Humans
"Ghk..."
Dragon scales or not, an impact like that was more than they could swallow whole. My entire body throbbed. The damage hadn't reached the bone, though; moving was no trouble at all.
"Ugh, I'm sore all over... I'd better ease up on stunts like that."
I did my best to ignore the dull ache radiating through me and took in the place where half-ruined Mount Everest had stood. I had come straight down from that height with frictional heat stacked on my own flames, and the result looked as if an enormous meteor had struck. A vast crater gaped there. Estimating the depth, I figured I had punched down at least a hundred and fifty meters, and all around it heat no stone could endure had melted rock into flowing lava.
A little much, maybe...
A fairly large earthquake had probably rolled all the way into the regions where humans lived, but that was hardly my concern. I spread my mana to check the area, and from the presence, utterly extinguished, the bear was dead for good. My whole body ached, and yet I felt better than I had any right to — exactly the feeling of finishing a thoroughly satisfying workout and filling my lungs with fresh air.
The pain was easing, and I was about to leave, when it struck me that I hadn't devoured the boss this time.
Does an assimilation-type gate yield nothing at all?
A little disappointed, I clicked my tongue for no good reason. The fight itself had been thoroughly unsatisfying, but the thing had looked as if it would taste decent enough. Still regretting the lack of a prize, I scanned the crater again — and cold began to gather overhead.
That...?
Every trace of lingering cold drew together above my head and started to change into something. Before long it took the shape of a fruit, like an apple, and dropped with a soft thud right at my feet. I wrapped my eyes in mana and examined it. This, it seemed, was the core of the gate.
I picked up the fruit, thick with fairly strong mana and cold woven together. The chill seeping in through my scales told me that what lay inside was nothing less than the very essence of the Everest range. I opened my mouth and tossed the fruit in whole.
It shattered against my teeth with a crisp crack, juice bursting, a fresh fragrance filling my mouth. It began bright and tart, then a heavy sweetness and a bitterness that wasn't unpleasant stirred my appetite. The moment I swallowed, cold welled up from inside me and poured out of my body without pause.
"This is...!"
The flames within me were shoving the cold back out. With nowhere to go, the cold circled my body, slipped in again, was driven off by the fire, and was expelled once more — over and over.
How long passed? The homeless cold began to settle into my scales and claws. Compared with my interior, the outside ran cooler, and the cold that burrowed in seeking that weakness took root almost at once. A minute or so later, it had already sunk completely into my claws and scales.
"Now this is a gift I can appreciate."
I poured mana into my claws. They lengthened by about half again, and frigid cold and blazing flame arose together, coexisting.
I swung a claw through empty air as a test.
Shhk—!
The ground split like paper, freezing even as it caught fire. The strange part was that ice and flame did not interfere with each other. The ice did not melt in the fire, and the fire did not weaken against the ice. They merged as if they belonged together. The edge of my claws had sharpened dramatically, and the flames wrapped around them had grown unmistakably stronger.
A smile tugged at my mouth over the unexpected gift and refused to come down. Not that it was anything but a smile packed with pure intimidation.
Humans who had finally gotten the situation under control seemed to be closing in to identify the cause. I could feel presences approaching this place from far off. Being seen didn't matter, but there was no reason to let it happen. Better to leave.
I spread my wings hard and shot up into the sky, climbed above the clouds to hide myself, and set off back toward the griffin's gate.
I arrived near the gate, but I didn't go in at once. Humans had pitched camp right in front of it, so I opened a little more distance, watched the situation, and focused my senses through eyes and ears.
"The red dragon's mana is thickest here."
"Yeah? But there still hasn't been a gate break. What's going on?"
"That is... something we ourselves are still having difficulty determining..."
From their talk, they had clearly come looking for me.
"No — before that, didn't it already come out of a gate break in North Korea?"
"Then why is that dragon's gate here too?"
At the sharp-voiced woman's questions, the man dressed like a researcher was busy reading her mood.
"Well... we don't even have a similar case on record, so it's a little difficult to say anything for certain."
"Tsk. Useless. Fine — get out of here. You'll only get in the way if the dragon shows up."
At her words, the people dressed like the man began to withdraw. She was probably fairly high-ranking. The mana I sensed from her was the highest grade of any human I had met so far, and the long blond hair she wore like a banner framed a beauty striking enough to catch the eye at once. Judging by that mana and the reactions around her, she was something like an S-Rank hunter — and still, the strength barely registered.
