Wraith POV
When he walked in through the doors, he nearly scared Volteer to death. "Gah!" Volteer jumped back in alarm. The other two guardians came running.
"Who are you?" Terrador demanded.
When Wraith replied, his voice was lower and slightly whispery. "I was recommended to look for you guardians since I wanted to enroll in the academy."
The guardians visibly relaxed. "If you want to enroll, then you will have to talk to Volteer. He can lead you to the academy and get you enrolled," Terrador replied.
Volteer stepped forward. "Before we go, may I have your name, young dragon?"
Wraith thought for a moment before deciding on the name he had picked out a long time ago when he had wanted to be a dragon. "Call me Darksield."
Volteer nodded. "Very well. Let us go to the academy." He then led the way out of the temple and into the city.
Darksield POV
Darksield and Volteer walked for about an hour in which Darksield told Volteer that his parents were killed in the war by Malefor. Volteer looked like he wanted to ask more questions, but before he could, they arrived at the academy. The academy looked somewhat like the temple, except it was smaller, and it had more open areas.
"Alright," Volteer said. "Let's go introduce you to that class over there." He pointed with a claw at a group of seven dragons, three of which, he knew. He saw Spyro, Cynder, and Flame sitting together working on something while the other four paired off.
Darksield noticed that two of the unknown dragons were boys, but the other two were girls. One of the girls was red; the other was green. One of the boys was brown, and the other was silver.
His gaze zeroed in on Cynder, and he watched as Cynder got up and walked over to a bucket filled with what looked like art supplies. She reached into the bucket and started moving things around, obviously looking for something. He noticed that she seemed to be holding herself away from a pair of blue dragons glaring at her from across the yard.
Darksield turned toward Volteer to see if he had noticed the same thing, but Volteer was busy talking to a blue dragoness roughly ten feet away from the group. Darksield guessed that Volteer was telling her about him and how he would like to become a student. His gaze returned to Cynder.
The two ice dragons were advancing toward her. "Hey, Cynder!" one of them called. "How is the Terror of the Skies doing?"
Cynder hunched over and didn't reply. Darksield glanced at Spyro and wondered if he was going to intervene. But Spyro was too far away, and the ice dragon had said it low enough that only Cynder could hear.
"Yeah," jeered the other one. "Kill any more innocents lately?"
Cynder's wings slumped and trembled with barely suppressed emotion.
Darksield felt rage billowing up inside him, and he teleported behind the ice dragons as they advanced on Cynder.
"What's wrong?" one of them asked nastily. "Did the heartless murderer finally grow a heart?"
That was it. Darksield walked up to the ice dragons and tapped them on their shoulders.
They turned. "What do you want?" one of them growled.
Darksield growled as well. "I am going to tell you once and once only. Leave. Her. Alone."
The ice dragons laughed as several other dragons arrived. "Or what? You can't take us both on."
Darksield glared at him and got into a fighting stance. "Try me."
The ice dragons laughed. "This is going to be fun." The one on the left charged and swiped a claw at Darksield's head.
Darksield waited until the last possible second and then teleported. The ice dragon's claw swung right through where he had been, and the ice dragon stumbled on the grass. "Where—" he started to say, but never got to finish. Darksield shot out of the shadows and slammed the dragon in the side of the jaw with his fist.
Darksield flicked his tail and turned toward the other one who was readying an ice attack. Darksield became aware of several dragons, including Spyro, Flame, and Cynder, forming a wide ring around the combatants. The ice dragon fired an ice beam, but Darksield dodged it with relative ease, and let it shoot past him and hit the ice dragon that was trying to sneak up behind him. The ice dragon immediately became encased in a layer of ice that completely immobilized him.
"My turn," Darksield said. He felt the energy inside him again and drew it up into his mouth before releasing it as a black ball of flaming energy shaped like a comet but with blue lightning running around it. The attack slammed into the ice dragon's chest and sent him to the ground, knocked out.
"What is going on here?!" a voice demanded. Everyone turned. The blue dragoness and Volteer were storming toward them.
