<h4>Volume 13, Chapter 8: Final Battle</h4>
This chapter was brought to you by AnmesicCat, and SterAshes.
‘C-can’t win… but if I lose, papa would be worse. What should Baolilong do?’
Baolilong’s eyes were wet, and tears were threatening to fall. No matter how hard it tried to bomb, old papa did not seem to be afraid.
‘I can’t win, but I have to win. What do I do?’ Baolilong felt helpless, and it called out to Li in its heart. If Li was right here, Baolilong would have rushed into papa’s arms.
‘Papa! Why are you still sleeping? Baolilong misses you very much.’
Having sensed Baolilong stopping its attacks, Miluo almost seemed unhappy. Suddenly, a few ck rays… no! They might have been ck “rays” to the giant Miluo, but to others such as Kaiser, they were practically “ck pirs.” The pirs erupted from the ground and shot straight up into the sky. From the ground, the pirs looked endless, as though it was connecting the ground to sky.
Baolilong was surprised by the sudden attack, and immediately dodged to the side. However, the ck pirs from the ground became more and more numerous, and they did not seem to go away after they were shot. Gradually, more and more pirs were shot out, and it became harder and harder for Baolilong to fly around them.
Before long, Baolilong suddenly realized, the ck pirs had be a bird cage, and it could not escape from it.
Baolilong was mad!
It suddenly spit out lightning towards the ck pir. However, not only did the pir not buckle under the lightning, but because Baolilong diverted its attention to attack the pir, another pir mmed right into it. The momentum sent Baolilong flying,nding on yet another pir. Painful Dragon roars continuously emitted from his mouth.
“Baolilong!” Purity covered her mouth, with sympathy filling her eyes.
‘It hurts! Papa!’
The space became more and more narrow. Even for Baolilong, whose speed and reaction time were first ss, it was still having trouble. In addition, having rammed into pirs, its back and left wing were both in pain, and its flying became slightly unstable.
With another carelessness, Baolilong suffered the same fate again, and it was worse this time: because the distance between pirs had decreased, the moment Baolilong scrape a pir, its flight path had been altered slightly, causing it to run into another pir. Even after barely returning to a stable fight, it had no time to dodge another pir from the ground.
Before long, Baolilong’s snow-white body was full of wounds, and blue blood frequently dripped down while it flew in the air, along with painful roars oftening out of its throat.
“Stop! Hurry and stop!” Purity yelled loudly at Miluo, “It still is a little child, and it’s even your child. Stop hurting it!”
In the end, Baolilong really did seem to lose its ability to reason from the pain. It saw the countless number of pirs around it, and with a dizzy head, it thought there was nowhere to go… Its wings were hurting, and it wanted to stop flying. Baolilong looked around, and found a ckish ce where there was no pirs. He happily flew over,nded on the ce, and opened its wings happily to rest.
All the audiences had wide open dropped jaws… H-how could it go andnd on Miluo’s back? That’s basically delivering victory to Miluo.
Miluo paused, and became infuriated; he viewed Baolilongnding on his back as an act of intentional provocation. ck smoke emitted from the giant body, and Baolilong was caught by the viscous air. It desperately pped its wings to try to leave this terrifying ce, but the ck smoke held it in ce. Even being the Sacred White Dragon, Baolilong seemed to be almost suffocating thanks to this ck aura.
‘No! It’s scary! Papa—’
Baolilong desperately called out to Li in its heart…
* * *
Daylight was in the room, reading the book he got from the royal library, when he suddenly received amunication via telepathy from mes.
‘Master, its Highness, Baolilong, can’t hang on anymore, it’s already… impossible to win.’
The book suddenly slipped out of Daylight’s hands and fell on the ground. Sitting quietly on the side, Mizerui seemed rather calm; he asked lightly, “Lost?”
“Mhm.” Daylight, who saw him being extremely calm, thought he had already decided to take Li away, so he also became calmer. Although he had always been firm about not lying and follow through promises… this time, however, even he was in favor of Li running away. Not only because the match unfair to begin with, but also because Li must eat the Heart of the Dragon Emperor if they lose, and he would no longer be himself. As hispanion, Daylight did not want to see him ending up like that.
