In a daze, Gerald could only lift his left hand to protect himself before an unstoppable force pushed him back to the ground.
Boom!
The lizard was thoroughly enraged and it did not care about playing with its prey anymore. After it whacked Gerald with its tail, the Earth Dragon rushed forward, viciously biting on to the hand with which Gerald tried to defend himself.
"Aaaah!" Gerald screamed at the top of his lungs. His left hand felt like it was in a metal vice clamp. And in a sense, it was. The pressure from the lizard's bite thoroughly deformed the iron forearm guard, clamping it around his arm and giving him extreme pain.
The giant head of the lizard was pressing on his chest, making it hard to move or breathe. In desperation to get himself free from the beast, Gerald took out a knife with his free hand and started stabbing it all over the lizard's snout.
However, the lizard's scales were hard and he was already tired, also the weak spot, the eyes, was too far away for him to reach. Left with no other choice he chose the next-best spot to attack - the nose. Specifically, the inside of the nose.
There were no scales for protection and the skin was very thin and tender. Gerald stuffed the blade inside and started his bloody expedition.
Roar!
The lizard roared in pain, but to Gerald's surprise, it did not let him go. The beast was determined to make him suffer for the pain it received. It did not give him even a moment of respite.
Instead, with it immensely strong neck it lifted him in the air like it was nothing and started to flail him around like a rag doll.
Being jerked left to right repeatedly was bad enough, but Gerald's whole body weight was supported by just one arm. The strain on his left shoulder and elbow was immense and the ligaments and muscles were stretched to their limits until…
Pa!
As expected, his body could hold on no longer and a loud popping sound came from Gerald's elbow. The ligaments connecting his bones snapped and his arm twisted at an unnatural angle.
"Aaaaah!" Gerald screamed again in agony as tears burst forth from the immense pain.
The lizard paused momentarily and his eyes shined with satisfaction. Finally, it managed to make this annoying human scream. Although it was not out of fear, it was still satisfying hearing its prey suffer, it busted its confidence as a mighty being.
But this momentary pause gave Gerald just enough time for a counter-attack. He swung his legs around the muscular, tree-trunk-like neck of the lizard, and pressed his right palm on lizard's bleeding nose, with burning hatred in his eyes, before spitting out a single word.
"Burn!"
A flame ignited on his palm and from it, it traveled deep inside the respiratory system of the beast.
As expected, the Earth Dragon, with his supposed fire-resistance, was completely helpless against the fire that was burning on the inside.
Animals having a fire-resistance made no sense in the young man's mind, since things like that weren't possible in reality. Just as he guessed, the secret lied in its scales. The scales were those that repelled the heat and offered protection from the flames for a short time.
The soft tissues were completely unable to resist the heat.
Feeling the pain, the beast swung its head down, ramming Gerald into the hard ground. It did not do that just once, in fact, it continued to bang him against the stone floor again and again until Gerald was finally unable to hold on blasting flames any longer.
Somehow he was still conscious after all that, and he did not let go of the lizard's neck, even though he was barely able to breathe, and was coughing up warm blood.
"You think you won?" he squeezed out the words hoarsely. Every cell in his body was in pain, there wasn't a single place where he wasn't hurt.
Even with leather armor, padding, and the Unmoving Boulder Combat Art protecting him, it was not enough. The armor was torn in many places, he had bruises and scratches, broken bones and sprain joints, as well as torn ligaments and muscles.
It all happened so fast. He was a bloody mess.
But even with all the suffering, his eyes were clear and determined not to surrender. "Nobody, not even a god can decide when or how I will die! This choice belongs only to me! Waaaah!" Gerald screamed at the top of his lungs, blood spraying from his mouth.
He gathered what was left of his Mana and sent it all to his left hand.
'It's not enough! I need more! MORE!' he screamed in his mind. What he had left was only 3 MP, but he needed more, much more!
He strained his mind, trying to pull more Mana inside himself. There was so much all around him, but he could only use such a little piece of it. It was so frustrating.
