B2 Chapter 236: Drake, pt. 3 |
Leashed lightning faded, the white light of dawn retreating from the forest gully. In the flickering orange light of the raging flames, Kaius saw the devastation he had wrought. Blackened scales peeled back from weeping flesh—clear fluid dripping from the cauterised ring that circled the beast’s neck.
A moment later the drake recovered from his onslaught and roared. Battered and bleeding, charred and smoking, it called its defiance to the heavens above.
The cry of hatred and fury was immense—a physical weight that pressed on them from all sides. The forest woke to a nightmare, its more humble inhabitants calling out their panic as the angered cries of their king threw them into terror.
Heaving up against the weight and burning pain that had it pinned, the drake tried to free itself from the burning weight of the logs that held it down—but its bones had been shattered, its body too broken to fight against the weight.
Cutting off its fury with a snap of its person-sized jaws, the drake turned its oversized head to level Kaius with a baleful gaze. A pinned arm twitched, and a stone the size of his head ripped itself free from the ground, a crack echoing through their surroundings.
Slaved to the drake’s will, it shot forwards—racing straight for Kaius.
He dodged, slipping through space with another cast of Slip Step—Porkchop was quicker. His brother snarled and raced in, smashing the rock off course with a heavy barge of his shoulder. It cracked against the jade plate, spinning off to shatter against the edge of the cliff.
Kaius raced in, refusing to allow the drake to batter them unimpeded. He held his blade steady in an inside-guard, pommel tucked into the pit of his arm, ready to parry any further stone projectiles.
Porkchop followed close on his tail, shielding his right from assault.
**Ding! Uncanny Dodge has reached level 60!**
…
**Ding! Uncanny Dodge has reached level 62!**
**Ding! Latent Glyph of Aelina has reached level 70!**
Whitening at the narrowly avoided doom, Kaius continued his charge—keeping one eye behind him as he spun around a half dozen follow up shots, his blade burring in an adamant defense. Enough for his vambraces to fully charge.
**Ding! Tempered by Dissonance has reached level 58!**
…
**Ding! Tempered by Dissonance has reached level 59!**
Covering his rear, Porkchop intercepted a dozen more—the shards shattering against his defense, leaving spider-webbing cracks in the jade.
Through the haze of motion, he saw Ianmus above. A storm of golden mana surrounded him, brow furrowed in concentration as he wove a series of overlapping decagons. Kaius grinned at the sight—he’d shared all he could about sacred geometry, and it was a joy to see the half-elf put the knowledge into practice with such ease.
Landing next to the beast’s neck, Kaius felt the searing heat of the burning logs radiating on his face. He attacked immediately with a thrust. Cutting through the air with unerring accuracy, he aimed for the thin and pale scales on its throat—half of them scoured away completely, leaving only a devastation of meat in the wake of his electrical assault.
His blade punched in, hot draconic blood spraying like a geyser from the wound. Droplets sizzled as they landed on the bonfire that raged above and around the drake.
It snapped its jaws, narrowly missing Kaius as he danced back, before it suddenly hurled itself to the side.
The display of power was not without reason, as its bulk shifted enough to resettle the logs that had buried it. Opening up just enough space for one of its long and muscular arms to be free.
Claws two-thirds as long as his sword cut through the air, racing straight for him.
An echoing cry cut through the crackle of the flames, and the drake's own growl, as Porkchop hammered the beast with another Bulwark’sChallenge.
With its attention forcibly removed from him, Kaius slipped under the swipe of its claws, and infused his blade with stamina. Sigils glowed with the majesty of his Bladerite; Kaius tapped into the well of energy held within his vambraces.
He slashed, the crystalline edge of his blade biting deep into the drake’s ruined throat. Muscles parted and searing blood painted the stone below in a wave—the gully filled with the scent of battle and war.
