Beast Empress Sovereign

10. The Threat of Aeris

The cavern groaned as if the mountain itself were screaming in pain. Dust filtered down from the cathedral's ceiling, dancing in the strobe-light flickers of Aeris's lingering lightning.

"Is that... her?" Lin asked, his voice shaking as much as the floor beneath him.

"The Mother," Aeris replied, her voice cold as a winter gale. She stood tall, her translucent wings twitching with an agitation that sent ripples through the air. "She is the fury of the clouds made flesh, Lin Ardent. And right now, she smells the stolen essence of her lineage on your skin."

"Stolen?" Nila snapped, her obsidian armor manifesting in a sharp hiss of shadows. "We saved you from a stone cage, bird-girl! If anything, your mother should be thanking my Master for breathing life into your stagnant heart."

"A snake speaking of hearts? How quaint," Aeris turned her sharp, pale-blue gaze toward Nila. "You smell of damp earth and rot. My mother will not thank him; she will shred him to provide the meat for my replacement."

"Master, please, can I kill her yet?" Nila growled, her nails extending into long, venom-tipped needles. "Just a small scratch. I want to see if her blood is as blue as her ego."

"Both of you, shut up!" Lin roared, his lungs burning. "The mountain is literally collapsing on us! Nila, status!"

"Forty meters away and closing," Nila reported instantly, her professional instincts overriding her petty jealousy for a brief second. "She is not flying; she is tunneling. Her talons are tearing through the bedrock like it's wet clay."

"Aeris, she's your mother. Can't you talk to her?" Lin pleaded, looking at the newly awakened Empress. "Tell her you're alive! Tell her the contract was necessary!"

"She cannot hear words, Sovereign," Aeris said, a shadow of genuine sorrow crossing her regal features. "Look at the wind in the tunnel. Do you see the black streaks?"

Lin squinted at the cave entrance. The swirling air wasn't just cold anymore; it was laced with oily, dark ribbons of energy that felt rancid. "That... that looks like the corruption Fang’s soul-tablet had. Dark Covenant?"

"The Curse of the Fallen," Aeris corrected. "She stayed in the 'Cage' too long. To protect my egg, she made a deal with the shadows of the lower realms. She is no longer the Queen of the Sky. She is a thrall to the hunger."

CRA-AACK!

The northern wall of the chamber exploded. Stone fragments the size of houses were sent flying. Out of the dust emerged a creature of nightmare—a bird so massive its head scraped the cathedral ceiling, its feathers no longer azure but a bruised, rotting violet. One of its eyes was a milky, swollen orb of pure malice.

"SCREEEE-EE-AH!"

The sound wave alone threw Lin off his feet. He felt blood trickling from his ears.

"Protect the Sovereign!" Nila screamed.

In a blur of darkness, Nila lunged forward, her shadow-energy coiling into a massive serpent-head that met the eagle's descending beak. The impact sent a shockwave that cracked the pillars of the tomb.

"Useless lizard," Aeris muttered, stepping forward. Her wings unfurled to their full, magnificent span. "Let a true sovereign of the heights handle this."

"Aeris, wait! Don't kill her!" Lin shouted, clutching his chest.

"She is already dead, Lin Ardent! I am simply granting her the silence she prayed for!" Aeris countered. She leapt into the air, gravity seemingly losing its hold on her. "Gale Force: Azure Rupture!"

With a snap of her wings, the air in the chamber gathered into a hyper-compressed sphere of blue lightning and wind. She hurled it at the Mother Eagle, the blast detonating with the force of a falling star.

The Mother Eagle staggered, its violet feathers smoking, but it didn't fall. It lunged again, its talons aiming directly for Aeris's throat.

"Master, her defense is wide open!" Nila hissed, appearing back by Lin's side to drag him behind a fallen statue. "The bird thinks she's invincible! She’s going to get herself decapitated!"

"Nila, help her! Use your Shadow-Whip! Tie the Mother’s legs down!" Lin commanded.

"She’s insulting my lineage, and you want me to save her?"

"Nila! That's an order!"

"As you command, my Sovereign," Nila spat, her emerald eyes glowing with a bitter resentment. She lashed her hand outward. "Shadow Binding: Serpentine Coil!"

The darkness on the floor came alive, thick black cords erupting from the Mother Eagle’s shadow and wrapping around its massive, scaly legs. The giant bird shrieked, its forward momentum halted inches away from Aeris.

"I didn't ask for your help, bottom-feeder!" Aeris yelled, hovering in the air as she rained down bolts of lightning.

"Then move your prideful wings out of the way so I can finish the binding, you overgrown canary!" Nila shouted back.

"Stop bickering and kill the corruption!" Lin stood up, his hand glowing with the Sovereign light. "The source is in its chest! Do you see it? The violet crystal!"

Both Empresses paused. Hidden beneath the matted feathers of the Mother’s breast was a pulsating, dark gem that looked like a festering wound.

"A core parasite," Aeris whispered, her fury cooling into a cold, clinical lethalness. "The Covenant’s shackle."

"I'll open the path," Nila said, her voice dropping all pretense of playfulness. "Sky-girl, if you miss this shot, I will personally weave your wings into a carpet."

"Just hold her steady, shadow-thing," Aeris replied.

Nila roared, her humanoid form beginning to blur. She didn't fully transform, but her aura expanded until she looked like a titan of obsidian smoke. She dove beneath the Mother Eagle, her shadow-needles puncturing the beast's legs, forcing the giant creature to its knees.

"Now!" Lin yelled.

Aeris folded her wings and dove like a falling bolt. Her hand was coated in a vibrating blade of pure, compressed wind. "For the Sky... and for the honor you lost!"

