First Demonic Dragon

Zheng hadn’t seen the attack that turned several hundred miles of Musphelheim into a crater.

But he had been acutely aware of the aftermath.

With the land being mostly volcanic terrain, the magma simmering just underneath was promptly displaced.

A rain of fire plummeted from the sky and pelted Thrudd’s fabricated valkyries.

The women let out shrill screams as they turned into vapor and dissipated.

A fog formed in the area, through which things became difficult to perceive.

Zheng’s enemies must have believed they could take advantage of the situation.

They lunged at him from the fog, coming from opposite directions.

Each of them was wielding black daggers that gave Zheng a downright unsettling feeling. He couldn’t even begin to guess what the metal was made from.

Zheng drew his own weapons quickly and clashed blades with the twin anti-mages.

The holes in his body had yet to close up fully, but he was still far from helpless. His magic had suffered, not his strength.

He pushed both women back dramatically and vanished from the place he stood.

Zheng reappeared in the air above one of the twins.

He maneuvered both of his swords in a cross-slash maneuver aimed to cut the demon mage apart.

But when his swords came in close contact with her, a reflective shield formed to cover her body. Even Zheng’s blades couldn’t cut through.

“Cheeky.”

The mage gloated as her protective barrier glowed with a dangerous life.

A burst of power was reflected towards Zheng and sent him flying, causing him to drop his weapons in the process.

The other twin’s hand caught him by the back of the neck.

Despite her diminutive form, she held him firmly without even letting her arm shake.

With her free hand, she held up her own black dagger that matched her twin’s.

“I must say, I was expecting more from one of that old dragon’s best. But you’re 0-2 on major missions now, aren’t you?”

“…Heh.”

Moving faster than human reflexes could ever achieve, Zheng grabbed his enemy by the wrist and drove her own dagger through her mask.

“I learned to give as good as I get.”

Half of the mask broke, and the mage screamed as her blood flowed freely and she dropped out of the sky.

“Morrigan!”

Her twin cried out equally as loud, as if she could feel the pain her sister was enduring twice over.

And in doing so, she made one very crucial mistake.

“So it is you two… My mother-in-law was wondering when the two of you would pop up again.”

Zheng appeared behind Merideth just as she began to rush toward her sister. He wrapped his arm around her chest and pressed her sister’s blade into her neck.

He could feel her anxious gaze on the weapon that was still slick with Morrigan’s blood.

Zheng kept the weapon pressed against her throat. Though he wasn’t extremely certain about where he would go from here.

His position was flimsy. He had to go with what he knew.

“Hands out, mask off. If I see your fingers so much as twitch, or feel a single fluctuation of magic, I will open you from your neck to your brain before you can finish casting.”

Meredith started to raise her hands.

“Slowly.” Zheng pressed the blade deeper into her neck.

Meredith began moving at a much slower pace.

When she removed her mask, everything Zheng already knew was proven true.

She was a woman in her late twenties or early thirties. Pretty, but fearsome. She had eyes like those of a goat, and raven hair wrapped in a tight bun behind her head.

No different from the memories he had seen of her.

“Very good…” Meredith whistled.

Her eyes had become misty.

With their bodies this close together like this, Zheng could clearly feel her trembling with rage.

If he lost control of the situation for even a second, she was going to make him pay for it. Dearly.

“…My sister needs help.” Meredith suddenly said.

Her gaze kept moving towards her twin’s crumpled form. She could feel the agony coursing through her body and the blood she was beginning to lose.

“You didn’t actually think that I would cave and just let you go, did you?”

“I thought you might. You also had siblings once, so you should know what it’s like to see them suffer.”

Zheng’s entire body froze.

His eyes trembled as his mind started trying to take him back to a time and place he didn’t want to revisit.

Morgan seemed to sense the discord within him.

“Oh… oh, that’s right. You were the one to make them suff-“

Zheng pressed the blade further into his captive’s neck until blood was drawn.

“You’ll want to stop talking now. If you’re smart, that is. I won’t lose any sleep about what happens if you’re not.”

Meredith fell silent. A fact that Zheng took notice of even as rattled as he was.

“You don’t heal like his other monsters, do you? Either of you.”

Zheng was met with silence once again.

