Chapter 111 - The Might of an Elder Astlan Dragon (2)

Elder Kronos was beating back Kiara with just his physical prowess alone. Not once had he used a natural ability or magic to defend.

A look of small frustration crossed Kiara's face for half a second, making me think that she too had a dragon's pride. Fire, earth, and ice magic suddenly exploded outward in various forms. Spears, shards, spheres of magic, bolts of pure fire and ice—everything Kiara could form—were fired toward her opponent.

So much magic of the three elements Kiara could control surrounded the sparring field, making it seem more like a battlefield. The air shimmered with the glints of ice, the solidness of earth, and the blaze of fire.

All of the magic came bursting forth from various directions, and soon surrounded the two opponents, making it impossible to see them. The impact was jarring and powerful. When the explosion of dirt, ice, fire, and earth cleared, only Elder Kronos was left standing, not even a small sign of dirt or wear on his black robe.

Kiara was left kneeling down on the pockmarked field, a few feet away from Elder Kronos. Her armor was shattered into pieces, and only a small part that was covering her breasts was left.

The victor and loser exchanged a few words, and Kiara returned with a somewhat humbled look. “Hah. To be solely defeated just by his physical abilities. One truly cannot underestimate an Elder dragon.”

I stood up, causing Aqua to take up flying from atop my head. “Nice try,” I said, not unkindly, or kindly.

“Your turn to get your ass handed to him,” Kiara said. Her expression was colorful. No doubt she and Eden had been influenced somewhat by the time they had spent with me in Shail Kingdom.

“Ah right, Eden. I won't say anything about fairness or any such like words. The world itself is unfair, and you can only do your best to continue living on. Live or die. Die or live. In the end, it all depends on you. And I know you try your best to live on,” I said, thinking of her secret daily training.

I walked away then, not even waiting to hear her reply.

It was out of character for me to say such words of consolation, when all my life I had only known a cold, barrenness, which was lit only by the rare, intermittent sparks of fire.

'Hey, Seraphine,' I called to the Lesser Fire Elemental in my mind. 'Is it just me, or have I somewhat changed since I have fully bonded with you?'

'You have changed, my host. We fire elementals are known for our sudden passions and temperaments. The lands we bind to are all fiery, fierce, and ever so changing. We are known as the capricious elementals.'

'So my emotions will become more like yours?'

'Not so, my host. My bond with you is still developing and even fully developed, it will only affect you moderately. Your very soul limits my influences. It's as if your soul was born missing something.'

'That's saddening to hear...to have my human soul be called a damaged soul.'

'I apologize if that was too blunt. The bond you and I have works both ways.'

'I am not sure whether that was a subtle insult aimed at me, or just your trouble with words. But I shall leave it alone.'

'I have your best interests in mind, my host. I owe you my life, after all.'

'I do wonder though. Why is it that you did not bind with Navra?'

There was silence as Seraphine thought over my question. 'Your broodkeeper or father, I suppose, scares me. He is on the level of a Greater Elemental, perhaps even an Elemental King. If I had bonded with him, I would have most likely been absorbed by the power of his soul. That, and he is far older than me.'

I let out a small chuckle in my mind. 'I will speak to you later, Seraphine.'

I mentally said my farewell toward Seraphine while facing Elder Kronos, who was standing patiently with a calm, unperturbed expression.

'Good luck, my friend.'

Friend, huh. I silently thought to myself as I felt Seraphine retreating back to the depths of my mind.

“Verath,” Elder Kronos said. “Out of all the dozens of dragons I have trained over the centuries, you are by far the strongest.”

I felt a little surprised at that. Compliments from the Elder were rare, especially a compliment such as that.

“Thank you,” I said, adopting a respective stance by lowering my head slightly. The lowering of your head, especially among dragons, was a universal gesture of deference to the receiver.

“Furthermore, you are a black dragon, an unexplainable color with unexplainable powers.” His dark, brown eyes turned sharp. “I do sometimes wonder how you came to be. I just cannot imagine Malia giving birth to you.”

“Perhaps I am just a rare color like white or violet,” I said in a calm voice that did not betray the slight nervousness I felt.

