The Phoenix King had been awoken by his most trusted servant, the squire, Itsü, had been promoted with Kenn’s own raise in status. Now he was Kenn’s personal assistant and protege.

  Now a young man, the tanned boy said “Sire, there are beasts marching on the castle. The Queen is already preparing to help-”

  Itsü was cut off by Kenn raising to his feet and said “Like hell she is.” as he didn’t take the time to grab more than a simple robe before he began marching out of his quarters. Itsü followed behind quietly.

  They marched out of the castle

  Alea looked up with fire in her eyes and said “And army of the beasts march on our land and you expect me to do nothing?” as she tried to tear his arms off of her. But he brought her into a hug instead. “I expect for you to care for yourself, not be reckless.”

  The white haired woman sighed deeply and slowly returned the hug. Itsü and their commander looked at each other silently for a moment. Alea said “I will still ready myself, but I won’t step out unless necessary.” and Kenn nodded. He said to the commander “Wake the garrison, I will dress and be ready to meet them and see what the beasts want.”

  Kenn and Alea both headed to the Armory, soon a number of other maids and servants joined them. Alea had to forego her armored dress but instead wore enchanted robes that elevated her frost magic. Kenn donned his iconic and trusted blue armor, it appeared to have seen many battles by this point but still remained uncompromised. A new change vs the last time Akai had seen it in his dream was runes carved into the wrist bracers.. Through Kenn’s eyes, they were understood to mean infernus ignis. Archaic words that Akai would not know the meaning of.

  Sword strapped to his side, shield held in his off hand, and helmet modified to signal his status adorned. Kenn walked to the outer walls with his garrison ready, Alea held back for now, and watched the incoming army. An enchanted timepiece revealing it to be 1am at this point. As Kenn stood on the wall, it began to lightly rain, a cloud moving overhead to block the moon’s light.. In the distance, what approached was only able to be described as beasts.

  Inhuman monsters of all shapes and sizes marched in unison, some armored crudely and others unable to be armored due to their shape. The rain masked the smell mostly, but not entirely, as the army was upwind of the city. Kenn squinted as he saw them flying a banner.. “They march under the banner of Baphomet..” Kenn muttered quietly to himself. “What does the Great God Of Beasts want with our city..”

  Within the hour, the monsters stopped just beyond the range of bows and spellcasters. A horn sounded and they began building and digging fortifications for a camp. While a flying messenger was sent forth.

  Kenn flared his golden flames around him to bring attention to himself, guiding the flying messenger forwards. It landed on the wall next to him, the armored men around them very wary of it. This creature was easily 10 feet tall if it wasn’t hunched over so much, taught muscles and thin bones visible with its gaunt figure, membranous wings sprouted from its back. Three glowing and slitted green eyes gazed down at Kenn. It spoke through a hideous maw. “The Great God of Beasts Baphomet has declared war on the Great God of Humans Asmodeus.” before it suddenly lunged.

  Kenn stepped back and narrowly avoided its adamantine claws aiming for the gaps in his armored plates. A putrid miasma of green energy followed the claw, but it was burned away as Kenn flared his golden flames. He drew and slashed his sword in one movement, sending forth a blade of his golden flame forth that split this beast in two.

  Horns sounded from the camp and Kenn shouted, his power pushing his voice further than he could naturally shout. “Prepare yourselves, Baphomet has declared war on Asmodeus!”

  As he said that, certain monsters surged forth from the camp and began launching magical attacks towards the city before running back, only stepping into their maximum range before leaving. Knowing that even the greatest of casters couldn’t reach them from the city’s walls. Kenn growled as he knew what they were planning. The beasts wanted him to expose himself by either sending out troops to their death or let them pelt his wall either until his people starved or his wall fell.. And he could expect them to send out their heavy hitters the moment he had to leave to rest.

  Kenn ordered his men to conserve their strength and to only fire back if they were confident in hitting them.

  Over the next day, Kenn was forced to sit and watch the beasts construct engines of war and he was unable to stop them.. He was right and when he was forced to leave the walls to rest, the beasts sent forth lumbering monsters in armor. These beasts vaguely resembled reptilian gorillas over 20ft in height. Carrying ladders, they attempted to scale the walls. Unfortunately, Alea was there and nobody could convince her not to expose herself. Despite her pregnancy, she was still a powerful combatant. Large spears of ice buried themselves in the beasts while the spells and arrows of their soldiers seemed much less effective. Half of these beasts made it to the walls and while they were then able to kill the rest, it took a minimum of 20 soldiers to do it.

