the underworld.’

Molly’s eyes hardened into sharp points of crimson light beneath her hood. ‘That fully explains why you couldn’t feel the formula,’ she mentally said, her mind already working through the implications, sifting through possibilities. ‘Could you see the person responsible for the act?’ She asked.

Nom Nom shook her head again. ‘That’s still another thing that surprises me. I couldn’t find the person responsible for the act, neither could my family. On a normal basis we have great tracking skill that automatically detects any threats to the forest or us Phragons, but this specific one bypassed all our senses… it’s like the person never even existed to begin with. It feels like everything that’s happening is beyond even us Phragons.’

Nom Nom’s body trembled as a dark thought slithered through her mind. She twisted her long neck to glance back at Molly, her large, expressive black eyes shimmering with something Molly had never seen in them before. ‘And that’s what scares me the most.’

Molly’s face softened briefly, the hard edges of her expression giving way to a flicker of sadness. She reached forward, laying her palm flat against Nom Nom’s back, stroking it calmly. Her lips curled upward into a faint, reassuring smile. ‘It’ll be alright.’ She projected the thought with all the warmth she could muster.

‘Now that I’m here.’

Before Molly could project anything else, a deafening roar shattered the night behind them. The sound rolled across the sky like thunder. Molly turned sharply, her hood slipping back just enough to reveal the full intensity of her widening eyes as she saw a Grand Wyvern rushing madly in their direction, its massive wings beating with frenzied desperation.

‘Go down!’ Molly shouted mentally, and Nom Nom obeyed without hesitation. With a quick fold of her wings, the Phragon pivoted downward, descending with terrifying speed. The wind screamed past Molly’s ears as the ground rushed up to meet them. Behind them, the Grand Wyvern did the exact same thing, folding its own enormous wings and plunging after them with single-minded fury.

‘What’s wrong with them?’ Molly asked, a frown settling deep into her features as she held onto Nom Nom tightly.

‘I don’t know.’ Nom Nom replied truthfully. She glanced back at the charging Grand Wyvern, whose eyes glowed with a bloodlusted light that seemed to burn from somewhere far deeper than natural instinct. ‘It’s very strange for it to try and attack me now. When I was going to call you for help, they were just shouting strangely as if trying to resist an opposing force. I didn’t have the time to look at any of the wyverns then.’ She stared longer at the wyvern, and her large, expressive eyes began to shift, the glossy black paling to the glacial blue-white of a deep crevasse. They glowed softly, an inner light pulsing rhythmically, while tiny, high-tier formulas etched themselves across the surface of those orbs like constellations wheeling methodically into place. ‘But now I see it,’ Nom Nom continued, her mental voice growing distant as she focused. ‘Their whole existence seems to be wild.’ Her tone shifted, colored with confusion as she probed beyond the Grand Wyvern’s physical body, delving deeper into the very essence of its being. ‘It’s far different from its usual identity.’

Molly’s eyes widened at that word, and she could not help but bite her lip until she tasted the faint copper of blood. Everything she had been calculating in the back of her mind began falling into place like pieces of a puzzle she had not wanted to complete. ‘Illusion formula, madness formula, mind control formula.’ A shaky breath escaped her parted lips as the gravity of the situation pressed down on her shoulders with renewed weight. Her eyes landed on Nom Nom’s back, her gaze becoming unreadable, distant. ‘It’s either the person we’re dealing with is a mid-stage Archmage and can use all these formulas… Or the entity that’s to be summoned is already partially summoned and has begun influencing a given area to fasten its descent.’

Molly’s gaze swept over the terrain they would soon land upon, and her breath caught in her throat. The forest far from Sigsug was burning wildly. Orange and crimson flames devoured trees with hungry, crackling roars, and wyverns of different kinds rampaged through the inferno, destroying everything in sight with mindless, systematic fury. Their shrieks and bellows rose in a terrible chorus that echoed across the ravaged landscape. ‘Nom Nom,’ Molly said, her mental voice steady despite the horror unfolding below. ‘I don’t think we have much time left.’

Nom Nom’s voice echoed in her mind, matching her seriousness. ‘I see that.’

Molly rose partially from Nom Nom’s back while still maintaining her grip, her black robe fluttering wildly around her slender form as the Phragon continued her rapid descent. The fabric snapped and billowed like a dark banner against the night. ‘This will be my temporary stop.’ She projected the thought inward, glancing sideways and almost upward at the charging Grand Wyvern, which had already opened its massive maw. Inside that cavernous mouth, a formula was etching itself into reality, burning images arranging themselves with lethal purpose.

At that sight, Molly released her hold on Nom Nom and let herself fall, her body tilting backward into the empty air. She projected one last word to the Phragon. ‘Find a safe place to hide before I finish with my temporary task.’

‘Be careful.’ Nom Nom’s mental voice followed her down as she pivoted her flight toward a safer direction, her translucent form becoming a ghostly streak against the burning sky.

A fleeting smile touched Molly’s lips, there and gone like a breath on cold air. ‘I will.’

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She shifted her gaze upward, unconcerned by how close she was to the ground. Her eyes tracked the Grand Wyvern as it pivoted smoothly to follow her trajectory, ignoring Nom Nom entirely. The massive creature’s attention was fixed on her and her alone.

It was just as she had suspected. The Phragons were not being targeted, something—or someone, had been after her. Someone was manipulating their senses with a mind control formula, twisting their perception like a puppeteer pulling strings.

And Molly was soon going to find out who.

She stretched her hands wide beside her, letting gravity do its work in pulling her down faster. The wind tore at her robes and whipped her pale hair around her face, but her mind remained calm, calculating her next move with precision. Based on what she had observed while flying on Nom Nom’s back, there were about five dozen wyverns scattered around the forest of Tsayad. If she expanded her range of calculation, having this many wyverns concentrated in one area meant two things.