Volume 3, Chapter 8: Dragon's Duel of Dominance

“Now then, if you will excuse me, I have some things I must attend to.” Navra smiled, instantly transforming into the male form he was in the first time I had met him.

“Wait. I thought you were going to oversee the duel?”

“Ah, no need to worry about that. I have sent in a substitute.”

Then Navra disappeared into thin air, before I even had the time to ask another question—Who?

Seeing this, Aqua finally came out of hiding from behind my back. She had been silent the whole time. She flew a little to the side of me, and I noticed her shaking, almost as if she was fearful of something. Of someone...

“Is he a god?” Aqua asked in a quivering voice.

“A god? No, I do not think so. He is a dragon just like me.”

Aqua turned silent. More than ten seconds passed by before she spoke up again. “How can you stay so calm in his presence...I would have already ran away in fear, if not for you beside me.”

Strange. I had not sense any threats from Navra. Was Aqua truly afraid of him? Could she perhaps sense something I could not?

It was a thought worth making known.

“What is it about him that makes you so afraid?”

“I felt as if I was being strangled...as if I was dancing in his palms. Each step I took, I felt more and more suffocated,” Aqua said with a tiny voice. She spoke those words of fear in the language of her Asrai race.

Aqua's answer told me nothing.

I could only attribute her fear to something like a prey in the presence of a large and powerful predator. It seemed right, and Navra himself had told me was just a dragon. Or it could be that he was just lying. But, if so, why would Navra, my so called father, tell me such a lie?

My thoughts were cut off when the sun above became blocked off, and I was inside a shadow. The shadows of two dragons.

I looked up and saw a white dragon and a green dragon quickly descending toward the section of the amphitheater I stood upon. They came to a halt and landed with a loud noise, as if a hammer the size of a house had struck the ground.

“Aaah!” Aqua screamed out loud, surprised by the two dragons suddenly choosing to land beside me.

The two dragons were enormous compared to Aqua and I. They overshadowed me completely by more than sixty feet. As for Aqua, the two dragons must have seemed bigger to her. Then they transformed into two females.

Both females were fully-naked, their bodies displayed majestically before the world without a care.

Truly, dragons were notorious streakers.

At least, that is what I would have said were I trying to make a joke. But on a serious note, dragons just had no compunction about nudity. Though some dragons did indeed like to wear clothing, as I could see from the other spectators sitting in the amphitheater.

There were very few spectators in the amphitheater today. Most of the dragons were simply not interested in a fight between two young dragons who had not even passed their third tribulation yet.

“Jester, I see you arrived earlier than I expected,” Eden said with a small laugh. Her appearance was that of a delicately tanned woman with long, blonde hair, and mocking eyes of dark green.

To the right of me, Kiara greeted, “Good afternoon, Verath. I have not seen you in a while.” She let out a dazzling smile, and her eyes shone with the color of the purest gold, flecked by white and red. They matched her snow-white skin, which looked even more graceful when framed with her long-black hair.

“Likewise, Kiara. You too, Eden,” I replied to the both of them.

“Both of you should most likely hurry to the ring now. There is a very powerful glare aimed at us right now,” Kiara said with just a light touch of amusement in her voice. “You should not keep Elder Kronos waiting.”

Eden and I both looked toward the amphitheater ring. The blood from the previous fight had been cleared up and the ring looked perfect, most likely having some earth magic done to it. In the middle of the ring, Elder Kronos was standing impatiently, glaring at the both of us.

“Stay with Kiara,” I said toward Aqua, who looked scared at those words. The aquatic fairy was most likely beginning to regret her words of accompanying me as my caretaker.

I did not even wait for Aqua to reply.

Forced by the look Elder Kronos was directing at us, Eden and I quickly flew toward the amphitheater ring.

With dark brown hair, and an even darker brown and lightly sparse beard covering his chin and upper lips, I could not even being to guess how old Elder Kronos was. Most dragons, the eldest had explained to me, would not grow facial hair, or any other type of hair except the hair on their head, even if they became more than three centuries old.

But Elder Kronos, however, had facial hair. It was a clear sign of his age as a dragon. It was also a good thing that he was wearing a pair of raggedy hempcloth pants. And though I say that, even if Elder Kronos had been naked, neither I nor Eden would have been distracted.

“Let us get this over with,” Elder Kronos impatiently said, almost growling his words out.

