Novel is on topwebfiction if you can vote for it that would mean the world!
Vote Now: https://topwebfiction.com/listings/the-mythos-chronicles/
-
The cavern smelled of burnt ozone and resin. Shards of emerald light flickered over the wet walls, glancing off the black pools that dotted the floor. Every drop that fell hissed faintly before dissolving into steam. From a rent in the roof above, lightning flashed brief, furious, then gone, leaving behind only the ghost of thunder.
Zalroth slithered from the shadows, her long, serpentine body gliding over the stone. Her feathers, once gleaming with acid-green luster, had dulled since the fall of her domain. Her home was gone, occupied, claimed, defiled by the scaleless usurper who called himself Artorius. The thought alone made her scales ripple and tighten with bitterness.
She reached the center of the cavern, coils rising, wings half-unfurled. A low growl rumbled in her throat. "Raijin," she hissed, voice echoing against the wet stone, "show yourself. I didn't crawl through the ruins of my home just to speak to thunder ghosts."
Image: https://www.pinterest.com/pin/368591550773776268/
Lightning flashed again this time striking the far wall and from the glow emerged the massive silhouette of Raijin, Lord of the Thunderstones. His body was sculpted from stormlight and cobalt scale, each motion wrapped in the faint scent of rain. Sparks danced along his claws as he stepped closer, the ground trembling beneath his weight.
Image: https://www.pinterest.com/pin/357402920424496031/
"I would say your tone is as sharp as ever," Raijin rumbled, his voice carrying the bass of distant thunder, "but you've lost your home, haven't you? Abandoned it to a hatchling with delusions of empire."
Zalroth's feathers flared, droplets of acid sizzling as they hit the ground. "Abandoned?" she spat. "You think I abandoned it? He came with an army of five hundred dragons; mercenaries, zealots, thieves. He brought flame and death. I had one hundred and eighty followers. If I had stayed, my bones would decorate his throne room by now."
Raijin snorted, a brief spark of electricity snapping from his nostrils. "So you ran."
"I survived," Zalroth snapped back. "Survival is not cowardice, it's strategy. You would do well to remember that before his host reaches your storm peaks."
Raijin's golden eyes narrowed. "So that's why you've come crawling into my hall to warn me? To beg for shelter?"
"I came," Zalroth said coldly, "because you're next." Silence followed, broken only by the slow drip of acid and the whisper of wind in the storm vents above. Raijin's tail lashed once, scraping the stone. Zalroth held his gaze, unblinking.
"You think this Artorius will come for me?" Raijin said after a moment. "He has the peaks. He has the dunes. He has the lakes. He has your jungle. But my realm is different. The mountains breathe lightning. The storms never rest. He will lose half his host before he even reaches my borders."
"That's what I thought, once," Zalroth murmured, lowering her head. "That the jungle itself would devour him. But he adapts. He learns. Every dungeon he conquers makes him stronger. He is not a mere warlord, he is a collector of legacies. He takes the powers of those he defeats. Kelthar's mist, the Zoklath flame, the Silver Dragon crystal... each piece adds to him."
Raijin gave a low rumble of displeasure, pacing along the pool's edge. Sparks crackled under his claws. "Even so, he cannot match thunder. I will burn him from the sky."
"Perhaps," Zalroth said softly. "But you will not stop him alone. You have two hundred and fifty dragons, half his numbers. He will crush you."
Raijin's eyes flickered, but he said nothing.
Zalroth pressed on, sensing the shift. "You can despise me all you wish, storm-lord, but I am not here for pride. I'm here because this creature has done what none of us thought possible. He has united many under his banner, forged an army across biomes, and slain four dungeon guardians. Do you think he'll stop once he reaches your peaks?"
"He will try," Raijin growled. "And he will die there."
"You sound like Kelthar before the Pavilion fell, and the Black Dread, the Silver Dragon before him," Zalroth said dryly. "Tell me, how did that end for them?"
Raijin's glare could have scorched stone. Though he finally relented, "What is your plan?"
"We strike from both ends. Once his army enters the Thunderstone Pass, you hold his attention from the front. I will move my forces through the lower jungle ridges, circle behind him, and close the rear. He'll have no retreat, storm before him, venom behind."
Raijin's claws flexed, lightning arcing between them. "You're cunning, serpent. Cunning enough to save your hide, maybe even mine. But if you betray me…"
She interrupted with a flick of her tail. "If I wanted revenge on you, I'd have brought poison to your table, not counsel to your hall. I want him dead and to reclaim my jungles. Once he is deposed of we can go back to the way things were."
The storm dragon regarded her in silence for a long while. The air between them hummed faintly, charged and dangerous. Finally, Raijin nodded once. "Very well. We'll strike together."
Though in both of their minds they knew they would be at each others throat the second the young upstart was dead. He conquered 3 biomes so far and they would be for the taking once he was brought low.
-
The chasm was silent, a black hollow carved into the heart of the Vacant Maw. Smoke rose from fissures like slow serpents, curling toward a sky that had never known sun. Here, in the eternal twilight of ash and brimstone, lay the Oblivion Dragon, Xytherion, lord of ruin, once rival of the White Lady, now a shadow of his former grandeur. His scales were dull, mottled black and iron, scarred where frostfire had struck him in the war long past. His wings, vast lay folded, torn, and crumpled like parchment in the dark. His chest rose and fell in shallow, uneven breaths, as though the life still within him was a candle flickering in a storm.