**Ding! Initiate’s Glyphic Bladerite has reached level 48!**
Alas, he didn’t cut deep enough. Neither its airway, nor its arteries were severed, the additional power from his vambraces lacking against a creature of such power. He turned through his strike—leaving the drake with the parting gift of a stab that punched deep—before he was forced to dance back as two walls of stone smashed together where he had just been standing.
Fleet he may have been, the drake was faster. When its instinctive magic failed, it followed up with a backhanded smash, instinctive alarm flooding Kaius a moment before it struck. He heeded the warning of Uncanny Dodge immediately, but he was caught all the same. The backs of claws built like steel beams crushed through his hastily raised defense, a ward too weak to fend off a psuedo-draconid.
**Ding! Tempered by Dissonance has reached level 60!**
…
**Ding! Tempered by Dissonance has reached level 62!**
Tumbling through the air, Kaius thought for a moment that he’d managed to avoid injury—the force of breaking through his guard enough to send him airborne.
Suffocating agony disabused him of that notion a moment later—his lungs screaming as he failed to draw breath thanks to a chest that had crushed like an egg.
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His health dropped like a stone, restorative energy burning to reknit muscle, mend bone, and seal torn blood vessels.
Rapid Adaptation did not leave wanting—the skill roaring as his mind stayed clear despite the sickening pops of his chest reinflating.
A snap rang out as he hit the ground hard, left elbow popping from his socket as it hyperextended on impact. Rolling backwards, it was whole by the time he came to his feet—bleeding momentum in a long backwards side.
**Ding! Lesser Regeneration has reached level 68!**
…
**Ding! Lesser Regeneration has reached level 69!**
**Ding! Rapid Adaptation has reached level 87!**
Kaius bared his teeth at the drake, tasting the iron remnants of his wounds in his mouth. Off hand dropping to his belt, he pulled free a restorative—roiling red held in a square glass vial. It tasted of scabbed wounds and restful nights, his lifesaving Health jumping back to almost full.
**Ding! You have imbibed a tonic: Minor Healing Dreams**
A glance upwards showed a storm of mana whirling around Ianmus—he was almost done, they just needed to give him a little more time. Unfortunately, he wasn’t fully recovered yet—Lesser Regeneration was powerful, but it wasn’t a miracle skill. He’d only be a liability if he rushed in.
Porkchop was already on it—his brother was a typhoon, an unrelenting storm of claws and stalwart fortitude.
No matter what hell the drake dished out, Porkchop refused to back down—swiping claws from a beast thrice his size crunching against plates of sacred jade. His brother’s style was evident—the way he would throw himself into attacks before they could be fully brought to bare, angling his body so that the blows fell ineffectively on the thickest armour across his shoulders and upper back.
Cracked and chipped, the jade plates held strong—suffering abuse uncountable as they saved Porkchop from greater injury.
For every blow his brother took, he returned one in kind. Green sickles carved through the comparatively fragile scales on the underside of the drakes jaw and throat, leaving deep furrows that wept the beast’s precious life blood.
“Ready!” Ianmus screamed, a golden storm raging around him, just barely held stable by his will and experience.
Porkchop reacted instantly.
A wall of jade sprouted from the earth, smashing the drake's head back and obscuring its vision. Porkchop retreated, creating room.
Ianmus unleashed devastation.
It was like a war god had descended.
A lance, as bright as the sun, imposed itself upon reality. So luminous that even his Truesight was momentarily overwhelmed, his vision dominated by a white gash in reality brought forth by Ianmus’s demands for the drake’s death. A terrible scream of tortured wind emanated from the beam in a wave, and the air reeked of the coming storm as the violent heat tore at its surroundings, the spell overwhelming all senses at once.
Even the very heat of it.
It scorched him—fine hairs on Kaius’s face curling under the intensity.
As the afterimages faded, Kaius was treated to the sight of the drake lying limp—a smoking hole in the middle of its skull. The spell had carved straight through it, leaving a glowing pool of slowly cooling molten rock on the floor of the crevasse.
But there was no ding. No kill notification.
