Glass or Diamond: Fairy's Wish

Three weeks have passed, and Lykha has had one question answered.

A lot.

MUCH of Murtoa’s day to day activities are walking to where the next colossus he’s heard of has been rumored to be. The colossi of the world are humongous themselves, but that also makes the territory they prowl very large.

She suspects he doesn’t carry much money on him at all, which makes some sense, given that he is prone to not press for payment if he thinks the innocents involved can’t afford it. So, she’s not overly surprised that he doesn’t try to hitch rides between villages, as well as the fact that very few villages have travel between them to begin with, making it an expensive request. It’s a sad irony that a renowned slayer of colossi has to walk because money comes far before reputation.

The pair has fought a much smaller colossi since the gryduke. In fact, this one was almost a normal-sized monster by comparison, and wasn’t particularly eventful. It was a large, hairy beast prowling a rocky mountain area bordering the desert the gryduke was in known as a burmooraak and eating paotrusses and smaller livestock so far.

As with the gryduke and the village after, Murtoa has been famously few of words unless Lykha asks him direct questions, but he’s also been respectful of her. He’s never even hinted at deceiving her about his interest in her wish, in anything nefarious for her, and he’s never asked her for anything.

Of course, as she wakes up this particular morning, she is caught off guard by something semi-new. He’s already gone. She scrambles up and flies upwards, scanning for him. By some miracle, he isn’t too far away, but it’s a rather long flight for her to catch up to him.

She scolds him, “WARRIOR! Why didn’t you wake me!?”

The warrior looks at her, seemingly surprised. He replies calmly, as if it’s nothing, “You were still following me?”

“I TOLD YOU GOOD NIGHT! OF COURSE I’M STILL FOLLOWING YOU!”

“Huh. I see.”

“HOW COULD YOU FORGET I WAS THERE!? I WAS RIGHT NEXT TO YOU!”

“I usually travel alone.”

“W-... Well, are you going to at least apologize?”

“Why?”

“WHAT!? WHAT DO YOU MEAN ‘WHY’!?”

“I’m not making you follow me.”

“I KNOW THAT! I ASKED YOU TO PROTECT ME!” She takes a deep breath and calms herself. “Please, I need you to protect me… I… I know it’s a pain, but please try to remember I’m here.”

“Alright.”

She sighs. “Did you already eat?”

The warrior presents some of the packaged meat they received from the burmooraak, “Not yet. If you're hungry, you can have this.”

“Oh… Thank you…”

Lykha takes the morsel of meat, nibbling on it as she flies alongside Murtoa while he walks. According to what he told her the day prior, they should be getting close to another village tucked out of the path of typical colossi.

The fairy asks curiously, “Warrior is kinda informal, and I’m not calling you Murtoa all the time. So, do you mind if I call you…? Mmm… Mury! Mury is a good easy name to say.”

“Doesn’t matter.”

“I hoped you’d say that! So, remember now, I’m calling you Mury, so you have to respond, okay?”

“Fine.”

“Mury.”

“What?”

“Just checking.”

“Mm.”

She nibbles again, fidgeting a little as she stalls.

“Mury?”

“Takes more than a few seconds to forget.”

“No, I know. Um… I… just want to apologize. I’m sorry I blew up at you. B-But, you should have woke me up! But… It was unfair that I yelled at you. Please forgive me.”

“Never a need.”

They continue on, and the village appears on the horizon.

This one, however, is closer to being a full town. There are lots of buildings, a decent number of people, and it feels more permanent than anything else she knows so far. Murtoa has mentioned that the villages survive by being too small to draw attention from colossi, and out of the way or too hard to find for pirates and bandits.

This one either has a good location or some other means of defense. Nevertheless, though it’s nowhere near as beautiful as a fairy village, it is an impressive town.

Murtoa makes a small trade for some water and grain -something else that annoys Lykha; the fact that he’ll eat seemingly anything, including nothing more than grain itself-. He packs them in his kit and makes his way further into town. When someone happens to mention a colossi bothering them, he changes course, instantly heading to the person to ask questions.

“It’s some kind of flying giant. It hasn’t spotted the town yet, but it collapsed a mine when it landed on a mountain nearby. It’s only a matter of time.”

“I’m thinking of moving my family this week back to the first snail I can find. I can’t live like this forever.”

“I don’t blame you.”

Murtoa politely interrupts, “Any idea where this monster is?”

“Why? You intend to kill it?”

