"Protect my dreams!"
Kai re-manifested his energy sword that he had put away while they were looking for the chest. Zero immediately placed his hand on Kai's shoulder.
"Wait a second, there's no way we can beat a DRAGON this early on!" Zero protested. "There has to be another way out of this."
Kai continued to stare down the sizable spectral dragon. "Stay back until the sun fully sets." With those last vague words, he took off in a head on rush toward the Echo.
"Y-you idiot!" Zero said. "Your sword won't be able to penetrate something as dense as dragon scale!" Mind you, Zero had never even seen a real dragon before now; but his knowledge with fantasy games and books told him that dragon scale was as hard as they come.
The dragon stood its ground as Kai came upon it. He leapt up into the air and aimed a strike right at the dragon's foreleg.
Gotta be strategic with my strikes! Kai thought. That armor won't shed easy..
The dragon made no attempt to dodge as Kai's Energy blade collided with the dragon's front left leg. The blade shattered into particles of energy as it impacted the dragon, not leaving a single scratch.
Kai's face dropped. "You're kidding me!"
The dragon huffed. "You should've listened to your friend." In one quick fluid motion, the dragon kicked forward with the same leg and slammed it into Kai. The leg was bigger than either of them so he was sent flying backwards - Zero quickly jumped in the way of his path and caught him before he could be thrown into the barrier of flames that surrounded the walls.
They both hit the ground hard from the force.
"Cough, cough....thanks for the save there." Kai mumbled as he struggled to get back up after that single hit.
"Maybe wait before just running at some unknown boss enemy that isn't even suppose to exist right now."
Kai re-manifested his sword. "Trust me, I know what I'm doing. I'm buying time for you."
Zero raised an eyebrow. "For me?" He was thrown for a loop as he had no actually offensive attack to use and he doubt the dragon was going to fall for some drugged candy.
"There is no break in the middle of a fight!" The dragon roared. Suddenly Zero was shoved to the side as Kai jumped in the opposite direction to avoid a powerful stream of blue flames that burst right between them.
The dragon had taken flight above them to give them no room to escape their wrath.
"Time to test out the upgrade I suppose. Crescent Strike!" Kai swung his sword in an upward arc towards the dragon and released a wave of energy at the airborne enemy.
Due to the dragon's size, it was unable to maneuver in the short time and the attack collided straight on with the dragon's chest which was partially armored. The dragon was knocked backwards in the air by the force of the attack, but the armor was mostly still intact.
"Hmm, not bad player. But surely you don't think that's enough?"
So even with the added 30% attack power from the upgrade, it's still not enough to pierce it's armor eh? Kai thought as he considered his options.
Meanwhile, Zero watched on trying to figure out what Kai possibly meant by 'he was buying him time' and 'wait for nightfall'.
He looked up and saw the sun slightly dipping above the walls. It was almost nightfall.
The sound of impacting energy went off again as Zero focused back on the fight that Kai was quickly losing ground on. He was firing off one wave of energy after another in an attempt to break the armor on the front.
"Crescent Strike! Crescent Strike!"
While not causing any damage, the impact of each hit was starting to build up and the armor wasn't as shiny and sleek as it use to be - Kai was definitely causing damage to the armor if nothing else.
"Foolish human." The dragon seethed. "Will you really burn yourself out on this folly of a task? Then allow me to assist in your death."
Another shot of flames descended down upon Kai.
He maneuvered out of the way as he felt something hot against his back.
"Kai! You're on fire!" He heard Zero shout.
Sure enough, Kai turned over his shoulder and saw smoke coming from the back of his outfit. In the time it took him to stop and register this, the dragon had already started its next move. It's large spiny tailed whipped around and delivered a crushing blow to the side of Kai.
The sound of breaking bone could clearly be heard tangled in with a scream of pain from Kai. He was sent spiraling into the air and landed hard against the unforgiving ground.
His breathing was ragged as he quickly found it hard to breathe. Zero rushed to his side.
"Kai, are you okay?!"
Kai sputtered words between breaths. "My...ribs...it..it broke a few.."
Zero looked further out and saw the dragon come to a landing not far from there, a look of triumph and discontent plastered on its reptilian face.
"I was known as Askook, the Fire Hearted." The Echo stated. "I was a boss that players only risked to take on in the later stages of the game. While I have not been an official part of the game for some time, I can tell by looking at the two of you....you're still beginners."
One flap of it's wings was enough to almost knock Zero over as he knelt beside the injured Kai.
I knew it! We shouldn't have even tried this battle...now...we're done for. Zero thought as he dropped his head. And here I thought I could become something more.
A tug from Kai refocused Zero's attention. He looked at Kai's stretched out arm as he pointed toward the sky.
"It's nightfall." He mumbled.
Zero looked up at the night sky and was still lost as to what this had to do with anything related to him.
"I get that, by what do you-"
Zero stopped himself mid-sentence as he finally saw what Kai wanted him to see. Despite the flames around the walls causing some illumination, there was still quite a bit of darkness around them as the area within the walls was quite vast.
Kai gave a weak smile as he clenched his fist. "It's time...for your first invocation.."