“Perhaps...perhaps. I also find it strange that just a few months after Eldest Navra became your broodkeeper, Malia decided to leave our lands, cutting of all connections with the Astlan clans.”

I was surprised, but I did not let it show on my face. My face was, as usual, calm and indifferent.

Malia, my fake mother and my first broodkeeper, had disappeared a few months after I had been adopted by the Eldest? I had never once been told that by Navra! It was beyond suspicious.

“What would a dragon like me who has not even passed his third tribulation know about her? In fact, this is the first time I am learning about my mother's name and whereabouts ever since Eldest Navra became my broodkeeper.”

“No matter, I was only wondering about her. That said, let us start our spar. I shall test you until I have a good grasp of your ability.”

“It will be an honor to fight with you, Elder Kronos.”

The past month of training Ancient magic, especially my blood magic, through Animus and by feeling the circulation of the ancient blood that runs through my dragon body, and my human soul tainted with other ancient souls and dragon-serpent blood, I had improved considerably. Kiara, who had been the strongest out of the three of us, could now only put up a few minutes worth of fighting and land only a few attacks against me.

My mastery of the Ancient dragon language had also improved considerably due to Elder Kronos' teachings. Learning Ancient dragon magic had three parts to it—the learning of the language itself, the simulation of your dragon soul through Animus, and the practice to familiarize yourself with the spells, allowing you to better tune and transform your normal magic into ancient magic.

Virdus Vict Sangius, I quietly said inside my mind.

At those words, I felt ancient magic power pour out of my body and surround me in my Dragon Living Blood Armor. It was the crystallization of my blood through Ancient blood magic. Then I materialized Sangius, using some of my blood in its making. I reached out for the materialized scarlet longsword with its three and a half feet length. Gripped in my right hand, the blade felt perfectly balanced with its somewhat large hilt, and hilt guard to allow for my part-dragon transformation. It gave out a dull, red glow and looked almost entirely similar to a steel longsword, except for its unnatural red glow. Finally, I covered the entirety of my body with a black colored magic aura.

The whole process had taken only about one second and a half. I was now ready to face Elder Kronos, who had been waiting patiently for me to finish transforming. He stood about ten feet away, and as usual, was giving his opponent the first strike.

I took the handicap without even one second of hesitation or guilt. There was no need to feel prideful or guilty before Elder Kronos, when none of us could even put a scratch on him or his black robe.

Vescretur Sangius.

The Ancient dragon words meant Hunting Blood.

At this thought, four fist-sized spheres of magic mixed with my own blood floated above me, while at the same time weakening me, even more than when I had materialized my weapon. Each of these spheres shot out three flexible blood spikes that followed its target. Just like the name suggests, the spheres of blood hunted its target. Ceaselessly, never stopping or resting until my magic ran out.

The three blood spikes of each sphere seemed to have a will of their own and could follow their intended target for a reach of twenty feet. This meant that the blood spike could reach from twenty feet away to kill its target.

The magic spell was costly to me, however. The four spheres, which was my limit at the moment, consumed around 1/10 of my blood reserves, the amount that was safe for me to use without me feeling impaired. Using this blood magic spell immediately weakened me just like Sangius, which consumed about 1/20 of my blood reserves. I would not, however, feel the full effects until I used up my entire blood reserves.

“Ohoh, interesting. I have never seen you use such magic before,” Elder Kronos said, a somewhat interested look replacing his usual calm expression.

At my will, the four Hunting Blood spheres started shooting out their blood spikes, and a total of 12 blood spikes were soon following Elder Kronos around everywhere. With this start, I joined the fray, no longer directly controlling the Hunting Blood spheres. I left the control up to themselves—the Hunting Blood spheres could sense enemy blood at a range of forty feet, so unless they were out of range, I did not need to control the spheres myself.

With Sangius held in the running stance of Wandering Flame style, which was a sword stance that you always held easily outward on your sword-hand side, I charged at Elder Kronos, who was busy dodging and testing out the limits of the Hunting Blood spheres.

