It was the most silent of nights in the beautiful city of Cyclokameya. Usually the city was awake at this hour, but not tonight. All of the citizens were safe inside their homes relying on the protection of those who never sleep: the Tuso Ku Vistrians, the dragon readers, or whatever the people addressed them as. They gave themselves no particular name, though they were from a region called Vistria. They were the elite fighting force of the whole nation, Periden. And tonight they were protecting Periden’s soul, the city of Cyclokameya. Massive, elegant buildings, made from materials unheard of by some of the outer regions stood proudly, but none quite as much as the beautiful castle at the center of the city. Not only were the buildings a remarkable feature of the city. Water ran through canals all over the city. Some of these were for transport and others just for the sheer beauty of it.
     This land was a paradise and their capitol city was a sheer representation of how elegant their land was. They had conquered all opposing nations and war was a forgotten thing, but they still kept their grand army strong, just in case. However, there were some matters of civic unrest. These were left to the bizarre civilization of supreme fighters that lived in the north, the dragon readers.   
     These so-called “dragon readers” lived up to their name. They read omens through sightings of peculiar behavior of dragons. Just that afternoon a black dragon flew strait over Cyclokameya. The creatures rarely displayed themselves to the public like that unless they meant to cause some sort of ruckus. It was interpreted that something awful would happen to the city, so the Tuso Ku Vistrian were called upon to patrol it. These people lived by the most extreme conditions: they scarcely slept or ate, they were taught the most excruciating and difficult forms of fighting, and most of them still they kept a rather positive spirit. Even though they were rather dark natured people, they still found their way of life content, if not, thrilling. It was unusual for people to have so much energy living off of so little, but they had a close connection to istheris, the very essence of life and time. It exists equally in all beings, but those who become Tuso Ku Vistrians have a very close connection to it.
     In a large plaza was Commander Mihan, a broad, heavily bearded man, and two other soldiers of lower ranks. They all were dressed in cloaks as dark as the night and carried their preferred selection of weapons. Commander Mihan held a long, single bladed sword and paced around giving the two of them comforting words. One of them was a red haired woman, Fersei, who had two scimitars sheathed. She had a habit of being somewhat nervous before battle. This habit was particularly irritating the other, Atyren. He held a sickle with a stunted, yet very sharp blade. His hair was brown, and his eyes a fiery orange. Even for Peridians, who had a wide range of features, this was unusual. No one knew of his ancestry. He was found, completely abandoned, by the Vistrians when he was just an infant 15 years ago and had been raised through their way of life.
     Atyren had a bit of a disturbing nature. Many of the people there that night had good intentions: to protect loved ones, they had a passion for their nation, or anything among those lines. Atyren, however, had a different reason. He found pleasure in witnessing death and suffering, sometimes, even if it was his own.
There was no report yet of anything in the city but it would take a while for word to reach all of them, scattered throughout the city. Atyren was restless. He swung his weapon around at invisible enemies. “Calm down, Atyren.” Said the Commander, but he ignored.
     The city seemed peaceful, but there was no real way of telling what the other Tuso
Ku Vistrians were doing. Mihan kept pacing around, saying things to try and calm Fersei down. He then looked at Atyren and sighed. He had dropped his scythe and had now pulled out a knife and was cutting into his arm. “Atyren, how many times must I tell you not to cut yourself?” The commander barked. Atyren rolled his eyes and pulled the knife out threateningly at the commander. “Would you prefer it if I cut you instead?”
     “I’m sick of your wisecracks, Atyren.” He said firmly. Atyren looked away, “Perhaps I was being serious.” He said under his breath. Mihan heard and continued scolding him, “I will not tolerate such behavior in my unit, you better shape up or you’ll be banished from Vistria.”
     “I don’t see what’s so bad about it, I’m just having fun.” Atyren said at a failed attempt at seeming innocent. His commander exploded, and grabbed his arm, which was filled with scars, many self inflicted, “You call this fun?!” He then noticed the fresh cuts spelled out something in Peridian. He read it out loud, “Tara sekei katek.” Then he translated it “You die today.” Commander Mihan looked Atyren in the eyes sternly. He had his dreadful smile on. Mihan just decided to ignore Atyren this time and walked away.
     “Just thought I’d let you know.” Atyren said, but his Commander was out of earshot.  He sheathed his knife, stained with his own blood, for now.
     Suddenly, the shriek of a bow firing broke the silent night. Everyone near recognized the sound of a dragon’s shrill, intimidating cry.  Then, there were axes and swords clattering, and more arrows being fired. Various voices could be heard screaming. Some voices giving orders, some out of one’s own suffering. Then, something large hit the ground, making it shake. Everything fell silent again… But not for long. More arrows shot than before. Breakouts of weapons clashing against dragon scales were starting to be heard all over the city. Atyren was content; these were the sounds of war.   
