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Book 3, Chp 12: Strength of the Wolf

When they got Keyleths message, they made their way to Zephrah. The land where the Ashari from four lands gather for a meeting. Fortunately Grog, Pike, and Scanlan arrive as well and they all wait for Keyleth.

Grog: Uh, are we in trouble?

Scanlan: Are we ever not?

They then hear someone clearing their throat and see it was Keyleth who just arrived. From there, everyone became quiet until Vex started to talk to give the news.

Vex: We, um...we got Ripley.

Vax: Good riddance too.

Keyleth: I saw.

Keyleth then sees the witcher who was quiet until they both talk.

YN/Keyleth: Kiki, I'm sorry how we left things-/Look, I need to apologize to all of you-

They stop for a moment to let the other speak.

YN/Keyleth: I should've said something, but I was too scared.../I know I should've stayed and explained...

Pike: (Stop them.) Her turf. She talk first.

YN: Fair enough. Go ahead, Kiki.

Keyleth: Guys. I've been begging you to listen to me this whole time, to trust me. But the truth is, I had to trust myself first. And I do now. You gave me that strength. That's what a team does. And even though I shouldn't have run off when I did...I had to leave to understand how much I need you all. Especially you, YN. Because... I-I'm in love with you.

Keyleth kisses the witcher and a few seconds later, she separates their kiss.

Keyleth: Now, w-what were you gonna say?

YN was left speechless, but fortunately he knows what he needs to say.

YN: When I was young, I pushed my friends' concerns away because it was hard to trust. You remind me I was that person after everything we all been through. Next time, I won't push my friends away. And um, don't feel bad about trust issues, you guys couldn't trust me for being suspicious of Cassandra back with the Briarwoods, and I forgive you. I mean it's not always easy to earn trust these days. But I'd be happy to fight alongside you again. If you're okay with it.

Grog: Boring. I liked Keyleth's speech better.

YN just shoves Grog away before they all laugh.

Pike: Well, shit. Now that we're a team again, we gonna finish this thing?

YN: Now that we've tied up loose ends. I'm in.

Vex: One more dragon. One last stand.

Vax: (To Keyleth.) And this Timex we'll follow your lead. If you have a location...?

Keyleth: (Chuckles.) Hells yes, I do.

YN: Lead the way, Kiki.

Time skip brought to you by the black wolf lay down injured after defeating the bear solo.

It didn't take long for Keyleth to teleport them to a location where Raishan is as they walk through the tree.

Grog: (Scoffs.) What, no welcoming party? Where are people's manners?

YN: Don't let your guard down, bad things happen in the dark woods.

Soon Keyleth leads them to what seems to be a ruin.

Pike: Holy crap, is that a Ziggurat?

Scanlan: (Groans.) I should've stayed in a coma.

YN: Either way, be ready for anything.

They enter the Ziggurat and walk until they arrive in a room.

Keyleth: I saw Raishan, through the soil, preparing some...ritual.

YN: Dragons corpse, ziggurat, ritual. What exactly is she trying to achieve with the dragon's corpse?

They look around the area until Keyleth sees something glowing purple before they all notice it. Revealing that Raishan is chanting a spell while Thordaks corpse is hanging in front of her until she is interrupted by her sickness. Soon, Keyleth steps in while the other party is sneaking their way closer to Raishan.

Keyleth: You sound awful, Raishan. And you look even worse.

Raishan: Ah. The child found me. Just as I expected. So very predictable. Like sheep. (Coughs.)

Keyleth: Whatever you're up to, you won't succeed-

Raishan: Child! I have existed for centuries. You cannot fathom what I'm capable of. But I grow weak. So there's no point in holding back any longer. Not against you...or your friends!

Raishan created a portal where something came out of it and hit Vox Machina where they were hiding.

Leaving Keyleth last one standing against Raishan.

Raishan: It's nearly over, Keyleth of the Air Ashari. When your people infected me, they had no idea what they awakened.

Raishan uses her magic to activate the Ziggurat.

Keyleth: No!

Raishan: I shall avenge my suffering and wipe your kind from existence!

Raishan uses her magic to levitate the rocks and throws it at her as Keyleth dodges it and stabs Raishan with the ice and chokes her with her vines.

Raishan: Only one thing remains...

Keyleth: Yeah. For you to die!

Keyleth snaps Raishan's neck and she dies. She checks that Raishan is completely dead until she hears a voice.

???: You see?

She looked back only to see Thordaks corpse come to life and it was Raishan's soul in the dragon's corpse.

Raishan: Predictable. Like sheep to the slaughter.

This shocked Keyleth to finally realize Raishan's plan.