“Yes.”

Lykha smiles, but she’s hiding behind him. The fewer people who see her, the better.

One of the two people replies, “It’s said to nest in the mountains to the south.”

“No good. We came from that way.” Lykha silently punches his neck, which unlikely hurts him, but hopefully he’ll get why.

The other person offers, “It does fly. It could go anywhere.”

“True. Thanks for your help.”

Murtoa simply walks away, headed for likely the bailiff of the town, or whoever is in charge. The fairy climbs up his back and whispers under his helmet’s ear, “Remember, the less attention I get out in the open, the better.”

“They didn’t ask.”

“I know, but… I’m nervous, okay?”

“Okay.”

A little while passes, and the bailiff reveals that there is, in fact, a huge flying creature that has been reported a few times from miners travelling to a mine a few miles away, and a brief eclipse that occurred without warning. Its landing caved in a large portion of the mine, trapping many of the miners inside. They never got a good look at it, but they’re certain it came from the sky.

“Nightenmael,” declares Murtoa without a thought.

Lykha looks over at his head from his shoulder, and he murmurs, “Nightenmaels are tricky. Anyone in town have firearms for trade?”

“Wait… do you intend to attack this thing?”

“Of course.”

“Wh-...! But, it’s a colossi! Only thing we folk can do in face of colossi is run! Hide, if we’re lucky.”

Lykha remarks warmly, “Trust me, he may not look like much, but this bucket-head knows what he’s doing.”

Murtoa says more directly, “Firearms.”

“Oh! Uh, I’m sorry, we can’t help you. Only firearms in town are in the hands of the Sandblast Runners. They’re a… uh… they prefer to call themselves mercenaries, but…”

“They’re bandits,” growls one of the older gentlemen sitting in a chair nearby, having been in conversation with the bailiff when Murtoa and Lykha arrived.

Lykha gasps nervously. So far, normal-seeming people exist, who think nothing of a fairy travelling with a warrior. Maybe they know they don’t stand a chance against an armored man with a bladed weapon on his back. That said, the fairy has no doubt a group of bandits wouldn’t hesitate. They would scheme from the moment they lay eyes on her and attempt to subdue Murtoa.

Murtoa simply replies, “I’ll focus on finding the nightenmael first. They tend to roost during the day. Without firearms, it’s the only opportunity I might get.”

“WE,” corrects Lykha. Murtoa nods. He then says to the bailiff, “I-We’ll be going now. Thank you for the information.”

“Good luck…” replies the bailiff uneasily.

After they’re a little ways away, Lykha whispers, “So… how do we find this… nightmale?”

“Nightenmael. It’s a bird. And, we find it by-...”

“Wait!” He stops, and she points.

A group of men of varying ages appear to be harassing a young woman in simple maiden garb; likely a barmaid or hotel maid. She clearly doesn’t want the ‘affection’ they’re giving her, and it’s not getting any friendlier.

Lykha whispers, “We have to help her.”

“Do what you want.”

“What?” She whirls and glares at Murtoa. He doesn’t move. “She needs help!”

“I’m a monster slayer.”

She hisses, “You’re a knight!”

“I didn’t knight myself. I slay monsters, not rescue damsels and slay people. Do what you want, but do it alone.”

Lykha growls in frustration. She may not be the bravest hero in the world, but she knows right and wrong. She can’t sit idly while a young woman is being harassed and threatened to be taken by these bandits. She darts over, her wings carrying her quickly.

“HEY! Get lost, you barbarians! Leave her alone!”

They look at her and laugh. One asks, “Who’s going to make us? You?”

“Me and my partner!” She points over her shoulder.

When the bandits look and chuckle, she starts to feel nervous. He wouldn’t dare, would he? They may not be the best of friends, yet, but he still values her at least a little… doesn’t he?

She glances when the oldest bandit remarks, “Which partner? The children? Or the one walking away?”

“HEY!” snaps Lykha. She’s just about to chase after him when she hears a bone-chilling click. She looks, and she’s looking down the cold metal barrel of a weapon specializing in aerial targets. She knows of firearms, though this is the first one she’s seen in person.

Her blood runs cold, and the bandit elder growls coldly, “Looks like we just got a wish come true.”

Lykha whimpers, feeling utterly terrified, foolish, and betrayed. How can he be so callous? She’s been with him for weeks now. Does he really value his lonesome life more than even a single friend who was willing to put up with him?

