The Final Round

Adelyn’s chainsaw whirred through the black substance that formed the dragon, before the creature eventually swatted her off. It began to quickly heal from the wound Adelyn gave it as the monster roared again.

A blast of dark energy shot towards Adelyn as she landed back on the ground, but Ed stood in front of her and formed a protective shield, defending against the breath.

“It seems like just cutting it isn’t going to work,” Ed told Adelyn. He was right, this creature seemed to be made of some kind of formless mass that seemed to shift to its own conveniences.

The breath dissipated, as Edward attempted to prove his point by forming a golden rope. It latched around the leg of the creature to attempt to slow down its assault on the marketplace. The rope held for a few seconds, before the leg shifted out of the rope and freeing itself.

“See,” Edward said. “We need a better plan rather than striking it.”

“It does seem to slow it down, at least!” Cozy shouted. She was flying around the dragon, shooting blast after blast at it. It seemed to annoy the creature enough to swat at Cozy. However, there didn’t seem to be much permanent damage. Teddie’s song could be heard from a safe location, Cozy’s speed being amplified by it from that vantage point.

The creature suddenly paused for a second, and began to shed some of its substance off of itself. Flying miniature dragons began to fly out of the massive beast, breathing their own smaller blasts of dark energy across the field.

“Shoot!” Cozy shouted. “There’s a lot of them!”

Adelyn saw Cozy clapping her hands together as a response. A large amount of spikes pierced through both the main dragon and its miniature spawn, clearing the field. However, Adelyn saw one coming from behind.

“Cozy! Look out!” Adelyn shouted. Cozy just turned around before the miniature dragon got blasted away by a small explosion. It dissipated the dragon instantly, as Cozy looked to the source. She saw Governor Knox with a massive launcher behind her. There was a family standing with her, blasting down more miniature dragons.

“I still need to evacuate more people,” Knox shouted. “Watch your backs more!”

After clearing out a few more of the miniature dragons, Knox began to lead the family to safety, leaving the kids to continue with the battle. The dragon continued to roar and start its rampage, knocking down stands in the marketplace as it did so.

“Eira!” Adelyn summoned forth the Spirit of Ice. She thought if normal attacks weren’t working, then maybe freezing it would impede its movement more. A blast of ice shot at the ground, and the feet and the floor itself froze over.

The creature slid into a nearby building, denting it significantly. The ice on its feet eventually shattered however, as the creature looked towards Adelyn and charged through the street to meet her head-on!

Ed was still standing in front of her, and Cozy was attempting to keep up from behind. The two of them took advantage of the dragon’s angry charge to try and perform their attacks as this happened. Eira froze the air around the dragon as it charged forwards, as Cozy’s crystals appeared to stab it through the neck.

The frozen dragon head was then responded to with Ed’s hammer. He crashed the entire head apart, shattering it into a thousand pieces. The strike revealed the inside of the messy black substance, and they saw Elaina. Her eyes were still bleeding, and there was still black substance being produced from her head. That substance began to remake the dragon’s lost mass once again… but bigger, and scarier.

It roared at Adelyn and Ed, before striking them both with its forehead. It knocked the two of them flying to the side and landed them right next to Teddie, on top of a building.

“Ah! Are you two okay?” Teddie asked.

“Nngh,” Adelyn clutched her head. It was a bad hit, but she looked at Teddie and Ed. “Did you see her too…? Elaina?”

“Yeah…” Ed said. “She’s still in there… producing that black stuff.”

“Maybe,” Teddie said. “If we can get her out of there, we can dissipate the monster! Then… we might be able to stop her crying?”

“That’s a good idea, Teddie…” Ed said. “Uh, do you happen to have a song that could blow him away like you did with… Kaos?”

“Uhh,” Teddie thought for a moment. “I’m not sure? My normal songs aren’t doing anything against it, and I don’t know anything that might help with that…”

“Shoot,” Ed cursed. “We’re going to have to do this the hard way.”

