A Peasant’s Guide To Sorcerery: 13

A Peasant’s Guide To Sorcerery: 13

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Commissioned by Ichypa

Wordcount: 2500

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Divinity.

The word was one with which I thought I was familiar with, until I found myself looking upon a Dragon.

Zi Long had taken to the desert upon a levitating piece of rock, with Zhang, Yuen, and myself following behind her. Such ability alone, amongst the Sects, would have her be proclaimed as a master. One of the most elite, as well. However, the act of flight was merely a means to ensure that a proper battlefield in the desolate desert would be reached.

There, Zi Long unveiled her true form.

Hers was a form straight of myth. Serpent-like in body, but with four clawed limbs, and a mane of silvery threads, I was reminded of the words ‘feathered serpent,’ but no sooner did I consider them did I discard them. Zi Long’s scales were the size of shields used by soldiers in battle, the talons on her claws as long as spears, and her length was that of an entire city district, while her width was that of three wagons side-by-side.

But that size was nothing compared to the sheer power that she emanated.

I was reminded of my master when he had shown me his full strength when I was a child, but orders of magnitude greater. My master who could cleave through stone with ease, who could stride upon snow without breaking its surface, and who could glide across waters could not compare to this Divine Beast. Merely being under its gaze made me cling to life, as my vision darkened at the fringes and my heart slowed. Just being on its opposing side was enough to cause my body to begin lulling itself to death… and I only just managed to send it away by taking hold of my sword and forcing myself into a pre-battle calm.

Yuen, despite her Draconic blood, seemed to waver until she took hold of her weapon as well. Before the battle, she had used an ancient trinket to call armor upon herself, and now she was clad in black plate from head to toe. Armor scales, plates, and chain mail combined to create a layer of protection about the Dragon-blooded scholar and warrior that looked formidable… yet still wholly insufficient for the coming battle.

She was afraid, as I was, and summoning courage in order to face what lay ahead.

However, Zhang merely walked ahead of us, held two hands before his mouth, and yelled out to the Dragon without a hint of fear.

“Okay, Zi Long! I’m going to go after you now! Get ready, okay!” Like a parent yelling after the child before they played together, Zhang had a wide smile on his face as he yelled out those words. Yuen seemed to both get more frightened and more calm by his words… especially as the Dragon suddenly shot straight up into the sky to gain distance from the three of us. “Okay! See you in a bit!”

Zhang lightly stretched, while skies darkened and thunder clouds formed above. In the middle of the desert, rain started to fall, storm winds howled, and crackling light coursed between darkened clouds. The clouds began to swirl and condense the moment that they were created, until they turned into multiple orbs surrounded by walls of fog, which spat out lightning bolts our way.

“Ooh, look! Yuen! She learned how to conceal herself this time!” Zhang gave Yuen a wide smile, while a free hand extended out and suddenly the sands around us shifted, changed, and turned into immense pillars of metal that absorbed the lightning, which he promptly sapped into his grasp. The constant stream of attacks our way was absorbed, not even the heat sent our way reaching us, and Zhang hummed as he collected the wrath of the heavens in his hands. He seemed to notice my stare. “Oh! Ummm, it’s hard to explain what I’m doing right now, so just watch, okay?”

I was vaguely aware that I was nodding when he suddenly extended his hand towards the condensed lighting storms above us. The collected energy he controlled went forth into the sky, no larger than a needle, but in its passing the sky was cleared of clouds… as was the heavens behind it. For a brief, terrifying moment, I looked upon a starry night sky above us at midday. With a singular attack, merely to counter what was being sent our way, Zhang carved through the Heavens.

