Chapter 124: Chapter One Hundred Twenty Four

Despite Leaf on the Wind we were dropping pretty damn fast. I was  spreading the skill over both of us so it was kind of dampened, not to  mention I didn't want to drop too slow because the Gargoyles were after  us. As mentioned they COULD fly. Somehow. I was still in Afterburner,  but I couldn't fly, even with Leaf on the Wind so when they started  swooping down I couldn't do much...at least not without a little nudge  from another skill. I used Cloud Step, planting my foot firmly on  midair, then pushed off hard, hurling myself at the nearest gargoyle.

I  slammed into it feet first, knowing it out of the air with the impact.  Callie, who was adjusting pretty well to hurtling toward the ground at  an admittedly less than terminal velocity, lashed out with a kick with  one of her black boots, the heel of which shifted into a spinning drill  via shadow embodiment. The leg flashed out a few times, shattering the  Gargoyles head. I yelled into her ear. "If I switch you to my back can  you make a glider with your coat?" I'd been considering hopping from  Gargoyle to Gargoyle to get down but the damn things were all higher  than us, and if we slowed down too much it would run out the clock on my  skill.

She grinned. "Yeah!" It took some awkward  shuffling to get her onto my back midair without letting go, but I  managed to get her in a piggyback position. Her coat, which was imbued  with shadows and could be manipulated just like her other clothes,  flared out behind us and stiffened into a glider. "Ok! Since we don't  have to worry so much about steering let's take out the other ones!" Her  obvious glee was infectious, and I whooped my agreement as I pushed off  the dead Gargoyle, hurling us at another one.

The body  went flying toward the ground from the force, but hell it gave me some  footing. I managed a relatively small bit of push and a shallow arc,  with the coat catching the air as we started to dip again. We went  sailing forward toward the Gargoyle I'd picked at a smooth glide, and I  was able to draw my tonfas and actually attack without Callie in my  arms. I activated Flurry of Blows and Consecration of Flame and rained  down the weapons as we got within range, shattering the Gargoyles, which  were mostly just rock shells around ghosts.

The fire  helped disperse the spirit, and I realized that these things were  actually pretty weak, at least if you could actively defy gravity. The  whole flying rock death machine thing probably made them a huge pain for  most people but once we got started we took out the nearest two or  three and the rest of them veered away. Callie cheered and I turned,  starting us in slow circles that would let us descend to the ground.  Luckily with Leaf on the Wind I was able to go at a steeper angle than  would have been safe otherwise.

Still, the destruction of  those Gargoyles didn't seem to deter the ghosts much. They kept swooping  in to attack, trying to exploit and openings we left. Callie and I were  forced to stay on guard as we descended. We were able to scare them off  with my tonfas though, at least for a bit, until they all scattered of  their own volition out of nowhere. I heard Callie yell. "Oh shit!" And  had the unfortunate feeling things just got more complicated. I looked  tightened our turn so I was facing the same direction she was and felt  my blood run cold.

I had to curse aloud at our luck, not  to mention the ridiculous nature of what I was seeing. "Oh COME ON! That  fucking dragon skeleton is made of BONES. How is it flying? That  doesn't even make any fucking sense!" Well, it looked like a dragon  skeleton. I doubted an E rank world had actual dragons on it, but  whatever it was it was big and reptilian and carrying what I suspected  was a really pissed off corpse in a robe and crown. I was guessing from  context clues that this was the Lich.

On the upside the  ghosts didn't seem enthused about getting near the pair either. I  basically abandoned the spiral and went into a straight dive. We needed  to get away from this thing as fast as possible, and that meant the  quickest drop we could make. I would pull up once we got lower and Leaf  on the Wind should help me come out of the dive, and if it didn't I  could MAKE it. Callie squealed with joy and surprise as we dove, and I  tried very hard not to think about the corpse on the dragon behind me.  It didn't work.

Firstly the thing had dancing blue flames  for eyes. Really eerie set in the dessicated face and surrounded by  poorly contained whispy white hair. It was holding a staff of some kind  made of glowing blue wood and it had a saddle affixing it to the back of  its bony steed. Despite not having any expression, I could FEEL the  malice coming from the eerie blue glare. Not to mention BOTH of them  were G rank, and I was seriously worried even the whole crew would be  able to take them down.

The ground barreled up at us  faster than I was really comfortable with, skill or not, but I was able  to pull up as I went. I used Seek Hidden as we plummeted, searching for  my party, and a flash of red was enough to bring me in the right  direction to meet up with my friends. Mostly. As we came in I pulled up  on Callie's legs to get her to yank back and try to come out of our  dive. It...didn't entirely work. Between the skill and glider I avoided  most of the impact but I still hit the ground going forward and slid  about forty feet, tearing up a long strip of black grass.

