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CHAPTER START---
Rixian warps onto the desolate plain above the cave, rifle drawn and ready for battle, but only silence greets him. Where a massive battle and monolithic mountain once were, now hosts a crater with a thick sea-wall keeping the tides at bay.
Above him the overcast evening sky is silent and eerie, but most concerning of all, silent. He looks around, using the Magic Lenses built into his full face visor to zoom in on the clouds and horizon, but sees nothing unusual.
"Damn it," he shuts his eyes, focusing on expanding the range of his sensory Magics to their limit, honing in on the familiar sensation of his father's Magic Energy.
While he's taking the time to join the battle, Osian is a dozen miles above the ocean far beyond the coast of Hacot.
Cloaks in white flames, sword drawn in his right hand and scabbard in his left, equally covered in white flames, he rockets through the clouds. Each cloud disappears when feeling the heat of his flames, all while a Dragon is a mere dozen meters behind him, jaws wide open trying to snap him in two.
"Where did he go?!" Jyin demands Oberon's location, only growing more annoyed as the man spins to release a slash of white flames at his face.
The Dragon takes the attack head on, suffering the smallest of scrapes against his solid crystal scales, no more than a child's nails scraping a chalkboard, and accelerates toward the man.
Osian waves the scabbard, creating a wall of white flames as he simultaneously stops holding himself aloft, allowing gravity to bring him down and avoid the massive jaws bursting through the wall of fire.
He crosses his arms while falling, looking up to see the underside of the Dragon and memorizing every detail. 'No difference in appearance or structure, no weak spots. But I'd expect no less from the most powerful Magical Species to exist…'
He sighs and spins, wrapping himself in a tornado of white flames before controlling and condensing them into the scabbard, then stows the sword within. Two smaller flames appear beneath his feet as his gaze remains locked onto the Dragon while it makes a wide arc to circle back to him.
Osian takes a low sword-drawing stance, focusing his mind and Magic as it closes in, and the moment Jyin gets within 100m -333ft-, he releases all the compressed flames with a burst of Magic Energy.
Jyin's eyes widen and he instinctively raises a claw against the attack, smashing the thin line of fire apart and accepting a shallow crack in his palm, while behind him the sea of clouds for a dozen miles is vertically split.
'Damn, not enough,' Osian thinks as he rockets away to continue the chase. He flies in a wide arc, swinging his sword to the side and releasing spheres of white flames that lag behind him, detonating when Jyin is close enough.
Doing no more than annoying the Dragon, but blinding him enough that he doesn't see Osian instantly flipping directions and closing in on his face.
Jyin sees the tip of Osian's blade descending toward his right eye, erupting in white flames as it crashes down onto the glowing grey spot. But the blade barely makes an etching as it glides off the solid crystal surface.
Osian's eyes widen in surprise, and the Dragon jerks its head up, slamming the house-sized skull into his body and sending him upward through the clouds.
The man spins, releasing a downward slash of white flames at the Dragon's back, hitting its wing but doing no damage. He prepares a second attack, but senses something approaching behind him.
'Crap!' he uses flames to generate just enough thrust to avoid the crystal tail rising up to smash him as the Dragon flies past. A moment later, in a green flash, Rixian appears in the air beside his father, using his Air Walker Boots to stand in the sky.
"Dad, what's the situation?" he asks, focused on the Dragon making a large arc to circle around to them.
Osian hovers closer to his son and rests a hand on his shoulder, allowing his Purifying White Flames to flow across the prince, enchanting the many bullets in his guns, magazines, speed reloaders, and bandoliers to carry this Magic. "This will help distract him, but that's all we can hope to do."
"I told them to call in Etherion, but, this thing is too damn fast, it needs time to lock on."
Osian frowns. "It was never meant to hit a moving target. I can keep Jyin on me, but—"
"I can't warp with that Lacrima, it'll break the connection."
"Shit!" Osian rockets away as Jyin is on a direct approach to them, and Rixian uses his Magics to run at super speed through the sky beside his father. "How far are we from Hacot?"