     Fersei whimpered and Mihan kept trying to comfort her. Atyren laughed, “How’d you even get into the Vistrian academy?” Mihan came back over to Atyren. “She’s just as deserving to be here as you, if not more so. At least she is respectful of her Commander.” He said, blatantly in spite of him. “Maybe I wasn’t talking about her.” Atyren responded. He was clearly amused by aggravating Commander Mihan. He knew he wouldn’t have to deal with him much longer. Mihan fumed and made a decision never to talk to Atyren again unless it was completely necessary.
     Fersei spoke this time, “Quiet! Just let them come. I’ll teach those beasts of darkness to hate the night!”
     Not too far away, someone yelled, “Pull back!” Then, rapid footsteps could be heard. A young archer, Isome, ran into the plaza they were in, firing back as frequently as he was able. A fair sized dragon with heavy gray, scales approached him slowly. Its scales covered nearly everything; even its eyes that might not even have existed. The sound of it lumbering on with its four elephantine legs echoed through the streets. Each of Isome’s arrows seemed to fail to pierce its scales, as the dragon progressively came closer to him. He panicked and stumbled down. The dragon gracelessly pounced on him. It reared its head back and opened its mouth full of razor-sharp teeth. In one fateful spur of adrenaline, Isome managed to mount an arrow and fire it into the dragon’s exposed mouth. It toppled over, off of Isome.
      He got back and ran over to Mihan. “We were overrun, I’m the only one that made it out, and more dragons will be here any moment.” He wearily said. “You heard him! Everyone get into position!” Mihan announced. Isome ran to the center of the plaza with his bow strung, ready to fire. Mihan watched an open path on the southwestern side of the plaza. Fersei unsheathed her two swords and watched another path. As for Atyren, he watched the narrow south passage that Isome had come from.
      Atyren was the first to see anything. Three dragons like the one before loomed into the path he guarded. He wasted no time, running towards them. He went for the leader first and intentionally fell onto his back right before it. He swung his sickle smoothly into the side of its head, piercing the scale, almost effortlessly. Atyren yanked his weapon to the right a little, then lashed back out, driving the attached dragon to the ground. He put his foot on it and pulled out the scythe. The momentum it took sent him rolling, just barely averting another attacker. He span the scythe around and the dragon ran right through its blade. Then, the last one tried to strike as well, but Atyren grabbed a scale and leapt onto its back. He put the handle of his sickle around its neck. Before the dragon could stop running, he tugged and redirected its head, which bashed right into the wall of a nearby building.
     Atyren was upset, he expected more. Yet the others hadn’t seen anything yet. Atyren spotted many more working their way to him. Amazingly, they were in ranks. There had to be someone who had trained them to be so organized. Four broke out of the formation, running to the best of their ability towards Atyren. He swung his weapon into one of the four and stuck them each periodically. The other dozen or so followed and managed to circle around him. Atyren was skilled, but not skilled enough to get out of this gracefully.
     His scythe lashed around, in endless circles of motion, each more powerful than the last. The dragons did not bother with organization any further; they had their victim in a weak spot. Each one would randomly lunge out at him: some were sent to the ground immediately others managed to have a short exchange of blows with him. They would keep their attacks constant, though.
      However, Atyren didn’t manage to kill a single one for quite some time. He had inflicted several serious wounds upon them, and they gave him something similar in return.
While he was dealing with several at once, another came from behind and leapt onto his back. It nipped at his neck a couple of times. However, before any one could strike him while he was burdened, he hauled it over his back, borrowing some godly strength that possessed him for that moment. It toppled onto all the others before him. Had he not needed to constantly be on the defensive, he would have gone for the kill.
     Meanwhile, Fersei, Isome, and Commander Miham were watching from their positions. The commander had seen such before and wasn’t going to leave his post. Also, he had developed a great sense of apathy for Atyren. Fersei was a bit more concerned. Isome was just hoping he wouldn’t have to get any closer to those terrible monsters, but as things were, it was quite inevitable.
      After a long search, death found several of the beasts. A distinct dragon approached Atyren, it was much larger, and some of the scales had been damaged: proof that someone had failed to kill it before. It reared back; about to pounce on Atyren. While it was just on it’s back legs, he made one swift uppercut into the breast-scale of it. Atyren was delighted to see that a maroon blood oozed out, staining the blade and dotting the ground. Some of it trickled down the handle to his hand. It was warm and sticky. He had to stomp on his weapon to get it out, and when he did the dragon stumbled around. All of them froze, watching it. It rolled onto it’s back, writhing in agony. Atyren lent it one swift blow to bring it out of its misery. He could hear them snarling as each began to close in on him. He must have just killed their leader.
