It only took a few hours for the party to find the wreckage that was the missing caravans. There were bits and pieces of wood scattered everywhere, with scorched earth dotting the light layering of snow. Adding some color to the scene was crimson blood, splattered violently across the white ground.

Belle went a shade paler than her usual white, shifting into a waxy grey. Adrest’s brow furrowed at the display of violence, meanwhile Alissa’s expression didn’t change even slightly. Her violent and dragon's nature showing itself again.

Adrest pulled Belle closer to himself and asked the casual Alissa, “Any idea where it is now? Doesn’t seem like it's anywhere nearby.”

Almost absentmindedly Alissa answered, “It’s a few miles ahead of us, at the base of the mountain in a cave. Looks like I was right, you won't be able to kill it Adrest, but fighting with it for a while shouldn’t be a problem if you’re careful,"

Rolling his eyes at the disregard for his opinion in fighting something that was a half step into A rank, he started trudging in the direction she pointed. Belle was about to follow along, but jerked back in place when a hand grabbed the scarf around her neck.

“Big bro has to go on his own from here, he can’t get distracted for this one. Just stick with me and we can watch from the air, okay?”

Seeing the girl sad that she couldn’t follow along with Adrest anymore, Alissa gave her a piece of candy before wrapping Belle up in her arms and taking off.

They shot ahead of Adrest and landed on the branch of a tree a few hundred feet from the cave entrance. From it, one could hear loud and deep breathing. The ground nearby seemed to vibrate and Belle could feel an unpleasant aura emanating from it, smothering her and making it difficult to breathe.

With a simple wave, Alissa dispersed the aura and explained, “When someone is strong enough, their bodies naturally give off pressure from the sheer amount of compressed mana inside of them. There’s other ways to create an aura such as killing so much that the dead’s resentment form a shroud, or when a monsters body gets strong enough to warp the air and space around itself, but this is the most common.”

As Belle recovered from the pressure, Adrest finally appeared through the trees below, buckling under the pressure for a moment before steadying and drawing his sword.

He extended his raven wings in preparation and carefully made his way towards the thundering breathing. Before he got even got within two hundred feet of the entrance a loud snarl rang through the air and a huge, green reptilian head emerged. As it made eye contact with Adrest, his entire body reflected in the blue serpent eyes.

Adrest was trembling and every part of his body was telling him to run, but he rejected it and charged forward aiming at the exposed eye. As he closed in a long and thick blue limb charged out of the shadows and made contact with his sword. It let out a loud clang and a series of creaks at the long impact.

Adrest’s eyes shot up in shock and back away. A cursory glance didn’t show any damage but he didn’t want to make that gamble too many more times. That was all he had time to think before a huge green monster charged him. The drake was over a story tall, and body nearly as wide. Its green scales covered thick muscle and sinew. the large reptilian head charging at him, mouth filled with many rows of sharp teeth was an imposing sight.

If Adrest hadn’t seen a real dragon charge at him, this would have petrified him, but after Alissa “welcoming” him back then, he could only see this drake as a shoddy imitation. It was just too small, too ugly, compared to the regal purple giant that had been nearly the size of Rose’s inn.

That being said, either could kill him with ease so it didn’t help Adrest much. He flew straight up as the mouth closed in, trying to get behind the drake, but a muscular and spiked tail flung out and into Adrest’s side. He took the impact with his arm, and went with the force to make some distance.

The drake pressed forward slashing at Adrest’s figure with a set of giant claws. The hand raked the air as Adrest just barely dodged. They went back and forth, Adrest always putting his safety first. As the dance went on for a few dozen more seconds, it suddenly seemed to reach a critical moment as Adrest sacrificed his arm, with it getting clipped by a passing claw to close in and stab into an eye. One of Adrest’s arm hung limply at his side as he retreated, everything below the elbow a pulpy mess. Adrest felt the cold sweat rolling down his face, but felt like it was worth it hearing the pained roars of the drake.

It had been a risk, but after fighting with it, Adrest got a feel for how the beast fought, while Adrest was no match for it in pure strength or stamina and he would die in one hit if it landed or he was just slightly too slow. However, the beast acted on instinct alone. It had no skill technique behind the power, it really highlighted what Alissa had said earlier about how the two species were so different.

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As Adrest madly retreated, taking advantage of the beast’s now huge blindspot, he loudly begged for help, not daring to close in on the angered drake again.

“Alissa! If you don’t help out soon your oldest student will die. Think of all the rumors that would spread if I died so early.”

There was an annoyed snort and Alissa came out of nowhere, she actually punched the ragged and retreating Adrest directly in the face, sending the already injured and one armed man into a tree in the distance. But oddly enough, he seemed to slow down just before impact.

As Adrest used his good arm to massage his bruised jaw, Belle appeared next to him with tear in her eyes. Belle had screamed when she saw Adrest’s arm essentially explode and begged Alissa to help, she just shook her head saying he could keep going a little longer.