“Hurry and take him away.” Daylight urged, unsure of why Mizerui was still sitting still; would it not be better to take Li away as soon as possible?
“It’s impossible.”
Daylight suddenly red at Mizerui. Was it really him who said that? Daylight tried to ask, “What did you say?”
Mizerui stood up slowly, and walked to the bed where Liy, and watched the person sound asleep on the bed. He started to exin, “Ever sincest night, I’ve been trying, but I don’t know what the Dragon Emperor did to Li. Although I can seem to teleport away, I cannot find a way to take Li with me.”
Hearing his exnation, Daylight began to panic. Then… what should they do? Were they really going to let Li eat the Heart?
Mizerui took out a shiny dagger from underneath his robe. The expression on his face was extremely rigid, as though he did not act this way, and would not have the courage to do what he was about to do.
“I-isn’t that Meinan’s dagger?” Daylight looked suspiciously at the dagger, then, suddenly realizing something, he hurriedly pushed Mizerui aside, then stood between him and Li. He roared, “What are you doing?!”
“This dagger was handed to me by Meinan personally.” Mizerui stated calmly, “Kaiser said, instead of me using Magic to blow him into disfigured pieces, it is much cleaner to use a dagger. After all, there are still people waiting for Li toe back; therefore, even if we cannot bring Li back alive, we can at least keep him looking good.”
“Kaiser and Meinan…” Daylight was deeply shocked, “They want to kill Li?’
Mizerui was suddenly infuriated, for he had held it in for a long time. He roared, “Would you rather we kill Li now?! Or let the Heart of the Dragon Emperor kill him, and use his body to hurt those he cares about?! You pick one then!”
Daylight’s face also turned rigid. He thought about Caffey; after being controlled by the Heart, not only did he kill his wife and his Sacred White Dragon, he even murdered his own son… What would Li do then? Of course, Li did not have a wife, but he had a Sacred White Dragon who was basically his son, and he had hispanions. If Li was truly controlled by the Dragon Emperor, everyone who used to stand by his side would have no choice but oppose him. In the end, they would all either be killed by him, or kill him…
Daylight’s always upright body suddenly copsed, and instead it was now warped from tiredness. He reached out his hand towards Mizerui, and said, “Let me.”
Mizerui hesitated a moment, but still handed the dagger to Daylight. Instead, he focused his attention on the surroundings, in order to prevent the Dragon Emperor from sending people to take Li away immediately after winning the tournament.
Daylight turned around, facing Li on the bed, and smiled bitterly, “Li, I’ve never ever imagined it would be me who would end your life with my own hands. B-but if you’re awake, you would definitely choose to end your life rather than eat the Heart of the Dragon Emperor… that has been what you were thinking since the beginning, isn’t it?”
“As such, maybe it’s best if I send you the rest of the way, so you wouldn’t have to hide in a corner tomit suicide, and we won’t even be able to find your corpse for a proper funeral.” Daylight smiled lightly, and the dagger in his hand was raised suddenly. He carefully aimed it at where Li’s heart would be, hoping hispanion could die without suffering any pain.
No matter how careful the aim might be, it should not take much time, but Daylight held the dagger up for quite some time. With his eyes overflowing with tears, Daylight closed his eyes turned his head, and swung his hand downward…
In that instant, a slender hand suddenly grabbed Daylight by the wrist. Since Daylight did not expect this, the dagger suddenly fell out of his hand.
“Li?” Daylight was deep in shock. He did not expect Li would wake up in this moment, but he was not worried Li might misunderstand him. Instead, Daylight was worried Li would not allow him toplete the euthanasia, and carry the weight of killing his ownpanion.
“Dragon Magic… I know it.” Li answered irrelevantly. He slowly got up from the bed, and said absent-mindedly, “I saw Lucifer’s Dragon Magic…”
Daylight’s eyes widened; Li knew Dragon Magic? Then the match…
* * *
Baolilong was caught in the ck smoke, and the pain it suffered was immense. Kaiser and others yelled several times to surrender, but Baolilong remained firm and cried that it would never surrender, no matter how painful.
