Chapter 322

The stone armor fell away.

Every plate on Gorvathul's body peeled back along its seams at once and crashed to the floor. Dust filled the tunnel. When it cleared, the thing in front of Grid looked like a different monster.

Under the stone, the drake's body was made of molten rock, glowing a deep, angry red. It was leaner now. When it shifted its weight, it moved with a speed its armored body had never had.

The fallen plates didn't stay down. They lifted into the air one by one and began to circle the drake in a slow ring of floating black shields.

[Gorvathul has shed its Earth Armor.]

[Gorvathul's Attack Power and Movement Speed have greatly increased.]

[Gorvathul's Defense has decreased. Floating Earth Plates will intercept incoming attacks.]

[The 'Scorched Earth' effect has intensified. ]

[500 Health is lost every second.]

[You have resisted!]

Grid read it, braced himself, felt the drain slide off him just like before, and still felt like cursing.

"Faster, stronger, and it hides behind flying rocks! You're greedy, you know that?"

Gorvathul moved.

One moment it was at the far end of the tunnel. The next, its jaws were in front of his face. He threw himself backward on instinct, and its teeth snapped shut close enough to singe his eyebrows.

The rhythm was gone. Its shoulders didn't drop before the bite anymore. Its legs didn't plant before the tail. It just attacked.

Grid didn't back off. He went in.

"Linked Kill!"

A floating plate swooped in front of the first strike and shattered. The second plate took the next two. The last two strikes reached the drake's molten shoulder.

[You have dealt 88,400 damage.]

[You have dealt 91,200 damage.]

The plates go first, Grid thought. Then the drake.

"Transcend!"

[Transcend has been activated.]

Power surged through Failure, and every swing threw a crescent of blue light across the tunnel. The plates rushed to intercept them, one after another, cracking and exploding into gravel. Grid kept swinging, roaring with every strike, Randy beside him in his shape throwing crescents of her own.

Seven plates. Five. Three.

Gorvathul's throat began to glow.

One second!

"Revolve!"

The molten breath hit him dead center. For an instant, there was nothing but white light. Then the light turned around, bent back on itself, and poured straight into the drake's own open mouth.

[You have reflected 100% of the attack.]

[You have dealt 418,000 damage.]

Gorvathul staggered back, choking on its own fire.

"Ha! How does it taste?!"

Noe dove in from above, trying to pull at the drake's soul through the wound in its eye, but the heat coming off its body drove him back before he could get close. "Master! It's too hot! I can't reach it, Nyang!"

"Then stay back and watch me!"

Two plates left. Then one. Then none.

"Flower Revolve!"

Glowing marks bloomed across the ground around Gorvathul's feet. Every time its claws or tail came down inside the marked area, a burst of reflected force slammed back into its own body.

[You have dealt 74,600 damage.]

[You have dealt 81,300 damage.]

[You have dealt 77,900 damage.]

Transcend ran out. Ten minutes into the second phase, Grid's arms were burning and the drake was at just over half health.

Gorvathul raised one front claw and slammed it into the ground.

The tunnel floor erupted. Spikes of black stone shot up in a wide ring, each one taller than a man, so many that there was nowhere left to stand. Grid saw one forming right under his feet and knew he wasn't going to get out of the way in time.

Randy hit him from the side.

She shoved him clear with both hands, his own face looking at him for a fraction of a second, and took the spike meant for him straight through the chest. Her body froze. Then it blurred, flickered, and burst into black smoke.

[Randy has been defeated. Randy can be summoned again in 12 hours.]

"RANDY!"

Grid's face twisted. Something hot and furious climbed up his throat.

"You," he snarled at the drake. "You hit my kid."

He charged straight at it.

He didn't think about the rhythm. He didn't think about the floor. He swung Failure into its legs, its chest, its claws, anything he could reach. The drake hit him back just as hard. Claw. Tail. Claw.

[You have received 32,800 damage.]

[You have received 29,600 damage.]

He drank a potion. Then another. Then he reached for a third.

[Super Health Potion is on cooldown.]

Grid saw the drake's back legs plant.

He knew exactly what was coming. He was already too close, too slow, out of potions and out of room. And he didn't step back.

The tail hit him.

[You have been hit by a blow!]

[A legend doesn't die easily. You can resist all attacks for 5 seconds with the minimum amount of health.]

His health bar dropped to a single point and stopped there.

One.

Grid's grin came back, wide and fierce.

Five seconds.