It was extremely obvious that Elder Kornos was annoyed by the task the Eldest of our Arkanan clan, my father, had assigned to him. His look clearly told the both of us that he could be spending his time doing better things than babysitting two young dragons.

“As requested by Eden, there shall be a Dragon's Duel of Dominance held between the two of you to determine your superiority. And let me warn you, there shall be no killing blows. You may, however, tear each other arms out or even rip each other eyes out, so long as the injury does not result in death, and so long as your opponent has not given up. There is also no need to worry about life-threatening injuries. We have employed Driads to serve as healers.”

Saying that, Elder Kronos suddenly flew up into the sky even without transforming. He was most likely using some form of magic, but I could not even sense the elder use it.

“Start.”

“Virdus Incentia!” Eden yelled out as soon as the duel began. With those Ancient words, a vortex of flames more than twenty feet tall surrounded her. When the vortex cleared after barely a second, Eden's appearance had transformed into a living conflagration of flames.

And she was no longer naked.

She now wore an armor that covered her entirely. The full-bodied armor was scarlet-orange just like her fiery hair and her hands that were covered in red-orange flames. The armor was strange in its nature—it looked metallic, yet at the same time, was alive with flames moving every few seconds.

From beneath her back, leathery green wings that were covered spanned more than eight feet. They were also covered in a scarlet-orange fire.

“Ever since that day, three months ago, when I became trapped in that condemnable water prison made from the human mages, I have been training extensively. I need not even transform into my dragon form to defeat you,” Eden declared in a fiery, dragon voice. “We shall fight on the same level, since you also cannot transform into your dragon form!”

I didn't bother to reply to her declaration. A dragon's human form, especially a dragon that could also use magic, was only a little bit weaker than the dragon form. There were advantages the human form had that the dragon form did not have—speed, mobility, turning speed, better reactions, and less consumption of magic.

And I was far stronger than I was before.

The soul of Demon Lord Codrixas, along with his personality, was beginning to integrate with my own soul and magic. Codrixas was still somewhat sealed along with the Deathwalker soul, but I could not afford to go near the boundaries of death, else he would take over through that weakness. I almost shuddered to even think of what would happen if he did. The seal would perhaps hold, but Navra had told me that Codrixas would only become stronger with the passage of time. The seals on his memories and on my stomach would not last forever.

Thus, I would need to win without any heavy injuries.

My actions would convince her of my strength.

“Virdus Vict Sangius,” I casually said.

Dragon Living Blood Armor.

This Ancient magic was one of the fruits of my three months training with Navra. It had been a hard slope to climb, especially since there were no previous examples of blood magic. But in the end, I had learned this Ancient magic, even though there were some setbacks since I did not have a dragon soul. My human soul, however, was still compatible with this black dragon body.

So in the end, I was truly like a dragon. It was as if I had never been a human, ironically.

Magic poured out from inside me and the threads of magic, mixed with my blood, instantly gathered to form a whirlpool of blood around me. The blood quickly crystallized into a living blood armor and covered me from neck to toe.

With three blood spikes of the deepest color of red that protruded outward from each of my armored shoulders, and various other spikes protruding outward from some of the armor joints, I had a frightening appearance. It would have certainly fit the appearance of a Demon Lord. My other soul, Demon Lord Codrixas, would have been proud to see it.

Looking down at the ground, Eden began to silently tremble to herself. Then she suddenly looked toward me and laughed. She had only been trembling in excitement!

“And here I thought you would not be able to last against me even for a brief minute. I am glad you will be able to put up a fight!”

A blast of fire was emitted from her wings and Eden came flying toward me. From her hands, she threw out two huge fireballs, each of them much larger than me.

I dodged, jumping upward more than twenty feet, and at the same time, formed two leathery, black wings that spanned a little more than eleven feet. The pair of black wings were surrounded with drops of liquid blood and an aura of black colored magic.

Having dodged the two fireballs, I shot spikes of hardened blood from my wings at the charging Eden on the ground. Hundreds of hardened blood spikes, each about only four to six inches long and as thin as a finger's width, came shooting out from my pair of wings.

Eden stopped her charge, looking upward at the sky with a grin aimed toward me. She planted both of her feet to the earthen ground of the arena and held out her fiery hands high against the storm of blood spikes. From those raised hands, a tornado of scarlet-orange flames quickly shot toward me, its length more than ten feet long and as wide as two feet.

