Gatekeepers Book 3: Redemption
Chapter 15: Balara

The flying islands of Río’s castle hovered high in the sky, casting a dark shadow over everything beneath them in the already dark night sky. The distant sounds of the battle was muffled by the enchanted mist swirling above. Flying underneath the islands, almost invisible in the inky darkness cast by the islands’ shadows, were three dragons facing off against each other.

“Is this truly the best the two can do?” Balara questioned, glaring at the two injured dragons before him. “Don’t tell me this is all the Skyhaven Prison Warden and Theravor’s personal advisor can offer.”

“S-shut up,” Vertex growled, returning Balara’s glare. Vertex took a moment to sneak a peek at Poseidon behind him. The elderly dragon was in a bad state; blood dripped from the various gashes Balara’s claws tore into his flesh. Poseidon’s left eye was bloody and clouded from a blow that would’ve been lethal if Vertex hadn’t knocked the trajectory off-course.

Poseidon can’t last much longer in his state; any more fighting would surely give Balara an opening to finish him off. Vertex chuckled softly to himself as he gripped his left wrist. Then again, I’m not doing much better myself.

Just beyond where Vertex’s sweaty right hand wrapped around his wrist, a bloody stump of flesh ended where his left hand should’ve been. Balara got the drop on Vertex and Poseidon the moment Vertex separated him from Río and Vinkex and bit Vertex’s hand off. Had Vertex not seen it coming a moment earlier, Balara could have very well bitten his whole head off, ending it right there.

The sound of crunching bones reached Vertex’s ears, and he returned his attention to Balara. Several talons of Vertex’s left hand stuck out between Balara’s fangs while the dark blue dragon mockingly chewed on the severed hand.

“This is so disappointing,” Balara commented as he shook his head. He reached up and pinched a talon sticking out of his mouth between his thumb and index talons before pulling it out, ripping it away from the rest of the hand. He tossed it at Vertex. “To think Theravor’s followers were this weak... how dull.”

Vertex smacked the talon away before it struck him. “Shut up,” he repeated, a low growl rising from his throat. “Stop mocking us and take this fight seriously.”

“Why should I take trash like you two seriously?” Balara sighed. “It would only be a waste of energy that would be better spent cutting your king’s head off.”

“Try that and I’ll kill you!” Vertex hissed.

“Vertex.”

Vertex looked over his shoulder and saw that Poseidon now hovered directly behind him. Holding his lance out before him, Poseidon tapped the gold dragon head on the bottom of his weapon against Vertex’s bloody stump twice. The jaws of the dragon opened, and a cold mist flowed out and wrapped around the stump before hardening into an icy cast. Vertex removed his hand from his wrist and flexed his left arm a few times to test the strength of the cast.

“Thanks for that, Poseidon,” Vertex said with a grunt. “I needed that.”

Poseidon snorted. “I know you did. Your Planetary magic may be powerful, but it has the significant drawback of requiring your hands to be free. You wouldn’t have been able to cast any magic with your hands tied up like that.”

Vertex glared at Poseidon. “You really don’t need to state our weaknesses out loud in front of our enemy,” he growled as he pointed up at the bottom side of the Rogue King’s floating archipelago above. A dull thud echoed through the air.

“Hmm?” Balara glanced up at the underside of the islands. Something shifted in the darkness above. Balara’s eyes widened in surprise before quickly moving to the side just as two thin stone pillars shot through the air just where Balara was before.

“Damn it,” Vertex growled, subconsciously grabbing his frozen left stump. “If I had both of my hands, he wouldn’t have been able to dodge that.”

Balara stared at the two stone pillars with an expression akin to excitement. ”That’s more like it,” he growled as an excited light flickered through his eyes. He spat out the remains of Vertex’s left hand into his palm. “If I’d known taking your hands from you slowed down your magic, I would’ve gone for the legs instead.” Balara tossed the mangled hand aside, and it fell down to the ground below. Whichever poor soul replaces that in the morning is going to be in for a nasty shock.

Vertex snorted. “If I were you, I would be more concerned about yourself than worrying about a good fight. You should pay better attention to your surroundings.”

