Odyssey of the Guardian Emperor

Alaric found himself at the edge of the Stone Gate demiplane, staring at a churning wall of destructive wind just begging to rip something to pieces.

From the city, it mimicked a clear sky kissing the earth, but here, the illusion shattered. The paved path faded into barren rock, stopping short of a storm that hovered inches above the ground, its winds thick with raw aether.

Thunder boomed and lightning flashed, lighting up the dark interior of the storm filled with dust, destruction, and a thousand ways to be ripped to shreds.

The boy swallowed, "I… didn't realise there was another exit."

LionHeart's eyes went wide as saucers, "You call that an exit? I doubt Four-Star armour can get anyone through that… meat-grinder."

Alaric was well aware that his armour, as well as LionHeart's, was a high-tier Two-Star armament. Powerful, yet they paled in comparison to the vortex ahead of them.

"Oh, don't worry, LionHeart. We'll be fine. How hard can it be to find a portal in there? As long as we follow Morn'ak's instructions, right?" Alaric answered, stepping off the paved street and inching towards the storm. At a distance, it looked suicidal, but Alaric was curious enough to get closer for another look.

'Is it just me, or is the Storm floating above the ground?' he wondered, taking yet another step closer.

"I'm more worried about Morn'ak's instructions being off," LionHeart shuddered.

Alaric rolled his eyes at the remark, "We'll be fine, LionHeart."

[ Aslan will pull you out when the storm gets you. ] Alia's voice filtered through with a chuckle.

[ WHEN?!!! ] This exclamation made the guardian crack up more. She offered him no solace.

LionHeart looked around, conflicted about braving the storm. The big sword hanging on his back, courtesy of the forge masters of the Steel District, didn't make him any more confident.

What Alaric didn't say was that he was also unsure about the accuracy of Mornak's words. It was the reason he was being this careful. He put his hand out as they breached the storm, lightly circulating aether through his body to keep himself from flying off.

Gritting his teeth, an odd sensation overtook his body as everything inside him began to itch and tingle like hot water down a parched throat. He hadn't circulated aether in a while, and it was painful to try, but he did it anyway.

Crouching, he got closer to the still air between the ground and the hovering storm and placed a hand through. For a brief moment, he expected the wind to snatch him right up into the twister, but nothing happened. He was still okay.

A spark of hope ignited in his eyes like a bonfire, urging him forward. One foot in, he realised Morn'ak was onto something and stepped through entirely, staying close to the ground.

LionHeart did the same, following the old Spinmaster's instructions to stay close to the ground while they walked in. Alaric closed his eyes on instinct, but soon realised there was no dust hitting him.

Opening them, he looked around, trying his best to ignore the lightning and howling wind. His clothes stuck to his body against the wind, but no matter how hard it blew, not an inch of cold went through.

'Elemental resistance!' he noted, 'Neat.'

A shuffle close to Alaric told him his guard had caught up, crouching beside him, "Where to?"

Alaric looked around, ignoring the fact that they were casually crouching in a storm powerful enough to destroy buildings and uproot large oak trees.

A bright glint caught his eye in the distance. With a squint, he could tell it was something metallic floating above the barren stone ground, and it was most likely where they were headed.

"Follow the markers," Alaric pointed out to the dim glint. The wind howled around them and above them, shrieking with cracks of thunder in the distance. Alaric couldn't make anything out in the darkness of the storm except for the constant metallic glint in the distance, so he pressed forward with his friend, staying low to the ground against his protesting muscles.

They reached the metallic glint only for it to go out, highlighting another in the distance. Following the markers, they forged deeper into the colossal tempest.

Ten minutes passed before they came across a large blue rift torn into the very centre of the storm, surrounded by a dome of stillness.

Cut into the storm, the portal stood tall, a giant blue archway held together by powerful winds prying space open and keeping it from collapsing in on itself. Aether poured out of the portal in torrents, sending shivers down Alaric's spine.

Before they could walk through it, however, the portal lit up, bathing them in blue light, and someone walked out of it. He was dressed in baggy clothes with a scarf around his dark green hair. In front of him, he pushed what looked like an old wooden cart.

The cart wasn't the important part, though. It was what was inside it. Alaric saw what looked like feathers and blue pellets—pellets glowing a blue colour much like the ones he saw embedded into the nests of Heaven-Crested eagles.

He locked eyes with the man, and his breath hitched. His hair was a different colour from what he remembered, but it was a face he couldn't forget. "Par'al."

Par'al stared at Alaric with a neutral expression, "So you were planning on running this whole time?"

"Running?" the boy tilted his head, "No way. I came to get feathers for a Spinmaster. She ran out of them. Though, to be honest, I'd like some instruction on how to get them. I'm not exactly a professional."

