When the thought first flickered across his mind, Mirrorblade—who had just been slammed in the ribs by the Blighted Espinas's brutal shoulder tackle—wondered if he'd finally gone mad or simply been beaten senseless.
Yet, as Mirrorblade whipped his blade-tail around, driving the serrated edge deep into the massive wound the Field Team Leader had carved into the base of the Blighted Espinas's tail, the sensation felt undeniably real. He wasn't concussed, nor was he losing his grip on reality due to blood loss. His condition was actually improving; he was growing stronger.
Is this right?
Even as the blighted horror lunged at him like a rabid hound, and even as the viscous, toxic hellfire clinging to his legs slowed his movements, Mirrorblade felt a strange sense of clarity. The monster clamped its jaws onto his neck, refusing to let go, pumping Bio-energy crystals and venom into his system—and yet, Mirrorblade felt better than ever.
The two behemoths thrashed and rolled. One struggled to stand while the other twisted desperately to gain the upper hand. In that frantic, split-second struggle, a streak of eerie blue fire tore through the air once more.
The Bio-crystal Bomb soared over the monster's stubby horns, grazing the thermal vents on the back of the grappling Mirrorblade. In the chaos of their close-quarters brawl, the projectile struck with surgical precision, detonating squarely against the Blighted Espinas's left eye.
BOOM!
The Blighted Espinas, which had been tearing at the flesh of Mirrorblade's neck, instantly recoiled. The agonizing sear of its vulnerable eye being scorched forced it to throw its head back. Its massive draconic skull was momentarily swallowed by a shroud of ghostly blue flames.
The fire was so fierce, so domineering, that it engulfed Mirrorblade as well. And yet, the sensation remained one of pure vitality.
At first, there was a sting—the sharp erosion of flesh and bone. But within seconds, the pain evaporated. It was replaced by a wave of pure refreshment. It felt like a dragon that hadn't eaten in hundreds of days suddenly being presented with a fatty, succulent feast. Mirrorblade inhaled greedily, his eyes narrowing in bliss.
He didn't even capitalize on the moment as the Blighted Espinas staggered back. He paused to savor the sensation. From the corroded wounds on his legs to his internal organs and every plate of his outer shell, Mirrorblade felt as though he were soaking in a warm, nourishing ocean.
It was a primal fulfillment that reached every cell in his body. It felt as if something missing was being restored, or perhaps something new was being added—something foreign, yet perfectly suited to him, as if it had been a part of him since birth.
Of course. What else could it be?
Exhaling a cloud of hot vapor, Mirrorblade glanced at his right side. He was covered in battle scars. Whether the Blighted Espinas had used its thorns, teeth, or claws, every wound had been encrusted with clusters of glowing blue crystals.
But now, the clusters were gone.
They had vanished, melted, transferred—no, they had been absorbed. He had consumed them.
Driven by pure instinct, he flicked his blade-tail. Mirrorblade brought the tail-blade before his eyes. Normally, the high-frequency vibration of his blade-scales created a blurred, silver-grey silhouette. Now, that silver-grey was stained with a haunting shade of deep blue.
As the vibrations ceased, a layer of blue crystal remained on the surface of the scales. With a mere thought, the crystals began to proliferate at a visible speed. They spread from the tip of the serrated edge to the base, creeping onto the stationary scales of his mid-tail.
Mirrorblade was suddenly reminded of his mother, the warlike, cold, and none-too-bright Acidic Glavenus. At this moment, the blue crystals on his tail were indistinguishable from the sulfuric deposits on an Acidic Glavenus's blade—dense, razor-sharp, and growing like a forest of glass, adding immense weight to his weapon.
But they were fundamentally different.
Mirrorblade moved suddenly. He didn't know why; it was an instinctive urge. He slammed his blade-tail into the earth before him.
Opposite him, the Blighted Espinas had managed to scrape the blue fire from its face. Driven by blind rage, it charged once more. Under normal circumstances, Mirrorblade would never have met such a head-on assault so casually. He would never have dreamed that simply stabbing his tail into the ground could stop such a juggernaut.
But he did it anyway, following an invisible guidance—a voice in his heart telling him that he could.
In the next heartbeat, a wall of crystal erupted from his tail as the epicenter. It grew with unnatural speed, as if it were alive. In the blink of an eye, a magnificent wall of translucent blue crystal stood between him and the monster.
"ROAR!!!"
CRASH!
The frenzied Blighted Espinas smashed the crystal wall to splinters. Countless shimmering shards filled the air. They didn't scatter in the wake of the monster's charge; instead, they hovered eerily in the air. Large and small, they hung like a thousand polished mirrors, reflecting everything in the clearing.
The Blighted Espinas panted heavily, its stamina finally reaching its limit. After the prolonged battle and its suicidal final gambit, even this terror felt the weight of exhaustion.
It looked around in confusion. It could no longer find its target. Its remaining eye stared blankly at the largest floating crystal in its line of sight. It saw its own reflection—and a blue spike growing rapidly within the mirror.
CRACK!
"ROAR!!!"