“Big bro Ady, are you okay? Why’d you have to do that, I thought it was going to kill you!” Belle was crying again at the end and tightly hugging his less injured side.

Adrest tried to pat the rabbit's head to reassure her, but his remaining arm wasn't cooperating. Sighing, he settled for just saying, “It was the only thing I could think of, after all even my sword couldn’t get through the scales. It was worth it though, do you think I impressed Big sis Ali?”

Belle looked up to his eyes surprised at what she heard. “She did smile when you got the drake’s eye. I think Ali likes violence and fighting a lot.”

Adrest laughed heartily though it hurt to do so at Belle’s frankness, eventually managing to say, “It’s just how she was raised, it’s in her blood so don’t hold it against Ali, okay?”

Smiling and blushing embarrassed, she stammered, “N..No, I just meant with how Big sis Ali looks and acts most of the time, you wouldn’t expect it from her.”

Enjoying the flustered girl's reaction, Adrest just sat back onto the tree Alissa had set him at and focused on Alissa crushing the drake, anything to distract from the explosion of pain that was his mangled arm.

She was violently imposing, forcing the beast to kneel into the snow and dirt as soon as she let out her roiling aura. Though her two family members couldn’t feel it, it was truly terrible for any living being unfortunate enough to be caught in such a pressure. It worse still for the drake as there was an amplification of suppression from it’s weak bloodline relation.

That's not to say that others would feel nothing under Alissa's intent, Alissa was trained brutally even by dragon standards and developed every aspect of herself to it's peak in each realm. The pressure she put off was the cumulation of over two decades of violent life or death training. Not only was the dragon the king of all beasts, able to intimidate all under it. Not only was Alissa’s body the pinnacle of perfection in the A rank realm, making even the air tremble according to her will. Not only was she supremely talented in magic, with her many talents all at the peak of the peak under S rank, allowing her to let out a violent storm of pressure from the unfathomable sea of mana in her soul. But her murderous aura gave the air an ice cold edge. It would cause a primal fear in anyone caught in her gaze. This intent could only be built upon thousands of corpses and rivers of blood.

Under the very real pressure, as if heaven and earth itself was rejecting the drake’s existence, it could only tremble helplessly as Alissa lengthened her perfectly manicured nails into lethally sharp daggers.

As she neared step by step, the drakes trembling intensified, cracks rang out from its scales that Adrest couldn’t even scratch. At the last moment it seemed to have gathered it’s will as it took a single step forward in defiance.

Alissa’s eyes lit up in praise for the beast’s final stand, but it did nothing to change the inevitable. With a harsh cracking and shrill scratching sound, her arm went entirely inside the chest that had been charging her. The Drake’s large blue eyes opened fully in pain and shock, before dimming.

Near death, it let loose a final weak roar before there was a wet ripping sound as Alissa pulled out a blue gem that was nearly as big as Adrest. It was gruesomely still connected to the drake via several long strings of what looked like muscle and cartilage.

Under the eyes of the pale Belle, Alissa waved her hand, sending out bolts of purple lightning to clean the gem. Now free of gore and viscera, the gem sparkles beautifully, deep and mysteriously as if someone crystalized an ocean.

Alissa waved her hand and the profoundly powerful crystal core disappeared into her storage crystal. With her business done, Alissa turned to her audience giving a mock bow and showstopping smile. The only problem with the picturesque image was the mountain of dead drake behind her, only now falling to the ground, and the blood that lightly splattered her face.

Belle still wasn’t used to the bloodthirsty side of Alissa as she hadn’t seen what happend after Alissa saved her, and since then there’s been no reason for Alissa to let loose. Seeing the hesitation in her eyes, Adrest leaned in to speak as it was getting more difficult due to blood loss.

“It’s still Big Sis Ali, I’m pretty the only reason she was so brutal this time was because it tore through my arm.”

Belle snapped out of her trance and hurriedly shook her head to deny. “Its not that, I just didn’t know Ali was so strong. I guess it didn’t feel real when she dropped that Scarlet Rent in the yard back then. I’m just not used to seeing Ali like this after how she usually acts.”

Adrest could understand as Alissa was always gentle to her little sister. To the little rabbit Alissa was her silly, smart, and slightly lazy big sister. Sure she could be brutal in training, but most of the time Alissa spoiled the girl with whatever she wanted.

Adrest put his hand on her head reassuringly, “She really is amazing, it’s like a completely different person when she’s fighting, but you’ll get used to it soon Belle.”

As Adrest comforted the girl who seemed to still be having trouble putting the two images of the dragon she’d come to view as family, said woman approached.

Alissa stood in front of the two with a huge grin, and preened in front of Belle, “Did you see your Big sis? Wasn’t I cool? Much better than that idiot that’s bleeding all over everything.”

Adrest was feeling too weak to talk, the cause obvious as there was a not small puddle of blood under him now, he was extremely pale, and most of his vision was obscured with black tendrils slowly encroaching. But this didn’t stop him from raising his remaining hand and shakily raising his middle finger at the dragon being an ass.