Rise of the Devourer

Book 3: Chapter 31 — Wyvern Cliffs Pt. 1

Wind stirred around wax, rustling the shrubbery around the group as the four of them landed. Vion stumbled forward, seemingly not very used to being flown around at rapid speeds.

“The wyvern cliffs are not too far from here, but this will be where we will be leaving the three of you. We’ll be here to pick you up in one hundred days. Though if you wish to return early, you can do so as well, after you’ve obtained an adult wyvern’s heart,” Zax said.

Noah gave a nod to the dragon, taking in his surroundings. The forest was tropical and dense, with sunlight barely making it through the canopy, and life teeming and buzzing all around him. The mana levels in the air were also higher than normal, and he could sense multiple presences nearby, tho none even tried to come close. If his own aura wasn’t enough to keep them away, then Zax and Vion’s aura certainly did the trick.

Three draconian auras with two actual dragons arriving out of nowhere. I’d be running away as well.

After a few breaths Vion had visibly calmed down from her abrupt abduction and transportation, and was now glancing around the forest with a dreadful expression.

“What will we do about food? And where will we sleep?” Vion asked, looking at Zax. “And there’s no bathrooms here either… I’m sweaty and feel gross and want to take a bath.”

Noah and Aurelia looked at her, somewhat surprised.

“You sound a lot like the princesses we’d abducted in our juvenile years, and not the dragon you are,” Zax said, looking at Vion.

“Well maybe because I am a princess,” Vion said with a hmph as she glanced away from Zax.

“You are training. Here, you must hunt to eat, and sleep where you find a safe location. And you can bathe in any lake or river you may find if you so desire,” Zax said.

Vion shuddered at Zax’s words. “You want me to live like a savage? And what…? Eat monsters?” Vion asked.

“Indeed. That, too, is a part of your training.,” Zax said.

Vion’s expression fell, a look of disgust forming on her expression before she let out a defeated sigh. “I suppose I can fast for a month.”

“The wyverns steak we had was pretty great. We could make that when we catch the wyvern,” Noah added.

“Those are prepared, by chefs, in a kitchen. Do either of you have any cooking skills?” Vion asked, looking at Aurelia and Noah.

“Aurelia can cook,” Noah said.

“Not… wyvern steak. But— I suppose there’s a first time for everything,” Aurelia said.

“The three of you can begin from now. We’ll be returning to the others. Since this is supposed to train you, we won’t be here to save you should something go wrong, and you will be unable to call for us. Your lives are in your own hands,” Zax said, and by the tone of his voice, Noah could tell he was serious

Noah gave him a nod. “We’ll be fine.”

The dragon took one look at the three of them, before magic swirled all around him, covering in him light, and he was gone.

Vion let out a deep sigh, before sitting on a boulder nearby. “So… what now?”

“Well, let’s make a plan. We need to get an adult wyvern’s heart right? For that we’ll need to find one,” Aurelia said, taking a seat next to Vion as she pulled out a piece of paper from her dimensional storage.

Aurelia turned to Vion. “Vion, you were on one, weren’t you? Do you know where to find them?”

“Juveniles? Yes. They’re everywhere around these areas, and even wander around the city sometimes. But the adults stay inside and are much higher atop the mountains,” Vion said, looking up towards the forest canopy. Through a gap in the forest path, they could see the cliff rising tall into the skies, and distant creatures swirling around it.

Vion pointed in the direction. “See those cliffs? That’s not a natural mountain. These mountains aren’t really mountains but giant nests of wyverns, it’s all empty on the inside. There’s caves inside all of them, filled to the brim with wyverns. That’s where they brood and nest.”

Noah followed Vion’s pointed direction, looking at the tall mountain and trying to picture it filled up with Wyverns.

“That sounds like a lot of them,” Noah said.

“Probably in the thousands,” Vion replied with a nod. “The juveniles go out and hunt the furthest, the adults come out less frequently, and stay higher up to catch stronger prey. The queen stays inside with the eggs and the young near the top of the cliff.”

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“Sounds a surprisingly lot like an ant colony,” Noah said.

“It’s similar, except they can fly and bite your face off and breathe lightning,” Vion replied, grinning.

“Could you maybe make a map?” Aurelia asked.

Vion thought about it, before taking the piece of paper and the quill as she began to scribble onto it. After a few minutes, a rough illustration of the area was drawn. With a forest section, a river dividing the area in two, the mountains, and then the sea beyond that.

“These two peaks are the main ones,” Vion said, pointing at the two tall mountains on her drawing. “We can’t really see it from here, but that’s the central one. The one we can see is a side nest,” Vion said, before circling the other mountain. “There’s two colonies here, Sky Wyverns and Thunder Wyverns. They don’t get along particularly well but have sort of a truce between the two groups. The juveniles fight all the time though, it helps weed out the weak ones and keeps them sharp,” Vion said.