“Ah, there she is! Wow, she was hard to find this time!” Zhang’s speech didn’t change a single iota. With cheer in his voice, he lifted up the metal pillars he created and turned them into hundreds of metal spears, and threw them into the sky after the Dragon at great speeds. Zi Long tried to evade, but they flew after her, like a flock of deadly birds trying to consume the Dragon. She was forced to evade, until she could find a way to attack the constructs, only to realize that it was a distraction as Zhang had finished creating yet another attack. No sooner did the swarm of spears disappear to a fiery breath did the Dragon find itself struck by an immense cylinder of compressed sand harvested from the surrounding desert. The particles of stone and earth dazed the Dragon, then proceeded to wrap around it, and drag it into the earth at a rapid speed. The solid mantle that it met cracked with the weight of its fall, but it also began to warp stone libs to entrap it, while the sand that held it down began to solidify and shift around it.

Zhang was burying the Dragon alive in sand and stone… and in those depths he would have the creature at his mercy.

“Let’s see if she gets out of that this time!” Zhang was cheery as usual, despite his immense display of strength. There was no hate or anger in his words. As always, he was happy to be present. No. This was a different form of happiness. He was happy to help Zi Long because he regarded her as his daughter. “C’mon, Zi Long! You can do it!”

Yuen suddenly spoke to me.

“This is when things get difficult. Get ready.”

I nodded in understanding and readied my blade and my body for the coming battle… then, I realized nothing could’ve made ready.

A pure blast of power shook the earth, then, a moment later all of the sand at our feet began to vibrate and shake. Zi Long infused the desert sands with her power and was now making it shake and we were sinking within it. No, my instinct told me there was something I was missing, then I realized what it was as stone bindings flew upward from the sand, while the Dragon stayed unseen.  Her attempts to stay concealed from Zhang’s gaze came to the forefront of my memory and I realized what it was doing, while empowering my feet to stay atop the shifting sands.

“It’s traveling underground! The shaking sands are easy to move through!” I never thought that a Dragon would be forced to crawl through the sands, but after witnessing Zhang’s overwhelming power, I realized that it was simply doing what it needed to do to grasp victory. Such cunning was needed to surmount the pure strength that Zhang wielded. “Zhang, do you understand!?”

I briefly caught Yuen’s panicked look at my statement, before Zhang’s eyes beamed with understanding and comprehension of my words!

“Ooh, I didn’t! Thanks, Ying!” Yuen nearly leapt at me the moment I spoke, but suddenly her shoulders slumped in defeat. I didn’t realize my mistake, until Zhang pointed at the ground… and suddenly all the sand turned to clear and solid at our feet. No. It turned into glass, right as the Dragon beneath the sands was set to attack us with its maw wide open. “Hi, Zi!”

Zhang had a wide smile on his face, as he pointed a finger at the Dragon trapped in a sea of glass, and Yuen immediately embraced me, unfurled her wings, and held me close to protect me. A tremendous amount of power surged just behind her, from Zhang, and all was deafened by the tremendous winds generated by gathering power.

Zhang, of course, was as casual as ever as he launched the attack.

“Bye, Zi!”

The sound of shattering glass echoed in my ears for minutes on end, while I lay in a protective cocoon created by Yuen, and when it ended we emerged into an entirely new world.

A world filled with immense, glass pillars in every direction which curved inward into a crater which held a defeated Dragon.

The desert landscape that was chosen for the battle was simply gone. Instead, it was now a massive crater composed entirely of clear glass shards the size of buildings. A city could fit in the center of the curling glass structures created by the last, concussive blow that Zhang loosed, and even now there was glass dust floating in the air, deadly but beautiful, which Yuen fretted over and cast flames upon to incinerate. In the heart of a great desert, there was now a great and terrible wonder that would cast fear and trepidation in the hearts of all that saw it.

Zhang had created it without sweat forming on his brow, and it was merely an after effect of his battle.

Yuen sighed as she looked my way and comprehended what I now understood.

She had tried to help me earlier.

“It’s best to leave Zhang in charge. If you let him go pass his limits, in what he lacks in knowledge and other such things, this is what happens.” Yuen sighed and gestured around us, before gingerly taking steps forward. The glass was hard to walk upon, so she elected to use her wings to take flight. She offered her hand to me, and I gingerly accepted her offer. “He has the power. If you give him any insight and aid, you multiply that power a hundredfold and this is the result.”

