Reincarnated into a Snow Griffin-Chapter 82

A sigh of relief leaves me once we are outside the monster’s reach, and after such an encounter I let myself forget about the situation we are in for a second, all the worries and fear to be swept past and carried away with the wind, so calm and empty in a good relaxed way that only flying up high in the sky could make me feel, a mood so centered as the astral up above us, just feeling the rivers of airstream flowing up and down, invisible to the eye but keeping our bodies afloat and pushing my long wings up, having to beat them only from time to time, mostly feeling the caress of the wind against my feathers.

It not, thankfully, distracted me too much to simply forget that I was carrying someone and drop him off sky high.

If I was in my griffin form I could have him on my back with ease, but that would be showing too much and putting at risk my disguise and all my efforts to keep it to waste, so tiring my arms it was, getting heavier by the minute and making me beat my wings more, trying to speed us and staring at the island that seems so close, yet stays stubbornly so far ahead of us, even if going straight to it as we are.

It is a welcoming yet frowning distraction when I feel Ethan shudder in my arms, making me harden my grip and plaster him against me when I ask:

"Are you cold?" Sometimes I forget how others are affected by the cutting cold of such high altitude, and even with our cultivator bases it takes more time and training to get completely immune to the weather changes, so thinking as such I bring him closer and try to shield him from the wind the best way I can, but there is not much I can do in our current position.

And yet he responds: "N-not really, is just that I’m not a big fan of heights you see..." As if on cue a wind stream tips my wings to the side, and the abrupt change makes him able to look down and shudder once more, his hands going around my back and grabbing tightly.

It takes me a moment to come back from my surprised state, and I swallow dry, looking straight ahead, unsure what face he would be doing right now, unsure of my own expression as well, a mix of emotions flowing over me, from surprise to a sentiment of protectiveness to a satisfying feeling of having seen yet another side of him, and such an exposing one at that.

I guess there is a human being under all that playfulness and strong face of his after all... and I did not know what to do or what to feel with the new information, or such private revelation, so I say the most logical thing next:

"Don’t look down then." I say after a few flaps of my wings, the cold air familiarly filling my lungs.

"Oh I haven’t been looking at all." He says and I already stiffen by his words, aware of what I was going to find when I looked down at him but unprepared to meet the pair of ablaze eyes staring with intensity at me.

"Stop fooling around or I will drop you." I say, waiting for him to fall back, chuckle away and give a silly answer back, but he has been surprising me since he came back, growing bolder by the minute.

"I’m not fooling around anymore." His tone of voice is low and raspy that I almost lose his words in the wind, but I’m sure of their meaning when he puts his arms closer to me, making his point known by putting our hearts together as they hammered against our chests.

I’m barely able to contain a shuddering breath by looking up and forcing my gaze on our target, not committing the same mistake again, staying quiet and focusing on flying for the rest of the journey.

And I had the feeling that this will be a very long journey...

We are now close enough that even Ethan can see a few details here and there, but what I see at first is the last thing I was expecting from the so called cursed island; because as far as my eyes could tell there was only a tropical paradise with beaches and palm trees stretching along the coast and mountains, all green, warm and full of life.

"Why is it so..."

"Green? Well, I guess is natural to expect a graveyard or something with the rumors surrounding this place, but the northern area of the island belonged to the Antshiva a long long time ago, so this area is very different from the rest of the island."

"I see..." I say, understanding only half of it. "Antshiva are demons?"

He chuckles. "Oh no, they are another sentient species, like elves and dwarfs, but they have three pairs of arms, literally."

"Oh." I say, not having seen one but trying to put a creature like that together, but somehow ended up with a human spider hybrid in my head. "They are no longer there?"

"Well, having the demons stuck there has its ups and downs you see, and they have been increasing their strength by the centuries so their last attempt of conquering the main continent ended up with at least enslaving or getting rid of the Antshiva in the island you see, so most of the remaining ones live in the main island now."

"Is it now?" So they had already tried to take the main continent over? That makes me wonder about their plans with the Higher Lands, on how having it at their disposal would be great for their conquering military strategies, a moving base unable to be traced by non flying creatures.

Lovely.

"But you said they tried..." I suddenly say, mind moving over such repetitive task of flying closer to the island, curious too about the history lesson, and I’m pleasantly surprised by his answer.

He chuckles at my curiosity, enjoying the attention: "Oh yeah, they almost had it too, with a strong Demon Lord to back them up, but you won’t believe it, an elf and a magical creature were the ones responsible for defeating him but, well, not after some problems with the elves and setting fire to some ancient cities..."

My eyes sparkle with the news. A magical creature, just like myself, had been the hero to banish the demons back to their islands in the past!

"...Interested?" 𝑓𝑟ℯ𝘦𝓌𝘦𝘣𝑛𝑜𝓋𝑒𝓁.𝑐ℴ𝓂

"Yes!"

He chuckles once more. "Good that we are still far then, because this will be a long tale to tell..." He says, but I can tell he is enjoying this moment.

And for a few minutes, so am I.