A gelatinous chunk of the Bahamut-form detached rather than being ripped off by Lith’s fangs and threw itself down his throat. The Doppelganger’s goal was to burn with his acid the Wyrm’s windpipe first and then his lungs.
? Unfortunately for Protheus, the Voidfeather Dragon had already drawn another breath and the fragment of the Doppelganger’s conscience found a black furnace waiting for him.
The Void Flames swallowed the gelatine but took care not to kill it. The chunk was still connected to the main body and its suffering was Protheus’ suffering. At the same time, Lith activated his Abomination Touch.
The Doppelganger felt his strength slipping away while Lith’s recovered. Protheus struggled to get free but the searing pain from the trapped fragment of his body made it hard for him to think.
They were physically on par, but Lith’s fury made him stronger.
“You asked me why you should believe me. Because Phloria is dead, that’s why!” Lith roared
The Doppelganger conjured several spells he had kept at the ready but it took just a glimpse of Domination from the Voidfeather Dragon’s eyes to turn them against their caster.
From so up close, Protheus didn’t have the time to understand what was happening, the demonic features of the Wyrm now were the only thing he could think of.
“Unlike your Queen, I never targeted innocents. Sure, I killed them, but never on purpose. They were just in the wrong place and at the wrong time. I bloodied myself for Phloria! I slaughtered thousands! How can you think that I would kill her?”
“How is that any different from what you say Mother did? Say what you want, you are a monster and you just admitted it yourself!” Protheus gave up on his Bahamut form, turning back into a gelatinous mass to escape from the hold.
He also let the trapped fragment die by retrieving his consciousness to make the blinding pain stop.
“I am a monster and I’ve never tried to deny it yet this war made me into something even worse.
“I sacrificed those people, I gave up on my humanity, and for what? Your Queen killed Phloria just to make me suffer. All those people died for nothing and it’s all my fault!” Lith replied, his fury growing with every word he said.
Protheus turned into a Seven Headed Dragon and used the multiple heads to produce multiple blasts of Origin Flames at the same time.
“I refuse to believe you! Mother would never do such a thing. Not after what happened to Father.” Yet even he had a hard time believing his own words.
Verhen’s fury was genuine and the fact that he didn’t shy from his responsibilities made Protheus’ doubt grow.
‘I’ve seen the records. Verhen and Father respected each other. Also, I can’t deny what he’s saying. Had Mother been kidnapped I too would have sacrificed Mogar for her.
‘If Phloria loved Verhen and he cared so much about her, why would he kill her? Why promise so many treasures and call upon so many allies in order to rescue her when he could have just waited to meet her on the battlefield.’ Protheus thought.
“Do you really think that Jormun would have entrusted his son to someone capable of killing those he loves? Are you insane?” Lith was so angry, his guilt for unwittingly killing Phloria that his right arm felt once again bloody and sticky.
The Voidfeather Dragon cried in pain and breathed out a torrent of fire. The fire started black, then became white, then orange, yellow, blue, and finally red. The blast was comprised of all the Cursed Flames but he had failed to merge them.
The fire inside the scales of the Voidfeather Dragon grew dim as the corresponding Cursed Fire was needed, but Lith didn’t care. They were nowhere near Dread Flames but the multi-colored volley destroyed Protheus’ seven Flames and necks alike.
The fire spread to the rest of his body as if it was covered in gasoline and seeped through the open wounds. Protheus tried all the forms at his disposal but the Cursed Flames burned them all, trapping him in a searing agony.
‘Verhen is right. Dad entrusted Valeron the Second not to me or one of Mom’s Divine Beasts, but to Verhen. Dad wouldn’t have done it unless he thought that Verhen would have taken good care of my little brother.
‘Was I wrong all along? What am I supposed to do, Dad? Has Mom really gone insane?’ Crippled by pain and doubt, Protheus let himself burn.
With his fury gone and his love for Thrud cracked, he had lost his will to fight and with it, his reason to live. The Father of all Doppelgangers was scared of losing and terrified of winning. Thrud was all he had and her truth the only thing he knew.
Without her and the mission, he was no better than an ordinary slime.
Not far away, Ufyl stared at the fight. He could have saved Protheus by pointing out the Doppelganger’s situation and the fact that Verhen seemed tired to his squad, yet he said nothing.
The Seven Headed Dragon hadn’t been punished for his defiance, but he had lost his will to fight anyway. He was there at the frontline simply because he had no other choice.
‘If I run away, I’ll be left with nothing. Thrud is like a mother to me and the other Divine Beasts are closer to me than my real siblings have ever been. If I turn my back on them, the Council will kill me.
‘Even if the Council lets me live, if Thrud wins she’ll punish my betrayal with eternal slavery. Like Leegaain said on the day we met, my hands are bloody with Forbidden Magic no less than hers. I’m in too deep. I bet too much on this war. My only path is forward.’
Like a gambler full of debts, Ufyl was driven solely by desperation. He didn’t care about the War of the Griffons anymore, he just wanted to live.
Meanwhile, on the battlefield, Tista had gotten stranded again in the mayhem of the fight and Linnea exploited the opportunity to fight her one-against-seven again. The Headmistress of the Golden Griffon didn’t care for trifling matters like honor.
She liked trampling over her enemies and enjoying their despair. Everything else was irrelevant.
“Come here, lesser Verhen! With you dead, your brother will do something stupid out of grief again. At that point, taking him out will be easy. I’ll get to wipe out Nerea’s legacy in one fell swoop.
“I’ll erase the humiliation that your brother inflicted upon me eight years ago and it will be only thanks to you, child!” Linnea had no qualms about sharing her plan simply because Tista had no way out.
Static Field blocked dimensional magic and even though the Red Demon was a powerful bright blue-cored Awakened, she was nothing compared to seven violet cores ready to deploy Silverwing’s spells.
Tista managed to stay alive only thanks to the Mouth of Menadion. The artifact made up for her lack of body casting and left her free to use her Cursed Flames and breathing technique at every opportunity she got.
