Dragons and Steel, Explosive Scale in Combat (Today's PK for Sanjiang, Please

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The setting sun painted the sky above the Iron Fir Hills red, and Garos's scales glimmered with a dangerous light in the twilight.

Centered on him, three Earth-Splitting Centipede Alchemy Golems suddenly burst from the ground from different directions. Their steel bodies cast ferocious shadows across the earth, screeching with grating metal as their jointed limbs scraped across the rocks and threw off dazzling sparks.

The first Golem curled into a massive metal wheel, its high-frequency vibrating blade legs drawing together as it sliced toward Garos.

The second Golem opened its hideous mandibles and sprayed out a liquid that seemed to have been processed from Black Oil. The liquid instantly erupted into raging flames in midair.

The third Golem's shell split open, firing a dense storm of armor-piercing steel spikes.

Garos drew a deep breath and suddenly raised his dragon wings sideways.

His guillotine-like dragon wing slashed toward the "metal wheel."

Clang! Clang! Clang! Clang!

Countless sparks flew as Garos's wing collided rapidly with the Earth-Splitting Centipede's blade-like jointed limbs. The clash of metal rang out, rising and falling through the night.

One blade-like limb after another twisted and shattered.

A few notches also appeared along the metallic outer bones of his wing.

Then Garos lifted his dragon wing.

The Earth-Splitting Centipede was flung away, spinning as it severed one thick Iron Fir after another.

At the same time.

Just as the first Earth-Splitting Centipede was sent flying.

Raging flames and a storm of steel spikes came straight at him.

Garos neither dodged nor evaded. He stepped forward and thrust out his chest.

The flames fell upon him first, engulfing Garos. Yet beneath the sweeping blaze, Garos instead bared a grin. His Explosive Scales were immediately tempered by the fire, taking on the color of red-hot iron.

Clang! Clang! Clang!

The armor-piercing steel spikes struck Garos with a clatter, easily shattering his Explosive Scales into fragments.

Then.

With a shake and flick of Garos's body, countless fragments wrapped in flames and glowing the scarlet color of heated iron surged back toward the two Earth-Splitting Centipedes.

Boom! Boom! Boom!

The blast waves and flames of the explosions instantly swallowed the two Earth-Splitting Centipedes, flinging them away and leaving their bodies covered in cracks and dents.

The flames spewing from the Earth-Splitting Centipedes' mouths abruptly ceased.

However.

The flames burning on Garos did not stop immediately.

These flames came from flammable liquid processed from Black Oil and burned fiercely.

The Red Iron Dragonet bathed in flames spread his wings and lightly flapped them as he raised his head and strode forward. His dragon scales glowed the color of red-hot metal, distorting the air around him as heat waves rose.

Though these flames were extraordinary, they were not magical flames.

Not only could they not harm Garos, they instead bolstered his Dragon Might.

As if realizing that fire was ineffective against Garos and that ranged attacks had only limited effect.

The three Earth-Splitting Centipedes, having steadied themselves and suffered varying degrees of damage, simultaneously transformed into metal wheels. Their blade-like limbs vibrated at high frequency as they spun and sliced through the air toward Garos.

Whoosh!

With a sweep of his dragon wing, Garos, wrapped in flames, shot toward the metal wheels like a fiery meteor.

A lava-like glow shone through the gaps in the scales on his chest.

The Earth-Splitting Centipedes attacking from different directions were reflected in his pupils.

Garos suddenly unleashed scorching Flame Dragon Breath.

Carrying an immense and powerful impact, the Dragon Breath first swept over two Earth-Splitting Centipedes and blasted them away, then bore down directly on the last one, pinning it firmly to the ground.

The black metal armor on its body visibly burned red and began to melt.

Both were flames, but Garos's Flame Dragon Breath was far more powerful than the Black Oil fire sprayed by the Earth-Splitting Centipedes.

Garos advanced step by step, his Flame Dragon Breath suppressing the Earth-Splitting Centipede and melting it into a twisted heap of scrap metal. Meanwhile, after this exchange, the other two Earth-Splitting Centipedes determined that they could not defeat Garos. They decisively changed tactics, stopped fighting, and began to retreat.

