Badge in Azure

Chapter 1419: Pride (Part 2)

The magic cannons high up in the sky fired at the same time for the second time. The Floating City even lowered its altitude, getting ready to really duke it out with the skeletal dragon.

The God of Magic Net had no need to be concerned about the Floating City’s safety. It needed to get within 15000 meters from the dragon to make use of the Thunder Dragon Blasters.

The fear felt by the Violet Angel was intense. It was wondering if it would have simply been digested or become a spirit after being gobbled by the dragon.

Rafel yelled as well. She yelled because she was concerned for one of her own. There were few moments where combat angels fight solely on their own. Rafel was instinctively concerned for one she considered a comrade.

The Violet Angel heard Rafel’s cry when it was gobbled up by the dragon, causing it to flash a contented smile on its face.

She yelled for me!

Oh yeah…

A huge lightning cage appeared from within the Violet Angel’s head, making it stuck at the dragon’s throat.

The skeletal dragon’s mouth was prevented from closing right there and then. Not only was its mouth unable to close, it also felt very awful. The electricity running throughout the cage was far more powerful than those in Saleen’s territory. With one such thing stuck at its throat, something it was neither able to swallow nor spit, the skeletal dragon wiggled about in the air and almost fell to the ground.

Yellow light flashed again at Saleen’s feet. He turned around midair and came right before the skeletal dragon again, sending another ball lightning in his hand into the other eye socket of the dragon.

Boom!

The ball lightning exploded, tearing the skeletal dragon’s soul flame to shreds. The dragon was no longer capable of flight by then and finally crashed to the ground.

Saleen did not expect for the fight to end in such a way. The Violet Angel’s combat capacity was the weakest among the three of them, yet the skeletal dragon’s failure was totally attributed to it having swallowed the Violet Angel’s head.

“Light them up!” Saleen only gave the order by then. His voice sounded like thunder and reverberated throughout the sky above Alchemy City.

He then brought Rafel to the ground. The Floating City came all the way down and the enchanters began cleaning up the half-dead in the city below. Those half-dead were powerful beings nonetheless, and there were quite a number of them being of level ten and above.

However, compared to the skeletal dragon, the Floating City had little to worry about, as there was no need to worry about those half-dead climbing up to the Floating City after all.

Saleen came to the dragon’s side and a huge axe was found on the ground. The weapon was a godly item.

He did not bother with the godly item. The skeletal dragon was not yet dead. Yellow light glittered beneath his feet. He stood in midair and looked at the dragon beneath.

“Mage, please don’t make me into a puppet.” The dragon’s voice had turned rather muddled by then. The Violet Angel’s head was still stuck in its throat, making it feel nauseous when it talked. It was actually all in its head. As a spirit, it was the power of its soul that enabled it to speak after all.

“Why?” Saleen asked.

“Please have some respect for me. There is no harm for you to do that.”

“But you intended to kill me, and my temperament dictates that I tear you to pieces and work on you bit by bit. Of course, you have a point, but one needs to pay the equivalent of what one intends to get. You want my respect, then you’d better offer me something in return.”

The skeletal dragon breathed a long sigh.

Saleen only lowered his altitude somewhat. He was afraid of the dragon retaliating right before it died, so he dared not stick to close to it.

It wanted a dignified death, yet it had been giving it all to attack Saleen mere moments ago. There was no way Saleen would not have harbored any resentment. To dragons, it was imperative for them to keep their bodies in one piece when they die, and in this case, it all depended on what it was able to offer.

Could I just tell the young mage that he is a good guy?

The mage apparently is not a good guy. He would not have killed so many of Alchemy City’s mages back then otherwise. The skeletal dragon remembered that well. When it came to set up shop there back then, it was at the time when the fighting there was at the most intense stage. That young mage had brought the huge Floating City and went on a killing spree.

“Mage, I have one thing to trade with you, which probably couldn’t compare to my body though.”

“Speak.”

“I have a set of dragon graveyard coordinates, but that is the graveyard in ancient times and there is no ghost dragons keeping watch there. You might not find bone remains suitable for your use.”

Saleen hesitated. A graveyard without ghost dragons keeping watch and it was one dating back to ancient times. Such a place might have been deserted for hundreds of millions of years. Dragon bones in such a graveyard might have been picked clean by the gods of ancient humans.

But then again, such a place would not have been dangerous as well.

Ghost dragons would have only been more powerful than skeletal dragons, not weaker.

“If you’re willing to exchange, I would provide you with the coordinates. Please place my dead body in that deserted graveyard.” The eye socket of the skeletal dragon had been broken from explosions. The soul flame within was scattered and difficult to put together again.

“If I’m unable to find anything in that graveyard, I would have your bones instead.” Saleen somehow barely agreed to the dragon’s request.

Even if there was only a tiny bit of deathly powers left in that graveyard, it would have been hugely important to the Winged Skull nonetheless. Powers of death were things that would have settled. If those powers turned out to be precipitates dating back tens of billions of years ago, even one tiny bit would have enabled the Winged Skull to advance and acquire spirit rules without problems.

