The dragon was immense, even from such a distance. While smaller than the mountains themselves, the way it moved made Axel feel that it was at least large enough to crush Ezarik's castle just by landing on it. It was covered with a dark brown and black material that looked like plates of jagged rock that crumbled and shattered as it moved, revealing the same glowing, yellow-red fluid flowing under its skin as was thrown out the top of a volcano.
"When you talked about the Elder Dragons," Axel whispered. "I wasn't expecting one made out of lava."
The others were too stunned to ask him what lava was.
"THAT THING IS HUGE!" Cyil shouted, scuttling quickly to hide behind Riselus.
"It has so much magic power," Qassot breathed, taking a slow step back.
Aavern and Riselus just stared in disbelief.
Axel's heart started beating wildly, struggling to get out of his chest and drag him away. He took a sharp breath in. He grasped at his chest in confusion. He closed his eyes and tried to calm down, instead feeling outwards around him with his senses. Carefully, he felt all around him, poked at the dust and debris on the ground, and slowly let the sensation in his heart fade away. He opened his eyes. The heavy throb in his ears had faded, but was still there. His heartbeat had accelerated, leaving a dull pain in his chest. His breath came in gasps as his eyes widened to take in the sight.
He didn't recognize this emotion.
"Axel?" Qassot asked from nearby. Axel could only dimly hear her voice from nearby. "Are you okay?"
Axel put a hand to his face in confusion. The corners of his mouth had turned downwards, and his eyes were locked open. He was gripping the hilt of his sword tightly as blood slowly drained from his face. The throbbing of his heart slammed in his chest, simultaneously begging him to move and commanding him to stay still.
The word for the emotion came to mind suddenly.
It was fear.
Deep-rooted fear at a monstrosity older and more powerful than anything he had encountered before.
Where have I felt this before?
A dull tingle ran down Axel's spine. A throbbing, uncomfortable buzz that shook his brain. Axel's mind frantically dug through his memories to find where he had felt that feeling before, but he gritted his teeth and stopped himself quickly.
"Now's not the time for this," he muttered.
Axel took a deep breath in and drew his sword. He swung it through the air with a dull hum and slammed it into a nearby rock. The clang shocked the others out of their trance.
"Axel?" Qassot asked.
"Get your heads on straight," he snapped.
"We need to get out of sight before it sees us," Dracoa said.
"Can't we beat it?" Cyil asked.
Dracoa hesitated. Axel could see some deep-rooted fear hidden behind the wyvern's normally irritable and rational eyes.
"It doesn't have its gem," Dracoa said slowly, "so we probably can, but-"
Axel's body moved on its own. He suddenly swung his sword to his side and darted forwards, letting white flame run down the edge of the blade. The world slowed around him as his vision tunneled in on the dragon. To the Gem Keepers watching behind him, he crossed the distance to the dragon in a few steps, leaping up in a streak of white flame and crashing down on top of it. The bright white flame surrounding him darted forwards and back, striking out before almost instantly appearing on the other side of the dragon and crashing against it like a tidal wave.
Like a force of nature, the dragon thrashed out. Massive claws cleaved deep rifts in the ground. Swaths of sand were turned to melted glass by the molten rock that poured out of the dragon's mouth. Cracks in the dragon's skin caused by the white flame's relentless assault dripped searing red liquid across the ground. Despite the dragon's efforts, however, its attacks hit air. The unstable ground only gave the streak of flame more footholds to leap up and strike out.
When Axel regained control of his body, he darted back to the Gem Keepers and let out a long breath.
Cyil let out a low whistle. "That's a wizard for you."
"What was that about?" Qassot asked.
"It would've been better to leave it alone," Dracoa said in a strained voice. The dragon had noticed the group in the distance and had begun to approach in anger.
"I think that rock plating is armor." Axel said, flexing his fingers. He didn't feel tired at all, despite how furiously he was attacking the dragon. The throbbing fear in his heart had subsided slightly. He had wounded it, struck it hard enough to crack its rock plating and reach the molten flesh underneath.