      They rushed Atyren, but he jumped onto a wall nearby and sprang off of it to the opposite wall. In the fraction of a moment he had before gravity claimed him he reared his sickle back and summoned the powers of isther within him. Such could be used to harness a large range of powers. Atyren had a thing for fire.
With his blade flaming, he jumped off the wall and plunged back into the fray. He made one continuous slash, all the way into the ground. The moment the blade touched the paved surface, fire burst out furiously. Not a single flame did so much as singe Atyren while it engulfed many of his attackers.
Fersei watched anxiously and Mihan’s back was turned to Atyren. Still neither had seen any disturbance in there areas. Yet, corpses and some dragons still attacking with their charred armor surrounded Atyren. Something was wrong; they had to be only attacking him for some reason.
     Atyren had killed almost half of the party, but more were coming and the remaining dragons were furious, having lost their leader to one pathetic human. The situation started to seem grim; he wouldn’t be able to fight them forever if they just kept coming.
One dragon thrust into Atyren, trying to bite him. He positioned his weapon so its handle was bitten instead. He was in disbelief of what he had just done; he was now stuck there with his weapon temporarily unusable. Atyren frailly tried to ward off other attackers with his feet. He let go with his right hand and whipped out his knife and stabbed in between the two nearest scales. It went through something important and the dragon collapsed, snapping the handle of his scythe at some point. Atyren took his knife out and the half of his weapon with the blade on it.
At this moment, Fersei gave in and ran over to help him. Commander Mihan was screaming and cursing at her, but she ignored it. Atyren would have done the same, had he cared. He was actually enjoying the onslaught, despite his struggling.
      However, the path Fersei left unguarded now emitted small, dark, scaleless dragons. They were only about half the size of an average human and were countless. It was difficult to see where one began and where it ended. They clung to the walls as they flooded into the plaza. It was a trap; they had waited until they let their guard down. They began coming through the other paths and large winged dragons were weaving through the peaks of the buildings. Mihan, Fersei and Atyren moved towards the center by Isome who was firing at the swarm futilely. They stood there, insignificant among the dark sea of foes. They fought off as many as they could. The beasts were easily killed, but there were so many it seemed useless. Among them, there were still some of the armored, eyeless ones. All the while, in the distance, the monstrous, winged dragons were ravaging the colossal watchtowers where some unfortunate archers were stationed.  
     The four warriors wouldn’t last long against this skirmish, but there was no way out now. As Atyren fought, he watched Mihan hack with his longsword in pretentious sweeps. The man was so drunk with pride, Atyren was tempted… but decided to save the sweet moment for now. Suddenly, one of the larger, scaled dragons erupted from the crowd, taking down the commander. Atyren knew this could be the moment, what he had been waiting for, but he rushed over and lacerated what was left of his sickle into the side of it. Mihan recollected himself and gave Atyren a look of gratitude.
     When it seemed almost completely hopeless of making it out alive, an archer on horseback arrived, firing her share at the horde of dragons. None of her arrows missed their mark. She was one of the utmost fighters and worked under Salavis, the leader of all the Tuso Ku Vistrians. “Salavis commands that all units in this area pull back to the main road.” All, except for Atyren, were delighted to hear this as they began the retreat.
     They ran as fast as they were able and those equipped with long-range weapons fired back, trying to hinder the pursuing horde.
     They passed a gate that a pair of soldiers, who were waiting there, locked quickly as they passed. As soon as their job was done, they kept running, but Atyren stopped. None could afford to stop, but Mihan did anyway.
     The gate rattled as at least a hundred dragons bashed against it, trying to get through.
     “Are you out of your mind, Atyren?” Commander Mihan screamed. Atyren was facing the gate that could budge at any moment. He abruptly turned to Mihan. “Let me stay and fight them here.” He said.
     “No! That’s an order, get out of here now!” Mihan was frantic.
      Atyren closed his eyes and grew his wicked smile. “Order?” He questioned. He started to laugh uncontrollably. Once he gained control of himself, his fiery eyes fluttered open into a hateful gaze.
      "You no longer posses the ability to give me orders, Commander Mihan." Atyren spat. Mihan exploded into a tirade about how wrong Atyren was, but he wasn’t paying attention. He had heard it all before; he could probably even mouth the words and perform the hand gestures perfectly.
      “You think you have so much authority over me, but not human’s can’t be controlled like that. The strong don’t follow orders.”
He looked up to a clock tower that read 11:59. “Look, I was right. Tara sekei katek.”
Atyren swung the remaining piece of his scythe into his commander’s back. He smiled as he watched the blood trickle down his commander’s back. He put his mouth right by the Mihan’s ear and spoke softly “I only saved you back there because I wanted to kill you myself. I hope that is clear.”
     The commander was still alive, so Atyren struck him again. The blade plunged through his heart.
      As Commander Mihan watched everything fade, he heard these last words:
“I can say or do whatever I wish… I give orders now.”