Renewed Battle (I)

Over the course of their constant clashes, Caesar had gained a fairly thorough understanding of Roy's troops. This army was well-trained, disciplined in every movement, and truly counted among the rare elite.

But aside from those thirty knights and one Archmage, they had ultimately failed to transcend the bounds of mortals.

That left the force with a grave hidden danger. As time passed, the cavalry entangled with the black dragon was visibly beginning to falter, their stamina severely depleted.

If not for the spellcasters, Caesar could have wiped them out by now.

Should I give it a try?

The black dragon circled high overhead, looking down at the dense mass of humans below, like ants, and hesitated briefly. He himself remained in fairly good condition. After all, having undergone two genetic modifications, every aspect of his body was far superior to that of true dragons his own age. His energy was still abundant, and the wound pierced by the heavy ballista bolt had already clotted and stopped bleeding, no longer restricting his movements.

Then I'll try.

After weighing it over and over, although he no longer had the Forest Fairy's assistance at his side, Caesar ultimately decided to launch another attack.

After all, following his repeated flanking harassment, the cavalry's combat strength had dropped by far more than a notch. Caesar had no reason to pass up this opportunity.

If one wanted enormous gains without bearing any risk, where in the world were there so many good things like pies falling from the sky?

If he could crush this cavalry force, the enemy's entire faction would suffer a severe blow. If Roy was rational enough, he might choose to cut his losses immediately and abandon this war.

Archmage Anthony sat upright atop a gray-and-white-striped warhorse, the ruby- and sapphire-set staff in his hand gleaming brightly. Squinting, he kept his gaze raised toward the clouds.

He saw a gray-black figure shoot straight out from the faintly visible mist, its enormous black-red wings beating away the surrounding clouds before it began a high-speed dive.

"Couldn't hold back any longer?"

Anthony smiled and casually cast Fearless Radiance upon his cavalry, enveloping the warhorses beneath them as well.

This time, the black dragon seemed to possess an unstoppable momentum, completely different from its previous cautious probing and harassment. It appeared ready to get serious.

"Spread out! Prepare for battle!"

Wayne, the temporary commander, shouted the order. In truth, he did not need to say it. Though these elite soldiers were already extremely exhausted, their vigilance had not diminished in the slightest. Sensing danger on their own, they immediately began seeking positions to engage the enemy and prepared to fight.

Even the well-traveled and learned Archmage Anthony could not help but marvel at the black dragon's savage and ferocious appearance before him—this was the beauty of pure power. That heavy black scale armor, brimming with texture; the protruding jaw that seemed forged from steel; the horns winding and extending in every direction; and its three utterly different kinds of breath, all proclaimed this black dragon's uniqueness and strength.

In terms of raw strength alone, this black dragon was likely not much weaker than an adult red dragon of its own age.

But none of that was the point. What truly unsettled Anthony was that this creature had yet to cast a single spell.

For an adult true dragon, that was highly abnormal.

Thus, Anthony had remained on high alert, his nerves drawn taut, fearing that this clever, cunning black dragon was deliberately lulling him into complacency, holding back some ultimate move as it waited for the right moment to slaughter them all with an unprecedented draconic spell.

At that moment, their target arrived.

"Roar!"

Caesar locked onto his landing point, folded his wings in midair, and plunged directly into the knights' formation at the front. He smashed down like a meteor, using the force of the impact to inflict as much damage as possible.

He still could not fight like an adult true dragon. Considering the huge yet fragile nature of his batlike wings, he would rather land and engage the enemy in close combat than circle them at low altitude.

The instant he landed, the battle began.

The black dragon roared, his hammer-like tail sweeping into a knight. The corroded and fragile armor, unable to absorb such force, shattered into pieces. Amid the sound of splintering steel, the spiked fleshy club at the end of his tail slammed viciously into the knight's chest, crushing his organs into a lump of pulp—

In short, an instant kill.

Yet this army was no pushover either. As Caesar poured everything into instantly killing one man, the humans' counterattack followed right behind.

"Bang, clang..."

Within two seconds, at least five weapons of different shapes struck Caesar's body at once, spraying brilliant sparks. Some even tore through his sturdy scales, leaving wound after wound across his body.

These knights were clearly not on the same level as those free riders and cavalrymen. They possessed greater stamina, faster speed, and far stronger qualities in strength, reaction, and every other respect than ordinary soldiers.

But the aberrant black dragon before them was no slouch in close combat either. His body was plainly far less sensitive to pain than those of other true dragons, so making him howl in pain with a single slash was nearly impossible. It would only make him more savage as he rampaged through the crowd.

For Caesar, adding a few more wounds at most meant losing a little more blood. The black dragon did not particularly care. So long as they did not strike fatal weak points such as his head, air sacs, or heart, injuries like these were entirely acceptable.

What truly kept him on guard was the spellcaster seated on horseback.

"Arcane Missiles!"

As Caesar was thinking, the Archmage lightly raised his staff and completed the spell in one motion, directly skipping the steps of constructing a spell model and locking onto the target as he instant-cast a spell.

It was likewise one of the spellcasters' three basic spells, but when Anthony cast it, it was utterly different from when Anrien had used Arcane Missiles. They howled through the air with terrifying force, tearing through it with shrill whistles.

Fortunately, ever since Caesar entered the battlefield, more than half his attention had been focused on the spellcaster. Though he had now lost Luna's ability to foresee events, his reactions were not much slower than before while he remained so alert.

As many as twelve elemental missiles locked onto Caesar from every direction, leaving no blind spot as he tangled with the knights.

The black dragon smacked his lips. After multiple modifications, his body had developed movement capabilities completely unlike those of ordinary creatures. Facing the spellcaster, this enormous monster actually ran backward for nearly ten meters, leaving himself enough time to react, then dodged every Arcane Missile one by one.

However, from beginning to end, the Arcane Missiles had merely been a feint.

Anthony had already witnessed the black dragon's capabilities and knew that basic spells alone could not inflict much damage on it. Thus, even as the first elemental missile screamed away, he had begun constructing another spell model.

"Flame Surge!"

This was the true killing move hidden behind the curtain. Anthony dearly wished he could smash the black dragon to death with a single fireburst, but unfortunately, that was a spell only legendary mages could wield. Flame Surge was his limit.

The next second, people seemed to see a demon formed entirely from fire elements. It let out a pained shriek and charged at incomparable speed toward the black dragon that had just finished its evasive maneuvers, overtaking the crossbow bolts and javelins flying through the air along its path and swallowing them whole.