By the time the Blighted Espinas realized the danger, it was too late. A jagged crystal spike had driven itself deep into its back, entering through an old wound without resistance.
The monster spun around to strike back, but there was nothing there. Its attacker stood far in the distance, while the spike lodged in its spine began to disintegrate. The portion of the crystal outside the body shattered into dust, returning to the air, while the rest remained embedded deep within the Blighted Espinas's vitals.
The monster tried to charge... but its legs wouldn't follow.
It could barely stand, let alone run. It watched as the creature across from it—the only monster it had ever truly feared—slowly retracted its tail.
Could that even be called a blade-tail anymore? The blue crystals had encased it like a massive lance. Even Mirrorblade thought the name no longer fit. Then, just as quickly as they had appeared, the crystals shattered.
I see.
The blue crystals reorganized and shattered again at his whim. Countless particles of Bio-energy responded to his will, covering the entire battlefield in an instant. Under the sunlight, these transparent crystals acted as a sea of mirrors, flashing with brilliant blue light and robbing the Blighted Espinas of its last shred of vision.
The monster saw nothing but shifting, blinding glints. It had no idea where it was, what lay ahead, or where the enemy intended to kill it from.
It began to spin blindly, lashing out with its teeth and tail at nothing, hoping to land a lucky blow or keep the predator at bay. But its body failed it. After a few futile rotations, the Blighted Espinas slumped, saliva dripping from its mangled maw.
I understand now.
Mirrorblade finally understood. He felt that only now did he truly earn the "Mirror" in his name.
With a thought, the shattered crystals condensed or dispersed. Sometimes they trapped the blighted beast in place, lost in a labyrinth of reflections; other times, they coalesced into physical weapons.
A Great Sword, a Long Sword, an Insect Glaive... one after another, these crystalline constructs pierced the Blighted Espinas's wounds from every angle, shattering inside or tearing the gashes wider.
The monster's blue-green blood sprayed across the clearing, staining the earth. Patches of crystal grew rapidly wherever the blood pooled, only to rise into the air and join the swirling sea of Bio-crystals at Mirrorblade's command.
Effortless.
That was Mirrorblade's overriding sensation. The battle had shifted from a desperate, life-and-death struggle where a single mistake meant being eaten alive, to a leisurely, almost playful execution in a matter of seconds.
The change was total. And the catalyst was this unique energy—Bio-energy.
Mirrorblade didn't know why he could absorb and manipulate it so easily. Had he known it would be this simple, he wouldn't have spent so much time avoiding Bio-energy deposits during his investigations as if they were lethal poison.
"This is... incredible..." The Field Team Leader, witnessing the transformation, pushed himself up using his Great Sword as a crutch. His eyes were wide with shock. "Partner... are you... Blighted?"
Blighted?
Perhaps.
Mirrorblade heard the Field Team Leader's words. By the definition of the scholars at the base, his mastery over Bio-energy and crystal shaping would certainly classify him as a "Severely Blighted Organism"—a Blighted Large Monster.
But that didn't matter. Only the change mattered.
Everything that happened today was a revelation. Despite the physical prowess and special abilities he had inherited from his father, Asterion, Mirrorblade had rarely felt this way—the feeling that even if he gave his life, he might not win.
The threat of death this blighted beast had posed was sharper than any hunt he had ever conducted. It had made him feel the sting of true weakness.
He had resisted that feeling with everything he had, but his intellect told him the truth: the gap wasn't something that could be bridged with traps, ambushes, or hit-and-run tactics. It was a fundamental issue of power.
But once he accepted the Bio-energy and found he was perfectly compatible with it, the monster that had nearly killed him became a joke—a toy to be discarded.
He had simply become stronger. His power was greater.
Suddenly, Mirrorblade felt he finally understood those cryptic words his father had said when he was kicked out of the territory years ago.
"You are a dragon."
"What determines a dragon's status isn't his wisdom, but his power."
"The gap in power cannot be filled by intellect. No matter how smart you are, you cannot kick a Colossal Dragon to death."
Thinking of it now, survival in this cruel world—the ability to live more freely than any other dragon—didn't depend on friendship or partners. It depended on whether you could forever defeat the monsters that stood in your path.
Mirrorblade almost wanted to laugh. He thought of his Uncle Kulu-Ya-Ku. His father's words were cruel, and his actions in kicking Mirrorblade out were harsh, yet hadn't his father protected the weak Kulu-Ya-Ku all those years?
He had allowed his uncle to live as he pleased, stubbornly and freely, in this brutal world. Old man... you...
As his mind wandered, Mirrorblade's gaze pierced through the sea of floating crystals, locking onto the blighted horror. He sent one final, massive Great Sword of crystal straight through the monster's chest.
It likely pierced the heart and lungs. After a few futile twitches, the Blighted Espinas finally closed its eyes.
Its wings, tattered and encrusted with broken crystals, partially draped over its corpse. No one would ever know if, in its final moments, the creature had regained its sanity or if it had never been mad to begin with.
But it was over. Mirrorblade dismissed the crystalline dust from the air, allowing the sunlight to return to the forest clearing.
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