SH-LINK!

The wind-blade pierced the violet crystal. A horrifying, inhuman shriek echoed through the cavern—not the sound of a bird, but the sound of a shattering soul.

The Mother Eagle froze. The violet light in its eyes faded, replaced by a final, fleeting spark of clear azure. It looked at Aeris for one beautiful, tragic second, let out a soft trill of recognition, and then began to disintegrate into piles of silver ash.

The cavern went silent. The ceiling stopped shaking.

Aeris landed softly in the center of the ash pile. She didn't move. Her wings hung low, their translucent glow dimmed.

Lin walked forward, his boots crunching on the remnants of the ancient protector. "Aeris? Are you..."

"I am fine, Sovereign," she said, her back still turned. Her voice was steady, but there was a tremor in the air around her. "The curse has been lifted. The debt is paid."

"You did well," Lin said, reaching out to touch her shoulder.

Aeris spun around, her eyes flashing. "Do not pity me! I am the Second Empress of the Sovereign Legion! I do not require the comfort of a level six mortal!"

Nila stepped out from the shadows, wiping black ichor from her armored forearm. "See, Master? I told you. She’s an ungrateful hatchling. We should have left her in the egg to become a stone statue."

"I saved your master's life three times in the last five minutes, serpent," Aeris retorted, her regal mask snapping back into place. "While you were playing in the dirt, I was dismantling the threat."

"Playing in the—" Nila’s aura exploded, the purple mist filling half the room. "I was holding her legs! If I hadn't, you'd be a pile of blue feathers right now!"

"Enough!" Lin's voice resonated through the bond, using a flicker of the Sovereign’s Authority to dampen their auras. "Nila, stow your venom. Aeris, stow your pride. We are in the middle of a Forbidden Zone, my sect is missing a hunting party, and we are currently standing in the center of a historical disaster."

"The Sovereign is right," a new voice hissed—not from the room, but from the Black Scroll.

The scroll floated out of Lin’s vest, unrolling itself in mid-air. The characters for Nila and Aeris were both glowing fiercely.

"The Legion has begun," the ancient entity’s voice boomed. "Shadow and Sky. Depth and Height. But beware the Sovereign... for a King with two crowns is a target for two different executioners."

"What do you mean by that?" Lin asked the scroll.

"The Sky Mother was not just a beast, Lin Ardent," the scroll replied. "She was a lighthouse. Her death will be felt by the High Temple of Luvia. They will know that a Wind-Tamer has been born. They will know that the 'Azure Heart' has stopped beating... and a new one has taken its place."

"Luvia..." Lin whispered. "The Pope's city."

"We must leave," Aeris said, looking at the ceiling. "My mother’s spirit is returning to the wind. In ten minutes, this entire valley will experience a hurricane that will level the mountains. If we are still here, even my wings won't save us."

"Can you fly us out?" Lin asked.

"With a mortal clinging to my waist and a serpent dragging behind?" Aeris scoffed. "My pride says no. My survival says... possibly."

"Just do it, Aeris!" Lin shouted as a massive chunk of stone fell behind them.

"Hold on, Sovereign," Aeris commanded. She grabbed Lin around the waist with a strength that belied her slender form.

"What about me?" Nila asked, crossing her arms.

"Turn back into a worm and hide in his pocket, lizard," Aeris sneered. "I’m a queen of the sky, not a cargo-ferry for snakes."

"Master, can I please bite her?" Nila looked at Lin with pleading eyes.

"Nila, into the vest. Now!" Lin ordered.

Nila hissed, a long, drawn-out sound of pure spite, before shimmering back into her small serpent form and slithering into Lin’s pocket. I will remember this, sky-bitch, her voice echoed in his mind. Wait until the master gets a bed. I'll take the right side and leave you the floor.

You’ll be lucky to reach the rafters, earth-dweller, Aeris replied internally.

"Fly!" Lin yelled.

Aeris unfurled her wings. They surged with a blinding blue light. With a single, explosive down-stroke, they tore through the ceiling of the tomb, ascending into the blizzard of the Frozen Valley.

Below them, the mountain began to implode, swallowing the secrets of the Ancient Tamer and the remnants of the massacre. Above them, the sky was a chaos of white and blue.

Lin looked down as the valley shrunk beneath them. He had twenty wolf-hearts, a glowing jade-slip, a black scroll that held the fate of the world, and two Empresses who were currently planning to kill each other in their sleep.

"This mission," Lin muttered, his hair whipping in the 100-mile-per-hour wind. "Is going to be a nightmare to report."

"Focus on your breathing, Sovereign," Aeris’s voice rang out in his head, clearer than the wind. "The Black Cloud Sect is near. Do we return as 'trash'... or do we return as a storm?"

"We return as 'trash' for now," Lin said, his eyes hardening. "But a 'trash' that is about to buy every spirit stone in their treasury."

"I like that plan," Nila hissed from his pocket. "Money is just power waiting to be spent."

"Humans and their shiny pebbles," Aeris sighed. "But fine. Let us return to your mud-hut, Lin Ardent. I am curious to see how long it takes for your people to realize they are hosting the end of their era."

As they disappeared into the northern clouds, a single violet eye opened in the center of the sect's mountain far away. Someone was watching. Someone had heard the heartbeat stop.

The threat of Aeris had passed, but the threat of the Sovereign had only just begun.

Status Update:

Lin Ardent: Cultivation Level 6. Returning to Sect.

Nila (Empress 1): In Shadow Serpent form. Extremely jealous/Hostile to Aeris.

Aeris (Empress 2): In human form (hidden in flight). Prideful/Regal attitude.

The World: High Temple of Luvia has been alerted to a 'Wind Anomaly'.