"Rooooaaarrr"
The Black dragon roared as it flapped its mighty wings and increased its flight speed. This time they flew at an altitude of 400 metres above sea level to conserve the energy levels of the Black Dragon.
After approximately 10 minutes had passed in their flight, the quartet saw the end of the landmass and the beginning of a majestic blue sea that stretched all the way to the very limit of their visions.
"Phew, that was scary," Prakash said as he slumped down on the sofa. The adrenaline rush of the previous encounter subsiding down as he gazed at the serene waves of the blue sea.
"Are anyone injured?" Inquired Akiko, as she began to check for any apparent injuries on Aurella.
"I'm fine" Replied Li Qiu as he began to eat some of their rations of meat to restore his expended Aria.
"I'm not hurt anywhere myself," Said Prakash as he gazed at Akiko with an intent that implied 'Don't forget to check your own injuries'.
"I feel a sudden craving for a drag," Said Li Qiu as he fished out a packet of cigarettes from his pocket.
"Do you want some?" Inquired Li Qiu, as he extended the cigarette packet towards Prakash.
"Nah, I don't smoke" Replied Prakash with a wave of his hands.
"What about you?" Inquired Li Qiu, as he further extended the cigarette packet towards Akiko who sat on the sofa to the right of Prakash, with Li Qiu being seated at the left extreme.
"I'll pass this time" Replied Akiko as she slapped the hand of Aurella who curiously extended his hand to grab a cigarette.
"No, you don't" Akiko warned Aurella who looked at her with pitiful eyes that looked on the verge of spilling out tears.
"Well, I'm not responsible if he starts to cry" Declared Li Qiu as he ignited his cigarette with his Thermal Flames.
He had taken only two puffs out of it when he felt his heart suddenly constrict in pain and then start to loudly thump.
'Thump' 'Thump'
His heartbeats were so loud that even Akiko, who sat the furthest away from him, could clearly hear his heart beats.
"Bro, is something wrong?" Inquired Prakash, as he started to inspect the packet of cigarettes to check if there had indeed been something wrong with it.
Not paying any attention to Prakash, Li Qiu closed his eyes as he tried to figure out the reason as to why his heart started to beat so loudly all of a sudden.
"The only other time something like this had ever happened was when that parasite tried to lodge within me…..It cant be?" Li Qiu immediately activated his Essence Sense innate ability to gaze at his surroundings.
His Essence Sense innate ability could view the essences of everything that existed in his surroundings, with its spherical range being one-tenth of his regular vision. Everything around him usually looked pitch black when there were no essences present around him.
But, this time, Li Qiu witnessed faint traces of green and purple that slowly floated towards their location.
"Everyone, don't breathe" Li Qiu bellowed in warning.
Everyone instantly placed their hands upon their noses to avoid inhaling whatever that Li Qiu had discovered.
As Li Qiu was trying to locate the source of these substances that couldn't be detected by the naked eye, he witnessed a wide yellowish barrier that suddenly appeared 10 metres before the Black Dragon.
Li Qiu tried to warn, "Black Drag…." But, was too late due to the speed at which the Black Dragon flew.
'Thump' 'Crash'
'Grrr'
The Black Dragon's face collided head-on against the barrier as its momentum threw everyone aboard on it off from its back.
Due to the speed at which the Black Dragon flew, even after colliding onto the barrier, its body, starting from its tail tilted upwards until the entirety of its spiked back collided onto the barrier.
Before they got sandwiched between the barrier and the Black Dragon, Li Qiu punched at Prakash's left shoulder.
The force behind the punch blasted Prakash along with Akiko and Aurella who happened to be in his line of flight and were all sent flying out of the range of the crash. The rebound produced due to his punch also sent Li Qiu away from the impact area in the opposite direction.
'Crash' 'Swish'
'Swish' 'Swish'
All of the jagged scales on the back of the Black Dragon broke due to the collision and further blasted off in all directions like the shrapnel of a hand grenade upon explosion.
'Swish' 'Swoosh'
Upon seeing some of the ruby coloured scales of the Black Dragon approaching towards him, Li Qiu who didn't even have enough time to erect a shield could only raise his arms to guard the vital regions of his head and heart.
