TL/N: 🎁 GIVEAWAY ALERT! (Details at the end)
Translator: AnubisTL
Heaven's Pier Stone Mine Outpost, Guard Barracks
"This damn weather..."
The old sentry exhaled a warm breath into his palm as he stripped off his soaking armor.
"Just got transferred to the wilderness, and now it's the rainy season," he grumbled, kicking a moldy ration bag at his feet. "I hate this place."
The young sentry chuckled, wiping rust from his breastplate. "At least it's better than the sandstorms in the dry season. Last time, my helmet filled with half a pound of sand, and my mouth tasted like grit for days."
He suddenly lowered his voice. "Seriously, what are you planning to do after your service is up?"
"I'm going back home to open a blacksmith shop," the old sentry replied. "My son learned horseshoeing in Silverpine City this year. It's not much, but at least it's safe. No worrying about seeing the sun rise the next day."
He turned to the young sentry. "What about you? What are your plans?"
The young sentry's face lit up with a grin. "After this year, I'm applying for discharge. I want to join the royal capital knights order."
"For that blonde girl?"
Calvin grinned, revealing a gap where his front tooth used to be. "Come on, kid. You even need me to write your love letters for you."
After a few more playful jabs, another sentinel joked, "I wish some powerful ferocious beast would attack and wreck the place. Maybe we'd get to go home early."
Boom!
A thunderous roar shattered the air, interrupting their conversation.
Simultaneously, the alarm bell tore through the rain-soaked silence.
The sentinels' faces paled as they grabbed their weapons and rushed out of the barracks. What they saw next would be etched into their memories forever.
Through the torrential downpour, a crimson figure tore through the clouds. Its majestic, steaming body evaporated the rain, leaving behind a comet-like trail of vapor and dark red flames.
The six ballistae surrounding the outpost activated simultaneously, their magic crystals embedded in the bases glowing with blinding blue light.
These war machines, forged by alchemists, were priceless. Each bolt, etched with armor-piercing runes, could shatter even the thickest plates of fine steel.
The ballistae swiveled skyward and launched massive bolts, each over ten meters long.
Giant crossbow bolts tore through the rain, their rune-etched shafts glowing like reverse meteor showers as they soared skyward.
It's best not to take these head-on, Garos thought, drawing a deep breath. Golden lightning erupted from the gaps in his scales, crackling around him like an electrified mane, and his body swelled visibly.
Time seemed to slow.
In the red-iron dragon's vision, the rain fell in slow motion, and the crossbow bolts hurtling toward him appeared to crawl through the air.
No, it wasn't that they had slowed down.
Garos's reflexes and speed had accelerated.
The red-iron dragon's massive body moved with unparalleled agility, twisting and turning like a swimming dragon, flashing like golden lightning as he darted left and right, weaving through the hail of bolts.
He dodged the first wave of crossbow fire.
Garos opened his jaws, molten flame and crackling lightning coalescing between his fangs.
Boom!
A spherical blast of flame lightning dragon breath erupted from his mouth, vaporizing a vacuum trail through the rain as it hurtled toward a crossbow siege engine.
A magic shield materialized, enveloping the siege engine. But the moment the flame lightning breath struck, the shield shattered into fragments.
The defensive runes and magic crystals embedded in the base overloaded and shattered simultaneously, but they successfully blocked Garos's attack, preventing damage to the heavy crossbow.
It had to be said:
A proper military legion was no match for the private armies brought by the noble sons earlier.
"Activate the anti-air pillars!"
The garrison commander roared the order.
The ground suddenly cracked open, and five black pillars, engraved with intricate incantations, rose from the depths in a circular formation. The pillars lit up simultaneously, creating a vast magic energy dispersion field and a super-gravity field that instantly enveloped Garos.
The flow of magic energy within his body became extremely sluggish.
Beyond the magic energy dispersion, an overwhelming gravitational force pressed down on him, like an invisible hand dragging him toward the ground.
For an ordinary dragonkind, this would mean losing their aerial advantage and being forced to land.
Garos's eyes flickered, and his body staggered as if affected, plummeting toward the ground.
The engines of alchemy golems roared to life as they converged rapidly on Garos's descent point, fully powered up and ready to surround and eliminate the attacker on the ground.