“Baolilong!” Kaiser really wanted to p himself. Why did he have to spell out everything to Baolilong before hand, resulting in it unwilling to give up? But now everyone could tell, there was no chance it could win, and prolonging this battle would only result in more pain and suffering.
“Baolilong, Purity beg of you; surrender, and stop fighting!” Purity cried out to it.
“No…” Baolilong also cried back. It did not want papa to be how he was before, no…
‘Baolilong…’
Baolilong blinked its eyes. ‘Papa? Are you awake?’
‘Baolilong, listen to me. Focus all your power to your forehead, the marking of our bond.’
‘Okay!’ Baolilong agreed, and started to focus all the divine powers towards its forehead.
‘It’s not enough. Baolilong, don’t be afraid, put all your powers to the mark.’
‘But,’ Baolilong hesitated, ‘I have to save power to stop old papa, otherwise Baolilong will be dragged into dark ces.’
‘I will protect you, don’t be afraid. Do you trust me, Baolilong?’
‘Mhm! Mhm! Baolilong trusts you. Papa is the best.’
Baolilong put everyst bit of power towards the binding marks on its forehead, not even leaving enough strength to move its limbs. It firmly trusted Li; had Baolilong been able to live without its heart beating, it might have even transferred that bit of strength towards the mark.
‘It’s enough. Now Baolilong, drop all your psychological barriers towards me…’
‘What’s a psychological barrier? Baolilong doesn’t understand.’
‘It’s fine, I’m wrong. You never had your guards up towards me. The person who had it was always just me.’
But now, he would no longer have any guards towards it. Li let go of all the walls he had in his heart. Baolilong was his Dragon, and even more like his child or his brother. It never had a single thought of malice towards him, and this little kid had trusted him without any reservation.
Only when there was no impedance between the Dragon and human, and their minds werepletely connected, to the point where they can give their lives for one another, would it be possible to cast Dragon Magic. It was a Magic based onplete trust.
When the human was Dragon, and when the Dragon was human, miracle would happen!
Li was still inside the room, and a blinding brightness emitted from his body, one unique to the Sacred White Dragons. Two different voices spoke out when he opened his mouth, “Ready?” He did not call Baolilong by its name, because by now, half of him was Baolilong.
Buried deep within the ck smoke, Baolilong opened its mouth as well. Like Li, two different voices could be heard, “Yes.”
“Divine Lightning of the Heavens”
* * *
“What’s going on?”
Meinan stared nkly at the sky. The entire sky seem to be emitting a faint gold light. Then, Baolilong suddenly gave an earthshaking roar from within in the ck smoke. After the earth stopped shaking, Meinan suddenly had a bad feeling. He raised his head again to look at the sky, and the golden light in the sky converged towards the center like a vortex. Though it was “converging,” it was not a small spot the light converged on, but rather the entire sky above them.
Every ce bathed by the golden light became bizarre; the wind blew so strongly that people felt pain on their skins.
“Kaiser, this isn’t looking great!” Meinan roared.
“Bastard! Isn’t that obvious? I think Baolilong has gone on a rampage!” Kaiser yelled back, but his heart was filled with happiness, “Looks like Li doesn’t have to die!”
“He doesn’t have to die… but I think we will!” Meinan yelled desperately.
“Damn!” Kaiser ducked to dodge a giant rock, and screamed in the strong wind, “Then we should bail, hurry! Let’s fly away with Purity! mes, let’s go!”
Meinan nodded, and each of them dragged Purity by one of her hands, and quickly flew up. Luckily, there was enough time; not only did the three flew out of the golden sky’s range, many of the Knights in the audience also used their legs to run out of range.
After the four of them flee like refugees, they all tried to catch their breaths as they looked back to see what was happening. Miluo was obviously panicking; even though he had lived many years, he had never seen anything like that. His giant body stood up, and before it took many steps, it reached the edge of the golden sky. Everyone scattered away from him, to stop themselves from bing a pancake. But the moment Miluo reached the edge, he ran into an invisible wall. No matter how hard he pushed or shoved, he could not leave the area.
Purity suddenly yelled, “Guys, look, the Dragon Emperor can’t leave either.”
