Chapter 24: The Dragon

  Boldly Tobias and Riley strode into what looked like a throne room decorated by a prince of hell. Rivers of lava flowed through channels that lined its walls; black glowing crystals wreathed with orange veins floated above them.

  Towering walls revealed three waterfalls of magmatic flow, coalescing into a pool that flowed around an obsidian throne, currently empty, before emptying into a circular pool that dominated the center of the room.

  Page Westphalia hung from the wall, bracketed by two lava flows, currently unconscious; half his face was blackened with soot and burns, and parts of his armor were burned away as blood dripped from his wrists down his chains only to boil on the floor as they hit the superheated stone.

  Hanging above the lava flow, high up towards the ceiling, suspended by taut chains, was a massive red crystal pulsing with a menacing light.

  Two strands of black metal chains hung down, disappearing into the pool, and strangely started to bubble as if nearing an eruption.

  An eerie quiet hung, like the memory of frost, drifted through the room.

  “Where’s Venosicipher? Where’s the voice, the howling, the head games?” Riley’s ears went flat as Tobias gripped his sword.

  “I don’t like this,” they said in unison, sharing a glance as the pool continued to bubble.

  “Be ready. Can you pull, uh, the wild ether into our bracelets?” Tobias asked as they took cover behind a large pile of fallen blocks.

  “I can try, but what happened here? Do you think this was all the page? Something doesn’t math!” Riley focused, feeling the currents of magic drifting like wisps of air in the stifling hot room, contracting her paws like she was digging into the earth, her ears went crooked.

  An ethereal kite shield manifested over Tobias’ left arm as Riley felt a cool barrier form over her like armor, sparkling blue at the edges of her vision.

  “Built-in AC, spiffy! Winter knight ward for the win!” She bounced a bit on her paws, the heat no longer feeling like a distant threat beneath her paws.

  “ I’m ok with the heat,” Tobias grinned.

  “Says the fire mage. My money is on the bubbling pool; the baddie is going to come from there,” Riley indicated with her paw, peeking up over the barricade of stone.

  “I’m not taking that action. Let’s not get too close to the lava; you go left, I go right. Whatever is coming, we'll harangue it till we know how to beat it,” Tobias ordered tersely, focused on the fight ahead.

  “Safety third!” Riley replied, dancing on her paws; even at a distance, the stones beneath her were uncomfortably warm.

  “We need to work on our ice magic,” she grumped just as a massive figure erupted up out of the lava pool, wreathed in a burning aura of flame.

  “Oh, definitely,” Tobias agreed, his eyes boggling wide.

  Long black horns swept back at a savage angle as if a demonic crown over a rigid and skeletalized face that drew out long and draconic. Razor-sharp teeth thrust down from its maw, dripping with lava. Glowing yellow orbs occupied the eye sockets like bright lanterns left in a window.

  Heavy obsidian scales coated its body like armor, while rigid spines grew up from the center of its back, chasing down to its long and whip-like tail, its ends glowing white hot with heat.

  Four-toed stocky legs ended in claws as black as sin and as sharp as any sword.

  A familiar box bracketed the creature as information populated their overlay.

  Augmented reality-Analyze

  Red Forest War Dragon of the Summer Court, Undead, Tormented Spirit

  Level 1-4, Elite, Extreme Danger

  Abilities: Fire, Fire Breathing, Berserk, Rapid Healing, Armored Constitution, Mana Regeneration, Poisoned Spines.

  Debuffs: None

  Beware the rage that transcends death...

  With a titanic roar, it pulled down on its chains, snapping them from the crystal, before charging towards Riley and Tobias.

  Her perception slowed; the world seemed to move in slow motion as Tobias began to break right, holding his sword out low and back like it was an extension of his arm.

  Moving without thinking, she was already going left. The heat of the stones beneath her paws added punctuation to every hop, as did the superheated air that moved around her ears, carrying every bit of the enraged dragon’s roar.

  “Oh, there haven’t been war dragons in a thousand years, Riley,” She said, her words dripping with sarcasm, doing her best to imitate Tobias.

  “It’s undead! It’s probably from a thousand years ago,” Tobias replied by projection, clinging to his bemusement as the dragon finally closed the distance, forcing Tobias to dive. A vicious swipe from its claws sent him into a desperate tuck and roll.