If it can bleed, it can die.
"We might be able to win," Axel said.
"You really pulled a Dracoa there," Cyil said. "She does that too."
Dracoa glared at him.
"I agree with Axel. I think we can win," Aavern said suddenly. Axel turned to look at the small winged fuzzball. Cyil had mentioned that he was the group's strategist.
"I agree!" Cyil said.
"How?" Riselus asked. He seemed a little concerned about the massive terrain damage Axel's brief encounter with the dragon caused.
"Axel can keep it busy over there, and we can spread out and bombard it with long-range attacks," Aavern suggested. "Also-"
A roar interrupted Aavern. The dragon had crossed half the distance to them in that short time and was getting angrier.
Axel took a deep breath. "Fine, let's go."
Axel darted away in a flash of white fire before anyone could respond. He narrowed his vision on the behemoth before him, letting everything around him slow down more and more. A massive claw came down above him. He leapt up and slashed the cracked rocky skin with his sword as it came down, then ran to the side of the dragon and slashed again. With each swing of his sword. The white flames engulfing it flew out in a wave, crashing against the dragon's flank and burning through its rock armor. The dragon could not touch him. Axel could see any attack coming and had the leeway to let loose a few strikes of his own before running around to the other side. As everything around him slowed further, he had the room to jump off of rocks jutting out of the ground to attack the dragon from above. The dragon's blazing yellow eyes couldn't follow Axel's movements, but burned brighter with anger the longer the fight dragged on.
Like a meteor, a beam of light suddenly appeared, crashing against the dragon's head and snapping its neck back. Swaths of rock peeled from the dragon's skin, revealing its molten, burning body underneath. In quick succession, even to Axel's sped-up view, massive rock spears crashing into the dragon's exposed neck, followed by a storm of red flames which poured harmlessly off of the dragon's flaming flesh, and a swarm of shining silver swords that slashed through the dragon's body in an instant.
The dragon's head was slashed to bits in an instant.
The dragon's body kept moving, lava pouring out of its body to construct a new head.
Its attention was now redirected to the small group of Gem Keepers who had begun to fan out. Axel could see Aavern charging up another blast, and Qassot generating thin green beams of energy that connected her to the others. Axel leisurely sidestepped a massive claw and slashed it a few times, cracking the armor slightly. He jumped up and gathered white flames onto his left fist. He kicked off the hilts of Qassot's swords which were still flying around near the dragon's missing head, ending up far above the dragon's empty neck, which had already begun to form back into a head. The dragon saw him and attempted to spew glowing red lava at him, but a set of wispy blades suddenly slashed its eyes, and a sudden downdraft pushed the lava back onto the dragon's face.
Axel twisted his body and dropped, swinging his arm and bringing his flame-covered fist down on the dragon's rocky back.
Axel had to quickly kick off of the dragon's hot rocky back to avoid the searing white explosion that caused the dragon's knees to buckle under it. Axel blocked the brunt of the explosion with his sword, but the force still sent him flying backwards. He quickly regained his senses and twisted his body to land on his feet, skidding to stop near the castle.
The explosion had broken his concentration, however, and the dragon had noticed him. It had broken into a run, shaking the ground with every step, ignoring the swords slicing apart its torso and the endless bombardment of stone spears and barely noticeable flames. Axel crouched as if preparing to dash at the dragon, letting white flame creep across his sword.
A sharp pain suddenly flashed through his left side.
Axel barely had the time to slam the white flame on his sword into the ground next to him to forcibly blow himself out of the way before the dragon's charge crashed into the castle, narrowly missing crushing Axel's legs, tearing through the protective red shimmer surrounding the castle's bricks.
The castle began to collapse, exposing various rooms on the lower levels.
A gust of wind picked Axel up and tossed him backwards, where he skidded to a stop next to Qassot and Dracoa.
