The smoke began to disappear after a few minutes of silence.
With a step, I slowly but surely walked out of the smoke to be greeted with my comrades having their eyes on me.
I smiled toward them and said. "That was overkill. I could have died you know."
"Jeez.. Captain." Mirai exhaled a sigh of relief after seeing me.
From what I could see, Mirai seemed to be treating the young girl in her cocoon.
While I was looking over to Mirai, Raiden quickly went by my side in an instance, saying this to me. "Sensei! Did we do great?"
"At least ask him if he's okay, Rai." Frostina with Behemoth in her arms, scolded Raiden.
I watched them with a grin on my face as I shifted my gaze to observe my surroundings.
This area that used to be an arena for players to fight, turned into a zoo with plenty of beasts and a forest as well.
But now that the Dragon's magical energy depleted, the beasts started to dissolve back to magical energy to restore the Dragon's.
On the other hand, the beasts already did a lot of damage toward the players, like causing some players to be injured while a couple had died in this place.
It was then that I spotted HwanGi and Alaine walking toward us.
HwanGi with his hand covering his upper left waist had blood dripping down nonstop, and as for Alaine, she had her right eye closed with noticeable blood all over her face.
To summarize this, they were both in severe states which was why I called Mirai to help them. "Mimi, could you go and help them? And tell them to drink HP potions instead of walking here."
"I'll do it as quickly as I can, Captain." Mirai grabbed the cocoon that had the young girl inside before giving it to Raiden.
"Oh and here, take these." I handed Mirai a bag of apples before telling her. "Go eat these with them to recover some of your stamina."
Mirai blushed, holding the bag of apples as she accidentally touched my hand. "H-Hai. Arigato, Captain!"
I thought to myself, looking at my hand in which Mirai touched. 'Ho? Is she sick? Because her face is red.'
Afterwards, Mirai ran toward HwanGi and Alaine who were confused as to why Mirai was heading toward them.
"My Liege." Frostina's voice resounded behind me as she knelt down which caused me to flinch and sigh in this moment.
"Frostina. Didn't I tell you not to kneel before me ever again?" I offered my hand to her as I said that.
Frostina looked at me before glancing over to my hand as she accepted it and stood up with me supporting her. "How could I possibly do that when I didn't recognize you earlier?"
"It wasn't your fault."
"Certainly, it was the Archangel who did this to me, however it was my flaw to not recognize you, my Liege."
"Big sis, why are you being so formal now?" Raiden budged in on our conversation while there was a cocoon he was carrying.
"I did something unloyal to my Liege." Frostina having Behemoth in her arms, patted his head gently.
Then Behemoth hopped out of Frostina's grasp and went to my head instead, yawning as he said. "Just apologize, big sis. Master is forgiving anyways."
Was it a bad thing to be forgiving or not? Because somehow I felt a bit irritated by Behemoth's statement.
I held Behemoth and smacked him in the head using little strength not to hurt him.
Behemoth was puzzled as to why I did that in which I just whistled and ignored him as if I didn't smack him.
Eventually, I laid my eyes on Frostina who was talking with Raiden at the moment, scolding him. "Rai, I had told you not to play around with the cocoon."
"There you go. This side of you will never change, big sis." Raiden chuckled, tossing the cocoon upward in a playful manner.
"If I'm not like this, who will discipline you and Mimi?"
Raiden nodded, crossing his arms as if he was honored to say this. "Sensei, of course."
"Rai." Frostina pointed her finger up.
Raiden instantly looked up to find the cocoon that he overthrew up into the sky.
The cocoon proceeded to move to the left then the right, making it hard to predict where it would land.
"Big sis. Could you help me with this once?" Raiden fidgeted with his fingers with a pleading expression on his face.
Frostina stared at Raiden closely before letting out a sigh out of her mouth. "How have you not matured at all since we last saw each other?"
In that moment, Frostina extended her hand out as well as ice particles started to appear in her palm.
Then those ice particles turned into snow flakes as it hovered below the cocoon, causing it to levitate downward at a lesser speed.
In the end, the cocoon descended into Raiden's arms without any harms done to the cocoon nor the little girl inside it.
Raiden then thanked Frostina for helping him while I witnessed this scene with a smile on my face.
Soon, my face turned grave as I watched the Dragon's body, still seeing no movements so far but it wouldn't hurt to hasten my plan.
"Get the girl out of the cocoon. We need to hurry if we want to capture the Dragon." I ordered Frostina and Raiden while gripping onto my katana that had just appeared in my grasp.
"Hai, Sensei!' Raiden was the first to respond before Frostina replied behind him. "Yes, my Liege."
After walking over to the Dragon and arriving a few distance afar from her, I stood guard with Behemoth while waiting for Frostina and Raiden to finish their work.
Afterward, me and Behemoth observed the Dragon and our vicinity, looking for anything that seemed out of the ordinary.
———
In the meantime, Raiden lifted the cocoon while Frostina had a snowflake in the size of a knife with sharp edges to cut through the cocoon.
She had her focus on cutting the cocoon while trying not to hurt the girl within this cocoon.
In no time at all, Frostina was able to free the girl, she then continued to remove the cocoon off of the girl and carried her out of it.
Before long, the girl managed to regain her consciousness and decided to look around her surroundings until she saw Frostina's good-looking face.
"Are you able to stand on your own, child?" Frostina had a soft smile on her face to ease the young girl's suspicion.
The girl blushed, dazing from the beauty of Frostina before she could have the chance to reply back to Frostina. "Woah.. I Uh..! I can stand."
Frostina grinned instead of responding back to the girl, after that, Frostina placed the girl down carefully.
Raiden bent down in front of the girl, looking straight at her small face after he reassured her. "You're safe now."
"You.. did you save me, sir..?" The girl nervously asked Raiden with her hands together behind her back.
"He did." Frostina spoke in a kind tone of voice, having her finger directed at JoonChul.
The girl shifted her eyes toward JoonChul, seeing his back with his coat fluttering through the wind current.
She said, pondering if this person was someone she saw before. "He looks familiar.."
Raiden with his serious expression asked the girl as politely as possible. "Since he saved you, could you do him a favor by chanting these words?"
The girl held her amulet tightly as if she was afraid that Raiden was asking her to hand over her amulet. "Are..you going to steal my amulet..?"
"Hm? Oh no. I only need you to stand here and chant the words that I will tell you."
"..is that all..?"
"Yes. So listen carefully to every word I say." Raiden smiled, leaning closer to the girl's ear to whisper those words to her.
During a short time, Raiden finished what he wanted to say and questioned the girl. "Did you get that?"
The girl nodded in response.
"Very good! So when I cover your eyes, you'll chant those words, alright?"
"But why cover my ey-..!?" The girl was about to ask Raiden until she was interrupted by a large noise of the ground being crushed.
A gust of dusty air emerged from the place where the Dragon was, travelling throughout the area in great haste.
Within only a couple of seconds, the Dragon got up from her spot, flapping her wings to depart the area.
Not only that, all her body parts had been wounded by Behemoth's insane explosion, indicating that she could perish if she gets bombarded with attacks.
Raiden immediately covered the eyes of the girl, in case she gets frightened by the mere sight of a Dragon appearing in front of her.
He then said to her in a solemn tone of voice. "Begin chanting and ignore any of the sounds that may occur later on."
"O-Oh.. Okay.." The girl responded while being anxious of what was happening around her, causing her to grasp her amulet firmly.
The Dragon soared through the sky, thinking that she had a perfect escape.
However, what came forth ahead of her, punched her, using 'Wave Vortex' to push her toward the ground.