For five seconds, nothing could touch him.

He threw himself at Gorvathul. A claw passed through a shimmer of golden light and did nothing. Teeth closed on him and did nothing. Its throat glowed and he ran straight into the fire, laughing.

Four seconds.

He was under its chin. The seam beneath its jaw was still there, still cracked from the first phase, glowing red and wide open now that the armor was gone.

"Pinnacle Kill!"

Failure drove straight up into it and curved deep inside.

[Critical!]

[You have dealt 1,312,000 damage.]

Three seconds.

"Transcended Link!"

Twenty strikes. All of them into the same seam. Each one locked the drake stiff for a fraction of a second, and Grid felt every hit go home.

[You have dealt 4,860,000 damage.]

Two seconds.

Gorvathul screamed and reared back. Its health bar was flashing red. Eight percent. Five.

One second.

Everything was on cooldown. His Sword Energy was empty. All he had left was the sword in his hands.

So he jumped.

Braham's Boots carried him straight up, and he brought Failure down with both hands on the drake's head as it lunged forward one last time. No skill. No dance. Just a swing with everything he had left.

"DIE ALREADY!"

The golden shimmer around him faded.

The blade came down.

[Critical!]

[You have dealt 48,700 damage.]

For a moment, nothing happened.

Gorvathul stood frozen with its head lowered, one eye still glowing faintly. Grid hung in front of it with one HP, sword raised, waiting for the claw that would finish him.

Then the glow went out.

The molten light in the drake's body dimmed and turned grey. Its legs folded. And Gorvathul, the Demonic Earth Drake, toppled sideways and broke apart into a vast cloud of blue pixels that rose up through the tunnel like a reversed snowfall and vanished into the dark.

[You have killed the 'Gorvathul, the Demonic Earth Drake'!]

[You have gained 86,400,000 experience!]

[The 'Scorched Earth' effect has disappeared.]

Something heavy hit the ground where the drake had been. It glowed a slow, steady red, like a coal that refused to go out.

[Gorvathul's Molten Heart]

[Rating: Legendary]

[The core of a drake that lived for centuries soaked in demonic energy and the heat of the deep earth. Even after death, it burns without fuel. A blacksmith who can control its heat could forge a weapon or armor of extraordinary toughness, carrying the earth's fire within it.

- Production material.]

Then the golden light came.

[Level up!]

[Level up!]

[Level up!]

[You have reached Level 300!]

[You have reached Level 300 and achieved the third stats awakening!]

[The effect of each stat point has been strengthened.]

Grid dropped out of the air and landed flat on his back.

He tried to sit up. Nothing happened. His arms wouldn't move. His legs wouldn't move. The whole fight in Scorched Earth had been burning through his stamina the entire time, and now that the adrenaline was gone, there was nothing left at all.

[You are exhausted. You cannot move until your Stamina recovers.]

"...Oh," he wheezed.

Noe fluttered down and landed on his chest, singed all over, one ear nicked. "Master. Are you alive, Nyang?"

"...One HP," Grid croaked. "Technically."

"That was very scary, Nyang."

"That was amazing."

They lay there together while his stamina bar crept back up, a sliver at a time. Grid didn't mind. He stared up at the dark ceiling with a stupid grin on his face and felt the third awakening settle into his body. Every muscle felt a little denser. A little stronger. He could feel it even lying still.

Twenty minutes later, he heard scraping.

Grid turned his head. Three Demonic Underground Lizards had crept out of a crack in the tunnel wall, drawn by all the noise. Their orange eyes fixed on the man lying flat on his back in the middle of the floor.

They started forward.

Grid's stamina bar was barely a third full. It would have to do. He fumbled a Super Health Potion out of his inventory, now off cooldown, and drank it in one gulp as he rolled to his feet.

Fifty-two gold, some small part of his brain noted.

"Bad timing," Grid told the lizards, and raised Failure.

The first one lunged. He met it head-on, and this time, when the blade hit its neck, it didn't skid off. It bit deep. The third awakening was right there in his arms, in every swing.

[You have dealt 31,200 damage.]

The fight was quicker than any lizard fight before it. When the last one broke apart into blue light, Grid stood alone in the tunnel, breathing hard, holding three new scales.

He looked down the tunnel toward the chamber where a huge black door stood in the dark, covered in carvings he didn't understand.

He clenched his fist. The new strength hummed in every muscle.

A slow grin spread across his face.

"Noe," he said. "Let's go break that door."