Chapter 34: Free For All

Chapter 34: Chapter 34: Free For All

The arena exploded. Fire. Lightning. Spears of bone and whirling blades of wind. A hundred different attacks tore across the pit at once, crossing and colliding and ricocheting off the iron walls.

A wave of water slammed into a blast of electricity and burst into a shower of steam.

A boulder the size of a car went tumbling across the dirt, flattening a pair of snarling hounds.

Somewhere a girl was screaming for her beast to come back.

[I guess not everyone is built for this], the system remarked as it noticed some people struggling.

Nobody was in charge.

That was the first thing Jared noticed, standing in the thick of it with his heart pounding. There was no formation.No one shouting orders or calling targets. Thirty beast masters had just been released into a sealed room with a monster, and every single one of them was doing exactly the same thing.

Trying to be the best.

"Over here!" a boy yelled, pointing his hawk at the Ground Dragon. "Go! Take it down!"

"Get out of my way!" a girl snapped.

"Hit it! Just hit it!"Another shouted.

The attacks spun in every direction. A tornado of wind carved through the left wing of the arena and swallowed three other beasts by mistake.

A burst of flame lashed out and scorched the tail of someone’s panther. A flurry of arrows rained down from above and stuck, quivering, in the back of a nearby boar.

[This is chaos,] the system murmured.

’I can see that.’

[It’s genuinely unheard of. Thirty beast masters in one space. Even in a standard dungeon, they’d never put this many people on the same boss at the same time. In an enclosed arena? It’s a recipe for disaster.]

’They’re not working together.’

[ If a skilled opponent wanted to shut this group down, it would take about 10 seconds.]

Jared’s eyes narrowed.

On the far side of the pit, the Ground Dragon hadn’t moved.

She stood in the center like a statue, calm she wasn’t roaring. She hadn’t breathed a single flame. She simply stood, and let the storm come to her.

A bolt of lightning cracked across the dirt and struck her squarely on the shoulder.

A second attack. A spray of flaming darts from a reptile on the left. The dragon turned her head, exhaled a short, sharp breath, and the darts froze mid air, hanging for a moment, before dropping to the dirt as lumps of ice.

A third attack. A wave of crushing wind from a falcon. The dragon shifted her stance, and a blast of her own wind met it halfway, meeting force with force and cancelling it out in a rolling boom.

Jared watched, ’She’s only countering.’

He had noticed it by the fifth attack. By the tenth, he was sure. The Ground Dragon wasn’t fighting back. She wasn’t going on the offensive.

She wasn’t even moving her feet. She was reading every incoming blow, picking the right element, and shutting it down. Ice for fire. Wind for wind. Ice again. Wind again. It was clean. It was almost bored.

A thin, green splatter arced through the air.

It was Zoey’s lizard.

The Poison Lizard had scrambled up onto a ridge of rock, jaws wide, spitting a spray of corrosive venom toward the dragon.It was on target.

It never landed. The lizard fired but it never made target.

Halfway across the arena, long before it came within a body’s length of the dragon’s hide, the poison froze. It turned white, hardened, and crashed to the ground in a scatter of green flecked ice.

"No," Zoey whispered. "That was my best shot."

"It didn’t even get close."

"I know." Jared followed with, he wasn’t even looking at her. He just said it while completely thinking of something else.

She stared at the shattered poison, then at the dragon, and her face went pale.

"Jared. That thing is controlled by someone really good."

"I know."

"Like, really good."

"I know, Zoey."

"I KNOW." He repeated much louder this time.

He had known since the first ice wall. Whoever was commanding the Ground Dragon was no amateur. Julius and Karl Marx were both skilled, that much was obvious from the documentary. Jared had expected them to be strong. But this was something else.

This was cleaner and sharper and more patient than anything he had managed in his days of training. Whoever held her gem was proving to be more capable than he had ever imagined.

The thought stung.

’If the one using her is even remotely more skilled than I am, she could counter every basic attack in this room with ice.’

[She already is.]

’I know.’

[Someone else is using your dragon better than you ever did.]

’I know that, too.’