Lykha quickly finds herself in the back of a desert cruiser; a large vehicle with a pair of tracked treads on the body of the vehicle, though the body pivots using a large tail wing that helps keep the vehicle more stable when racing over dunes. It softens the drop of the body when it crests a sharp dune peak, letting the vehicle “glide” to a softer landing.

She and the maiden are tied up and trapped in the back of the vehicle. There are small windows, but it’s hard to see much out of them from the sun’s glare. The maiden cries, but most of the taunting and bullying is directed at Lykha, as the bandits joke about what wish to make.

Lykha considers her options. She could try to ignite her bindings, but she would likely burn herself. She could try to harm the bandits, but likely, she’ll just anger them. She doesn’t have enough magical power to affect much combat prowess. She can basically make a match’s worth of flame, a bright, camera-like flash for the briefest of moments, produce a cup of water from the air, and perform a recovery spell that boosts healing for a little bit. The healing spell uses most of her magic for the day, and can essentially only accomplish one injury’s worth of healing; set a broken bone -but not fully heal it-, close one basic cut, and similar basic healing, but it’s something. She’s not sure how to become stronger in magic, because she suspects healing could definitely be a boon to her compan-...

Her thought trails off. It’s hard to call him a companion now. Did she really overestimate their friendship that badly? They aren’t much, but he makes her feel a little safer in a world out to exploit her.

The vehicle slows after about an hour of driving. She spots something surprising out the window. A humongous, feathered creature is lying on the ground, with much smaller people around it. They seem to have it captured, further given evidence when the vehicle enters a compound, with walls and everything, all made of clay blocks and stone.

Two groups leave the vehicle; the bandit leader-type individuals, who head towards the monster, and the captors, who take the maiden and Lykha another direction. Lykha almost thought she saw a man holding a polearm, but it couldn’t be. He left. He abandoned Lykha and kept going.

This thought brings tears to her eyes, and both she and the maiden are crying now.

As they walk, gunshots fill the air. Lykha sees a training ground where bandits are firing at targets. There are shouts as they practice combat with each other. Others eat meals at benches, and further bandits pound hammers on metal as they make armor plates or machine and forge weapons.

The prison room the two are taken to is filled with about twelve or thirteen women in three different cages next to each other. The maiden cries and squirms as the captor dragging her shoves her in the cage with the others.

Lykha, however, isn’t so lucky.

Her captor taunts vilely, “I’ve heard a fairy feels pain from the tips of her toes to the curves of her wings.”

The fairy winces. That’s definitely true, unfortunately. A fairy’s wings can grow back given time, but it’s extremely painful if they’re damaged. And, worse is that their wings are possibly their most fragile body part.

Lykha is set roughly on a workbench as the captors cackle together. “Let’s find out how much that wish of yours is worth to you.”

“Please… don’t…”

Another one taunts, “Awww, what happened to that bravery earlier? Big and bad when you thought you had a warrior at your back, huh?”

“I’m sorry…”

“Mmm, apology accepted. Now, let’s talk about what we want.”

There’s a puff from outside the room, but no one pays it any mind. There are gunshots that are much louder, and it’s likely someone simply brushed the wall as they passed by the room.

However, when the captor holding Lykha makes a joke, “Think we can wish for more wishes?” He looks smugly over his shoulder.

The other captor seems to have left the room without a word. He looks around, “Duggs?”

The captor holding Lykha is suddenly spun around forcefully, and he grunts when a slicing sound comes from him. He coughs up blood as a familiar figure pivots into her view, pulling the firearm from the captor’s belt holster and inspecting it momentarily. The newcomer shoves the double barrel shotgun into his own belt. He then pulls the ammo belt off of the bandit and shoves him unceremoniously to the ground, ignoring the bandit weakly clawing at his arm and trying to stop himself from drowning on his own blood.

Lykha’s eyes water and her heart races. The warrior looks at her, asking as if nothing happened, “You okay?”

She nods, ready to leap at him to hug him. She sniffles, wiping tears from her eyes. She murmurs, “Thank you so much… I-I knew, deep down, you wouldn’t abandon me.”

When she looks up, it’s to see his back as he’s passing through the doorway.

“HEY!”

Murtoa halts, looking at her. “What?”

“Didn’t you come to rescue us!?”

“Don’t be ridiculous. I’m here to slay monsters.”

“You’re going to execute that poor helpless one outside?”

“Of course not. I’m going to use it as bait.”

