It had been three days since he'd left the Cathedral training facility and he had made good time.
    The first day he'd managed to hunt down an Elk and using a fast curing technique he learned in Nijuu's survival class, he fashioned a crude water skin for his journey.
    His day began by breaking his fast on whatever was leftover from his diner the night before, then after stretching he would begin his run which lasted the rest of the day, save for a brief rest period where he would refill his depleted water skin and hunt some small game upon which he would feast
when he stopped his run as the sun sank below the horizon.

    On the eighth night out he found himself staring into his camp fire contemplating the chain of events that had lead up to this moment.  "Mother, father. . ."  Tears streamed down his face as he remembered that horrible day when the Dragons had come to Balifor, he'd only been five, five years old and he'd lost his parents.
    Only one thing escaped him, he couldn't remember the time between his parents telling him to run and when the priest had taken him to the temple of Alanis.    He gripped the partisan which he always kept close to him, even tighter as he attempted to recapture the lost memory but he couldn't.
    ". . . I promise that I will avenge your deaths, and give you a son to be proud of."  He swore to the fire, and the partisan, the moon and stars, and anything else that cared to listen, and then he fell asleep.

    The morning came, Saran awoke feeling exhilarated, he knew that today he would reach his destination, the border of Alania wasn't far from here and soon he would be crossing into the Kikai Badlands.
    After his stretch he began running Norinth, towards the border.  Around midday the grass began to recede leaving the ground bare and dry, the wind picked up and the temperature dropped as he continued onward.  He soon found himself running through cold, hard packed snow and ice instead of dirt and rock, he also found himself beginning to regret this journey in more ways then one.
    He slowed his run to a plodding walk, a raging gale tore at his unprotected face and body, it was all he could to hold onto his weapon.
    As the elements raged against him he got the feeling that a malevolent force was controlling them, he could almost hear the wind saying Go back!  Go away!  He dropped to one knee in the freezing snow as the raging wind tried to blow him all the way back to Balifor.
    Something inside Saran snapped, he couldn't take it anymore.  "DAMN YOU!"  He screamed.  "I know you're out there you coward!  KAMERON!  I Saran of Balifor have come to slay you!  Stop hiding behind your tricks unless you're afraid of the holy chastisement that I bring!"  He threw the insult into the Ryu-Jin's teeth so to speak, hoping it would draw the great beast out.
    The winds abruptly stopped, and Saran found he could bare the cold easier.  From behind a snow drift a voice answered Saran's challenge.
    "If that's how you want it then so be it."  The voice was as cold and emotionless as the biting wind around them.  A form stepped out from behind the snow drift, it was much taller then Saran but still Human size, the cold did not seem to bother him since he only wore a short tunic and leather boots.
The man, for it was a man, sported long ice blue hair and eyes, when he opened his mouth to speak Saran could see that his canines were longer then the rest of his teeth, upon his brow was a birthmark of a Dragon rampant.
    A nasty scar ran across his face.  "I am the one you seek, I am Kameron."  He said simply.
    Saran was shocked beyond belief, he had been taught that Ryu-Jin could take on Human form but he never truly believed it, he was at a loss for words.
    "Yes, isn't it strange how our peoples are so much alike Saran of Balifor?"  He asked while walking in a circle about Saran with his hands clasped behind his back.  "Indeed, your Goddess and my God are siblings, so that means we are related in some way are we not?"  He stopped directly infront of
Saran and spat at his feet.  "It sickens me to the very core of my being!  You, I don't even dare call your race Humans, the only true Humans live on Kuso, you are Alanians, Alanis's chosen people, the only Humans stupid enough to swallow her lies!"
    Saran felt the fire inside him spark and ignite.  "Silence!  Your kind are nothing but devil spawn, you slaughter our people like lambs and you expect us to not fight back?"  He demanded.
    Kameron whirled on him.  "SLAUGHTER?  You speak of slaughter?  Why you act as if we just arbitrarily scamper about attacking you insects!  Fool!  You are the ones who started this war, all the races lived in peace before your Goddess-"  he spat the word, "-created those abominations the
Dragoons!  They came in droves and massacred my people, killing women, children and the old as cold heartedly as one steps upon a bug in your path, and you dare to think we would just roll over and die!"  Kameron was no longer calm, his face had turned a deep shade of red as he let loose the anger pent up over centuries of life in hardship.
    Saran's resolve began to falter, "It had to be done, in order for the Human race to be truly free we had to-"
    "-Eliminate my people."  He finished.  "Enough talk Saran of Balifor, I grow weary of this game, come then if you are so eager to meet your Goddess!"
    He opened his mouth as if to scream, but the voice that emanated from his throat was Human no longer, it was the voice of an angered Dragon.
    Saran took an unconscious step back as the horrible transformation began.  He fell back in terror watching Kameron's head and neck elongate, his handsome face tearing away revealing a snout and tooth filled maw.