“Which ones are easier to get?” Aurelia asked.

Vion hummed to herself. “Sky wyverns are very fast, but do less damage. Harder to catch though. Thunder Wyverns are less fast, but can breathe lightning. About the same?”

Noah looked at the mountain, trying to observe the distant wyverns in the sky. Tony bubbled forth from under his skin and Noah raised the symbiote up as it took to the skies, observing the target.

“Gross, what’s that?” Vion asked, looking at Noah.

“Tony, my abyssal symbiote, and also how dare you. He’s the best there is,” Noah replied.

“Abyssal symbiote…” Vion’s eyes widened, as she turned to look at Aurelia. “Is it… did he put an abyssal parasite inside of him?”

“It’s a long story,” Aurelia said, shaking her head.

Noah felt a steam of thoughts come to him via Tony.

“The one we’re closer to is the Sky wyvern nest,” Noah said.

Vion frowned, before looking down at her map and marking an X mark. “So we’re somewhere around here. To move ahead… we’ll need to head through this direction, cross the river and reach the base of the nest. That will take a day or two to get to. The river has… annoying creatures.”

“What kind of creatures?”

“Sea serpents. Well, juvenile sea serpents that is. They lay there eggs up stream and the children stay in the river till they have outgrown it before heading out into the sea. There’s also deidacrocks and other pesky monsters, and most of them have draconic blood which means they’ll have weird mutations and abilities,” Vion said.

“Doesn’t sound too bad. So we cross the river and then we need to enter the nest?” Noah asked.

“Are you insane? You will die. There’s thousands of wyverns inside, and they will swarm and annihilate you before you can even blink,” Vion said.

“So… how else can we get an adult? You said they don’t come out.”

“They stay inside most of the time, but not always. If there’s a big enough threat then they’ll come out to defend the nest. The only problem is reaching that high up on the cliffs without dying to all the stray juveniles trying to pick us off.”

Aurelia frowned. “This might be a lot more complicated than just hunting an adult wyvern. No wonder Zax gave us a hundred days worth of time.”

“I think we’re overthinking it,” Noah said, looking out to the cliff. “If there’s too many wyverns, we simply need to kill a bunch. Isn’t that the whole point of this training?” Noah said.

“That’s the dumbest idea I’ve ever heard,” Vion said. “Even I would not be able to take out all the wyverns, my stamina wouldn’t last, and neither would my mana.”

“Who said we have to take them all out?”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, we need to just lure one out right? And if this is really like an ant colony, then we want to kick it up and make ourselves seem like a big enough threat.”

“That will put the entire nest onto us. Sounds like a good way to die,” Vion replied.

“Listen, I wasn’t done. We kick it up, kill a bunch of juvenile and just kick up a storm, and then run. As the wyverns start flooding out, the bait runs into the other nest. In the meantime someone else was doing the same thing to them so both sides are riled up. The wyerns start clashing against one another, fighting against each other and using the chaos we lure out an adult. The third person will be waiting for the right chance during this and give the signal to recollect before we take out an adult wyvern,” Noah said, grinning to himself.

“That… is so stupid,” Vion said.

“But it might just work,” Aurelia said, looking at Vion.

Aurelia turned towards Vion, holding her hand. “I can’t believe I’m supporting this, but this might be the best method to get an adult wyvern.”

Vion looked at Aurelia in surprise, before glancing back at Noah. A moment later, she let out a sigh.

“We’ll keep this as a tentative plan, but I’m going to thing of something else. For now, let’s focus on tossing the river first,” Vion said.

“Alright. Sounds like a good first step,” Noah said.

“We’re around here so we can—” Vion paused as her stomach let out a loud grumbling noise. The girl blushed visibly, holding her stomach.

“What… this… this never happens…” she said.

Noah chuckled to himself. “Seems like someone’s hungry?”

“I don’t know. I’ve never… I’ve never had this happen. After that battle and transforming, my body feels strange,” Vion said.

“I understand. I get quite hungry after I use my embers of fury as well. Though mana stones can do the job as well, but food is definitely good to have. We should get something to eat,” Aurelia said.

Noah nodded, before glancing towards the sky. A moment later, Tony flew down, before merging back into his skin.

“Good news. Tony found something nice. From what I can tell, it was some kind of a giant wild boar,” Noah said. The image formed as Tony’s thoughts were shared with him, and Noah pictured the creature. A giant boar with large tusks and some draconian scales on its body.

Licking his lips, he glanced towards the other two. “Seems like we have our food bait as well.”