Par'al put down the cart and came up to Alaric, stopping only when their noses were nearly touching, "You're the esteemed guest of the High Sentinel. You expect me to believe you came here to do casual labour?"

Alaric held his serious face for a short time before breaking into a grin, "Yes."

The green-haired male huffed and turned back to the portal, "Take those. I'll just go get more."

"No way. I want to come," Alaric responded and dashed past Par'al without giving him a choice in the matter. LionHeart shrugged his shoulders as he walked past the visibly irritated demihuman.

On the other side of the portal, Alaric found himself on the absolute outer edge of the storm. This close to the wall of the storm, Alaric caught a glimpse of how the valley led into it, like a spiral of mountain ranges shaped the way water went down a funnel.

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LionHeart and Par'al came out moments later.

Nests littered the wide valley floor, each of them harbouring the familiar Heaven-Crested Eagles. Alaric saw eagles take flight, some evidently yawning from not wanting to get up in the morning.

A lively group perched at the distant top of the mountain, adults surrounding young fledglings who were not too thrilled to be up there learning how to fly.

More eagles were just returning, hauling early morning catches and dumping them into nests full of young ones. It was a cacophony of life that made a beaming smile bloom on Alaric's face.

Par'al saw this and merely rolled his eyes, "Stay here, and don't touch anything."

Not far from where the portal had placed them, three wooden carts were randomly strewn about. Par'al grabbed the handles of one and pushed it into the valley, picking feathers he found on the ground and dislodging a few pellets he found poking out of nests. The other eagles generally ignored him while he did his work. He did, however, bow slightly every time he was going to pick glowing pellets from the nests.

Alaric noted the pattern and picked a cart of his own. LionHeart's eyes widened. "Hey, Alaric, what are you doing?"

"Helping."

"He told us not to…" LionHeart had just started when Alaric lifted the cart and gasped. Enchantments roared to life in response to his touch, channelling a controlled gale of wind around the cart. Alaric marvelled at the safety enchantments as he pushed the cart deeper into the valley, cruising right past Par'al.

The green-haired demihuman glared at the stubborn human as he came to a stop a few nests away and bowed low.

"Sentinel of the Stone Gate. Might you allow me the privilege of taking one of your blue pellets?" Alaric declared in the Old Tongue.

The eagle inside tilted an eye at him before growling lowly, "You…"

Alaric lifted his eyes to see an Eagle, white as snow, with barely a fleck of gold in its feathers, glaring down at him. The aether in his feathers pulsed weakly, and from the way the air shifted, he could tell the eagle was angry.

His gut didn't react, and yet his heart beat faster at the sight of feathers rising around the eagle's neck, its eyes red with rage. Alaric took a step back and swallowed, stammering in the Old Tongue, "H-Have we met?"

"You are the reason I will never evolve," the Eagle screeched.

A large clawed foot stepped onto the edge of the nest as a golden beak came down to stare Alaric in the eye. From this close, the hooked beak looked large and sharp enough to tear Alaric's skull open with ease, and yet he stood there staring.

"I… I don't think I follow," Alaric replied.

A hand suddenly rubbed the creature's beak, admitting Par'al's presence to the scene. Alaric's relief was short-lived as a shocking realisation struck him. They were speaking in the Old Tongue, which meant everything that had just been said was true.

Alaric really was the reason the Eagle wouldn't get to evolve. Either that or the Eagle somehow had reason to believe that he was behind whatever bottleneck he was experiencing. But what had Alaric done to cause such a thing?

"Par'al, what's the meaning of this?" he breathed, desperate for answers.

The green-haired demihuman, seemingly unbothered, asked, "Meaning of what?"

"He said he'll never evolve because of me. What's that supposed to mean?" Alaric snapped at the demihuman.

Par'al looked at him for a bit, his eyebrows knitting with fascination before he scoffed, "You don't know, do you?"

"Don't know what?" Alaric asked. What was he supposed to know when this was the first time he was laying his eyes on this specific Heaven-Crested Eagle? It was hard to tell Aether Beasts apart, but Alaric made an effort to find distinctive features, and this one he'd never met.

"What happened during that ancient spell of yours—the Storm Shield?" The boy's blank expression was more than enough to tell Par'al how clueless he was, "You sucked so much aether out of our air, you practically drained some of the Heaven-Crested Eagles in the process. Most of them were able to regenerate the aether, but some… were not that lucky."

"I didn't…" Alaric paled. What was this man talking about? He remembered sucking aether from the air during that spell, but there had been no side effects. "Why didn't anyone tell me this? I pushed Dara'k out of the way before doing that to prevent such a thing from happening."

