Looming above Idonio's army, glowing with power, thousands of my brethren at my command, was the best feeling in the world. I had power beyond anything I could imagine, even in my wildest dreams. Hundreds upon thousands of Ventils poured from the sky, from the woods, even from the lake nearby. So many individuals, empowered by magic, all ready to obey my command. I could see why Eclipse liked her power. The feeling was incredible. Like I could win this war with a snap of my fingers.

Of course, it fled as soon as I saw how badly my friends and our allies were losing the battle.

All of Idonio's forces were frozen in shock and awe, staring at Eclipse, at me, their eyes drawn like a moth to a flame. The Proditorus were vast and varied greatly; some of them I could see had just shifted, with discernible features that could have once been human. However, the others—such as a gigantic Wyvern with fingers and arms extended so grotesquely I could barely look at it blocking in the Arcadians—seemed too far beyond helping. However, monsters or not, they were still Ventils at heart. They could be healed with guidance from Eclipse.

Idonio himself was frozen, his eyes widened in fear and disbelief. I smirked at his reaction.

We outnumbered them one thousand to one, and he knew it.

I roared to get the attention of the Ventils. They all stood at rapt attention, glowering behind me. They were eager to dive into the fight. I could sense it, their thirst for blood and chaos. They wanted to shred their opponents. To hear them scream in agony while they tore their bones from their bodies to make jewelry. The feeling was like an aura, radiating off of them and sending ripples through the ranks.

Ventils!!! I yelled, making sure my voice projected for miles. This is where we make our stand. We will kill the stranger named Idonio, and make it slow and painful! We will tear out his still beating heart and offer it to our goddess! His screams will be the finest music we will hear in ages!

The Ventils screamed their battle cries in agreement, howls, shrieks and roars piercing the ears of everyone there. Go for the larger creatures first, I ordered. They're keeping our brothers and sisters captive in the ship behind them. Be wary; one of them still possesses the ability to hypnotize.

Here. I gestured for the three Alphas to come closer. I placed a hand on each of their chests over their hearts (three times for the Sea Alpha), a glowing handprint lingering where I had touched. I have given you a gift, I told them. Our fallen Ventils can be revived. Reach out, and they will be Reborn. You need only to touch them.

What about the leader? Ramos questioned, coming up beside me. I just smiled. Leave the big one to me, I said. Grinning, he pointed his newly formed wolf snout to the moon, and let out a howl that echoed throughout the clearing.

CHARGE, I screamed. We all shrieked like banshees as we stampeded into the fray.

There were thousands of us. Leaping from my perch, glowing with sheer power, I hit the ground running. I had ran fast before, obviously. Sometimes for my life, sometimes after prey, but this time I was really flying, and my wings weren't doing anything to propel me.

I had only one target in mind: Idonio.

As I ran, I caught glimpses of Toby smacking Proditorus upside the head with his flaming war hammer by the dozen, keeping them a 3-foot radius away from himself, Aaarrrggghh!!! keeping his back covered. Aquarius had begun to run lines of water over the battlefield, allowing the seaborne Ventils to reach down and grab unsuspecting Proditorus, dragging them into the water. Scales was a great help in this endeavor, slithering through the water as if it were air and snatching them up in pairs, or unhinging his jaw and blasting scalding water at opponents from his mouth. They quickly learned to avoid the floating water, and foolishly headed into Insanity's territory.

Words cannot describe how much pity I felt for the creatures who were stupid enough to run away. Insanity was basically a giant fireball. Every inch of her skin was on fire, like some crazy, burning angel. She was melting the faces off of any creature that came close to her at an alarming rate. Not that they were stupid enough to do it in the first place, anyways. One naïve one in the beginning dared to take her on. She responded by grabbing him roughly in the face and melting his skin off like a wax statue. If the creatures didn't come and attack her, she would start shooting fireballs at them, forcing them to flee into the arms of the rest of our army.

For the few that made it in close enough to make contact, she was ruthless. The moment they were out of range of her fireballs, she was merciless, ripping the limbs clean off of the bodies of her enemies. She was covered head to toe in blood of varying colors. Mostly a deep crimson, but some varied in shades of blue, black and green. I was enjoying watching her work at first; she was very efficient with it, I had to hand it to her. Though I had to turn away when she sunk her fangs into the corpse of a headless body. Even that was too much for me to handle.