Qassot didn't say anything. She just held her claw next to Axel's side. Relief spread through Axel as the pain in his side gradually diminished.
A blast of white light appeared from Aavern, who was further away. The massive beam scorched the earth where it passed, giving off heat more intense than the dragon's molten skin, slamming into the dragon's still-exposed flank and knocking it further into the rapidly-collapsing castle. Its deafening roar of anger was cut short by the top of the castle caving in and falling on its head.
"Nice shot!" Cyil called from Axel's left. He was closer to the battle than the others, and seemed somewhat roughed up by the rubble that had been flying around.
"Thanks!" Aavern said.
"It's not dead yet," Dracoa said. "Get ready."
The rubble shook as the dragon struggled to get out of the debris. The red shimmer had already begun to take hold as the castle's bricks began to reconstruct itself.
Another roar reverberated through the air.
The time, it wasn't anger.
It was triumph.
The air suddenly began to get extremely hot. The ground began to shimmer with heat. Stray scrolls that littered the ground began to catch fire.
"What-" Qassot asked as the dragon slowly shook rubble off, rocky skin plating gradually growing back to cover its exposed sides, neck, and back.
Dracoa's eyes widened. "We forgot about that."
Clutched in the dragon's claw was what looked like a brown and black ball shining with red and yellow between the cracks in the visible plates. The orb, taller than Axel and perfectly spherical, which seemed so large when they saw it before, seemed like a mere trinket in the claws of the dragon.
"It has its gem now," Dracoa whispered. "We can't win anymore."
The dragon roared and stomped the ground with a massive claw, now more molten and cracked. The lava that made up the dragon's body was seeping through the cracks and burning the ground. The rocks at its feet had started melting into pools of red and yellow liquid. Without warning, a crack opened up where the dragon stomped, rapidly making its way towards Axel, Dracoa, and Qassot. Axel rolled out of the way as Dracoa swept her and Qassot up in a whirlwind. A massive spurt of lava burst from the crack like a geyser, raining fire down on the surroundings.
"WE NEED TO RUN!" Dracoa shouted. Qassot immediately jumped up and started flying, followed closely by Dracoa, propelling herself up in a whirlwind.
"Hot, hot, hot!" Cyil shouted from a little ways away, jumping off the ground. Axel got up too. The ground itself had started heating up to a painful degree, and the air itself seemed to be on fire. What few hardy plants who managed to root themselves in the wasteland found themselves reduced to ashes before they could even catch fire. It would be foolish to keep fighting. He channeled his focus and turned to follow the others.
Another eruption of lava exploded out of the ground to his left. Aavern managed to deflect it with a blast of light. The ground began to heave and melt. Axel glanced back. Massive claws of rock began to reach out of the melting ground, clawing upwards at the dragon even as they collapsed from the heat. More cracks began to form across the ground, rapidly spewing lava as they tried to catch up.
"QASSOT!" Aavern shouted over the roaring of blood in Axel's ears. "BRING US INTO THE DIMENSIONAL LINK!"
Axel heard this and sped up, leaping over fissures that suddenly opened underneath him, dodging crashing rubble as chunks of land had their foundations melted, and slashing stray rocks and debris from Riselus's attempts to protect them as he ran. He quickly caught up to the whirlwind-propelled Dracoa and Qassot. They had stopped by Riselus. Cyil arrived shortly after him. Qassot made sure she was touching everyone before starting the procedure.
"Oh no," Cyil whispered behind Axel. Axel looked back as the world around him began to warp.
Far in the distance, the massive dragon had reared up to its full, immense height, throat glowing brightly through the cracks in its armor, glowing red and yellow as it dripped with magma, before opening its mouth and letting a massive burst of lava rush from its mouth, closing the distance at an incredible pace, melting the wasteland as it passed.
In that same instant, the world warped around them and they appeared in the Dimensional Link.