“Don’t! DON’T!” Joan yelled, but it was too late.

She watched helplessly as the Emerald Dragon, despite its ancient wisdom and great might, decided to fly straight at the Avatar of the Inferno God. On the up side, at least the Demon Lord and titanslayers quickly fled out of her way. Three obsidian trolls also attempted to block her way, though they were scattered with ease when she barreled into the creature. Joan cringed, watching nervously. The Emerald Dragon couldn’t hope to win this fight, could it?

But maybe it could. It was an incredibly powerful creature. One so far beyond most of the creatures of this world. She felt a small glimmer of hope when she watched the dragon’s wings flap and her mighty claws dig into the body of the avatar.

Only to let out a mighty, pained roar and then turn, spinning her entire body to bash into the avatar, knocking it away before spreading out her great wings once more, taking to the skies.

Her scales, normally a bright, radiant green were scorched black, some torn free and causing blood to slide down her side. The avatar barely looked phased, its great flames as powerful as ever. No, nothing was ever that easy, now was it?

“So you must be Joan,” a voice said from behind her. It took her half a second to identify it, after which she tried to dash behind Bauteut. Unfortunately, she was too slow and felt those arms wrap around her from behind, pulling her back into an unwanted hug. She gulped and looked up at the vampire’s face.

“Heyyyyyy, Kris, errr. Hi,” Joan said sheepishly.

The vampire’s eyes widened slightly and she actually looked surprised. “Oh? So Korgron told you about me, did she?”

“Yesssss,” Joan said slowly. She made a mental note to tell Korgron to never invite Kris to anything like this. Ever. Of all the people who should be here, a half-mad vampire was not the kind of person who should be out here. Maybe they’d get lucky and her robes would catch on fire and she’d be incinerated. She found it unlikely, though. “Errr, she invited you? Can you let me go?”

“You know, she is awfully protective of you,” Kris said in a soft, gentle tone. Her hand reached down to grip Joan’s chin and make her look up. “I offered to… help ensure you wouldn’t--”

The vampire’s wrist was grabbed by Bauteut. “Let. Her. Go. Or do you want me to talk to Korgron about this? She told me she’d be more than happy to grab the toads.”

Kris had looked almost ready to throttle Bauteut up until that last word. However, at the word ‘toads’ the vampire actually manged to turn paler, something Joan had never seen her do. She then let Joan go. “Very well, if you insist.”

Joan took the opportunity and quickly fled, moving behind Bauteut, who let Kris go. To her surprise, the vampire shifted into a dark mist which then flew off, down the cliff towards the obsidian trolls.

“Toads?” Joan asked.

“I don’t know,” Bauteut said before glancing back towards her. “Korgron said to mention it if she caused any trouble.”

“I’ve never seen her actually scared before,” Joan said softly. Half the time the Hero had been forced to kill her, getting her under control wasn’t something she thought possible. Just what in the world had Korgron done?

Speaking of things she really didn’t understand, she felt a hand take hers and turned to see Qakog kneeling before her, his hand gripping hers and staring up at her with wide, shimmering golden eyes. “I knew you hadn’t perished.”

“What?” Joan asked.

“When they claimed you had, I knew you hadn’t,” Qakog said. “I knew a maiden of such might as yours would not allow yourself to be bested so easily. I have waited long for this day, where I could once more prove myself to you. To prove my worthiness of your--”

“DUCK!” Bauteut yelled before knocking them both to the ground and holding up her bracer. A golden shield formed around them, barely in time to stop the titanslayer from landing on them. It ground its talons against the shield, however, trying to pierce through it.

Only for a strange, writhing blob of vines to slam into the creature. It took a moment for the vines to reform into the strange dragon, but a moment later both went careening off of the cliff and down to the ground below. Joan gave a groan, trapped with Qakog under her and Bauteut on top of her. “Ow,” she said.

Qakog gave a low, pained whimper and she realized a moment later why, the fall had driven her knee right into his stomach. Joan shoved Bauteut off before rolling off herself.

“Qakog? Are you okay?” Joan asked.

“Y-yes… take… more than that… to… defeat the… Piercer of… Bark,” Qakog said softly.

Joan gave a light chuckle. Well, at least he’d be fine. She then glanced to Bauteut. “Thanks.”

“Yes, yes,” Bauteut said. “But maybe we should focus on the here and now? And THAT!” She then motioned around them.

Not that Joan could blame her. Three titanslayers, the Demon Lord and dozens of obsidian trolls. Oh, and the Avatar of the Inferno God, a creature that had slain four Chosen. On the up side, the Emerald Dragon wasn’t exactly something the Hero had wanted to fight, so while she wasn’t winning any fight with it, she was at least seemingly able to keep it distracted. At the cost of some scales, burns and blood.