Image: https://www.pinterest.com/pin/13721973860924966/
For years, he had lain in slumber, hidden by volcanic smoke and forgotten by the world as he slowly recovered. Time had gnawed at him, his anger and pride coiled like vipers in the depths of his mind, waiting for a spark to awaken. That spark came in the form of his follower, a noble dragon of metal, a creature born of ferro and ember.
Image: https://www.pinterest.com/pin/563018695303852/
At last, he reached the sleeping lord. "Master," the dragon voice rumbled, low and resonant, carrying the weight of volcanic halls. "The time has come."
The Oblivion Dragon's eyes fluttered open, revealing pupils like black pits within a corona of dim, dying fire. His voice came slowly, as if each word was dredged from a grave of memory. "Who disturbs my slumber?" His clawed hand rose weakly, scraping the jagged obsidian floor.
"It is I, your faithful," the dragon said, bowing his immense head in deference. "The world moves without caution, and the one who bested you, the White Lady, spreads her frost like a plague across lands that were once ours to command. She dares to believe her reign is eternal."
The Oblivion Dragon's gaze sharpened, the dim glow of his eyes brightening with remembered fury. He drew a ragged breath, and smoke curled from his nostrils. "So," he whispered, voice low and dangerous, "it begins. The White Lady's frost… it shall end. The Pale Snowfields will burn, and her ice shall crack under the fury of those she once thought vanquished."
The Xytherion lifted his head fully, and the shadows of the cavern seemed to twist and recoil from him. His scales shimmered faintly in the molten light, the marks of age and battle glowing like veins of dying stars. "And my armies?" His tone was hungry. "My sons of ruin, my legions of ash? Do they still breathe?"
The metal dragon wings spread slightly, veins igniting with soft, ominous light. "They await you. The faithful, the loyal, the destroyers who remember your wrath. They have grown restless for war, but they are ever patient. Your command will awaken them."
The Oblivion Dragon's eyes gleamed now, pupils narrowing to slits of hunger. His wings stretched painfully, unfurling like banners of doom across the cavern, their torn edges scraping stone, sparking with the faintest trace of arcane power. "Good," he growled, voice rolling like volcanic thunder. "Let the world tremble at my name once more. Let them remember the ruin we brought upon it. Gather the loyal. Let every shadow, every ember, every forgotten warrior of mine know that their master has returned."
The Oblivion Dragon stretched again, powerful wings cutting through the cavern like dark lightning. He flexed each claw, each tendon, testing the strength that had slept so long. "We shall not fail," he said, more to himself than to Xytherion. "The White Lady's frost will shatter. And when it does…"
He let the words hang, a promise forged in fire and shadow, an oath older than the Pale Snowfields themselves. The Oblivion Dragon had returned.
-
The Dewdrop Meadows biome stretched like a living tapestry beneath the sky, a garden untouched by frost or fire, bathed in perpetual dawn. Petals the size of shields drifted lazily on the wind, each carrying the faint warmth of sunlight, though no sun could be seen. Rivers of liquid gold wound between towering stalks of flowers whose fragrance carried visions, faint glimpses of memory and dream for those attuned to magic.
The air shimmered with pollen that glowed faintly, drifting like starlight caught in a slow current. Lady Shiun moved through her realm with deliberate grace, coils rippling across meadows of towering blooms.
Her antlers, long and curved like branches, caught the iridescent light of the biome, reflecting faint glimmers of violet, rose, and amber. She inhaled, and the scent of a thousand blossoms filled her senses, each one layered with echoes of dreams and premonitions. Here, she could think, unburdened by the rigid frost of the Pale Snowfields or the tension of the White Lady's court.
Her gaze lifted toward the eastern horizon, where her Seer's sight always reached first. Closing her eyes, she let the currents of her magic carry her mind south, tracing the footprints of conquest left by the upstart.
The Misty Lakes shimmered in her vision, silver and grey beneath a swirling fog. The waters no longer held the placid serenity they once had. She saw Artorius moving among the land and bending it under his command.
Shiun's vision drifted further, tracing the creeping tendrils of his ambition as they spread through the Toxic Jungle, a land of mutated flora, acidic rivers, and serpentine predators. Even there, he moved with calm deliberation, reshaping the natural chaos into order that served his purposes.
She could see the final desperate ambush the two dragon lords were setting up for him to try to put a stop to his ambitions, but she somehow felt like it wouldn't work. That is why she had advised the White Lady to send aid, but it was rejected.
Her attention was on the oblivion dragon who was already attacking their borders. Somehow she felt as if this new scaleless dragon was more dangerous then the dreaded High dragon lord.
"I do not understand him," she whispered to herself, voice soft yet resonant, drifting across her domain. Her gaze returned to Artorius, standing on the pyramid in the toxic jungle. She saw him surveying the twisted rivers and mutant forests, his stance calm, measured, and utterly confident. Even from this distance, she felt the hum of power he carried, the subtle reshaping of lands and creatures to his will.
How far will he reach, what will he do. None of these she had an answer for.
-
A/N: Well there are many forces planning things in the shadow, how will things go for our mc.
-
Chapter 24 Recap!
Leveled up Race: [True-Blood DragonMen] → Lvl. 16
Leveled up Archetype: [Leader] → Lvl. 16
+1 INT, +1 WIL, +1 CHA
Leveled up Class: [Storybook Squire] → Lv. 16
[Trial of Swiftness — Completed] +3 Dexterity Gained