The dragon reared up triumphantly and roared. Swatting the two puny humans who charged at it, it prepared to finish them off. It had eliminated one of them. Soon, the other two would fall as well, and it could return to its nest to lick its wounds.
Though the three mages had dealt it terrible, terrible damage, it would only take the venerable dragon a few days to fully heal.
First, it had to eliminate the irritating humans that had trespassed into its nest and hurt it badly. The two it had just swatted away were slowly rising to their feet, stunned from the blow it had delivered to them. The Hellfire Drake had no intention of allowing them to recover, and was mercilessly generating flames along its spikes to power up its superheated flamethrower spell.
However, before it could unleash its wrath upon the two, something caused it to freeze in its tracks.
Stunned, the great dragon slowly turned around to stare disbelievingly at the sight behind it.
"Where are you going?" I asked, standing in the middle of the red, molten crater. "Our battle's not over yet."
*
My skin had been completely burned off, leaving nothing but blackened flesh and angry red blisters. I was completely unrecognizable. Both Troy and Kureha were staring at me with undisguised horror at my grotesque condition. Yet, despite losing most of my skin, I still had a manic grin on my face, or what passed off as a grin, anyway. I had lost most of my cheek muscles and flesh, leaving blackened bones and teeth beneath my burned face.
"If you thought I died from that, you're dead wrong," I warned. I was still holding my two swords in my hands. In contrast to my completely smudged and charred body, they were still shiny and clean. "What, you don't believe me? I admit, I look a little worse for the wear…oh, all right. I know I look like a corpse right now, but what do you expect? You were the one who burned me to a crisp."
The dragon was still staring at me in disbelief. So were Troy and Kureha, whose mouths were practically hitting the ground.
"How are you still alive?" Troy blurted out. The dragon and Kureha both looked as if they had the same question.
I rolled my eyes, unable to blink because my eyelids had been incinerated. "Come on now, don't tell me you have never seen a zombie before?"
"You're a zombie?!" Troy exclaimed.
"Don't be ridiculous!" Kureha shouted. "How do you expect us to believe that?!"
The dragon was, incredibly enough, nodding in agreement, as if it understood every word Kureha was saying. You know…you could just attack each other instead of staring at me in disbelief. Sometimes, the logic of these people and monsters baffled me. But instead of fighting, all three continued to stare at me intently.
I stomped my foot impatiently. "Fine! Ah, damn it! And here I was thinking I could fool you with this appearance."
Green Dragon appeared behind me. Flowers began dancing around us, and in a flash, I transformed back into a totally normal human being, but with plenty of bloodstains, bruises, cuts and burns. It wasn't a healing spell – there was no way I could learn such advanced magic with my specialization in summoning and foray into combat magic – but more of a camouflage spell that belonged to the wood element. Otherwise I would be healing myself and my friends long ago. Unfortunately, such convenient things didn't happen, and I was stuck with the wounds I sustained over the long duel with the Hellfire Drake.
Still, it was at least much better than the charred zombie-like corpse I adopted earlier.
"How did you survive that?!" Kureha exclaimed in shocked. I glared at her, wondering if she really wanted me to die, and then sighed and shook my head.
"His tortoise soul beast is still there," Troy pointed out. Black Tortoise raised a paw and waved weakly before grinning. He had conjured a water barrier over me at the last moment before I was swallowed by the flames.
The dragon was unamused by my prank.
Roaring, it unleashed a torrent of superheated flames in my direction. Troy and Kureha stepped back inadvertently, shielding themselves from the intense heat. Black Tortoise also made to conjure a fresh barrier of water between me and my assailant, but a mental command from me forestalled his spell. I decided to just dismiss him there and them.
Instead, I stepped forward and raised Gan Jiang before slashing the flames. Black mana billowed around me as the stream of fire seemed to stop in front of me, as if they had just hit an invisible wall. Instead, they were all blown sky-high. Troy and Kureha watched in awe, reminded of a volcano that had just erupted.
The dragon could only stare incredulously at me as I deflected the superheated flames upward. I tilted my head and smiled at it, a hint of a sneer on my lips.
"Honestly…I didn't know Gan Jiang and Mo Ye had this kind of power. If I did, I would have used them long ago, from the start of the battle. Well, it doesn't matter anyway." Taking a deep breath, I cast my ultimate summoning spell. "Draco!"
An enormous dragon materialized behind me. Unlike the crimson Hellfire Drake, he was entirely black. Spreading his giant bat-like wings, Draco took to the air and flew toward the stunned Hellfire Drake, slamming into it like a speeding bullet and knocking it off its feet. Draco sank his humongous claws into the smaller dragon, causing the latter to scream pitifully.
"What the…?" Troy sighed and shook his head. "So we were all buying all that time just so you can summon your own damned dragon?"
I shrugged. "The most powerful summoning spells take the longest. You should know that by now."
"Yeah, I did, but I certainly did not expect you to summon a dragon!"
"Is it over?" Kureha asked, scarcely believing what she saw. There was no way the heavily injured and smaller Hellfire Drake could win against my Draco, who was at full health and larger. "Did we win?"