  These harassments lasted for days until the army began moving forth.. Magical beasts summon ethereal shields in front of their lines as they move in, the strongest ones carrying large barriers with them to shield the weaker beasts from arrows and weaker spells. A battering ram was being wheeled to the main gates of Kenn and Alea’s city. Others carried ladders to climb the wall. However most of the forces concentrated on a hastily built siege tower. Kenn shot forth motes of golden fire at it, but it impacted summoned ethereal shields before hitting it.. He cursed, not having many strong ranged combat abilities. Itsü stood by his side and was slinging forth ethereal violet bolts of energy from his hands at beasts he saw not protected by a shield.. His bolts were deceptively powerful, piercing through multiple enemies while only looking the part of weak basic magic. But against a force of thousands, one boy wouldn’t be enough.

  Kenn said to his men “Concentrate forces to defend the gate. Have our ranged units focus on picking off stragglers and stopping those ladders. When the tower gets close, I will handle that myself. Itsü, you will support me from the wall.”

  His men all shouted “Yes, Your Majesty”.

  At the gates, his soldiers prepared counter measures against the battering ram. Lugging up heavy stones and boiling oil. Archers prepped to use a supply of enchanted arrows while their mages huddled around murderholes at the portcullis.

  One of the mages lifted a large looking staff over their shoulder as it began sparking with intense magical energy and a sudden flash of light caused a bright white explosion to appear among the forces of beasts marching to the gate. Then as it flashed a second time, but the overcharged magic missile was stopped by a sudden massive barrier. A massive wall of stone appeared and crumbled away from the impact.

  On the battlefield, an unusual creature broke away from the horse of animalistic monsters. A creature made of ethereal energy stood wearing robes made of black stone. Cyan wisps encircled it as it drew forth intense magical power. Then beams of cyan energy shot forth and battered the city wall, cracking the stone. As it drew more energy for a second volley, the mages and archers parted from outside and Alea strode to the edge of the wall. Her eyes gazed coldly down at this beast of magic.

  The second volley of cyan bolts were stopped halfway by intercepting darts of ice. Alea’s hair rose as she ice elemental magic within her surged as powerfully as she could, frost covered the wall around her as she prepared to engage this elite of the beast’s army.

  Elsewhere along the wall, the approaching siege tower and its entourage of beasts watched as a knight clad in blue metal armor dropped from the very tall wall. Landing in the dirt with a cloud of dust, which cleared a moment later as golden flame enveloped their form.

  Glow from golden eyes gazed from behind their visor. The flame spread to the symbol of a phoenix on the shield and the blade of his sword as he began marching forwards.

  Various animalistic beasts stopped, the foot soldiers were intimidated by the sight, but a roar from a monster in the rear made them continue forwards. A number of them rushed forwards ahead of the tower to meet the king’s advance. Two legs, four legs, and six legs charged as their fear was replaced with fanaticism for the beast god Baphomet.

  Wings of flame sprouted from Kenn’s back and the air around him became superheated, so much so that the grass around him was rendered to ash and even the dirt charred, dried, and cracked. Directly beneath his boots the dirt was left glowing red hot. This trail followed as he broke into a sprint of superhuman speed.

  He ducked a claw and met it with his sword, the fire blazing as hot as the sun as he cleaved the beasts into pieces. A scaled creature was sliced into three, but another gaunt winged creature lunged forwards. Unfortunately for it, a wing of flame extended out as Kenn turned, burning through it, making it crumble to ash as it fell.

  A flurry of sword strikes, blades of fire shooting out in other directions, and his flaming wings all kept these beasts at bay. Burning hair, singing flesh, and any that got too close were cremated before they could land a claw, talon, tooth, or tail on the king.

  When he was finished with one group, another ran forth to intercept him as well, only slowing him down for moments before he continued running for the siege tower. When he was halfway there, however, his instincts screamed to dodge. Kenn leaned left just as a jagged metal lance lunged at where he was just a moment before. He narrowed his eyes and saw the perpetrator.

