Hey, I didn't expect anyone to guess how this would continue. Congrats, Frog in Lily Pad!.
Just a side note: no, this obviously isn't the Black Dragon you're thinking of. Think of it as Asterius's version from this fanfic. But... well, it is the same type of monster as the OEBD. It could end up being just as good or even better (since this one is a Xenos).
...
The battle had turned into a one-sided massacre.
Despite being the absolute elite of Orario, they didn't stand a chance. The black dragon's speed wasn't anything special, but what was truly unbeatable was its crimson beam.
It was almost instantaneous. There was no charging point, no accumulation of magical energy they could read. One second the jaws would open, and the next millisecond death was already slicing through space.
A gunshot ripped through the air in front of Gareth. The dwarf fell backward, his reflexes at their limit. The beam didn't touch his flesh, but the oppressive heat of its proximity disintegrated his entire beard in an instant, leaving his face smoking and dazed against the ground.
Tione lay unconscious several meters back, buried under the rubble of a collapsed balcony. Bete groaned with impotent fury, leaning against a wall split in two, unable to move with his right leg bent at an unnatural angle.
Only Finn and Ais remained unharmed.
Everything had fallen apart too quickly. The black monster had ripped a stone pillar from its foundation and used it like a bat against Tiona. The Amazon had been flung through the air like a rag doll.
The fire dragon accompanying Bell had burst into the sky to intervene, but the encounter was pathetic. Its flames didn't even make a scratch; it took a couple of direct hits to the body and merely caught Tiona in its mid-air jaws before fleeing the street.
Finn felt his muscles burning, unsure exactly how long they'd been fighting for their lives. But if Riveria hadn't returned yet after removing Cranel's remains, it meant this whole ordeal had unfolded in a pathetically short span. Seconds. Maybe a couple of minutes at most.
Finn dodged a block of molten stone, squeezing the shaft of his spear until his fingernails dug into his palms.
"Damn it!" spat the Pallum.
The emerald sky intermittently spat out new Infernals. Molten stone meteorites crashed into the street and, for some incomprehensible reason, ignored the adventurers to hurl themselves blindly at the black dragon.
They were torn to pieces in the blink of an eye, but those few seconds of distraction were the only thing that kept them breathing.
Finn used one of those encounters to analyze his opponent. Although the beast was devastating on the ground, it would hover just inches above the ground for brief moments while moving.
It could fly.
Pallum had no idea why the monster wasn't gaining altitude to bombard them with its beam from a blind spot. He didn't care about the reason; if the creature took flight, the fight would become virtually impossible to win.
Ais gave the beast no respite. Taking advantage of an Infernal blocking the dragon's vision, the Sword Princess slipped under its guard and aimed directly for the chest wound.
The flesh crater had been partially sealed by the burns that Bell's dragon had inflicted on it (literally the only useful contribution of its fire), but it was still the only crack in the armor.
Desperate cut through the charred fabric.
The black dragon unleashed a roar that shook the stones, filled with pain and pure fury. With a violent swing of its arm, it struck Ais squarely. The impact lifted her off the ground and hurled her through the facades of several houses, through walls, and buried her in the distant rubble.
Gareth didn't waste a microsecond. Pushing his heavy muscles beyond their limits, the dwarf became a blur of pure speed, raising his axe to slice through his throat. But before the steel could even graze the scales, a tail whipped through the air like a dark lash.
The blow struck Gareth in the torso. The dwarf was thrown back and rolled violently against the pavement. The force of the impact ripped his helmet from his head, sending him bouncing directly at the monster's feet.
Finn watched as the dragon picked up Gareth's helmet with the tips of its claws, stared at it for a few moments, and then placed it on its head.
Finn's mind short-circuited. 'What the hell...? Is it an intelligent monster?'
He was the only one still active on the entire battlefield, staring death straight in the face. He gripped the spear with both hands. If he was going to die, he would do so by plunging the weapon into his eye.
The black dragon didn't even look at him.
The beast raised its face to the greenish sky. It took a deep breath, sucking in the wind from the alley, and let out a roar that shook the city's foundations.
"COME OUT NOW, RABBIT! I KNOW YOU'RE ALIVE. WHY ARE YOU SENDING THESE WEAKLINGS TO SAVE YOUR SKIN? COME AND FIGHT LIKE A REAL MONSTER!"
Finn froze completely. His hands trembled around the flagpole and his breath caught in his throat.
The monster... had just spoken.
He gripped his spear, ready to launch a suicidal attack, when a voice pierced the emerald wind.
"REA LAEVATEINN!"
The black dragon looks down at the magic circle formed under its claws. Leaping back it opened its jaws and unleashed its red beam straight into the elf's inferno that formed under it.
Both powers collided in the middle of the street.
