Part 2: The Summoner and The Escort

“Wa…wake….p…”

I hear a faint noise in the darkness, loud enough to stir but not to wake me.

“Wake…p…Wake Up!”

I awaken to being violently shaken by ‘him’, ‘master’ the title I use to annoy him. He stares at me, his expression urgent and annoyed.

“Come oooon, get up already! I’ve got some great news.” He pulls my arm before he leaves from out of my room.

Using his pull I bring myself to my feet from my bed and follow him into the next room with a reluctant growl.

“Let me guess…”

Seemingly appearing out of nowhere and grabbing my hands “Yes! A new creature to tame!”

“Tai, the last one we went after almost killed us. And that was just two days ago!”

Tai stares at me with pleading eyes “Creede~”

I stare at him back unfazed “You know that won’t work…”

We stay like that for a minute until he leans in closer, surprising me, and whispers in my ear “It has a bounty of 10k gold”

I squeeze his hands in excitement before running back into my room and getting dressed and geared up “Dear, lets hurry! What are you waiting for hurry up and get ready! We have no time to waste!”

“Hey Tai! Tai!” I call to him as I walk about the cabin, ready for our adventure.

“He must be with the coach driver” I thought to myself walking towards a curtained window located at the center wall of the cabin.

Peeking my head through I find him and the coach driver. The coach driver was a literal horseman. A type of spirit who came with the caravan. He adorned an odd chimney pipe type hat and a black suit, with a singular vision piece, if I recall correctly I believe it was called a monocle. His body was that of a slim average man, but his head was of a horse’s. He amused me so, for he had a very interesting accent. That of a man I would assume to be very elegant and from a name of money. Every time I encountered him I could not help myself but to take in his image and manners in shear bewilderment, starring. Tai, to the right of Sir Thomas, was already dressed and geared up in our guild attire. Our guild was a hunter’s guild. We sought out beast and bandits for bounty. Unlike most guilds, we were an independent one, not owned by the tyrannical hand of the king; therefore, we were allowed these free traveling adventures.

“So I said to him, ‘the big blue one!’ and his ale comes flying out of his blow hole from laughter and the entire bar starts fighting” It seems I’ve appeared as Tai was telling Sir Thomas one of our adventures. Before I can speak up, a mixture of Sir Thomas’ whinnies and Tai’s laughter interrupted me. Amidst the interruption I realized that we were already on the move. I squint my eyes in realization and slight annoyance as I stared at the horses pulling our caravan. I climb my way onto the driver’s seat in between the two and place a hand on each of their shoulder. They stopped in mid-laugh surprised and scared of my arrival.

“So…it appears that we have been on the course to this beast even before you asked, because we were in Agost Forest before I slept and now we’re in Deadmenz Range” my grip clinched a bit harder on their shoulders.

Letting out a small squeak before giving me a forced laugh Tai says “Well, you were coming anyway…because you live here…ha…ha”

“Gentleman Creede…Sire Tai…made me do it…” Thomas whinnies

I begin to shake them “Rude…absolutely”

I was interrupted yet again, but this time by a roar.

“Also! We’re pretty much here already!”

I release them, they sigh simultaneously, and I peer at our surroundings. A mountainous range ran through the valley along a small river. The sun was beginning to set, but the air was still hot and dry.

There was yet another roar, but this time it was accompanied by a bright gleam of blue in the distance.

“See, now come on!” Tai grabs my hand and we jump off of the moving vehicle. We use magic to stabilize and buffer our landing. “Go hide somewhere safe Mister Thomas! We’ll meet here afterwards!”  he waves at the venturing away wagon.

The light was approaching at great speeds, and I then felt a dangerous energy emitting from it.

“Watch out!” Pulling Tai out of the way, behind a nearby boulder, we dodged the blazing fire ball just in time.

“Woah…That was cool! I’m positive that was him” he peeks from behind the boulder. The roar is heard again but much closer this time. Tai looks at me as if to go confront the beast. I stare at him a bit reluctantly before sighing “Fine” and summoning forth my golden saber as I jumped from the boulder towards the direction of the roar. Stopping immediately in my tracks I stare at the beast in awe. A dragon. A freakin dragon! He wants to ‘tame’ a freakin dragon! I’m shaken from my stupor by the beast’s mighty voice.

“I, Allureedous, new crowned keeper of these stone walls stand before you. Who dares invade this territory? Mere mortals? How incompetent. Be gone, or face my wrath.” His tone was calm and confident, but the power of his voice boomed and slightly shook the ground beneath us.

He floated above the ground, slowly winding and slithering through the air. The rays of the setting sun gleamed off of his green scales and golden hair. His head adorned a gold mask of some sort with a sapphire jewel emanating energy.

“Ok! Let’s go!” Tai gets into positon to prepare his summon. This is my cue to cover him. I dash towards Allureedous , preparing to dodge any of his attacks, constantly changing direction to keep his attention. Finally reaching him I jump up and attempt to attack the obvious “attack me here” crystal in his masked forehead. But before I could make contact he grabbed me and sends me towards Tai. He catches me in a wave of his energies.

“Ready! Sending you back, go!” Tai shouts. We make eye contact for a split second in understanding and I nod, positioning myself to take the dragon again.

Tai forces me forward just as he finished his summon. An ethereal carbuncle appears and together they charge forward.