"Seventy miles."
"We flew that far? I really lost track in the heat of things…" Jyin easily catches up to them, expecting to easily kill them during their conversation, but as he's about to reach them, Rixian warps them both a mile back, placing them behind the Dragon.
Jyin's massive and stiff body takes time to turn, needing wide arcs unlike his more nimble natural form, so even as he knows where they are, they continue forward while he turns to get behind them once more.
Osian dispels the flames on his blade and runs a single finger along the edge, drawing enough blood to give Jyin his scent, betting on the mythical natural senses of a Dragon.
"Take us back to Hacot," Osian says, and Rixian places a hand on his shoulder before warping them back to his Runic Circle within the Barrier.
They both appear inside the Barrier, stumbling forward. Rixian turns to the Rune Knight beside the Etherion Connection Lacrima. "What's the status?"
"It's syncing, but it needs five minutes. This thing was meant to be placed on a timer and left, not used in real time combat."
"We'll make it work, but how much power are we getting in the shot?" Osian asks.
"Full output."
"That will do," Osian turns to his son while pocketing the Lacrima. "Be ready to get me out of there, but not a second before, we can't let this be destroyed. I'll lead it as far from here as possible, since the moment Oberon leaves this Barrier that thing will come for him. And I don't think it cares about how far we take him."
"Don't talk like I'm just going to wait in here," Rixian holds his rifle and warps away, moving to the battlefield within the canyon Oberon created.
Seconds later, his father slams into the ground beside him, melting the stone and wearing a proud smile. "How far is it?"
Rixian nods toward the eastern sky, rifle at his side. "Seven seconds."
"So much for getting a breather," Osian sighs as he flies away, and a moment later Rixian warps away.
Two seconds more and Jyin smashes into the ground at their previous location as a black blue, shaking the entire canyon, making it break apart into pieces. Before the dust can settle, Rixian fans the hammer on one of his revolvers, firing six shots in 0.001 seconds, releasing beams of condensed fire with each bullet.
They pierce the dust cloud and shatter against the Dragon, and before the final shot hits the creature, he reloads the pistol and already fanned the hammer on his offhand pistol.
Jyin sees the second volley coming and barely tilts his head to look at Rixian properly, but the man has already disappeared, appearing on the Dragon's face aiming his high-powered rifle at its eye. He pulls the trigger, releasing an explosion of Purifying Flame the size of a football field while warping away.
Jyin rushes out of the explosion before it fades away, completely unbothered. His heavy both and tough crystalline form destroy the barren earth in the canyon while his wings kick up a cloud of dust, moving toward Rixian, who is standing on the ground ahead.
As he's rushing forward Rixian unleashes one hundred shots, firing and reloading so quickly his body looks like a blur, so quickly that shots from multiple volleys struck the Dragon at the exact same time, all of which were completely useless against its overwhelming power.
Above them, Osian sees this and descends with his blade pointed down, dropping onto the Dragon's back and releasing a pillar of white flames.
"Purifying Ascension Pillar!" Osian's flames expand to engulf himself and the Dragon, reaching high into the sky and punching a hole in the clouds before narrowing to a needlepoint and descending toward his sword.
As all the flames condense into the blade, it's expelled down toward the Dragon, clashing against its body as black and white sparks, barely annoying Jyin as the Wizard Saint pours most of his Magic Energy into this attack.
Jyin casually reaches up with a claw, aiming to swat the man off his back, but Osian leaps away and flies to the side, retreating toward his son while trying to catch his breath.
"Now I know how mosquitos feel," Osian says while landing beside his son.
Rixian reloads his guns and rolls his shoulder, taking aim at the Dragon as it rushes toward them. "Yeah, but they're persistent, so we—"
A deafening roar shakes the sky, sea, and land in the region, sending a primordial spike of fear and dread through all living things that hear it.
Both men, trained for high-level battles their entire lives, freeze up like children against an unstoppable tide. This would have meant death for them on any battlefield, especially one hosting a Dragon supercharged with Death Magic.
