16. Sadness. Final Edit.
Archer made his way towards the eastern gate after buying a water-skin from a vendor near the old mans meat wrap stall, he barely drank anything and only survived by eating hearts.
But he still wanted to eat and drink normal food.
Speaking of normal food he pulled out 2 wrapped meats and scoffed them down, as he finished he licked the juice off his fingers and exited the gate after telling the guards he is on a quest.
He turned north and walked for hours, an hour into his journey a pack of wild dogs came across him.
Casting cosmic sword and thunder stepping to each dog slicing their heads.
Killing all 6 dogs, he pulled out their hearts but didn't eat them, he stored them alongside the bodies.
Carrying on with his walk until he came across a creepy looking lake.
Tall trees darkened the area.
The water is flat. Empty. Devoid of life and there was no movement what so ever, no birds singing or beasts howling.
A dark forest grew right up to the river bank, branches hanging over the dark water.
Standing on the bank of the river, he stared into the water that looked like the void.
He felt like something was watching him from the river, like a predator waiting to attack.
Archer shook his head and started to look around for wolf clues.
Looking around he found tuffs of wolf fur, picking it up and he smelt it.
His head jerked back as he smelt it.
The nasty smell coming from the fur was that off blood, wet dog and rubbish that's been sitting in the sun for a year.
But he still sniffed it to see if he could track the wolves, once he took in the nasty smell he threw away the fur then started smelling the air.
After 10 minutes of sniffing, he smelt the same foul smell coming from a mile away.
He ran towards the smell, it didn't take him long to reach the source of the rotten smell. There was a pack of 10 wolves relaxing at the edge of the river, a couple of them were keeping watch, making sure nothing sneaks up on the pack.
He smiled as he saw the challenge in front of him.
Casting cosmic sword as he thunder stepped into the middle of the pack and started slashing and piercing, they were startled and bolted away in different directions.
''HAHAHAHAHAHA.''
Archer was laughing as he was killing the wolves with his dance of death, but as he spun around to attack another wolf, his senses warning him but it was to late and a wolf pounced on him bringing him to the ground.
His cosmic sword vanished when it left his hand after getting taken down.
The wolf was biting down on Archer's right arm but the white scales blocked most of the teeth, but some teeth from the wolves lower jaw stabbed into his inner arm making him scream out.
''Ahhhhh.''
The wolf was yanking on his arm, it used it's claws to slash at his chest and stomach, slicing into the areas that didn't have scales protecting them.
Blood squirted all over both of them, as Archer's adrenaline kicked in so he couldn't feel the pain much.
He put his hand on the beasts neck and cast fire missile at it.
The beast yelped as it let go of the boys arm and went to run away but before it could.
It was struck by a purple beam that tore through its body.
The beast dropped to the floor as Archer's hand that was held up fell to the floor.
He had 3 slashes going down his chest, the blood started to slow down and thicken, that's when he felt a skill level up.
[Regeneration: 1>2]
Archer was laying injured on the floor, as he felt the injuries slowly start to stitch together.
The puncture marks on the his inner arm have already closed up and felt better, but the pain didn't go away though.
It felt like someone was pushing hot pokers into his body, after an hour of excruciating pain he felt better.
After recovering for a little while he slowly got up of the ground and cast cleanse on himself.
It cleaned his whole body and clothes but the spell don't repair them.
His sleeve was torn and the chest area was sliced up.
He decided not to change as he only has 2 pairs of shirts and pants left until he could buy more.
Looking around he saw 7 wolf bodies laying around, so 3 escaped.
Archer looked around and caught the same smell coming from the north.
He quickly took out his knife, cut out the hearts and stored them with the bodies into his storage.
After that he followed the smell for a few hours, the afternoon sun cooled him down as he found the last 3 wolves.
He quickly kills them with a plasma shot, loots them and notices something behind the 3 wolves.
Dense fog gathered in the center of the terrain.
Surrounded by rolling hills on each side, a desolate and ruined temple stood isolated and abandoned, the fog slowly creeping towards it.
Tendril, like fingers, clawed their way closer, slowly smothering the open pathway that lead to the entrance of the temple.
The hazel frame of the door had a corner missing, all splintered and fractured from where the mites had been chewing for decades.
The metal of the door handle had eroded with rust and the color had faded from the harsh gold that it once was to a dull grey, each screw had its own swarm of mites, chewing from corner to corner, fighting and competing against the rest.
Gravestones that surround the temple outside from all four sides were standing stationary, helpless and crippled from age, each symbolizing its life through the gentle glimmer of light that was shining softly from above.
Wind was howling, almost creating sounds like the whispers of those who lay beneath. No other sounds except those of Archers feet as he stepped across the moss-covered ground could be heard.
All around, the dead were kept company with statues of mythical dragons, and dragon-kin statues perched comfortably against the old black, wrought fencing covered with old vines.
Stone dragons peering at you as if to keep you away, or perhaps to invite you in.
The temple looked like it was ransacked, statues lay broken on the floor covered by growing plants, Archer could see through the broken wall that there was burnt tapestries still hanging on the walls.
He approached the building with slow steps, when he arrived at the broken doors he pushed them open with a creak.
Entering the large hall, he saw a massive western dragon statue with four massive limbs, but its head missing, getting closer he saw the dragons head laying on the floor further away from the statue.
Looking at this scene, old memories flooded back to him from the previous Archer.
This is the one of the temples of the Dragon Goddess Tiamat, she was the protector of the dragon race and all the dragon subspecies.
Decades ago there was the last Draconic-Aliance war, the dragons were defeated and vanished, while the dragon-kin turned into nomads searching for a new home.
Archer thought to himself.
'Makes sense that mother was in the Avalon Empire, they are a mixed empire and the people don't care what race you are.
He shifted through all the memories he had filed away in his brain and learned that the God of light Darikha, had hated Tiamat with a passion for some unknown reason and encouraged his followers to go on crusades against all of dragon kind.
They are called The Followers Of The Light.
The years following the start of the war, many kingdoms and empires joined the Church in their prosecution of all dragon kind.
All types of dragons fell in the 1000s over the decades until the dragon race was left as a shadow of their former selves.
Over 5000 years ago, the first draconic-alliance war erupted when the knights of a certain kingdom forgotten to time tried to target a dragon princess for a ritual.
After finding out what they tried to do, the white dragon King Kyndrah burnt the kingdom to ashes and burned any allied nations who stood by them with his violet flames.
The king bathed in the blood of the god of lights followers, his rage lasted weeks until none stood in his way,
He steamrolled across the continent and ushered in a time of wings and fire.
Followers Of The Light went into hiding alongside the knights who fled for their fallen kingdoms, until 5000 years later when they enacted their revenge and brought the infamous dragons to their knees by raising 100s of crusades against them non-stop until the dragons finally fell and their people butchered.
The survivors fled to the northern wilds to roam as nomads, some adventurous dragon-kin managed to make a place for themselves in different kingdoms thanks to their fighting prowess.
Archer thought religion was rather simple in this world, their are many gods and goddesses, all representing different things such as, love, war, home and conquest.
There's loads of temples all over the world, where worshippers can pray to their chosen God/Goddesses.
But at the time the God of light ordered all the dragon temples be destroyed.
Looking at the big hall, Archer left with a deep sense of sadness spreading within him.
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