“Fools…” Allureedous makes a quick motion calling forth large flame orbs and sending them towards us as he appears to charge some form of attack.

Casting magical platforms, I intercept the orbs midair, allowing Tai and the carbuncle to get closer. After boosting Tai into the air the carbuncle bombards the dragon with a variety of spells. Too preoccupied with his charging it seems he wasn’t fazed at all. I too joined in the attack charming myself with a speed buff and dashing around the dragon slashing and stabbing him. Tai reached his head, greeting him with a wound up fist. Releasing, just behind the fist followed a summoning circle conjuring a large armored fist punching Allureedous square in the jaw, disrupting his channeling. Tai punches him again and finishes with an attack slamming his (and the summoned fists) on the dragon’s head before falling to the ground. Allureedous shakes the ground around us with a groan. Landing Tai prepares for another summon. Simultaneously, I go in to try and bind the dragon to the ground. I slid underneath him still disorientated.

“Let my words bend time and space…let the sky become ground! Gravity reverse!” as the incantation finishes a magic circle forms beneath the circumference of the dragon and pulls him downward.

“Enough!” He awakens from his stupor. In a quick motion he spins around us, thrashing the wind and sand about and simultaneously bringing lightning. Dizzied by the gust I’m unable to avoid a bolt of lightning. The sounds of static and heat fill my head. Collapsing to try and regain my breath I was surprised by the next round of shocks. Tai was able to dodge most of them, but I noticed one heading towards him. Quickly, I muster the rest of my strength to throw myself at him, pushing him out of the way and taking the hit.

“Worms! You are beneath me! Wait? What? What sorcery is this?” peeking from behind one of the nearby sandstone boulders I noticed that Creede’s binding spell’s secondary activation finally took effect.

Allureedous’ body began to be pulled down to the earth by ethereal tendrils. His attention averted from us and directed towards disarming the binding.

Creede grunts a bit “Tai…babe…you ok?”

“Shhh rest, I got this” I run out from behind the boulder with carbuncle in tow. Running towards Allureedous I charge up for my next summon.

“Disperse” snapping, the carbuncle vanishes into a cloud of energy.

“Perfect, now I can complete the first summon.” The energy swirled around me just as I landed a few feet from the dragon in position to complete the spell.

“Grand summon: armored one of the gates of limbo, come forth and bear your arms against my enemy! Holy knight emerge and guard!”

A large summoning circle blazes forth in front of me, and in the short time it was there it vanishes with the knight exploding from it. His armor was gold and silver, and in his hands he wielded a shield and sword. Emerald jewels were encrusted within the center piece of his armor and shield. They glowed a holy light. Around him chirped small but malicious looking cherubs, who held in their plump little hands sharp pointed spears or a set of bows and arrows. The knight’s halo scorched the air around him and burned more so like a ring of fire rather than light.

“What brightness, how magnificent…but yet…still beneath me!” Allureedous growled erupting into a twister of wind and lighting, severing most of the binding spell, but not all of it.

The knight and the dragon fight each other, but the weakened and partially bound dragon is not winning this fight, it seems.

I run closer and prepare my final spell.

“Haha, I’ve got you now!” somehow Allureedous bound himself around the knight’s sword arm and kept his shield arm at bay.

“On the contrary, I’ve got you!” I shouted out.

“Disperse and rest my knight! Now! Bound and harmed creature cease resistance! Capturing circle constrict and confine!”

Unsummoning the knight, I used his energy to form a large binding circle around Allureedous. The circle glows dim and hums faintly. He struggles to use his magic but it gets absorbed into the circle.

“What? How can this be? Bested by…by mortals?” he roars

Ignoring him I finish the incantation “Oh great dragon, Allureedous, succumb to my will you have and now you are mine. Law of the heavens and the right of battle I beseech thee: accept this pact!”

The capturing spell seals a spirit into the Other dimension. There they can be summoned to assist me. Capturing can go one of two ways: either they accept defeat or I have to muscle them down some more...a being as strong as Allureedous…I don’t think I can fight him any longer, even less now because of Creede being out.

He stops struggling for a bit. “Summoner, you have bested me so far, and for that I give you my respect, but tell me, why should I the great gold keeper Allureedous, serve with you?”

“Because I want to free you from the curse that binds you here. With me…us, you could explore the world and be free once more!”

He is silent for quite sometime

“The curse…it has damaged your mind. Your tale is known quite wide throughout this land and after slaying the warlocks who bound you here to protect their treasure I brought it about myself to save you. You see…I’m quite fond of dragons…my master…Semris...”

“Semris, the golden drake! Say no more child” this was his words as he broke the circle with one mighty roar (nullification spell I assume). He towers above me, his large head now directly in front of me.

I slump onto the ground completely out of energy.

“Ha! Dragon, prepare to face my…uh…where’d he go?” I jump from behind the boulder prepared to attack.

Tai laughs at me “We can go home now, I’ll tell you all about what happen and I can introduce our new friend to the family.”

 His smile radiates warmth and I cannot hold back a smirk in admiration of him. He jugs me and takes my hand leading towards our meeting spot for whenever we finished capturing the target. Mission success! And once the townsfolk’s ravens check the Range and we show proof we can get the bounty reward!

“Alright! Let’s go celebrate with the cake and the round pie of cheese and meats!” I exclaim excited

“Pizza, dear” he giggles.

“Ah yes, pizza!”

 END