At first, the terrifying Divine Beast only had eyes for Bebe. To it, the scent of the little mouse’s blood was almost heavenly, but when it heard Ace’s words, its aloof reptilian eyes focused on the human beside its main prey.
Due to its rank, it was unable to speak in human tongue, but as a Divine Beast, its intelligence couldn’t be compared to other beasts of the same level. Its intelligence was already comparable to that of a human teenager. As such, it was more than capable of understanding Ace’s words.
It hadn’t met many other dragons due to growing up in the Mountain Range of Magical Beasts instead of the forest of darkness where the dragon pit was located. Still, it had met a myriad of other Beasts, including various types of lizards, and without fail, none of them could compare to it.
It may not know much about its lineage, but what it did know was that it was no mere lizard. The fact that a human dared to say that was an insult to its supreme bloodline. Since this human was in such a hurry to die, it would kill him first before focusing on his primary target.
It wasn’t just him. Even Linley felt insulted by Ace’s remark, especially as he was fully aware that at least two of the ‘lizards’ Ace was referring to were he and his brother. Still, he knew now was neither the time nor the place to say anything, as Ace and Bebe were likely about to be in for the battle of their lives.
As he looked up at the beast, though, he felt a slight affinity to it. The longer he looked at it, the more his blood thrummed with excitement as it coursed through his vein. It was hard to put into words, but if he had to try, the only word that came to mind was ancestral.
Of course, it didn’t make much sense to him, especially when considering he was human and the dragon before him was clearly still an infant, but it was how he felt all the same.
“Does he have to provoke everyone he meets?” Julius asked helplessly.
Even though he heard Ace say he wasn’t confident, like the rest of his classmates, Julius had unwavering faith in Ace. In his eyes, Ace was unbeatable, and their time in the wild this last month had only cemented that viewpoint, so whilst he acknowledged the fearfulness of the dragon before them, he didn’t feel all that worried…
Until he heard Amira’s voice. “That… That’s an Azure Dragon!”
“Ooh, you recognize it?” Cowart asked with a hint of surprise as even he didn’t recognise it despite his wealth of experience.
“My family’s library has many books documenting various types of Divine Beasts. But of all the various types of Divine Beasts, there were four that stood at the very peak. That Dragon, it’s infinitely smaller than the one I read about, but it’s still the spitting image of a genuine Azure Dragon!” Amira explained, the worry on her face quickly turning to anger, frustration, and resentment as she turned to the ghost-like old man. “And because of you, I can’t even help him!”
Doehring could only smile wryly at her words and say nothing as he knew she wasn’t wrong. Still, he didn’t regret his decision. It was the only way he could save both his disciple and Bebe. ‘If it comes down to it, I’ll use what’s left of my strength to ensure all of you get away safely.’
Thinking to there, Cowart couldn’t help but give the light-skinned girl beside him another glance.
Before his ‘death’, Doehring Cowart was quite the scholar. What kind of library hadn’t he visited during his time? He’d heard of Divine Beasts, but any information on them was scarce, to say the least – they were simply too rare. Yet this girl seemed to know far more about them than even he did.
‘There’s definitely more to her than meets the eye.’ The former saint thought to himself as he turned his attention back to Ace, his interest piqued. ‘What’s the deal with these freakish kids?!’
Ace and Bebe had no idea what the others were talking about. They couldn’t afford to lower their guard against a Beast like this for even a second.
Upon making its decision to kill Ace first, the dragon didn’t hesitate in taking a nose dive towards the ground, its ferocious maw wide open as if it wanted to swallow the infuriating human whole.
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But both Ace and Bebe prided themselves on their speed, and with both of them receiving a buff in the form of [Supersonic] – Ace from Amira and Bebe from Linley – their speed was incomparable to what it was when they fought each other, not long ago.
Like a flash, they separated, allowing the dragon to bite down on nothing but earth.
And before it could regain its bearings, Ace had already returned, standing right beside him. His [Haki] coated glaive tore through the air as it aimed to split the scales on its neck and kill it in one go, but despite its head still being buried in the ground, its tail shot forth like a whip clashing with Ace’s blade.
“Ugh!” Ace grunted as he slid backwards along the ground, his arms almost numb from that one clash.