  The beast moved to stomp, but as it reared, Tobias launched on his heels, thrusting his sword, rising for a killing strike.

  The blade hit the obsidian scales with a loud chink, doing only superficial damage, Only for the beast to rear back while its throat glowed a magmatic orange.

  “Get your claws off my sorcerer!” Riley cried, pulling ether.

  ‘Pull power! Use ambient ether to power your magic!’ Sparky prompted.

  ‘I can do that?’ Riley wondered, only to be broken from her thoughts by a deafening roar as she reached for the currents around her like a lifeline.

  The golden bar slammed full with power and then began to blink in warning, the power leaping to her as quickly as it did when she fed on mana.

  ‘Or a soul, but this is not the time for an existential crisis…’

  ‘Only you would talk to yourself in a time like this.’ Sparky teased, the words appearing as a text bar at the bottom of her vision.

  Great, I’ve got a discount Navi critiquing how I roll…

  ‘Hey!’ Sparky echoed as Riley reached for her magic.

  Entropic Bolt

  They erupted from her paws like a barrage as she pulled the cast again and again, smacking the dragon in the muzzle with a flurry of chaos magic, drawing its focus and ire.

  With the distraction, Tobias got clear, trying to move around towards the back of the beast, only for it to viciously swing its tail.

  Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.

  Like a whip, it cracked the air with sounds of thunder, sending him diving yet again, this time uncontrolled.

  Sliding and then tumbling across the floor, he rudely smacked into the lip of a lava pool. Spines from its tail peppered the wall above him.

  “You fools. You will never leave here! There is no hope for you now! You will share in my chains and my servitude!” The dragon said, their tone riddled with misery.

  A wailing cry rang out, drawing each of their attention as fresh blood dripped from Page Westphalia’s chest, now impaled with one of the deadly projectiles.

  "Riley, keep up the entropic casts! It’s all we’ve got right now; maybe we can weaken its armor,” Tobias ordered, thinking strategically.

  "Got it! We need to hurry; the Page doesn’t have much time, and healing is out until we pull the spine!” She replied, sending the next volley and drawing the dragon’s attention.

  “It has been a thousand years since I’ve fed,” it intoned, its voice dripping with malevolent focus, its eyes locked in on the hare.

  "Dude, eat a Snickers!” Riley replied, already starting to move back towards her right as the beast vomited lava, blocking her path; the deadly fluid came surging towards her.

  Riley spun around to find the dragon’s tail in motion, this time coming for her, forcing her to scramble yet again while spines whipped over their head, zipping by her long ears.

  A distant sting followed the smell and feel of blood running down when one clipped an edge.

  “Sacrificed in vain hope only to be reborn in pain and chains...” The beast moaned.

  “Drama queen!” Riley taunted, digging her claws in as best she could, scrambling across the hot stone that grew hotter while she moved for the root of the dragon’s tail, speeding past its back legs while it turned its whole body, jaws snapping just inches from her paws.

  Reaching out to her inventory, she scattered seeds as she ran, willing mana into them. The dragon stretched open its maw, drooling lava just as the vines erupted, burning them to cinder.

  “Hey, ugly!” Tobias shouted, holding his sword up in challenge. Sweat dripped from his forehead, knitting with effort, as he held up his left hand, contracting it closed to a fist, much like Riley did with her paws, willing mana into the ancient blade while Riley hopped up on Venosicpher’s empty throne, crouching down below its stone armrests, panting and near panic.

  “Get control, get control,” she chanted. Her eyes zeroed in on Page Westphalia, currently bleeding out.

  “I don’t know if this is the right thing to do with that barb, but...”

  Pulling ether from the environment, following the same pathways of her last cast, the golden bar dipped briefly, as the spell rocketed out from around her.

  Celestial medic.

  The healing magic slammed into the page, eliciting another scream. The flesh tried to knit closed around the barb, and the burns on his face began to heal, leaving behind shiny pink scars that glistened in the dusky orange light of lava and flames.

  “That Magic. How does Feos power still live in this corruption, how does it exist among the Ashen?” The dragon roared, as a look of bewilderment danced across its eyes.

  “Tobias, look! The chains!” Riley called out.