“Teddie, can you do a song that can heal Elaina, at the very least?” Adelyn suggested. “That’s much more you, you know?”

“I can certainly try that too,” Teddie nodded. “It’s… It’s something that I might workshop... Until then I’ll try and strengthen you guys so you can reveal Elaina more easily.”

“AAAAAH-”

As they conversed, Cozy crashed down right next to Adelyn. It looked like she took a pretty bad blow from the monster as well. She rubbed her head as she recovered.

“Are you three gonna help or are you guys just going to talk while I get my butt kicked?” Cozy complained, her wings spreading out once again.

“Sorry, sorry,” Adelyn said. “We just need to break it apart again.”

“It seems to be getting more resilient to that, so you’re going to need to break it apart before it gets too strong!” Cozy said. She took to the skies again, before firing energy blasts at the creature once more.

Adelyn, Edward, and Teddie all nodded at each other. They all jumped down from the top of the building, all of their weapons—or in Teddie’s case, his voice—were readied as they landed back on the street. Adelyn knew she needed another summon to break the creature’s ever-growing thicker skin. So, she decided to try and counter the encroaching darkness with Luz.

The Spirit of Light was called forth by Adelyn, and the light beams shot up into the sky. The creature looked up, seemingly prepared to counter the attack as it came down onto it. However, Ed took advantage of this, forming a sword to stab the creature in the jaw!

The monster roared, before its dark breath shot into the air to counter the beams of light that struck down at it. Adelyn saw Ed holding onto the dragon’s jaw as it aimed up to clear the skies. However, she also saw the mini-dragons resurging from the main dragon’s body, and they began to charge towards Ed.

Jumping to protect Ed, Adelyn began to slice away at each of the minions that were sent to attack him with her chainsaw. They went down quickly, but there were a lot of them. Luckily, Cozy had Adelyn’s back, as the crystals tore apart anything that she missed.

Teddie’s song floated through the air, as he avoided any minions himself. The song boosted both Adelyn and Edward, it seemed, with Adelyn herself feeling much stronger as she kept on fighting the monsters.

“Ed! Do you have any bright ideas?” Cozy shouted, creating even more crystals around them to protect against the swarm. Ed was busy hanging onto the sword in the monster’s jaw, as it was trying to frantically shake him off.

“I’m trying!” Ed shouted back, with his free hand, he stuck another sword into the beast’s neck as it rapidly flung him around. However, eventually he gets flung off, landing on the balcony of a nearby building.

“Damn it!” Ed said. “What if we froze it again?”

“Good idea!” Adelyn said. “Cozy, cover me!”

Cozy took to the skies once again and began blasting. Her classic ‘Pew pew!’ was heard as the pink energy blast distracted the vampire. Eira was called forth, with a chill in the air filling the entire street. The blast of cold instead struck at the creature’s body, freezing over where they last saw Elaina.

The creature realized what was happening, and as its body was frozen over, it reached out one of its legs and extended it. The extension kicked Adelyn and Eira right in the chest, crushing the frost spirit and slamming her summoner into the building.

“Agh!” Adelyn said, but she looked back. She saw Edward leaping forwards with a massive hammer heading to strike the creature once again, and to shatter its body into two! The creature was split apart, and the only thing holding it together was Elaina.

“Cozy, grab it!” Adelyn shouted from her beaten position. Cozy saw Elaina and flew straight towards the girl, who was still creating more black substance at every second. Cozy grabbed her, and tried to pull Elaina out of the beast.

As she tried, strange tendrils from the beast began to grab at Cozy, dragging her inwards against her pull.

“Shoot…!” Cozy shouted as she got grabbed. Adelyn jumped towards the tendrils to begin cutting them away with her chainsaw. Ed also jumped into the battle, as they eventually tore away the tendrils, but they could not grab Elaina.

The creature had regenerated, and instead of a tail, it now had two heads on each side of its body. They roared at the trio, ready to pounce once again.