My  friends were running to meet us even as they saw me come down, I'd  managed to get close enough to be visible to them at least, though the  skid took me well past them so it took a minute for them to reach us. As  they headed over I groaned, pulling myself out of the dirt. My costume  had tanked most of the impact, but even with all the mitigation it  wasn't exactly comfortable. Luckily Callie had been on my back so I had  cushioned her fall. Lucky for her rather, because I'd gotten twice the  damage, not that I was stupid enough to mention that. It had been my  idea after all.

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I brushed the  dirt off me as I climbed to my feet. "That was a terrible plan. I should  never have ideas. You ok babe?" Callie was climbing to her feet right  next to me, cracking her neck and checking her costume for rips. There  was nothing there of course, I'd taken most of the hit. I turned to see  our friends arriving. "Hey guys, good to see you, if you didn't notice  the Lich is riding a skeleton dragon down here to kill us. Which seems  bad to me. Sarah, any idea what the hell that is and what we should be  expecting?"

Sarah  stared up at the sky in trepidation, looking for the Lich and the  dragon. I suspected we'd lost them for a second during the fall, one of  the benefits of being in a dark cavern and crashing into a field of  black grass wearing all black. Luckily the flowers were in patches and  we'd avoided them in our hit. "Well it isn't a dragon. At least I don't  think so. Bone Dragons are powerful undead monsters. It's most likely  Bone Wyvern, they're much smaller and more common. Still terrifying but  they don't breath frostfire."

She  spotted the Lich as it finally drew close. "Ok, wow, yes that's a  Wyvern. The skull shape is different. Wyvern horns curl like a ram,  dragon horns curve back gently and they're branched. Plus dragons are  universally pretty high rank when they're grown. The younger ones can be  lower but you don't often see them out and about. Point is, there  should be a core in there you can target. An organ magically bonded to  the bones that supports the spell keeping it animated. It makes them  more independent but for undead of that scale its more efficient because  they can continue to grow stronger."

I  winced, though honestly the Wyvern was a distant second concern. Mostly  I was staring at the withered, eyeless, flame socketed face of the lick  as it sneered hatefully down at us. Now that it was getting closer and I  wasn't falling I could finally focus on the thing properly. I could see  its withered hands clutching the blue staff with twisted black nails, a  pair of cloth shoes in the stirrups of the saddle, and flaming eyes  seemed to follow us everywhere, despite being literal balls of fire and  not having any indicating features to show orientation or direction.

The  Bone Wyvern crashed down onto the grass in front of us, a low boom as  its massive weight smashed into the earth, buckling the loose, hydrated  dirt under the field. The soil down there had been dark and loamy, like a  graveyard, and I wasn't shocked to see the ground buckle under the  weight of the massive skeletal form. The shadow of the towering beast  fell over us like an impending tidal wave as it loomed above out group, a  specter of grim judgement that was preparing to enact our final  punishment.

The  Lich stood, sliding free of the saddle and stepping off the draconic  form, floating gently to the grass beside it. Despite the lack of  determining features on the eye flames the Lich was clearly focused on  Callie and I when it finally spoke. "Thieves." The Lichs voice was  terrifying. A rasping, rustling hiss like the wind through dead tree  leaves in depths of a haunted forest. "Return what you have stolen, and  die swiftly."

I  raised an eyebrow under my mask. "Don't you mean or?" He cocked his  head, and I rolled my eyes as I repeated. "Don't you mean return what we  have stolen OR we die swiftly? Because saying you're going to kill us  if we give the shit back is clearly not an incentive to do it. Who wants  to die?" The response was an even more raspy and terrifying chuckle,  the blue flames dancing in their sockets.

The  withered head shook slowly. "You misunderstand. Death is inevitable.  YOUR death is inevitable within the day. Your choice is not life, but  quality of death. If you return what was stolen I will kill you swiftly.  If you make me take it from you, your deaths will take hours, and your  corpses will serve as footsoldiers for my army, where I will use them  for the amusement of my sapient troops. So, I say again, and for the  last time. Thieves. Return what you have stolen, and you can die  swiftly."

Ah,  that wasn't ideal. I kind of wished we'd had time to plan this out.  We'd discussed fighting the Lich a bit, but since they tended to vary we  had no actual idea what the hell he could do. His magic could be any  one of multiple different things, so we would need to play it by ear.  Not to mention the existence of the Bone Wyvery complicated the hell out  of this entire situation.

I  pretended to think about it for a second, but eventually I'd run out  that clock. I turned to Cark and bellowed. "Wall!" As if on reflex the  pyrokinetic hurled out a hand and tossed a huge wall of blue inferno out  between us and the Lich. The Bone Wyvern roared and charged into the  flames, its sheer size creating a break in the fire for the Lich to hurl  itself through. As it landed in front of us, bringing the staff to bear  we all readied ourselves. Looks like we wouldn't have time for a  planning session after all. Oh well, guess we'd wing it.

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