An elliptical scale that was about a foot in length pierced through his stomach and emerged halfway out on the other side of his body while plenty of other smaller pieces of the broken scales pierced through various other parts of his body.
His intestines were damaged at various places but thankfully, his other organs were relatively safe.
The situation was even worse on the other side where Prakash and Co. were thrown off.
Prakash, who got his left arm crippled when Li Qiu saved him with that punch, had his left leg severed from the part below his knees and also suffered from other injuries.
Akiko, who barely managed to react in time against the flying scales, instinctively hugged Aurella and shielded him away from the flying scales.
But, a huge piece of a triangular scale pierced through her back and with other scales that also pierced through at various regions of her spinal cord instantly knocked her unconscious.
Due to the fact that Akiko shielded Aurella, he was relatively safe. But, the triangular scale that pierced through Akiko's back went through her body and pierced the left eye of Aurella.
Since it lost most of its force in while passing through the body of Akiko, the triangular scale stopped at his eyes and didn't travel towards his brain.
Other than his left eye, Aurella was unhurt at other places of his body.
"Aaaaarrrgh"
Seeing the bloodied state of Akiko who got injured due to shielding him with her body, Aurella roared with anger as rage clouded his eyes.
Tears started to flow from his eyes as his left leg got severed but Prakash still activated his innate ability in order to rescue Akiko and Aurella who, at the speed at which they were falling would fall into the sea with a few seconds.
The calm blue sea may look majestic, spectacular and serene with its calm waves, sea breeze and all. But, Prakash knew about the monstrosities that lived beneath that calm visage.
Prakash pushed his innate ability 'Moving Nature' to its absolute limit as he shot towards the falling duo and barely managed to catch the extended hand of Aurella just 20 metres above the deep blue sea.
The moment Prakash took hold of Aurella's hand, he immediately felt danger signals go off at all of his senses. Not wanting to spend even a single extra millisecond at that place, Prakash instantly shot up at the fastest speed he could muster upon with the help of his innate ability without a single concern as to the expenditure of his Aria.
The next moment, a huge shark jumped out of the surface of the sea and opened its huge mouth filled with razor-sharp teeth.
"Damn, faster…faster….faster!!!" Prakash bellowed in his mind as he tried to desperately fly up as quickly as he could.
Just the cross-section of the head that popped out of the surface of the sea was about 8 metres as it closed the distance between them within a second with its mouth wide open.
'Clank'
The shark clamped its mouth shut as its open mouth encased the trio of Prakash, Akiko, and Aurella completely.
"Aaargh" As blood seeped out of all his orifices, Prakash didn't even care if his Aria circuits would rupture or explode and directly burned his Aria within his body and exploded out with a burst of speed.
'Splurt'
As the mouth of the shark clamped shut, copious amount of blood splashed into the air and onto the face of the shark.
Prakash and Aurella had escaped successfully but Akiko was not so fortunate.
The entirety of her body below her hips had been severed by the shark. Thankfully to them or unthankfully to her, due to the sharpness of the shark's teeth, it clearly severed Akiko's body from where it bit. Otherwise, the trio would have become its munchy snack by now.
Due to having most of her sensory and receptor nerves severed due to the previous attack by the scales, Akiko didn't flinch in her unconscious state even when the entirety of her body below her hips were severed.
"Aurella…Aurella!!! Damn you AURELLA!" Aurella, who went mad in his rage by now, regained a bit of his sanity when Prakash repeatedly bellowed his name in his ears.
"Stop her bleeding. She won't die" Bellowed Prakash.
Aurella flinched in response for a second as his eyes regained a sense of clarity and immediately began the treatment of Akiko while Prakash increased their altitude.
Meanwhile, on the other side of the Black Dragon that slowly tried to regain its balance, Li Qiu had his wings and thrusters materialized as he stabilized himself in the air and slowly gazed up at the direction where monstrous amounts of essences had gathered.
All he could see with his Essence Sense innate ability were huge clumps of essences made of Aria each of which were many times greater than his own.
One of the essences that flew before the other powerful essences was almost 10 times his own.
Li Qiu momentarily switched off his Essence Sense innate ability, when, he saw the types and species of birds that had arrived at the scene.
"****!"