Noble had only been paying peripheral attention to the dragons once her copy unceremoniously entered the world.
She had expected it to take more time, but really, the fight had been over before it began.
The Remnant had survived far more fearsome creatures than himself. A veteran of the Doom War, he had grappled with and destroyed horrors that Noble could never dare to dream about.
So even before the Other Dragon had completed his exit from the Mirror Realm, his fate was sealed.
There was only one Dragon Prince. And the newborn copy could not compare to his battle prowess and power.
That was not to say that the Remnant was unscathed. The reflection might have been on its last breath, but the incoming victory had come at a cost.
The Prince had lost a portion of his magnificent tail to a particularly brutal bite. Many of his horns were broken or bleeding from the clash. Gashes ran down the side of his torso, and more than one of his nails lay in the cooling lava. Even his wings, which he had worked hard to protect, had new holes in them.
The Remnant was in pitiful shape. But that only made him fight harder to exact his revenge. As the reflection tried to carve out another pound of flesh, the Prince had had enough. He flamed in the face of his adversary, causing the copy to disengage.
The Other Dragon roared, his pearly teeth tinged with the real Dragon's blood. The Prince's stumpy tail whipped through the air, striking the copy across his snout. The Other bit into the scales, bringing both of them down to the ground and rolling in the gelatinous, smoking rocks of the hillside. Covered in glowing stone, the copy jumped to claw out the original's good eye.
But the stumpy tail, unwilling to be denied, wrapped around the back leg of the copy as he tried to take to the air. The change in momentum pulled the reflection from his vicious arc, and so he leaned on his back feet and reared to get his footing. That was a mistake.
The Remnant lunged, his teeth bared like a wild dog. He sank them into the Other's throat, snapping its neck. The move was so sudden and unexpected that the reflection had no time to react.
Its head fell limp, hanging the superior creature's maw. The Prince snorted, fire blistering the scales of the Other with their intensity.
It was over, but the Prince was not satisfied. To fuel his own hatred, he would consume the imposter.
He clapped down on the broken neck, but the ruby scales vanished, causing his teeth to crack as they crashed against each other instead.
The body of the copy began to dissolve. Wisps of black permeated the air.
Infuriated, the Remnant sought his enemy, snapping at the air. But it was in vain. The Other Dragon was no more.
Noble took all this in, her mind judging the situation dispassionately so that she could find a way forward.
But her heart? It was worried about the unconscious Saint on the ground holding the overheated mirror in her torn tunic.
Whatever spell Syrce had used on the mirror before passing out had not been dependent on her being awake. The coating around the mirror glowed faintly in the night, impervious to the chilly night air.
But not resistant to the black mist filling it. The Nothingness passed through the barrier without pausing. Thankfully, it seemed content to stay within the confines of the gilded frame, at least for now.
The world, which had felt frozen in place, suddenly began to move twice as fast to make up for lost time.
In a burst of emotion, Noble sent her copy flying across the landscape toward the sulking dragon. The Other would never reach the Remnant, but the floating Master didn't care.
She turned toward the ground. "Syrce!"
Helie made it to the Saint first and cradled her head. Noble was only a moment behind.
"She's still breathing," Helie noted with no small amount of relief. "But she has lost a lot of blood and spent too much essence."
Roan and Aether put their backs to the women, shielding them with their bodies.
"Syrce is too weak to stay here," the cohort leader shook his head. "She needs time to heal and wake up."
"And a blood transfusion," Aether pointed out.
"We don't have either of those," Noble felt for Syrce's weak pulse. "Get her out of here, Helie. For real, this time."
Pressing her lips together, Helie took the chastisement with a nod.
"Uh, Lady Bel?" Aether furrowed his brow.
Noble didn't need to look over her shoulder. The amount of time she had bought them to talk had come to an end.
Having found no more evidence of the copy at the top of the hill, the Remnant had turned his attention to the other intruders. He would unleash his unspent anger on them instead.
In front of him, a more looming threat was returning toward them faster than a boomerang that Noble had once seen in a documentary.
"Your doppelganger seems perturbed." Aether's calm words were in contrast to the heated anticipation Noble could feel coming from him.
Child of Promise nodded. "I will deal with her."
Roan understood her implication. He tilted his chin at the younger man. "We will deal with our royal visitor."
Noble felt a weight lifted from her shoulders. If they left the Remnant alone in favor of battling the Other, he would surely chase down either Helie and Syrce before they could make it to safety, or move on to consume the poor soldiers who were still battling the copies who had been following Other Mae.
While she hated to split up again, they needed to divide and conquer. As long as they didn't crumble...
Helie lifted Syrce off the ground, awkwardly trying to cradle the mirror as well. If only she were able to carry her like a pack horse, the task would be so much easier!
Thankfully, the rain of sparks already manifesting beside her relieved her of her burden. Helios's violet back accepted both her and the injured Saint with a subtle purr.
"Go!" Noble bid her echo to leave as fast as his muscular legs could carry them.
Aether and Roan took the cue as well, rushing headlong toward the Remnant to finish the job that they had begun. They rushed under the Other, ready for an attack if the woman should try to act against them.
But the blonde imposter paid them no mind. They were specks of dirt to her, and she would let the dragon burn them to the dust they were. The Other's goal was singular, and her vision was laser-focused.
Raising her Zenith, Noble watched the reflection with eyes swirling.
Is that what she looked like to her opponents in the Dreamscape? No wonder so many of them had felt so much fear at her appearance!
Noble steeled herself for what else she was about to see. She would watch herself be mangled and torn apart.
Ultimately, one way or another, she was about to witness her own death.