The old dwarven mage spread his shadow out like a thin black blanket and slowly dragged Badul and the other surviving dwarves away from the blue dragon's vicinity.
Azla's eyes didn't even glance in that direction. Her full attention was fixed on the black silhouette at the mountaintop.
"What is it?" Azla's voice carried a hint of tension. "The so-called strongest — Da Long — has also come to poach a kill?"
Da Long lay sprawled along the rocky ridge at the summit, eyes half-open, wings folded at her sides, making no aggressive display.
"I just sensed the Dragon Strife over here. Came to take a look."
"Take a look?" Azla's dragon face made no effort to hide its suspicion.
Da Long paid no attention to her expression.
"Have you encountered Svirgis?"
"Which Svirgis? Ah—!" Azla paused, then it clicked. Her slit pupils narrowed slightly. "You mean that dragon-kin who always followed at your heels?"
"Have you seen her?"
"No. But—" She bared her teeth in a wide grin, flashing rows of white fangs. "That feeble little creature, actually daring to overestimate herself and join the Dragon Strife... she's probably been killed by someone already."
Da Long didn't argue. She lowered her eyelids, as if losing interest in the topic, then braced her forelegs, wings beginning to slowly unfold to leave.
"You're still planning to protect that worthless thing? In this Dragon Strife?" Azla suddenly spoke again, her voice dripping with mockery and scorn. "Silvia is already dead, you know."
Da Long went still. Those half-lidded eyes snapped wide open, pupils contracting to a thin slit.
The wings spread fully at the last instant, blotting out the setting sun.
The next moment, the black dragon dove from the mountaintop like a falling meteor.
Azla reared her head and opened her jaws wide as lightning breath gathered in her throat.
But before the breath could fire, a black claw had already seized Azla's snout shut.
The lightning breath detonated inside the blue dragon's throat. A muffled explosion rolled from her neck, arcs of lightning sparking from between the scales.
Had the blue dragon not possessed a natural, extremely high resistance to lightning, that alone would have been enough to char her entire neck.
Da Long pressed Azla's head down and slammed it hard into the cliff face. The black dragon's roar erupted from the cloud of dust and debris, shaking the trees for miles in every direction.
"How dare you — use that flippant tone — to call my mother by her name!"
"So what if I do?" Azla was pinned into the rubble, scales shattered, blood at the corner of her mouth — yet she showed no intention of backing down. She turned those golden slit pupils upward to stare directly at the black dragon pressing down on her head. "You're the stupidest one among us! Just as stupid as that lackey of yours!"
"Mother? Ha ha ha!" Her laughter, mixed with blood and foam, was squeezed up through her throat — sharp and grating. "You call her mother, but did she ever treat you as a child? In her eyes, we were just a group of creatures who showed up beside her of our own accord. No different from the kobold servants in our lairs!"
"Mother, children — what nonsense. The one true mission of every dragon in existence is to become the next Ancient Dragon!" Azla enunciated each word. "Only you would actually believe she was some kind of mother."
"Ha — cough cough — come on then. Kill me. Go become an Ancient Dragon. Then spend every moment you have left agonizing over something this ridiculous and pointless!"
Just as Azla shut her eyes in expectation of death, the claw at her head suddenly released.
Azla felt not a shred of gratitude. "What? Surely you're not so weak you can't even bring yourself to kill me? That's not fit for an Ancient Dragon."
Da Long stepped back and raised her head, looking down at the battered blue dragon from above.
"The Dragon Strife should choose the strongest dragon. I'll give you time to recover your strength for a fair fight. But you have to promise — if you encounter Svirgis, leave her for me. I want to kill her with my own hands. Otherwise, you die here now."
"Hmph. As you wish." Azla, having gotten her life back, stepped back twice, held Da Long's gaze for a moment, then spread her tattered wings and flew toward the distant horizon. Her silhouette grew smaller and smaller, until the dusk swallowed her whole.
After Azla left, Da Long glanced once toward the forest, then spread her own wings and flew away in a different direction.
---
In the forest, inside a temporary barrier blurring the light around them, the old mage's hand on his staff was still faintly trembling.
That blue dragon alone had been enough to make him feel completely incapable of resistance — let alone Da Long, who came after. In all his years, he had never seen two creatures this terrifyingly powerful appear before him at the same time.
Only after both had finally flown away did he slowly let out a breath, as though expelling every last trace of terror built up inside him. He quickly rummaged out healing potions and poured them one by one into Badul's mouth and the mouths of the other critically injured dwarves. The liquid trickled down scorched throats. Some coughed from reflex. Others didn't react at all.
The situation was bad.
Aside from three dwarves with lighter injuries showing some color returning to their faces, the rest — including Badul — were steadily sliding toward death.
Their bodies, devastated by the attacks, were like hot air balloons with gaping holes. Even the potions gave them a slight boost, but not enough to outpace the rate of decline — it only delayed the inevitable.
"This won't do!" The old mage stood up and paced. "We need something else to help with the healing, or none of them will make it." He stopped abruptly, remembering something — on the other side of this mountain, there had been a patch of fungal mat recently cleared away!
"Cleared away" or not, fungal mats were notoriously persistent. Chances were a new growth had already appeared.
He knew perfectly well how fierce the conflict in the Mountains had become over the fungal mats and mycelium infection.
He also knew that if Badul ended up infected by the mycelium, it could set off a whole chain of serious consequences.
But all of that was a problem for later. Better than watching Badul die right here.
He swung his staff. The shadow beneath his feet stretched out and coiled around the critically injured dwarves again, dragging them toward where the fungal mat had been.
---
Boom!
"Despicable..."
A dragon's resentful shriek trailed off with a long drawn-out echo through a combat arena fashioned from ancient ruins. A battered dragon body crashed heavily onto the rubble-strewn floor, sending shards of ice flying in all directions.
Its eyes were still open and glaring, but the pupils had already gone unfocused, reflecting the ice ceiling above.
From the wreckage, Little Black crawled out cradling a head that had gained several new bumps. Tears welled at the corners of her eyes, blinking and blinking, stubbornly refusing to fall. No. 7 led a crowd of delicious Puchis swarming in from all directions, dancing a victory celebration around Little Black.
After a short while, No. 7 rushed eagerly to the front.
Norris, "tearfully grateful" to have been rescued yet again, presented a pile of silver-white scales.
Little Black sniffled, forcing the tears that nearly spilled back down.
She puffed out her chest, planted her claws on her hips, raised her tail high, and struck a pose that said: I've got you covered.
Looking at that self-important display, Norris already knew — he was going to be stuck in Little Black's mushroom house for a few days again, listening to her snore, occasionally getting slapped awake by her tail.
---
Meanwhile, Lin Jun was pleasantly surprised by Little Black's growth.
Her progress along the [Ancient Dragon Path] was no small thing — she was already halfway through.
He'd expected her to need at least three or four more rounds. Just two turned out to be enough.
It seemed like the further along the Path you went, the less impact the gap in base stats made.
Good news. Raising a full Ancient Dragon was well within sight now.
The one small regret was that the [Ancient Dragon Path] didn't boost intelligence. Little Black was still the same loveable dummy she'd always been — couldn't remember directions, couldn't tell gems from glass, and sometimes walked around awkwardly hugging her own tail.
But maybe that wasn't such a bad thing either.
Looking out at the world — everyone was anxious, worried, struggling as the end times loomed. Little Black was the only one genuinely happy every single day.
Lin Jun kind of wanted to be that happy every day too.
Drifting along that thought, his gaze drifted — without him quite intending it — toward the Sword Saint.
(End of Chapter)
Comments