Raishan: No allies. No help. You're all alone, Keyleth. But you are lucky. For you alone get to gaze upon my glorious new body. The perfect weapon to destroy every Ashari village, one by one.

Keyleth: You will never!

Keyleth uses her ice magic to stab Raishan's body.

Raishan: Oh. Such a spell might have destroyed my old form...

Raishan breaks the ice down like it was nothing.

Raishan: But I have become a death, child!

She breathes blue fire at the Ashari who tries to evade it until she hears Grog yelling.

Grog: Keyleth!

Grog tosses a boulder in front of Keyleth to protect her from the fire before she sees her party are still alive thanks to Pike shield.

Grog: Thordak!

Scanlan: Uh, actually, I think that's Raishan.

YN: She must've switched her body with Thordaks corpse.

Grog: Eh, I don't got to understand something to kill it.

Grog charges at the undead dragon and punches right to its jaw.

Raishan: (Laughs.) This body feels no pain.

She grabs and throws Grog away before breathing fire at Keyleth until YN uses Quen to protect her from the fire.

YN: Vax, get her out of here!

Vax quickly grabs Keyleth to escape from the flames before YN uses Aard to knock the dragon's head away.

Vax: Pike?

Pike: On it. Go!

Pike gets to healing while Vax uses his speed to get in front of Raishan to attack until she stops him with her magic.

Raishan: Enough games!

Vax tries to break free from the magic until he notices the dragon is about to eat him. Fortunately his sister saved him by firing lighting with her vestige as Vax is free from the magic.

Vax: Watch it!

They were then knocked back by the dragon tail swinging right at them.

Pike: Bring it. (Grin.) I can handle fire.

Raishan blast fire at Pike who uses her vestige to absorb the flames. However, the effects don't seem to work correctly.

Raishan: These flames burn different.

The flames were too much for the vestige as it knocked Pike back.

Grog: Pikey!

Raishan: You think I'd have helped you acquire these vestiges if they were a threat to me? You're puppets. I pulled your strings and you danced.

Raishan uses her levitation magic to raise huge bricks and throw them at them.

The party tries to evade them all but they are overwhelmed until they are back against the wall. Soon the blocks form a line before it magically creates a barrier where the party is at one side and the witcher is at the other side as well as Raishan.

Keyleth: YN!

YN gets to cover to hide from Raishan while he notices the magic barrier is between him and the party. He tries to use his vestige to pierce through the barrier, but it was no use.

YN: I can't break it through!

Vax: Forget about that, just run! We'll find a way out.

YN looks back at the zombie dragon and realizes that he's alone now. Despite the odds, he knows that he's the only one against Raishan. Otherwise Raishan will kill his friends and leave before destroying the Ashari. With his final decision, he looks at his friends before making a stand as Keyleth looks at him with a worried face.

Keyleth: YN, please don't...!

He placed his hand on the barrier as she did the same.

YN: I love you...

Keyleth: YN...I know.

YN: (Chuckles.) Good. Just remember, I'm not like the other witchers.

YN leaves and faces the dragon alone while the party watches him making his last stand as he walks towards the dragon after drinking the elixir.

YN: Hey, dead lizard bitch. I wanna word with you.

Raishan: Oh, a witcher fighting alone and who doesn't even know what it's dealing with.

YN: I'm a witcher, of course I know what I'm dealing with. Finding and killing things is what we do. And you're absolutely a thing.

Raishan: I have existed for centuries to kill every last one of you. I am more than a thing.

YN: (Chuckles.) No. You're only a thing, you're only an old killer. You don't live, all you do is just eat and hide.

Raishan: Is there a point to this? Are you trying to give a derogatory speech to me to death?

YN summoned his spear vestige on his hand.

YN: It's time to give this world back to people who know how to build things. You and I, we're just monsters of history. So it's time for us to go back to hell.

Raishan: And who's going to make me go? You and your tiny toothpick?

YN: Hell no. (Grin.) But let's make something that's worth being remembered. Shall we?

The witcher made his first move by throwing his spear at Raishan before she breathed fire at him. Fortunately YN react fast enough to evade it and use the broken bricks as cover while look and attack an opening. Meanwhile everyone is watching them fight from where they are.

Vax: Damn it, we can't let him fight alone!

Keyleth then sees Raishan's corpse and gets an idea.

Keyleth: I have an idea, but we have to get through.

Vex: (To Grog.) Big guy, any more punch in those gauntlets?

Grog: Let's find out.

While Grog tries to break the barrier by punching it. YN does his best to stay focused on every second of the battle as he slides under the tail swinging towards him.

After each dodges he throws the spear at any weak points he sees while Raishan still attacks.