Darksield pointed at the two ice dragons. "They were bullying Cynder, and I put a stop to it. They attacked me; I defended myself, simple as that."
"It's true," called a dragon from the crowd.
"They attacked him first," another agreed. The blue dragoness narrowed her eyes at the scene before her as more and more dragons shouted out support on Darksield's behalf.
Darksield grinned. Then he glanced in Cynder's direction and noticed her staring at him curiously. This is going to be fun, Darksield thought.
"What is your name?" the blue dragoness asked.
"My name is Darksield."
Her eyes widened. "Ah, so you are the new dragon Volteer was talking about. He told me that your parents were killed in the war; is that true?"
Darksield nodded sadly. "Yes ma'am."
Her eyes sparkled with amusement. "No need for that. You may call me Aurora." She glanced around at the surrounding students. "Everyone back to class!"
Everyone started moving away, but Darksield caught snippets of conversation like, "Who is that guy?" and "How did he move that fast?" and "Did he use two elements? How is that even possible?"
Darksield focused on that last question. Now that he thought about it, he realized that he had used two elements. He had used shadow and electricity. Wait a second, he thought. If that was electricity, then why was it deep blue instead of yellow? He snapped out of his thoughts as Cynder, Spyro, and Flame walked toward him.
Darksield searched their faces and found suspicion, curiosity, awe, and a little bit of fear. Darksield shook his head. How the heck had he figured that out just by looking at them?
Before he could answer his own question, Cynder blurted, "Why did you protect me from them?"
Darksield opened his mouth and closed it before responding, "Because it was the right thing to do. And I have my own experiences with bullies." He looked over at Spyro and Flame. "Who are you?" he asked, pretending not to know them.
"Wait, you don't know who Spyro is?" Flame asked incredulously.
Darksield shrugged. "Sorry, I've been out of town for the past few years."
"Then how come you know Cynder?"
Darksield mentally slammed his head into a wall. He had to come up with something quickly. "I didn't know her name," he lied smoothly. "I just saw that she needed help, and I intervened." He glanced toward Volteer and Aurora. "So, what's going to happen to them?" he asked as he flicked a wing in the two ice dragons' direction, who were currently being dragged off by several dragons that looked like teachers.
"They will be expelled," Aurora answered. Then she looked around at all of them. "Since you all seem to be getting along, I will be assigning Darksield here to your group."
Darksield smiled internally. This'll be fun, he thought.
"Very well," Volteer said. "I have guardian business to attend to, if you don't mind. I will be back in a few days to see how things are doing." He spread his wings and took off.
Darksield turned his attention back to the others. "So, what now?" he asked.
Spyro shrugged. "We have combat next with them." He pointed in the direction of the four dragons that had previously been painting. "The brown one is Marsh; the silver one is Streak; the red one is Flare, and the green one is Ivy."
Darksield nodded. "Let's go."
Thirty minutes later, the eight of them were standing outside on the outskirts of a large pit. The pit was seven feet deep and had sand on the bottom. The instructor clapped his talons together. He had red scales and a golden ridge of spikes running down his back. "All right," he said. "Who would like to go first?"
Marsh and Ivy raised their claws. The instructor pointed at them. "You two, go ahead." Then he noticed Darksield. "Ah, you must be the new student Aurora told me about."
Darksield nodded.
"My name is Firestorm. I will be your combat instructor. I will be interested to see what you can do after these two are finished."
He jerked a talon at Marsh and Ivy who were battling down in the arena. Marsh launched a boulder at Ivy who responded by planting her claws into the ground and summoning a wall of earth that countered the attack. Then she lunged forward. The two of them fought for five minutes before Ivy whipped Marsh's legs out from under him with her tail.
"Match over!" Firestorm shouted. Then he pointed at Darksield and Spyro. "Let's see how you two do. No convexity, Spyro." Spyro nodded and flew down into the arena with Darksield close on his tail. Ivy and Marsh flew past and alighted on the rim of the arena to watch with the others.
