Final Breath

I remember when I was a child I always got bullied. All the kids would avoid me or push me around just because no one in my family had any magic ability. I hated it, I hated it so much that I wanted to run away. I wanted to be like everyone else, I wanted to play and have fun with the village kids, but none wanted to accept me. No one expected me to achieve anything.

When the first trial for us kids to grow into what they call "Blade Handlers" had begun, everyone left me behind. I never felt such anger. I hated everyone. I cursed the whole village. Even my parents didn't care about what I wanted. They just told me to give up. All I was ever told was to give up, everyone said the same thing. Must have been some sort of miracle when I was trying to get my own blade, I managed it, however, that lead to nothing good. People just called me a fake. Even my parents looked at me like some sort of monster.

Since no one wanted to help me train, no one even wanted me to join in playing games with everyone else. I had no choice but to go out of the village and train myself. At first, I didn't know what I was doing, I would swing around my sword hoping this would help me somehow. Since I had no way to know if what I was doing was going to be worth my time, I ended up spying on some of the village's training classes. Watching them train helped me understand how I need to practice myself.

Each day after the village kids finished their training I would go into the woods and practice for myself, after a few months I ended up making a lot of progress. I felt the difference, I felt far stronger than I was before. Despite being able to feel the improvements, since I was training alone, I didn't have a real way to see if I improved or if it is just a delusion of my own.

One night I was training in the woods longer than usual and ended up taking a nap. Late at night, I got woken up by some rattling in the bushes. I slapped my face a few times to try to wake myself up more to make sure I wasn't hearing things. Sure enough, the rattling didn't stop. I grabbed hold of my sword and stood up. It was extremely hard to see in the dark, so I started taking steps back out of the forest into the moonlit fields to get better visibility.

As I entered the brightly moonlit field I stopped and tried to take a better look at what was hiding within the bushes. Suddenly a huge brown bear came charging out. It started throwing its huge paws at me. I had no time to react. All I could do was take the hits. I was terrified. Despite being thrown around by the bear, I was able to find a second to roll back away from it. However, there wasn't much time to do anything but keep running away. I had to find a good position where I would be able to get an advantage over it.

Although I couldn't get into a perfect advantage point, I was able to get far enough from it to get up and counterattack. I began swinging my sword at the bear, although it wasn't perfect, the training paid off enough for me to cause damage. I managed to cut the bear's arm off. That was enough to make it back off and as soon as I noticed it fleeing back into the forest, I ran towards the village.

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I wonder why I remembered that. Seems rather random but the more I think about it, it seems like a rather similar situation, but with a slightly larger enemy. However, I still felt like there was more to it. Something important that I overlooked.

Defeating this dragon will be the hardest task I've had to deal with. I took deep breaths to calm myself down. I need to be able to calmly analyse the whole situation before acting.

"Kato are you there?"

"Huh?"

"Kato!"

"STOP SHOUTING"

"You wouldn't reply otherwise. We have been trying to get your attention for the past 5 minutes."

"Oh… "

"Something wrong?"

"No… I was just, thinking…"

"What's on your mind?"

"Well… I'm trying to think of a way to-to defeat that dragon."

"Ahh, that does make sense, you must have been in some deep thoughts if you wouldn't respond to anything."

"Heh… yeah, so uhm, was there anything that I missed while I wasn't paying attention?"

"Since you wouldn't snap back to reality, I took command and we wiped out most of the minor demons. So, all that's left is getting that dragon down."

"Oh wow, that's fantastic, but do you have any idea how?"

"Well, I was hoping that you would know."

"Yeah… I wish I knew, this would be much easier, but sadly I do not."

"Hmm, we will figure something out together then. All of us. We are working as a team after all right?"

"Yea-yeah you're right. With all of us together we will be able to achieve something."

I forgot, something I never had before was friends, a team, people I could rely on. I was always alone so I was thinking of a way to solve this by myself without anyone's help. Even though I have a whole team who are here to help me.

"So, Takeo, what do you suggest we do?"

"Well, I think that we should start with attacking its legs, get it out of balance."

"Oooh, I see."

