While a certain white haired demoness joined a certain troublesome guild,
At the same a fierce confrontation was taking place between two of the strongest dragons on the earthland,
This was a confrontation between
Irene Belserioin-The master Enchanter and one of the twelve sprigging
VS
Selene: The Moon Dragon, one of the five dragons god
They were high in the sky, right above the open sea.
Both of them were in their full dragon forms, moving in wide, tight circles through the cold air. Irene was a massive, heavy dragon covered in dark red scales. Opposite her was Selene, a silver dragon glowing with a pale moon magic that made the air twist around her wings.
Neither one was backing down. They kept circling, their massive eyes locked onto each other while the open water below churned into ugly, violent waves from the pure pressure.
With a loud roar, they dived and slammed straight into each other.
BOOM.
Their claws collided in mid-air, throwing a massive shockwave across the empty sky. Irene snapped her jaws, her teeth lighting up with a dark enchantment spell meant to do some serious extra damage. Selene, seeing the immense danger the enchantment presented, twisted her massive neck to dodge the bite by an inch.
In response, Selene gathered a massive amount of lunar energy into her tail, causing it to glow with a bright, blinding white light. She swung it around like a massive whip, trying to smack Irene out of the sky. Irene quickly chanted a rapid line, using her enchantment magic to force the air itself to harden, creating a solid, invisible shield right in front of her ribs.
BANG.
The glowing silver tail slammed into the invisible barrier, the impact ringing out like a massive iron bell. The two dragons bounced back from the collision, hovering in the wind as they waited for the other to make the next move. Irene remained still, her massive wings catching the updraft, but Selene simply glided in a lazy circle, refusing to take the initiative to attack.
Irene growled in pure anger at her stillness. Her massive form began to shrink, a deep scarlet light enveloping her scales as she took her human form.
She floated effortlessly in the freezing air, her four thick scarlet braids blowing wildly in the gale. Her dark robes lined with soft white fur parted heavily in the high-altitude wind. The low-cut neckline exposed her heavy, full breasts, while the high thigh-slit revealed her shapely, long legs and curvaceous hips, perfectly framing her voluptuous hourglass figure beneath her hat. Every line of her posture radiated the power and authority of a Master Enchanter, her eyes sharp and focused on the silver dragon before her.
Selene, seeing her opponent transform, decided to change into her own human form as well.
A cold silver light flashed, and the giant dragon condensed into a breathtaking woman. Selene floated opposite Irene, dressed in a light, flowing gown that moved gracefully in the high wind. The thin silk clung tightly to her frame in the wind, highlighting a slender, powerful physique. The silk mapped out the soft curve of her breasts and the elegant line of her narrow waist and full hips, her long silver hair drifting around her like silk, and her lips pulled into a smug, teasing smile.
"Still hiding behind petty tricks, little girl?" Irene said, her voice dripping with pure condescension as she looked down her nose. "You are nothing but a child playing with toys in front of me."
Selene let out a soft, mocking laugh. "Fu fu fu... You talk quite big for a half-broken dragon, Irene. Let's see if that mouth of yours can match your magic."
The small talk was over.
Irene moved first, her hand sweeping forward as she cast Atmospheric Compaction. She instantly enchanted the very concept of the air surrounding Selene, forcing the empty space to bind together into a solid, inescapable cage of invisible walls.
Selene didn't even blink. She executed a Lunar Phase Step, her body blurring into a moon-phase illusion that folded the dimensional fabric directly ahead of her, allowing her to slide straight through the solid barriers without a scratch.
"Too slow," Selene teased. She raised her palm, unleashing a Tidal Reversal. Using her absolute command over lunar tides, she gripped the ocean five thousand feet below, ripping a massive, towering column of seawater straight up into the sky like a giant liquid dragon to crush Irene.
Irene didn't back away. She used Ethernano Ignite, casting a high-speed enchantment straight onto the rising water column. With a single word, she rewrote the nature of the spell, forcing the water to instantly transform into a roaring wall of pure, crackling fire.
Selene's eyes narrowed. She quickly sliced her hand through the air, opening a Spatial Mirror. The tear in space swallowed the fire explosion whole and redirected the burning blast right out of a second rift directly at Irene's blind spot.
Recognizing her own magic coming back at her, Irene used Kinetic Friction. She enchanted her own movement, removing the very concept of resistance from her body, causing her to slide effortlessly through the empty air like oil on ice, the redirected blast grazing her cloak without touching her skin.
Furious, Selene unleashed a Lunar Eclipse. The light of the sky completely dimmed as she forced the ambient space around Irene to turn into localized, freezing pockets of absolute darkness, meant to suffocate her magic.
Irene countered instantly with Concept Inversion. She enchanted the darkness itself, forcing the empty void to violently invert into a dense, crushing shockwave of physical pressure that shattered the freezing pockets.
Selene slammed her hands together, creating a Dimensional Horizon. She literally cracked the magical fabric in front of her chest like a sheet of brittle glass, absorbing the heavy shockwave cleanly into another dimension.
The two women were completely panting, their magic containers beginning to feel the strain of the high-altitude combat.