  “An Elite came out to play, huh?” he chuckled, taking a stance with his shield forwards as what marched towards him sent a shiver through not only the beast’s army, but down his own spine.. It lumbered on two massive front arms made entirely of jagged metal. Razor claws dug into the earth as it walked, equally huge hind legs trampled behind it. A long tail of metal whipped against the earth.

  This beast was 12ft tall, covered in this metal from the tip of its angular head down to the tip of its sharp tail.. Its eyes were made of Ruby steel, its razor teeth made of mithril.. Kenn could tell because of the same bluish hue it shared with his own suit of armor. “This will be fun..Haven’t fought one of these before” He muttered, preparing as he saw it ready to lunge and close the distance between them.

  In the blink of an eye, this metal monstrosity was upon Kenn, leaving behind a crater and cloud of dirt and dust where it just was. Kenn had to put every ounce of his flame into his body to strengthen it as his shield dented under the force of its clawed hand striking out. Kenn stood his ground, but the ground was what gave out first. He slid many feet sideways as the monster dug its claws into the dirt to change direction and chase him.

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  Kenn firmed his stance and focused as this beast lunged again. He stepped in and deflected its claws, deflecting the hit, saving his shield from a further dent. Its claws could not pierce the metal of his shield or armor, but with so much force behind it, Kenn did not want to take a direct hit.. Because those teeth absolutely could.

  His armor was an alloy of mithril and steel, the precious metal was incredibly rare.. But those teeth, they were pure mithril… He smiled under his visor, wanting to keep them for himself. His flames burst forth from his sword and left a glowing red slash on the surface of this metal titan. Kenn ducked and jumped back to avoid its bite, then had to jump over its tail that came swiping along the ground.

  The two armies watched the duel between Kenn and the metal titan, and the duel between Alea and the arcane beast.

  Kenn flared his fire as Alea brought down a maelstrom of ice. Kenn’s fight was furious and intense while Alea’s was cold and calculated.

  After many minutes of narrowly deflecting or dodging these attacks, the steel titan moved. Kenn moved in, seeing that it was going to try and feint an attack to get him off balance. This fight was fun, but he couldn’t spend too long embroiled in combat against this one enemy, he had to bring that siege tower down.

  Kenn moved with incredible efficiency, his stance was firm and planted but it did not inhibit his ability to dodge or maneuver. He ducked under a swipe, countering with a fiery slash of his own sword. He side stepped its bite as it tried to bring its head down on him. He raised his sword and thrusted, burying the blade into its red metallic eye. Metal creaked as he breached its unnatural defense, then he forced his fire into the sword. Flames burst from its mouth as it seared the creature beneath its metal elemental armor. Destroying many vital parts of the inside of its head, but he could not keep it up enough to kill it. Kenn saw purple bolts of energy strike the metal titan as well, but they failed to pierce its armor.

  The steel titan swung its head to the side, launching Kenn away and leaving the sword stuck into one of its eyes. Kenn cursed as he began running to get back to the titan, but had to roll to the side as jagged metal rose from its back like the quills of a porcupine. It spun and flung its tail, launching more metal lances at him at near supersonic speeds. Kenn dodged most but one struck his armored leg and bounced off, denting the plate. One struck the pauldron of his armored shoulder, the force too much to bear for the leather straps holding it in place. The pauldron flew off with a large dent in it.

  Kenn saw the steel titan preparing to shoot more metal lances and he had to quickly think of a plan to get closer.. He realized what he needed to do and began sprinting. He was not sprinting directly at it, but perpendicular to it. Steel lances missing him and embedding into the city wall instead, which Kenn then used the moment after these lances shot to move in before moving sideways to dodge more. Kenn changed his speed at the last moment, avoiding its attempt to lead shots and hit him. After three volleys he was close enough to kick off the ground and his wings of fire give a powerful flap to thrust himself in. Scorching the ground as he rocketed in, tackling the steel titan and knocking it off balance. Kenn threw a number of empowered punches, fire bursting forth from the opposite side of the titan as he pushed his fire into and through the creature. Damaging its insides far more than normal attacks could.

  After a barrage of punches and dodging its attempt to bat him away with its tail, he stopped and ran for his sword. Sticking close to its side to stay in its blind spot until he could grab the handle and pull it free.