Burning dragon wings tore through the night.

The Red Iron Dragonet raced after the Earth-Splitting Centipede on the right. Before it could burrow underground, he suddenly twisted his body and swung his tail.

Crackle! Crackle!

The Tail Ring lit up, and arcs of electricity danced across Garos's tail, enhancing the lightning's lethality and stimulating his muscular strength.

The howling wind mixed with the crackle of electric arcs. Garos's dragon tail flashed like lightning, striking the Earth-Splitting Centipede precisely and smashing its shell into severe dents and cracks. Silver snake-like arcs wormed their way inside its body, leaping continuously within and without.

Crackle! Crackle!

This Earth-Splitting Centipede was comparatively intact. It convulsed and collapsed, pungent black smoke rising from its joints.

Bang! The Red Dragonet fell from the sky, crashing into the ground and smashing out a deep crater.

Samantha swayed to her feet, dazed and disoriented, feeling the world spin around her.

She had imitated Garos's method of attacking from the sky and targeted the third Earth-Splitting Centipede, but she had not been fast enough to stop it from burrowing underground. The recoil also left her entire body aching.

Without Garos's day-after-day training and without his powerful body.

This method of directly slamming into a ground target at high speed was not suitable for an ordinary Hatchling Dragon.

After burrowing underground, the third Earth-Splitting Centipede immediately fled.

Since Garos had not mastered a Spell-like Ability such as traveling underground, he did not pursue it. Besides, endlessly hunting them down was meaningless. These Golems appearing here meant this place had likely been exposed. Even if he kept it here, the Black Rock Dwarves could still use underground passages to locate the Iron Fir Hills. At most, it would only delay them a little longer.

"Dragon Lord, your divine might is unmatched! Your strength fills me with awe and submission!"

"Those steel beasts are utterly powerless before you! It is my honor to become your retainer!"

The battle was over. Mobel, the Earth Violent Bear, came before Garos and showered him with flattery.

Garos ignored him and silently calculated, sorting through the information from the battle.

"These three Alchemy Golems have no specific Life Level, so they cannot be assessed. But each one is stronger than an ordinary Level 8 beast monster. They know how to cooperate and how to adopt different strategies in different situations."

"Compared with them, the Goblin Tribe's Alchemy Golems are like crudely made, fragile toys."

"If they hadn't used flame attacks against me, this battle would probably have taken even longer to end."

These combat-oriented Alchemy Golems were indeed formidable.

Garos did not know the exact model of the Earth-Splitting Centipedes, but judging by their size and apparent precision, they should be inferior to the Alchemy Golems stationed above ground.

"Ah, my Alchemy Workshop!"

Samantha let out a shout, stomping her feet in fury.

During the battle just now, her Alchemy Workshop had once again been caught in the crossfire and destroyed completely. This was no longer the crude rock-slab shed from the beginning, but an Alchemy Workshop that had been constantly repaired over five months.

"Where did these damned things come from? I'm going after them and slaughtering every last one!"

She said it in a rage.

Garos did not stop her. Instead, he encouraged her. "They came from a garrison at an oil field under the Black Rock Principality. I'll give you the location and let you have your wish."

Me?

At those words, Samantha's anger instantly subsided. What a joke—she still remembered how she had merely taken one look from high in the sky and nearly been shot down, coming within a step of death.

Though it was not the same place—she had been attacked at a mining outpost back then.

Any place guarded by regular troops was not easy to provoke.

"A dragon shouldn't be too reckless. I'll think about it some more and let them live a little longer."

Samantha gave an embarrassed laugh, then changed the subject. "I'll go rebuild the Alchemy Workshop first."

"No."

Garos shook his head. His gaze swept across the vegetation and land of the Iron Fir Hills, and then he said decisively, "We can't stay here any longer. We need to change territories."

The Iron Fir Hills had mediocre resources to begin with, and recently its water sources had gradually been drying up. The number of creatures living nearby was dwindling. Every time Garos wanted water or prey, he had to fly a great distance. He had long been considering moving to a new territory.

Now that he had sensed the danger posed by the Black Rock Dwarves, he finally made up his mind to abandon this place.

And that also meant the peaceful life of the past few months was coming to an end.