The magic crystal sphere was originally shooting out a fire column as thick as a man's embrace. When Dany leapt onto it, a ring of gold-red flames two meters high surged up around her.
The white-robed priests below were trying to burn her alive.
Well, burn the Dragon Queen alive.
Walking through the flames, Dany not only suffered no harm but moved as if she were in her natural element. Like sliding down a smooth slope, she stepped on the slanting fire column and slid rapidly toward its source, the crystal sphere on top of the magic tower.
She even laughed proudly, letting out a gleeful "Hahaha!"
"I'll fight you to the end!" One of the white-robed priests was pushed over the edge. He roared, released both hands from the crystal sphere, drew the short dagger at his waist, and stabbed it straight into his heart.
"Hahaha! Go to hell with me!" he uttered a vicious incantation. The bright red blood soaking from his chest visibly turned black, thick and inky, giving off a foul, rotten stench.
The pitch-black blood writhed as if alive, while a mass of black mist slowly gathered toward it.
Blood and mist fused into a face identical to the priest beneath the hood, twisted into a vicious, savage demonic grimace the size of a washbasin.
At the moment Dany landed atop the tower, it lunged straight at her face.
The process happened too fast. The priest had been hidden in Dany's blind spot behind the two-meter-wide magic sphere. She had no chance to defend herself and was struck head on.
"Hiss hiss hiss!" It was like throwing a rusty nail into concentrated sulfuric acid.
"Awooo!" The ghost face slammed against Dany's helmet. Acrid black smoke rose, and the old priest's soul let out a shrill, tortured scream.
"No… Valyrian steel armor… I refuse—"
In an instant, the giant ghostly face evaporated completely.
"What are you upset about? This is not ordinary Valyrian armor. It is embedded with the Brandon Anti-Demon Array, which grants immunity to elemental attacks.
Your petty blood sorcery is not even half the level of a demigod. What good is it supposed to do?"
Though Dany cursed loudly, her pretty face had gone pale, and she felt sick to her stomach.
She almost fainted from the stench.
"Hah!" Anger boiling inside her, she wasted no time. Her greatsword came down in a cleaving strike, hacking a nearby white-robed priest clean in half.
The magic crystal tower drew fire magic from the molten lava below and converted it into various spells for the archmage to wield.
In theory, the earth-fire beneath them contained infinite magic power, and the archmage wielding it was like a mage with unlimited mana.
But magic still required mages to use it.
Under siege by three dragons, the eight white-robed priests were already pushed to their limits. With two gone, they could no longer maintain the relentless barrage they had unleashed before.
"Boom!" The column of flame dueling the black dragon's fire exploded into a sky full of blossoms.
"Hiss hiss!" Like a dagger in her hand, the door-wide greatsword sliced through the air. In a blink, four more white-robed priests were cut neatly in two.
As the pieces fell and their cloaks opened, each revealed a twisted, deformed face with crooked mouths and slanted eyes.
The skies cleared. Fire serpents and columns attacking the dragons vanished completely.
Only two priests remained. One collapsed to the ground in terror. The other stood facing the Dragon Queen. His eyes hardened with resolve as he threw his head back and roared, "My Lord Balerion, descend upon this world and punish the sinner before us!"
A heartbeat later, an overwhelming aura of divine majesty surged from his body. Blinding golden light shot from beneath his hood.
Balerion wasted no time descending into the fanatical believer willingly offering himself.
"How dare you invade my magic tower!"
"Swish!" The dark-red blade screeched through the air, coming down straight toward Egghead's skull.
"Whummm—crackle!" A transparent eggshell-like barrier appeared above Egghead's head. Sparks burst and scattered where the blade landed.
"Shit, a magic shield?" Dany froze for a heartbeat. Then she gripped the sword with both hands and pushed down harder, her left foot snapping up from below in a powerful kick.
"Boom!"
The sudden strike was still blocked. The god-possessed figure did not move and perhaps had not even reacted, but a faint red translucent barrier had formed over his groin.
When her iron boot hit it, ripples spread outward like waves on water.
Dany did not hesitate. She withdrew the sword and sprang back two steps, blade angled down, then lunged forward, thrusting at the priest's throat even faster.
"Whumm—spark!" Four or five sparks sprayed outward, and another transparent shield of flame materialized.
"Whumm whumm—crackle crackle!"
Dany slashed again and again, sometimes thrusting, sometimes chopping. Flame-thin shields manifested one after another around Egghead. When they overlapped completely, they formed a full suit of fiery armor.
It was not the eggshell dome she had assumed, but a suit of armor.
Smooth surface, not a single marking, rivet, or seam. It looked like armor sculpted from a single piece of transparent crystal.
"Susano?!" This time, Dany was truly shaken.
At a glance, the smooth tight-fitting fire armor did resemble a bodysuit version of Susano.
It actually looked even more like the icy armor worn by White Walkers.
"You think learning the archmage's meditation technique makes you an archmage? In front of me, your magical knowledge is as shallow as a baby's." Egghead mocked her.
"If you have guts, take your hands off the magic crystal sphere." Dany stepped back, holding her sword upright before her chest. Her eyes slowly closed. Her face showed no sadness or panic at all. Her voice drifted toward Egghead, borne lightly on the wind.
Yangdan did not notice the faint breeze that stirred the hair at his temples. He only turned his head to glance at the blue magic crystal sphere.
His right hand rested on it, with boundless magic at his disposal.
"This is also part of my power," he said with a smug smile. "On the magic crystal tower, the Archmage is a god."
