The dragon behind him roared as he jumped up into the air and shot T⍑∷ᒷᒷ straight away, not giving them chance to take in their new surroundings. He flew forwards and quickly destroyed the portal so there was no way of immediate escape, for T⍑∷ᒷᒷ or him.
You really think you can beat me, hybrid? They yelled in Galactic, dodging his shot and staying on the ground. Xelqua landed on the side of the cliff.
I think one of us isn't leaving this server alive. He replied. Then he glided down, picking up speed, and made the ground around T⍑∷ᒷᒷ come alight with fire. Oリᒷ was right; he was best in the air. T⍑∷ᒷᒷ flapped their wings and took off, shooting back at him three times. He dodged two and deflected one with magic, and it crashed into the wall behind the other Watcher.
The dragon ran forward and took off, shrieking and breathing purple fire at T⍑∷ᒷᒷ. Xelqua had never realised it could do that.
T⍑∷ᒷᒷ shielded themselves. Xelqua shot a continuous beam at them from behind, and they were forced to shield on all sides for a second, meaning they couldn't attack for a second. The dragon's breath ran out and they focussed on fighting Xelqua's beam with one of their own. They evened out again, the beams meeting in the middle.
"NOW!" Xelqua screamed at the top of his voice, and the hermits emerged from a small cave and flew into the sky, circling T⍑∷ᒷᒷ and shooting continuous, magic-coated arrows.
So you gathered the help of some pesky humans. T⍑∷ᒷᒷ yelled, making a sphere of a shield around themselves and stopping their ray of magic.
They're my friends. Xelqua replied, in English so they could hear, stopping his own ray.
Friends? Watchers don't have friends. T⍑∷ᒷᒷ said spitefully in english, letting their shield down and shooting around them five times.
Two of the hermits got hit.
They fell.
The dragon breathed fire on T⍑∷ᒷᒷ at the exact moment they shot.
They also fell.
Xelqua rocketed down to where he'd seen the two humans land, a couple of metres away from each other. Bdubs and Etho, Bdubs with a leg injury which looked severe but not irreparable, and Etho with, oh notch no, a head injury. He was unconscious, breathing shallowly. A few more hermits landed beside him, rushing to the aid of them.
And Xelqua got angry.
He gritted his teeth and balled his hands into fists, the near-black fingernails digging into his palms. Last time he got angry he acted stupidly, used too much magic, and someone else died as a result. He needed to keep being strategic.
He turned, not wasting any more time and went back in the air, shooting mercilessly at the evil Watcher. They shielded themselves, standing up and returning to flight as well. There were still a few hermits in the sky, shooting at them, but they shielded every arrow. T⍑∷ᒷᒷ flew forwards at him, like a cat pouncing, and grabbed him, before lighting their hands on fire and burning him. He kicked them back, and as they separated they left some magic on him, which travelled down his body before he could stop it and wrapped around both of his ankles, increasing it's strength to become like a thick iron chain as he struggled with it and tried desperately to get it off.
Same trick, the other Watcher said as they attached a rope-like bit of magic to the ankle cuffs and began to swing him around. Your turn. They said, letting the rope dissolve into the air and lighting the cliff he was heading towards with magic.
Xelqua tried to get a shield up or at least wrap his wings around himself but he was too slow. He hit the slightly glowing wall of rock half way up and fell to the ground. Some rock fell around him, making a noise he'd heard before - similar to banging stones together - but it sounded abnormal.
He looked around, his vision fuzzy and shadows seeming to be closing in on all sides but never quite meeting in the centre. Was the world always this... strange? There was purple everywhere, and things were constantly moving, whizzing around in the sky. Had it always been that bright? The sound of rockets echoed a million times between the walls, each time clear and slightly different. Weren't echoes meant to get quieter?
He blinked slowly a few times, realising they weren't echoes at all and were just new rockets being fired as the hermits frantically flew around, going all out and showing T⍑∷ᒷᒷ with arrows and tridents.
He blinked a few more times as his vision focussed on the world again, until he was suddenly fully there again, the ringing in his ears coming to a direct halt. He stood up, everything hurting and screaming at him just to lie down and maybe close his eyes for just a few minutes... but he ignored it.
Then T⍑∷ᒷᒷ shot at one of the hermits. Before it hit them, though, he also shot and the magic bullets collided with each other, knocking the paths off so that they ended in the other side of the cliffs with an explosion. Xelqua tried for the life of him to get his wings to work, before looking back and seeing that one was broken. He couldn't control it past the second joint.
He stayed silent as he realised he couldn't do anything. He was fixed to the ground, his magic felt too weak to do anything effective, and all he knew was that everything hurt. He really was useless.
His mind was too tired to even follow what was happening in the battle. He felt dizzy, powerless and... stupid.
T⍑∷ᒷᒷ shot at the hermits again, hitting three of them. His eyes widened and he ran over to them, forgetting for a second at the way his body hurt with every movement. Cub, Stress and Ren lay injured. And something began to bubble up inside him.
Strength hit him hard and he shot a fiery stream at the Watcher. It missed. He shot again, and again, until he no longer could.
