Chapter 40 - Thirty-Eight (1/2)

The ground shook as the thing moved, his massive body coming to view piece by piece, it's gigantic arrow-shaped head with red and greenhorns almost formed a coral on his back, contrasting with his blue and white scales on the rest of the body.

He had gigantic talons too, rasping deep inside the sand with membranes between the fingers, his body ending in a long tail with a red coral-plant covering it and moving with the current like hair would do.

And even with the lack of wings I could easily tell what the thing was.

DRAGON!

I start snarling at him, not before having one last good look at the creature:

Coral Water Dragon – This type of dragon has immense power and agility underwater. Is an expert in magical attacks, sneak attacks underwater, and is very territorial. Like many dragons is a collector of shiny objects.

I don't care!

Kill the dragon!

Death to all the dragons! Smug bastards! Home stealers!

…

I really don't like them…

Already alert and prepared to battle we could see when the Coral Dragon started to use his magic, turmoils of water spiraling and trying to suck us in and out of the bubble.

Well, let just say that for a water user this place was heaven, and for a fire/air user… Not so much.

The pressure started to build up, clouding our vision from the outside even more as the sand raised with the water, so this time when Leonel comes closer and wraps an arm around my waist I don't even protest.

I could use half of my magic attacks here without consuming our air, so I use my Shadow Illusion together with my Shadow Veil once Leo uses the air to hop us up and farther away from the attacks.

The dragon was still focused on the illusion, closing in with tornados of water unto our illusion, and when he reaches it he sucks the illusion right into his mouth, making good use of his water manipulation.

”Let's back up, for now.” Says Leonel.

And as far as I want to deal with this dragon, I agree that it was impossible to win against it underwater.

So, for now, we flee- I mean, strategically fall back.

~~~~

In the end we spend one more night there, thinking and planning; and I hadn't received my title of Strategist for naught.

One thing for sure that we easily agree on was that we needed to change the battle to our favor by taking the dragon off the water.

We first thought to annoyed it in a way that it would follow us out, but it was too dangerous to go underwater as I wouldn't be able to dodge and dash and my fire attacks wouldn't reach him, as well as Leo's attacks, since light could blind it but we didn't know how effective that would even be…

And we needed to think of a way to improve our chances of winning on land as well, after all, once out of the water it was our only chance; the creature woulnd't fall for the same trick twice.

So we thought carefully that night, barely talking, eating mechanically.

And then, of course, I had the brilliant idea that would get us to pass the creature and into the door beyond him.

That's how, now, I ended up acting as bait; You see, dragons love shining things, and I just have the right thing right on my forehead and changing into my Hell Form made it quite sizable.

We waited for the night to come so that my crystal would appear more as I approach the water, pretending to go for a drink while Leo stayed hidden, giving a little more light for my crystal to reflect into the water.

Then we waited.

I was suddenly getting anxious, looking at the undisturbed water, waiting for a gigantic head to pop up, his snout filled with sharp teeth coming right at me and chewing me down.

I had to contain a shiver at the idea.

Even more because it wasn't that impossible to happen.

Great, now I'm jinxing myself.

…

And I kind of did when he had to keep this plan up for 2 days without results.

After that long I thought to be even silly how I was scared once; now I was just bored and irritated, thinking about other plans, some pretty absurd as trying to boil all the water so the dragon would cook inside.

As tempting as it was to try, it would have been futile, and stupid, to do as my MP would dried out before I even reached the deeps.

As I was lost in thoughts it was a surprise when the water started to move and my plan started to work, and damn the creature was massive, even in my Hell Form I was just the size of its head.

Our eyes met when he started to get out of the water, his colossal clawed paws touching the land and making the ground shake.

He opens his mouth, letting visible the three layers of sharp-curved teeth, the long tongue coming out to lick his eye as he kept staring me down, or rather, kept starring my crystal down.

”Sorry pal, but I need this thing to keep myself alive, so… see ya!”

I breathe a fan of flames on his face and start dashing back, feeling the ground shake as the creature ran in pursuit, very very close to me.

Hell, shit, I don't think this was a good idea anymore!

I go to the side where there were the rocks that hide the circle of water, bringing him to a more enclosure place where we prepared a trap.

I stop when I reach a wall, the circle of rocks opening enough that the dragon could come closer and stand on his hind legs, gurgling a grow at me. I step back until my butt touches the stone and the dragon closes in, a smug expression over his eyes and a snarl showing off his massive teeth, while his long red tail stood over the entrance and blocked my path.

I grow back at him, looking up the hills and waiting to see Leonel there, but once I don't see him and the dragon tries to close in more, I go to ”the hell with it” mode and attack it.

From his shadows many Shadow Tentacles go up as if a marine monster himself was resting just below the Coral Dragon, the huge arms curving around the dragon's body and restraining his movements.

Yes! I try to bring his head down to the ground but he keeps his standing position against the firm grip of my tentacles, forcing his mouth open against the moorings.

Shit, he was strong, I couldn't keep this much longer.

I try to use the Shadow Spikes, but even when I combined with the tentacles and pierced very close to the skin the scales deflected, unscratched, my attacks.

Pissed I go all out, breath fire at his face, try to concentrate the flame in one part, even manipulate fire to cover all of his body, which only leads for it to get very, very pissed at me.

Once I tired myself out his escape against the tentacles was bound to happen.

And he knows it.

With a smile showing off his back teeth he gurgles again, bringing his enormous paw closer.

”Leo…LEO! This would be a good time for, you know, a little help?!”

He did not left me behind now did he?

The mere thought made me look back at the enormous creature in front of me, the colossal scaled paw coming closer. I dodge as long as I can, which is not much now since I brought it to a tight place.

Seriously Leonel, now would be a good time as ever you know…

I started to get really worried when suddenly his figure appears over the peak, as he screams:

”Close your eyes!”

I do as he says, waiting to be hit by the enormous paw any second, but time passes with nothing happening so I slowly open my eyes to see the dragon… paralyzed mid-motion, his paw stuck midair, his eyes black as if… dozed off or something.

Standing on my hind legs I look him up, seemly completely ignoring me. What the hell…

Then I look around us and the wall… turned into mirrors? They were reflecting us, making a circle around the dragon and taking in all his angles. In one of them there was a gigantic rune so, so complex that I couldn't even make out how many layers of runes it was made off.