Its chest rose weakly—fluttering under their myriad offensive—and its wounds writhed agonisingly slowly. The creature’s brain had been boiled, exposed to the world, and its Health was failing.
Weak, and ailing.
But not dead.
Somehow, some way, the drake had survived. For a moment it was all Kaius could do to stand rooted to the spot, staring at it in disbelief. No matter what they had read, what they had been told, the truth of the jealous grip it held on life was only now becoming real to him now that he was forced to contend with it head on.
It didn’t make any sense. There was a bloody hole in its gods’ damned brain! How was it still living?
A shudder passed through its body—the many agonies of its wounds revealing themselves in a scream of such potent hatred that Kaius half expected his own Health to start dropping.
Bending the world to its will, the ground shuddered, a wave of stone and earth emanating from the drake like ripples from a pond. It kicked Kaius into the air—the shaking ground ruining his footing.
Burning logs rolled free, dislodged by the drake's sudden magic. It heaved against the remainders, putting its titanic might to work.
Lumbering and slow—the arm and leg on its left side limp and half-useless—it rose in a shower of sparks and embers. Crippled as it was, it just barely managed to crawl out of the inferno, revealing the extent of its injuries.
The scale and flesh along its back had been scoured clean by purifying fire—revealing blackened bones to the world. Scorched muscle contracted, working to keep the beast moving. Half of its jaw hung lip and useless—sword-like teeth poking free from behind dead lips. Dozens of rents had been opened on its ruined throat, his blade and Porkchop’s claws taking their pound of flesh after his barrage of Stormlash had peeled back its defenses.
It was dying, that much was clear.
But even dying, it was still a drake—and even a rat was at its most dangerous when cornered. With fire at its back, in a crevasse too tight for it to turn, it only had one thin hope to survive.
Going through them.
…
Snapping his hand to his waist, Kaius pulled free a pair of tonics. He tossed one to his brother, who snatched it from the air and shattered the glass in his jaws.
Kaius ripped his own cork free with his teeth, downing the thick orange liquid within. It hit his tongue with the force of a kicking stallion, his eyes going bloodshot as raw power smashed its way through his veins. It was a heady taste—the stench of physical superiority overwhelming his senses as it burned its way down his throat.
**Ding! You have imbibed a Tonic: Tiger Blood**
Tossing his bottle to the side, the square bottle seemed to glide lazily through the air at half speed as the enhancement hit his system with an almost feverish and septic heat.
The drake growled, each motion exaggerated as his heart started hammering on the inside of his ribs. Streams of energy leached from the tonic in his stomach, suffusing his bones and flesh—a clarion call that demanded action.
With the power, came instinct—a familiar one, enflamed to new heights. The rushing joy of weakening prey, and the cold focus of a patient hunter settled over him like a cloak—wrapping him tight in their embrace.
His Glass Mind raced—leaning on the support of his skills to plan his assault.
The drake was weak and ailing—Explorer’s Toolkit sensed vulnerabilities everywhere. The gaping hole in its head had left the right side of its body weak and deadened, its moves slow and ungainly.
Its physical superiority had been utterly removed from the board.
Magic would be the real problem. From what he could see, most of the creature's bloodline skills seemed to be related to its earth manipulation—either meta magic, or sorcery. Instinctive as its casting was, those would have been left relatively untouched, even by the wound that had burned the radiance from its eyes, leaving them dull and unfocused.
Still, even if he doubted that it had any other tricks up its sleeves—the situation had grown dire enough that even a beast as dimwitted as the drake would have used them by now—he wouldn’t take any chances.
He pulled on his bond, melding close as he readied himself for his assault.
Porkchop would keep him safe, and he would hammer the drake's wounds—either he’d kill it, or buy Ianmus enough time for another beam.
Blue motes of light erupted from his feet, Aelina glowing as he cast a Slip Step.
**Ding! Latent Glyph of Aelina has reached level 71!**
He raced in.
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