A part of me understood her words.

Another, of course, rallied against them.

“That feels like betrayal. I cannot do it.” The glass spires, the destruction of the dessert, and falling of the Dragon did inspire fear in my heart. However, in the end, I couldn’t deny the simple fact that I would never stop myself from helping Zhang. The thought alone shamed me. “You must think me a fool, but I won’t let his life come to harm. Ever.”

“He’s not… he won’t get hurt. It’s impossible. Look at him. He’s beyond even the strongest of the immortal Sect leaders!” Yuen spluttered and I realized she must have realized what her own words said about her. That she would rather leave Zhang, an avenue to be hurt, rather than provide her help to him in a dire moment. “Do you believe that someone who can just turn a whole region of the desert into glass can get hurt?”

“I’ve yet to meet anyone stronger than him, but I have seen many people I could’ve never defeated dead due to a moment of distraction.” I told Yuen the truth, while she lowered the two of us towards Zhang. We glided to him, as Zi Long transformed back into a young woman with a frown on her face and idly rubbing her skull. Zhang fretted over her while she pouted and crossed her arms. “I won’t let that happen to him, Yuen. You shouldn’t either.”

“B-but… dammit! You’re making sense, but can you imagine this in a city? Someplace where people live!?”

“Zhang would never hurt the innocent.”

“Would you mind stopping, so I feel less bad!?”

Yuen groaned and shook her head, but whatever else we had to say to one another stopped as Zi Long levelled her gaze at us boast.

“It seems that father grew greatly in strength since our last meeting, making your contributions unnecessary.” Though some may have considered those words inflammatory, I just took them in stride. They lacked tact, but it was the truth. However, as I nodded, Zi Long looked at her father and frowned when she found him shaking his head. “Hm? But I did not see nor feel them help you, father. My senses remain, even while the strife occurs.”

“Lady Ying pointed out that you were coming out of the ground! I didn’t realize it at all. She’s amazing!” Zhang beamed at me and something strange welled up in my stomach. It was a fluttering sensation that in ever felt before and my face heated up faster than I could ever recall. Oh no. It’s getting worse. “The moment she found out, she told me, and I was able to do all of this and really end things quickly!”

“I see. Then, I withdraw my words. Lady Ying, thank you for helping my father.”

“Hey, what about me!”

“Thank you for staying guard beside my father.”

“Good girl!” Zhang praised Zi Long, and despite being a capable administrator, merchant, and Dragon, she stood straighter at his words. I felt a tinge of jealousy, but I buried it after a moment. It wouldn’t do in the slightest to compete against Zi Long. Wait a moment. I shouldn’t be considering that at all! “I was about to tell you about Yuen, too. I feel safe when she’s right there beside me.”

“…thanks.” Yuen looked away and her hand came up to scratch her cheek, despite having a helmet on. When she realized what she was doing, she cleared her throat and shook her head. “I mean, yeah! That’s what I was doing. Thanks for noticing, Zhang.”

Zhang beamed at us both, and it was my turn to look away from Zhang’s earnest gaze.

Zi Long, thankfully, cleared her throat and stood straight in her flowing red robes and overcoat to address us.

“This is the third Strife with which I have had with my father. Four more lay ahead. I hope that the two of you will trust in father to strengthen you both, while also sharpening your own skills, so that you may both aid him in the future.” Zi Long gave a prim bow to us both. Suddenly, I felt as though my breath was being taken from my lungs. Not by power, but by realization at what Zi Long truly meant.  “Please, take care of my father. Both of you.”

My mouth felt incredibly dry, and even though I knew I should refuse because of all my responsibilities… I couldn’t say the words.

They refused to leave me, and a glance at Yuen, confirmed the same was the case for her.

Could we hope to refuse a Dragon’s edict?

…did we want to?