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Xiciro couldn't believe what he was hearing.

It felt like time stopped or skipped without him knowing. Just an hour ago, he was talking with Erakor with a wealth of knowledge lost to Western history, all with smiles, laughs, and dirty jokes.

Now, he heard that his new friend was killed by the gate of Nia Baleth, and an army of dragon slayers were marching towards them. He quickly opened a portal to appear near Erakor's body. Fury and rage fueled him as he walked towards Erakor's body and triggered a trap in the form of magic circle. But nothing happened.

"I will not let them desecrate his corpse," said Xiciro to an Argoon. He then turned towards a healer and said, "How's the library?"

"Some dragons have gone there to see if anything is missing or damaged. Fortunately none of that happened."

"Good." Some Argoons kept their distance from Xiciro, a Western Outsider. Some would thought that they were suspecting him, but they saw his genuine anger and pain as he examined Erakor's body.

"A dragon did this to him," said Xiciro. "A dragon that has betrayed you all to the enemy. He killed Erakor to undo the temporal shield around Nia Baleth."

"Which of us did that?!"

"I suspected anyone that had ever been inside the library and knew the secret of the shield. I would be one of those suspects, but I was in Avet's room when Erakor was found killed. You can talk to the healer tending to him in there. Avila is out of it because she didn't know the secret, do you, my dear?"

Avila said 'no', but then she could sense some dragons were doubting her, but were too scared to doubt Xiciro. Somehow, he had the most influence from all of them, despite of being an outsider. Avila wanted to think that he was using a fear ability, but it was genuine anger, something that he had never seen him did before. And also, for that matter, she had never seen her father so angry before.

"This is not the time to mourn," said Mitra appearing by the crowd. "All of you, take position to fight. You may not be fighters, but you know how to fight as a dragon. The army is big, and there are dragons with them. Anyone capable will protect the library. The place is the treasure of this place and it must not be harmed! Helox, Lokan, on me. Avila, you're on the frontline. The rest of you, to your station. This is not a drill!"

Avila was more concerned on Xiciro. She knew him as someone that's calm and collected. As vile as he was, he would never lose control. Then something came to her mind.

Could it be that Avila realized that he was her father made Xiciro prone to emotions? It was too far to be true, but it was a possibility.

By nighttime, the army and its dragon could be seen by the horizon. It was a bigger army than what they thought it would be. More dragons filled the sky and blocked the stars and moon, and dragon slayers wearing foul armor coated with anti-dragon magic and weapons that could easily pierce their scales were shown to make the Argoons less sure. Fortunately, dragons like Mitra managed to keep order (the Argoons had never had any war before, unlike the West). Avila was concerned that some young dragons would be traumatic enough to kill. It was true that dragons were supposed to see each other like untrustworthy and would always expected their closest kin to die either in combat or accidents, but the Argoons were just like civilized humans. They never saw any combat and was living in a relative comfort of isolation.

But something awakened from their slumber and initiated the attack from inside. Whatever they were, Avila could not forgive them. She wanted to find quite life, but war came to her.

Just as the army was nearing the gate, the dragons they enslaved flew over the city and breathe fire towards the dragons. For the Argoons, it was nothing serious since they could use their darkness, but then they realized what's wrong. The dragons were distracting some of the dragons to go to the hatchery and the library. Some dragons planted inside the city started to slaughter some dragons and start a fire. Avila was surprised on how they could be inside the city, until she realized that they were Argoons, too.

Suddenly, everything turned to chaos as dragons clashed with each other, unable to be certain on allies and enemies. Avila realized that Nia Baleth was invaded before a fight could happen, just like what happened in Xici Kingdom. It was so stupid of her, thinking that the city was different.

What's worse was, while they were distracted, the humans started to attack them, weapons drawn. Some dragons that had been distracted by a dragon was easily subdued or killed by the dreaded weapons. It was a chaos and slaughter.

Suddenly, Xiciro flew towards the main army. Avila saw this and said, "What the hell are you doing?!"

"Do not stop me, Avila!"