The tornado of fire quickly batted aside and devoured most of the hardened blood spikes, swallowing them up in a burning spiral of fiery rage. Dust formed on the ground below as the fierceness of our magic raged against each other.

I quickly formed a shield of fire that was about as tall and wide as I was. Then behind that shield of fire, I formed a half spherical shield made entirely out of blood.

The tornado of fire collided with my first shield. But the shield did not last long. The tornado of fire easily broke through it in just a few seconds, before colliding with my second line of defense.

I battled with the tornado of fire as I poured more magic into the hardened blood shield.

Crack.

I saw jagged lines running through the center of the shield. It was beginning to crack. A few more seconds passed by as my blood shield endured the unrelenting fire of the tornado. It almost seemed endless, as if the fire would never run out.

Then the tornado of fire suddenly dissipated, and Eden came flying at me. Her right hand, which was surrounded by scarlet-orange fire, punched through the already cracking blood shield and collided with my blood armored chest.

The impact of her punch sent me flying through the air. But in just two brief seconds, I quickly stabilized myself and regained my footing in the air. I had been sent more than seven feet through the air—it was a testament of her strength and the power of her fire magic.

I was undamaged, however. The defense of my Dragon Living Blood Armor was strong and Navra had estimated it to be the strongest out of my generation, which was Kiara, Eden, and a few other dragons whom I had not met yet.

Above the skies, with Elder Kronos watching from a distance, Eden and I stood face to face. I stared at Eden and Eden stared back, both of us measuring the strength of each other.

A small smile formed on Eden's lips. “Not bad, Verath.”

“Same to you,” I said with casual indifference. From my observations, I had noticed a punctured hole on Eden's left wing. A small amount of blood was seeping through from it. “Though you seem to have lost this exchange.”

“Hah! This is a mere scratch.”

“Agreed.”

I had not been utilizing the full advantage of my Dragon Living Blood Armor. The armor was not suitable for a long-range battle and exchanging magic. No! It's full potential could only be shown in close-range battles.

I summoned my threads of magic, mixing some of my blood with the magic, and soon enough, a scarlet blade made entirely out of crystallized blood materialized to my front. The blade had formed starting from the center and traveled outward in both directions, ending simultaneously at the tip of the sword and the end of the hilt.

I took hold of the blade glowing with a dull red light and grasped it tightly in my right hand. The balance of the blade, to be precise, the longsword, felt natural and smooth. With a length of three feet and a half, it was a perfect weapon for me.

At the same time, I felt weakened after creating Sangius—I had named the blade with a simple word in the Ancient language of the dragons—Blood.

The weapon was different from my Dragon Living Blood Armor. Unlike the armor, the weapon weakened my body, since I had mixed some of my own blood into making the weapon.

Blood was also mixed into my Dragon Living Blood Armor, but since the armor was deeply bound and attached to me, the armor did not weaken me. It only enhanced my defense and improved my strength a little. But if I took too much damage, the armor would consume some more of my blood to retain its shape and defense.

A rather double-edged armor and weapon, I suppose.

“Oh my, a blade now? How exciting!” Eden said with fire in her eyes. She was thirsting for battle.

The fire surrounding her hands suddenly grew brighter and more intense. The flames almost seemed to solidify one sec and the next second, uncoil itself. Eden was most likely feeding more and more magic into her hands.

At the rate she was spending her magic, she would soon run out.

Almost as if in silent agreement, we both charged at each other, our wings beating powerfully at the air. We climbed even higher above into the air in diagonal paths. Then Eden and I met each other.

Blade and fist collided with each other, causing a massive shockwave of fire and air. Her left fist was undamaged as she blocked the strike of my weapon. With her free right fist, she aimed a punch at my face.

Seeing that I could not move in time to counter with a magic shield, I manipulated my Dragon Living Blood Armor. From the chest of the armor, crystallized blood stretched out to quickly form a shield that blocked her punch.

Small pieces of the shield exploded outward to the sides from the fiery impact, and I became a little weakened as my armor consumed a blood to make up for the loss of armor mass.

It was my time to counter attack.

Using magic, I instantly manipulated Sangius—my blood longsword—to stretch and encircle Eden's left arm. The weapon coiled itself over her left arm multiple times around. Then I manipulated the weapon once more to turn it into sharp serrated edges.

The weapon had become notched with saw-like teeth and with her left arm trapped within, I attempted to cut off her entire left arm.

