185 The Burning South (1/2)
FWOOM!
The land had turned to fire. Black smoke covered the skies.
Sir Ivan was running with Father Petrov dangling over his shoulder. He must have been using some sort of emergency speed boost technique; they covered ground much, much faster than Petrov dared to hope, faster than had ever seen him run before in his life.
But it wasn't fast enough. In no time, the conflagration caught up to the pair.
”Light!” Father Petrov summoned a protective cloak around both of them just a moment too late to avoid harm entirely, but in time to save them from anything worse than blisters by the fires that instantly spread through the entire death zone.
Still, he urged Ivan. ”Go! It won't hold for long!”
Also, there was another problem. While they were protected from the heat, that sort of protection allowed air through so that people could breathe and talk and all that good stuff. In other words… it didn't keep out the smoke. Father Petrov only managed the one sentence before he choked on the smoke.
Then, he passed out, while Sir Ivan ran for safety.
***
When he came to, he and Sir Ivan were outside the death zone, near enough to feel some heat, but far enough to avoid getting burned.
Professor Alexei and Mindy were nowhere to be found.
”Alexei… Mindy…” Father Petrov coughed. ”No…”
He got to his feet, took a wobbling step toward the flames.
Sir Ivan grabbed him. ”Sorry, Father. I can't allow you to go back.”
”But… I can't just… leave them…” Petrov coughed.
”There's nothing we can do.” Sir Ivan shook his head.
Father Petrov just stood there, staring into the fire and the smoke. Sir Ivan held on to him with a girm grip despite his own battered state. Time slipped away like sand through his fingers as he stared helplessly while the great flames raged and devoured everything they could in a frantic burst of activity and then began to fade away when they had consumed all there was to consume and there was nothing left to sustain their brief, forgotten lives.
Then the great flames were gone, and only the small ones remained, the weak replacing the strong for no reason other than that they fed on less.
The wind howled through the bones, like a mournful dirge lamenting the loss of such brief glorious lives, such that the world could not sustain them any longer. The smoke began to clear.
”We should go.” Sir Ivan said at last.
”Not yet. At least…” Father Petrov lowered his head. ”At least I should say the last rites for them.”
Sir Ivan nodded wordlessly as Father Petrov began. ”Ashes to ashes, dust to dust…”
The words trailed off, as Father Petrov stood there, staring.
”Father?” Sir Ivan prompted. Then, he turned to see what Petrov was staring at. ”What the…?”
Walking through the burning land as though on harmless grass, was a figure wreathed in fire. A vague outline could be seen, as if the flames surrounding that figure had taken on the shape of a bird, complete with wings. ”Mindy?!”
Mindy stepped out of the death zone and approached them, still wearing that bird shaped fire.
Sir Ivan squinted. ”Is that… a protective aura?”
”Mindy! Are you all right?!” Father Petrov asked.
”Yeah.” Mindy nodded.
”And… Alexei?”
To that, Mindy shook her head wordlessly.
Sudden light and heat flared overhead as a bird of fire descended upon them. It was a big one, with a wingspan of easily a hundred meters. Not quite as large as the Roc King or the likes, but still very big compared to a human, and more importantly, it actually seemed to be made of flames.
”Run…!” Sir Ivan gasped, stepping in between Father Petrov and the bird.
But Mindy went over and stroked it and spoke to it in a low voice without hesitation and didn't spare a moment to worry about getting burned. ”Calm down. This is my friend, Chirpy. Or at least, her avatar.”
”Her… avatar?” Father Petrov blinked.
”It's like… a piece of her mind. A wisp of her consciousness.” Mindy scratched her head. ”But it's her. Chirpy, these are my other friends…”
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