The Battle Of The Soaring Dragon (7)

"Graaaaaaaahh!!" The President sobered up. Her body exploded with whatever Neutral Energy she had left but saved her blood essence for a timely opportunity. President Leslie threw her left-handed dagger towards Heian Ciemnosc, its shards making it to his body without any remaining force. Her body lunged forward, rapidly spending her Neutral Energy as she bashed her right hand and dagger towards his forehead in a fit of rage. Neutral Energy covered her fist as her shoulder blades seemed to gain scales and feathers, and her hand adopted the shape of a draconic Fauna.

… … … … pah! … grab~! Pshift! Pshift! Pshift! Whooosh!

Heian Ciemnosc sent his Vocón Link towards her, but she used a tremendous amount of Neutral Energy to bash it away before continuing her flight towards him. However, after the dark whip was bashed and its extremity was slapped behind her, the rest of its body moved towards her, surprising her already dulling senses after so much blood essence and Neutral Energy was used in such a short period.

The Vocón Link entangled her neck, around her shoulders, and wrists. Heian Ciemnosc didn’t need to jerk his arm back for the Vocón Link to drag the President towards the side. Heian Ciemnosc remained immobile on the same spot where he kicked Yulia down and waited for the President to arrive before him as she puked blood. Heian Ciemnosc could tell she was hurting from every thinkable place of her body, like metallic ants stabbing her with their every step.

Whoosh… Heian Ciemnosc looked at the President, whose body was rapidly becoming quicker. But she regained strength and attempted to escape his grasp every now and then, like a weak, beating heart fighting against its stop. Her struggles slightly calmed down when she saw his feet, but her eyes remained hateful while Heian Ciemnosc’s left dark claws lightly clutched her chin and jaw.

Her face became haggard and lost most of its color, but she still retained her peak strength despite all these setbacks and looked back at the terrifying pale, little black monster. However, she avoided Heian Ciemnosc’s eyes because they always caused her inevitable fear. Heian Ciemnosc looked at her before raising his right foot. He then placed it against her collarbone. The air around her suddenly felt like it had solidified, and her eyes widened as she felt her bones crush getting crushed.

“Hu-gasp!... Haae… you…!” President Leslie looked up and found Heian Ciemnosc’s pale, pervertedly handsome face— looking down at her without a worry about anyone around him preparing to take him down. But then again, after seeing what he was capable of, he probably never feared them, not even before. She opened her mouth wide, opening her lips, but she could only make pitiful noises as her body was stomped in the hardened air.

The President looked up at Heian Ciemnosc and suddenly felt her head clearer and her thoughts becoming open. With the last struggles of every fiber of her being, as her Soul exquisitely trembled, she whispered. “I would never… you are… have become the… my Nation’s fatal enemy! We… will never… I will… die with or agai-nst… you… No other way… No other paths… Just this… so, please… if you will it… take… her… in… don’t kill… her!”

The President’s last word was insanely bloodthirsty and vicious. Heian Ciemnosc looked down with the same indifferent, casual expression. But a couple seconds later, after the hands holding his right foot became limp, and the President’s visage became desolate, filled with unfulfilled regret. He grinned widely from his right corner and calmly spoke. Only to her ears, though. “Oh, so you noticed the blondie didn’t die? Mn, it wasn’t just her. That other determined fellow I stomped hard against the land she was fleeing is also still alive!”

“Am I not ‘that bad’ after all?” Heian Ciemnosc added, his tone becoming blatantly obvious. He then added with the same tone as just now, “Oh, but don’t worry. Your organization is dead. It couldn’t be any deader. However, the punishment has just started. These 2 will just be the beginning of a life of subservience. That will just be the start of the humiliation for the stupid ancestors of yours that just couldn’t let go of their past. It’s good knowing it, but what use is there in wanting to regress back to it?”

“After all, isn’t all this situation the fruit of your ancestors? Hell… What did you do to make them want everyone to die and never become stronger? You’re all First Step organizations after long, arduous many years, building, rebuilding, self-destructive, and simply cockroaches.” Heian Ciemnosc shook his head, slowly placing his right palm on the President’s neck without grabbing it, simply resting it there. “Nope, I’ve gotta make something what little talent you have.”

“Those 2 women? They will be good servants of the Blauw Empire. Those 2 men had a higher cultivation base and could maintain their position under your rule for several reasons, but they lacked in everything else compared to the girls. Just like you,” Heian Ciemnosc softly spoke those last 3 words while shooting the President a penetrating gaze, leaving her baffled and confused as to what he meant since she and those 2 males were the best in the organization in a 10,000 year period. But she wasn’t in a condition to say or doubt anything.

