Chapter 209

Getting through 100 stamina was no joke, even for Luke. Sheer mass also factored into the equation, and despite hammering the dragon with more than a dozen hits infused with [Power Strike], it was still alive. Not only had Animar survived the poison Luke had given it with [Inflict Status], the damn thing actually seemed to be recovering.

Scales littered the ground around Luke’s feet as he struck Animar’s skull over and over again. Just as he charged up the twentieth hit, he heard the mental ding of a notification. Since the dragon was obviously still alive, Luke had to check it to see what had happened.

[Congratulations! Power Strike has reached rank 3. 1000 XP awarded.]

Luke felt the difference immediately. If he’d still been using his old mace with the amount of strength he’d had a few months ago, it would have broken right then and there. Lightning and fire raced each other out from Luke’s chest and down his arm to form a crackling, pale silver aura around the mace. When it stuck, the impact boomed out so loud it echoed across the valley and something finally cracked in Animar’s face.

Luke started swearing as soon as he pulled the mace back. All that had snapped was a layer of scales. The skin had parted, revealing the same black bone that his mace was crafted from. Hakiro’s aunt hadn’t been kidding about the stuff being practically indestructible. The skin and muscles were split down to the bone, but it was unmarred.

“Well this isn’t going to fucking work, is it,” Luke said. “I’m half-tempted to just leave you here, but I don’t need you coming after me again if you do manage to stand back up.”

There was really no excuse to give up after a mere thirty seconds. He hadn’t even run out [Life Surge] yet. It was abundantly clear to Luke that he wasn’t getting through Animar’s skull, and he doubted he could break any ribs or limbs either. That did not mean he was out of options, however.

“I am ashamed to admit this to you, but right now I do kind of wish I had a sword.” Luke paused. “Nah, fuck that. I wish I had a spear. That would be perfect. But, well, work with what you’ve got, right?”

Then Luke smacked Animar in the eye with his mace. The dragon flinched and tried to claw its way to its feet, but the poison was still in full-swing. Luke struck it again, and again, and again. It turned out that pearlescent dragon’s eyelid was surprisingly durable, even if it was only level 1. It took Luke sixteen swings, each one fully infused with [Power Strike]at its new and improved rank 3, to tear the scales aside and strike some sort of glass-like coating protecting the orb. That wasn’t dragon bone, at least, and within three blows, Luke could see small tears in the membrane.

It was gruesome work, but Luke put out a dragon’s eye, then jammed his mace in the empty socket and scrambled its brains. At first, he thought that somehow even that wasn’t going to do it, but ten seconds later, he got another ding.

[You have slain Ancient Pearlescent Dragon (lvl 1). 1 XP awarded.]
[This creature has slain 32214 other creatures.]
[Total kills for this type of creature: 1.]
[Highest level kill: 1.]

That was the hardest single point of XP he’d ever worked for, and Luke was struck with the vague sense that he’d destroyed something irreplaceable. It had taken Animar thousands of years to reach the age and size it was. Literally thirty-two thousand other creatures had lost their lives to keep that dragon alive. Who was Luke to come in and say he knew better?

Then he remembered that one of those creatures had been his own father. Luke might not have liked Bill Bennet all that much, but he wouldn’t have wished that fate on anyone. And from the sounds of it, his dad had gotten his shit together after arriving on Aros and spent the better part of twenty years on the same quest Luke was on now.

He’d probably helped a lot more people along the way than Luke had. If he was being honest with himself, Luke had been a very selfish man who’d very rarely helped anyone just because they needed it. The only times he could think of where he’d done something good just because it was the right thing to do was saving that orphan girl in Kazos after she’d been crushed under a giant hunk of steel in an old abandoned factory and killing that necromancer with the slave caravan.

With a sigh, Luke extracted himself from the corpse of the pearlescent dragon and started walking away. The body was probably worth a kingdom’s ransom, but he couldn’t make himself care. Maybe he’d show it to Zea once he got her back. She’d probably like that. Or she’d bitch and moan about how much money they were leaving behind. That actually sounded more like her, now that he thought about it.

He’d find out soon enough. The cathedral that was the God Machine was less than a day away now.

* * *

“I can’t believe this,” Barshar rumbled as he watched a simple human fell the unquestioned Lord of All Skies with nothing but a simple mace.

“It’s… impossible,” Velka agreed. “Some trick of Animar’s?”

“What would be the point? Besides, illusions don’t smell, and Animar is clearly dead. I can smell the blood and brains from here.”

The two dragons were perched on a neighboring peak, only seven miles away. They’d caught the entire fight, if it could even be called that. The human had beat on Animar for a minute or so, and then walked away after killing him. It was inconceivable.