How did she become this strong? Irene thought, her inner monologue full of genuine shock as she gripped her staff tight. This shouldn't even be possible. Her magic container shouldn't have this much power.
Suddenly, with a violent burst of swirling pink flower petals, Merlin materialized right between them.
His face was dead serious, the usual lazy slacker expression completely gone. He didn't say a word to Irene. He turned his head, his gold eyes instantly flaring with a sharp swirl as he activated the his special eyes He used Sha Naqba Imuru to see straight through Selene's body to trace the source of her unnatural magic container.
The moment his sight locked onto her core, Merlin's consciousness was violently yanked away.
The stormy sky, the ocean, and Irene vanished completely. Merlin suddenly found himself standing in an entirely different, infinite surrounding. It was a chaotic, shifting void where multi-colored lights warped and changed every single second.
The Chaos Realm, Merlin realized internally, his mind tracking the ambient energy. The birthplace where magic originated.
Suddenly, two massive, terrifying green eyes with black, slit-like reptile pupils ripped open in the shifting colors above him. A heavy, suffocating pressure dropped onto his shoulders.
"Thou hast disrupted our plans, outsider," a raspy, screeching, and angry voice boomed directly through the void. The speech was uniquely blurred, stacked with layered, chaotic textual echoes that vibrated with ancient corruption. It was the Goddess of Magic—the very first dragon.
Merlin just stood in the center of the shifting colors, completely unbothered. "Plans? I couldn't care less about your plans."
The massive green eyes widened in absolute rage, the blurred, screeching voice shaking the entire realm as the distorted words distorted the very air.
"A̷n̶a̸t̸h̸e̴m̵a̸"
"Insolent mortal! Thou hast taken our magic... thou owest us the debt!"
A mischievous smile slowly formed on Merlin's face. He knew exactly what she was talking about. He lifted his right hand, casually spinning Odin's staff before flicking his wrist.
"Oh, right. The Rune magic Odin got from you," Merlin chuckled, his gold eyes flaring. "Are you talking about this?"
He didn't hesitate. He opened his bottomless container and forcefully strung an entire sentence of actual, heavy primordial runes aloud, driving the absolute authority of the words straight into the void.
"ᛋᚺᚨᛏᛏᛖᚱᛖᛞ ᛞᛁᛗᛖᚾᛋᛁᛟᚾ ᛋᛚᚨᛋᚺ—ᚲᛟᛚᛚᛁᛋᛁᛟᚾ ᛟᚠ ᚹᛟᛱᛚᛞᛋ!"
"F̵o̴r̶ ̵y̵o̵u̴r̸ ̸b̶l̸a̷s̴p̸h̴e̴m̷y̸,̴ ̸I̴ ̴d̴e̵c̴l̴a̷r̷e̶ ̸y̵o̶u̶"
"A̷n̶a̸t̸h̸e̴m̵a̸"
SHATTER.
The entire Chaos Realm violently cracked like brittle glass, the multi-colored void exploding into nothingness.
In a split second, Merlin's consciousness snapped straight back into the real world. He was standing right back in the sky over the open sea, the wind ripping through his white robes.
Selene staggered backward in the air, her jaw dropping open as she looked at him with absolute, wide-eyed shock. "How... how did you escape?!"
Merlin let out a soft chuckle, shifting his staff onto his shoulder as he looked at her. "Oh, don't you worry about me, moon girl. Worry about yourself. How are YOU going to escape?"
Selene's face flushed with anger, her silver hair whipping around her face. She realized she was completely outmatched with him on the field. She raised her hand, using her spatial magic to tear open a glowing portal right behind her heels.
"You will regret coming in the way of my mistress, Merlin!" Selene snorted angrily, stepping backward into the rift. "This isn't over!"
The portal snapped shut, and she vanished completely from the sky.
Merlin and Irene stood alone in the quiet air, the storm clouds completely clearing around them. Irene lowered her wooden staff, her breathing still slightly ragged as she looked at the empty space where the Dragon God had just been. Her face locked into a bitter, irritated expression.
"You let her escape," Irene said, her tone sharp and angry as she glared at his white coat.
Merlin chuckled softly, shaking his head as he leaned back against the empty air. "Of course not."
Irene blinked, her face completely confused. "What do you mean? She's gone."
"I didn't let her leave empty-handed," Merlin said, a wide, highly mischievous grin hitting his face as he looked at the exact spot where the portal had vanished. "I just gave her a wonderful little parting gift."
Irene's eyebrows raised, her strict general persona slipping. "What did you do to her?"
Merlin let out a loud, obnoxious laugh. "I cursed her with absolute baldness. The second she steps out of that warp, every single strand of that silver hair is going to fall straight out."
Irene froze. She stared at him for three flat seconds, her jaw slightly dropping as she tried to process the absolute absurdity of what he had just done to a Dragon God. Then, her cold, unyielding general mask completely shattered.
She burst into a loud, booming, and genuinely helpless fit of laughter, covering her mouth as her shoulders shook. Merlin laughed right along with her, the heavy tension of the god-tier battle completely evaporating into the open sky.