The shockwave shattered the remaining glass for three blocks around. The energy surge illuminated the ruins with a blinding glare. At the peak of the spell, Riveria gritted her teeth, the veins in her neck bulging from the monumental effort of holding her breath against the sheer annihilation of the enemy lightning.
The dragon landed, rooted to the ground, momentarily occupied in devouring the elf's flames. It was the only millisecond of real distraction in the entire exchange.
And Bell Cranel didn't waste it.
Emerging from the alley smoke like a ghost, the boy closed the distance in a blur of speed. He raised his sword and unleashed a brutal slash against the creature's side. But the dragon, without interrupting its lightning duel with Riveria, twisted its hips and used its tail like a whip.
The blast swept through space and nearly hit Bell, forcing him to back away.
A few meters away, Finn watched the scene, completely petrified.
The boy had been headless just minutes before. The Pallum knew the reality of a mutilated body; he knew the boy from the Hestia Familia was dead.
And yet, there he was, rising again, unscathed, throwing himself against a calamity without hesitating for a single fraction of a second.
In his forty-two years of life, Finn Deimne had never experienced such an overwhelming feeling.
He had built his entire existence around a single goal: to be the light of the Pallums, to be a hero. But he had always admitted deep down that he was a calculating, artificial leader, someone who didn't quite fit the genuine, immaculate mold of classical heroism.
But what stood before his eyes was different. It was the absolute embodiment of everything he had ever longed for.
Watching the white-haired boy wield his sword against the apocalypse, the veteran captain of the Loki Familia felt his deepest longing take shape, breathe, and bleed before him. It was his dream physically manifested in the world.
'I want to be like him.'
Bell recovered in a flash and charged again. The exchange of blows resumed in a burst of sparks.
Riveria was no slouch either. Every time the claws threatened to corner the boy, she would chant Rea Laevateinn, forcing the dragon to change course to avoid the full force of the blast or baiting the dragon into dodging and cancelling the chant.
Bell immediately stood in front of the monster and unleashed his magic at point-blank range.
"EXPLOSION!"
A massive explosion erupted at the exact point of contact. The shockwave ripped through the pavement beneath them and pushed the immense mass of the dragon several meters back, its claws dragging along the ground.
The smoke slowly dissipated. The monster shook its immense head. Its nostrils flared and expelled two dense columns of dark smoke. As the mist cleared, he saw that the scales on its chest showed no sign of damage.
He hadn't retreated because of the damage; he had simply moved aside to avoid swallowing ash.
"YES! THAT'S IT. FIGHT!" roared the black dragon. His cavernous voice shook the rubble. "THIS IS HOW I'LL ENJOY KILLING YOU, PERMANENTLY!"
In the rear, Riveria frowned sternly. She gripped her staff and pointed it directly at the creature's torso.
"Harbinger of the end, the white snow. Blow with the wind before the twilight. Closing light, the freezing land. Blizzard, the three severe winters, my name is Alf Wynn Fimbulvetr!"
This time there was no body to use as a shield.
The magic struck with full force, enveloping the dragon in the icy spell.
The dragon broke through the surface crust of ice with a simple flick of its shoulders. On the outside, its black scales appeared undisturbed. It immediately lunged at Bell to crush him, but as its claw sliced through the air, it was clear that it was slower.
Bell dodged the blow by a margin of several centimeters. The cold hadn't broken the monster's armor, but it had managed to penetrate, freezing the internal moisture of its muscles and slowing its joints.
Sensing its own body's slowness, the dragon aborted the melee combat. It took a heavy leap backward, gaining distance to resume its long-range slaughter.
It opened its jaws suddenly, igniting the crimson glow in its throat.
But the bundle of hyperpressurized acidic blood came out in fits and starts, losing its straight line.
The attack was interrupted by a series of coughs that shook the dragon figure, forcing it to spit out chunks of bloody ice that fell to the ground.
As the dragon coughed up chunks of bloody ice, Finn's figure became a blur.
The captain of the Loki Familia closed the distance in an instant. He knew perfectly well that striking the armor was suicide, so he aimed for the only viable opening.
His spear pierced deep into the raw flesh crater in the monster's chest.
The dragon let out a shriek of pain that made the rubble tremble.
Finn wasn't satisfied with just one thrust. He gripped the shaft with all his might, planted his boots on the shattered ground, and dragged the blade through the exposed tissue. The blade sliced through muscle and tendon, opening a new, wider gash.
A gigantic, bloody X was etched on the torso, one of Bell's and one of Finn's.
Before Finn could retrieve his weapon to retreat, a huge black claw closed around the metal shaft.
Finn tried to pull, but the force was overwhelming. He refused to let go of his spear out of pure instinct. That second of stubbornness was his undoing.
The dragon lifted the weapon in one brutal jerk, raising the Pallum into the air, and slammed him like a rag against the molten pavement.
The impact shattered his guard and knocked the air out of his lungs. Finn finally released his grip. The momentum of the collision sent him bouncing off the rocks, launching him back into the air.