As they got into position, Darksield whispered, "Round three." He remembered how he had fought Spyro before and watched Spyro closely for the signs he showed before using a certain type of attack. It wasn't much, but it might give him an edge.
Spyro attacked first. He launched a fireball at Darksield, but he simply slammed his tail into the ground sending a geyser of dirt into the air. The dirt intercepted the flames and stopped them. Spyro charged up an electricity attack, but Darksield was already ready for it. He had seen how Spyro dipped his head back and flared his wings before launching electricity in their previous fights.
Darksield concentrated and encased his tail in blue lightning as Spyro launched his lightning bolt. He swung. The lightning bolt hit his tail, and his tail absorbed the charge, making the electricity running over it more furious. He charged forward and sidestepped a boulder attack. He swung his tail and slammed Spyro in the chest, unleashing all the electricity he had absorbed along with his own. There was a massive shockwave, and Spyro slammed into the opposite wall.
Darksield waited, not pressing the attack. He didn't kick opponents when they were down. Spyro slowly got to his feet and stared at him. Then he charged up a fire attack. Darksield could tell because of the glow in Spyro's mouth. He started charging a 'shadow comet,' as he liked to call his signature fireball. Spyro released a massive stream of fire just as Darksield released his shadow comet. The two attacks met in midair and created a massive fiery explosion that sent both combatants flying.
Cynder POV
Cynder watched as Darksield and Spyro got to their feet. She was shocked. She had never seen firepower like this before. Nor had she seen a dragon with two elements. She watched as Spyro shot a blast of ice at Darksield. It looked like it was about to hit, but he just disappeared. She summoned her shadow element and tried seeing if he had disappeared in a shadow dash, but he was nowhere. Then he suddenly appeared beside Spyro and punched him in the side, knocking Spyro sideways. She gasped in surprise.
Just before it looked like Spyro was going to hit the wall, Darksield appeared out of thin air and slammed him up into the sky. Then he was right there above Spyro and slammed him down to the ground with both fists. Just before impact, Darksield reappeared and slammed Spyro with his tail sending him flying into the wall. Spyro collapsed, and Darksield was immediately on him, pinning him down with his claws and swinging his tail around to Spyro's throat. "I win."
Cynder was in shock as she flew down with the others. She had never seen an attack like that before. It was over as soon as Darksield attacked. She landed on the sand beside Flame and ran over to help Spyro up. Darksield held up Spyro's other side. Firestorm fetched some red crystals from a nearby crate and placed them on Spyro's wounds.
While Spyro healed, Cynder and the others turned to stare at Darksield. He noticed them looking and gave them a hard glare. "What?"
"How did you do that?" Ivy asked.
"Do what?"
"You know," Marsh and Streak exchanged a look. "That disappearing and reappearing trick. How did you do that?"
Darksield looked down at his claws. "Honestly, I'm not really sure."
"That wasn't a shadow attack," Cynder pointed out. "There were no shadows above Spyro, so you couldn't have used a shadow attack."
Darksield shrugged. "I don't know what I did. All I remember was concentrating on being in a certain spot and then poof. I was there."
Streak looked like he wanted to add a question along with Flare, but Firestorm cut them off. "Whatever that was, it was impressive." He looked at Darksield with grudging respect. "I think you just discovered a new move with your tail. You have a right to name it. What do you want to call it?"
Darksield POV
Darksield considered the question. "I think I'm going to call it 'whirlwind slam' because when I spun, it seemed to increase the force of the blow tenfold."
Firestorm nodded. "Very well." Suddenly, a bell rang. "Well that's it for today. I will see you all tomorrow."
Everyone thanked him and flew off, Darksield leaving first so that no one could ask him any more questions. While Flare, Ivy, Streak, and Marsh flew off to different parts of the city, Darksield flew off to the side of the city that was opposite the temple. He landed behind a tree. As soon as he touched the shadows, he teleported inside the temple and immediately assumed his regular form.