At first, Asterios chose the safest option.

He observed.

It was not clear if he had landed in any of the realms he knew, not to mention Ebiarhia, so it would be wise not to jump to conclusions right away. This might be a completely new world they hadn’t heard of or seen yet, with its own set of rules and common sense. As someone who studied magical creatures deeply, he knew that judging a book by its cover was extremely risky.

Between the two warring sides, the smaller folk could very well be evil vermin of this realm, bothering or hunting the usually peaceful furry giants. The fact that they weren’t doing too much of a great job at that couldn’t be taken as a sign of anything. Bad guys weren’t always highly skilled and experienced.

From what he could see, only five of the bipedal marine beings resembled fighters, wielding bone swords, hatchets, harpoons, and hammers. The rest had only daggers or knives that could very well be intended for more artisanal craft like gathering or skinning. One wielded a staff bigger than it was, but no magic currently filled the air.

Luckily for them, the massive creatures, while dealing powerful, earth-shaking blows, weren’t fast and accurate enough. They struggled with following the tiny clothed balls which literally rolled away from their ice clubs, and used their rather bulky, round physique to their advantage. But, it was only a matter of time until something hit and reduced somebody to a bloody splatter. The sealfolk didn’t look like they could outrun the colossi in a straight line so fighting back was all they could do.

As Asterios tried his best to remain impartial, it was definitely getting harder not to sympathize with the smaller creatures. From the traces in the snow, they had been looking for an escape from their enemies for a while already, attempting to run for it for quite some distance. He spotted two bloody smears behind a hill to his left, most likely the result of that unfortunate attempt.

The upcoming conclusion to this scuffle was easy to predict.

Still, not wanting either to antagonize one of the sides or remain a bystander during an obvious massacre, Asterios decided to do the only thing he could think of at the moment.

Focus the attention of everyone on him and see where that led him.

While descending in his human form was fine, especially if he brought out his Spellslinger greatsword equipped with some powerful spells, it might not be enough to immediately force the massive entities to halt their attacks. For the intended effect on both sides, he needed to shock them.

Thankfully, he had an easy way of achieving that goal.

Taking a quick look around to examine the nearby hills and peaks, Asterios judged that there didn’t seem to be a risk of an avalanche coming down from any direction. In the end, the giants’ clubs would have called it down long ago if that was possible.

Therefore, he threw himself forward while letting his transformation take over. In less than three seconds, his impressive draconic body soared through the cold air, and he could only imagine how noticeable he was on the pure white background as a big red spot in the sea of snow. Most of the sky was covered with a blanket of thick clouds too, so there was no being stealthy for him.

Good that he wasn’t going to need it.

Diving down at a sharp angle, Asterios drew a big chilly breath before releasing a booming roar into the flat valley. His deep bellow rumbled thunderously throughout the area, echoing in the distance soon after. Both the giants and the midgets froze at once, directing their gazes to the sky.

He wasn’t sure what they had expected to see, but it definitely wasn’t a plunging True Dragon heading straight for their battlefield.

Before anyone could react, Asterios slammed into the middle of the fight, knocking up a lot of unbothered snow. His sudden descent separated the two groups as the big guys took a few steps back and the small people rolled away from the sheer force of impact. Growling fiercely as thick steam escaped his jaws, he directed his glimmering crimson eyes at each party in turns.

“Mother of all that’s salty… We are doomed…” The dwarf-sized walrus with the staff whimpered in resignation.

“That depends on what is going on here.” Ast’s deep voice sent a shiver through the creature’s squad, perhaps words not being something they had assumed would greet them. “Who are you and why are you locked in a fight to the death.”

While the sealfolk continued to tremble and lament at the arrival of a new predator, the four giants exchanged confused glances amongst themselves, their ugly faces twisting in quite silly expressions that didn’t hint at much intelligence of their kin. Since they weren’t even bothering to look at him, sharing a silent conversation instead, he turned his head to the scared bunch.

The little people yelped almost as one man and the armed five shakily held their weapons up at him. Assuming that the one with the bony stick was the leader, Asterios focused his attention solely on that guy. From what he could tell now that he had gotten closer, the walrus-looking one might represent the males of their species, while the slightly softer seal-like ones were the females.

To some extent, finding a creature he hadn't read about before fascinated him, but there were more pressing matters than studying the unknown race.

“O-Oh Great and Magnificent One… We are definitely not tasty and good for your health… Our bodies are over two-thirds fat—”

Asterios shifted to the side and a mighty thud followed right after as one of the ice clubs smashed into the ground where he had just been, thankfully spotting the movement in the corner of his eye. Whipping his head to the giants, he snarled at the one who was just pulling back its weapon.

“Would you kindly not interrupt others when they are spea—”

A horizontal swipe from a different colossus forced him to duck down and watch as the assailant lost their balance and fell into a heap of snow, tumbling awkwardly away from them. Its friends started releasing choking sounds which had to be their weird version of laughing at their companion’s misery.

Letting out a defeated sigh, Asterios flexed his limbs. “Well, this certainly makes things easier. Off with you it is, then.”