I instantly closed the distance between the two of us and went in with Trailing Embers, an initiator two sword-strike combo that utilized strength and mobility to quickly do a downward slash that changes into a sideways diagonal slash midway during execution. It was an aggressive move used to shred the opponent's stance and chest using strength and built-up momentum.

Sangius descended downward into a simultaneous attack with the six blood spikes from the spheres. Elder Kronos was a font of calmness, however. He quickly struck his fist into my stomach, launching me backward with the blood armor covering my stomach shattered into pieces. It had happened so quickly that my blood armor did not even have time to recover its damage!

When I recovered and was no longer looking at the upturned sky and ground, I realized that I had been blown more than twenty feet away. All four of my Blood Hunting spheres were also cut into tiny pieces, which laid in shambles within ten feet of Elder Kronos.

I quickly searched around for Sangius and found it lying about seven feet away from me. It must have dropped when I had been blown back. Manipulating the blood inside Sangius, I called the weapon back into my hand. It was a useful thing, which I had discovered after learning Vescretur Sangius, or Hunting Blood. Within a range of forty feet, I could instantly recall Sangius back into my hands through the blood connection; I only needed to expend a little amount of magic, an inconsequential amount, really.

I calculated the amount of blood reserves and magic reserves I had remaining, based on my usage of spells and the slight weakness I felt. I had about 6/10 blood reserves remaining if I counted the usage from the previous team battle with Elder Kronos. For my magic reserves, I was still in the clear. I probably had about 9/10 remaining, since blood magic spells that consume my blood used very little magic.

If my entire blood reserves were gone, I would start feeling the full effects, instead of just a temporary weakening, and lose about 25% of my full physical abilities, and could possibly even faint if I used more than what was the safe amount. I had tested it out multiple times, and the numbers resulted to around there with me fainting when I lost about 40% of my blood, twice of what was the safe blood reserves amount (20% of my blood).

“I have to admit,” Elder Kronos said while walking toward me. “I actually needed to use a little magic physical reinforcement to block that attack just now, else I would have been injured. Now then, we shall stop the spar so that I can see your control of earth and fire magic. Use nothing else.”

“Very well,” I said.

Ever since I had become fully bound to Seraphine, the Lesser Fire Elemental, my mastery and affinity of fire magic had become twice my earth magic. I was most likely equal or perhaps even stronger than Eden with fire magic.

I absorbed Sangius along with my Dragon Living Blood Amor back into my body and felt a little blood and magic return to me. With my black-colored magic aura still surrounding my entire body, I shaped my normal fire magic into ancient fire magic which caused conflagrations to cover both of my hands—it was a similar technique Eden used when she was in her Dragon Fire Armor.

Covering both my hands with these fire was my limit, however. I still did not have much control over basic Ancient fire magic. Eden, for example, could form the Dragon Fire Armor and cover her whole body with these conflagrations, and could even turn her entire hair into living flames.

“Proceed to earth magic now,” Elder Kronos instructed.

I stopped the fire magic and started earth magic, which was my weakest element. I could not even use Ancient earth magic. Pouring forth as much magic as I could, I formed an earthen sphere with a twenty feet radius to my right side. It took a few seconds for the sphere to fully form, since that was my limit without further extreme consumption of magic.

“Alright, I have finished estimating your magic and power now.”

Hearing that, I stopped putting froth magic into the earthen sphere and started flattening it into the ground. Soon, there was only a huge pile of earth and dirt left.

“Gather up, Eden and Kiara,” Elder Kronos said toward the two female dragons who were sitting on the flat rock.

On the sidelines was also Aqua, who came over to me, seeing that I had finished my spar.

“I will show you three Aural Weaving now.”

I was a little excited hearing that. I was quite curious as to how Aural Weaving for dragons worked. The human mages, after all, could even trap Eden and Kiara inside once they started working in concert together. The enormous amount of magic I had felt from their weaving was not inconsiderable, far more than what I was able to produce by myself.

“Before one can even begin Aural Weaving with others, you have to become familiar with the dragons you plan to Aural Weave with. But since the three of you are a little more familiar with each other, you can begin Aural Weaving. Now close your eyes.”