Despite of her warning, Xiciro landed and walked towards the dragon slayers. The slayers wanted to attack him, but they were all killed without being able to attack him. Even then, it didn't falter some of them and they came out with heavy weapon to fight him. He started to run, even though one of his legs were literally bones. Rage was in his eyes and he roared as he enhanced his claws to maul all the small humans into minced meat. The Argoons saw this and was surprised on how much rage the dragon had. Mitra looked at him and said, "What a fucking lunatic!"

"Concentrate on the dragons! We'll deal with the humans!" exclaimed Avila. She ran towards the gate's front and twirled as she lashed her tail. She roared as some of the humans were cut in half by something sharp. The expression of genuine fear and disbelief were painted on their faces and was apparent to a small-sized dragon like Avila.

Mitra quickly joined her, despite of her insistence. She used her dark ability, but it didn't have any effect on them. Avila then showed her how it was done: cutting many in half.

"It seems you have seen this kind of fight before!"

"I've fought these humans all my life."

"And you are 100 years younger than me! I think I understand why you think Argoons are a warrior race. You two are fucking lunatics!"

"I'll take that as a compliment. Mitra, I cannot fight all those dragons all by myself. Do you think you can fight them for me? I'll hold the fort."

"Leave it to me!"

As she flew away, some humans, clearly scared on what she could do, ran towards her and tried to stab her. She stopped them with air pressure, and willed the pressure to push outward, sending them hurtling back to their attacker.

"Even after a hundred years have passed, you still use the same tactic? How boring," said Avila. She proceeded to pour out her own rage of losing Seraphor, and her desire to meet with him again, and fueling her fear ability. She looked at the army and said, "Leave, or taste despair."

Meanwhile, Avet was trying to get out of his room when a red dragon came to him and said "Traitor!" and made a stance to pounce him. Avet realized that with his weakened condition, he couldn't move fast enough. Yet, at that moment, he saw the dragon was crushed under an apparent weight.

"W-what? What is this?!"

"Don't ask me!"

At that moment, Avet realized that he was the one using a darkness ability, with gravity type in it. He never thought it would happen.

"Uh...of all the things...why am I so weak against a traitor? Fight me!"

"Well, I don't need to, apparently," said Avet, smiling sinisterly. "In fact, you're fucked."

Avet moved towards the dragon's head and bite the side of his neck. He was roaring and writhing, but unable to move. Avet, despite of his injuries, pulled a chunk of the dragon's throat out and spit it away, and looked as the dragon sprayed blood and gurgling, looking at him in rage. He then died.

"Unlike them, I know how to fight your style," said Avet. "Gravity just helped me. See ya on the dark side."

Avet walked away from the corpse of the dragon he killed and looked at the carnage unfolding in front of him. He looked at it in pure terror, and come to realization that it was not a dream. Nia Baleth, after 2000 years of peace and isolation, was invaded.

What's strange in that spectacle was the lack of humans. The dragon slaves were the one attacking them, but the dragon slayers were not even sighted within Nia Baleth. Just as he wanted to find it did he found the two dragons that protected him fought the humans themselves. They looked like they had an experience in doing so, with so many of the dragon slayers either dying or running away. But then, another strange thing happened there, too. Avila had virtually no wound and any humans trying to attack her either lost their confidence or flee, or just plainly killed by her. Xiciro, on the other hand, was more direct and fought like a savage dragon. It looked like he was so mad.

Avet joined them and helped support Avila by causing gravity to act against the human. He looked at her and said, "What the hell is your father doing?!"

"Don't talk to me, help him! I don't know what the hell is going on but his mind is clearly clouded by anger."

"Angry for what?"

"Erakor was killed by a traitor among you. I'll explain later. For now, help him. He's injured by the weapons more than a dragon. By now..."

Avila stopped mid-sentence, not wanting to talk about death after realizing that her father was her former enemy by this point. She grimaced and said, "Just help him." Avet understood, and he helped Xiciro. By this point the dragon had expended all his energy and was struggling to even stand with his leg. Without the dark magic sustaining it, the bone leg he had could not support his weight, and it was already out. The moment it was out, he would lose. Avet did not want to see a reunion turned into a bittersweet farewell, so he helped, with the new use of his darkness type. He didn't care about control. All he wanted was to help Xiciro.