His jaw tightened. He couldn’t stand there and watch. He couldn’t be a spectator. He had to do something, and he needed to do it now, before the others wore themselves out.

"Zoey," he said. "Stay behind me."

"What are you doing?"

"Fusing."

"Fusing what?"

He didn’t answer. He closed his eyes and reached for the bond.

The SwampGorilla stood beside him, the big beast stepped forward, wrapped its arms around him, and dissolved. The swamp poured across his body in a rolling wave, cool and wet, hardening into bark and moss and root.

In seconds he was encased in a thick suit of green armor. His boots sank slightly into the dirt. His fists felt like tree trunks. His body covered from the neck down.

He still couldn’t discharge the gases. He knew that. He tried, once, to push a puff of freezing air out through the vents of the armor, and nothing came but a faint, damp hiss. It would take more training. More time.

But he was strong in this form.

Not as strong as he would have liked. Not close. But the gorilla used his mana more efficiently than the dragon ever had.It was a good fit. A comfortable weight. He could last longer in this than anything else he’d tried.

’Okay,’ he thought. ’Let’s go.’

He lowered his head and charged.

To anyone watching, it looked reckless. A single armored figure, bursting across the arena with his head down, running straight at the strongest beast in the room. A few applicants shouted. A girl dove out of his way. A boy with a spear yelled, "What is he doing?"

[They think you’re an idiot.]

’Let them.’

[It does look a bit like suicide.]

’They are still non believers.They won’t be for much longer.’

It wasn’t blind. It only seemed that way. Jared had a plan, and it was a good one. He would run at the dragon, closing the distance as fast as he could. Then, when he got close, he would drop the suit. The swamp would peel away from him and rise as a separate beast, the SwampGorilla in full form. And he would fight beside it, both a gorilla and a beast master. Two bodies. Two attackers. The dragon could only counter one thing at a time.

They were going to split.

All he had to do was get close.

He pounded across the dirt, dodging a stray fireball, jumping a heap of rubble. A tail whipped past his head. A shard of ice exploded against his shoulder, harmless against the armor. The roar of the arena rang in his ears. His breath rasped inside the helm.

Fifty yards.

Forty.

Thirty.

Then he noticed something strange.

Every applicant who had tried to approach the dragon had stopped at the same line. It was invisible, but it was there. A rough circle in the dirt, about 30 yards from the dragon’s feet. Beasts that crossed it were hit with a sudden blast of ice or wind. Masters who stepped over it were knocked back. No one was getting past. It wasn’t a wall, exactly. It was a boundary. A line the dragon was guarding, calmly, without effort.

’She’s not letting anyone pass a certain point.’

His eyes narrowed. He couldn’t just run in. If he did, he’d be flung back like the rest.

’I need a way in.’

He slowed, just a fraction, scanning the ground. His gaze dropped to the dragon’s feet.

Then, without warning, her weight shifted.

It was a tiny movement. A shift of the front left claw. A slight turn of the hip. A subtle change in the way her tail curled. But Jared knew that dragon.

He had trained with her for 2 days. He had spent hours learning the rhythm of her body, the angle of her shoulders, the set of her spine. And he knew, instantly, that something was different.

Her footwork was changing.

It wasn’t a counter. It wasn’t a defense. It was something else, something deliberate.

"Head down!" Jared shouted.

He didn’t know who he was yelling at. Zoey, maybe. Anyone who could hear him. Every applicant within 50 yards. He just knew, with a cold certainty, that something terrible was about to happen.

"Get down! Everyone! Heads down!"

A few people glanced at him. A couple ducked, uncertain. Most didn’t.

’Did that beast just...’

The person couldn’t finish the thought. The dragon’s body had gone completely still. Her eyes gleamed. A low, rumbling sound was building in her chest, deep and slow, like a distant avalanche. The ground trembled. A thin crack split the dirt at her feet.

’Something’s coming.’

[Rex.]

’I know.’

[It’s not countering anymore.]

’I know!’

He skidded to a halt, dropping into a crouch, bracing both armored fists against the dirt.

The dragon’s head dipped.

Her whole body began to turn.

It was slow at first.