Ela was using huge vines as whips to keep enemies away from her, crushing them completely whenever they got too close. Sometimes, she would stomp the ground and a shockwave would ripple out from under her feet. Her hair was down and freed from the many tiny braids she kept, allowing flocks of birds to swoop out of it like hunters in the foliage, pecking the eyes out of those who dared to approach. Cephas was with the healers, trying to prevent injuries from happening and treating the fallen.

Krel was fighting the aliens as best as he could with some sort of energy gun. His serrator, I assumed. Changing it from a gun to a sword-like thing, he was slicing and dicing like a pro chef on Chopped. Douxie was using his staff, playing incredibly complex guitar riffs that blasted away enemies. Archie was in his dragon form, flying around torching anybody who didn't protect their heads.

Nari seemed to be struggling from hurting living creatures and was mostly playing defense, but she looked like she was holding up okay. Steve was running away, screaming, from a particularly tall and brawny lizard-like Proditorus. His axe, Toothache, was nowhere in sight--probably eaten whole by one of the more savage creatures, or something--so I decided to help him out.

I launched myself towards the hulking brute that was looming over a terrified Steve. He had his back to a large rock, and he had nowhere to run. He was whimpering like a baby, while the lumbering beast drew closer. I barreled into the scaly oaf at top speed, knocking him onto his side. He went down fast, limbs and tail slashing at the air around him, searching for his attacker.

I came up quickly, summoning magic into my hand, palm glowing with magic. The creature snarled at me, angry I had interrupted his hunt. I just hissed in return, standing my ground in front of Steve. He might be a jerk sometimes, and a total idiot, but even he didn't deserve to be eaten alive by some giant, hulking lizard.

I ran around his right side, trying to find a weak spot on him. He turned, razor-like claws bared, ready to shred me to pieces. I dodged them, waiting for an opening to strike. For now, it was just defense until I had a clear shot.

When he made a particularly over-sized swing at me, he lost his balance. Seizing my opportunity, I swung hard at him, bringing my hand down on his like a blade when it passed by. He howled in agony as my claws passed clean through his plated wrist and severed the claw. It flopped onto the ground with a disgusting thump.

Swiveling one of my ears in his direction, I could hear Steve retching to my left. Ignoring his disgusting vomiting, I kept my eyes on the enemy, and faked to his left this time. He fell for it, and he stumbled, falling onto one knee. He was only down for a second, trying to get his bearings. That was all the opportunity I needed.

His headless body fell limp to the ground, and I heard Steve screaming from the side. I turned to him and he was frozen, a look of shock and horror frozen to his face. The head had rolled towards him and flopped over at his feet, a long tongue lolling out and eyes rolling back disgustingly.

I just rolled my eyes and offered him a hand up, making sure to wipe off the creature's green blood beforehand. He took it reluctantly, trembling in fear. "Oh, quit being such a coward and help Scales fry the rest of them," I snapped at him, pulling him to his feet. It must have come out more forceful than I intended, because he shrieked and ran away to help out Douxie instead. Humans, someone huffed in my mind. They don't have the stomachs for war.

I mentally nodded, and went back to fighting. Slicing through armor and skin with ease, I chopped my way through the fight to get to Ela. I wasn't going to hang with Insanity, because there was a fairly good chance that she might rip my head off, being so enthusiastic. However, a sudden shout made me turn, freezing in horror. I hadn't noticed the spirit, floating near a frozen Zephyr, encased in solid blue ice.

"My my," the icy creature purred in his raspy voice, trailing a finger along Zephyr's cheekbone and leaving a trail of frost in their wake. She snarled, pulling away from the touch as best as she could while trapped within a block of ice. "It seems I am not the only being on this planet who controls the power of the winds."

He chuckled as Zephyr snapped at his hand when he went to cup her cheek. "Such a creature as this would make an exotic pet for a god such as myself," he mused. Zephyr winced as frost began to spread further across her face from where he was touching her, her breath beginning to fog as it puffed from her mouth in quick clouds. "Or perhaps a lovely trophy to keep at my side..."