“But did you see at the beginning? Animar had him. That human isn’t invincible. A surprise attack is all it would take to end him. And think of the bragging rights, to kill the human who’d slain Animar himself,” Barshar said.

“Do not do something foolish, Barshar,” Velka warned.

“You are too timid. I can’t believe we came from the same clutch,” Barshar said. “Watch, and see how a true dragon hunts.”

Fire filled his belly and he spread his wings. Silent as only a dragon could be on the wind, Barshar caught up with the human in minutes. He swooped low, secure in the knowledge that his [Shadow in the Sun] skill would keep him hidden, and unleashed dragonfire on the unsuspecting human.

Barshar strafed through the air, then turned on a wing to see the devastation he’d wrought. Somehow, impossibly, the human was still alive! He was just standing there with a stupidly surprised look on his face while the stone boiled and bubbled around him. His skin was barely reddened from the heat. In all his many, many centuries, Barshar had never seen a human so completely resist his dragonfire.

His eyes narrowed as he spotted a fine chain hanging around the human’s neck. A fire eater enchantment had been etched into it, but it was weakening already. A second solid blast would be all it took to end the human’s life.

[Your XP has been reset to 0. Your level is now 1. You have 1 AP to spend.]

Barshar blinked in surprise as his stats plummeted and the many skills that aided him with his aerial acrobatics disappeared. He tumbled into an uncontrolled spin and crashed to the ground, not even a quarter of a mile away from the human. Before he could even start to understand what had just happened to him, sudden sickness surged through his limbs.

They became heavy, so heavy. It was so hard to see, to think straight. He needed to get away, to get back up in the air. This creature was no human. It was a trickster, and it had caught him in its trap. Barshar would end up just like Arimar at this rate. He tried to spread his wings, but they’d become so numb that he could barely even tell they were there.

Panic set in as the world distorted around him. He had to get away, had to flee. He… had to…

An impact rattled his face, just barely strong enough to cut through Barshar’s delirious panic and make him notice it. It was followed by another, and then another.

* * *

Luke wasn’t sure why he was surprised to find that there was more than one dragon living around the God Machine. This one didn’t shimmer with colors like the first one, instead having scales of dull, dusty red and brown. It was certainly easier to kill than the last one, but the notification said it was only an adult rust dragon.

For whatever that meant. It wasn’t like Luke was an expert on dragon society and hierarchy.

There was a third dragon watching him from about two miles away, but it made no move to attack. The things were obviously smart, at least as smart as a human anyway. It had probably seen him kill the first two and was waiting for a more opportune moment.

“I’ll tell you what,” Luke said, trusting its senses to hear him and pointing towards the building off in the distance. “You fly off. Spread the word not to fuck with me. I’m not here hunting dragons. I’m just going there. You guys leave me alone; I’ll leave you alone. Everyone wins. But I swear to God, if another one of you fuckers comes at me, I’ll put you down just as hard as the last two.”

The dragon cocked a head as he spoke. When he’d finished, it gave a whole-body shiver, spread its wings, and flew away. It was actually kind of beautiful to see in motion when it wasn’t trying to kill him. Hopefully it would do what he’d asked and he wouldn’t be bothered by any other dragons as he finished descending the mountains and crossed the few miles of flat, open ground.

The alternative was that the dragon was smart enough to go for reinforcements, and he’d have a few dozen of them descending on him all at once inside the next hour. On the off chance that he was right with that prediction, Luke broke into a loping run, one that involved a lot of risky jumps to speed up his descent.

* * *

Things were going to be dangerous in the coming years for the dragons living in the mountain range they called the Crown of the Gods. With Animar dead and one of the strongest contenders for his position defeated immediately after, there was going to be a lot of posturing and fighting for territory.

Velka’s concerns were primarily for the unhatched clutch of four eggs waiting for her back in her lair. When dragon politics got rough, the younger ones tended to die quickly. Unfortunately, the clutch was due to hatch any year now, which put them in a very tenuous position. It would be best if a few other would-be rivals met their ends at that human’s hands.

She shook that thought away even as it occurred to her. The human was too much of an unknown. Anything that could kill any dragon that quickly, let alone the Lord of All Skies, was too dangerous to try to manipulate. There was far too much potential that her plans would blow up in her face if she included such a volatile element to them.

She almost couldn’t believe she was even considering it, but it might be best to take her clutch and relocate to a different mountain range for a few decades, just until things calmed down at home.

If things calmed down at home.

She’d seen where that human was heading. Everyone knew it was impossible to walk through the doors. They’d been sealed by the gods themselves, but that human apparently thought that rule didn’t apply to him. Velka had to wonder if he was right, and if so, what that meant for the rest of the world.