"Yeah." I scratched my head. "Honestly, I took quite a while to summon Draco because I was casting one of his spells, and we really shouldn't be here when it goes off."
"Huh? What did you do, Richie?!" Troy was glaring at me.
I never got to answer.
A deafening roar drowned out any reply I might have, and something heavy crashed onto the mountaintop. Spinning around, I caught sight of a second Hellfire Drake ramming my Draco off the first. Like my Draco, it was fully unscathed, but unlike my Constellation spirit, the new dragon was utterly furious.
"What the hell?!" I hollered, anxiety curling up in my heart. There was no way Draco could take on two Hellfire Drakes at the same time, even if one of them was near death. "Where did that other Hellfire Drake come from?"
"There are two of them?" Kureha whimpered, despair filling her voice. She gripped her sword tightly, ready to battle to the death, if necessary.
"Did that stupid thing learn a cloning technique or something?!" Troy demanded.
Then it hit me, even as I slapped my forehead in exasperation. "Of course! This is the dragon's nest! That second Hellfire Drake must be the first's mate!"
"There may be eggs!" Kureha was trembling. "If they raise a whole brood of dragons…"
"We have to destroy them!" Troy agreed vehemently. "No matter what it takes!"
"That's part of the plan. I was planning to nuke the whole mountain." Turning to my Constellation spirit, I issued an order. "You get to unleash the Thuban after all, Draco."
Draco bellowed as he leaped back, charging the beam of mana in his jaws. However, the second Hellfire Drake rammed into him, knocking him off his feet. Draco crashed heavily onto the ground, the mana in his jaws dispersing at the interruption.
"Damn it!" I was already casting another summoning spell, even as Troy and Kureha were sprinting toward my fallen Constellation spirit. "Cancer! Provide some backup!"
A giant crab materialized above the Hellfire Drake and smashed his massive pincer onto its head, driving it right to the ground. At the same time, Kureha pierced it with her sword while Troy grabbed its tail with both hands and swung it around before throwing it right at its mate with his incredible strength. He was only able to do that because the dragon was still stunned from Cancer's Crab Hammer attack.
"Both of you! Tactical withdrawal! We have to leave the mountain right now! Get to my position immediately!"
Even as I dismissed Cancer, I was yelling and waving my friends toward my direction. Thankfully, they obeyed without question.
"Draco, use Eltanin first!" I hollered. Two huge black beams of mana glowed from the dragon's jaws and erupted into twin bursts of destructive force that struck both Hellfire Drakes and knocked them into the neighboring mountain. "Now, get ready to fire Thuban!"
Then I sprinted toward the edge of the mountain and leaped off. Even as I spiraled down to the abyss below, I yelled, "Aquila!"
The enormous eagle appeared below me. I landed on a bed of feathers before rolling upward to check on the progress of my friends. Troy didn't hesitate and also followed me off the cliff, as he was familiar with my modus operandi. On the other hand, Kureha was a little apprehensive, but she took off when she saw my hovering Aquila.
"Gonna give them a parting gift." Turning around, Troy raised a hand and clenched it into a fist. Along the surface of the mountain, huge rocks flowed outward to grasp both Hellfire Drakes. They struggled against their binds, slowly breaking the stone with their immense strength, but it was enough to hold them for the precious few seconds we needed.
Rising to her feet, Kureha also summoned a thousand swords before bombarding the Hellfire Drakes with the devastating storm of blades. Both dragons screeched as the spirit swords sliced and pierced through their armored scales, blood spraying across the mountainside.
Aquila soared away at incredible speed, leaving the two shrinking figures of the dragons behind. At the same time, Draco unleashed the Thuban once he was sure we were far enough.
The black beam of mana slammed into the two dragons before blowing up in a gargantuan mushroom cloud. The black explosion swallowed the entire mountain range, erasing the entire terrain and leveling it, leaving a smoldering crater of colossal proportions. Even the valley below was not spared, disintegrated without a trace.
"Amazing…you did that?" Kureha gasped.
"You really fucking nuked the entire mountain range!" Troy yelled, his voice filled with delight. "You maniac! You incredible maniac! You're a fucking, walking and talking nuclear bomb!"
"I wish I feel like one…" my consciousness was slipping. This wasn't good.
"Are you all right?" Kureha asked worriedly. "You look extremely pale."
"…yeah. I've expended too much mana. I need to land, or I'll pass out, Aquila will disappear below us, and we'll fall to our deaths."
"Not surprising, after casting a spell of that magnitude." Troy was nodding. "No wonder you took so long to summon Draco and cast that spell. Of course it would take an insane amount of time to complete the casting! It'll also require crazy amounts of mana too!"
"There's a military base just a couple of kilometers from here," Kureha was looking around to find it. "Just hang in there…"
"No. land. Right now." Troy placed a hand on my shoulder. I was literally collapsing on top of my Aquila, who was gradually becoming transparent as maintaining his existence in the material became quite the struggle. "I'll take care of the rest. You've done more than enough."
"Thanks."
Exhausted, I had Aquila set down immediately, and then I crashed onto the ground. Troy quickly caught me before my face could hit the dirt.
The last thing I knew was an inevitable wave of darkness swallowing my consciousness, and then I truly knew nothing.