Tom leaned forward on Ragnvlar's neck. The dragon beating its wings in long, powerful sweeps that cleaved the acid-filled sky like a blade.
Steam trailed behind them as raindrops vaporized on contact with the dragon's mana-coated scales.
He scanned the forest beneath again and again searching for movement, for a flicker of cloak, for the signature disturbance of someone running fast enough to challenge physics.
"Where are you hiding.…?" he muttered.
Ragnvlar rumbled low, as if urging him to trust its instinct.
Suddenly, a scenario caught in his sight. A strange displacement of droplets, bending wrong for a split second.
Tom's eyes sharpened.
" I guess.... "
He steered Ragnvlar lower.
Piere Lal was running with silent, rhythmic steps. His cloak fluttering in the storm, its enchanted fabric repelling every falling drop with a perfect curve.
He had just passed another charred tree when the air above him boomed.
A wing-sweep that displaced the clouds themselves.
Piere skidded to a halt, boots splashing in sizzling puddles. He looked up and froze.
High in the sky, Albert Newton, not ahead, not vanished into checkpoints, not unreachable up front…
but right past him all this time?! Closing the distance with terrifying speed!
Piere's pupils shrank.
Impossible…. I calculated his trajectory…. he should've been miles ahead by now.… unless,
He wasn't running forward. He went down. He might have taken a Under-Quest or Shrine Challenge.
Piere felt something tighten in his chest — not fear, but a cold jolt of realization.
Albert wasn't just fast or tricky. Albert was unpredictable even in loss.
For an instant, Piere considered firing a shot upward but he immediately crushed the impulse.
If he attacked first, Albert would counter. If Albert countered, explosion's shockwave would force Piere to dodge and if Piere dodged, he would lose momentum and if he lost momentum….
Albert would overtake him instantly. Not a good idea at all.
He forced his breathing steady, pretending not to see the dragon descending.
He had to stay perfectly composed.
Perfectly neutral.
Perfectly unreadable.
Because Albert Newton was watching.
Tom hovered above, scanning the ground. He still couldn't see Piere clearly — the cloak's optical distortion wrapped him like disappearing ink in the rain.
He felt someone was near somewhere.
Piere Lal, hidden under the cloak's shimmer, whispered to himself,
"Don't attack.… stay invisible. If he sees you, he'll strike first."
Both men held their positions.
Ragnvlar's wings tensed beneath Tom as he finally lifted his arm and pointed downward.
"There."
Without any hesitation or second guessing, he commanded in rough tongue,
"Ragnvlar, strike."
The dragon's pupils contracted to thin slits.
A deep, rolling growl rose from its chest vibrated through Tom's bones. Then burst outward into a thunderous roar that shook the canopy itself.
In the next second the dragon dropped there like a comet.
Acid rain evaporated in a steaming cone around its body as holy-white fire ignited along its scales. Piere's cloak flickered and his body blurred sideways the instant the dragon landed. A clean, silent sidestep that left an afterimage in the rain.
The ground where he stood exploded.
Ragnvlar's claws tore a crater into the earth, holy energy radiating in rings that burned holes through the falling acid.
Piere flipped backward, landing on the trunk of a warped tree. His boots hissed as they touched the stinging surface. His cloak fluttered, barely holding against the blast.
"Tch. That dragon can see me?" he muttered.
It could.
Because beasts or mages with Holy also known as Purity affinity could see through lies, illusion, hidden anomalies.
Ragnvlar's head snapped to the right.
It spotted Piere instantly.
White divine flames spiraled around its horns then shot forward in a spiraling lance of light.
Piere leaped again, twisting mid-air, card symbols flickering under his boots as he stepped off invisible footholds. The beam scraped past his heel, melting a tree behind him to liquid.
Ragnvlar did not stop.
It swept its wings and hurled a slicing gale of consecrated wind very sharper than steel, bright enough to carve the rain in half.
Piere ducked barely dodging the attack but the wind force clipped his shoulder.
He spun and landed hard, cloak smoking, hand twitching from the sheer force of the strike.
Ragnvlar lunged.
This time its mouth opened wide. The radiant fangs glowed. Ready to crush him like prey.
But inside its fur, pressed tightly between soft divine skin, Tom hid with quiet breath and sharp eyes.
Studying Piere's reactions.
Letting the dragon be the chaos while he calculated a pattern to dominance.
Piere's eyes widened. He's not riding it. He's hiding inside it?!
Ragnvlar reared back for another strike.
Ragnvlar dove again, claws tearing trenches through the dissolved ground but this time Piere didn't dodge.
He reached into his coat and drew out a Christian cross.
