Chapter 302: Why So Weak?

Indicators flashed and flickered within his helm interface, displaying status and perimeter scans as the battle suit activated battle mode.

Its reinforcement function, infused into the grim bone spear.

Seth’s eyes glowed royal purple, his bronze cells buzzing as his frontal glabella simmered bright from beneath his helm.

The bronze cell activity reached its peak, his spear rattled and his blood boiled...

There was a moment of silence, as the commotion from the dragon’s earlier attack attempt settled.

The dragon’s wings settled into an arc, all four limbs gripping tightly to the earth as its gait hunched low, its belly almost making contact with the earth.

Seth’s spear arced as he got into stance, his suit already charging his rapid movement thrusters...

He couldn’t use divine weapons now, not only would he not last long, but he couldn’t guarantee a single attack would kill this dragon...

From the overwhelming flow of thick boiling essence he could sense, Seth could instinctively tell this was a worthy foe.

His eyes glowed, fostering emotions of both wariness and anticipation.

No more words were said....

BOOOM!

The dragon launched forward at a dizzying speed, taking a low altitude flight supported by the sharp boost from its wings.

Its frame screamed through the wind, as its maws snapped wide open, a wave of crimson welling from its throat.

Seth’s pupils restricted, ’not good.’ He hissed, injecting essence into his astral boots, creating an astral path to initiate a swift evasion.

His foe was so large, its reach was so exaggerated, every evasion needed to cover a few miles before he was safe.

The dragon arrived, its widened maws carrying incoming torrents of carbonized flames slowly charging.

Diving straight down head first as its maws snapped tight, its terrifying teeth taking an easy crunching bite out of the burnt earth narrowly missing Seth.

All four limbs followed making contact with the earth, its claws tearing trench marks, as it pulled its neck, not bothering to spit out debris, its head whipped Seth’s direction.

The heavy gales stormed around it due to its size and movement, its maws widened agape, rocks falling free while a torrent of flames burst free.

Seth couldn’t make another evasion so soon, the astral boots skill was on a cooldown and relying on his base speed alone and he wouldn’t be able to make a clean dodge.

His genetic suit charged a compact energy shield, while he mobilized his spear into a rapid spin in hopes of deflecting some flames.

The torrent flowed raw upon him, his suit temperature climbing as both the spinning spear and the energy shield did their best to protect Seth.

But it still wasn’t enough, his skin sizzled and blistered from the heat, the once cool embrace of his genetic battle suit beginning to cook him alive.

His jaws clenched tight from pain, a pained groan cracking from the seams of his teeth, as his feet dug deeper into the slowly liquefying terrain in search of a foothold.

That was the most terrifying aspect of these flame incarnates, and their annoying flame breath.

Once you hit point-blank, don’t even think of holding your footing cause even that will be turned into molten lava.

Boom! And explosions raged as his frame lost balance and footed the obsidian scale, surrendering to the black dragon’s flames and turning to lava.

Seth was swept away by the flame torrent, the pressure almost caving his breast armour and crushing his lungs.

His blood pumped thick, regulating his temperature, as his bronze cells forced to the brink greedily began to feed on the flame essence more wildly.

While Seth was swept out of sight, through the trail of liquefying earth nothing to cushion his uncontrolled motion, skipping against the scalding currents as his skin slowly burned black.

As his hair was shrinking and sizzling...

Finally, the dragon’s breath calmed, Ash snapped its maws, its flame core already charging more essence for another round.

It stared into the distance, its slits locking onto Seth, it scoffed. "I expected more." Its voice rumbled loudly, reaching Seth’s smoking figure collapsed in a long drawn-out trail of lava now marking the land.

From the void a pair of draconic eyes spectated, in confusion...

’Why was this human suddenly so weak?’ Atherion wondered, perplexed.

It didn’t make sense, the same being decimating the dragon forces in one attack, leaving scraps for its troop was this weak?

It didn’t make sense, this wasn’t the level of power it expected to witness.

Atherion scowled in annoyance, if Ash defeated this human so easily, that black scum wouldn’t let him hear the end of it.

"But at least that’s better, than letting the humans carry on their scary momentum." it muttered.

But it spoke too soon.

Back on Seth’s end...

Ash took slow steady steps towards Seth, its wings flapping and stretching as it moved, its weight causing the earth to quake and rattle at each step.

Its sheer size allowed it to scale hundreds of feet with each step it took.

It stared down at Seth’s crumpled body, in disdain...

Atherion dared wake him from slumber just for this?

A human who hardly qualified as an ant? A flimsy creature that broke before the battle even began?

Ash was irritated and infuriated, it bared its teeth, its smoldering fumes coiling out of its nostrils...

"So weak!" It hissed, drawing close to Seth, "I don’t understand how your pathetic kind came to be hegemons of this planet!"

"You lot aren’t even worth being snacks." It growled annoyed at the thought of such a race of weaklings daring to attack their nest.

"Even now with this base filthy lineage you can’t stand against us, when the purification is complete we will grow even stronger, and your entire race won’t even be worth keeping as servants." Ash’s eyes glowed brighter at the thought of purification.

The golden dragon bloodline, it will soon be theirs and theirs alone.

This thought alone eased the annoyance felt from having to face such a weakling.

The thought of embracing its true calling brought a smile to its savage lips, but first... it had to finish its enemy.

At this exact moment Seth’s frame suddenly began to billow heavily with distortion mists of darkness.

The dragon’s gaze narrowed, its limbs halting, and its wings rising tense...

Seth’s quiet strained voice coughed weak but still perceivable to the beast’s senses.

"Fine little guy, come... Here’s your chance to claim your meal..."