Eden screamed out in pain as the weapon crushed her through her armored left arm. Multiple cracks resounded in my ears and I heard the bones in her arm break.

Suddenly sensing a huge buildup of magic, I quickly moved Eden using Sangius, dragging her whole body, wings and all, down below me. Then I kicked at the fiery chest armor, which somewhat damaged my blood-armored feet. But I did not relent, and from my wings, I shot out six hardened blood spikes, each of them two feet long, and each of them mixed with blood.

They pierced through Eden's wings and parts of her armor as she went spiraling down toward the ground from the impact. At the same time, from four corners around me, huge spheres of scarlet-orange fire shot out beams. The beams from each sphere crisscrossed and connected with the other corner spheres.

At least, that was what should have occurred.

The situation, however, was that I was in the middle of all those beams of fire. But since I had been somewhat prepared for Eden's magic, I quickly moved out of range using the full extent of my physical power.

Four of the beams of fire had hit me and almost entirely pierced through my Dragon Living Blood Armor, before the holes in the armor were regenerated by the consumption of my magic and blood.

I breathed a little in pain as I felt myself weaken even more. A lot of blood had been consumed blocking Eden's magic.

Down below, Eden was still spiraling toward the ground of the arena. Then she hit the earthen floor like a fiery meteorite. Dust formed everywhere, and while this was happening, I quickly descended toward the ground of the ring.

When the dust cleared, Eden was lying inside a large crater, while coughing up some blood. The six hardened blood spikes had pierced through her shoulders, her legs, and her wings. One spike on each shoulder, one spike on each leg, and one spike on each wing. But since the spikes had entirely pierced through her body, armor and all, wings and all, the spikes were affixed to a different area of the crater.

In her fall, Eden had veered off course.

“Damn,” Eden said weakly, coughing out some blood. The blaze of her fire armor, hair, hands, and wings were losing their intensity. She had used up most of her magic in that insanely powerful spheres of fire, and some more in easing her fall.

“I guess I lose this...” Eden's voice held a small amount of resignation and bitterness.

As soon as Eden had admitted her defeat, Elder Kronos appeared inside the crater before the two of us.

“Winner, Verath.”

I proceeded to walk toward Eden, who was now entirely naked due to her magic being consumed. I was planning to carry her body.

But before I had even moved a few steps, Elder Kronos held out a palm. “Stop. You may leave now. It is disrespectful to show pity and help out the opponent after her loss. I shall handle the healing.”

Saying that, Elder Kronos picked up Eden in his arms and teleported out of the Amphitheater of Dominance.

I looked around at the spectating seats. There were a few dragons, some of them in human forms, and others in dragon forms, who had been watching the duel. Most of them were looking at me with impassive and calculating eyes. At least, that was what their eyes seemed like to me from the distance. It was hard to tell even with my dragon vision.

With my victory announced, I dematerialized Sangius and my armor, Virdus Vict Sangius. Now, I stood alone in the huge arena where some small sections of the floor had been pierced through by my blood spikes.

Then I flew toward the area of the seating where Kiara and Aqua were spectating the duel from.

“You were awesome, Verath! As expected of my husband, er...I mean protector!” Aqua said with a small squeak of delight.

Kiara, beside the flying Aqua, only looked at me in silence before nodding her head. “At least she will not underestimate you anymore, Verath.”

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With the day over, and when night had taken over, I went back toward the mountain where Navra lived in. It was an enormous mountain and looked just like any other mountain except for the huge hollowed out half-oval entrance that led to the inside of the mountain—Navra's chambers.

With Aqua flying beside me, I headed inside the chambers. Before the chambers stood an enormous black gate. I transformed into my dragon form and breathed out fire into the black gate, which greedily devoured it. Then I passed through the somewhat glowing gate. Aqua followed nervously from behind me.

“Just what is that door! How can we pass through solid objects?” she asked in an excited voice, no longer nervous.

Inside the spacious chambers, Navra Bloodseeker, Astlan Dragon King of the seven major dragon clans, and Eldest of the Arkanan clan, sat upon his black throne. With amused and somewhat impassive eyes, he looked at me with a small smile. He was in his original form, an appearance of a tall white-haired man with an impressive build.

Even from across the vast distance between the throne and from the entrance gate at which I stood at, his voice spoke as if he was just beside me. “I have a small trial for you. You will like it, or die trying.”

Volume 3 (Chapter 9)