"After that, we can concentrate on just doing sequenced attacks in groups which will attack in unison. That way we will have it getting damaged consistently without giving it a chance to rest."

"I see, that's pretty smart."

"I am not sure if it will work out perfectly, but it should do some damage to it before the plan falls apart."

"We will get behind it while the others are keeping it distracted."

"That's a good idea, we could get a powerful hit if we both manage to get behind it or on top of it."

"Yes, and that can be easily done if we have the dragon distracted."

"This might just work out for us."

"Alright let's give it a go. There's nothing else we can come up with now."

Takeo seems to be more competent than he was before. Or is he more confident in himself now? Either way, I will let him be the main leader for this battle. Until he starts acting like an idiot.

Takeo quickly gathered everyone up and explained every part of the plan from start to finish. They all seemed to have understood. First time I ever saw Takeo act so professional as if he was a real leader.

"OOOOH, what do we have here. Seems like the recruits have come up with a plan for the dragon HAHA! They all seem to be concentrating their attacks on the legs, I have to say that is a very interesting tactic they are going for here. They also have some archers in the back quick-firing at its head to keep them distracted. They seemed to have improved their overall leadership and teamwork skills, HAHA, they really look like a real group of soldiers now!"

Now we are making progress, it feels good. Haven't felt like this in a while, almost as if I'm not carrying everyone on my shoulders anymore. Having others help really makes everything easier if only I was born as a male. Everything would be much easier. I shouldn't divert my mind yet though, we still have plenty to do before I stop concentrating on what's going on.

We have been attacking the dragon's leg for around ten minutes now. Finally, we managed to make enough progress for me and Takeo to get the dragon from behind.

"TAKEO!"

I yelled over to him to try to get his attention. However, there was no reply. I looked around to find what he was doing. Didn't take too long for me to see him jumping around like a child. He was enjoying himself. I could look at him all day like this. Once again, I got myself distracted. I don't understand what has been happening recently, I have been getting distracted by the smallest things ever since I got here. As I was staring at Takeo, he finally noticed me fading away into my own fantasy.

"Kato, you okay?" He asked while catching his breath.

"EEEE"

"Kato?"

"Shut up."

"Huh? You okay…?"

I felt like dying of embarrassment, getting caught staring at someone is the worst thing that can happen. What was I even thinking? We are doing an important task and I'm dozing off. I have done nothing but get distracted, I need to sort myself out quick or this is going to cause some serious problems.

"HAHA! What are those two recruits doing sitting around? Are they getting lovey-dovey together? HAHA! Surely not! Sitting around waiting for the dragon isn't going to work here HAHA!"

Oh goodness, he said it out loud, now everyone is looking towards me. This is dreadful.

"Kato let's get going. The quicker we get rid of this dragon the quicker we get to move on."

I nodded in agreement.

He grabbed my arm and pulled me up. As I got back on my feet our faces met. I stared deep into his eyes. They were breath-taking, I felt like I was entering another dimension…

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Damnit, I got distracted again. I need to clear out my head quickly. I grabbed my blade out and began concentrating on putting my mana into it. Takeo looked at me confused and said nothing. Ice began forming on my sword and soon I was able to form spikes out of the ice on my sword.

"Alright, time to get going. We got a job to do right?"

"Finally, I thought you would never say that." Takeo happily replied.

We began dashing towards the dragon. Since it was distracted by all the other guys, we were able to easily sneak by him. We sprinted up to his tail up and up its body to quickly reach the top before it realises that we are on top of it.

Luckily enough for us, we made enough distractions, and it didn't notice the two of us on top of it.

"So, how are we going to do this?"

"Hmmm… how deep are you able to freeze things?" Takeo asked curiously

"Depends on what it is, if it's solid then not very deep if there's space between it then around three to four meters. Why?"

"Okay, what if it's not a solid but a living creature?" he asked with excitement

"I never tried with living creatures but considering there's water inside living creatures I could probably freeze them, but it will depend on the size."

"How about this dragon?" He asked with a smile on his face

"It's pretty big, so it would take a while and I would need it to be still otherwise it will take even longer."