  Kenn wasted no time, he saw it struggle to stand by this point and ran under it, then dropping his shield to hold his sword with both hands. He empowered his fire as much as he could, the metal armor of this titan began to glow orange just from being close to him. The dirt turned into char beneath his feet, blood ran from Kenn’s nose and boiled under his own visor as pain wracked his body. He pushed it as high as he could without killing himself, then pushed his sword forwards. The metal of his weapon acting as a conduit for his power and not simply melting under his own heat. It cut into the metal titan’s body like a hot knife through butter, piercing its heart before he drew the sword down. Slicing through its abdomen, its innards met the superheated air around them and cooked.

  The titan stumbled backwards and moved in for one last desperate bite. Kenn was reeling from the pain of straining his phoenix fire and couldn’t dodge in time. He raised his his arm, stopping the steel titan from biting his head off. But instead, he felt its razor teeth slice into his arm.

  He concentrated his fire on both arms, holding together the arm that was bit to prevent it from being torn off. And his other arm as he began laying blow after blow on the titan’s snout. It tried to fling him away but its strength was waning, and every hit made its jaws loosen just a little more until finally it let go. The steel titan stared down with its one eye at Kenn before finally collapsing.

  Kenn’s arm was a mess, but his blood refused to spill. He struggled to close his fist, but he still managed to pick his shield back up with it. His grip wasn’t as firm as before, but he could still brace against it to block if need be.

  He looked and saw the siege tower was almost close enough to begin letting enemies storm his city’s wall. Kenn cursed under his breath and began running for it.

  The beast army, after seeing their elite metal titan be killed, was met with fear at seeing this human now running straight for them. The brave amongst them began pushing the tower forwards with more might, while the cowards broke rank and tried to run away.

  A roar sounded out, the officer in charge issuing a command. Those who weren’t overwhelmed with fear cut down the ones trying to run away, not allowing them to flee.

  Kenn scoffed at the sight. “Killing your own forces, pathetic.”

  He soon reached the tower and began his rampage. He destroyed the supports for the structure and slaughtered any and all beasts that got close to stop him. Within a minute, just as it reached the wall to let down ramps onto the top, it began leaning to the side. The beasts within panicked as the wood at the bottom broke and burnt under this shift. Kenn backed away from it in time to witness the tower collapse onto its side, crumbling into half burning debris.. He was getting tired now and could not stay down to fight the horde in front of him, he stopped their ability to storm the wall.

  A purple bolt of energy wisped over him and impaled a beast to his side, stopping it from rushing him.

  Kenn gathered his energy and lifted his wings, then brought them down and jumped with all of his might. The ground beneath him cratered as fire washed over everything within 20 feet of where he was. The beasts all saw as Kenn leaped all the way from the ground up to the ramparts of his own wall and disappearing from view.

  Kenn slumped against the stone rampart and took off his helmet, panting as his hair was wet with sweat. His chest burned and thankfully his nose had stopped bleeding, dried and stuck to his face and beard now. He looked to the gate and saw his wife stressing herself to conjure shields of ice and dozens on dozens of small ice spears.

  “Shit.” he muttered and put his helmet back on, getting back to his feet. He wouldn’t let Alea push herself too hard. Within moments, he was by her side and saw the stalemate she and the elite magical beast were in, but unlike her the beast wasn’t getting tired. The battering ram was at the gates and working as arrows, spells, boiling oil, and heavy stones crashed down onto it and the attackers.

  Before Alea could say something to Kenn, she watched as he leaped over the wall again. Her eyes stuck onto his visibly wounded arm before he disappeared from view. Itsü, the king’s assistant and protege, appeared shortly after and began assisting by slinging purple bolts from his hands. Alea frowned deeply as she continued to hold back the enemy spellcaster as best she could.

  Kenn landed amongst the monsters and flared his aura of golden fire, making space before he ignored the common chaff of their foot soldiers and darted towards the 2nd elite beast. It saw him pretty easily and Kenn had to dodge left and right to avoid bursts of arcane blasts. When he got closer, he didn’t have time and raised his shield, spreading his fire to it and while it did successfully block and deflect two arcane projectiles, the force was more than his injured arm could support. It was knocked out of his grip and Kenn scowled under his helmet. “The hard way it is.” he said, coating his sword in fire and having to cut at incoming blasts to neutralize or deflect them.. He was thankful his wife was still keeping it busy, and Itsü’s occasional shot pulled its attention too. Itsü’s first blast shattered one of its magical shields but was stopped by a 2nd and this beast had to put more of its energy into denser shields to stop the young man from punching through them.

