“Bring on your next opponent!”
The guards rolled Gorro’s body out of the ring, taking his club with him. Their quickness to take his weapon scrunched my eyes and I turned to Redfeur for answers. The fae soldier already knew what I was going to ask as he walked up to me while cupping some sand in his hand that was dark with moisture. “Another opponent? This is unusual,” he whispered to me. “But so is this arrangement. Me and my partner usually fight one pair or one beast.”
“So, unusually bad.”
He smiled. “You did well on your own. I guess I shouldn’t expect any less from you.”
I smirked, handing him Gorro’s spine. “That club would have been too heavy for you anyway, right? Here, use this.”
He chuckled skittishly. “I don’t think a weapon like that would do me any good for our next opponent. But… it could be good for something else… Jezz, do you think you can slice me a vertebra?”
“Sure.” I sliced the joint in the mid-section, the warm jelly and blood caking in my claws. Then after I loosened it up, Red helped me pop one out in two places. Unfortunately I wouldn’t know what he needed it for, because the announcer introduced our next opponent.
The bigger they are, the harder they fall…
A dragon—I wasn’t expecting that! According to the announcer he was a class A criminal scheduled for a beheading, but the princess lined him up for this special event, and figured he’d be the one to torment the fae ice wolf before his head was chopped off.
Funny enough, no one cheered for him. I thought when paired with any dragon, the audience would favor their own kind to a fae. He didn’t seem to care, the dragon already in his prime form, with his silver eyes peering at me like fresh dinner.
Hakku, the Impaler.
He was huge, at least fifteen feet tall and twice as wide. His scales were a deep red, almost black in the shadows of the arena. He had a long forked tail that he swished back and forth with menace, and long black claws that dug into the ground beneath him.
His wing span took up a fifth of the stage as he stretched them out, the heat radiating from his body making it feel like a furnace around him. As he stared me down, his mouth curled open to reveal razor-sharp teeth that could easily tear through any foe it came across—an intimidating sight indeed! When he noticed I wasn’t an ounce bit scared, Hakku roared so loud that it shook the very foundation of the arena, making Red’s heart race. A stench of sulfur hit me like the waves in Juddei Beach, but unlike those waves, this wasn’t pleasant.
“We should evade this one as much as possible,” Red said as he took a few steps back. “There is no beating a level 150 dragon in its prime form.”
“Oh fae of little faith! Anything is possible! I’m used to beating foes bigger than me! Don’t let this one’s appearance scare you.”
“If you are so confident, then you won’t mind fighting him alone.”
“No problem!” I said, curling my fists.
“My previous spell didn’t work. But with the composition from the bone of the vertebra, I might be lucky. I need you to distract him and keep him away from me.”
“You do what you have to, Red. Leave it to me!” I swung the spine of Gorro now broken in two, using them like dual wielding weapons. Once Red fled to the other side of the ring, I stepped up to the plate, eyeing the scaly bastard down. “You’re not much of a small talker, are ya? I like it when guys get right down to it! But I have to warn you, your size is going to be your downfall. I’m quick on my feet, and even quicker when I have a road to run on!”
The dragon snorted at me, not caring about anything I had to say. He spread his spiked wings, dragging them against the ground as he charged at me. Hakku had a mean mug on him as he ran, his mouth opening up with a spark inside of it.
Fire breath, meet ice shield!
The little mana I gathered between the time Red had temporarily broken the spell and now allowed me to defend myself against Hakku’s flame breath. However, because he was basically three times my level, I had to be careful. Even though I maxed out my Ice Manipulation trait, a dragon’s flame breath is nothing to take lightly. So I used my ice shield to ward myself from the intense inferno as I circled him for an opening along his back.
The flames ate through my shield like nothing, feeling it melt along my fist. I had to continue tacking on mana to keep it alive, because once my handle was gone, it didn’t matter how strong the face of my shield was.
But I was in for a real challenge with Hakku. Unlike Gorro, he was a tactful fighter, understanding that I was trying to climb him to deal real damage.
As I tried to vault onto his back, Hakku jerked to the side, tapering off his heat waves and opting for a gusty wind attack instead. He straightened his back and flapped his wings, the strategy working perfectly for him. I was the size of a raisin compared to him, so I flew back and crashed against the transparent warding around the ring, the distance I’d tried so hard to narrow between us gone.
Worse than that, Red was Hakku’s new target, and I tried my best to get back on my feet to reach him in time.
Turning into my beast form wasn’t optional now, but it had to happen. Red was in trouble, Hakku circling him. Under three seconds I went from a two-legged fae to a four legged wolf, my speed multiplying. But Red wasn’t as defenseless as he made himself seem. Just as Hakku prepared to tail swipe him, Red used his hydro powers to disappear.
A splashing whirlpool spun around him when Hakku’s tail swung, leaving nothing but drops of rain where he had been standing. Red reappeared on top of Hakku with two bloody symbols drawn on his palms using Gorro’s blood, and when he slapped them together, a ring of white circled his feet. Hakku’s scales began to turn stone gray.
Hakku started to panic, but Red’s spell-work was quick. In under a few seconds the dragon’s entire body was made out of stone!
“Jezz, now!” Red shouted at me. “While he is immobilized!”
Red was a genius!
I sprinted toward Hakku, my sharp claws digging into the sand with every quick step. Once I leaped onto the dragon, I locked my footing and climbed to the back of the beast’s neck. There, I already saw Red working to break through Hakku, but decapitating him wouldn’t be easy. This dragon not only had his naturally tough skin, but he also had a layer of stone we had to deal with.
My teeth were stronger than my claws, withstanding all types of elements. So I was used to smashing my jaws in between anything, although this challenge was nipping me in the butt. My jaws were doing little chipping action and we were getting nowhere fast. And with Red warning me that the spell would be fading soon, I had to think of a way to use this session as an advantage.
Every time Red clapped his hands, there was a cool down, the timer noted as a fiery light tracing along the inlays of Hakku’s back. Red was required to stand inside of that ring, and as long as the symbols on his hands were there, he could clap again and repeat the process for as long as the spell was able. Usually the sessions lasted longer, but since Hakku was such a big behemoth, we only had a few seconds to use.
So we improvised. I targeted the thinnest area in his dragon form’s body, his wings. The method looked a bit childish to the audience, but I wasn’t worried about appearances. As long as we were chipping away at his HP, then I knew we were headed the right direction. My hind legs slammed into his stretchy winged flesh covered in a layer of stone, shattering it piece by piece. For every section along his right wing, I felt Hakku trying to budge within the stone. A light grunt came from his chest, the security of the stone beginning to falter. And before I could run to my next section, Hakku’s wing jerked, making me fall through one of the holes I’d created.
Hakku was animated again, and the beast’s first reaction was to squash me dead.
I bucked it, but not fast enough. With a sharp yelp, my ass was dragged back down again. He’d stepped on my tail, and I was forced to transform into my fae form again to avoid being snatched up by his big mouth.
“Crap, I’m out of mana already!” I said as I ran my course underneath him. If I had some mana on me, I’d freeze his underbelly, down to his legs to keep him stable. Because right now he was dancing around this ring, trying to both step on me and fling Red off of his back.
“Hang in there, Jezz!” Red cried from above, just as the dragon’s step blew me from one side of his tail to the other.
I hit the back of my head hard, fighting to get back on my feet again. Being dazed underneath a dragon was like signing a death ticket, so I had to stay sharp and ignore the blood drooling from my left temple. Thinking fast, I extended my claws and slashed away, weaving in and out from under him. He roared, he grunted, and he pranced. Hakku hated the approach I took—if he couldn’t see me, he couldn’t attack me head on.
