“Sorry, I’m not single dragon lady,” Mateo grunts.

  The world around them has vanished and Mateo finds himself and the god dragon Dios in his small plot of land in the void. At his current rank it’s only a small cabin surrounded by a shadowy picket fence on an empty space in the void. Everything around him is devoid of color only being decipherable by darker and lighter shades of grey. Dios grips Mateo by the throat lifting him into the air.

  “Render unto me the knowledge of your realm!” She demands gripping his throat harder.

  Mateo struggles at first, but then he realizes he can still breathe. Though the god dragon is a powerful entity it holds no power over him here. He peers down at the god dragon who is adorned in the same open chested crimson robes Jessica was. Her breasts are covered in scales like most of her body. It is difficult for him not to stare.

  “What is so drawing about my chest, and why do you not falter mortal!”

  “That is an excellent defense, if she can’t see past your perversion, she can’t penetrate your mind mijo,” a familiar voice says.

  The familiar voice is followed by the entrance of a familiar samurai.

  “Kitanai, the Hentai Samurai?” Mateo asks.

  Kitania steps up to Dios placing his hand on her shoulder.

  “Yes, but I am not enough to banish this foe, you must call forth the others.”

  “You think you can break the will of a God!” Dios yells.

  A jade haired woman Mateo recognizes as Ryukaze steps up to his side placing her hand on his shoulder. She presses downward forcing Mateo to the ground as Dios still grips his throat. Mateo closes his eyes, and three more figures appear around them. Zena, Furioso, and Kobold grip Dios’s arm pulling it from Mateo’s throat.

  Mateo takes a deep breath before returning to Dios’s gaze. He holds out a finger pointing it at her with malicious intent.

  “This is my realm, you have no power here,” Mateo states.

  “That is untrue.”

  Dios lunges forward once again gripping Mateo’s throat. The world around them vanishes and Mateo finds himself thrust into memories from his previous life.

  The blades of a helicopter beat to the drums of war as heavy metal echoes across the frozen fields of Siberia. Flak shells explode in the air filling it with shrapnel.

  “Raven squad leader Ryusane, these are your squad mates, Cuervo, Redscope, Dreadnaught, and Hare,” second lieutenant blank name states.

  Cuervo is a slender woman in a snow covered ghillie suit wielding a bolt action mag fed .308 sniper rifle.

  Redscope is a close-range combatant utilizing a bullpup 5.56 nato rifle. His job is to cover Cuervo from close range combatants. He is her spotter.

  Dreadnaught is a heavily armored ebony skinned man wielding a thirty-caliber browning heavy machine gun and a lot of explosive ordinances. The barrel is water cooled not unlike the machine emplacements from one of Mateo’s previous combat tours.

  Hare is a medium to close range combatant sporting a 7.62 Scar style rifle with medium range scope. His job is scout, and he tricks the enemy by wearing snow hair ears on his helmet. At a distance he seems like a normal snow hair bouncing through the dense Siberian winter.

  “If you need to know any of their actual names it will be on their dog tags, which I expect you to retrieve if they are lost in combat, if you’re as good as they say you are, it shouldn’t come to that.”

  Mateo stares off into the snowfall as explosive rounds burst in the air around him. A piece of shrapnel rips through the helicopter cutting a gash across his cheek as he continues to stare into the frigid Siberian mountains.

  Cuervo steps out of her seat brushing the blood off his cheek with a bandage. He turns to her staring into her dark brown eyes.

  “Hell seems nice this time of year, a lot cooler than I remember.”

  Cuervo gives him a crooked smile and returns to her seat.

  “Alright you fucking dandelions, it’s time to blow in the wind!” Second lieutenant blank name states.

  The small crew of insurgents exit the helicopter falling behind enemy lines. After making a graceful descent into shin deep snow they bury their parachutes and begin the long trek toward their objective.

  Before they can break into a valley the sun, which is barely visible through the crippling snow, fades below the horizon. Mateo directs his squad to a nearby cave to wait out the night. They will be able to make a fire and rest without drawing enemy attention there.

  “Area’s clear, we’re on a cliff so we’ll have to rappel down in the morning, likewise it’ll be hard for the enemy to get to us if they somehow determine our location, I’m going to take a break,” Hare says laying his rifle beside his sleeping bag.

  Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.

  “I’ll tend the fire with what little wood we have,” Dreadnaught says sitting beside Hare’s sleeping bag.

  Cuervo shuffles something to Redscope and he stands watch at a small chamber to an inner room in the cave. She steps in sitting by Mateo as he meditates on his sleeping bag.

  “Cuervo, is there something I can help you with?” Mateo asks breaking from his meditation.

  She pulls off her BDU’s revealing a fit caramel skinned body. Her long dark hair falls just below her shoulders as she unties it. She slides into his lap facing him as her fingers grip the top buttons of his BDU.

  “Do you have someone at home?” She asks her brown eyes peering into his with lustful intent.

  “No, but is this proper behavior for a mission?” He asks.

  “Being on a mission is what makes it so exciting, you going to rat on me,” she replies biting her lip seductively.

  “Yes.”

  She unbuttons his coat slowly before pulling it off him and tossing it aside. He leans back as she presses her hands against his chest pushing him onto the sleeping bag on the cold stone floor of the cave. Cuervo leans down and Mateo grabs her hips hesitantly.

  “Are you sure about that, Mr. Ryusane?” she asks pressing her lips against his.

  Mateo pulls away hesitantly.

  “What’s your name?”

  “Sombra,” she replies.

  Sombra leans down biting his bottom lip as she presses her warm body against him.

  “You been with a lot of girls?” She asks.