Sure enough, the Dragon Emperor was also standing at the edge. He was not charging senselessly like Miluo, but he reached out his slender fingers and lightly touched the invisible wall. Everyone saw his finger looked like it was stopped by ss, stopping in the air.
“Your Highness!”
All the Knights began to yell, and they hurried back to save their Emperor, but the golden sky that generously allowed them to leave, would not allow them toe back. Another transparent wall stopped the Knights, making impossible for them to go back to save their Emperor.
The Dragon Emperor seemed unusually calm, as though he already knew this already going to happen. He raised his head to look at the sky, and his calm looks gave no indications of what he was thinking.
“The sky… gold lightnings!” The Knights all yelled.
The first bolt of lightning struck down, as if it was just a warning shot. When this bolt of lightning struck, it was wider than Miluo’s ck pirs, and a prideful figure appeared in the sky. It was a beautiful Sacred White Dragon, and the pink eyes told everyone, it was Baolilong. However, this Baolilong looked even more matured and beautiful than before, and every single white scale on its body was shimmering with a golden light.
When it slowly pped its wings, countless golden lightning shot out beneath its wings, shooting down to ground like lightning from Zeus himself.
The golden lightning immediately filled the space between the transparent walls. It looked as though the walls were covered by a golden light. Everyone stared at this nkly, including the Knights who were anxious to save the Dragon Emperor. Not because they weren’t loyal, but because the situation was clear to them, they were no match against the golden lightning.
“This is too crazy, what the hell is this?” Kaiser asked while staring.
“Dragon Magic.” mes answered reflexively. It was stunned also. Although it had already known from its master that Li had gained the insight to Dragon Magic, but it would have never fathomed the spells would have such overwhelming and terrifying power.
Kaiser gulped, then said, “If I mess with Baolilong again in the future, someone please remind me with the words ‘Dragon Magic’.”
Everyone else nodded in awe.
* * *
Since the percentage of people staring absent-mindedly had reached one hundred percent, no one knew how much time had past before the golden lightning had faded away, leaving behind only beautiful sparkles twirling around in the air.
Everyone slowly regained their senses, and they looked inside to see what had happened; Miluo’s giant body was now nowhere to be seen. Kaiser and others were shocked, wondering if Miluo’s corpse did not even survive the onught? Crap, he was, after all, Baolilong’s biological father, and he was only under control.
Kaiser and others ran over quickly. It wasn’t until now that they saw two people inside. To be more urate, one Dragon and one human. Miluo was lying face-down on the ground. Because he had turned into Dragon form before, his clothes were already gone, so he was on the ground, naked, with his dense long hair barely covering him. Nevertheless, one could see there were not many wounds on his body.
This made Kaiser and others very surprised. Judging from the attack they had seen, how could it not have leave any major wounds on Miluo’s body?
“The attribute of the Dragon Magic is decided between the Master and the Dragon.”
Standing on the side, the Dragon Emperor looked like he was about to fall over at any moment, however, he burst intoughter instead and exined, “Haha, looks like those two don’t want to harm anyone, and used such an unique Magic. Although it drained the enemies of all power and will, it did not actually hurt their bodies.”
At this time, Baolilong also fell out of the sky. In its human form, Baolilong was also naked, and it lookedpletely exhausted. It crawled into Purity’s arms, and murmured, “Papa ising.” Then, fell asleep soundly. By the looks of it, Baolilong was far too tired, and not even the end of the world could wake it right now.
As if to fulfill Baolilong’s words, Li walked towards them from afar, followed by Mizerui and Daylight. He walked up to everyone, and turned around to see hispanions. Everyone looked truly happy to him; how could they not? They originally thought they may have to personally kill Li to prevent him from falling prey to the Heart’s control, then living a life that he wish he could end.
In the end, everything seemed to made an one eighty. Li did not have to die, nor would he be under control, and everything sad and tragic had past… Tears of joy filled everyone’s eyes.
Li smiled lightly towards hispanions, and turned around to face the Dragon Emperor once again. Since he had gained the knowledge of the Heart, and thereby Lucifer’s past, even while talking, Li could not help but include a sense of sympathy,
“You’ve lost, Dragon Emperor.”