Teddie came running behind the rest of the group, looking for Elaina.

“You didn’t get her out yet?”

“No,” Ed shook his head. “This thing is a lot to deal with. Adelyn, freeze it again!”

Adelyn quickly obliged, with Eira shooting out another blast of ice as a result. This time would be much less effective than the previous two attempts however. Ed would proceed to smash the ice with his hammer, but what broke did not reveal Elaina.

“It’s getting stronger!” Edward said, before blocking a chomp from one of the heads of the beast. Adelyn saw him struggling and attempted to help, but she was intercepted by another head.

Her chainsaw clashed against the teeth of the dark beast as she held it back. A few blasts of support from Cozy, and it retreated backwards. But, it began to spew the dark breath at them, destroying Eira and forcing Adelyn and Cozy to defend against it.

“We’re going to need something way stronger,” Teddie said, a song of his boosting Adelyn’s defense as they held against the barrier. “Do we have anything?”

“Well, one…” Adelyn said. “But if I use it now I might be really tired after.”

“Isn’t it your hydra?” Cozy asked. “I’d say use it now, definitely!”

“Right?”

Adelyn figured there was no other option. Her newest summon was definitely not one she was familiar with, and she only showed it off at the tryouts. But, since this thing kept on getting stronger, it would be best to destroy it before it could evolve further.

Magical energy flowed through her body, and the book. The memory of her battle with the hydra began to project out of her mind. A circle formed around her, as five massive heads raised out of the ground and into the skies. It matched the dark dragon head on, and roared.

The two beasts shouted at each other, as the ground trembled in their wake. Then, they clashed. Their two opposing breaths clashed against each other, as they physically entangled themselves with each other. The hydra eventually managed to topple the dark beast, and was holding it down.

“Guys…!” Adelyn said. “You need to break into it now!”

“Right,” Ed nodded, so did Cozy.

Cozy looked towards Teddie before saying, “Buff, now!”

With a song from Teddie, the both of them began to move as fast as they could. They landed on the stomach of the creature and tried to dig through it. Ed tried to stab through its stomach, and Cozy began to blast away. However, the substance kept on reforming too quickly.

“Damn it, it’s not letting up!” Ed said. The two of them were struggling to maintain their balance on the fighting dragon. Adelyn continued to try and order her summon to hold down the beast still, but her mind was straining.

Then, suddenly a large BOOM rang in her ears. A massive explosion blew up the dark beast’s stomach. The dark beast shrieked at the damage, before being silenced by the hydra chomping down on its neck.

“Who?” Adelyn looked behind her, and saw Governor Knox standing behind her. A projection of a cannon in front of her.

“You four have done a lot, let's end this, now,” Knox said.

Adelyn nodded, and she saw Cozy and Ed working together in the gap that the explosion made in the beast. Cozy was busy dragging Elaina, the substance trying to pull her back inwards. Ed was fighting off those tendrils once again.

She commanded the hydra to help Cozy pull, and its powerful jaws gently clamped Cozy’s feet and helped her pull. Bullets began to fire at any tendrils attacking either of them, as the monster’s grip on Elaina began to weaken.

And then, with one final pull… Elaina snapped away from the monster! However, the black substance was still forming from her person. It still helped regenerate the monster, as Cozy dragged the girl towards Teddie.

“Teddie, do you have a song?” Cozy asked.

“Yes… I do,” Teddie nodded. He began to sing. A song that calmed the mind, and one that would make everything feel better. Adelyn herself began to feel relaxed at Teddie’s song, even despite the situation.

The black substance began to fade, eventually no longer flowing from Elaina to the monster. The connection between them severed, leaving the monster screaming under the weight of the Flourishing Hydra. With one more powerful stomp, the hydra crushed the entire monster, as it dissipated into the air.

The hydra itself would not last much longer, as it too faded from the battlefield, leaving just an empty street… with all of them alone. Adelyn collapsed to the floor, lying on her back.

They did it. A grand finale.