RD 3 Ch 36

Chapter 36

"Merlin, can you teleport to the limit of this space?" I asked quickly as the dracoon swooped down towards us.

"Already on it," Merlin replied, chugging back one of the mana potions. She held her staff with both hands and began to chant. From what I understood of here teleportation ability, she slowly raised the radius she had access to before activating the ability anywhere in the radius.

"What do we do?" Antonio asked, turning to me for help.

"We stall it," I said, feeling a blood blade running down my wrist.

"What do you mean, 'we'?" Antonio interjected. "I couldn't stand up to that thing for a moment if I tried." He reached out to grab Simone, but she jerked her arm away.

"You will not take me away from Bran!" Simone retorted, glaring back at Antonio. Instead of casting a spell, she pulled out the Rockie-Talkies. She clicked five of them at the same time. "Mulbranova, Bran needs you," she commanded, her voice carrying an authority I rarely heard from her.

Instantaneously, there was an echo of replies from the Rocks. "Yes, Saintess," a dozen voices sounded off at once.

I frowned at Simone. "I thought I told you to send them out."

Simone looked away from me, unable to meet my eyes as she wiggled a little uncomfortably. "They're all waiting right next to their portal in case they need to use it," she replied defensively. "However, one of their newer abilities involves helping you, Bran, so I wanted to keep them around in case you needed them."

"What does that mean?" I asked, only to feel several dozen abilities lock onto me. I could feel them tracking through space as red ribbons of blood appeared in my peripheral vision.

It was as if nothing would stop them. The ability penetrated through the space of the vault, racing towards me. I didn't have a chance to ask what was happening before one after the other, they slammed into my body. Each one set my blood aflame and sent shocking pain throughout my system.

It was a pain I was familiar with feeling. It was the pain of stats increasing too much at once.

As strength flooded through me, I could feel the swelling reservoir of this ability inside of me. I grit my teeth and threw my hand up, a brilliant crimson barrier snapping into place as the dracoon landed. The impact as it touched the ground sent shockwaves that uprooted all of the trees in the vicinity, causing the crimson barrier to shudder.

"Simone, we're going to have a talk after this," I called out, my voice rough through the pain. 

"Bran, are you okay?" Antonio asked.

I ignored him, meeting Simone’s eyes and giving her a look that said I was both impressed and displeased.

She gave me a cheeky smile. "That's right, when we're done with this, you're going to chase me down and you're going to punish me real good." Simone put her butt out for a spanking. "Remember, you have to get through this in order to punish me."

"Merlin, take them away," I demanded.

The mage cracked an eye open, as if questioning why I wasn't coming with them.

"This thing is fast, and I need you out of here, now." I told her, knowing that her ability wasn’t ready to get us all the way to the exit.

The crimson barrier shuddered, a crack forming along it as the dracoon swiped a furry and dangerously clawed paw across the protective field. 

"Now Merlin," I demanded, "I'll be fine." 

With those words, the space around Merlin and the other three warped, as Simone feverishly cast all of her abilities on me before they disappeared.

I turned back to the giant raccoon-dragon hybrid with a smirk on my face. I wasn't its match.

The strength I felt right now was not quite comparable to my Last Stand ability, but it was up there, and I could feel instinctively that my Bloodrage Ascension also now had a reservoir for me to use despite the lack of blood on the battlefield.

It seemed the Mul Branova had an ability to directly help me activate my Bloodrage Ascension and empower me, though something like this would always come at a dire cost. I just hoped Simone and the rest of the Mul Branova weren't putting themselves at risk.

I might as well use it and activated Bloodrage Ascension.

As my clothing ripped, my muscles swelled, and I turned into a giant. At sixteen feet tall, I was still small compared to the dracoon, but it at least put me on a comparable playing field. 

The monster squinted at me and swiped its paw again. This time, its claws found purchase on the cracks before it ripped open the crimson barrier with the same ease that I would have opening an eggshell.

But I was ready, roaring as I came out. My blood blade was now sized closer to a claymore for my size, and I swept the giant sword along its leg, scratching through several scales and leaving a shallow wound.

Even for my current enhanced form, I felt disappointed at the lack of damage. Then again, this monster was way above my league. 

The monster recoiled at the slash as if it was unfamiliar with pain before glancing down at its arm. Its beady black eyes became infuriated as it roared loud enough to kick up dust all around me.

I pivoted and rushed through the cover, not away from it, but around its side.

The monster followed up its roar by coating the space where I had just been standing with more firestorm, stretching it out into the distance as if it had expected me to run away. 

I had other plans, jumping up with my massive claymore and slicing into the delicate webbing of its massive dragon wings.

If the scratch on its leg had infuriated it, this hit definitely angered it. The irate monster spun around, sweeping its tail where I had just been.

I barely managed to jump out of the way, kicking off the tail and leaping for the other wing as it finished its spin. Pulling out the drop sword, which was barely a dagger in my hand, I activated the ability, piercing down on the other wing with my claymore before doing my best to slash through and rip the webbing.