Just as my thoughts leaned toward simply sweeping them aside and going in, something rather interesting came out of her mouth.
"The moment the summit ends, we start the subjugation immediately — but it could appear at any time. All of you, stay at full readiness!"
At her words the hunters nearby answered with shouts full of fighting spirit.
A summit...
Piecing their words together, it seemed a summit had been convened to subjugate me over the mess I had made. They still didn't know I could come and go through the gate whenever I pleased. Making an enemy of all humanity would be no great problem. But speaking as someone who had once been human, humans were a troublesome breed. Judge them a threat, and they turned endlessly cruel.
Or was that actually for the better? Humans driven to the brink would make far more interesting opponents than some half-baked gate boss. Slaughter them now, throw the corpses into the regions where humans lived, and the war between me and humanity would begin.
The sudden memory of one frail human's words made me hesitate to wipe them out.
While I kept turning it over, I sensed a gaze locked precisely on me. The woman from before was looking straight at me through the clouds.
What? With the detection I roughly gauged from her, she shouldn't be able to sense me at this distance.
I shifted a little to the right, and her eyes followed at once to where I was. I had already been found. No point hiding once I was caught. I folded my wings and dropped fast.
As expected, the humans below who had begun to brace drew their weapons and hauled their mana up to the limit. The moment I broke through the clouds and showed myself, dozens of spells came flying, aimed dead at me.
"Tanks, ready your taunt skills! Mages, start chanting support magic!"
Under the woman's command they moved with the tight discipline of hornets with their stingers raised, and I batted the spells aside with my tail.
"Shall we talk for a moment?"
"Don't listen! The dragon will seize your minds!"
"Confident you won't regret this later?"
"Shut up!"
She shouted that, drew the sword at her waist, and charged. From the way the hunters behind her froze, this was a development they hadn't expected. Lightning sheathed the blade as the slash came flying, aimed precisely at the membrane of my wing — but I didn't feel it was worth dodging. With a crackling snap the cut struck my wing and scattered, useless.
"So this is the full extent of your power?"
"Kh..."
She gave no real answer to the taunt. She only poured more mana into her body. Lightning now spat wildly off her, sparks practically leaping from her eyes, and she jumped.
KRRROOM—!
Thunder rolled, and in the next instant she was right in front of my eyes. Speed alone, she rivaled the thunder. She brought the sword straight down. The lightning-wrapped blade stabbed into the base of my wing; lightning and scale collided, and sparks flew without mercy.
"Ghk...! What — why won't it cut?!"
That the sword hadn't split my scales even a little must have been a serious shock. I grinned at the woman staring at me with horrified eyes.
"I'll grant you this much. Your courage, at least, I rate highly."
I drew the wing back and beat it hard, swatting her.
"Guhk...!"
She let out a scream that didn't match her looks, went flying, and slammed into the ground — and I struck her again with my tail.
"..............!!"
Unable even to scream, driven deep into the earth, she couldn't move. The damage had been too great.
"Well. Your leader is down. What do the rest of you intend to do?"
I looked at the remaining hunters as I spoke, and they took their stances without a word.
"I see. Not bad, though. Go on, then — without regret."
Brave humans weren't bad. I rather liked them, in fact. To feel the fear of death — a living thing's most basic instinct — down to the bone, and still not turn one's back, but face it: that was more than enough to deserve praise.
I wrapped both wings in mana to the limit and breathed flame from my scales. The tanks, each deploying their own defense skills, and those behind them laying some magic over them — despair was nowhere in their eyes. I swung my wings violently and loaded flame into the vortex that formed.
Come, then, humans. Receive it.
Just before the two sprawling, flame-laden vortexes struck them dead-on, a massive bolt of lightning burst up from underground and blocked them.
"You were still awake?"
"Ghk... kh... not... yet... mph..."
She vomited a mouthful of black blood, barely propped her staggering body on her sword, and raised her mana with a body that was all but dead.
"...Not... ghhh... not down yet..."
"Indeed. I underestimated you."
I had definitely looked down on that woman. So an apology was in order.
"I apologize for the rudeness of underestimating you. I shall deem you my enemy."
I drew a breath, gathered the flames inside my body, mixed them with the mana welling from my heart, and collected it all in my mouth. The earth around me burned, and the density of mana near me climbed high enough that merely looking at it could turn the stomach.
The breath that had burned a mountain range was fired, aimed at the frail humans.