Face of Eternity : The Little Angel

What was once a frozen village of inactivity was now full of energy once more. Not because we'd freed its cold preserved people, but because Indena and I were running for our lives from a cloud of sublimation that vaguely resembled a dragon.

The chilling blast of a cold breath attack rained down on us, only missing by a hair’s length as we dashed across the village to find safety.

“Why did you have to remember a dragon attacking?!” I yelled at the currently tiny Indena.

“Oh yeah, I totally did it on purpose!”

This crazy situation did confirm one thing. Whatever dream reality we were in was based on her memory of the event. Anything she didn’t know or couldn't recall properly was not present here.

The cloudy dragon was an example of that. Indena didn’t exactly remember what he looked like, so he was just kind of a blur flying around. His monstrous cries and attacks were very real though.

“Couldn't you have remembered it as a giant teddy bear who gives warm hugs or something?” As I said that, the stupidity of the statement hit me like frostbite.

“Sure. I’ll get back to you on that when I see it in my nightmares.”

Patches of ice over the roads hindered us as we slipped across them. It took a few moments, but I realized an alternative way of getting through these chilly streets.

“Up you go!” I scooped her up in my arms and threw her over my back in a piggy back.

“Wooah!” She uttered, adjusting until she was holding on tight. “What's the plan here?”

I lifted up my right foot and grew a blade of stardust on the sole of my shoe, creating a makeshift ice skate. I then did the same to my other foot too.

“Are you serious?” Indena questioned. “You’re skating us out of this mess?”

“Just don't tell a joke. We don't want the ice cracking up while I'm on it!”

“I hope the dragon eats you for that one.” I’d never heard a more livid tone come out of her mouth.

With morale raised, and the foggy ice dragon swooping down for a cold claw at us, I used my wings to give us some motion forward. I'd never skated before, so finding my balance took some trial and error. Thankfully my wings were more than generously able to keep me from falling over.

Once I got the hang of this, our speed and maneuverability effectively doubled. It might have been fun if we weren’t in a life or death situation.

The foggy dragon fired off another icy breath attack, but I easily dodged thanks to the movement these skates afforded me. His ability to track us with that attack was really good, but we were just a few steps ahead and kept a good distance.

Rather than continue to fruitlessly breath a chilly wind our way, he swooped over our heads and hail rained down on us. It wasn’t just tiny pebbles. We were getting pelted with some pretty sharp pieces. He might as well have been dropping knives.

“Flame Wall!” I announced, motioning my hands upwards to catch the pieces of razor ice in the melting heat.

As both the hail and flame cleared, I noticed something was actually on top of the foggy dragon. It wasn't obvious in all that haze, but now I was getting a good look at it as it swooped around to try and attack again. It was the silhouette of a person, but one that had really unnaturally long proportions…

I recognized that thing. It was one of the demons that I faced back at the Longitude Point tower. The demon lord must have been sending him to finish us off.

It wasn’t just the one riding the dragon though. Those lanky freaks were breaking free of those blocks of ice scattered around in the streets… The ones trapping people within.

-Lesser Nephilim identified! Tagged; Foe-

“Nephilim, huh?” I uttered as I skated around one. “Slow, but creepy.”

“They're not slow!” Indena pointed. “Look!”

A few of them had grown bat-like wings and were flying at us faster than the dragon.

“Oh come on!”

I'd already hit my max speeds while skating, so I needed to take flight if I wanted to go any faster. But my wings were still affected by all the damage I took before.

It didn’t make sense. Dreams are supposed to defy reality, and so far that really hasn’t been the case to our benefit. Humans could fly in them if they wanted, even without wings. It was absurd to think an exceed like me couldn’t do the same.

“Screw it!” If this was a dream, I could do anything I wanted!

As belief in my abilities started overtaking my mind, washing away the doubt, my wings started to tingle. The tinglier they felt, the easier it was to move them the way I needed.

Finally, one good wave of them shot me right up into the air! I could take flight once more.

“Yes!” I cheered, flying up at crazy fast speeds.

“Woah!” Indena cheered in the cutest baby voice I'd ever heard. “Awesome!”

The Nephilim were dominating the dog fight scene up high, but only until another creature joined the battle… A giant crow.

As it swooped past the dark creatures, its feathers brightened like the sun, more than enough to temporarily frighten the demons away, some were even destroyed.

“Friend or foe?” I turned my head back to Indena.

“I gotta’ good feeling about this one.”

The crow was massive, not quite the size of the dragon, but still big enough to not be normal. His three legs were also a feature of interest.

“Follow,” instructed the crow.

Without any other options, I followed the crow closely, gliding along in his tail wind to ease the burden of flight. He took us a few kilometers away from the village, all the way to the top of a hill where some sort of shrine grounds were.

He flew through a red wooden archway, which appeared to be the entrance into those grounds.

“Stop,” he ordered as I was about to follow him in.

Indena got off my back and we both cautiously approached the red archway.

“Thank you for saving us back there,” I said, but the bird did not reply to my gratitude.

“Neither of you should be here.” He turned and gave me a particularly disapproving look. “Especially you, child of Hyam. Do not mistake my aid for approval.”

He called me something very similar to what Melpomene did. The hostility though was disconcerting.

“Why aren’t we allowed?” I asked.

“The wall between dream and reality has been blurred. Your fight is elsewhere. Do not bring it here to an already torn land.

“Why is she especially not welcome?” Indena asked.

“Because her god is no friend of ours.”

“God?” my eyes widened. Is that who Hyam was?

The crow made a gesture with his wing for us to pass through the red archway. A hint of strobing lights scattered around the inside of it, forming what seemed to be a translucent portal.

“Because you aided Hanako, you will be allowed to leave. Pass through the torii gate and be sent home. But tread carefully, for you are not welcome here in the home of the gods.”

Indena and I both shared a look, then nodded, knowing this was our only way back to Verrenville.

We were about to walk under the gate, but the crow stopped us.

“Pick a side of the gate to enter in and bow before passing. This will show you respect the god’s domain”

“Seriously?” Indena mumbled, letting out a sigh. “Guess we have no choice.”

We both chose the right side and bowed as the crow instructed, showing clear respect to a place we weren’t welcomed in. This apparently found favour with whoever was in control, because they allowed us through.

As we passed under the torii gate, our surroundings immediately looked more familiar, but not exactly in a good way.

We’d been transported back to Verrenville, or what seemed like Verrenville at first.

It was clearly daytime, but the sky looked starry, like twilight. A commit slowly hurdled across it and an oversized version of the twin moons on the horizon. Buildings were significantly less demonic, but lush green trees were growing out of them, as if the town had been overtaken by nature. It also looked like some of the buildings were missing, leaving big gaps between the ones still present.

Just ahead of us was a building with large stone columns in the front of it, something I’d expect a government to run out of.

“Did he pull a fast one on us?” Indena asked.

“We're definitely back…” I shrugged.

I kept looking around but didn’t see the demon fortress anywhere nearby. Something was very wrong.

My eyes darted to a person walking down the crumbly looking street. It was a skinny guy who wore a familiar blue coat and marched along as if it were any other day.

“Why would father summon me this early?” he mumbled to himself. “The debate is in a few hours. I hope he doesn't have bad news...” He sighed, giving the air a very distressed cringe.

“Marek, it’s you!” I ran up to him, but he just walked past me, like he didn't even know I was there. “Marek?” I called his name again, but to no avail.

He ignored Indena too. He must not have seen us, but we followed him into the building anyway.