He managed to triple the weight of the slayers around Xiciro and reached the dragon with ease. Aside from bruises from being bludgeoned by rocks, Xiciro was also stabbed in many places, with some of the weapons lodged in him. He was clearly affected by the magic imbued in the weapons, but he was still standing. He then noticed Avet, and said, "Oh, care to join us?"

"This isn't like you. What's wrong?"

Xiciro's expression became solemn, giving concern to Avet. He then looked towards the gate. Avet gasped as he saw the body of the dragon he regarded as an elder.

"By my forefathers..."

"Erakor may be an old dragon, but he's far from invalid," said Xiciro. "It is clearly a dragon that killed him. These weapons are not as effective for Argoons...except if it goes directly to your heart."

But even after saying those, Xiciro still spitted out blood and was trembling. Avet wanted to support him, but he said, "No need for that. I am fine by myself."

"You're definitely not fine! Xiciro, those magic weapons are still lethal!"

"I said I'm fine."

"Is this because of the elder? Look, I'm sorry for the old one's death, but you cannot lose your cool just because of that. Hey!"

Xiciro smiled to him and flew away towards Nia Baleth, presumably to fight the dragons invading the city. Avet stomped his front leg and said, "Bloody hell..."

He wanted to turn towards Avila, but she had finished her job splendidly. If there was an army that can instill fear to the enemy, they had one in the form of Avila. It was as if the reason for the failed skirmish by the Dragonsbane was all because of her return. He shuddered on the thought the dragon as his enemy.

Even then, she was not better than Xiciro. Like what she did with the red dragon contact Avet had, he was questioning a human, yet because her brain wasn't as strong as a dragon's the dragon slayer could not even muster a strength to fight her.

All Avet could do was to say, "Avila!" Fortunately, the female Argoon stopped what she was doing and said, "What?"

"You've won! There's no need to torture that human."

"I know...but I haven't got the answer to the way to get into the dragon prison," said Avila throwing away the already dead slayer. "Fuck!"

"Whoa, I thought Western are cool gentledragons."

"Do I look like one?"

"There's no time to talk about it, isn't it? Anyway, you are needed back in Nia Baleth."

Avila assessed the situation and said, "I don't need to do anything. They are all reliable. I'm more concerned on my father."

"Xiciro...what did the elder said to him to make him that angry?"

"I can say they've become best of friends after three days. Xiciro had never lost his cool before. One time he did that was when he was confessing on...oh, fuck."

"What is it?"

"If he's my father then...damn, I hate to admit it, but my friend is actually my mother now."

The fight was over after five hours of fighting, with death counts in both sides. There was another reinforcement coming to fight for Nia Baleth, but they were quickly defeated. Nia Baleth had never experienced such loss before, and it was a big blow towards the close-knit community. Those with capability to fight helped bolster defenses, and until the new elder was chosen, the place would be vulnerable from attacks since they were in the middle of many dragon camps and dragon slayer bases. Dragonsbane was not a place for dragons and was inhospitable, but the Argoons assured Avila that it was okay.

The problem was Xiciro. Despite of his strong exterior, he was actually dying inside. Losing a new friend soon after knowing him was harsh, even for a dragon. Avila had learned it the hard way and chose not to associate herself more than necessary, except if they were able to survive longer than she thought. Xiciro could be a dangerous dragon if provoked, but it also turned him into a reckless and suicidal dragon.

In the end, he was partially cured with Avila's Emero Carought (after a guide from Xiciro), but he couldn't use darkness for a while and was forced to rest. Avila wasn't sure why Xiciro did that, until she found it when he was mumbling, something so out of character for him that Avila had no other choice but to listen.

She couldn't hear much of what he's mumbling about, but she heard the word "Avila" many times. Of course, she was thinking that Xiciro was referring to her, and had been thinking about her for a while. But then, when she managed to hear some words, she was so surprised she couldn't help it but gasp.

"I can't protect our child. I'm so sorry...Avila..."

Thoughts raced through Avila's mind, until the Argoon realized which dragon he was referring to.

Avila was not her own name, but her mother's, too.