Not giving the dumb apes time to regather their wits and make another attempt, he lunged at the closest one with a strong flap of his wings, sending more of the sealfolk rolling, effectively pushing them away from danger as a bonus. Since the giants were taller than him while standing straight, he went right after the throat, sinking his fangs into the blue jugular from below.

Icy-cold blue liquid rained on his snout like a waterfall and the choking sounds turned into a gurgling mess. With a swift twist of his neck, Asterios tore the beast’s throat off and used its hard body to launch himself away. His target put a hand over the empty gap, then looked down on its bloody palm with a complete lack of comprehension. The others were equally flabbergasted, possibly not having any creature stand up to them for some time.

As their comrade fell onto its back and stopped moving, they let out shrieking cries and smacked the ground with their weapons repeatedly, their furious mugs turning even deeper blue as they glared at the lizard that had taken down one of them. Somebody was pissed off and the reason why was clear as day.

The three remaining giants charged at him together, but thanks to their general clumsiness, Asterios didn’t have much of a problem evading the powerful swings. They looked to have entered some kind of rage as they threw their entire bodies alongside their attacks, quickly rolling on the ground and making another attempt with the retained energy. While still widely telegraphed, their attempts became much more chaotic, and one would inevitably land at some point.

Jumping away from an overhead blow, Asterios slashed at the creature’s legs from behind and launched himself into the air. Before his opponent recovered from the fall, he gathered the heat from his core and drowned its body in merciless crimson flames. Hissing noise filled the air as the water evaporated quickly from around the assaulted spot, accompanied by howls of agony. The stream of focused inferno forced the others to cover their faces until their second friend ended up roasted alive.

Withdrawing his breath, Asterios noticed one of the still-living individuals take a deep breath too and a spray of sparkling mist gushed out of its mouth. He spun around to evade the dust but it still managed to graze his wing during the maneuver. An incredibly cold layer of frost began covering his membranes, speeding for his torso.

Out of pure instinct, he brought out his flames once more, this time directing them at the whitish glaze, melting it away moments before he crashed into the snow. Flying low near the ground at a high speed from the unplanned descent, he slammed into the blower and they went tumbling in the direction of the chubby folks, causing them to jump away in panic.

Too close to them to use fire, Asterios wreathed his claws with fiery mana, focusing on sharpness with his black Heart, and blazing heat with his red Heart. That was enough to pierce into the monster’s tough hide and start mutilating the big brute.

Its mighty hands tried to pull on Ast’s wings and legs but to no avail. Receiving more and more wounds as blue liquid splashed everywhere around, covering them both almost wholly in the process, it gradually lost its strength to resist. Having most of your stomach carved out would do that to you.

Just as Asterios was untangling himself from the dying colossus, the final enemy showed no regard for its ally and struck them both with its massive club. A pained roar left Ast’s jaws as he was sent hurtling to the side with his recent victim. His wing and side felt sore from the blow but it wasn’t anything serious. Only the biting frost that the weapon seemed to inflict didn’t bode well for a prolonged brawl.

But, the fight had now been reduced to one-on-one and the giant’s impressive size was nothing more than a weakness against a fast and agile fiery lizard. The challengers stared each other down while letting out intimidating growls. Ast’s opponent was still furious but had regained enough composure to make good use of that fury. 

Releasing its crystal club from its grasp, it bashed its chest and roared threateningly. Not bothering to pick it back up again, it rushed forward on all fours. Asterios briefly thought that he had expected too much from the humanoid beast, but he spotted its actually shrewd plan a split-second before it came to fruition.

On its way to him, the giant passed over two stacked corpses of its companions, taking their weapons in both hands. With a quaking stomp, it pushed itself into a spinning motion while heading for Asterios once again. The whirling colossus picked up fluffy snow and created an obstructive cone around it that hid the two clubs in a cloudy haze.

While impressive and definitely dangerous, such a move was unfortunately useless against Ast’s current form. With a nimble roll aside, he hastily shot into the air before the spinning monster managed to make a full turn back without halting its technique. It got pretty close to achieving that, though.

But, as Asterios peered down onto his opponent from above, something changed. The winds began quickly picking up and a small typhoon joined the rotating haze, growing in size and intensity at a rapid pace. This had to be more magic or innate abilities from the beast as there was no way it spun fast enough to create such a phenomenon.

As the frost tornado expanded upwards, it became increasingly harder to avoid getting sucked into the hail of sharp ice fragments and frozen rocks, not to mention the two spinning clubs at the core of the cyclone. And while Asterios could strain his draconic body enough to escape its range with some effort, the small, ground-locked sealfolk could not. The first pair was already being drawn in without any mercy.

Reacting without thinking, Asterios let the winds pull him in extremely close, and broke off them as he was right by the sloped wall of death, using the momentum to escape the whirlwind’s orbit. He dismissed his enchantments and caught the flailing duo into his claws as gently as possible.

Heading for the rest of their friends, he landed in front of the group and tossed the rescued men into the small crowd, immediately digging his limbs into the ground for purchase. His bulky body protected them from the suction as he lay down, but the furry creature was already altering its trajectory toward them, somehow able to sense where to go.