Skrael barely had the time to finish his thought, before an outright scream shattered his concentration, stopping the spread of frost across Zephyr's face. Immediately, he was tackled out of the air by a blur of flaming black, screeching in pure rage as Insanity was bashing his head repeatedly into the ground with both hands around his neck.

Without a second to spare, Skrael threw the rabid Ventil off of himself, sending a wave of bitter cold outwards in a shockwave that raked over my skin, the beginnings of frost blooming on my arms. With another scream, the cold was replaced with an all-consuming heat that instantly melted the ice and made me begin to sweat harder as I fought against another Proditorus.

Words were unable to describe the anger Insanity held in her eyes as she bore down on the demigod. No letters, no string of words in any language could have possibly done justice to the amounts of rage in those blood red eyes, absolutely searing with heat and hatred. With a gigantic sweep of her arm, a mountain of flames erupted from underneath the immortal, casting his silhouette in the haunting colors of hellfire.

His roar of anger and pain sent the flames spluttering into mere embers, bitter cold surrounding and encasing Insanity in an icy imprisonment as it erupted in a stream from the staff he wielded. Their face was contorted in concentration, struggling to keep the white-hot flames from melting through the wintry prison, and unaware of the presence that lurked behind them.

Zephry and the icy demon grappled in the air, the clouds darkening and winds turning austere. With a shout, Skrael swung his staff arm around and bashed Zephyr in the head, sending her floating to the ground in a rainbow vortex, wings forming a parachute to assure her safety. However, he forgot to account for Insanity.

He screamed as she launched herself into the air, grabbing his face with both hands and dragging him down, her own screeches of anger drowning out any cries of theirs that might have erupted. Insanity's burning wings beat against Skrael's struggle, fighting against his attempts to return to the air.

Cries of pure agony filled the air, reaching pitches nigh-impossible to draw from a living being. Skrael fought against her, blackened fingers swiping at whatever they could, drawing blood when his sharp fingernails scraped against her skin. This only seemed to make her angrier, as she continued her assault with even more drive and spite, black and red mixing until I could no longer tell what was whose.

His body evaporated under her touch, instantly drifting away into the atmosphere in the form of steam that sighed with the last of Skrael's anguish. A horned skull and remains of an icy staff clattered to the ground, and his black shawl that fluttered lifelessly onto the grass were all that were left of the once-powerful ice god. And with a wave of fire from a flap of Insanity's wings, even that was reduced to ash.

Bellroc's anguished cries carried over the entire battlefield at the loss of their sibling, heatwaves surging and causing burns to erupt on skin and scales alike, knocking away any Ventil that tried to take her down. Callista was one of the many who charged, hands and teeth bared to maim, and managed to latch onto their neck.

Bellroc growled, bodily ripping Callista off of them like she was a leech and flinging her to the side, molten blood leaking from wounds that closed a second later. With inhumanly fast movement, she sliced off her arms, her legs, before finally bringing it down on her head and cleaving her in two, the parts falling lifelessly to the ground.

Meloetta's anguished cries echoed through my ears as a blur of ginger darted past me, launching herself at Bellroc. As they prepared for the attack with their staff raised, eyes on their chest laser-focusing on her, Pythia struck from behind, wrapping her coils around Bellroc and sinking her fangs into them. Bellroc thrashed, neck exposed so Meloetta could deliver a killing blow.

Bellroc screamed, flames erupting along Pythia's body, causing her to hiss in pain and relinquish her grip, darting away. Bellroc rose, limping as one of their arms hung at a weird angle, bones snapping to pop back into place. "Foolish mortals," they hissed, voice flickering from male timbre to feminine soprano in their pain. "You will be a speck on the new timeline of the new world I will create."

"I've already gotten that talk from Insanity," Cephas said coldly from behind me. I jumped, turning at the serious tone in his voice, watching him as he marched through the turmoil to get to Bellroc. Any resistance was met with a loud bleat that made me cover my ears to prevent induction of fear that made me want to run away and hide for the next thousand years.