"Makes sense, how about just freezing its neck?" he questioned

"Let's see, the neck isn't that big so if I freeze one part of it, including its insides, it will stop blood inflow to the head as well as make it brittle allowing it to break easily. Give me like 5 minutes and it will be done."

"FANTASTIC KATO!" he yelled.

He ran off to the top of the dragon's head and grabbed its attention so that I could start freezing the neck without getting attacked. I forced my sword through the dragon's scales into its thick neck. As fast as I could I began flowing all the mana I had into the dragon and began freezing it. This did agitate the dragon and he began trying to shake me off. To prevent getting flown off the dragon, I quickly froze my feet to the dragons' scales, as horribly cold as it was, this was the only quick solution I had so I must make do.

Slowly, bit by bit, blood cell by blood cell the dragon's neck began freezing. It started getting more noticeable since the dragon's movement became weaker. Probably due to the lack of control over its body since the head was losing access to the body. Another few mins and it will be over. However, I am starting to feel lightheaded. I've been pouring out all the mana I have, and although I managed to train myself to increase my mana capacity, I still do have limits.

"OOOH HAHA! Look at that! The dragon looks like it's about to fall to eternal sleep! HAHA! Did the recruits really manage to defeat it? OR did they forget about something very important after they saw the dragon HAHA!"

As always, he's stating the obvious, but my mind feels so empty now that I can't even get mad. Freezing the dragon's neck was harder than I expected, I probably miscalculated my mana capacity. Wait, I never even thought of my mana capacity in the first place. I forgot about it completely. Nothing but getting distracted.

I ended up letting go of my sword and stopped transferring mana, if I tried to keep going, I would end up passing out myself, leading to my disqualification, and I can't have that.

I yanked the sword out of the neck and jumped off the dragon. I should have thought that through better, the drop was long, and my legs took that at full force, hopefully, I didn't break anything. I quickly crawled away from the dragon. When I got a safe distance, I needed to let Takeo know that he could do the final strike.

"Takeo"

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"Takeo!"

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"TAKEO!"

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Am I getting ignored or am I not shouting loud enough? My whole lungs feel empty, if I try to speak any louder, I might rip them apart. However, thinking about it, failing the exam would be worse than losing my lungs. I took a deep breath and yelled as loud as I could.

"TAKEO!!!!"

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After a short minute, he finally noticed me, but as I expected, I killed my lungs. I felt relieved, he understood what he needed to do after I pointed at the dragon's neck. Finally, I saw the most powerful swing from Takeo, cracking the brittle frozen neck, smashing it apart.

"This was fantastic HAHA! This is the best work I have seen in 10 years! It brings a tear to my eyes, seeing such phenomenal teamwork. I would cry, but it seems like we ran out of time. HAHA! The examination will continue tomorrow for the final part! Next time please remind me not to give unlimited time on this, that was a big mistake, thanks Jennis! HAHA! Now, thanks to everyone for attending the first two stages of the recruitment process. Return tomorrow for the final event, which will be a one vs one between all the remaining recruits and see who will get what ranking! HAHA!"

I see so that's what the final stage is for. Glad we don't have to do it today, I used up so much mana to the point that I can sleep for a good week but that won't be an option. My old master once taught me how to make a homemade mana potion, but I wonder if I'll be able to find all the ingredients in the city, usually I would just go into the forest and find them easily. They probably have ridiculous prices here.

I looked around and saw the rest of the guys dancing around and screaming. Glad that they managed to be useful. Thanks to Takeo's plan I don't think we lost anyone else during this final wave.

"You alright Kato?" Takeo asked while grabbing my hand

"Yeah… I just emptied out all my mana, that was pretty stupid of me, but it worked out in the end."

"Yup, thanks to you we managed to pull it off in the end. Honestly, I had a lot of doubts about this plan working, but we managed it." He explained whilst carrying me on his shoulder.

"I think it's time to head back to the room, I don't have any energy to talk anymore."

After everyone left the gear they borrowed, we were finally free to leave.

"H-hey, what about me?" said the boy still sitting on the ice pillar