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For hours, we trudged through the forest, but it was not as difficult as it sounded. The drake did most of the work for us. The path we followed was paved with flattened vegetation and plowed through branches, allowing us to stroll through in a single file without issue.

As we walked, there was one thing obvious to everyone, and that was the drastic decrease in wildlife activity. Usually, there would be the sounds of songbirds and animals making noise to attract mates or mark their terrority, and even small woodland animals scurrying about, but now, all we could hear was the sounds of insects, the howling of the wind and the rustling of leaves.

Eventually, the hunter comes running back to us, “My Lord, I have found the drake. It is sunbathing outside of a cave of a bear that used to live there, the drake either killed it or scared it off.”

“So how big is the thing? Any other information we should know about?” Dad asked the hunter.

“It is on the larger side as far as drakes get. From what I could observe, it had battle wounds, but not from human weapons, I think this drake lost a turf war for its previous territory and came here.” the hunter explained.

Dad rubbed his chin before asking, “You mentioned battle wounds. I take it that these are relatively fresh-looking wounds?” to which the hunter nodded in the affirmative.

“Nice, where is it wounded? Drake's hide is tough enough to ward off even aura-powered blows to a certain extent. If we attack its wounds, we can bypass its natural armor.” Dad said.

To which the hunter shook its head, “Nothing critical, the wounds were mainly on its face and arms, I could not see some parts of its body due to it being curled up, but that is not much help, its skull is tougher than its skin and skull, maybe the only option is to target its front limbs to disable its mobility before finishing it off?”

“I guess that is as much of an advantage we are going to get, are there any good ambush locations?” Dad asked.

Once again, the hunter shook his head “We are currently downwind of the drake, so it cannot smell us, the only advantageous position is on top of its cave, but then we would be upwind of it and lose the element of surprise.”

“Then, from the treeline it is, lead the way, Men, let's move!” Dad said to the hunter before leading his men forward.

After walking for a few minutes, the hunter signaled all of us to walk as quietly as possible. Eventually, we were all slowly crawling on the ground to avoid making any noise, or as much as we could avoid when our armor clinked.

Soon, we were all looking out from behind shrubs and tall grass at the snoring drake. We were all briefed on the plan. After the heavy crossbows were fired, Dad, his knights, and I would charge the drake while Elise would cast spells. As for Dave and Sam, Dad was not confident in their survival if they charged a drake, especially since they had not learned how to manifest their aura yet. Instead, they were tasked with guarding Elise in case she drew too much agro and the drake targetted her, but that did not mean they were just going to stand around doing nothing, the moment the knights dropped their heavy crossbows, they were to pick up where the knights left off and take every opportunity to harass the drake with bolt fire.

When all the crossbows were trained on their target, the knights all gestured their readiness, and with a hand gesture from Dad, the twangs of the heavy crossbows rang out, followed by the roar of the drake who had a rude awakening from a side full of crossbow bolts.

The moment the bolts left the crossbows, we pushed ourselves off the ground, drew our weapons, and charged while bellowing our warcries and flaring our auras.

By the time the drake was done thrashing and locked in on us, we were almost upon it. It lunged at Dad, who was leading the charge, but its fanged maw first but only bit empty air as it snapped its maw shut, by then. Dad had jumped over its bite and slashed at its head, but the only thing that accomplished was breaking its thick skin and scratching its skull bone… and also pissing it off.

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At almost the same time that happened, me and the knights, with aura coating our weapons, attacked the drake with slashes and stabs. I delivered a slash with all my might but only managed to break the skin, while Dad’s men made deep gashes.

As me and knights backed off from delivering our strikes before the drake retaliated, the knights who stabbed the drake were a split second late from pulling out their swords from the drake’s flesh and were caught in a body check when the drake violently trashed its body from side to side, sending the men flying back into the surrounding treeline.

It may sound like a serious injury for most people, but for men like that, it is just a slight tumble. I have seen my dad send them flying further during practice without armor.

In the meantime, while waiting for the men who were sent flying to rejoin the battle, the rest of us were performing hit-and-run tactics while aiming for any open wounds. It was then that Elise called out from the rear, “Spells incoming!”

The moment we heard that, we all backed off as two spells fired off simultaneously. From below, an Earth Spike punched up into the bottom of the drake, while an Ice Lace fell from above towards the same point the Earth Spike manifested from.

The Earth Spike hit the underside of the drake, lifting it barely a few inches off the ground but ultimately crumbling under the tough bulk of the drake, while the Ice Lance shattered off its back, seeming like it did not have much of an effect.

When the Earth Spike crumbled and the drake was on its feet, it began gasping and retching. I guess this is the same feeling as someone with a bulletproof vest getting shot in the chest, the upside is you do not have a hole in your body, and the downside is that you may have some broken ribs.

While it was retching, we melee fighters once again closed in, only to be witness to one of the most visually and olfactory disgusting things I have ever seen or smelt. On the drake’s last retch, it projectile vomited the half-digested remains of what was most likely the old farmer’s sheep, and two of Dad’s knights had the misfortune of being directly in front of the drake.

Just as the drake was in the middle of blowing chunks, two crossbow bolts flew into its mouth. This caused the drake to rear up on its hind legs and release a vomit-gurgling roar as it brought its forearms to its mouth to try and remove the bolts inside its mouth.

It was not a pretty or dignified sight in the slightest.

Me, dad and his knights took this opportunity to cripple it by attacking the hind legs it was standing on.

While it was stumbling around while only balanced on its hind legs and tail, we started hacking away, and with so many of us concentrating solely on his hind legs, we made short work of it, making the drake fall over with a pitiful whine.

The moment it was on the ground and wriggling around, unable to pivot properly, we swarmed it and stabbed it wherever there was an open wound on its main body. As for me, I came at it from the side while holding my sword by the blade.

When I was in range, I swung my sword down like it was a war pick and crashed the tip of my crossguard into the drake’s skull. Its skull proved a lot harder than the ogre’s during the tournament, but I persisted, up and down, the crossguard of my sword went, I had to back away a few times as the drake swiped or snapped at me, but I always returned to hit the same spot.

On my tenth hit or so, I finally felt and heard the satisfying crunch of my crossguard breaching the drake’s brainbox, but I did not manage to hit the brain. This made me target number one in the drake’s eyes as it chased me on its remaining forelegs and ignored everyone else in favor of trying to kill me.

Seeing that I would no longer have the chance to attack the same spot while it was concentrated on me, I called out the target, “Hole where I was hitting, stab its brain!”

At my call out, the knight nearest to the head jumped on the head and rode it for dear life as he crawled over and drove his sword into the drake’s skull through the hole I created. This immediately dropped the drake into a twitching mess for a few seconds before it became still.

All those who had their blades embedded into the drake waited for any reaction, after around five seconds, one of the knights was brave enough to take off his helmet and put his ear to the side of the drake, and after a while, he shouted, “No heartbeat! It is dead!”

As one, we all raised our hands in the air and cheered. It was a good fight and my hands were trembling in excitement! But when I looked down at my hands, I noticed that excitement was not the only thing my hands were experiencing, it turns out that while I was using my sword as a war pick, the blade had dug past the leather of my gloves and cut into my hand, and my brain was starting to catch up with the injury.

This was going to suck! Grandpa has gone back to his territory, so I sure hope we have a healer in town because I will not start my healing magic lessons until next year.