At the Summit of Apocrypha

Across a field bordered by magnificent arches of eldritch architecture and crowded by monsters of slimy black skin and others draped in tentacles and weed-like garments, two women looked over them contemptuously and went to war.

One woman, with hair resembling golden rivers of honey, refused to allow the beginner of Solsteim's struggle to save their free will to focus on the object of her affections. With a shout that would have cleared the clouds if the sky had them, blowing back the frontlines of their inhuman foes several feet.

"YOUR OPPONENT IS ME! AKAA SVIIR DIIN SEYAAS!"

As the shout suggested, 'Mantle of Dragons Arrive Upon Me', Yuri and Ally had used their time and practice in the Draconic Language to create their own Dragon Aspect shout. But what Herma couldn't help but note out loud was that she did not feel like any dragon he knew of.

With a burst of regal blue and gold light, Alera was concealed from the crowd momentarily and allowed her sister-wife to slip into the fray undetected just as Hell intended. When the light receded, Alera was hardly human.

"What the hell kind of Dragon is that, Null?!" Herma was startled enough to hurry the pace of his speech pattern.

"The True variety," He motioned cryptically while letting a smile let loose from his face. The Sigil on his right hand shone with a powerful blue glow.

Her hands didn't grow much bigger, but they were the most menacing among the host of beasts before her, wrapped in scales of ocean blue inlaid with golden bone to make her outer layer seamless, gleaming claws that rend steel propelled themselves from her fingertips prominently but didn't grow long enough to hinder the grip on her prized blade. This scale pattern stretched across her appendages and up to her neck while her chest area was guarded by a complete gold breastplate of a similar pattern and a single green gem in the center. A massive tail grew from her tailbone and extended behind her for over four feet before ending in a gold-wrapped spear tip. Horns grew from her forehead and twisted up symmetrically while forking out and closed over her skull to protect like antlers and adorn like a crown. Her blue eyes flashed like precious diamonds and her pupil narrowed predatorily into an elliptical slit.

{Similar to the Baal Djinn Equip of Sinbad, if you want a reference. Picture of that here}

Alera may not be able to detect Toni harvesting lives in this crowd, but with the bond, she felt her and avoided her direction before making this attack.

"IHR KRADAS KADUUR!!!"

True Dragons don't typically chant to attack specifically if they can avoid it, but this Record encouraged it and gave it extra weight. The word in Draconic for fire is Ihr, and is also the same word for wrath or in some cases, heart. Mixed with her True Dragon Mantle, the fire gained new life.

Tempestuous, yet directed in a steadfast and unwavering stream, the Fire gained a blue tint and from her mouth, a torrent was born. Inside the stream, the shadows of the enemy were quickly extinguished as they turned to ashes and blue cinders flashed from the swirling chaos to give those who were spared a taste of the burn. From a single spark, arms and limbs were taken and the wailing monsters parted like the Red Sea to avoid what Alera could move with a simple tilt of her head.

Miraak clenched his fist tightly and glared from beneath his mask, forced to admit the most present danger. He gave one last glance above his head to the bastard who casually loomed over him with the man, nay, the creature who tried to bind him in a lifetime of servitude. But Miraak believed Fate could be wrenched from the hands of gods, and killing the Dragonborn who was so wastefully draining her power on disposable goons would be his greatest step to a glorious return.

Alera wiped out the left flank of servants in a matter of ten seconds, and when her victims stopped their wailing the sounds of more agony from their backlines revealed another attacker.

"I can barely feel her, Null. She takes after you?"

"She was born for the Shadows. Soon, maybe you will have a hard time detecting her."

Tonilia's title, Sworn Blade of the Champion, did not give her the same grace to hide from gods of Fate like Herma that Yuri's did. She did possess a certain talent for work of espionage and telepathic manipulation alongside her illusion and alteration magic. Yuri believed everyone has an aptitude for a branch of the mystical when given the opportunity. Yuri wondered how she would take shape in the Record when given that very same chance?

Despite being invisible to all but the four observers, Tonilia's path was carved like a feast from hell.

With every singular stroke of one of her single-edged dual blades, a tentacled titan would kneel and be split in a black and bloody deluge or a floating and faceless weed monster would be destroyed and turned into a pile of mulch. With every stroke her blade rang out and vibrated into the depths of her heart and soundlessly her heart beat a rapid drum of joy.

Her eyes glazed over as she cared not for how much blood she was soaking with, all sounds began to be blocked out and only the heat and the light of a blue and stormy flame could momentarily wake her up to divert her path slightly.

Nine-foot masses of black tentacles would grow wise of her path and attempt to slap her into a pulp, but they hit nothing but air and earned her fatal attention. Her feet, free from the 2,000-kilogram weights of her day-to-day, flew across the scenes of her carnage like the northern winds and the targets of her newest enlightenment were emulsified in a storm of accursed cuts.

Even the non-fatal cuts would grow into a festering and sparking red scorch, trailing from the wound of a monster and growing into a bloody crimson pyre before exploding the victim into entrails. The flaming entrails earned the other monsters fear when it expanded in its flight, catching cursed and vitality draining fire into the masses of flammable seekers as they joined the severed. Tonilia's blades Silence and Severance were garnished with her application of Curse and Shadow magic.

*Dum dum*

Her heart beat violently in her chest, and her gaze bordered on a strange and ethereal mix of focus and cloudiness.

