Dragon Knight Awoken

I woke up, feeling dazed, wondering what the hell happened to me. I perked up from hearing shrill yells of panicked people and security outside, and then noticed I was in the backroom of a store. Am I supposed to be here?

I got up and noticed I got taller after hitting my head on a light. I looked at my hands and noticed that I had clawed hands with obsidian scales. While wondering about that, I heard a security guard yelling, "The creature is in here, sir!" That’s when I ran in the place further. Then while looking back a bit, I noticed a hole in the wall above the doorway to the backroom. I somehow got smaller and hid in a break room, the likes of which I never thought I'd see again. What I didn't expect to find in the break room was a big vanity, which was where I saw I had become a humanoid red dragon knight that was more dragon than knight in the physique, but I still had armor on me all the same.

I knew this day would happen somehow and yet I didn't think it was possible. People becoming dragon knights spontaneously, even if they have the power to fight the demons that sprung up from the Earth, were seen as omens of those who could fall to the influence of the demons they fought. Ophion was formed to take care of the dragon knights, regardless of if they fell to the influence of demons or not, but it didn't feel right to take down the ones who couldn't help that they were gifted or cursed with the powers. They never asked for the power to become dragon knights nor for the responsibility to take down the demonic threat that no one else could combat.

Why me though? I had a normal life prior to my transformation, but to be chosen to have this power, it must have been some kind of mistake.

I didn't have time to ponder in this break room, I had to get away before the agents of Ophion came for me like I got a virus of some kind that needed containment. I crashed through the walls of the break room and flew off away from the chaos that I caused somehow. Whatever gave me those powers must've taken my body for a joyride for that to happen, and yet, I knew how to fly even when it was my first time ever doing that. It felt almost natural, even when seeing fields of farmland below me as the worry of pursuit melted off of me in the cooling breeze of night.

That calming feeling subsided when I quickly dodged a purple laser beam from below. I stopped and saw it came from a demon that was standing in the middle of the cornfield by an abandoned barn. It was a muscular tapir-like being with a cloudy tail and big feet, stitches all over its arms, chest, neck, and eyes on the chest.

It bellowed, "Face the might of Daemos' children, crimson dragon knight! I am Hypsomn!"

The demon shot out another laser that I swiftly evaded as I dived down towards it. This proved to be a mistake as the world slowed down around me before it landed an uppercut on me to counter my tackle. As I wiped the blood off my helmet mouth, the biggest stitch on the monster's chest then opened up to reveal black tentacles within its belly that pierced into my armor before grabbing and holding me in place.

Hypsomn taunted, "You have spirit, but you must be new to your powers if you haven't even used..." The taunt was interrupted when blue lightning shot into the monster's chest, which didn't kill it, but made it stagger into letting me go. I thought that I somehow was able to shoot energy from my helmet, until I looked back and saw a different dragon knight flying down to aid in fighting the giant tapir demon.

This dragon knight was different from me. For one, they were white and blue with a physique based on the eastern dragons, which aided in them having faster flight around the demon, compared to me being based on the western depiction of a dragon and being slow to Hypsomn. For another, this knight was shooting off enough attacks to stun this demon before going in for the kill with an attack from a second mouth they had on their face, which vaporized the demon completely.

The white dragon knight looked at me as I stumbled back a bit before they asked while floating over to me, "You okay, newbie?" I looked at the hand they offered, and I took it, getting right back up. I noted, "You're like me." They replied while chuckling, "Yes, I am, though that's not something to wear like a badge of honor around here. We'll need to move before Daemos or Ophion bring their goons to this place." We flew away and found another barn similar to the one that was nearby when fighting Hypsomn. We hid and talked about what was going on.

The white dragon knight told me they go by Nesseram, which was a unique name I thought. They asked about how I became a dragon knight, and I told them all that I knew. I recounted how I turned up at the place I used to work. It felt like something within me was in the driver's seat of my mind but then I blacked out. They asked if there was a ball of light involved, and that's when I said, "No, I didn't notice any kind of light beyond the light of the backroom warehouse that I woke up in."