He was left completely defenseless, suspended in the air for a fraction of a second.
The monster adjusted its grip on the spear. It drew its massive arm back and unleashed all the tension in its muscles, using the adventurer's weapon as if it were a simple javelin.
A muffled buzz broke the emerald wind.
The tip of his own spear struck Finn in the stomach.
The steel tore through his armor, skin, and organs, piercing him from side to side. The brute force of the throw dragged him several meters backward through the air, before slamming him violently against the facade of a building.
The blade pierced the stone with a dull crunch.
Finn coughed up a mouthful of blood. His feet dangled in midair, nearly a meter off the ground, impaled against the wall.
Bell gritted his teeth and propelled himself forward, but the sky creaked above them.
A massive meteor crashed directly between them. The shockwave forced them to shield their faces. It was a colossal Infernal, easily more than three times the size of previous Infernals, like a veritable mountain.
The rock giant stepped between Bell and the dragon. It opened its jaws and unleashed a deep roar that shook the pavement.
Instantly, a pressure shot through Bell's spine. His muscles tensed to their limit.
A sharp pain shot through his forehead, and in the blink of an eye, two horns emerged from his skull. An overwhelming force flooded his bloodstream.
[What a horrible night to have a curse]
The black dragon charged at the stone giant.
But this time, the Infernal did not disintegrate. It withstood the impact head-on. It raised its enormous fist engulfed in green flames and delivered a brutal hook to the monster's jaw, forcing the dragon to stumble backward.
Out of the corner of his eye, Bell caught a glimpse of movement in the ruins. Yharon swooped down, snatched Finn's body in its jaws, pulled him from the wall, and took flight to carry him away from the carnage.
Bell took a step back to match the High Elf.
"Go and heal him!" Bell ordered.
"No!" Riveria retorted. "Neutralizing the threat is the priority. He can hold out if there's a decent healer in the backline."
Without hesitation, Riveria raised her staff and began to concentrate chanting Wynn Fimbulvetr, knowing that the extreme cold and the slowing of the dragon's joints were the only real advantage they had.
The black dragon saw the magic light gather. Completely ignoring the green fire that was beginning to burn its scales and melt its skin, it crouched down and closed its claw directly around the leg of the colossal Infernal.
With a display of physical strength and violence that defied all logic, the dragon used the stone giant as if it were a simple bat.
He spun around and swept down the entire street with his body engulfed in flames.
Bell read the trajectory in the last microsecond. He kicked the ground and threw himself to the bottom of a hole. The immense mass of molten stone whizzed past inches from his back.
Riveria was in the middle of chanting.
The burning body of the Infernal one slammed into her like a freight train.
The resulting Ignis fattus launched Riviera into the air at a ridiculous speed, smashing through structures and tearing through the ruins of Orario until she vanished completely into the distance. She would survive, but she had just been wiped off the battlefield.
Bell slowly rose from the crater. He brushed the dust off his sword.
Now he was alone.
The infernal colossus crashed into the wreckage several dozen meters away, dragging tons of rock and green fire in its fall.
The black dragon shook its charred claw and fixed its bloodshot eyes on its latest prey. The beast advanced with heavy, cracking footsteps, ready to crush the white-haired boy.
Bell did not raise his sword to defend himself.
Instead, he planted his feet firmly on the cobblestones and extended his empty left hand to the side.
The dragon stopped for a microsecond. That posture made no logical sense. That wide-open guard confused him.
That moment of hesitation was all it took.
A white flash split the emerald sky.
A projectile descended from the clouds at an immeasurable speed, slicing through the atmosphere with a deafening roar. It crossed the space between the monster and the boy like a flash of pure light.
The black dragon's left wing crossed the path of the white lightning. The membrane, the thick sinews, and the dark bones were disintegrated from base to tip in an explosion of divine light and acidic blood.
The monster roared, unbalanced by the instant and brutal amputation of its limb.
The flight of the white projectile stopped with a snap.
The shockwave blew dust around Bell. The boy held the projectile firmly in his outstretched hand. Pure, bluish light pulsed through the divine metal, dispelling the darkness of the alley and revealing its shape.
The Artemis Spear.
"You took too long to call me," the goddess's crystalline voice echoed, flowing directly into his consciousness through the weapon. Her tone was meant to sound stern, but it concealed a clear, anguished tremor. "I felt so... powerless. I felt our connection almost completely fade away just a few minutes ago."
Bell knew exactly what she meant.
He let out a small laugh, tightening his grip on the shiny pole.
"Forgive me, Artemis. I promise it won't happen again."
Bell twirled the spear in his hand, pointed the divine blade directly at the mutilated dragon, and lowered his center of gravity, adopting a perfect fighting stance.
—
Bell used the same technique on him that the dragon used on Mikoto.
And yes, I like sending people through buildings.