*Dum dum*

Time seemed to slow down as she single-mindedly felt the ringing of her blades as it grazed through flesh, vibrating into her soul.

She exhaled and knew in her heart her next moves, even lowering her ESP to become more natural with her surroundings and more connected to her blades.

*Dum dum*

Yuri stretched his continuous smile of pride even further as his Sigil gained a spiritual red glow, turning purple at its edges and becoming gold in its center.

"Hahaha! How blessed! To think her Redguard blood talent would join so powerfully with her title!"

*DOOM DOOM*

Toni halted as her heartbeat shook the land in her vicinity, she twirled with unspeakable grace and her swords spun and danced around her beautiful form, before she lowered slightly and let them sing.

A ring broke out and a spiritual red beam projected around her in a perfect circle when she completed her move. United, the circle expanded and pressed out in a wave of red light, looking as slow as a ripple through a lake and being much faster.

"Fuuuuuu," She breathed out and flashed open her eyes, displaying a brilliant red light from them as the aftermath began.

The ring of death had sliced a horizontal line at the waist of the entire right flank and continued further, even closing in on Alera before the Sigil dispersed the intent between holders harmlessly and the red light fizzled out near her. The right flank grew motionless, some groaning and others never letting out another breath as their torsos keeled over and their waists revealed a cauterized red cut. The pieces which were severed took fire once more, and around Toni a sea of red flames sprouted and grew like cherry blossoms on spring, their leaves floating upward and gracefully revealing a blushing brunette. Tonilia's chest heaved not from the effort but from the spirit that she had just resurfaced from. A gorgeous smile finally split her face, and across from the red cinders, the girl in the blue ones smiled with her.

Miraak was enraged. He expected those cannon fodder to die off quickly, but this was humiliating.

A wave of space encasing power traveled from the peak of the summit in a horrible burst of sickly green light and bound their ESP to 10 feet while they could no longer teleport.

"FIRE AT WILL!" Miraak pointed at the women below at the ruined port across the black bay and shouted at the host of dragons standing at the summit with him, seven in total, and fire they did.

Seven meteors fell in an arc down below to the warrior women who remained unfazed.

Toni twisted her hips and danced with her blades, throwing beams of sparkling red light and destroying the shape and momentum of three of the meteors. "DIIS VIRAAN!" From Alera's mouth, a gale of icy winds was pushed and the four other meteors lost their temperature and their trajectory.

The Dragons continued catapulting projectiles of ice and fire, even thunderstorms, but the girls were not willing to play their target practice. From the back of Alera, wings that fully resembled her skin of blue and gold-inlaid scales unfurled and stretched at 5 feet long to either side of her, with a spiney point at each tip and a leathery segments divided by more golden bones visible underneath. The air was shoved aside and she ascended with a single flap. Tonilia created wings of black and red feathers resembling an angel of death, following her closely with her swords out and ready to swing.

"GO AND INTERCEPT THEM!"

The girls still had over ten miles of height to fly while seven dragons dropped to take them down.

Shouts of elements and curses charged from the mouths of the descending dragons, which Tonilia found easy to dodge since they could only follow Miraak's verbal commands to find her, before accelerating to cut apart the tough dragon flesh to sharpen her blades. Alera, fully accepting the verbal challenges of these dragons, shouted back with incredible power and made them realize that slaves of a Dragonborn can never match another Dragonborn.

Tonilia weaved between them with practiced ease and cut the wings of her prey before piling onto their backs and taking multiple swings to cut off their heads. Alera used her voice to plow the challengers into the imitation Tower and drive her blade into their hearts.

Tonilia was blasted with a wave of fire while on the back of another and had to use her wings in defense. Feathers were scorched and she gritted her teeth in pain while they regenerated with some struggle. She drove her sword into the back of her falling dragon as she did this and took its vitality for herself to heal her before finishing it off and resuming the fight. Taking to another strategy to not be found, she attacked the dragons' throats from below before running off to slit the next one.

The girls, unfortunately, noticed that none of the dragon souls were making their way to Alera and were instead being taken by their most recent master. Ally was bitter. They did manage to use their Sigils to store the skeletons of their prey, much to the surprise of Miraak. When every dragon was already stored away and gone, Miraak drew his eldritch sword and stepped away from the edge to welcome his challengers.

"Jealous yet?" Yuri asked the Gardener of Men to his side, rubbing his better champions in his face.

"Hmmm...The better your champions...the better my chances...of reclaiming Miraak's soul."

"That's okay, you don't have to say it."

"They were not fated to be mine... I'm sure... they would cause more trouble...than Miraak himself."

"That I can't argue with."

'WE HEARD THAT'

Yuri rubbed the inside of his ear canal despite his attackers using a psychic channel to shout at him.

His attackers, Ally and Toni, reached the Summit of Apocrypha in half a minute's time without further delay and the top of his tower was revealed. Three dragons were notched down to the floor by a neck post in a triangular pattern from the center where Miraak stood, having already drawn his prized blade which he named after himself.

"After killing you, little Dragonborn, I will slay Alduin myself and rightfully take his throne. And you," He looked exactly in Toni's direction. "are not as skilled at hiding as your master."

Toni unmasked her presence and stood with her two blades to her side proudly.

"I won't need it for you."

"You will never rest again, let alone on a throne"

Yuri smiled gleefully, ready for the power his women were about to display.

"Burn brightly for me... my stars"

{Next Chapter: At the Bottom of Apocrypha}