“Just… fine… this is how… it should…”

Puum~! Thudddd! Whoosh- fwuushh~~! Before the President could finish some words, without her knowledge, her body slammed against the ground and became a liquefied fertilizer for nature’s soil. The nearby top 4 organizations’ survivors looked at this and could no longer feel shocked, only mildly surprised. After too many similar moments when they could still be called to be at war with the Blauw Empire, something like this was just… fitting.

“...” - “!!” Heian Ciemnosc looked at the burial place for the Wyrm Lord Nation’s President, a random location near the Far East Region’s borders, just a couple hundred kilometers from entering ownerless land, far from the western Regions of the Blackotia Kingdom’s east. A good start for something. Perhaps in the far, far future. But now, he changed his darkest eyes to the survivors, and they immediately lost all color from their faces. From their bodies, in fact.

“One moment,” Heian Ciemnosc said without lifting a finger, turned around, and faced the sweating Blauw Monstorm and Blauw Birstorm. They were encapsulated in a bulb with a pair of dragon’s eyes, a tail coiling from below and to their front, arching in a fetal position but without claws or fangs. Everything was too ethereal. This provoked a thought in Heian Ciemnosc’s head, ‘Their Bloodline had been neglected. It’s almost as if they’re trying to employ an Art without its requirements, enough knowledge, and not even knowing it.’

“If you take this move from us-” Blauw Monstorm was practically internally sweating blood as he struggled to keep his head from trembling but failed. He lifted his chin to gaze in Heian Ciemnosc’s direction but could only see his feet. All he used to keep a hold of himself after seeing the immense power of the little black monster was his sister’s left hand, who did the same and focused on sharing her warmth with her brother’s right hand. Only then did the siblings feel this struggle plausible since they were the last of their family and organization.

But it became noticeable now more than ever… They, everyone, were going to die here. However, there was no other option. They were waiting for this opportunity. Yet, as time went on and they were left to die, she and her brother knew they were being used. And they could do nothing about that. Their mortal enemy was before them, trapping them mentally and powerfully. Blauw Bristorm looked at the distant, far east as she thought, leaving anyone who saw her unaware of her thoughts, except for the nature-reading Heian Ciemnosc, whose darkest eyes let her have this moment. “...”

However, when Blauw Monstorm spoke, Heian Ciemnosc turned to look at him and barked. “Shut up. Don’t you want to try giving it your all? Is now or never. I will administer the punishment myself. What happened years ago was just a death notice, and everyone failed to notice.”

“...” - “Gulp.” - “...” Heian Ciemnosc’s words caused silent desperation within the small crowd, leaving the Blauw siblings absolutely alone on the other side, forming a semi, overly spread triangle of dots with their dots glowing brighter and started showing off sparks and electricity. Blauw Monstorm closed his eyes to recompose himself, and when he reopened, he wore a stern expression. He had nothing to say about their past or his behavior. He just looked at Heian Ciemnosc before saying what he believed to be his last words.

“There is a truth to the Azure Dragon’s de-... Bloodline. We are ‘masters’ of the Water element,” Monstorm said, slowly standing up, with his sister following half a second later. Their clothes started ripping away, and their bare skin revealed before that also started peeling off their bodies to show muscle and tissue. “But there is one thing our legends used to speak of, even before forming an organization in this Kingdom, our home.”

Zi… zz… zz… zzziiii… zzziziiiiii… Blauw Monstorm looked directly into Heian Ciemnosc’s darkest eyes with pride, and his sternum started bursting open with… Lightning! His tone was haughty as he continued, “Our past records from yore mention our Aboriginals and their use of the Lightning element without having affinity. Without needing one! All Myriad Races depend on the laws of nature to grow technique, energy, and knowledge. But our Bloodline has always had the peculiarity of mastering the Lightning element without any explanation… Just like a creator is before anything else!”

This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it

“That, Heian Ciemnosc, is one of the Azure Dragon’s Bloodline legends. Something that defines the thick line between a Race and a Bloodline a little more. And that, Heian Ciemnosc, is something I can be proud of from just existing! I have it. My Sister has it… even the Blauw Empire has it… But… what do you have? Although you are definitely not a Race, and assimilate more to a Bloodline. Aren’t you all alone? Aren’t you the only one in the entire world? There has never been someone like you before! You’re not the Azure Dragon! It doesn’t matter what you achieve because you are nothing! From nowhere! For none!!”