Closing my eyes, I continued listening to his instructions.

“Feel the circulation of your dragon blood, your Animus, and reach into the depths of your soul. Everything stems from there, including Ancient dragon magic. I will now use some of my Ancient magic to temporarily force open a magic channel inside your soul, connecting it with the circulation of your blood. Note, however, that this will only be temporary. It is merely a method for you to feel your own magic channel and become familiarized with it, so that you can open it yourself.”

I could suddenly sense strong magic coming from Elder Kronos. It was a refined and powerful magic, sharp and honed to perfection throughout the centuries. None of us could emit such a powerful magic.

A thought came unbidden into my mind. Would Aural Weaving even work with my human soul? What if the others, especially Elder Kronos, somehow sensed the other two souls bound to me?

Deeply alarmed, I quickly went into the depths of my mind, following the bond I had with Seraphine. The familiar fiery land and the darkness-covered desert soon entered my vision.

“Codrixas!” I shouted in a hurry.

A dark form, similar in shape and appearance, except for the two red glowing eyes, appeared before me, near the boundary of the darkness-covered desert.

Codrixas answered before I could even ask about my concerns. “You need not worry. The Deathwalker and I are so deeply intertwined and bounded to your soul that nothing will seem out of place. Your human soul is also more like a dragon soul than ever, possibly due to the blood running through your veins. I must admit though, it is an irony that you are the offspring of that red dragon.”

“I see. So I had nothing to worry about. Thanks.”

“I do not need your thanks, my other self. Consider my advice a future investment...” Near the end, his voice trailed off, and Codrixas was no longer seen, retreating back into the darkness-covered desert.

Almost immediately, I felt a blast of magic sear my very soul, opening up a magic channel. It was the magic of Elder Kronos. I opened my eyes, and soon saw Elder Kronos blasting magic into Eden, who was the last of us in line.

“Familiarize yourself with the temporary magic channel I opened, and when you become more familiar with it, you can Aural Weave both ancient magic and normal magic into the channel. Send out a link of magic to each other and the channels will become connected through that link of magic. Once connected, the three of you can combine your magic into one and form a spell. Guidance of the spell, however, should come from a lead dragon with the others helping. I suggest using normal magic first.”

Through the magic channel that had opened up inside me, I formed two faint, black-colored magic links which slowly extended outward from my body and connected with the magic links of Kiara and Eden.

I felt their souls in my soul as our magic links connected with each other. Kiara's was a cool blue, steady and unyielding at one time, yet formless and shapeless the next. Eden's, on the other hand, was a blazing fire full of determination.

“That will be all for today's short testing. The three of you can continue experimenting with Aural Weaving, though I suggest not to use it too long. Also, there will be a one week break before we resume training, since I have something I must attend to.” Saying that, Elder Kronos disappeared.

Thus, for some time, the three of us began testing Aural Weaving, with each of us giving up the leading guidance once a turn was over. Our magic became significantly stronger, and during Kiara's lead, more than three hundred feet by three hundred feet square of the valley became encased in solid ice.

At Eden's turn, she shot out an enormous fireball that blotted out almost the whole sky and set part of the valley on fire. It was quite troublesome, and we had to spend some time extinguishing the fire.

When Kiara and Eden left the valley in late afternoon, almost nighttime, only Aqua and I were left in the valley, which had burnt marks and ice marks in some parts.

“Don't forget, Verath,” Aqua reminded, “we are going to visit my sisters.”

Aqua's sisters, huh. I had only met them for a short time, while I had been on a small break, and had saved Aqua from a wild beast. During that time, I had kept to myself as much as possible.

“Ah right, I remember they aren't as annoying as you,” I said in a slightly joking voice.

My teasing did not have much effect on Aqua. “Hmph, I know you cannot live without me, for I am your caretaker.” Saying that, Aqua made water dance around her in a theatrical fashion. It would have been quite an impressive display, had it not been for the end where she wet herself from the water magic she was controlling. After all, Aqua was not known as The Clumsy One among her sisters for nothing.