“Answer me.”

“I thought I was supposed to keep my mouth shut…?”

“You will speak when I ask you a question, and you won’t say anything useless. Nod if you understand.”

After a few seconds, Meredith nodded her head.

She was compliant, at least for the moment. Zheng knew he had to act fast.

He reached out with telepathy, and just prayed that the one he was calling would answer.

‘Zheng? It’s rare for you to contact me, kiddo, what’s wrong?’

The dragon had never been so relieved to hear Yara’s voice in his mind.

‘Grandmother, I need your help.’

‘What do you need?’

‘Mother-in-law’s forge. She made a pair of anti-magic based restraints a few thousand years ago after a party. I need you to find them, and bring them to Musphelheim as quickly as you can.’

Yara didn’t even bother responding back. Zheng already knew that she was on her way.

Now, he just had to hope and pray that nothing changed until his grandmother could get here with the cuffs. Or else there was no telling just what kind of shit-show he could be calling his family member into.

He could start by keeping Meredith talking.

“What’s Percival planning? I want evrything you can give me.”

“That’s…”

Meredith started to answer. Zheng started to think that maybe his gamble was going to pay off.

But then, the body several feet away from them began to stir.

Whimpering, Morrigan slowly started to sit up.

Her left hand covered her eye, but it couldn’t stop blood that was pooling from the socket.

“M-Morrigan…!” Meredith’s heart broke inside her chest.

Breathing heavily, her twin looked up and forced a smile onto her face.

“I-I’m alright, blubber-baby… Barely even a scratch.”

Zheng quickly began trying to get control of his second captive. However, she wasn’t as disoriented as she might have seemed.

Before Zheng could tell her not to speak, she screamed.

“THORRR!!!”

“Shit!”

Zheng started to act on his threat and open Meredith’s neck.

But before he could kill her, a giant hammer even larger than him crashed into his side.

Zheng felt the air vacate his lungs like they’d received an eviction notice.

He was sent crashing through the air again. Meaning Meredith was free again.

But she was wounded.

She fell into her sister’s arms while holding her own neck.

Zheng hadn’t killed her, but he had cut her. And that was too close a call for Morrigan.

“Thor, we’re leaving now! You’ll get another chance later!”

In the sky, Thor clapped his hands and sent forth a shockwave of booming thunder strong enough to knock back Thrudd and her minions.

Though he didn’t look happy about it.

In a flash of lightening, he came to the twins’ side and helped them get to their feet.

With his last act, he shot one final parting glance at Thrudd.

It was filled with love and… mayhaps even a bit of pride too.

They were the eyes of a man too accustomed to having what he wanted. The eyes of a man who believed everything was fated to be as he would have it.

“I will come for you again, daughter! Do not stop growing in the meantime!”

“None of you let them ecscape!” Thrudd ordered.

Despite the best efforts of Thrudd’s valkyries, they couldn’t get to Thor and the twins in time.

In a flash of light, all three were gone. With no trace of themselves left behind.

“Fuck!”

Thrudd cursed aloud as she returned to her normal body.

“They got away! The fucking pieces of shit got away!”

Zheng had a small coughing fit as the wounds he sustained earlier were re-aggravated.

“Yeah, I… I got that.” He wheezed.

Thrudd swallowed her anger long enough to notice the kind of state her brother-in-law was in. She immediately grimaced.

“Damn it… Nubby’s going to kill me.”

At that moment, a blinding white light filled their eyes.

Thrudd was surprised to see her grandmother standing in the middle of a battlefield. She was even more surprised to find Behemoth standing right next to her.

And she did not look happy to see her.

“Zheng? Oh my god..”

Yara rushed over to Zheng like he was one of her own children.

“I’m fine, grandmother, i’m fine…” He waved his hand.

“You’re clearly not fine…I-I brought the-“

“I see. Thank you, but… they’re gone. We were too late.”

Thrudd stood up and left Zheng to be tended to by her grandmother.

She walked over to Behemoth with her gaze lowered.

“B, I-“

Thrudd remembered her grandfather often saying ‘hell hath no fury like a woman scorned.’

So in hindsight, she shouldn’t have been all that surprised when Behemoth slapped her.

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