YN then notices Raishan is about to chomp him and he wasted no time to leap towards her and jammed his spear to the dragon's mouth to keep it from closing. Raishan tries to shake off the witcher until YN sees she's about to breathe fire.

YN: Shit!

He quickly uses Quen to shield himself, only reason he wasn't burn by flames was because of the shield took the impact to which it knocks him back but badly injured.

Vax: Come on. Keep going!

Grog still tries while YN gets back up but immediately collapses to the ground.

Raishan: Oh, the dog fell down.

The witcher struggles to get back up even with the spear supporting him.

Raishan: I'm going to chew your corpse, spit it out and use it to smuggle your Ashari girl to death.

Raishan prepares to breathe fire to burn the witcher to ash.

Raishan: I am death. You're just a human being.

Suddenly out of YNs wolf instinct, he immediately evades the flame.

After that, he threw the spear right at Raishan's right eye to blind her right side. Giving him time to hide and pull something out from his magic pouch where he hid it ever since after killing Ripley. Raishan sees where YN is hiding with one eye and wasted too much time blasting fire at the witcher before he realized it.

Keyleth: YN!

All they saw was ash on the ground until out of nowhere, YN appear where he was and wears a cloak.

This shocked Raishan to see YN is still alive.

Raishan: How!?

The witcher just grins before unsheathing both of his swords out. 

YN: My turn.

Raishan breathes fire at the witcher who easily dodges it by disappearing and reappearing as he slices her weak point at her muscles where it supports the legs. Raishan tries to lay a hit on the witcher, but with YNs enhanced strength, speed, and the cloak, he easily evades any attacks the dragons blind spot. Vox Machina watched the whole fight as they were surprised to see the witcher's reaction speed and how he moves quickly.

Scanlan: How is he able to teleport that quick?

Pike then realizes the cloak the witcher is wearing after observing it from a distance.

Pike: That cloak he's got, it's the Cabal's ruin vestige!

Vex: How did and since when the hell did he get it?

Vax: He must've got it after the ship sank with Ripley.

YN continues to evade Raishan attacks until the dragon has had enough.

Raishan: Enough of this!

She breathes fire at the ground which spreads everywhere to clear the area with fire. Fortunately YN uses the cloak vestige to absorb the flames and counter it by throwing it back to Raishan. Blinding her with fire until she sees the witcher in front of her and now has nowhere else to hide.

Raishan: Now you die!

YN: Been there, done that.

YN taps his spear vestige as Raishan realizes there are multiple spears on all her limbs. Once they all exploded, it pierced all the bones on her limbs and despite that she couldn't feel pain, she was unable to move.

Raishan: This stops nothing! I will still kill you, dog.

YN: Maybe, maybe not. Either way, it did do something. Buy enough time.

Before Raishan could figure it out, large vines trapped and pin her down before Keyleth appears from the ground with her earth magic golem form, punches right into Raishans stomach.

Raishan: What!? Impossible!

Thanks to Grog, he manages to break through the barrier before Keyleth immediately execute her plan as her vines grab Raishan's body and merge into the ground to drain and pass the disease back to Raishan.

Raishan: My disease!? No! You can't! Not again!

Raishan tries to escape, but with all her limbs broken, pin down by the vines, she's unable to escape as Keyleth continues her plan.

Raishan: You cannot harm this body!

Vax shoots Raishan's head with the pepperbox.

Vax: Looks like she just did.

Raishan tried to resist but it was too late as the disease overwhelmed her undead body and collapsed to the ground. YN approaches Raishan's left eye where she sees him.

Raishan: Damn you...Ashari...and you...witcher...!

YN: Give death my regards.

The witcher uses Igni to burn what remains of the dragon before its corpse collapses completely into dust. The witcher then checks on Keyleth, worried that the disease got her as well. Keyleth collapsed but YN caught her.

YN: Kiki, are you okay?

Keyleth: I'm fine. You?

YN: I'll live. I don't know how you did that. But pulling that off against a zombie dragon, definitely makes you legendary.

Keyleth: (Small smile.) Disease is a part of nature. And you can control it...if you find your anchor.

YN: (Smile.) I'll keep that in mind.

They glance at each other's eyes until Keyleth speaks.

Keyleth: You gonna kiss me or what?

He kisses Keyleth but it was then cut short by Keyleth who's not feeling well.

Keyleth: Oh, wait. One sec-

She starts puking and coughing.

Keyleth: Sorry...it's not you, it's...

She pukes again while YN looks away to not see it all.

Keyleth: It's poison...

YN: It's fine, take your time. Oh god, no, no, don't make me puke, don't make me puke...!

YN tries to hold his puke to not join Keyleth while the party just laughs since they're finally okay and end the last dragon. Finally ending the chroma conclave for good.

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