They were surprised by my answer, but then noted how some of the knights they knew didn't see the light of the heavens either. I asked what they knew about dragon knights and their meaning.

They told me how they were a normal person like me too before a blinding ball of light shot down on them and made them become the dragon knight. They said they were destined to put an end to the machinations of Daemos by the heavens above. They had a group of dragon knights to turn to, but one by one, they either fell to Daemos' children or the weapons of Ophion's soldiers. Unfortunately, one, Waldemar, did accept Daemos' call to darkness. There are other dragon knights, but we had to be cautious in our fight against the true evil lurking out there. Thus, if we were to face the path that lied ahead of us, we had to stick together.

As we got ready to leave the barn, we were ambushed by a demon bursting from the ground beneath us. It was a giant, golden snake-like creature with tusks, a mosquito nose, bat-like wings, big, clawed feet, and a tail grasping an orb with spikes surrounding it.

The being bellowed, "Hello, Nesseram." Nesseram looked with surprise and said, "Waldemar. So Daemos reshaped you into this monstrosity, I see. Well, at least he's showing the world how much of a snake you really are!"

Nesseram flew in to battle their friend turned demon, but before I could help them out, I was hit by a flurry of black and purple bats that pushed me away from the battle. I crashed by a water tower and saw the bat swarm converge to become a demon that had a skull head with antlers, a back with bat wings, and a lower half of a snake.

It taunted, "No one will help you this time, not when your talents would be more suited for Father Daemos and his army. You know nothing about yourself or how this world really works. Why don't you give up this futile effort and join us, dragon knight?"

I looked at the demon, but before either of us could answer, some lights shined on us, along with shouts for us to surrender. I saw uniforms of black and orange, belonging to Ophion. I used the distraction to slice off one of the gangly arms of the demon with an arm blade that was hidden in one of the gauntlets on my left arm. I ran at the demon, and it caught my arm blade with its other hand.

The demon retorted, "You can't beat us all. I, Ruvator, won't allow you and your knights to beat Father Daemos!" I spat back, "That won't stop me from trying!" I sliced the head off the demon that turned to dust instantly. As I flew off, I evaded bullet fire from the Ophion agents below.

I caught back up to the fight going on between Nesseram and the demon-empowered Waldemar. Both dragons were evenly matched as I shot out red lightning at Waldemar to stun him a bit, but it didn't do as much damage as I thought it would.

Waldemar spat, "This must be the new knight chosen by the heavens in their fight against Daemos. Not like you'll ever become human again in this war." My eyes got wide at the mention of being unable to return to my normal life. I thought this could be fixed once this was all over, but it's irreversible! That must be a trick. They wouldn't just keep me like this forever, right?

This daze left me wide open to getting smacked down into the ground by an arm from the golden snake. It's disturbing how much I'm getting used to being brought down to the ground by some attack, but the thought still remained: is this transformation really irreversible? Surely, I'd be able to go back to my life the way it was before I became this dragon knight. Surely, if I was freed from this obligation, Ophion could look the other way, like nothing happened, because I certainly never asked for this.

Nesseram protected me from the purple flames from the golden snake by erecting a barrier with their gauntlets. They called out, "Snap out of it, newbie! This isn't meant to be forever, but it will be if you die or turn to the dark side!" I perked up as the blast died down before they struck Waldemar like a bolt of lightning, which hurt them both. He smacked Nesseram away while they were dazed from their attack.

Waldemar looked at me before I flew up and slashed the hand of the golden snake, wounding him. I flew towards him with red energy flowing around me, about to impact the monster...

I bolted up, looking at my bedroom full of soft dragon and bat plushies, including the big red dragon plushie that's nestled in a chair by my nightstand that had the look and color of the armor I had as a dragon knight.

I was relieved and just thought to myself while looking at the stuffed animal, "I have to limit how much action anime I watch at night, even the ones I haven't even seen yet. This is going in the dream journal in case it turns into an action anime to write someday." I pet my soft and big red dragon plushie and left my room to start a new day.