“What?” Balara glanced around, but didn’t see anything other than the two stone pillars, Vertex, and Poseidon. “What are you babbling on about?”

In that moment, another pillar of stone shot out of the side of one of the first two and extended towards Balara at a ridiculous speed. The tip caught Balara on the cheek just as Balara turned his head to glance around some more. A loud crack rang out as the impact sent Balara sprawling backwards. Balara forced himself to come to a stop and glared at Vertex with a furious expression as his lower jaw hung loosely from the rest of his face.

“I only dislocated your jaw with that?” Vertex observed, surprised. “Anyone else would’ve had their entire jaw shattered from that blow.”

Balara grabbed his jaw with one hand, and with an audible squelching sound, he shoved it back into place. “I’m much sturdier than you could hope to realize,” he hissed as his tail twitched in annoyance.

“Oh, because of Vinkex’s enhancements, correct?” Poseidon queried as he proceeded to freeze his own wounds.

“Wha- How do you know about that?!” Balara snapped.

“It was blatantly obvious the moment we separated you three,” Vertex answered. He made another pillar shoot out of the second and punch into Balara’s gut. “Do you think we’re so inexperienced that we wouldn’t recognize the difference in magic you’re giving off now from when you were imprisoned?”

“All your leader has ever done is underestimate us,” Poseidon commented. “And that’s going to be the very reason why this war is going to end in our victory.”

Another stone pillar slammed into Balara’s shoulder. White cracks radiated from the spot of the impact.

“V-Vinkex’s enhancement spells?!” Balara cried in shock. “Why are they breaking?”

“You’re just now noticing that?” Poseidon reached into his white hair and pulled out an empty crystal vial no bigger than his talon. “You see, the head of the Managuard family is quite a superb alchemist. You wouldn’t believe what kind of new potions and poisons she’s concocted over the years.” He flashed the vial at Balara. “Take this one, for example. Simply pour it on your hands, and any magical attacks you land on your target will rob it of its magic. It’s mostly used to remove seals from old lockboxes and whatnot, but as you can see, it’s great for removing Enhancement spells mid-combat as well. I took the opportunity to splash this on Vertex when I was treating his injury.”

“I hope you’re ready, Balara, because beating the magic out of you will be rather painful for you,” Vertex growled. He held his right hand high above his head and held it out towards Balara with the talons outstretched. The air rumbled for a few moments before countless stone pillars erupted from the first few and assaulted Balara like a horde of flying snakes. Balara tried to fly out of range, but more stone pillars kept spider-webbing from the previous ones and multiplied in number until Balara was completely surrounded in a net of them.

“Theravor said that our magical attributes would be a bad match-up,” Vertex said to no one in particular as the net tightened around Balara. “What utter nonsense. To hell with attributes! I’m not fighting with some half-hearted resolve here!”

“I’m not just going to let you best me!” Balara roared. He held his palms close to one another before him, and a dark red fireball appeared in his hand. “Nova Prominen--!”

A stream of water suddenly shot through the air, moved straight through the moving stone net, and hit Balara’s fireball with pinpoint accuracy. Similarly surprised, both Balara and Vertex turned their gazes towards Poseidon. The old dragon held his lance in a reverse grip in his right hand while holding the head up with his left, the three tips of the lance pointing directly at Balara. If anyone from Draycos’s world saw this, they’d say Poseidon looked just like a sniper.

“I’m not really good at this,” Poseidon admitted as three orbs of water formed on each tip of his lance. “Try not to move around too much, alright Balara? I don’t want to take an eye or something by accident.”

“You think you can intimidate me with a lucky shot?!” Balara growled. He waved his hand in an arc above his head, and numerous dark fireballs formed in the air in its wake. “Once I melt this cage, you’ll be the first on my list to finish off!”

“Just try it,” Poseidon growled, infusing his lance with his magic power. The three tips of his lance turned crimson before splitting apart. Numerous red petals bloomed from each tip with long, whisker-like feelers stretching out past the petals. The petals fell off the lance by the scores and floated in the air around Poseidon.