Murtoa walks through the door, and Lykha cries, “WAIT! What about them!?”

Murtoa looks at the other prisoners. He states as normally as ever, “Do what you want.”

Lykha growls out an immensely frustrated “Grr-AAHH!! BASTARD!” She quickly flies to the keys, and then takes them to the cages. Just as she’s unlocking the first cage, an all-too-familiar male voice adds from the doorway, “I would recommend you get them as far away as possible in the next five minutes.”

She looks at the warrior, ready to snap at him about how, when she halts. He’s peeking only his head back into the room, but she realizes it. He didn’t have to stop to tell her that. Maybe he’s not the knightly figure of the stories, which she doubted anyways, but… maybe he’s at least trying.

One of the girls in the second cage says confidently, though with a dry throat, “We’ll take one of the cruisies. Don’tcha worry about us!”

The warrior nods and leaves.

Lykha looks at the girl. She’s a teen with messy hair and bright, somewhat crazy looking eyes. She’s far from an innocent little teen girl, but she also doesn’t look like a catty manipulator or anything. She just looks like a product of her environment.

The fairy asks the girl, “You can really drive one of those things?”

“Yeah prob’ly!”

“Probably!?”

“Don’t get short with me! Got any bett’r ideas?”

Lykha admits reluctantly, “No.”

“Great! We’ll be fine!”

The maiden who rode in with Lykha asks quietly, “W-... Was that your friend?”

The fairy scoffs. “Prob’ly. He makes me worry sometimes.”

“At least he came for you…”

Lykha softens. She knows part of that is the girl’s own loneliness. No one seems to be coming to her rescue, other than Lykha.

The fairy opens all of the cages for the women, guiding them out. “Okay! Follow me and this girl. We’ll get you out of here!”

“W-What if they find us?”

“Can we really make it?”

“Wh-Where did the warrior go?”

Lykha sighs. She says confidently, “Look, I’m his partner. I’ve helped him fight monsters, okay? We don’t have to be scared. We’ll make it. He’s… Distracting the bandits, okay? They’ll all be in the direction he went.”

The teen nods, “Heck yeah! I migh’ no’ look it, but I’m a Techromancer! Ain’t a tech around I can’ne figgur out!”

We’ll see.

Lykha doesn’t say her thought out loud. It is the best option they have, and if the girl CAN do it, then they’ll definitely be safe.

Lykha leads the way down the hall, watching carefully. She listens for enemies approaching. She’s not a combatant by any stretch, but she watched. She watched the skilled warrior as he picked out parasites about to pounce on him before he could ever see them. And that was in near pitch-black darkness.

Lykha gasps when a bandit stalks out into the hallway. He has his double barrel shotgun drawn, investigating some weirdness in the fortress, by the looks of it.

The fairy reacts instinctively and in startled fear. She casts her ember spell. She’s not sure why or what she expected to accomplish, but not much could prepare her for what happens.

The bandit explodes in a fiery ball, lighting the hallway briefly as he screams. His body is thrown against the wall, and he squirms and flails on the floor weakly before ceasing motion.

Most of the women are screaming, while the teen is laughing. The strange girl cheers, “Yeah! You can blow peeps up!? Tha’s rainy!”

The fairy stares at the man she just executed as nausea fills her stomach. She didn’t mean to. It was an accident. She just wanted to scare him, or hurt him, or…

The teen tugs her leg, calling, “Let’s go! ‘fore more these goobs show!”

Lykha shakes her head, patting her cheeks as the teen pulls her down the hall. She has a job to do. She needs to focus.

The two lead the group of women to what appears to be a shaded vehicle bay. There are three of the dune cruisers, as well as a few smaller sand rails -four wheeled, open frame buggies-. The teen doesn’t hesitate, darting into the closest one even as bandits mill around across the bay from them.

Lykha guides the women into the cargo bay of the cruiser quietly, and then flies up to join the teen. The girl is flipping levers and hitting buttons furiously, clearly having no idea how to drive a cruiser. The lights turn on, and Lykha notices the bandits look. She asks quickly, “Do you actually know what you’re doing, or did you bluff to impress someone? Because I’m not impressed right now!”

“Me process is fluid! Ye can’ne rush techromancy! If ye coul’, then it would simply be operatin’!” The girl accidentally pulls a lever off of the ceiling of the cruiser, grimacing sheepishly. She tosses it behind her and continues. The bandits start walking closer.