The dracoon flailed, flapping its wings, rearing up, and twisting its body back and forth, trying to dislodge me.

All that did was make me rip its wing further as I held onto the loose flaps and threw my body weight around.

Its beady black eyes shone red with rage. It twisted, breathing more firestorm over me and the wing I was clinging to.

Hunkering down, I used some of its own wing for shelter, but that did little to protect me as the searing heat tore through my skin, blackening my back and shoulders. I received a dark, crispy burn.

At least it was training my resistances.

I twisted, grabbing on to the flap of leathery wing that I'd used to shield myself, and jumped, using my weight and the resistance as it tore to carry me to the ground.

More of the delicate flesh ripped and the dracoon screamed in rage, spouting more firestorm into the air before turning it down to the ground and setting everything ablaze. 

My regeneration was working overtime, that was for sure.

The dracoon spun and slammed its fluffy, scaly tail on the ground as if it intended to stomp me out. Swinging up again, the tail slapped down repeatedly as all four of its feet stomped. The move was like a toddler throwing a tantrum, one that was incredibly dangerous to me.

I rolled, beginning the next step of my plan which involved sprinting out of the area as fast as I could.

Ducking and jumping out of the way of its rampage, I rushed away.

It caught sight of me as I tried to rush away and reared up as if to fly. But several flaps of its wings failed to bring it into the air. The monster was confused before glancing back and seeing the torn tatters of its wings. Several whole sections of the webbing were missing, and all its flapping had done was fling blood at me.

Infuriated, it pounced forward, trying to chase me through the forest. Even without its flight, it was terrifyingly fast. Each gait of its massive body pounded after me, devouring the short lead I had managed to obtain while shaking the earth beneath me.

It was somewhat embarrassing for me to be running in my Bloodrage Ascension form. It was also a little awkward because I was hindered by the pines, forced to weave between them, rather than slow my run by crashing through them.

Fire filled the air, and another crimson barrier snapped up around me. The dracoon's flames washed over the barrier, melting it away, but giving me enough of a chance to escape the center of the blast.

Even then, I was still being cooked alive parts of my back were burnt down to the bone. Though, my primordial titan physique was likely gaining proficiency towards the next rank. My resistances were now baked into that ability. 

As my body smouldered, I decided this probably wasn't the time to think about ranking up my abilities.

Instead, I needed to focus my mind on how to escape the present situation.

The dracoon tore through the forest behind me, pausing to breathe. Its firestorm breath had only momentarily stalled it as soon as it realized I had escaped the blast. It was pounding after me, its colossal body tearing through the swirling firestorms, barely effected by its own ability. 

I racked my mind for a solution. I wasn't going to be able to take the dracoon in a head-on battle, nor one where I tried to use my smaller frame and agility to outwit it. If I had a chance at taking out the dracoon, it was either going to be with my spirit or my inscription. The thought gave way to an idea. 

I took out a B-grade sword and bit my thumb before scribbling an inscription along both sides of the blade. Using blood on metal wasn't exactly the most precise work one could do. However, I needed a solution that would affect the dracoon, but not me. And to do that, I needed ranked metal for this particular enchantment. 

The dracoon was pounding after me, but I performed inscriptions well under pressure, finishing off with a flourish at the tip of the blade.

My blood dried quickly thanks to all of the burning forest around me, and I threw myself forward, stabbing the sword as deep as I could into the dirt before rushing past it. My feet slipped as I ran, sand expanding from the sword. A little water bubbled up, spouting out like a natural spring ten feet over. 

The B-Rank sword glowed bright red as the inscriptions on it began to warp the metal. I needed something that would work quickly and over as much space as I could. Something as simple as ranked paper would have burnt up in an instant. The sword was necessary to get the depth and the speed while lasting more than a moment. 

The dracoon pounded after me, only for its front claw to sink deep into the sand. It jerked, but that didn't immediately free it. Instead, it had to pause, slamming down its other claw for leverage and pulling hard to rip the first claw out of the quicksand I had produced. Only then did the dracoon realize its second claw was now stuck. 

Thankfully, despite all of this monster's stats, it didn't appear to be very experienced, nor did it appear to be very intelligent. If I had to guess, this creature was raised in isolation by demons just for this use, and it didn't actually have much more than instincts driving its actions. 

I chuckled, seeing the colossal monster struggle with quicksand. Despite its stats, the quicksand would present some trouble.

In its attempts to bring either of its claws back out, its body was tipping forward and unable to get leverage to get its front claws out. It flapped its wings and blew more firestorm breath into the quicksand. 

I realized my trap wouldn't actually hold that much longer and rushed through the forest towards the beam of light that I hoped would provide my exit from this terrible situation.

There were more battles ahead, and I was rushing headlong into another unknown trial. The last thing I wanted was to push myself to the brink and use Last Stand to defeat the racoon only to be dropping into a difficult challenge while suffering the after effects of Last Stand.

My back was still healing, but I could feel the burn as my skin repaired itself, the final stages of regeneration telling me I was close to being healthy once again.

AN - My bad, here's the chapter.