Translator: AnubisTL
A bone-chilling wind swept repeatedly across the gray skies of the Frontierlands, and scattered snowflakes swirled down from the leaden clouds.
The scarred body of the red dragon Cahill trembled slightly in the cold wind. The most shocking of her crisscrossing wounds was a penetrating injury: an alchemically reinforced heavy arrow, its barbs and blood grooves piercing through her lower abdomen and exiting through her right rear spine. Warm dragon blood continued to ooze from the dark red grooves on the arrow shaft.
This alchemically enhanced weapon was lodged in her muscle tissue like a living thing, and each flap of her dragon wing tore new wounds.
"Vile dwarf bastards!" Cahill snarled through gritted teeth, her vertical pupils blazing with almost tangible fury.
She swore a blood oath in her heart: if she survived this ordeal, she would extinguish every furnace in the Blackrock Principality in dragon flame, and send those weapon-forging dwarves to eternal slumber upon their own anvils.
Her oath was so resolute that she even cursed herself with the prospect of reincarnation as a white dragon—a fate that red dragons loathed above all else.
After taking her oath, the red dragon silently beat her gradually stiffening wings, struggling to fly alone in the vast sky. The biting cold and boundless loneliness surrounded her, dragging her mood down into the depths of despair.
Her former ambitions now seemed utterly laughable.
Months ago, when the dragon pack escaped the Steep Cliff Strait and first arrived in the Sierre Wilderness, seven young dragons were full of ambition.
Like most fledglings and juvenile dragons leaving their nests, they planned to achieve great things in this new land.
But reality soon struck them with a harsh blow.
While scouting the environment separately, an inexperienced young blue dragon wandered into the territory of a ferocious beast. By the time reinforcements arrived, only scattered remains remained.
Two enraged juvenile dragons led their companions to hunt down the beast, but this incident stripped them of their innocence and forced them to become cautious.
They tried to build their strength steadily by subduing weaker monster clans, but during a territorial dispute, they misjudged the enemy's strength and lost their entire familiar force.
After this,
some disheartened dragons decided to lay low and develop quietly, waiting at least until all of them had reached the juvenile dragon stage before making their move.
However, their weakness proved to be their greatest risk. They wanted to lie low and develop, but danger and misfortune always found them, forcing the dragon pack to wander constantly, their lives never finding stability.
It was only then that they realized surviving alone in the outside world was no better than enduring exploitation in the blue dragon community.
Slowly...
As various accidents piled up, the dragon pack lost two more dragons. Of the original seven, only four remained:
* A young blue dragon, a young red dragon, a young black dragon, and a young green dragon.
After careful deliberation, they decided the Sierre Wilderness was too dangerous and chose to start anew elsewhere. But during their migration, they passed through the airspace of a mining vein, where they were spotted by a stationed legion. The legion pursued them relentlessly and launched a surprise attack when the dragons let their guard down.
The black dragon and green dragon were almost instantly gravely wounded and captured.
The blue dragon and red dragon found themselves in a desperate struggle.
In the end, with their dragon wings shattered and no escape possible, the young blue dragon fought to the death, covering the red dragon Cahill's retreat. At the cost of his own capture, he gave her a chance to flee.
As Cahill watched the blue dragon's retreating figure, his broken wings spread in a final, desperate attempt, an unprecedented mix of emotions churned in her chest.
The proud red dragon had never imagined she would owe her life to the blue dragon, her rival, with whom she had always clashed.
This mix of fury and humiliation burned in her heart. For a moment, she almost turned back to face death, but the burning desire for revenge ultimately suppressed her impulse, leaving her with a sliver of clarity amidst her rage.
Time flowed on, unhurried.
The sky gradually darkened, and night enveloped the land.
Bathed in the cold moonlight, red dragon Cahill beat her wings with uneven strokes, her flight growing deeper and shallower.
Due to her prolonged flight and injuries, her altitude steadily decreased, her speed slowed, and her consciousness grew sluggish. Though she was driven by the need to escape and live to exact her revenge, her severe injuries left her powerless.