    Kameron's body bulgled and spasmed as he grew to an impressive twenty foot height, his pale skin was replaced by ice blue scales that sparkled in the daylight, wings and a tail sprang from his back.
    Saran felt more afraid then he had ever felt before, I can't move my body. He thought desperately, It must be the Delirium!  Yes the famed Dragonfear that clouded the mind and paralyzed the victim before the Dragon struck the first, and final, blow.
    The transformed Kameron stared down at Saran with a gaze like ice.
    "AND THUS IT END'S, SARAN OF BALIFOR!!"  He said in a great voice, pulling his head back he lunged toward the helpless Saran.
    As Saran looked at the immenant death coming towards him time seemed to stop, memories long forgotten flowed into his mind unbidden: an Ice Dragon, a golden armored Dragoon, a fight in the clouds, the Dragon suffered a wound across the snout. . .
    Saran remembered!  This was the one he'd been searching for!  Kameron was the Dragon that had attacked Balifor sixteen years ago, Kameron was the one who had ruined Saran's life and taken his innocence away, Kameron was the one who had murdered his parents, Kameron was the one who was going to pay!
    His anger freed him of the Dragon Fear that had taken hold of his heart, as Kameron lunged toward him he nimbly jumped to the left missing the huge Dragons head by mere centimeters.  Gripping his partisan with both hands he began to run a tight circle about Kameron, searching for a weakness.
     "YOU UNDERESTIMATE ME SARAN OF BALIFOR!"  Kameron said with a hint of amusement in his powerful voice.  With a quickness that belied his large form, the great lizard followed each of Saran's movements perfectly, firing the occasional blast of icy breath at the fleeing man.
    As he ran Saran remembered how his parents had told him to run, and to never stop running.  And he realized that he'd been doing that all his life, running.  "No more running Kameron, from you, or from anything!"  Stopping abruptly he dodged to the right avoiding another cold burst of breath, and leapt
high into the air.
    As fast as he was Kameron could not follow the jump Saran had made.  He cast about looking at the surrounding terrain and the sky above but he found no trace of the young warrior.  Roaring his displeasure he flapped his great wings lifting his heavy body ponderously off the icy ground into the
clouds above.
    "Gotcha!"  Whooped a triumphant voice.
 Not long after rising into the sky did Kameron feel something collide with his back.  Turning his snake like neck at a one hundred and eighty degree angle he beheld Saran poised for battle upon his immense back.
    Kameron flew higher into the sky desperately trying to shake Saran from his back, doing barrel rolls and soaring through cloud banks.
    Saran crouched with his left leg stretched out behind him and his right bent at the knee just below his chest, partisan in his left hand, his right gripping a large scale to maintain his balance.
    He was like a coiled snake ready to strike.  "Tch, tch, tch. . ."  He waved his index finger at Kameron's snout as if scolding a naughty puppy.  "Bad form."
    "HOW DARE YOU!  YOU INSIGNIFICANT INSECT!!"  His gaping maw opened even wider and a blast of frozen wind issued forth from it.
    Saran jumped, once more managing to outrun Kameron's deadly breath, but Kameron himself could not, the ice blast caught his right wing freezing it solid.  Saran landed back onto Kameron's back, and he swung his partisan with all his might at the frozen wing.  It shattered in flash of blood and scales.
    Kameron roared in pain as he plummeted to the earth far below.
    Saran slowly, carefully inched his way up Kameron's neck until he reached Kameron's head, he put the sharp tip of the partisan to the unprotected flesh on the underside of the Dragons jaw.
    "FOOL!  I SHALL SURVIVE THE FALL, BUT YOUR WEAK BODY WILL BE CRUSHED!"
He gloated the rest of the way down, the fall seemed to last an eternity but the ground came up at an alarming speed and they both hit with a bone shattering crunch.
 
    Kameron's body convulsed and thrashed about as it died, the fall had imbedded the partisan into the Dragons brain on impact.
    Saran lay underneath the dead Kameron's heavy neck, with little effort he
pushed himself out from under it.  He tried to move his right arm, it was bent at an awkward angle, he winced as spears of pain shot up his arm.  Deciding that he should bind it he walked over to Kameron's head where his partisan was still stuck in the Dragon's jaw.  Sadly he looked at his fallen enemy,
"Now what?"  he asked of the corpse, "All my life I've wanted nothing more then this, and
now that I have killed you I feel. . .empty."
    Sighing he worked the spear like weapon free, walking over to the Dragon's forelegs he cut into the flesh searching for some tendon or muscle tissue, finding it he cut some strings which were very thick due to the immensity of the creature, and pulling the string through some holes he cut into his water
skin he fashioned a crude sling for his arm.  Walking back to the corpses head remembered that to complete the quest he required a trophy.  Sticking his partisan into the gaping hole in Kameron's neck began cutting all around, he had some trouble when he reached the bone but he managed to cut through it.
    He foresaw that taking the large severed head back to Balifor was going to be a problem, nonetheless he began dragging the awkward thing Sorinth, out of the Badlands cursing all the way.