“We’re going to be discovered, girl!”

“Coco! Me name’s Coco!” She turns a key briefly, and the vehicle's engine burps a short noise. The girl grins, exclaiming, “An’, Coco is destined ta be the best damn Techromancer the world ever seen!” She turns and holds the key, letting the engine roar to life. She releases it, laughing excitedly.

Lykha finds herself excited and hopeful, but still nervous. The bandits are calling out now, waving at them.

Coco taunts, “You goobs best get out ta way! I gots the POWUHHHH!!!”

Coco slams her foot down, and the vehicle roars, taking off aggressively and slamming the door closed as it takes off. The girls in the back scream, and the woman that is in the passenger seat next to Coco clutches to every hand hold she can find. She calls out, “Please slow down!”

“NEVAAAA!!! HAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!” The teen girl driving keeps her foot pegged, barely able to see over the steering wheel. The bandits dive out of her way, and she barrels the vehicle straight ahead.

Lykha is clutching to the dash, watching ahead of them. She calls out, “COCO! CAN YOU SEE WHERE WE’RE GOING!?”

“WE’LL MISS THE BRICKSTACK, FAIRY-BAE!”

“BRICK STACK!? IT’S A WALL!”

“SAME-SAME! WATCH’IS!”

The teen turns hard, and the cruiser banks sharply, roaring over the sand and crushing something with a metallic smash and a shake of the whole vehicle that jostles them. Again, the women and girls in back scream.

Coco yells over her shoulder at the window, as if taunting someone outside, “GET OUT THE WAY, YA GOOBS! BET’CHAT TRASHLOG CAN’NE KEEP UP NOW!”

“WATCH WHERE YOU’RE GOING!!!” shrieks Lykha at the teen.

Coco replies arrogantly, “I got dis, Bae! Migh’s want to hang on, doh!”

Lykha is struggling to make sense of ANYTHING this girl has been saying. Her words are of the common language -mostly-, but they seem rather vulgar or of an entirely different dialect.

Of course, being distracted with an apparent lunatic at the wheel is the worst thing she could do. Lykha looks ahead at the curved-upward pile of rocks ahead. She screams, “NO!”

“YES!”

“NO YOU CRAZY IDIOT!”

“HOL’ ON TO YOUR PINKIES, MACHENS!!!”

“NoooooOOOOOOOO!” Lykha’s objection descends into a general scream of terror as the vehicle rumbles over the pile and into the air, rocketing upwards. She waits for the vehicle to explode or for the tracks to get ripped off by the wall as they soar.

Instead, moments pass by, and the vehicle bumps and rocks as it touches down on sand, eased down by its tail wing. With the driver’s planted foot still in place, the vehicle continues its dead sprint over the sand, while the driver herself laughs triumphantly.

Lykha catches her breath, holding the dash board with a death grip as Coco drives straight away from the fortress, avoiding rocks and pits with relatively small motions.

Coco jokes, “Bet’cha that pu’ered up my tur’cutta for the res’ o’ the day.”

“Are you Mury’s long lost daughter…?” asks Lykha queasily.

The woman with them, catching her breath, looks out the side window. She points breathlessly, “Look! Isn’t that…?”

Lykha looks. Murtoa’s armor stands out compared to the bandits. He doesn’t hide his armor very much, mainly because it gets eaten by stomach acid or singed by fires. And, because of the fairly regular acid baths, his armor has a bright reflection. He also has a cape that flutters behind him as he moves, shielding him from the direct sun.

The warrior is approaching the prone creature. It’s much bigger than him, but still doesn’t seem nearly as intimidating as the gryduke. One would hardly call this thing a colossus at all. Like the burmooraak, it’s kind of just a big monster, rather than a fully qualified colossus.

Lykha murmurs, “It’s Mury. What’s he doing?”

“I can’t tell.”

Coco crests a dune, and she stops the vehicle. “I wanna see!” She opens her door, looking back. With a brief search, she finds binoculars along the edge of her seat, and she pulls them out to get a better look.

The warrior with the polearm on his back, and who saved the fairy and indirectly all of the women in the cruiser, is kneeling at the head of the creature. It shifts a little, but it seems pretty out of it.

The warrior plants something that looks like a small barrel with a spike on the bottom into the ground. He then messes with what looks to be a metal tube with holes in it.

Lykha pushes in, saying, “Make some room! Let me see please!” Lykha uses one eye piece, while Coco uses the other.

