Rise of the Devourer

Book 3: Chapter 39 — Wyvern Cliffs Pt. 9

Noah looked at the shade wyvern sitting nearby, idly crunching on the remaining bones, and sighed in frustration. He’d spent the entire day trying to get the shade wyvern to come to him. But the only time the shade wyvern showed any interest was when Noah offered mana crystals or food.

At least it was no longer running away when Noah approached, but if Noah tried too hard to get close, it would turn invisible, and move away. It was like trying to get a cat to like you, except this one had wings and could breathe fire.

Noah tried one more time to walk closer and just touch the wyvern. Said wyvern paused in its crunching of bones, eyeing him for a moment, as if to dare him to do it. Noah froze in his step and he could’ve sworn the wyvern scoffed, as it resumed to its chew toy.

“You know you can get one of the other wyverns too,” Aurelia said, walking up to him. Next to her the fattest looking wyvern Noah had seen sat, its face oddly round, making it almost look like a giant lizard-puppy, with its tongue hanging out from its mouth and fire occasionally blasting from its nose as it got too excitement. It was even wagging its tail.

Aurelia glanced sideways and scratched the creature’s face, and the wyvern leaned into it, enjoying the sensation. Noah noted Aurelia’s hands were glowing with flames, and any other creature would be yowling from pain, but not the giant wyvern who seemed like it would just about roll over onto its back.

“Yours seem to like you a lot,” Noah said, grumbling, trying not to be jealous.

“He’s great. Apparently one of the few males they keep around in this hive, because he’s too docile and they decided he was harmless enough,” Aurelia said, tossing a mana crystal to the wyvern who jumped up in the air to catch it, crunching down on it happily.

“I believe it,” Noah said, looking at the creature. He imagined this was how wolves originally got domesticated too. One just walked up to a human and realized what a fantastic source of free food they were.

Noah glanced back at his own wyvern, who was done with the bone it had been chewing, and was now trying to clean its teeth with the claws at the end of its long and sleek wings. The creature noted his glance, paused, then with a little chitter, melded into shadows and disappeared.

Noah tried not to sigh. He didn’t succeed.

“I’ll try for a little while longer. If it’d at least let me get close to it,” Noah said.

“That one does seem more headstrong than the rest. Vion said she’d be surprised if you manage to bond to her. Apparently that one’s always been the arrogant child, though she also said it’s for good reason,” Aurelia said.

“Right. You know, that gave me an idea. Do you think these guys can understand us?” Noah asked.

“This one seems to do,” Aurelia said, glancing towards her big fire-lizard. “Hand,” she said, and the big wyvern put its hand on hers. Aurelia tossed another low grade mana crystal at the wyvern who snatched it up happily.

“I’m regretting not picking up that Draconian Rider path I’d gotten. It’d certainly be coming in handy right now. You bet I’m gonna get even more options for it if I ever reach B grade,” she said, and paused. “If I was by myself I wouldn’t be so sure. But I have a feeling that if I keep hanging out with you it’ll end up being an inevitable thing,” she added.

Noah wasn’t listening, his attention taken by the wyvern. Locating the wyvern hidden by in shadows, Noah let Arcane Step take him right up to the creature. The wyvern glanced at him, but did not immediately run away. Right when it was about to turn away, Noah held out his hand with a C grade mana crystal.

The wyvern paused, looking at him in surprise. It leaned in, sniffing once, and then tried to bite at the crystal but Noah pulled his hand back.

“Not so easily, it’s for a wager. Between you and me. A challenge,” Noah said, wondering if the creature would even understand what he was trying to communicate.

His clothes stirred, void goo rising as Tony’s singular eye formed, the symbiotic chittered as he flapped around Noah before going up to the wyvern.

Noah watched in surprise as Tony shivered and vibrated, changing forms and shapes, and the wyvern watched him intently, seemingly understanding what the symbiotic was saying. A second later, Tony returned to Noah, sinking back into his body and the wyvern glanced towards Noah, snorting.

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Then, the creature leaned its head, as if telling Noah to get on. Noah grinned to himself.

Tony you’re the best.

The abyssal symbiotic let out a quiet cheep of excitement, before returning to his dormant state.

Noah climbed on the nightshade wyvern, the creature letting out a grunt as if annoyed. He grabbed onto the obsidian black scales on the giant creature’s back.

Before he had any time to ready himself, the wyvern raised its wings and glanced upwards.