"Ah, so that's why you jumped off the Eagle. I thought you were just showing off your ability to fly," Par'al chuckled, "What can you do about it though? What's done is done."

Alaric shifted his attention to the near-white eagle glaring behind Par'al, "If I took it away, can't I fix it?"

The man chuckled, "If it were that simple, we'd all be Saints. Everyone knows aether can't be given. It's earned. Our kind does this through flight and storm. He will have to challenge the storm for at least five years if he's dedicated."

Alaric stared back at the storm blowing not far from them. It went up all the way to the sky, standing like a pillar in the centre of the Barren Mountains, churning the clouds above. 'Challenge… that?'

Par'al turned to the eagle and spoke in the Old Tongue, "I'm sorry for what happened to you on that day. I'm sure I can get the High Sentinel to compensate you."

"I don't need compensation, Par'al," the Eagle's voice boomed, his feathers rising. The eagle flapped its wings with one powerful jump and was airborne, the air stirring chaotically. A dome of calm surrounded the trio as they stared up at the beast circling them.

Before LionHeart could retrieve his blade, Alaric put a hand on him and shook his head. They weren't here to stir up more trouble.

Alaric raised his voice, "Have you seen one of your kind called Dara'k?"

A growl echoed through the mountain, "The fledgling that challenges the storm every day… Everyone knows him."

Alaric nodded, "When I left the Barren Mountains, his aether had grown a lot more potent than I found him. Maybe he could tell you how he's doing it."

Par'al's narrowed his eyes, "Now that you mention it…"

LionHeart's dark chuckle cut everyone off. This time, he pulled out the large greatsword on his back and pointed it upwards, "My Old Tongue is rusty, but even I understand what's happening here. Tell that Eagle to stand down, or I'll make him."

Par'al smirked, locking eyes with the circling white eagle, "The big human says you should leave them be or he'll carve you up real good."

Alaric turned to Par'al, "What do you think you're doing?"

The demihuman shrugged, "What can I say? I love a good fight."

No sooner had he said that than the world shook with the shrill screech of the white Heaven-Crested Eagle, "I will skin you humans down to your bones and feed them to the storm."

Par'al grinned, "Don't die, Guardian Emperor."

And with that, the protective dome of wind he'd been maintaining vanished. Alaric's gut reacted for the first time, but before he could move, LionHeart had launched into the sky.

A tear in the sky welcomed a white winged lion shooting for the sky right below him. More Eagles rose into the air, their wings beating like bees from a hive, rising all around them in brilliant shades of white, and almost no gold in sight.

'All of them?' Alaric paled.

LionHeart's sword struck the air in front of him and with it, unleashed a wave of wind that detonated half a second later. The explosive attack plucked a large swath of eagles out of the sky.

A moment later, a crack of thunder shook the Barren Mountains before a loud screech brought everything to a standstill.

Gold flashed, as something too fast to follow shot out of the storm. Aether washed into the valley in great torrents, giving Alaric the strongest sense of nostalgia he'd felt in a while. He followed the gold streak as it shot about in a circle around LionHeart.

The white lion descended, drawing its claws and growling at the golden streak. The flying bundle of gold flew about the trio in a circle from which a tempest was born. The golden eagle clapped its wings at once and sent the tempest outward in a powerful wave.

The attack sent all the eagles careening out of the sky, fighting to stay in the air. The wind didn't listen to them, and no matter how hard they flapped their wings, they descended. Some landed on their feet while others crashed into the mountain sides unceremoniously.

The creature of gold landed behind the trio with a heavy thud. Alaric's heart was thundering in his chest, and he stayed completely still as the bird approached them. It slowly circled them, bringing its head low to meet Alaric's green eyes with golden ones, sending a chill down the boy's spine.

His rainbow crest, and body included, had grown a lot larger, and the bestial look in his eye reminded him of the High Sentinel—powerful and unforgiving.

"It's been a while," Dara'k's voice rumbled in the Old Tongue.

Before Alaric could respond, Dara'k's eyes cringed, and he started coughing violently. The coughing turned to choking, and before long, the massive beast was wheezing for its life.

Par'al approached the wheezing Eagle and started rubbing a hand through the feathers on his back, "That's what you get for ignoring your storm sac while challenging the storm."

Alaric watched with a pale expression as the Eagle fought with something in its throat. Just when it looked like Dara'k would pass out, something shot out of his beak and crashed into the ground, glowing a furious blue.

It was a pellet—a large one, too.

…silence…

"Wait…" Alaric's jaw dropped, and his face went even paler. "That's where pellets come from?"

Dara'k lowered himself to the ground, panting, "It's good to see you, too."