Chapter 45
Chapter 45
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Translator: Ace
Chapter: 45
Chapter Title: Mountain Lord (2)
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A few minutes before the battle broke out.
"......"
Federback gazed down at the snowy expanse from atop the hill.
Black dots were scattered across the white canvas.
They were iron stakes driven into the snowfield.
Chunks of metal soaked in the foul miasma of the vilest humans.
They had corrupted all the pure veins flowing beneath the earth's crust, destroying them beyond repair.
Kuududududu...
The mountain writhed in agony, screaming with its entire body.
Earthquakes and avalanches erupted everywhere.
Federback watched nature's torment with an expressionless face.
'As a child, I once stubbornly clung to vegetarianism, insisting we had to protect nature...'
What a foolish thought.
Who was protecting whom?
Humans were astonishingly powerless before the whims and furies of Mother Nature.
Having once experienced the extinction of his kind at nature's hands, he felt not a shred of guilt about crushing and destroying the environment to bring it to its knees.
'To survive, nothing is off-limits.'
If it meant humanity's survival, he was prepared to reduce mountains and oceans to wastelands.
'Well... the beasts holed up in these mountains, sucking the land dry all this time, are probably all waking up now.'
A child wails when its milk runs dry; an elder rages when his meals are cut off.
Block anything from entering their mouths, and they all react the same way.
Sure enough, a response came.
Kwa—bang!
From deep within an ice cave, the mountain lord crawled out.
[Grrrrrrr...]
White steam billowed from between teeth as sharp as a longsword's edge.
Ice Dragon Adara.
The nightmare born in the heart of winter.
Its massive body writhed like a river freezing over in real time.
Its elongated limbs gleamed with brilliant silver, their surfaces covered in crystals of snow and ice accumulated over thousands of years.
Its head was enormous and intimidating, like an ancient peak rising from the snowfield.
Beneath layers of snow-white scales lay deep-sunken eye sockets.
Within them flickered a light as intense as the aurora.
Kaduduk—
Each time its claws scraped the ice, a chilling metallic screech echoed.
[Kroooaaargh!]
Fury at the severance of the mountain's vital essence flowing into its lair.
Federback stepped toward the Ice Dragon Adara.
'...Exactly as I saw it before regressing.'
He had encountered it while healing his wounds from defeat in the Beauvoir abandoned mine.
Adara looked identical to that time.
In the primordial mythic age, when humans were far weaker than monsters.
Ancestors forced to hide in caves connected the stars in the night sky to draw gods and beasts, passing those forms down to their descendants.
Among the oldest and most primal shapes from that era was the dragon.
Primeval terror. Humanity's natural predator.
'But this one has a fatal flaw.'
Federback eyed the ice dragon before him.
Unlike the terrifying forms passed down from the mythic age, Adara was missing one key feature.
Wings.
One of the core elements that made dragons terrifying.
The Ice Dragon Adara had no wings.
It wasn't pureblood.
A sub-dragon born from a diluted branch lineage—that was Adara's true nature.
"No wings, but those teeth and scales rival a true dragon's."
Federback drew his sword and faced off against Adara.
Gazing at the dragon's gleaming teeth and scales, he offered a curt assessment.
"You'll make for decent use."
* * *
Kwa—bang!
Adara's claws tore into the snowfield.
"Gaaah—spare me!"
"A dragon! A dragon's here! Run!"
"N-no! I can't escape! It's too fa—!"
The prisoners were annihilated by the ice dragon in less than thirty seconds.
"Y-you bastard! You planned this from the start...!"
The few survivors turned their backs on Adara and charged toward Federback.
Snap—
But rushing that way only got their necks severed all the same.
At last, the ice dragon's gaze turned to Federback.
Federback spoke.
"Sucking up the mountain's essence your whole life won't help. Not for a half-breed worm like you."
[......!]
Understanding human speech, Adara's eyes widened.
Federback kept mocking.
"No matter how strong you get, those wings won't grow. You'll just get bigger. Your kin will never accept you. Ever."
[Krooooaaaaaargh!]
Adara's eyes rolled back.
Federback nodded.
'Taunt landed perfectly.'
Dragons freshly awakened from slumber often wreak havoc on nearby humans.
The once-thriving Beauvoir mine turning into a gloomy ruin was due to Adara's awakening.
'I have to kill it here.'
To prevent future casualties.
And to restart the Beauvoir mine, essential for reviving Meursault territory—this subjugation was crucial.
...Pat!
Federback charged forward.
Adara's massive bulk followed.