  “I haven’t been with any girls like you,” he replies.

  “With an answer like that you might not make it til morning, I might just fuck you to death.”

  “You really think you can kill me in under three minutes?”

  Sombra laughs. Mateo laughs. They wake in the morning seeming awkward.

  “Cuervo, you alright?” Redscope asks.

  “Hijo de puta said he’d be done in three minutes, kept me up all night,” Cuervo replies buttoning her jacket.

  Redscope laughs handing her a small tin cup of coffee.

  Mateo’s memories flash forward to a barrage of gunfire. The snow erupts as mortar shells crater the earth. The cranking of treads shakes the earth as heavy tanks roll across the frozen tundra.

  Blood washes over Mateo’s vision drowning him in confusion. Waving his hands about he slaps the blood out of the air swimming through it. A large man adorned with the medals of a lieutenant grabs his wrists.

  “Did you get their dog tags?”

  Mateo calms pulling items from his pockets.

  “What was her name?” the Lieutenant asks grabbing the tags.

  “Sombra,” Mateo replies.

  “And the other two?”

  “They’re not for me to remember, Lieutenant.”

  The world fades as Mateo struggles mentally to hold it together. His mind a puzzle newly solved Mateo grabs at his head. The pressures of a god bear down on him.

  “Yes, show me more, show me more of this warfare!” A loud booming voice echoes.

  Flashes of war fill the air around him hovering about as if he was surrounded by several floating screens.

  “No, you have no power here, this is my domain, I am Lord of this realm,” Mateo yells.

  Mateo and Dios return to the small plot of land in the void with his familiars, Ryukaze, and the Hentai Samurai. The fear drains from Mateo’s eyes leaving behind a stern look of fury.

  “I was frightened at first seeing my familiars manifest as demons, thinking they might be some manifestation of the darkness inside me, then when they were killed in the challenge I felt I had lost a part of myself, because I had, I came to terms with the fact that there is a demon dormant inside of me.”

  Mateo pauses for a moment pulling Lord Dios’s hand from his throat.

  “And now you have awoken that demon, sometimes you should let sleeping demons lie,” Mateo says his voice now strong and commanding.

  “You think I am scared of you?” Dios asks.

  “Yes, and you should be, because I am going to kill you, maybe not today, or tomorrow, perhaps not even in the next hundred years,” he pauses his hazel eyes burning a path through the void into the galactic spheres of the god dragon’s eyes.

  “But I am going to kill you.”

  “You think just because you can defy my influence that you can defy me you whelp!” Lord Dios thunders.

  Mateo’s familiars, Ryukaze, and Kitania gather around him challenging Lord Dios to confront him outside of the domain of gods and the realm of Gottes. Mateo stands firm pointing his hand toward Dios before raising his middle finger.

  “Fuck off, dragon bitch.”

  Reality comes screaming back as Mateo once again finds himself on a cold stone floor. The ominous glow of candlelight fills the room as he grips his broken ribs. A massive dragon looms over him as Jessica pulls him from the floor forcefully. She leads him to the door but is stopped by the gnashing maw of the massive dragon god.

  “His eyes, take his eyes.”

  Hours later.

  Mateo digs his nails into the stone floor as a burning pain grips his spine as if someone is ripping it from his back. He writhes in agony on the ground kicking his feet and throwing his hands like a mad man. When the pain stops, he curls up on the floor crying. As he whimpers the door to his cell slides open and a large elf man tosses a bloody naked caramel skinned woman into his cell. He crawls to her side still gripping his broken ribs.

  “Natalia?”

  “Mateo?”

  “Natalia what did they do to you?”

  Mateo pulls her into his lap as blood splatters across the floor. He runs his hands over her back breathing heavily. Where her brilliant butterfly wings once were rest two bloody stubs. He pulls her close.

  “I’m sorry, I told them, they were going to send me back to the void, so I told them,” she says her soft tears running down his thighs.

  “What did you tell them?” Mateo asks.

  “About arms of fire.”

  “You mean, firearms?”

  The door to Mateo’s cage slides open and Jessica steps in holding some strange tools and wearing a very provocative leather outfit. Mateo uses his body to cover Natalia as Jessica approaches.

  “Please, don’t hurt her anymore.”

  “Don’t worry, I came to hurt you,” Jessica replies.

  Jessica grabs Mateo’s chin staring into his hazel eyes with a cynical grin.

  Mateo’s party rest at a camp outside of Heroldin with the Harmony Casters as well as Rick and Beatrice. It’s been a few days since Mateo’s disappearance, and no one knows how to rescue him from Drakvania. A calm air is sent into chaos as the young dragon Rayo lets out a painful wail that pierces the heavens. Stitches runs to his side rubbing his scales gently.

  “What’s happening, why is he so distraught?” Serenity asks.

  “They’re hurting him, not just physically, Rayo is soul bound to him, so the pain he’s feeling must be spiritual damage,” Stitches replies.

  Rayo raises his gnashing maw to the sky letting out a beckoning roar and the clouds disperse allowing it to pass into the heavens. Every creature in the entire realm stops as the roar of an anima dragon rings across the skies.

  Moments later a large obsidian circle wrapped in golden vines opens in the sky. A familiar ivory skinned dragon with sapphire splines shoots through it crashing into the ground by Rayo. Yasmina rolls across the dirt using the momentum to bring herself to her feet in front of a very angry dark elf.

  “What the hell are you doing here?” Serenity demands.

  Yasmina looks around the group concerned.

  “Where is Mateo?”

  “Your sister took him,” Serenity replies.

  “Then he is in grave danger.”