City of Sin

Book 7, 147

The Wolf That Found The Pen

Anyone who should be hiding away better do so, don’t make me beat you up!

While they had never met before, the broodmother quickly determined the source of such an arrogant statement. It was almost certain that there was only one possibility; Richard’s Master, the Dragon Slaver Sharon. She immediately turned around to fly back to the Land of Turmoil at full speed; Sharon’s target was obviously this valley, and staying here for any length of time was ill-advised in that scenario.

The moment Sharon’s message spread throughout Faelor, all of the gods suddenly got too busy to notice. They all had things that they just had to do immediately, rendering them unable to respond to the threat.

Thunder resounded in Faelor’s sunny sky, a lucky few beings able to spot a graceful blue trail crossing towards the north. The legendary mage was constantly blinking forward several kilometres at a time, the unstable mana behind her exploding into fireballs and lightning. While Richard had convinced her to go through Faelor, he hadn’t arranged for any means of transport within the plane itself. Sharon obviously wouldn’t do something so boring as using a long-distance portal; while robbing dragons was important, she wanted to take a good look at Little Richard’s plane as well.

Of course, she didn’t care about the commotion she caused. Even the most ordinary people could tell something strange was going on in the skies, but the west of Faelor was going through a tough time and most powerhouses put their own safety before anything else. Feeling the sheer power of the aftershocks, they decided to ignore it altogether. There was one dukedom where a bunch of sub-legendary warriors were travelling together, the group rising up with confidence in their numbers, but they didn’t even manage to get a proper look at Sharon’s face before they were blown away by the ripples of her energy. One of them was charred almost to death, causing them to flee for their lives.

......

In the Dragon Plane, Kralkalor couldn’t stand the wait any longer. While it had been less than half an hour since Paero had entered the portal, it felt like half a year had passed for him. He sighed in relief when the portal surface started to ripple, but his eyes went wide when he saw the Dragon Slaver walking out instead.

It was this again! None of the dragons outside of Kralkalor himself were really disconcerted by Sharon’s appearance, some even stretching their bodies and yawning. They had seen hundreds of famous powerhouses in the past few days, each one only showcasing their auras before pretending to unleash their signature attacks. While Sharon hadn’t appeared too often, she had still come twice. They had already learnt that the true threat came from those they didn’t recognise; or at least, hadn’t recognised before. Right now, Richard and even his followers were growing familiar to them.

When the legendary mage walked out of the teleportation gate, she saw dragons all around her and shivered in excitement. It was like a wolf had walked into a pen of sheep; her breathing had already grown rough.

However, a sweeping glance showed that these dragons were completely lax. Some were lying around napping, and a pair of mates were even going at it on a little hill in the distance. Most infuriating was that it was the pathetic half-blooded weaklings that came forward to challenge her, and even they didn’t seem particularly scared.

Sharon’s brows shot up in rage. She was fairly well known within the myriad planes, and her reputation had been built through battle. This kind of dismissal was a slap to her face! Even saints barely made a meal for her, but she had to fight a dozen-odd level 10s?

Of course, the legendary mage wasn’t one to talk things through or wait for explanations. Her expression darkened and she pulled her hands apart, a portal dancing between her fingers.

The dragons all watched with interest, expressing all sorts of opinions.

“Oh, this one almost looks real.”

“Exactly! Her expressions are so lifelike!”

“Is she trying to cast a spell?”

“Not bad, there’s some actual mana in there. Nice one, the spell looks good too.”

“What is she trying, though? Is that a portal, or have my eyes gone bad?”

“Interesting. Can a portal really be compressed and pushed around like—”

...

Everyone went quiet for a moment before a scream broke the silence, “It’s a real portal! Planar!”

The dragons broke out in a frenzy, quickly taking to the skies and flying as far away as they could. A few of the smarter ones flew close to the ground, avoiding the large group. Some even began to just run across the earth in desperation. They didn’t even dare to look back and wonder just how Sharon had managed to knead an actual planar portal; they just knew that the spatial rifts from an explosion would kill them.

“Too late!” the legendary mage snickered, lifting her arms high and tossing the unstable portal like a stone. A few moments later, an enormous explosion rocked the skies and sent many dragons careening towards the ground. A mushroom cloud blocked everyone’s vision, so large that its rapid expansion seemed slow to a distant observer.

*ROAR!* Golden light flashed as Kralkalor flew through the flames, heading straight for Sharon. His golden scales turned red from the intense heat, but this only increased his offensive powers. With him taking the lead, a dozen more turned around to join in on the attack; while they weren’t as smart as humans in many other contexts, dragons were geniuses at battle and knew that fleeing from someone with long-ranged magic was pure stupidity.

As the mushroom cloud continued to rise, the dragons quickly found their balance and flew up once more; only those who were too close to the explosion or otherwise too young and weak landed on the ground. Even of the dozen that had been struck by the attack, less than half of them died; their naturally powerful bodies were apparent.

After flying a few circles, the panic-stricken dragons quickly formed up to attack Sharon together. With Kralkalor taking the lead, breath attacks, bites, and swipes were everywhere. The dragons on the outer edge couldn’t even find a way to attack, only able to fly around and replace anyone who was injured,

The battle was fierce, a loud howl of pain ringing out every few seconds as a dragon was thrown out of the encirclement. Every such dragon had fractured bones and torn ligaments; enough to immobilise, but not enough to kill. Those outside couldn’t tell what was going on within, but the twisted limbs and dangling wings left them terrified. They just couldn’t imagine how such a tiny human could cause so much physical damage to a dragon; evidently, the damage came from brute force and not magic or weaponry. Was she really that strong?

From the very beginning of the battle when Sharon had thrown the portal, the dragons were terrified of her. If not for Kralkalor being the first to fight, they could just have dispersed. Even now, those on the outside were watching closely with fear; it looked like the woman was tied down, but all of the injured dragons were dropped in one region and could only moan pitifully on the ground. These were also the rarest breeds amongst them; it was the ordinary ones she didn’t pay attention to.

The clouds up above suddenly blazed as a dark red dragon covered in flames descended from the sky. Its body was enormous, spanning nearly a full kilometre from head to toe, and all of its scales were spewing fire. Pure draconic flames burst out of its nostrils with every breath.

The Flame Dragon Bahamut was just like the Prime Evil Tiamat, considered one of the most powerful existences on the Dragon Plane. With his appearance, all of the dragons grew excited; in their minds, this meant the situation would be taken care of.

However, the Flame Dragon immediately roared in shock, “Sharon?!”

This left the dragons flustered. The most infamous beings to the residents of this plane were those titled Dragon Slayer, Dragon Slaver, and the like. They had seen many fakes in the past few days, so even with Sharon showing her power they hadn’t thought it was really her. However, Bahamut’s reaction made it obvious that this was the genuine one.

Bahamut himself roared so loudly that the earth trembled, half the sky turning red as the temperature of the surroundings rapidly rose. The already-withered grass and trees just burnt up and crumbled to ash as flames spread across the ground.

This was his most powerful ability, World of Fire. It was a domain that changed the laws of the environment, allowing him to showcase his true might and limit that of the opponent. It also took a great chunk of energy to use it, but Bahamut clearly saw Sharon as a major threat.