I flew forward, hurtling directly at the Wyrmking. The serpent soared forward to meet us—flying with no obvious means of propulsion, its long body like a river of scale and muscle—and Ezzie sent us in a nosedive to avoid being swallowed whole.

We flew beneath the creature’s belly even as it twisted and righted itself to give chase, and I flashed out a Refraction Strike along with a pair of melee attacks to get the ball rolling.

Ezzie said.

I glanced back over my shoulder and saw a needle of blue light lancing straight at me. I activated Magic Reflect and twisted my shield around, sending the projectile backward, where it lodged between a pair of the Wyrmking’s ice-blue scales and detonated with incredible force.

Ezzie said.

I glanced back again and saw four more needles were giving chase; the damn things were materializing out of thin air with no animation to speak of.

Ezzie flew us in tight circles, keeping us slightly ahead of the Wyrmking’s enormous mouth, forcing the creature to twist in and out of itself, knotting and unknotting its huge body to stay on the attack, blue scales blurring by into a water-like surface.

The Wyrmking begins to radiate!

Ezzie said.

Ezzie said, as she dropped us low and sent us zooming across ground and away from the city, flying only a few feet above the bloody snow and causing a cloud to pull up into the air behind us.

Given that Magic Reflect was still down, I activated Mirror Block, thinking that at the very least I could reflect a good-sized chunk of the damage to come.

The Wyrmking flicked its long tail in my direction and a flurry of sharp blue scales loosed from it.

Ezzie said.

I said, as the swath of disk-like projectiles ripped through the air. I said, as I brought my legs up and ducked my head beneath the cover of my shield. We dropped ten feet in quick succession, but even then the Wyrmking’s attack was much too wide to avoid.

I caught one of the scales head-on, the force of the blow driving me backward, blasting me through the air at a nearly horizontal angle.

Ezzie grunted and unfurled my wings, causing me to spin out of control for a long, terrible moment. Then she caught me, and I leveled out into a smooth dive about ten feet above the snow.

Mirror Block has blocked an attack that would have otherwise dealt more than 75% of your maximum Health!

{Iceshard Shield of Constitution} has been reduced to 1 durability!

Ezzie said,

The dragon was soaring toward me so Ezzie shot me straight up into the air, then doubled back and dragged the titanic creature across the center of town, allowing the mages and archers to rake its underbelly with their attacks. The mortars boomed, their projectiles flashing across the length of the Wyrmking’s many curves.

And best of all? The mortars were slowing the boss down, too.

Ezzie said.

Four more blue needles spawned out of nowhere and lanced toward me.

Ezzie said.

I nodded. “Mirror Bomb!> Each of the projectiles disintegrated as the dome of light swept out from me—no, a sphere of light, now that we were airborne—and made contact with the dragon, hitting for nearly three thousand damage.

Ezzie said.

Ezzie said.

I reached out and grabbed the edge of the wooden shield just before the piece of equipment was finished. I secured it to my left arm.

The Wyrmking retreats to the sky!

Ezzie said, as she banked us away from the now-glowing creature, taking us out over the western wall.

I said.

The Wyrmking is readying its ultimate attack!

Ezzie said.

I said.

Ezzie grunted and turned me around, positioning me directly between the Wyrmking and the city below. The creature had long-since outdistanced our defenses, and the city was eerily quiet, lit by torches and the glowing, fiery hands of nearly a hundred mages.

The Wyrmking has reached 33% capacity!

I said, as the clouds above the creature began to wheel about, forming a dark whirlpool in the sky.

Ezzie said.

I said.

don’t pop your block and the main attack kills you?> Ezzie said.

I bit my bottom lip; she had a good point. But in the end, I disagreed.

The Wyrmking has reached 66% capacity!

The Wyrmking’s entire body was glowing white-hot, the very personification of lightning itself.

Ezzie said.

The Wyrmking has reached 100% capacity!

The massive serpent dripped its head, its huge eyes boring into mine. It opened its mouth and a river of white-hot energy surged forth, a continuous beam that was taller and wider than I was.

This was it. My entire life depended on this moment.

I raised my shield aloft, hovering about twenty feet off the ground, my wings beating the air. “Magic Reflect!”

The beam slammed into my shield, driving me downward at terrible speed. I had to close my eyes against the brightness; it was like the whole world had gone white.

The beam drove me straight into the ground, the air rushing out of my lungs, but the attack just kept coming, driving me into the earth as it vaporized the snow and the dirt that surrounded me.

Ezzie said.

The beam continued, pushing me farther into the earth, my armor warming beneath its onslaught, the dirt sizzling all around. Then finally, mercifully, the beam cut off.

The Wyrmking has entered a weakened state!

I said, cutting off as my wooden shield flared so bright that I honestly thought I’d been blinded for a moment.

Then an identical beam erupted out from me and soared into the air, a pillar of pure energy that struck the serpent right between its red eyes.

Ezzie said, cackling the words.

The recoil on the attack was incredible—I couldn’t move, couldn’t even budge—but I could see the serpent’s health bar rapidly depleting, numbers in the high thousands filling the air above it. The attack went on and on as the serpent’s health plummeted: seventy percent, sixty, fifty, forty.

The reflected attack finally winked out, so I got my feet underneath me and Ezzie flapped my wings, flying me out of the massive crater the serpent’s attack had created.

I said, as the serpent smoldered off in the distance. Its scales were sloughing off, turning to dust that was stripped away by the wind.

Ezzie said.

The serpent dove, heading straight for us, blue needles appearing all around it and lancing directly at me. I Mirror Bombed them away as I had before, and though the damage was beyond pitiful, it was more than enough to clear the needles away.

I dragged the Wyrmking above the city from there, letting the mages and archers whittle it down, careful to keep in range of the clerics.

The creature began to radiate again at about twenty percent health—while in range of the city this time—so Ezzie took me high into the air and laid into it with the full force of our defenses.

I hovered in place, waiting to block the attack that I knew was coming, watching the creature’s health drop beneath fifteen, beneath ten, beneath five.

It flashed its long tail out once again, launching a hail of scaly projectiles my way. Ezzie flew me directly into the path of the attack, navigating so that I’d be struck by only one of the massive scales. I raised my shield and activated Mirror Block, battering the scale out of the air and punching through the AoE attack.

Ezzie said, as she brought me in close, needles of light materializing all around.

I checked my Mirror Burn; that last attack had spiked it to thirty-five percent. I took a deep breath and said: “Mirror Bomb!”

The dome of light blew the needles apart and expanded from there, its outer bound just barely, barely making contact with the serpent’s skin.

But it was enough. The massive creature keened and folded in on itself, then dropped out of the sky. For a long, terrible moment, it appeared that its bulk would crash down upon the village, but the mob began to disintegrate when it was still thirty feet off the ground.

Blue nanobots filled the air as the creature dispersed, the swarm so thick that they obscured the city below.

Regional Quest Completed: The Creeping Ice

Awarding 10,000 Experience and 3,500 Renown!

Congratulations, you reached the rank of Recognizable!

You qualified for Grade E!