“...” Heian Ciemnosc’s face became indifferent, ultimately cold, and severe. He himself didn’t know why, but Blauw Monstorm’s words hit him somewhere. It was fatal, but at the same time, he didn’t feel enraged or lower than him or the Azure Dragon’s Bloodline. Heian Ciemnosc felt… as if he pitied Blauw Monstorm? This was just another of his instincts, and it baffled him more than he thought as he became paralyzed for a few seconds. But a few seconds was everything the Blauw siblings, the last remnants from the True Dragon House, not the Azure Dragon’s Bloodline’s Blauw Empire… needed.

Zip-zap! Zzzzzzz~! Dash! ZAAP! Cuuh- ziiiiiiiiiing~! The siblings exploded with speed from midair. Their legs became scaled, their Earth weapons pointed forward as their Artifact was swung in a punch. Their Soul fluctuated and arrived before Heian Ciemnosc first, as he lifted his darkest retinas and looked at the incoming all-out attack. The all-or-nothing last stand from the Azure Dragon's traitorous Bloodline.

Between the siblings was a large ball-like cluster of blue lightning flashing and crashing with one another in a determined, circular area. Electricity flashed and flowed nonstop, but sparks rapidly spread throughout the siblings’ arms and filled their azure eyes, which instead transformed into blue lightning. Their speed was undoubtedly above the Dantreulity realm, widening Heian Ciemnosc’s eyes a couple percentages as he saw everything in a stopped-motion-like picture.

He evaluated everything, from the siblings’ bodies to the blue lightning cluster between them as they charged with the intention to bombard him with it. The noises it made were tremendous, and the other top 3 organizations’ survivor had to cover their ears to endure it, but they were barely lifting their hands up to their heads. Heian Ciemnosc’s darkest eyes’ irises and pupils shrank while his eyelids enlarged, but only momentarily, as he immediately lifted his left hand and caught the blue lightning cluster with his palm.

ZZzzzzzziiiiiii~!- BAAAAAAA- futomp! Bam bam bam bam- pffsss, crackle crackle… sshh- zzzz… pshift- click~~! Phhshk!~~~~!

“C-kggh, kuh… spit… pooh… ptui… drip, drip…”

“... NOO!!!” Blauw Monstorm only felt his body stop moving, followed by the sound of the blue lightning cluster crash and zizzle nonstop as if it found a surface to bathe in. Monstorm heard constant detonations becoming lower and lower and felt all the Neutral Energy and blood essence he put into the blue lightning cluster becoming weaker. As the blue lightning cluster became infinitely weaker to its weakest, he opened his eyes, expecting to see Heian Ciemnosc’s charcoal'ed body before him as he and his sister penetrated any part of the little black monster’s torso.

However, he instead heard a few last sounds in the last second, like something coming out of a Fauna’s limbs, like an insect’s offensive instincts, or any other type’s defensive measures… followed by the penetration of flesh from something sharp and powerful, a weapon, Artifact, or Art technique… and he wasn’t wrong.

“...” When he opened his eyes completely, his Spirit Sense coming into being, he saw his sister’s neck fully penetrated by 5 dark claws, each one crossing to the other side as she lay in the air, holding his right shoulder with her left hand, and with her head turned to the right, projecting in the same direction as her right, fragile, pale shoulder. Her mouth moved ever so slightly, dripping with azure blood that slowly turned dark, and thin, bloody streams steamed down her lacrimals. However, she couldn’t move her body anymore and could only hold his shoulder intensely.

Blauw Bristorm expelled a few more drops of blood from her lips before licking them and starting to lose consciousness. Life decreased from her azure eyes as her scales fell one by one in midair, becoming more fertilizer for the land. Only her face kept its skin and features, while the rest, except for her azure hair, had fallen on the ground already from their previous position and after clashing with Heian Ciemnosc.

They were so fast that their bodies’ remains didn’t even spread over the distance… But all Blauw Monstorm could see was his dear sister’s life slipping away. When she no longer moved, and Heian Ciemnosc pulled his thumb’s dark claw out and penetrated her throat in the middle again, he finally let go of her body. Her brother felt her hand losing all strength from her grip, becoming as limp and weak as a tiny newborn. She fell under his eyes, with the Artifact in her right hand broken to pieces and its luster gone.

Blauw Monstorm gradually turned his head towards Heian Ciemnosc robotically and ignored his bloody left hand with the Artifact’s fragment embedded into his hand’s structure. He looked at Heian Ciemnosc with azure, bloody streams running down his cheeks, taking a black shade after a second, tainted by his emotions and torment.