However...
An unexpected event occurred.
As Garos descended to about a hundred meters, he suddenly flexed his wings, his body arcing in a golden arc as he reversed direction and charged straight toward the anti-air pillars.
Harden body!
A layer of dark, iron-like luster coated his already formidable body. Garos's wings struck with unstoppable force.
Boom!
The magic shields protecting the anti-air pillars shattered.
With dragon wing slashes, clawing strikes, and sweeping tail strikes, he swiftly destroyed all five pillars. Then, with a series of agile twists and turns, he evaded another barrage of heavy crossbow bolts before unleashing a blast of flame lightning breath at the now shieldless crossbows.
The ground cracked as a humanoid golem, heavily armored and wielding a massive steel shield, leaped into action.
The flame lightning sphere was intercepted mid-air, colliding with the giant shield.
The alchemy golem was blasted backward by the fiery explosion, its shield riddled with cracks but miraculously intact, its construction clearly extraordinary.
Flames billowed through the air.
Before the flames could dissipate, the crimson-gold dragon shadow surged forward.
With a scythe-like sweep of his dragon wings, Garos cleaved the crossbow in two.
The remaining five crossbows continued firing relentlessly, their bolts raining down on Garos at cunning angles, attempting to pin him down and prevent him from taking flight. The alchemy golems closed in, several now equipped with glowing jetpacks that propelled them into the air.
The human spellcasters and sorcerers were all preparing their spells.
The warrior-class guards stood ready, poised to swarm Garos the moment he was injured and forced to land.
Nearly all the guards' attention was focused on Garos, and they unleashed a relentless barrage of attacks against him.
This was exactly what Garos wanted.
The opportunity had arrived for the other two dragons.
"There are still two more—"
The shout was abruptly cut off.
Then, the alloy gate of the western warehouse began to groan under immense strain.
The red dragon and iron dragon had crushed the thinly spread defenders and launched a surprise attack on the warehouse.
Samantha's fiery breath didn't strike the gate directly; instead, she channeled it through the narrow seams, the terrifying heat and force causing the metal to expand and warp, the runes etched upon it flickering and vanishing one by one.
Boom!
The iron dragon's hardened claws plunged into the widening gap, its muscles bulging as it tore the thick steel gate into twisted scrap metal.
A sulfurous heatwave surged into the warehouse, illuminating the celestial pool gems displayed in blast-proof cabinets like pulsating azure hearts.
"Shiny! Wonderful, shiny gems!"
"You belong to the dragons now!"
Samantha roared with excitement, her pupils narrowing into vertical slits.
She and the iron dragon stormed into the warehouse, greedily plundering the gems within.
The commotion at the gem warehouse drew attention, and several alchemy golems, followed by a contingent of guards, abandoned their pursuit of Garos and turned toward the warehouse.
Sensing the defenders were splitting their forces, Garos immediately changed tactics.
No longer bothering with the ballistae, he suddenly swooped down to the lowest altitude, his dragon claws alternating in rapid strikes. He smashed one golem attempting to reach the warehouse into scrap metal, then hurled the massive wreckage at the surrounding warriors.
Garos displayed overwhelming power, making it impossible for the defenders to regroup.
Moments later, two thunderous crashes echoed as the iron dragon and red dragon shattered the warehouse roof and soared into the sky. Samantha, not forgetting her parting shot, unleashed a blast of dragon breath at the warehouse behind them.
Flames and thick smoke coiled upward like giant serpents, rising through the torrential rain.
Solgorn had severed the supporting pillars with his tail before leaving, and now, struck by dragon breath, most of the warehouse district collapsed into a roaring ruin.
With engines roaring and fiery auras surging from their backs, the alchemy golems charged toward Garos.
"Remember this—it's a return gift for Viscount Ironthorn!" Garos roared.
Ignoring a ballista bolt that pierced his wing, he shot straight upward at full speed, shaking off pursuit and catching up to the two juvenile dragons. He covered the red dragon and iron dragon's retreat.
Even the torrential rain couldn't extinguish the flames and smoke.
The Duchy of Raymond's defenders could only watch helplessly as the juvenile dragons vanished into the distance.
(End of the Chapter)
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