Chapter Fifty-six: Consequences.
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~~~Third person, eleventh moon, 276 AC~~~
~~~Essos, Braavos~~~
The attack on the Temple of the Faceless Men had had several days of preparation, in which the Dothraki or Unsullied would not participate since, although good warriors and excellent fighters, they would not be good opponents for beings using unknown techniques, especially knowing that most of the fighting would happen inside the temple.
Azrael also hoped to catch the House of Black and White off guard. If the weather conditions were right, a sea or land journey from Xandar to Braavos would take at least two months. Plus, their advance would be detected from cities in the distance.
The fastest route would be an aerial one, and thanks to the Wyverns, that method was accessible.
The idea was to travel during the night, using the shadow-winged Wyverns with black skin and dark wings, perfect for flying at night and not being detected. Hence, the journey from Xandar to Braavos took longer than expected since the legion of Wyverns, which consisted of 140 Wyverns, enough to transport a hundred witches plus their riders, only flew at night.
In the daytime, they would head for regions far away from all human eyes to avoid detection.
Therefore, the attack on the House of Black and White was unexpected.
As for the witches and the Enderman who participated in the fight, the moment they entered the temple of the faceless men, the witches initiated a significant skirmish against the group of assassins, engaging in combat against the acclaimed masters of murder.
The witches were outnumbered, for in the temple, there were perhaps more than two thousand faceless men. Knowing the facilities better, these men became powerful enemies of the witches, so if it were not for the help given by the Enderman, the witches would be forced to fight twenty each.
The Enderman were the ones who caused the most casualties to the faceless men, a product of their invulnerable body. Provoking the Faceless Men to seek to gain ground with the witches.
Valka, for her part, was doing excellently, together with Sabhana, Sara, and Valery, who were fighting as if there was no tomorrow, in a synergy that only the four of them managed to create.
They were the ones making the faceless men lose ground, forcing them to corner themselves more and more towards the grand fountain. In this place, there were several statues of sacred idols of different religions, which the faceless men believed to be facets of their god.
One of the faceless men, even with several wounds on his body, was fighting side by side against a witch in a heated conflict that had created wounds on both of them.
He and six others were subduing the witch, who, even with her armor and whip, was suffering increasingly worrisome injuries.
The witch, growing more and more tired, failed to stop a stab aimed at the back of her knee, which, though protected by metal-lined pants, caused the witch to lose her balance and fall to the ground, her bruised knee touching the ground.
"Fiuuu." That carelessness was enough for a faceless man to stab her in the eye in a display of surprising speed and precision, causing the witch to fall slumped to the ground, her body burning and her ashes scattering into the air, leaving behind her armor and weapons.
The faceless men had no time to celebrate their victory when an Enderman came at them from the air, grabbing two of them and starting to cut open their stomachs and chests with its claws. The faceless men were unable to do anything since every time they stabbed or cut the Enderman, they pierced its body as if hitting the water. The Enderman's 'body' could be felt but could not be hurt.
The other four faceless men were not idle for long, for just as the previous Enderman had killed two, the other Enderman were also closing in on the others to send them to Capybara heaven.
In one of those, an Enderman grabbed a faceless man by the neck and lifted him off the ground, taking him with him as he flew overhead. The faceless man managed to wriggle out of his grip and fall back to the ground, being closely followed by the Enderman.
"RAAAGH!"
The faceless man fell into the fountain, and the Enderman, who was following close behind, was splashed by its waters. This caused him to let out a terrifying wail while his body wholly disintegrated.
This joint action stopped the battle for a few moments, only for the Enderman to shout in unison and renew the conflict again, this time in a much more violent and aggressive manner.
The faceless men near the fountain saw that the water from it worked against one of the cloudy beings attacking them. They began to remove some of the faces they were wearing, dipping them into the fountain and obtaining a kind of macabre basin.
The faceless men began to spray small splashes of water from the fountain at the Enderman flying by, causing more Enderman casualties to follow.