“Your little ‘gift’ awarded your sister with a complete head. Now, it’s your turn. Try behaving next time.” Heian Ciemnosc’s words returned the hopeless brother to reality as if he had been teleporting in and out of this Kingdom nonstop, with the corners of his vision rippling like water splashed by a sinking rock. Blauw Monstorm became confused by the little black monster’s last phrase, stopping his lash out when his face lost its skin and azure hair was shedding off as Heian Ciemnosc’s right claw punched him square on the bridge of his nose.

Whoosh! Pum! Splaaassshhhh~~! Splutteeeerrr~!

Heian Ciemnosc’s right elbow stretched, and the body before lost its head and part of its upper torso. His pale face was slightly filled with azure blood, while most black blood, corrupted by one’s most painful emotions, fell on the air. Like rain, the blood fell, but not faster than their owner’s corpse. Let go by Heian Ciemnosc as he casually looked at the top 3 organizations’ survivors without granting the fallen True Dragon House another glance.

Whoosh! Heian Ciemnosc’s dark tail slapped the air downwards and reappeared before a couple cultivators in the middle of enemies, and scared the fucking shit out of everyone’s alerting senses. Those 2 were the Sand Emirate Grotto’s Grotto Master and Vice master. Heian Ciemnosc kept his dark claws behind his back and looked at the former 2 without hurriedness. One of the few left alive that wasn’t part of the top 3 organizations, but a vassal, and whose emblem was a draconic eye ‘captured’ by 3 dragon’s claws, suddenly spoke after lowering their hood, followed by another of the same emblem and vestment.

“Heian Ciemnosc! You will stop immediately! This is beyond absurd!” The one to speak was an old man whose face showed fear from his twitching eyebrows, keeping his emotions in place. Heian Ciemnosc looked at the old fuck for a moment before returning to gaze at the Grotto Master and Vice master, saying, “Blue Starreye Clan, shut your mouth. I haven’t bothered with you yet. Don’t ruin my mood.”

“...” - “...!” One of the Blue Starreye Clan was an old man, but the other was a beautiful woman with a slightly aged face, but whose strength was the highest here besides Heian Ciemnosc at the 10th stage of the Dantreulity realm. Meanwhile, the elder was only at the 8th stage. However, this was enough to beat the top 7 organizations at their peak, let alone the top 3 organizations. The woman was startled but kept a gentle, passive expression while the elder was flabbergasted, and his face reddened.

“Now, here’s the thing. I can do without your people. But… it is much more efficient to instruct already capable fellows. Your spies are the only ones still trying to get into the Blauw Empire all this time without your allies even realizing that. I am looking forward to letting the Empire own this exemplary force. However… I don’t like any of you. Not anymore.” Heian Ciemnosc said, crossing his arms before his chest and lowering his head to look at them with upturned, darkest eyes.

“... Choose me! I am older and have seen the organizations’ best and worst! I can help you train them better! With my experience and your guidance, the Sand Emirate Grotto will serve the Empire well! We will become your third vassal in history!!” The Vice master, Irsome, immediately shouted after 5 seconds of silence ensued between the Sand Emirate Grotto’s only 2 survivors in this group. The Grotto Master was rotundly shocked. He looked at his Vice master with an incredulous face and a bent neck but didn’t hesitate to ‘defend’ himself.

“He is too old! The newer generations are in need of someone who values them more because of their possible growth than sees themselves as more feasible because of age! Choose me, respected assigned supervisor. Only I can help my Grotto serve the Empire. We will serve you!”

“M-tsk!” Heian Ciemnosc looked up with a jolt and slapped his lips open. He seemed truly concerned and returned his darkest eyes to the 2 fellas before saying, as he rubbed his chin with his right pale hand. “On one hand, the Vice master is indeed too old and has views that are twisted… mn, not good enough for growth!”

The Vice master’s face fell, and his wrinkles wrung even heavier. But Heian Ciemnosc immediately added without bothering about their reactions. “Yet, the Grotto Master shows he only thinks of himself as the Grotto. What’s more, not only does he believe the Sand Emirate Grotto will continue to exist or that it will be mine, but he also thinks I’m not doing this for the Empire? Tsk, tsk. Is that a critique?”

“Besides…” As the 2 fellas’ faces completely fell, and the Grotto Master paled until he cosplayed as Heian Ciemnosc. Heian Ciemnosc crossed his arms and lowered his head, becoming sinister in their eyes as he hoarsely whispered, “Who told you you’ll be the third?”

“!!” - “?!” The 2 became shocked, and their eyes relaxed to reveal more of their sclera. On the other hand, the hopeful top 2 organizations’ people at the side and the Blue Starreye Clan became insanely distressed. “!!!”

…