Yet she’d stood here so many times. While the Demon Lord was new, only making things worse, everything else was so familiar. The final envoy of the Inferno God, an unstoppable monster. The obsidian trolls, continuing to return and fight against them. No matter what happened, their numbers couldn’t be stopped, they would overwhelm eventually. That was what they did.

It was a fight they couldn’t win. Yet, despite all that, she couldn’t help but feel that they had. She felt her heart rising when she looked around. Why hadn’t she done this so long ago? Why hadn’t the Hero just ASKED? He had been surrounded by so many amazing creatures, entered so many realms, helped so many. He was the Hero. It was their world just as much as his. Well, except the fae. But fae liked messing with them so it wasn’t like they wanted them dead. Why?

Because it had been his responsibility, his task. Because he felt he was the only one who could. Because only she c…

No, that wasn’t it. Joan stared at the many different creatures fighting all of these threats. All of the people willing to risk their lives for this world. The Hero was arrogant, was an idiot. He had been so, so sure of his own superiority. He’d failed to really understand that people were so different from him. He failed to understand how it felt to truly be weak. All of those things were true.

But despite all that, he’d never felt he was worthy. He had been gifted by the gods and, because of that, he felt it all had to be done by him. That if he didn’t do it, then he failed.

Joan felt that if she had to ask for help from anyone but the Chosen, then she had failed entirely. That if she didn’t personally save the world, that if she didn’t prevent all of this, then she’d failed. Everything would be her fault. Why had she struggled against such an obvious thing for so long? Why hadn’t she realized it was okay for her to NOT bear the entirety of the world on her back at all times?

It was so incredibly obvious and oddly freeing to feel that.

Which was quickly shaken from her mind when the cliff they were on began to rumble.

“Oh, that’s not a good sound,” Zorn said softly.

“No, it’s not! Flickerpuff!” Bauteut said, turning towards the fae.

“What?” the fae asked. “You don’t expect me to teleport all of you, do you?”

“Flickerpuff!” Bauteut yelled, a moment before the cliff collapsed beneath them.

Joan shrieked and hugged Bauteut, holding on as the four of them plummeted to the ground, the fae still hovering in the air above.

Right. THIS was why she hated fae. Almost all of them were jerks. What in the world had--

The pair slammed into the side of the partially collapsed cliff, stone falling around them. She let out a groan before she glanced down and finally caught sight of what had caused the ground to collapse. An obsidian troll. Its massive, flaming fists punched the side of the cliff again, causing another rumble and sending more stone dropping.

“Plan?” Bauteut asked.

“I’m thinking!” Joan said. She could, maybe, handle an obsidian troll, if she was careful. Just one. Except it was quite a distance to fall and she didn’t trust herself to be okay landing like that.

“Jump!” Zorn yelled.

“What?” Bauteut said.

Joan just shrugged, grabbed Bauteut’s arm and jumped, yanking her along. A moment later she saw Qakog and Zorn leap off the side of the cliff as well. Bauteut let out a shriek when she was dragged along, though apparently not a moment too soon. More stone collapsed a moment later, bouncing off the hide of the obsidian troll.

Which was still far below them and coming closer, albeit slowly.

“Ummm…” Joan said before looking to Zorn.

“What?” Zorn asked, holding up a small, silver ring. “I explore a lot of dangerous places, do you think I’m not ready to fall?”

“Why would you just JUMP?” Bauteut asked, glaring at her.

“I mean, he said jump, you have to assume there’s a reason,” Qakog said.

“That, pretty much,” Joan said.

Bauteut let out a groan and put a hand to her forehead. “There’s three of them. I take it back. I quit. I’ll be a farmer.”

“So, what’s the next plan?” Joan asked nervously, eyeing the rapidly approaching troll.

“Next part?” Zorn asked. “We’re not being buried under stone and rubble, this was kind of the plan. I uhhh… was hoping a cliff falling on it would take care of that problem.”

Joan let out a groan. Well… she supposed it was up to her, then. She held out her hand and Guardian Nova appeared in her hand. “Okay. I’ll distract it while the rest of you--”

“Oh no you won’t!” Bauteut snapped, grabbing her arm. “No.”

“But—” Joan said.

“If we’re doing this, we’re doing it together!” Bauteut said.

“But what about--”

“No!” Bauteut said.

“Fine!” Joan yelled. “I’ll distract it and then we can ALL work together to kill it! Happy?”

“No, but that’s probably the best I’ll get,” Bauteut said with a sigh. “Err, how much longer until we land?”

“Uhhhh, about that,” Zorn said, eyeing his ring nervously. “You see, it was meant for… one person.”

Joan groaned the moment their fall began to accelerate. Well, at least she was much closer this time to the troll. “Qakog, catch!” she yelled before she shoved Bauteut straight at him. The demon let out a startled grunt, but to his credit he did catch her.

That was good, if Bauteut landed on him he was at least a lot tougher than her and much softer than the ground. She didn’t have much time to worry about that, as she plummeted at the troll.

Time to see how effective her training had been.

MelodyAvant

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