Old iron. Silver edge. Radiant sigils pulsing like a heartbeat.
"Dominus Cansius."
The cross flared with a pale, ancient light that was of nothing but the authority.
It was meant to unravel beasts and men alike.
Ragnvlar staggered mid-charge.
Its wings spasmed.
Its pupils constricted in pain.
Tom felt the dragon's fur stiffen around him as its body shuddered.
Piere raised the cross further.
"Submission."
Ragnvlar's front half buckled not physical body but its spirit.
The dragon slammed its tail down, cracking the earth, breaking the invisible grip. Divine flame erupted along its spine as it roared defiantly. A roar that shook the cross's glow.
Piere clicked his tongue.
"So you resist the First Command."
He twisted the cross like a key.
"Nullification."
A wave burst outward.
Ragnvlar's holy fire flickered — dimmed — then guttered like a dying candle.
That was the moment the dragon began to lose power.
That was the moment Tom understood it's the time to move.
He slid out from under the dragon's fur only enough for one arm to extend. Any farther and the acid rain would carve him open again.
"Ragnvlar! Mark him!"
The dragon's eyes locked onto Piere instantly. Even weakened, it could still see truth.
Ragnvlar roared and pointed its snout toward Piere's new position.
Tom swung Kuga one-handed.
A black arc of cutting pressure flew toward the point Ragnvlar indicated.
Piere swerved sideways but the dragon was already there.
Ragnvlar slammed its wing against the ground, creating a shockwave that forced Piere off his balance for a heartbeat.
Tom followed the displacement, stabbing the air where Piere had moved.
Steel clashed against steel. Piere had drawn a dagger card to parry. Sparks sprayed into the acid rain.
Piere smirked.
"Two against one? How noble."
Ragnvlar whipped its tail, crashing down like a divine hammer. Piere blocked with the cross, holy artifact forming a shield that sent the dragon skidding back.
Tom didn't wait.
He retreated into the dragon's fur before the rain melted his arm off again.
Ragnvlar inhaled sharply. The divine force built and Tom aligned Kuga with its spine.
A synchronized strike.
Dragon breath and cursed steel.
The blast and slash split the clearing into white and black light forcing Piere to brace with both arms, cloak burning away, cross glowed red from stress.
Piere slid backward across the dissolving earth, boots carving thin lines through melting soil.
His cloak was half-gone. His cross was overheating. His breathing had changed very frantic.
Inside his skull the thoughts rolled cold and sharp.
This is slipping out of his hand.
That dragon.… its divinity is higher in this current state of both.
At my true level I would crush it with a blink.
Holy heck, I can't use unleash myself here.
I am fighting at a child's height while hiding an emperor's uniform.
Ragnvlar's roar grudged again.
Even weakened by the cross, it shook the forest.
If I go at it head-on again I'll lose a limb.
If the limb burns, it won't grow back here. That boy, he is hiding under the dragon's fur. Smart but annoying for him since it will be harder to target. If they keep syncing this well, they might actually kill me in this suppressed form.
Piere clicked his tongue silently.
So brute force is done. Time for misdirection.
He slid two cards from his sleeve, pressing his thumb lightly to each.
They shimmered, not with magic, but with a slight fold in reality.
"Two mirrors" he whispered.
He tossed them into the air.
Both burst into a haze of white sparks that shaped into silhouettes. Ghostlike Pieres sprinted in opposite directions.
Ragnvlar lunged at one. Tom swung Kuga toward the other.
The real Piere, meanwhile, was dropping to the ground, rolling under the dragon's wing, and planting a tiny metal prism in the mud.
He whispered, "Scatter"
With a bright pulse, deafening crack erupted on it but a sudden vacuum implosion, sucking dust, mist and vision inward like a collapsing lung.
Tom shouted from beneath the dragon's fur, "Ragnvlar! Pull up!"
The dragon leapt skyward, wings beating against the implosion's drag. Within the swirling empty space Piere already marched.
They can't see me for three seconds. Three seconds is enough. Trap set. Time to go.
He dashed through the blur, cloak re-knitting into a thin layer of invisibility. By the time the implosion dissipated, Piere was already fifty meters away and accelerating onwards.
Ragnvlar's divine eyes locked onto emptiness.
"Where is he!?" Tom shouted.
The dragon sniffed the air, growled, then turned sharply east.
"He ran!" Tom realized.
Tom scrambled up the dragon's neck, gripping the mane.
"Ragnvlar—after him!"
The dragon roared. Wings opened like banners of white flame in a flash of divine light, the two shot through the acid night, chasing the man who refused to be stop.