  The beast began to visibly panic as Kenn got closer and closer, until it raised many shields and completely ignored returning attacks to the top of the wall.

  It had a few seconds worth of shields and it brought its mostly ethereal form forward to focus fire on Kenn. But the king wasn’t dumb enough to let it do this unchallenged. It had to divert focus to raise yet another barrier as Ken swiped his sword and sent blades of phoenix fire sailing through the air towards it.. He had a much shorter range than his wife did but when he was close, he was the heavier hitter.

  By the time its last ditch effort was ready to fire, Kenn was already upon it. He circled around and a flurry of slashes cut through its mostly non-physical form but his golden fire still burned it, severing pieces and causing it to let out a shrill cry in pain. Kenn slashed, and slashed, cutting deep into its form again and again until finally the last barriers it had were broken. Alea’s ice spears pierced it and, while damaging it, did less damage than Kenn’s fire.. But what ultimately killed it was a violet bolt of Itsü’s magical energy. It struck the wounded magical beast and punched straight through it, dealing direct damage to its ethereal form. The hole imploded on itself then rebounded, scattering as an amorphous form. The beast made mostly of magical energy had dispersed, if still alive it was no longer able to fight back.

  Fear spread amongst the beast’s ranks as Alea turned her ire towards the masses. Hundreds of small darts of ice formed around her and shot forth, decimating the enemy with each attack. After culling half of their forces by the 5th volley, they abandoned the ram and all began running back. Everyone would see the beast army begin issuing a full retreat. Cheers spread along the wall as they repelled the attack and dealt a devastating blow to the attacking forces of their army.

  Kenn approached the walls, snuffing the flame around him as he leaned against the gates.. He heard his men all yelling to open it for him. He didn’t have the stamina left to jump back up.

  Minutes later, Kenn was being guided to a makeshift hospital set up by the city’s doctors just inside the wall. As Alea followed closely, teams of soldiers moved to the gate to drag in the metal titan and other beasts that had useful gear or body parts for them.

  When Kenn was sat down, one of the free nurses rushed to his aid along with a doctor. But Kenn said “Finish tending to that patient first, I’m not critical” as he lifted off his helmet again. It cluttered to the ground where it was hot enough to hiss when touching the damp grass.

  Itsü, seemingly immune to this level of heat, began helping Kenn out of his blue armor. When they got to the injured arm, everyone would see his golden fire filling the gaps of skin where his wounds were. No blood escaped, the fire holding the wound closed. This would catch the nurses and doctors attention, and Kenn sighed. When approached, he held up his arm and said “Phoenix fire is more than just destructive in nature. It will hold my body together until I can be healed.”

  A minute later he finally had the full attention of a number of nurses and doctors. In their care, he finally released the hold of the phoenix fire within his arm. He hissed in pain as the moment the golden light vanished from the wounds in his arm, his blood began to spill very rapidly.. Thankfully he was in good hands, nurses quickly began wrapping his arm in bandages as the doctor applied what levels of magical healing they could to him. First setting a bone, one of the two bones in his forearm had been split by the titan’s teeth. Then repaired a severed major artery and veins, and finally the flesh itself would be mended. When it was enough he would be fine to heal naturally, Kenn stopped the doctors and told them to go back to healing the injured soldiers.

  Kenn would hate it if their attempts to fully restore his arm would be the cause of an injured soldier under his command to not receive treatment in time.

  Alea wrapped her arms around him and hugged tightly from behind. She scolded him as she hugged him. “That was incredibly stupid of you.. Don’t ever do something as ridiculous as jumping over the wall into a horde of beasts again.”

  Kenn reached back and gently patted her shoulder, soothing Alea.

  With the siege over, Akai began to wake up in his bed. He was out of it for a moment before realizing the dream was over and he was back in his normal body again. He looked down at his hands and pondered over what he witnessed.. Thinking back to the way the Phoenix King shot out blades of fire from his sword, the feeling of selectively empowering parts of himself and equipment.. How he moved and fought.. And lastly just how far his power would let him stay injuries.. “I still don’t know why I’m having these dreams.. Or if you are real in some way or another.. But thank you.” Akai muttered to himself.