Swift movement unbefitting its size.
But Federback's sword was faster.
Papapat—
Federback scaled the rocks beside the cave and mounted Adara's back.
Where shoulder met back, the spot for wings—empty.
Just malformed wing bones protruding like melted wax, bare without hide.
A mark of degeneration.
Toward that spot, Federback thrust his blade.
Jeoeok!
The famed sword White Scale sliced through draconic hide and burrowed deep.
[Gya—aaaaak!]
The ice dragon spat pain.
From its gaping maw exploded subzero chill like a blast.
Jeojeojeojeok!
Its breath blanketed the area in frost.
Federback rolled across the ground with all his might.
He dodged, but couldn't fully escape the cold.
His left hand, holding the shield, burned fiercely.
At such low temperatures, frostbite and burns blurred together.
[Grrrgrrrring!]
Ice Dragon Adara began pursuing Federback.
Federback covered himself with his white shield and flattened into the snowfield.
Everything around was white, hard to spot visually.
But Adara zeroed in on his hiding spot.
The scent—fresh meat stirring its hunger.
Soon.
Kwa—jik!
Adara stomped where it guessed Federback lay prone.
And sure enough, flesh, bone shards, and juices burst from there.
[Gruk?]
Adara tilted its head.
It had crushed something... but was it the prey it hunted?
But.
Seogeok!
Federback rose from the snow and severed Adara's rear ankle with his sword.
[Kreoooargh!?]
Adara whipped its head around in shock.
But Federback had already vanished into the flurry.
Kwa—kwakwang!
Adara swung its claws again, following the meat scent on the wind.
Something impaled on its clawtip.
[Gruk?]
Adara eyed the round meatball skewered on its claw.
Flesh and organs balled into meatballs, scattered and buried lightly across the snowfield.
Federback's scent was masked by them.
While Adara faltered.
...Jjeok!
Federback rose from the snow and nicked the tip of the ice dragon's tail.
[Kya—aaaaak!]
Ice Dragon Adara flew into a rage.
Enraged beyond measure at being toyed with in its own hunting grounds.
"Holding in anger's bad for you. Come on."
Federback beckoned with his signature emotionless tone.
Adara charged.
Federback leaped toward a distant peak away from the snowfield.
[Grooooaaaaaooo!]
Ice Dragon Adara pursued fiercely, maw agape.
Soon, their shadows reached the mountainside.
"This looks good."
Federback halted abruptly.
He turned before a burrow just big enough for one person.
Midway up the slope, a straight hundred meters from the Beauvoir abandoned mine.
"Good work climbing this far."
Federback addressed Adara, now just ten-odd meters below.
"Now, time to go down."
[Gruk!?]
Adara had no time to react.
Ku—woong!
Federback stomped.
Mana from his foot rippled out in double, triple, quadruple ripples—up to tenfold waves.
Chiiiii...
The snow around boiled, then surged as massive water.
Underlying soil, rocks, logs uprooted, forming a colossal mudflow.
Simultaneously.
Jjee—eok!
A roar from the peak.
[Krrruk!?]
Adara looked up to see a peak thickly studded with massive iron stakes.
Federback's ripples had widened the cracks between them.
Kwa—bang! Bang! Kwakwakwang!
The peak collapsed.
Kwarururururung!
Up close, an avalanche isn't pure white.
A turbid brown tsunami swept down the slope with immense force.
Kwakwakwakwakwakwakwakwakwakwa—!
Ice waves crashed like a tidal surge.
[Kroaaaak!?]
Ice Dragon Adara dug claws into the ice.
From its gaping throat, it vomited ancient rage and inferiority.
Flash—!
A breath far fiercer than before.
...Kwa—bang!
Draconic breath clashed with nature's avalanche.
Yet.
Kwakwakwakwakwakwakwa—!
The sub-dragon's breath began yielding.
No matter how mighty, a dragon was part of nature.
Insufficient against the wrath of an entire peak.
Brown waves overflowed the frost wall of its breath.
The dragon's body was swallowed by the avalanche.
...Ttukak!
Its ground-anchored claws snapped one by one.
[Graaaaaak!]
Thus, Ice Dragon Adara was swept away by the wave of snow, mud, and ice.
But it wasn't over.
[......!?]
Tumbling in the avalanche, Adara finally saw what lurked below.
Beauvoir abandoned mine.
Where it had massacred humans long ago.
A place it had ignored since.
...And where a lava vein flowed at the mountain's base.
The avalanche bearing Adara poured straight toward it.