"I am standing right in front of you. Why do you not attack me?" Dany asked with a faint smile.
The smile vanished from Yangdan's face. His empty right hand lifted, and a transparent, palm sized crescent shaped fire blade appeared around his body.
With a casual point.
"Whoosh, whoosh, whoosh." The crescent fire blades flashed like lightning across less than four meters of space, striking Dany's visor, neck, torso, arms, and some even arced around to hit her back and hips.
"Clang, clang, clang."
Unfortunately, each fire blade only left a crisp ringing sound on Dany's armor, and nothing more.
Not even sparks flew.
It was as if the fire blades were mere illusions. Dany did not even sway.
Yet the three inch deep, smoking cuts on the rosewood floor proved that the blades were not illusions at all, and that their power was immense, no weaker than a sword swung in a full chop.
"Turn up the power. Are you scratching my itch?" Dany mocked with her eyes closed.
Yangdan's expression darkened. His outstretched right hand flipped upward, and his five fingers tapped lightly, like plucking the strings of a lute.
"Roar." A red dragon's head, as large as a small van, surfaced from the blue magic sphere, as if the sphere had opened a portal and a ferocious red dragon was emerging from the other side.
Dany knew, however, that this was Yangdan's fire sorcery, not a real dragon.
"Rooooar." A ten meter long red dragon fully took shape, circling above Yangdan, its form and presence almost indistinguishable from a true dragon.
"Go!" Yangdan pointed forward, and the red dragon turned into a streak of light, howling as it charged at Dany.
The impact speed was so extreme that the air atop the vast black stone tower churned violently, like a Category 12 typhoon.
Then the typhoon truly arrived.
Dany suddenly opened her eyes. A flash of cyan passed through her violet pupils, and a ring of greenish blue tornado wind rose around her iron boots.
The cyan tornado wrapped around her calves, swept past her skirt armor, and finally turned into wisps of clear wind that coiled around the greatsword blade on her chest.
A faint sky blue, illusory sheath appeared over the dark red blade.
Dany stepped forward and swung her sword to meet the roaring fire dragon.
From the dragon's gaping mouth all the way to its tail, it was split cleanly in two, the cut surface smooth as a mirror.
"Boom." The halved red dragon exploded violently, like the detonation of a light missile.
That was only the beginning. Dany seemed to turn into a gust of wind, moving faster than the limits of human sprinting. In the blink of an eye, she was in front of Yangdan. In truth, the distance had been only four meters, just one or two steps away.
As Yangdan looked on in slight shock at the sight of the fire dragon being cleaved apart, a cyan shadow flashed and vanished.
"What was that?" he asked in confusion.
"Clang." The sound of a sword returning to its scabbard came from behind him, followed by the Dragon Queen's calm laughter. "Something that will take your life."
"What?" Yangdan cried out in alarm.
When did she get behind me?
He tried to turn his head, but stopped halfway. A searing yet chilly sensation spread downward from the center of his brow.
"How is this possible?" Yangdan murmured in disbelief.
"Hiss, hiss, hiss." It was as if invisible hands grabbed both sides of Yangdan's body and tore outward with force, splitting him neatly into two halves. Blood sprayed everywhere, forming a crimson mist.
"Boom." Scorching flames erupted from the wounds of the two halves, igniting the blood mist and setting the remains ablaze like firewood.
That single strike contained both wind and fire divine power. The sharp wind cut through Yangdan's fiery protective barrier and split his body, while the fire power within the magic sword ignited him from within.
"What is impossible about it? Do not forget, I also have a magic tower. A magic crystal sphere can provide unlimited magic, but its output has a limit."
The process of the magic crystal tower drawing power from the earth's core was much like drawing water from a rural well, while the magic crystal sphere functioned like a reservoir.
Earlier, the eight robed priests fighting three giant dragons had already drained most of the magic stored in the sphere. The conduit for drawing magic was only so thick, and there was a maximum amount that could be replenished per unit of time.
Dany's earlier taunts provoked Yangdan into attacking her, further consuming the magic in the sphere. If the total output of the magic crystal sphere was ten thousand watts, then when Yangdan did not attack Dany, the strength of his imitation Susanoo was ten thousand watts. If he diverted three thousand watts to offense, the imitation Susanoo dropped to seven thousand watts.
Creating that ten meter long red dragon alone diverted at least eight thousand watts, leaving only two thousand watts to maintain the imitation Susanoo.
And Dany's move, Wind Scar, had an attack strength of at least eight thousand watts. Breaking through a two thousand watt defense was effortless.
Dahei landed atop the crystal tower and smashed the blue magic crystal sphere with a single tail strike. Dragonfire poured out, incinerating the remains of "Yangdan."
Dany stood to the side and used an enspiritment technique, transforming the fragment of will belonging to Yangdan within the flames into ownerless spiritual matter and a small amount of divinity.
Well, Yangdan had only descended a single thought into his believer. There was not much to harvest.
Even as Dany complained about the meager gains, Yangdan in the Abyss of Smoke was enraged.
"Buzz, buzz." The sacred black tower shook violently as a terrifying surge of magic poured up from its base.
"Yangdan, are you insane? At this output, the volcano will erupt!" Dany shouted in shock and fury.
"Hahaha, are you scared? Do not worry. Before the subterranean fire erupts, I will kill you. Ah, no. R'hllor!"
At the bottom of the black tower, "the other Yangdan's" triumphant laughter abruptly turned into a shrill scream.
(End of chapter)
Want to read the chapters in Advance? Join my Patreon
https://patreon.com/Glimmer09