If only Jyin wasn't in the same terrified state, trembling enough to break apart the ground while mustering the courage to look to the sky.
Jyin barely musters the nerve to raise his head, seeing Acnologia, the Black Dragon of the Apocalypse, the Anomaly he knew he couldn't defeat, circling above.
"Damn it!" Jyin roars in anger, snapping the humans out of their stupor. "If only I had more time, I'd kill you all!"
Acnologia releases a lighter roar in response, as if laughing at Jyin's lofty ambitions.
"I'll at least take those phony wings from you!" Jyin gives in to his rage, a choice driven by the fact that it was the only thing that could let him act while knowing his death has arrived. He beats his massive wings, his body even larger than Acnologia's as he rushes toward the Black Dragon.
They both release deafening roars, shaking the region as they crash into each other. Both Wizards look on in horror as Acnologia easily clashes his claws against Jyin's, and shatters both crystalline forelimbs of the Death Magic Dragon.
Jyin screams, releasing a massive cloud of death Magic that has both Wizards retreating miles away into the air as the Dragons smash into the canyon.
Acnologia pins Jyin down, and from above they can see it clearly. The Dragon that destroyed a nation and absorbed its life as fuel, was just a mere toy against Acnologia.
Acnologia gently swats Jyin's head, shattering his jaw before placing a claw on his chest, slowly digging into the crystal scales like a Sun Sword through butter, cracking and slashing the Dragon's chest to allow more Death Magic to leak out.
Jyin screams in anguish as Acnologia removes his claw and instead sings all the claws on his right forelimb into the larger dragon's size, then with a spin sends him flying across the ocean.
Jyin stabilizes himself in the air, spinning into a glide as Acnologia races after him, happily tormenting and playing with his next victim, all while flying through the massive cloud of Death Magic leaking out of Jyin's crystal body.
"They're getting out of range, I need to go," Osian says, only for Rixian to place a hand on his arm, stopping him.
"You can't go into that cloud, it'll kill you. You've used too much Magic Energy."
Osian turns to his son, patting his shoulder and cloaking him in a protective Purifying Flame enchantment once more. "Only if I stay in it too long, but you'll get me out. And even if the worst happens, I already did the greatest thing I could ever do, create you…"
Rixian frowns beneath his visor, not liking his father's tone, but he solemnly nods and allows the man to race after the Dragons.
Osian flies above the trail of black clouds, until he gets dozens of miles away from the area his son was, noticing the cloud was much thicker here and lingering. It then rapidly expanded outward with a grating scream from Jyin, followed by the sound of crystal shattering.
Osian then senses Jyin moving away, hopelessly fleeing from Acnologia, rapidly disappearing into the horizon with a wall of black clouds forming behind him.
The man instantly gives chase, counting the seconds as he's forced to enter the cloud. As he gets closer, the strain on his Magic to protect him increases, and the sound of vindictive laughter echoes all around him from Acnologia, but he pays it no mind.
Instead, he focuses more of his Magic Energy into his speed, catching up the severely injured Jyin and the casually cruising Acnologia with monumental effort, reaching them just in time to see Acnologia tackle the other Dragon and knock them into a tumble over the ocean.
Jyin's body is shattered in many places, including his tail and two limbs, along with his entire lower jaw being torn away, and a gash in his chest, gouging at his crystal heart. And Acnologia is no different than when he first appeared.
Meanwhile, even Osian is feeling the effects of the Death Magic through his thinning defenses, feeling his lifeforce and energy being drained by the second, but thankfully a moment later Rixian's voice echoes in his head.
'Now!' Rixian says, and his father throws the Lacrima toward the grappling Dragons.
The Lacrima glows as Rixian appears beside his father, teleporting both of them away, and the full power of Etherion descends onto both Dragons.
CHAPTER END---
Discord: discord .gg /eHuxNeZfyS [Come chat with me]
pat.reon: Keanu_Eugene [Read ahead & support me]
You.tube: @KeanuEugene [Giving away all my writing knowledge]