For the briefest of seconds, Noah thought he saw the creature give a grin, before they were off.

“Whoaaa,hold onnn!!” Noah shouted, as the creature shot forward like a missile off to seek its target. The wyvern jumped ahead with a rapid head start, wings slunk next to its body as it just sank down towards the bottom of the hive like a shooting bullet. Other wyverns scrambled rapidly to get out of the way, as the ground rapidly approached the two of them and for a second, Noah thought the two of them were going to collide into the ground and be paste.

He tightened his grip on the wyvern’s back.

At the very last second, with a rapid thrust upwards the wyverns wings spread out and it turned going parallel to ground, wings flared outwards, and the acceleration of the change almost threw Noah off, but he clung on.

The wyvern glanced back at Noah still on his back, now laughing from the adrenaline rush, and grunted in annoyance. Then the creature sped up even further. Noah felt the air now howling in his ears, moving faster than he ever had and he had to learn down and squint to see anything.

Within seconds the wyvern spun around, moving through chambers and barely dodging the wyverns that came in its path with inches to spare. Noah had to duck more than once, slamming into wings and claws that threatened to poke his eyes out or claw at his limbs by accident. His heart was thundered, lifeblood healing any injuries as they continued to move, and he could feel the magic thrumming inside the creature’s body now, underneath the scales.

The wind howled, the scenery moving fast as a buzz surrounded them, they moved like an arrow, spinning and curving in all directions and spinning up and down. The wyvern even tried slamming Noah into a wall at one point, but Noah held firm, not letting loose in his grip.

Seeming growing more and more annoyed, the creature turned up instead, starting to fly straight up. Its speed slowed down a little but now Noah had to fight against gravity as he clung on with one arm grabbing onto the wyvern’s back.

The wyvern began to spin sideways, trying to shake him off and Noah felt his muscles groaning in pain as more and more force jerked him around, his grip shaking. Forming claws at his hands, Noah tightened his grip, pulling himself upwards. Raising his body up he wrapped his legs around the wyvern, righting himself.

The wyvern roared now, annoyance rising as it blasted a blue ball of fire ahead of itself that turned into a giant plume of flame washing over them and Noah was forced to close his eyes. AS the heat passed him by, Noah he felt air hitting his body from all directions, the world turning colder. He opened his eyes and saw clouds all around him. They were out of the hive, and into the skies.

“Holy shit, this is awesomeee—” Noah shouted, before being cut off as the wyvern dived down once more, the world blasting all around it.

Noah felt the air hitting his body so hard that he started to actually lose health, even with lifeblood’s constant healing. He watched his health dip by 1% then 2% and then more, his fingers starting to bleed from having to keep his grip.

The wyvern roared in anger, fire blasting ahead of it and covering the world in waves of heat as he continued to speed faster and faster. The world shivered for a second, a blast echoed around them, and then Noah’s ears began to ring, as everything went silent.

He couldn’t think now. Couldn’t even see anything, every inch of him focused on just keeping his grip. The wyvern roared, and then dark wisps of magic began to rise all around it, as the creature spread its wings out spun upside down.

The change was so sudden, Noah felt his world spinning from the jerking force of the motion, and the next second he was flying off.

His body shot forward like a missile across the surface of a lake, moving so far that his skin began to burn from the friction. Noah’s instincts kicked in as he triggered Metamorphosis, his body partway through his transformation, his back turning obsidian colored as he slammed into a tree, shooting through it, and then another, and then one more.

After nearly a dozen broken trees, Noah slammed into a giant boulder, shattered it into pieces as he finally came to a stop. He watched his health with a dazed glance, lingering somewhere in the low 30s as it rapidly began ticking up from lifeblood.

His spine had nearly shattered, and one of his arms was twisting the wrong way, and his ankles were broken, he coughed blood, groaning in pain, realizing he’d forgotten to turn on pain tolerance. He flipped the skill on, breathing in relief, as he twisted his limbs back into place, cracking his joints into their sockets, Noah rose up to his feet, as his health quickly rose back to full.

He strained his neck and saw a wyvern flying in the air, blasting blue flames all across the sky, roaring in celebration.

He had only been half certain before, but now his mind was made now. It had to be this one.

Noah found a feral grin rising to his face, which was half transformed from metamorphosis, giving him a truly monstrous look.

“Oh it’s on now.”