'More! I need more Mana! Obey me!' He was screaming inside his head when suddenly he felt something like a heartbeat. It came from the light barrier over his body. It was just a single pulse, lasting only a split-second.
The light barrier seemed to quickly expand a few centimeters and then it shrunk back down, capturing a bit of Mana at the same time.
Gerald did not have the luxury of figuring out what just happened. He received an extra 4 MP and that was all he needed.
Quickly he sent the rest to his left palm and his face finally relaxed. Gerald looked in lizard's mad eyes, and showing his bloody grin he whispered with a deathly voice, "Go to hell… Explosion!"
BOOOM!
Back when Gerald was trying to create explosion magic, he triggered it in the open, where the energy could go in every direction and dissipate without too much damage. It was different this time.
His hand was firmly stuck between the jaws of the lizard and the energy didn't have much of a choice of escape.
When the Mana detonated, it was like a bomb just went off. A flash of light and flames was immediately followed by a thundering explosion and blood and flesh soon rained down from the sky.
In the explosion, Gerald was thrown back, his eyebrows and stubble beard were completely singed off, together with a part of his skin. The helmet did little to protect his face and neck. He looked like a corpse that was just washed in blood.
On the hill not far away, the woman riding the Warg shrieked. Her heart tightened when she saw her beloved lizard get burned by fire, but when the explosion came, it scared her silly.
As the dust settled and the silence came, her scream could be heard miles away.
"My baby!" is what she shouted. Her beloved lizard was laying on the ground, swimming in its own blood, and was missing a greater part of its head.
"You bastard!" The woman hysterically cried with flames of hate burning in her eyes. "I'll kill you! I'll fucking kill you!" She lightly kicked the Warg with her heels and the beast ran down the hill like a whirlwind.
The Wargs eyes were shining with bloodthirst, as it could already imagine itself feasting on the people below.
But then, just as they were about to come out of the cover of the forest, they heard many people yelling and running closer. Soon, a group of about ten people came running on the road, with the Silver Phantom gang among them.
The woman and the Warg stopped at the edge of the forest but they did not dare move forward.
Gnashing her teeth in anger, the woman knew that if she tried to take on all of those people at once, no matter how strong she or her mount was, it would be a losing battle.
She could only watch from afar as the people came closer and surrounded her now-dead lizard. It was driving her mad. "My poor baby… Momy will get revenge for your death I promise!" Tears of anger rolled off her cheeks.
Meanwhile, the group of people confirmed that the Earth Dragon was dead and they were able to relax. Even though they were many, against the incredible defense of the beast, they did not have much confidence in winning.
"Sera! Is that you?" Derrick noticed Sera on the ground and so he ran towards her. "Hey, are you alright? What happened here?"
She turned to look at him and her eyes were bloodshot and her lips were trembling. Derrick hugged her to calm her down, but as soon as he did so, she started wailing like a baby, and streams of tears ran down her cheeks.
"Hey, hey, what's going on? Please don't cry…" Derrick didn't know what to do in such a situation. By now the rest of the team came closer as well.
"Sera? Are you hurt? Where's Gerald? Weren't you two together?" Kara asked as she looked around the battlefield.
Hearing her words, Sera started crying even harder, "It's- It's all my fault! I didn't notice it… I was so scared… I couldn't help… Waaaaa…." She was sobbing and wailing loudly so the rest were only able to catch a few words.
"Someone's here! He's bleeding out!" One of the people that came together with Silver Phantom called out.
They quickly ran to take a look, and indeed, they found Gerald, in a pool of his own blood with wounds all over his body, but the most damage was concentrated on his head, chest and left shoulder and arm.
"Stay with me!" a person yelled and shook Gerald. "Don't you dare close your eyes, you hear me? Hey, wake up!"
But Gerald was too far gone and his mind was a complete mess right now. He was completely exhausted and the blood loss was too severe for him to stay awake. The only thing he understood at that time was that he was extremely tired and that some idiot was screaming in his ear.
Before losing consciousness he uttered, in a barely audible voice, "Fuck you, asshole, just let me sleep…"
For him, his well-deserved rest has finally come, and he embraced it with open arms.