Upon waking up and packing up their camp, the three of them descended the slope and headed towards the source of last night's noise.
They were on guard; the gorge was diverse enough with forest and bush that anything could hide in the dark places outside of their view.
They walked for a while, and Icarus noticed some strange pieces of rock littering the area.
He scanned, confused, and his eyes suddenly widened; his companions seemed to make the same realization, and they all instantly entered their fighting stances.
All around them and in front of them were broken chunks of defeated stone trolls.
In fact, they had been walking over these chunks for a while, but then they had been so finely smashed that they just looked like pebbles, and they were paid no mind.
Now the trolls' arms, torso, and entire bodies were strewn about before them, as they continued, the number of bodies and debris indicated that at least one thousand trolls had been destroyed in this battle.
Icarus wondered silently what could be capable of something like this, but didn't utter these words as he was focused on reacting to anything abnormal.
They all stopped in their tracks suddenly, the ground beneath them shifted, it stopped moments later, and Ingel gestured to stay still.
Nothing happened for several moments, and Icarus breathed out, not realizing he had been holding his breath in the first place.
Ingel turned "Bad news, there's a behemoth here, we should tread carefully, but it seemed like it was heading to the wyvern fortress, as long as we stay quiet, it should ignore-"
A massive thump sounded in front of them, and two men with winged arms holding large spears stood before them.
They had black armor and helmets that hid their faces; their scales were a pale blue and looked less sturdy compared to a dragon's scales.
"You! Why did you destroy his Majestys trolls?!"
They were shouting, and Ingel drew his sword, "Icarus! We have to kill them, or it will be the end of all of us!"
Icarus raised his staff, words played through his mind, 'Icarus, you kill when I order you, do not think, you live and die for me, your life is forfeit.'
His master's face, he shuddered as he aimed the staff at the two Wyvern men. He hesitated, thinking back to the first man he had killed under his master's orders, and he felt a tingling on his throat where the mark of the slaver had been positioned.
Ingel gritted his teeth in annoyance but reacted instantly to Icarus' hesitation. He lunged forward, "AZLAT MAXIM!"
His entire body scorched with the brightest fire his sword could produce.
He swung to kill instantly, the Wyverns raised their spears to block, and at the same time, the ground began to shake violently.
Ingel swung his sword straight down.
Icarus was grabbed from behind. He looked and saw Alazea holding him as she burst into the sky.
The ground ripped open, and a massive set of jaws opened around Ingel and the two Wyverns.
Icarus watched in horror as the jaws snapped shut, the Behemoth burst out, its entire body suspended in the sky, its shape resembled a large hippo, it was scaled like a reptile, and covered in a crust of rock and mud.
Icarus yelled and unleashed a blast of compressed fire at it. It scratched along the side of the beast, and it didn't even seem to notice. It began climbing up a rock wall. Alazea glowed with white fire, but it did not burn Icarus.
She transformed into her true form, a massive white Dragon, crowned by a golden Halo that radiated golden light that felt nourishing and healing to Icarus.
They had flown over the edge of the gorge, and the vast expanse of the dragon continent was in view. It was a flat land, the gorge the only real sign of life, with the rest being the same dark stone for miles and miles.
On this plateau, the gorge snaked forward like a massive vein that ran far across the land into the far distance.
Alazea roared, and a ball of white fire formed in her maw, and she roared, unleashing it towards the behemoth, who was lazily crawling up the gorge.
It shot down to Earth, gaining momentum as it fell. Icarus concentrated on the sphere. He channeled wind magic into it, and it swelled to twice its previous size as previously. The behemoth looked up and saw the falling fireball.
The fireball was now the size of the creature's entire body, it roared and pillars of earth shot up to meet the fire. They crumbled on contact, and the fireball fell into the creature, it's weight crushed the creature into the earth, and it finally exploded.
A pillar of fire, larger than a skyscraper, rose into the sky, Icarus stared, "That must have killed it, right?"
Alazea grimly shook her head and, in a resounding voice, replied, "No, behemoths are exceedingly durable; if we are lucky, that might have just broken through the century-old earthen shell on its body."
The Behemoth stood up. It was smoking, and its earthen shell was cracked but still in one piece.
"Damn it!"
Icarus concentrated a ball of hot and cold temperatures, mixing them. It was extremely hard to keep the spell stable once it left his body, so it would need to be propelled faster than normal wind magic would allow.
Icarus merged fire and wind, superheating it and creating a combustion to launch the projectile.
It shot down, massive streaks of fire followed it, it ripped through the earthen shell and erupted, its explosive force ripped off a chunk of earthen shell and created a small wound on the creature's body.
The behemoth roared, and pillars of earth shot up at Alazea. Icarus was being held by the hood of his cloak by one of Alzeas talons. The pillars of Earth were fast approaching, and he reacted by using ice magic to freeze one of the pillars.
Alazea dodged two pillars and blew a third apart with a fireball.
She then soared down and ripped off more of the earthen armor, roaring at Icarus, "Hit it now!"
Icarus channeled a massive spear of ice. He used the same principle of propulsion, but this time he used a merged mass of hot and cold temperatures, which would provide dozens of times the explosive propulsion.
It would have a little backlash, though.
He fired, and shards of ice cut his face and body. He shielded his vitals but was knocked out of the sky. The ice spear flew, moving ridiculously fast, and it buried itself in the creature's exposed back.
It let out a roar and burrowed into the ground. Alazea cursed and saw Icarus falling from the sky.
She turned around and dived, Icarus turned and blasted wind magic downwards to slow his descent, and Alzea was able to catch him on her back. She turned again and flew after the shaking earth as Icarus sat up, startled.
"Don't worry, Ingel will have survived in there; we just need to get him out."
Icarus questioned how that could be possible in his mind, but hoped it was true.
.
.
.
Saarnax stood atop his fortress; his men should have been back by now. It was strange.
In the distance, he had heard a loud commotion but just assumed his men had found their prey.
It was then that he saw a massive figure approaching in the distance.
A white Dragon.
"DRAGONS! You have come to me now! Well now! I promise not to disappoint!"
A lance appeared in his hand and crackled with lightning. He prepared to hurl it at the White Dragon, but from the ground in front of it burst an even larger beast.
" What the!?"
A behemoth shot up from the ground, it let out a roar, and the earth started to tremble. He heard his subjects cry out, and his fortress began to shake, it's questionable design came to mind.
"Shit, I will have to take care of this myself before all my work comes crashing to the ground!"
He grimaced and looked at the dragon angrily.
"And you! I will punish you for bringing this beast into my territory!"