"What is this?" Bellroc asked, leering at Cephas. "A farm animal dares to speak that way to me. Tell me, little lamb, how quickly would you like to die?"
"You hurt her," was all he said in reply, voice terrifyingly calm. I wracked my memory, before recalling Ela's area of battle had been uncomfortably close to Bellroc in her anger. Oh. Oh no.

Cephas SCREAMED, mouth unnaturally wide, the pure volume of the sound enough to blast back any Proditorus that may have been lingering behind Bellroc. His target was frozen in place, paralyzed entirely by fear. I noticed the silhouette of a little figure reflected in Bellroc's flames, but had no time to register it before claws raked through Bellroc's face, sending her toppling backwards.

Cephas dialed his screech up by another fifty decibels, reaching volumes so loud I felt blood falling from my ears. Raven dove out of the way as Bellroc gasped, a clawed hand reaching for their heart before they froze again, falling over. Their heart had stopped entirely. They had died from sheer, absolute fear. A river in the sky quickly dashed by, Scales swooping up to grab the corpse, dragging it into the water and dissolving as it sizzled, eventually cooling and melting away into the water.

I took this as my cue to continue going, making my way through Proditorus and healing them as I went. I saw Ventils brought back to their former state with a gasp of pain, making eye contact with me and immediately rushing off to join our ranks. The other Proditorus began to run as I approached, but I kept at it. I pulled Birds from the air, grabbed the arms of the Wolves and Bears who passed me, dove after Octopus and Rays, and more beyond that.

It became a blur of motions. I dragged them out of the airborne streams where they grappled with other Ventils, Eels electrocuting the enemy in shocks of sparks, Jellyfish tangling them in ethereal ribbon-like tentacles. I noticed Foxes swiftly weaving around the enemy, Weasels twisting in the air before landing on the enemy with the entirety of their weight, sending them crashing down like bowling pins.

I saw Phoenixes igniting into brilliant flames in the sky, before dive-bombing the enemy, tucking their wings in close and spinning faster, faster, faster until they hit the ground like flaming torpedoes, sending Proditorus and Ventils alike flying. All except for one, who was very noticeably cloaked in lightning rather than fire.

Zephyr had rocketed up into the atmosphere and was spinning in the air at supersonic speed, pulling in clouds and wind as she went. Her hair had come loose from its confines and whipped around her as she fell, lengthening and growing wilder as the cocoon she was creating grew alongside her, lightning striking her in bolts that surely would have killed a mortal being. The eye of the hurricane grew larger and larger, snapping and crackling until a shape burst from it like an egg.

A dragon made of clouds the size of a parking lot spread its murky wings, head thrashing around as it opened its maw and pure white electricity burst from it, lighting up the sky and making a BOOM so loud my ears rang. The lightning crashed down onto Idonio's ship, vaporizing it in an instant, too fast to even allow the Proditorus around the blast zone to even scream in terror.

The other two sisters looked up to see the dragon, and as if bound by a psychic connection they took off across the battlefield, heading straight towards it. Ela sprinted from where she had been staying with the trolls, Jim and Claire. Rapid footsteps shook the earth as she ran, injuries forgotten, blasting a crater into existence as she pushed off the ground into the air, jade wings extending as she glided on the tumultuous winds, tucking and diving into the stormcloud.

Enormous vines began bursting from underneath the ground, wrapping themselves in and around the cloudy shape of the dragon, bulking it up to an even bigger size than before. A hurricane of birds emerged from the trees, more than I had ever seen before in all of my lifetimes, dropping feathers that swirled and constructed a second draconic face, snarling ferociously, glowing yellow eyes trained on the enemies below them. Plates of turf ripped themselves from the surface, stacking themselves into plated armor that was secured with more vines.

Aquarius slipped through the ranks like a dolphin, practically swimming through the rain that had begun to shower, the water forming a staircase for her that she climbed effortlessly. She too jumped directly into the eye of the storm, encased in the creature's cloudy hide.