Even if all that was left was a bunch of eroded bones, the bone dust would have been useful for the Winged Skull to create intelligent spirits nonetheless.

However, there was no way Saleen would have let that skeletal dragon off easily.

Seeing how hesitant Saleen was with his answer, the skeletal dragon breathed a sigh of relief instead. Regardless of pesky mages were, there was one thing about them that everyone liked, and that was the fact that there were few mages who would have gone back on their word.

Saleen did not collect the last of the skeletal dragon’s soul flame. The power of the ball lightning had scraped off any useful bits of the soul flame. After Saleen acquired the coordinates, he dug out the Violet Angel’s head and put away the dragon’s dead body, before heading back to the Floating City right away.

There was little to the imagination of what any battles in Alchemy City that followed.

Regardless of how powerful the half-dead might have been, flying units were practically unheard of after all.

The Floating City loomed high from above and was purely on the offensive, without needing to be concerned with defense at all. As soon as powerful half-dead were found, they were locked onto by large scale Thunder Dragon Blasters, which were especially effective against spirit and holy types of creatures.

About half a month was spent cleaning up the place, as half-dead were very resilient creatures and their numbers were just too massive. It was not until the start of February that Saleen had finally cleaned up Alchemy City. He then spent another half a month to repair destroyed buildings and broken walls.

Once the Elemental Hand was set up once again, Saleen would have never needed to see to any of that personally.

His current goal was the dragon graveyard.

The coordinates provided by that skeletal dragon was not all that far away according to the calculations. Furthermore, the coordinates were in great clarity. Saleen did his calculations using astrology and found nothing particularly dangerous about the space.

Saleen had the Inter-dimension teleportation portal built when the construction at Alchemy City was almost finished, before bringing the Winged Skull and Rafel to the dragon graveyard.

Daniel was going with them as well.

Daniel never expected something like that would have happened. He was a death mage and if he were to be able to get to a dragon graveyard that was devoid of any danger, he would definitely be advancing to level 10 in one way or another. Even if he were to be horrendously untalented, no danger would have come to him with Saleen and the Winged Skull around.

His dead soul flame was something that was refined with the help from the Winged Skull in the first place. He would not have been at even level nine otherwise.

The light on the portal lasted for only a brief moment. After making past spatial vibrations and endless darkness, Saleen found his feet on a dark, cold piece of land.

It was a pitch black continent without sun or moon hanging in the sky, just very weak stars. There were no clouds above and there was no wind blowing on the ground.

The place was almost vacuum and the air around made breathing difficult as well.

Saleen had Daniel return to his magic amplifier. The Floating City was left behind on Myers Mainland. The magic cube within the magic amplifier was more than enough for Saleen to bring a massive legion with him.

At the time when Saleen was at the dragon graveyard, the Elemental Hand members were at a tower inside Alchemy City. A young fallen holy master faced the three mage trainers and said, “My name is Van Gogh and I have once served the Black Dungeon.”

“You said that you have important business. What would that be?” The mage trainers hurried him impatiently. They were hardly interested in fallen holy masters after all.

“I’m here on behalf of Saleen, to kill you people,” Van Gogh grinned and said.

“Hah…”

“If Saleen wanted us dead, he would have done it himself. Now die!” All three of them attacked at the same time. Dimensional Blade, Firestorm and a very simple Dark Blue Chant.

Van Gogh smirked and his body disappeared all of a sudden. The mage trainers lost their targets and dispelled the spells they have just cast.

All three of them were totally calm and collected facing Saleen, due to his overly terrifying equipment. He was nonetheless a level 11 mage as well, and his magical abilities were top class in the world.

“In that case, there is little else to be said…” Van Gogh appeared again, as if he had emerged from a parallel dimension.

“Silence!’ A mage trainer shouted. He had no intention of letting a fallen holy master cast lesser prophecy spells. Fallen divine arts like that were eerie after all.

“Stop wasting your time.” Van Gogh’s body disappeared yet again and by the time he reappeared, Silence had worn off. He was actually capable of shaking off being targeted.

“Dear god whom I have once served, may thou allow me to steal thy power to judge the ones before me,” Van Gogh’s prayers sounded rather insolent, yet the following phenomenon caused all three of them to be shocked.

Space shifted within the tower and the land beneath their feet turned fiery hot.

That was purgatory. A group of purgatory dwellers were repelling soldiers at a faraway mountain, making their way to a palace near a volcano.

The fallen holy master had actually dragged all three of them to purgatory, using only his own power.

Van Gogh smirked and said, “Settle down and figure out how to get out of here on your own. I’m heading back.”

“Wait…”

The three mage trainers called and quickly shut up, recalling the indestructible contracts they signed with Saleen and felt dejected. They did not so much have a chance of surrendering.

Van Gogh disappeared from the purgatory plane and reappeared in the tower. The sweat on his body had drenched his shirt.

“Goddamn it. Fallen divine arts cost a lot to cast indeed!”

Van Gogh listened for sounds outside the door and found nothing. He then came to a seat and took out a piece of black divine crystal, holding it as he sat and meditated.