Screech!
A piercing shriek suddenly rang out.
Cahill instinctively dodged sideways, only to feel a sharp pain in her dragon wing as an alchemical bolt pierced through it.
Glancing back, she saw the dwarf pursuers closing in relentlessly.
Lightly armored cavalrymen rode great-horned antelope across the hard earth of the Frontierlands, kicking up clouds of dust. Behind them lumbered several massive golems of steel and metal, their massive feet shaking the ground as they advanced.
Whoosh! Whoosh! Whoosh!
The light cavalry raised their crossbows and loosed a volley of bolts toward the sky.
The red dragon Cahill was flying at a mere three hundred meters, well within the range of the bolts. She dodged as best she could, but was still struck repeatedly, the shafts piercing her body and drawing gushing blood.
Wobbling precariously, the red dragon was about to crash to the ground.
"At least I'll take a few of them down with me!"
Feeling her body grow weary and her wounds ache, the red dragon showed no fear. Instead, her eyes blazed with savage fury. With a guttural roar, she flapped her tattered wings, forcing herself to turn and dive toward the dwarf cavalry below.
A trail of blood droplets trailed behind her in the cold wind, painting a crimson streak across the sky.
Her torn dragon wings ripped through the air with a deathly shriek as she gathered the last of her dragon flame deep in her throat—until the sky suddenly lit up with an unnatural crimson glow.
The juvenile dragon instinctively looked up.
In the next instant, her pupils constricted sharply.
A colossal evil dragon, clad in black, armor-like dragon scales and possessing a physique so monstrous it defied belief, loomed into her vision. With a mere flap of its wings, that massive, imposing form tore through the night sky like a comet, blazing across the heavens.
Whoosh!
In that split second of stunned silence, the red-iron dragon had already plummeted toward the earth.
Only then did the thunderous boom that shook the air finally arrive, like a thunderclap.
The dwarf cavalry captain was the first to react.
His pupils constricted as he shouted, "All hands—"
His voice was swallowed by the deafening roar.
Under Cahill's horrified gaze, the red-iron dragon crashed into the cavalry formation like a meteorite, reducing the dwarves and their mounts to bloody pulp. The shockwave and rolling earth carried outward, flinging surrounding dwarves in concentric circles.
Boom!
The engine roared.
Three alchemy golems on the periphery charged into the swirling, dust-choked haze.
The next moment, a series of violent collisions echoed as wreckage rained down.
The red-iron dragon toyed with the heart-like alchemy engine in its claws, then emerged from the dust with ponderous, unstoppable steps.
"The Frontierlands prohibit outsiders from hunting," the dragon's voice resonated through the air. "Especially dragonkind."
The surviving dwarves nearly stopped breathing as they gazed at the monstrous, terrifying dragon shadow.
Simultaneously, the red-iron dragon's eyes noted the dwarves' armor and the insignia upon it.
Blackrock Principality.
A subtle change flickered in the red-iron dragon's eyes.
After more than twenty years, Garos had once again set foot in the Blackrock Principality, but the circumstances were now drastically different.
"For the Blackrock Principality!"
With a thunderous roar, the dwarf captain unleashed his final act of valor. He leaped into the air, swinging his warhammer at the red-iron dragon's head, only to be struck down by a casual claw that moved with lightning speed. The captain exploded into a mist of blood.
A clever dwarf warrior quietly retreated to the rear, fumbling for a communication device at his waist and activating it.
But to his shock, the device remained unresponsive, as if jammed by some unknown interference.
"A dying struggle is more entertaining than a groveling surrender."
Before the red-iron dragon's words had even faded, his afterimage blurred across the battlefield.
In mere tens of seconds, the earth fell silent once more. Only the cold wind, carrying the stench of blood, swept across the field of carnage and the imposing, powerful dragon shadow.
Only then did Cahill, who had been suspended in mid-air, snap out of her shock.
"What kind of terrifying evil dragon is this?!"
"A young dragon? Or an adult one?"
Staring at the monstrous figure, her heart filled with wary fear and awe.
(End of the Chapter)
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