“Eastern-Style Enhancement: Spider-Lily Sharpshooting.” The water orbs shot forward and extinguished all the fireballs as soon as Balara generated them.

“Let’s end this already,” Vertex commented, curling the talons of his right hand into a tight fist. “Stone Bombardment.”

All the stone threads forming the net suddenly shifted and shot directly at Balara. All Balara could do was curl up into a tight ball and protect his vital spots as each thread repeatedly nailed him with the force of a cannonball. The white cracks on his shoulder quickly spread across the rest of his body until it looked like it was about to shatter. Vertex paused his assault and watched on with Poseidon as the image of Balara shattered completely and broke off of Balara’s body like a broken exoskeleton and fell out of sight below. Balara himself was completely spent; his scales were cracked and destroyed in multiple spots on his body, revealing swelling, bruised skin beneath. Blood trickled from the corner of his mouth, and he grasped his broken right arm with his left hand.

“Vertex,” Poseidon suddenly whispered into Vertex’s ear, nudging his shoulder before pointing at something with the tip of his lance. Vertex followed his gaze and saw a dark red shard of crystal protruding from the front of Balara’s right shoulder. Vertex instantly knew what it was, and he started chuckling at the sight.

“What’s so funny?” Poseidon questioned with an extremely perplexed expression.

“Is Vinkex really so uncharismatic that he needs to forcefully bend everyone to his will?” Vertex asked, still chuckling. “I don’t know about Río, but even Balara’s not following him willingly.” Sighing, Vertex stopped laughing and gave Poseidon a serious look. “Let’s remove that blasted crystal.”

Poseidon nodded. He pointed the butt-end of his lance towards Balara, and the golden dragon head’s jaws opened once more to spew forth multiple gold chains that quickly wrapped up the enemy.

“R-release me at once!” Balara demanded, struggling fiercely against the chains. A magic aura flared up around his body, but it quickly disappeared as the chains around him turned pitch black.

“There’s no point in trying to free yourself with magic,” Poseidon informed him as he and Vertex drew close to Balara. “My weapon also has Antimagnium capabilities; all you’ll do is waste your power.”

“I... I haven’t lost yet!” Balara spat out, spitting with fury as the crystal shard started to glow softly. “I will win the battle! I will take the throne from that bastard of a piece of trash you call your king! I will--!”

“Give it a rest?” Vertex interrupted, finishing Balara’s sentence. He reached out and grabbed the crystal shard with his hand. “Be our guest.”

Balara’s eyes widened even further as he realized what Vertex was doing. “N-no! Don’t do that!” he cried.

“Rest in peace, ye fragment of Vinkex’s soul,” Vertex said solemnly as he tightened his grip on the crystal. The crystal cracked violently before disintegrating to dust. Balara suddenly went rigid before his whole body became limp as he hung loosely from Poseidon’s chains, unconscious.

Vertex held his hand close to his face and examined the crystal powder remaining in his palm. As Poseidon looked over his shoulder to observe, a dark shadow rose from the powder before fading away. Far off in the distance, Vertex thought he heard a roar of rage.

“Well, I guess this means that one of the biggest problems has been taken care of,” Vertex said with a sigh, dumping the powder out of his hand. He watched as it was blown away by the wind until it was no longer visible. “And I think we learned something from this, wouldn’t you say, Poseidon?”

Poseidon nodded his head. “The way that Balara spoke just before we destroyed the crystal fragment... you would think that he was actually Vinkex. This brainwashing ability Vinkex has isn’t exactly as simple as brainwashing... it’s more like he’s implanting part of his soul into his targets.”

Vertex looked up at the islands floating above, unsure of what to say. Saying it like that doesn’t sit well with me... having a part of that scum’s soul in my body for two years is unnerving to think about.... A shiver ran down Vertex’s spine, and he shook his head to clear it of those thoughts before glancing at Poseidon. “Alright. First things first, let’s go locate Damrabe and get our wounds treated. We won’t be of much help for the rest of the battle if we remain in this condition.”

Poseidon nodded in agreement, and together, the two dragons took off in the direction where they could sense Damrabe’s magic power, with the unconscious Balara in tow.