‘That thing’s power is no joke,’ Ace thought as he studied the beast in front of him with an oddly nostalgic smile suffusing his lips. ‘It almost reminds me of that freak Kaido.’
As that thought crossed his mind, his blood began to boil with excitement. Whilst a member of the Whitebeard pirates in his previous life, he had watched ‘Pops’ clash with ‘The King of Beasts’ once or twice over the years. He had always aspired to stand at that level one day, and although he couldn’t in his last life, he could in this one.
The dragon watched as Ace vanished from his position, appearing right before it. It would be lying if it said it wasn’t surprised by the speed of the little human. It had to admit that as far as speed went, it was slightly inferior, but unlike Bebe, speed wasn’t an attribute it was particularly proud of. No, that was its virtually impenetrable scales and its peerless strength.
Ace watched as the Dragon thrust its claw at his face. He could tell just from the way the wind howled around it that if the claw were to land, his head would instantly be reduced to paste, but he had no intention of trying to compete with it in raw power. Instead, he skilfully used his blade to slap the claws up whilst he ducked, narrowly avoiding death.
Just parrying took more strength than he would’ve liked, but the smile on his face only widened as he came to that realisation. The thrill of battling against such a powerful opponent was almost overwhelming.
If he were alone, he would love to go crazy and really push himself to his limits in a battle to the death against the Divine Dragon, but he couldn’t afford to do that, not with Amira and fatty being there, especially in their condition.
Instead, he sent a message he knew Amira would understand. As he danced around the dragon, parrying and dodging each attack, he suddenly tapped the upper rear of his neck.
Other than Amira, Cowart was the only member of the group that saw Ace’s action, but he couldn’t figure out what it meant.
“Linley,” Amira called out whilst her eyes remained focused on the battle. “Can you pass a message to your partner?”
“Errm, yeah. Why?” Linley replied in confusion.
“Every dragon has something called a reverse scale. It’s a scale that’s significantly weaker in comparison to the others. Unfortunately, every dragon has theirs in a completely unique position.” Amira explained. “Luckily, it looks like Ace just found the one belonging to this specific dragon.”
Linley and the others were all shocked by that revelation. Not about dragons having reverse scales, but that Ace was able to actually locate it.
Till now, it genuinely looked as though Ace was being thoroughly suppressed and was holding on for dear life, yet somehow, he was still able to locate the ‘reverse scale’ and relay its location to Amira.
Linley could only sigh as he admitted his inferiority. Everyone considered him to be a genius seen once in a generation, but as it stood now, he and Ace couldn’t even be mentioned in the same sentence. Still, he knew now wasn’t the time to get caught up in his feelings of inferiority if they wanted to survive. He hurriedly passed the location given to him by Amira to Bebe.
Whilst Ace was fighting for his life against the dragon, Bebe had been patiently hiding in the shadows waiting for his time to act. As soon as he received the location of the reverse scale from Linley, his beady little eyes locked on to it.
On the top of its neck, hidden by part of the milky white hair on its back, was an unassuming azure scale that faced in the opposite direction compared to the others around it. If not for Ace, Bebe never would’ve noticed it, but now that he had…
The dragon had long since known where its primary target had been hiding. It had been expecting Bebe to pounce at any moment, so when Bebe made his move, an almost human smirk appeared on its face, but that smirk quickly disappeared.
From the moment that Bebe and Ace dodged his attack, it knew that they were both the speedy type, but it never expected the little rodent to be this fast. At its top speed, Bebe was even faster than Ace.
Still, it saw Ace as the bigger threat of the two. Though it had been the one dominating thus far, and Ace hadn’t been able to break its defence as yet, after clashing for so long, it understood that Ace’s weapon definitely posed a threat to it if it weren’t careful.
The moment Bebe made his move, Ace shifted gears, going from passively defending to attacking.
As the tip of Ace’s glaive shot towards its eyes, the dragon chose to ignore the rat and trust in its near impenetrable defence as its long winding tail acted like a whip striking Ace’s sinister glaive away.
Believing it had Ace right where it wanted him, the dragon prepared to pounce when it was suddenly overwhelmed by pain the likes of which it had never experienced before.
Bebe’s frighteningly sharp claws and razor-like teeth had torn straight through the dragon’s reverse scale, allowing it to deal a savage blow to its insides, causing the dragon to release a heart-wrenching roar.