Murtoa is just finishing his placement of plugs in some, but not all of the holes of the metal tube, including a plug in the top. He then sticks it into the top of the barrel. He pulls flint out of his belt pouch -Lykha remembers which pouch-, and he strikes it on his forearm gauntlet for a couple sparks. Nothing happens, so he strikes again. Still nothing. One last, more deliberate strike ignites a fuse, and the warrior instantly stands up, walking away from the object he placed. Is it a bomb?

If it's a bomb meant to kill this creature, it’s not very big, and he’s not very concerned about evacuating the likely radius.

There are elements of a bomb to be sure, as a small flash and puff of smoke precedes a similar flash and puff through the metal tube, which burns out the plugs and billows smoke out of them as well.

Within seconds, the fairy and the teen both hear a deep call, like a woman or a bird in perfect pitch, filling the air with a chorus note, “uuuuuooooooooooooooooooOOOOOOAAAAAAaaaa.”

It’s a haunting sound, filled with melancholy and foreboding. It touches Lykha’s heart strings, like she just heard the call of a siren of the stories her mother used to tell her. It was a lonely sound, but beautiful.

Of course, the creature doesn’t seem to agree. The sound from Murtoa’s strange instrument sets it into a panic, and it bucks and tries to fly, but it’s chained down. It tries to roll and squirm and claw, but is getting nowhere.

Murtoa, meanwhile, is standing calmly with his polearm drawn, but resting the collapsed grapnel end on the ground. His head is dipped, like he’s meditating or listening.

Coco and Lykha share a curious glance. Coco asks, “He music up all his walkin’bones?”

The fairy sighs, “What are you even saying?”

“The music. He play music for all he ‘bout to merc on?”

“No, of course not. I have no idea what he’s doing. He said he’s using that monster for bait, but…”

“Some pre’y big bait, i’n’it?”

“He only tells me this stuff when it’s happening.”

The two watch a minute or so longer, but Murtoa hasn’t moved, even as the creature behind him has almost rolled itself over in spite of its restraints. Their focus is deeply engrossed in the binoculars.

“I bet’cha he’s a sessy one, i’n’ he?”

“What?”

“Mm-hmm, husbando material righ’dere.”

“YOU HAVE NO IDEA WHAT HE’S LIKE!”

“Spoke like a bae want’n’ him all ta hersel’.”

“I DO NOT! IT’S NOT LIKE THAT AT ALL!”

“Mm-hmm.” Coco grins deviously.

However, over the course of only a few seconds, it’s suddenly night time.

Lykha peeks over the binoculars. A massive, irregular eclipse has blocked out the sun.

The fairy looks at Murtoa, since Coco let the binoculars sink away from him. The warrior is now in a sprint to their left, left of the direction the eclipse seemed to come from.

Within moments, the sun returns, but they get a full view of the cause.

The bait monster has feathers, a large hawk-like beak, but forming big jaws like a crocodile, and humongous, sharp talons at the end of beefy, padded feet. It’s similar to a bird in ways, but bulkier and possessing spines along its back with a leathery sail in the middle of its back.

The eclipse-maker -THE nightenmael- is probably 30 times larger. If not more. While they appear to be almost the same kind of creature; both nightenmaels, the smaller one must be a fairly newly hatched chick or a subspecies.

However, if the bait nightenmael is a chick, then the eclipse nightenmael is not its mother. The eclipse maker lands ‘gently’, but with a short drop at the end, and it’s impact sends a small shockwave through the ground, shaking the vehicle and shifting the sand under it.

The woman in the cab asks in horror, “I-Is that a colossus…?”

Lykha nods. She’s astonished, too, but mostly because something so large can fly. And, like a tiny speck that seems easy to forget, Lykha spots Murtoa running away from the nightenmael as it mercilessly feasts on the smaller one.

Did he bite off more than he can chew? Why would he run away after apparently summoning it?

Gunfire rattles off from the bandit base, but their shots barely seem like golden dust to the titan. It notices them, but simply scratches its feet in the sand, demolishing the base in seconds and burying entire buildings in single strokes of each of its massive talons.

When it decides to stretch its wings to straighten its feathers, it’s then that Lykha connects the dots.

The tip of its wing extends almost directly to her armored companion, including low enough to the ground. And in this moment, Murtoa swings his grapnel end, hooks extended, and latches onto the wingtip, swinging himself up.

She sees now. He wasn’t running away.

He was getting into position.

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