And then T⍑∷ᒷᒷ hit the dragon, sending it hurtling towards Oリᒷ and T∴𝙹's memorial. It crashed against them, making the stone break up into a hundred pieces and crumbling to the ground on top of the dragon, which shrank down to it's smallest size.
And Xelqua got angry.
His emotion boiled over the top and he could no longer think straight. And he let it, because he couldn't stop it anyway and he didn't even care what he lost anymore. He just wanted the evil Watcher dead.
He let the magic take over, he let it coat his wings and the fire roll down his cloak and he let himself become engulfed by it. He let the magic in his hands become so strong that it almost burned and travelled up his arm. He let himself rise up off the ground without even using his wings.
Taking inspiration from his own injury, he shot two massive, arrow shaped flames at the stunned Watcher, hitting both of their wings and pinning them against the ground. T⍑∷ᒷᒷ broke three from them, but couldn't get off the ground. They shot at his glowing figure but he merely absorbed the magic, not taking any damage.
Then he saw an opportunity.
He undid the spells on the hermits' armour and picked them up, suspending them a metre off the ground as he let a purple fog settle over the entire server.
You can't! T⍑∷ᒷᒷ yelled. We're the only Watchers who can do this without a partner, you really think you can bring it back on your own too?! They tried to convince him. It's never been done before!
He stared forward, concentrating. This was one of the strongest things a Watcher could do, and the only way to survive being there when it happened was to fly, as any magic by someone different got destroyed along with the server. And T⍑∷ᒷᒷ no longer had wings to lift them.
He focussed, scoping out every block and building up the energy. If he got this wrong it would be wrong forever. He took a deep breath, as everything else went silent. Completely, deathly silent.
And then all the fog rushed down and every hermit was suddenly suspended over the void.
If T⍑∷ᒷᒷ screamed or yelled or made any noise at all, it was cancelled out by the abyss beneath them. But Xelqua saw them fall, and die.
The hermits were calling his name, but he couldn't hear them. It was like they were in a body of water, the sounds sounding muffled and distant to him. He closed his eyes, fuelling his energy into imagining the purple smoke come back up and clear, leaving each block as it had been before.
But he couldn't. When he dared open his eyes again, all he saw was darkness.
He looked around. Cub holding his arm and looking around worriedly. False with her bow in hand looking down. Beef holding Etho's limp body. The dragon at it's smallest size flapping it's wings weakly.
He wasn't going to let them lose as much as he had.
He looked down, breathing deeply before willing the purple mist to come back up.
He was Xelqua, the Watcher and Grian, the human. He was Grian, the one who'd started two wars on Hermitcraft and been his own empire in Evo. He was Xelqua, the Hybrid Watcher who was more powerful than any other Watcher. He was uncontrollable. He was mischievous, strong, deadly and loving. And those weren't bad things. He was the one that would be feared, not T⍑∷ᒷᒷ or anyone else. He was also the one that was caring and kind and compassionate.
And, he was going to be the first Watcher to ever undo the destruction of a server.
He let all the magic inside him gather in his hands and up and down his arms, he let it burn in his eyes and outline his mask from behind with neon violet. He let the fire pulse through and along his body, stronger than it had ever been before. And he looked down, watching and yelling as he pulled up the clouds. They rushed up like a tsunami splashing across a city, and washed over ground level. They flowed up and over the lumps and bumps of the world, building up the cliffs and mountains and bases beneath the smooth purple texture.
And then, he sent it away. It cleared like it was sliding off a slope in all directions.
Xelqua placed down the hermits and lowered himself down just after with his freshly healed wings as he dismissed the magic that was running around him like electrical sparks did on Evil X. He took a deep breath, looking around his base, which he'd brought back without the previous damage.
Other than that, the server was exactly as it had been.
He grinned, and the hermits around him let out noises of celebrated. Mumbo and Pearl came up to him and hugged him, while he just smiled.
He'd done it. He'd defeated T⍑∷ᒷᒷ, he'd protected his friends.
He hadn't protected the Watchers. His smile fell as he realised that despite the fact he hadn't lost anything more, he'd still lost other things.
He walked over to the memorials, which had also been recovered, and looked up at them. He felt a few of the hermits walk up behind him. He felt an arm wrap around him from the side and glanced over to see Mumbo there, giving him a sad smile. Iskall placed his hand on his other shoulder, and Pearl held his hand from behind while the rest of the hermits stood close by. The dragon negotiated it's way through all their legs and jumped up to sit on Oリᒷ's staff.
The bottom of the white staff started turning to stone, and the infestation rose up slowly until it passed the statue's hand and got to the top. The dragon stayed obediently as it's flickering, fiery body stilled and turned grey, it's magical life disappearing as it was fully covered in stone.
It had fulfilled it's orders.
Xelqua wished he could do something, wished they would all magically come back to life so they could live happily ever after, but this wasn't a fairy tale. He put his hand up and constructed a fiery, purple flower with gentle flames, and put it down on the floor in front of the dead Watchers.
He stood in silence for a few minutes, surrounded by friends, and acknowledged what he'd lost.