Time was running out. He knew he could easily stop the giant after returning to his humanoid form and using his Spellslinger to launch a powerful, sharp spell that would slice through the middle of the cyclone like through butter, but that could leave the short folk at risk. One could get picked up and dragged into his attack with the unexpected, disorderly drafts.

He had to try something in his True Dragon body.

Recalling his mentor’s words from before he had walked into the breach, Asterios took a deep breath and focused on his powers. All of them. Including those granted him by the intimate bonds of trust and love he shared with his incredible mates.

Two of them immediately fit the situation.

Connecting deeper to Selene and Silvia, he felt them respond to his call even through the many dimensions separating them. 

He directed his head at his opponent and opened his jaws wide. A small, flaming orb of amber flickered into life between them, resembling a medium-sized Fireball. Streaks of bluish spiritual energy wafted against it from all directions, pushing it into its own rotations too. As the faint puffs of mana coated it with a thin soap-like layer, dark crimson tongues joined them, causing the orb to rapidly grow in size while grazed by blue-red stripes of energy.

The sphere soon reached the limits of Ast’s jaws and the energies continued to condense inside of it. It swirled with reddish-orange patterns, glowing like a miniature setting sun, illuminating the area around him with the same shade. The sealfolk stared at the show with awe, almost forgetting the impending death rolling their way without a pause.

Satisfied with the result of his efforts, Asterios called for a final burst of flames deep in his throat, and just as the crimson inferno crawled up his tongue, he snapped his jaws shut. The fire had enough time to touch the round projectile and push it past his sharp fangs. The pressure of an abruptly stopped blaze erupted past his draconic lips and sent the globe of sizzling death forward with a powerful whoomph.

It sped over the snow while retaining its glow and pierced right through the swirling surface of the ice cyclone. Not even a second later, a bright flash came from the inside and it exploded with a roaring boom. The ground shook as the force of the detonation destroyed the currents and burst out into a ginormous flaming ball that crackled menacingly for a good ten seconds, basking the valley in a bright, rusty shine, fading away in a few seconds.

Everything returned to normal and the surrounding whiteness suddenly felt out of place. Amidst sharp rings in the snow, rested a shallow crater of scorched ground, displaying just how much frozen snow lay between the surface and the solid earth. In that pit, the badly burned body of the frost giant reclined flatly, two-thirds of its frame unrecognizable in the form of charred shapes. It was still smoking and smoldering at the edges.

“The Frost Titans… are gone?” a female hesitantly asked, half in disbelief, half in amazement.

After the silence dominated the air for a few more moments, the burly folks burst into cheers and laughs, hopping around in joy and hugging each other in celebration. Asterios chuckled at the quite adorable sight, but he couldn’t really blame them for being happy about barely avoiding death by crushing.

His rumbling chuckle unfortunately reminded them about the elephant in the room and they froze, all deep black eyes turning up to gaze at his draconic visage. He might have just saved them, but it didn’t make him any less scary with such a towering and domineering figure.

“Ummm... Oh Great and—”

“You can stop that,” Asterios interrupted the staff-wielder. “My name is Asterios and I’m not going to eat you.”

A collective sigh rolled off all his companions and some anxious giggles and chuckles were exchanged in the group. They seemed to joke about the possibility amongst themselves, telling each other they would have given him indigestion or worse. A few even elbowed their friend while teasing the stout man that they were ready to sacrifice his fat ass if worse had come to worst.

“Oh Great Asterios, what brings you to these lands?” the leader asked, waving annoyingly at his people to stop the chatter.

“I was simply exploring,” he answered rather truthfully. “What lands are these exactly?”

“This is the Glazed Vale, of course,” his conversation partner replied with an attempted bow, almost poking himself with his long tusks.

“Alright. And does this realm perhaps have a name? This isn’t Eabiarhia, is it?” Asterios inquired, looking around once more.

Some muted whispers passed through the crowd.

“Does this mean that you appeared before us from another world, Great Asterios?” the chief wondered out loud and received a nod in response. “Father of the seas! That’s miraculous! We thank our great savior from a different world for its timely rescue! Welcome to the Domain of Eternal Frost!”

The others gave him their bows and curtsied too and Asterios was already having flashbacks to the Lizardkin village back from the Scorching Steppes.

“If you aren’t busy with your important exploration, we would like to show our gratitude by hosting a small, celebratory feast for you back in our village, Great Asterios,” the main male offered. “We wouldn’t want to impose, of course, so please, feel free to ignore us if we are bothering you, as our home is still quite a distance away.”

Asterios considered the gesture briefly and shrugged his muscular shoulders. “I would like that. Hop on. I’ll get you there in a blink.”

“Oh, no, we wouldn’t dare—”

But, the excited sparkling in dozens of dark eyes told him otherwise, and the others sprinted forward to start climbing up onto his back, to their leader’s abject horror. No matter how much the little man tried, no one listened to him, and he was forced to surrender, accepting Ast’s fierce paw to lift him up.

With everyone in their seats, Asterios gently rose from the ground to the accompaniment of excited whooping and yelping. An amused smirk twisting his snout, he flew in the direction appointed by the leader.

An accidental failure had landed him in something quite entertaining.