  Instead of looking, he pulled from their side of the connection, noticing the wispy tendrils of red energy coming from the chains that hung broken from the crystal and the dragon, reaching out towards each other, forming new links as if they sought again to be whole.

  “Interesting, but it doesn’t help us, and your bolts are hardly making a dent,” Still, Tobias stood defiantly, willing more mana into the sword, intending to call fire to it when he noticed the glowing glyphs set into its side only to be interrupted by a powerful burst of breathed flame billowing in his direction.

  The dragon shook its head, as if shaking off the confusion, zeroing in on Tobias.

  A pall of instinctual fear, icy and cold, gripped his core, squeezing his heart.

  "Oh dear."

  Scanning to the left and right, his mind popped out piles of debris and toppled columns amidst the ruins of the throne room, seeking safety as he inched left.

  "That sword is not yours. I will reclaim it!" The dragon snapped its jaws, clicking its teeth, sending out thunderous booms as it talked forward, as if a cat teasing a mouse.

  Riley pulled hard and switched tactics,

  Celestial inferno

  White hot balls of holy fire streaked across the room from her perch upon Venosiciphier’s throne, peppering the back side of the beast, ablating with a sizzling hiss.

  “I can scent your mana, fire mage; you have no hope of defeating one of Summer’s fury,” The dragon mocked with rumbling laughter. It stalked forward toward the Ranger, “You ashen mages are stilted and shallow in your discipline. You plumb the depths of a puddle while forsaking the ocean before your eyes!”

  Tobias continues to inch closer towards a fallen column, as the Dragon stalked.

  “I’ve had about enough of you!” Riley cried, going for their trump card.

  Soul’s Crucible

  She could feel the white-hot rage of the creature as she made the connection, and power came flooding into her, filling their charge bar, but then something unexpected began to occur.

  It glowed in gold and then began to flash as pain ripped through her body.

  Her health bar plummeted, but she couldn't let go. Tobias faltered, the pain ripping across their connection, dropping him to his knees.

  With a titanic act of will, he dove, crashing rudely behind a pile of stone, contracting his hand again, pulling toward their inventory, producing a healing potion.

  “Riley...” He reached for her while his health bar crept up pathetically.

  'You idiot, don’t feed. What part of Soul burn don’t you understand!’ Sparky admonished.

  "You dare to take from me. Your kind has already taken everything!” The dragon roared, rearing back on its back paws as if to spin and obliterate the throne. A white explosion emanated around Riley, blowing her across the room.

  "Stupid..." Riley spat, as she skipped like a hurled stone, her body beaten by rocks and unforgiving floor, before coming to a rest against the wall.

  Scanning around, she stumbled up on her paws, pulling herself behind a ruined column. "Really stupid... not doing that again."

  “Little tick, do you think that one such as I could not control my magic? Fool,” The dragon spat lava with the words, its acids eating into the stone.

  “Riley!” Tobias was already in mid-charge when the willowy wisps of red energy connected, reforging the chains and preventing the beast from dropping. It struggled, weakened by the hare’s soul siphon.

  Their mana charge bar was still gold while Tobias shunted the power towards one particular glyph set into the sword, hoping it would work.

  Riley was down, smoke rising from her fur... Her paws looked burnt, blackened socks traced half way up her forelegs, but he knew they wouldn’t get a better chance.

  The blade began to frost. The air around it condensed so that it appeared as if it were giving off steam; driving it up, it hit the tough armored scales of the dragon’s body on contact. Frost spread like a creeping disease, turning them white and shattering them in contraction from the sudden cold, while Tobias kept feeding it power, seeing their charge bar drop precipitously.

  Thrusting the blade deeper, he continued to plow forward, opening the belly of the beast, altering his direction only to run towards Riley as orange lava spilled from its guts, eating a massive hole into the stone.

  Tobias’ kite shield flashed into existence. He held his arm aloft, bits of lava landing and sizzling upon the ethereal barrier as it seemed to feed off the heat, growing more substantial as he charged out of danger.

  The chains began to pull the beast away while it moaned in pain, the light from its eyes fading.

  “You don’t know what you’ve done. Not all of us served willingly. There is nothing more I can do, my Lady. The time is come…" It gasped before being pulled back into the lava pool, its flesh dissolving back to a skeleton as its tortured spirit finally fled.

  https://www.royalroad.com/fiction/81852/second-tier-sorcery