Brazenly Bloody Battle

Dr. Yuzuki ran to where the coach lay splayed across the ground and placed a hand on her shoulder to keep her from standing back up. “Rekki, there’s no dragon. We’re not in a dungeon. Just take a deep breath. Everything’s going to be fine. I’m right here.”

The coach swatted away Dr. Yuzkuki’s hand. “You saw how powerful he is. Juice me up. We need to buy time for the brats to get away.”

“He caught you by surprise with a Force Redirect.” The doctor’s voice was calm and soothing. “That’s not something a dragon would do. Besides, dragons don’t look like humans.”

All the while, the man walked slowly toward the coach. the same confident smirk on his face. “I expected more from the famed Rekki Gouka, but I can see now you’ve gone soft. No wonder you lost to a mere child.”

Stretching her arms wide, Dr. Yuzuki put herself between the coach and the man. She looked a lot like a red panda trying to make herself look intimidating. Given how short she was, it wasn’t convincing. “That’s enough. If you’re trying to provoke Rekki to prove--”

“Silence,” the man hissed. He swatted at the doctor’s head with the back of his hand. She was so surprised that she froze in place. The coach reacted faster, running forward and grabbing the man’s arm.

“Redirect this!” She picked him up and swung him like a club, slamming him into the ground. He bounced up like he was made of rubber and delivered a quick kick to her forehead, right between her horns. The force of the kick sent her stumbling backward, tripping over the doctor.

But the man wasn’t finished. His hand fingers turned into black claws and he raked them across the scar on the coach’s abdomen. Blood splattered over the field, dying the grass red.

I should have run away, but my legs were shaking so hard they wouldn’t move. If this man was truly a dragon in human form, it wouldn’t really matter how far I ran anyway. Nowhere was safe.

Once again, he stood over her, but this time, the grin was gone, replaced with an expression of pure anger. “Apologize!” he yelled. “Apologize for being weak. Apologize for killing Ravargon even though you’re weak. Or else, show me the strength you used to kill a dragon. Prove to me that Ravargon didn’t fall to such puny strength.”

“What are you talking about?” the coach groaned. “The only dragon I ever met handed my ass to me. I barely made it out alive.” She pushed herself upright and looked down at the man. “Manged to drive my club through his eye though. He’ll remember me for the rest of his life. If he ever fully awakens, that is.”

This only made him angrier. “That club skewered his brain. Are you telling me it was a fluke? An accident? Ravargon didn’t deserve such an inglorious death. I ought to crush your body and leave you an invalid so you’ll remember me for the rest of your pitiful life. I’ll show the realms that we’re the superior beings by destroying you with everything I’ve got.”

From behind him, Robolina’s voice rang clear across the field. “Analyze.”

The man stumbled as if struck from behind. The coach’s attack hadn’t budged him, but the force of Robolina’s spell nearly knocked him off his feet. Having been on the receiving end of a couple, I knew just how powerful they were.

His smile returned as he straightened himself. “The Maginorian puppet packs quite the punch, unlike you, kinslayer.”

“Coach, he’s not a dragon,” Robolina yelled. “He’s just possessed by draconic mana.”

“Fat lot of good that does me,” the coach mumbled.

“Shield. Flood. Levitate,” Robolina said. All three spells activated at once. An orb of golden light surrounded the man, filled with a swimming pool’s worth of water. It took the chunk of the field he was standing on with it as it rose a meter into the air.

The man flailed for a moment then swam to the top of the bubble. He punched it a few times, but the shield didn’t so much as buckle. Then, fire spread across its surface. From the outside, it was difficult to tell if he’d drown before being boiled alive or vice-versa. But then cracks appeared on the shield and scalding hot water poured out onto the dirt below.

Drenched and steaming, the man emerged from the bubble and ran toward Robolina. She launched a crackling orb of lighting from her palm, but he caught and crushed it with his bare hand.

At the same time she was casting the lightning orb, Robolina had summoned a futuristic-looking pistol to her hand. It was made of the same blue metal she was, with silver accents and a swept-back design.

The man’s eyes widened when he saw. Hundreds of golden light walls appeared in front of him to block the shot, but they might as well not have been there. When Robolina pulled the trigger, a white laser beam tore through them as if they were tissue paper.

But they did succeed in obscuring Robolina’s view of the man. He dodged to the side and she missed her shot. By the time she realized, he had closed the distance between them and knocked the gun from her hand.

“I was going to let you be. It amused me how you had tricked the gods, but I forgot how much you Maginorian puppets love to bear your fangs at your superiors. Time to cut your strings.”

At that moment, it was as if the fear that held me paralyzed vanished. “No!” I shouted. The man turned his head and looked at me as if noticing my presence for the first time.

His jaw went slack. “Kaledrak, is that you? We thought--”

A red blur rocketed across the field. The coach, now fully healed, tackled the man from behind and grabbed the top of his head, her long fingers gripping the length of his face. “Expel!” she shouted. The orange aura around the man pulsed as if being torn away, but then snapped back into place. “Purge!”

That did it. The aura was ripped from his body. It hung in the air, its outline the vague shape of a dragon. Then it wavered and began to dissipate.

The man reached his hand up to it, his eyes now a normal blue color. “Lord Zagroth, come back. Please, take my body again.” But for whatever reason, the aura drifted away from him.

“Hold him for me,” the coach told Robolina. She then sprinted back to where the doctor lay on the field. Evidently, she had transferred the coach’s injury to herself. A few of my teammates knelt over her, casting healing spells on a large gash across her stomach. The coach joined them, holding the doctor’s hand to help her through the pain.

All around me, everyone was doing something. Robolina was restraining the dispossessed man. The healers were attending the doctor. Yuumondou was leading the rest in repairing the damage to the field.

I was the only one who was useless. Yuumondou was right: I didn’t belong here. Even if I had managed to learn a couple spells, I was still so far behind everyone else. Who knew how long it would take me to catch up? Hoping to be of some use to her, I walked over to where Robolina was.

That’s when I noticed the orange aura was floating toward her. No, it was floating into her.

“Robolina!” I shouted. “Run! Your systems are absorbing the draconic mana!” Honestly, I had no way to know if that was true, but it sure looked like that’s what was happening.

Robolina blinked in surprise and looked up at me. She took one step, but the rest of the mana rushed into her. Her holographic eyes flickered and went out. I managed to catch her as she fell. She was heavy, but I managed to slowly lower her to the ground.

Accompanied by a loud whirring noise, her eyes lit back up. Only this time, they weren’t blue. They were yellow with vertical pupils.

When next she spoke, the voice was hers, but the words weren’t. “Kaledrak, as I was saying before we were so rudely interrupted, We thought you were lost. It’s good to see you again.”