This went on for several minutes, with the witches taking it upon themselves to fight the faceless men. The Enderman had lost momentum and, at this point, was only flying high to avoid the fountain water.
Observing this and seeing that the strategy was taking longer to take effect, Valka was forced to act. "Ruaragon syt nyke!" she shouted, calling for cover, as she ran up to the fountain.
The witches specifically did just that, fighting alongside their general, hoping to make it to the fountain.
Valka, taking a small TNT explosive and setting it off, threw it at the fountain, at the same time shouting for everyone to take cover.
The fountain, which had been gushing black water from its overflow that filled the fountain, shuddered, then exploded into thousands of pieces, scattering the 'gift' everywhere.
This time, the Endermans were unaffected, as they were a safe distance from the explosion, so when the 'gift' blew up, none of them were killed.
With the explosion of the fountain, the faceless men were momentarily defeated, since up until now, what they had used to even things up was the water from the fountain, which, now that said, the fountain was destroyed and poisoned on the ground. They understood that their chances of winning were not significant.
Still, if their fate were to die, they would gladly accept death, but first, they would take as many invaders with them to their deaths as they could.
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Azrael walked the halls of the Temple of the Faceless Men, absorbed in all the bodies on the ground, occasionally seeing golden armor buried in ashes, causing Azrael's gaze to harden.
"We lost twenty-two sisters, along with fifty-three Enderman," Valka said to Azrael once this one reached him.
Azrael nodded, staring blankly, absorbed in his surroundings. For him, death was not so strange; maybe it was because he had died once already, besides transmigrating to another world utterly alien to his own; however, the deaths of beings that left their trust in him did give him a bad taste in his mouth, mainly because it was him in the first place to bring them here.
That feeling made him feel a responsibility towards all those he had called; after all, that title of Father of the Arrivals was not unfounded; perhaps that was how Daenerys felt when she sent the Dothraki to die in foreign lands against people alien to them. That feeling of having felt that things could have ended differently, with a better plan and better moves made.
Yet before him was the outcome, and it could not be changed.
"No sign of faceless men alive, My King," Valka commented in a monotone tone; she felt the loss. "Alright, everyone out," Azrael ordered, walking out of the temple and realizing that all his troops were coming out equally, not before he had collected the armor and weapons of the fallen witches.
Outside the temple, the scene was different, with hundreds of huge Wyverns stationed in front of the House of Black and White, but above all, the one that drew the most attention was Endoxes. After being released from its prison in the End, the dragon had been growing more extensive, and now, standing on the joints of its wings that looked like arms, it towered over the Temple like a coconut tree next to the grass.
Azrael looked at Endoxes, and the dragon understood, so perching on his massive four legs, Endoxes waited for Azrael to fly up and stand on his back.
Once there, he amplified his voice with a megaphone-like object as he spoke to everyone.
"Let this be a token of what happens to all who dare tickle the dragon's fancy; Xandar will not accept nor forgive any attack on its sovereignty. That much is certain; let the House of Black and White be a token of that."
With his speech said, the hundreds of Wyverns took flight, taking off one after another after the witches boarded them. At the same time, the Enderman that had come flew close behind them, as did Azrael.
He made Endoxes soar over the temple while the people who had heard the commotion and had come out of their homes in the early morning stood in awe at the sight of a dragon of old.
"Pryjagon ziry!" shouted Azrael as Endoxes opened his mouth, and a purple light illuminated from his tail plates to the horns on his head.
A rhythmic rising could be heard until the sound stopped, only for Endoxes to let out his attack. He sent a massive beam of purple light into the temple, obliterating everything, melting stone, and fusing the temple onto itself. All the while, the Braavosi were shocked by the dragon's breath, with some fainting, believing they were next, and others beginning to run from place to place, seeking asylum.
When the temple was destroyed, Endoxes stopped his attack and roared to all of Braavos; at the same time, the Wyverns joined in the joint roar.