People screamed as a tsunami of water surged up from the lake, arching over the trees to follow the same steps Ela had taken, seafoam and razor-sharp seashells forming a third face. Enormous mollusks the size of an apartment complex were left behind, their shells forming spines along the dragon's back, salt packing its way into the crevices of the earthen armor and forming an impenetrable shield.

Tentacles burst from the watery center of the monster, enormous limbs of innumerable strength already reaching for the enemy. Three pillars of light, I had just now noticed, shined out from the core of the monster. The earth, sea and sky, three sisters culminated into one single unit.

Idonio screamed in rage as he saw his ship's smoking remains, eyes blazing as he charged the hydra, serrator gripped tight in his hand. The sisters echoed a response in three parts, galloping towards him with the intent to smite him down. He was busy there, then. I turned my back, searching for anyone who needed my help.

I ended up back to back with Krel, though I don't remember when or how. We were in perfect sync—attacking, defending each other, working like the perfect machine. Attack, slash, put up the shield, turn a Proditorus back, repeat.

For a glorious 10 muthres, everything was perfect. The sisters' avatar was now the size of downtown Arcadia Oaks, dealing with Idonio like an elephant would a tick. Steve had gotten Toothache back—probably from Douxie or Archie—and was screaming war cries and charging into the fights. Everybody ran away from him, but it probably wasn't the fact that he had a very disturbing scream. It was most likely that they were terrified of Scales, who was charging in right behind him and boiling anybody who came close to Steve. They made a pretty good team, to be honest.

Cephas was going ballistic. One taste of battle had him addicted, I suppose. He was on the front, screaming the worst curses known to Ventil kind or just plain screaming, and making the remaining Proditorus on Idonio's side faint in fear, or made them turn and flee, screaming. Douxie utilized this, using the extra sound waves to amplify their own spells, Archie in a snake form coiled around his neck.

Jim, Claire and the trolls had been transporting people back to Arcadia where it was safe; they were clearly in more danger being here trying to help. Claire was opening portals by the dozen, sweat flowing down her face in buckets now that Ela no longer aided her as Jim fought off anyone who dared to come close to her, sending them stumbling into Insanity's territory. Insanity was...well, she looked like she was having the best night of her life.

She was laughing like a sadistic tyrant on nitrous oxide. Somewhere, she had picked up Bellroc's staff, and was proceeding to surgically remove any parts of her enemies that she felt were not necessary to their survival. Particularly their heads. Then she proceeded to rip their bodies into pieces beyond recognition. I was almost sick on the spot.

It was perfect for a moment.

And it all fell apart in the next.

Krel's gasp from behind me caused me to turn, and I was speechless in horror, my heart petrified and my lungs refusing to work. There was Idonio, the point of his sword emerging from small of Krel's back through his stomach. He gasped louder when Idonio yanked it back out, bright blue blood gushing in sickening waves as a staticky smell reached my nose. Krel collapsed, gasping for breath, and Idonio grinned, pressing one of his boots into his back.

"No," I whispered, barely audible, falling to my knees and crawling over to his prone form. I pulled him into my lap, his eyes glassy and lifeless. "No." My cries grew louder, drawing Idonio's attention. He laughed, pointing his weapon at me. "Not such a powerful goddess now, are you?" He asked condescendingly. 

The pain was starting to grow now, out of the numbness of shock and into a red-hot, blistering, inhuman agony that was more painful than the worst tortures the human mind could create. It was like twisting a poison-tipped dagger stabbed straight into my heart—over and over and over again, cutting through tissue and vessels and nerve endings and killing me slowly in the most painful way possible.

"This is what happens when rebellion culls in the face of true authority," he continued, leaving his weapon at his side. "I am a merciful man. Call off your mutts, and no one else will be harmed."

Shock. Numbness. Pain. Sorrow. Grief. Agony. RAGE. 

All of these emotions stormed through my blood, raging and pulsing, barely contained beneath the surface of my skin, threatening to burst out and paint Idonio in red, red, red...

Krel is dead. It echoed in my head, like a bell chime that made my head ache and my brain rattle. Krel is dead. Krel is dead. My love is dead. My friend is dead. My Krel...

That day, the citizens of Arcadia Oaks were present for something no living being had heard before.

They heard a goddess scream.