Others Summon Dragons, I Summon Legendary Knights

Chapter 525: Snow’s Nightmares

A harpy flew swiftly over Paradise before drifting downward and perching on a rooftop. From there, it watched several figures in black mantles and white horned masks moving along the street.

One of them dragged a man behind him, his throat slit open. A trail of golden blood marked the path they had taken.

Adrian emerged from her summon’s body.

”He’s alive.” Her eyes widened.

The man’s eyes were still open. They didn’t have the distant, lightless gaze of the dead, but were filled with pain and the desperate strain of suffocation. Whatever was keeping him alive, it had left him trapped in a state that was nothing short of torture.

Adrian didn’t recognize him, but an enemy of the Fanatics was a friend of Paradise.

She fused with her summon once more, and the harpy spread her massive wings before launching from the rooftop.

Her shadow swept over the Crusaders.

They looked up and immediately threw their daggers.

Adrian hadn’t expected such a quick reaction, but her summon had. The harpy swerved sharply to the left, then beat her wings to propel herself away from the other incoming projectiles. Once clear, she spread both wings and unleashed a fierce gale down the street.

The wind tore the Crusaders from their feet and hurled them through nearby walls.

After surveying the area from above, Adrian descended. She emerged from her summon and hurried towards Snow, who had been thrown two streets away from where the Crusaders had been dragging him.

He had been caught in her attack as well.

Adrian knelt beside him. He was a Monarch. Surely he could survive being thrown around by a gale if having his throat cut open hadn’t killed him.

”I don’t know if our healers can fix this. Let’s hope Mrs. Daniels is alive and well. If—” Adrian stopped.

Snow’s eyes were wide.

Was he trying to warn her? Trying to say something?

Her harpy carefully watched the surrounding buildings. Nothing should have been able to escape her summon’s gaze, yet Adrian suddenly felt strange, an uncomfortable sensation creeping over her.

She looked back at Snow.

With what seemed to be all the strength he could gather, he moved his fingers slightly.

Adrian reached for one of her mana jades and brought it out. ”You can heal yourself—?” She asked.

’Drop the jade into my hand!... just do it!’

Snow bellowed the words inside his head. He wished desperately that he could force them through his ruined throat. All she had to do was put the jade in his hand.

If she didn’t, she was going to die.

Those Crusaders weren’t all dead. Out of sight, out of mind. That was how they worked.

Adrian had already forgotten they existed, but Snow hadn’t. His gaze shifted towards one of his wrists, where a black-glimmer tattoo preserved an image of the Crusaders.

He had prepared for this exact problem.

Unfortunately, during his fight with Jon, he had become so absorbed that he forgot to look at his wrist.

One mistake. That was all it had taken. Now he lay there bleeding, trapped in indescribable pain, unable even to close his eyes and surrender to unconsciousness.

Being alive had become his prison.

Time wasn’t on his side, and Adrian could see it. Snow had lost so much blood that by any normal measure he shouldn’t have lasted this long. Perhaps the biology of an ancient god was different. She didn’t know.

Either way, he might die soon or lose consciousness. Neither possibility helped her.

As Adrian pulled the mana jade free from the others, a dagger shot from one of the buildings.

The harpy reacted immediately. Her wings snapped outward, generating a ring of wind as her talons closed around Adrian and dragged her towards the sky.

More daggers followed.

They spun through the air and buried themselves in the harpy’s wings and body, but she refused to fall. She endured the pain and beat her wings harder, carrying Adrian away from the street.

The mana jade slipped from Adrian’s hand.

It fell onto Snow’s back just as the Crusaders began gathering around him.

Several looked towards the sky, searching for Adrian, while their leader approached Snow. He had seen something fall onto the man’s back, but when he looked now, there was nothing there.

The Crusader frowned. Snow’s eyes were closed, his breathing faint.

Still suspicious beneath the white mask of his summon, the Crusader reached down and grabbed Snow by the foot. He nodded towards his comrades, and one after another, they disappeared back into hiding until he alone remained in the street.

”Pull me and I’ll kill you.”

The Crusader froze. He spun around. Red glimmer swept through his body and turned him into stone.

Snow sat up and sucked in an enormous breath.

”Ahh...” He slowly exhaled through his mouth, relishing the simple feeling of being able to breathe again.

Then his ears caught the whistle of spinning projectiles. Daggers. They were moving faster than bullets.

Snow would give them that—they were fast. Far too fast for their tier, but preparation would always provide an advantage.

A cloud of smoke suddenly erupted across the street, engulfing the road and swallowing the buildings on either side.

The remaining Crusaders emerged from hiding.

They moved through the fog like owls through the night. Silence was their home, darkness their essence, and within the thick haze they seemed to become part of both.

Snow ran. He didn’t stop until he had escaped the fog entirely. Once outside, he turned back, breathing softly as a smile gradually appeared on his face.

Screams erupted from within. Deep, nerve-tingling growls followed them. The fog churned with signs of struggle, but Snow already knew it was futile.

Illusions could become nightmares. They had certainly been nightmares for him.

The creatures haunting his dreams had made him afraid to sleep, but they too relished the fog. They relished darkness, and most of all, the fear of prey that knew something was hunting them but couldn’t see where it was coming from.

This was Snow’s gift to the Crusaders for slitting his throat.

”Ah, I almost forgot.”

His eyes twinkled. Inside the fog, the leader of Jon’s Crusaders broke free from his petrified state.

He blinked and immediately drew two daggers from beneath his mantle. Many more remained strapped inside it. Then he saw the eyes. White and ghoulish, piercing through the thick fog.

One pair, then another. They were everywhere.

The Crusader’s eyes widened. Outside the fog, Snow listened to the screams of dying men while the mana inside him churned and rapidly depleted.

He was petty. He knew that. And he didn’t care.

He already planned to hide after this. There was nothing wrong with that.

The Crusader leader suddenly burst from the fog, his white mask broken and his black mantle ripped to shreds. The body of his summon was pitch-black, an inhuman creature in its own right, yet even it had encountered something far more dreadful within that fog.

Tentacles lashed out after him.

Several wrapped around his limbs and waist before he could escape. The final one curled around his head.

The Crusader screamed.

He was afraid.

Snow raised a finger to his lips.

”Shhhh.”

He chuckled as the Crusader was dragged backwards into the fog.

The screaming ended beneath the wet sound of flesh being torn apart. Blood splattered across the street like water poured from a height, followed by the muffled crunch of bones collapsing beneath powerful jaws.

Snow waved his hand, and the fog gradually began to dissipate. The creatures within stared back at him as they disappeared with it. They wanted him too. They wanted to do to Snow exactly what they had done to those men.

Well, no matter how much he ran, they would meet again the moment he slept.

But for now, the sun was still up. Snow turned away as the last of the fog vanished, leaving behind a grotesque mess of blood and flesh.

He found a nearby house and walked inside, eventually discovering a family hiding in the attic.

They stared at him.

Snow opened his arms.

”Is there space for me? I just wasted the mana a good Samaritan gave me, so I can’t harm any of you. And I killed a good number of Fanatics, which means I’m on your side.”

Nobody moved. Snow looked from one frightened face to another and sighed. Apparently, he would have to find another house.

What a drag.