Chapter 439: Wind VS Water Part 3

The giant water sphere tightened around Talon.

Talon twisted desperately, its wings carving through the currents as it searched for another opening. It shot upward, only for a column of water to rise and block its path. It darted sideways, but a second current slammed into it before it could reach the sphere’s edge.

Every escape route closed almost as soon as the Griffin found it.

The Leviathan had turned the water it could command into a birdcage.

‘It’s adapting to Talon.’

Ethan watched in growing horror.

The water dragon had recognised that the Griffin’s speed made direct attacks unreliable. Rather than wasting its strength trying to catch Talon, it was restricting the space in which the Griffin could move. The more Talon struggled, the more accurately the Leviathan adjusted its currents.

It was terrifyingly intelligent.

And it had the power to make that intelligence matter.

Talon beat its wings and unleashed a concentrated shriek using Skyshatter Cry.

KRAAAAAAAAAA!

The sonic blast tore through the water sphere, sending vibrations across the surrounding currents. The Leviathan’s control faltered for an instant, and the sphere shuddered.

That instant was enough.

Talon accelerated through the weakened barrier, emerging into open air with a spiralling trail of wind behind it.

The Leviathan lunged.

Instead of fleeing, the Griffin dove straight toward it.

‘What the hell are you doing?!’

The water dragon opened its jaws wide enough to swallow a truck. Talon waited until the last possible moment before twisting aside, skimming over the monster’s crown as its teeth snapped shut beneath it.

Its talons struck the neck, continuing to exploit the damage Ethan had inflicted on the Leviathan.

KRAK!

A scale broke free.

Talon swept around and attacked again.

Another scale cracked.

Then a third.

The Leviathan reacted, whipping its enormous head toward the persistent attacker. Its tail followed, sweeping across the ocean with enough force to raise a towering wall of water.

Talon dodged the tail but couldn’t escape the shockwave.

It spun through the air, caught a current, and struggled to stabilise itself.

Its speed and abilities were still extraordinary, but the strain was becoming obvious. Its feathers were torn, its breathing ragged, and every burst of wind seemed weaker than the last.

The Leviathan had barely suffered any meaningful damage, though its defences had begun to fray. Several scales were cracked, and while the damage was difficult to spot beneath the water and reflected sunlight, Talon could see it all.

Especially around where Ethan’s attack had struck.

The weakened armour was not enough to defeat the monster, but enough to give Talon a chance.

‘Those cracks!’

Ethan forced himself to focus through the pain and reached out through Beast Communication.

‘Talon! Behind its head! The scales on its upper neck are damaged! Aim for those!’

The Griffin turned.

For an instant, its eyes met Ethan’s.

Then Talon looked toward the cracked scales, and understanding passed between them.

Ethan managed a breathless grin.

‘You already saw them, didn’t you? Haha.’

He had considered instructing his Griffin to swoop in, grab him, and zoom off, but this opportunity was just too good to give up. That was without accounting for the Leviathan’s Domains and attempts at stopping them from getting away.

‘Hopefully gambling my life a second time works.’

Talon folded its wings and dropped toward the Leviathan.

The water dragon immediately raised a torrent to intercept it. Talon angled its wings, catching the current and redirecting its force into a sideways burst of acceleration. A second wave struck its flank, but the Griffin twisted around it.

It was improving.

Any water attack the Griffin couldn’t evade, it used some sort of wind barrier to block as it continued its approach.

Ethan quickly realised what it was up to.

‘It’s building momentum.’

Talon circled once, then twice, each revolution tighter than the last. But rather than producing a tornado, it coated itself in the torrents of wind, compressing it into a spiralling blade that screamed across the surface.

Then it unleashed another shriek.

KRAAAAAAAAAA!

It stunned the giant Leviathan for a moment.

The Griffin burst forward towards the Leviathan’s neck, its emerald feathers trailing a violent spiral of wind.

Its eyes were locked onto the damaged scales.

The Leviathan reacted instantly.

A towering column of water erupted beneath Talon, while another surged toward it from the side. The Griffin threaded between them, moving so quickly that the two attacks collided in its wake.

It reached the neck.

KRAAAACK!

The first damaged scale shattered completely.

Talon’s momentum carried it across the weakened section, its claws tearing through the exposed seam between the remaining plates.

The Leviathan roared.

Dark blood seeped from beneath its armour, staining the ocean around its colossal body.

Ethan’s eyes widened.

‘YES!’

For the first time, Talon had inflicted real damage.

The Leviathan recoiled, its enormous head jerking away.

Its giant eyes narrowed, and the cold curiosity that had filled them vanished.

The water dragon was furious.

Talon hovered above the ocean, its wings trembling from exhaustion. Yet it held its head high, refusing to retreat even as blood ran down its own battered feathers.

It had earned the Leviathan’s attention.

Now it had to survive it.

The water dragon’s roar rolled across the ocean, shaking the surface and sending ripples racing toward the horizon. Its colossal body coiled beneath the waves, and the surrounding sea rose with it.

The Leviathan wasn’t merely angry.

It was responding to a genuine threat, one that was fast and lethal, and it had no intention of letting that threat leave alive. A wall of water surged around its head, twisting into a spiralling torrent that reached high into the sky.

Talon spread its wings.

The wind answered.

One A Rank beast commanded the water. The other commanded the air. Between them, the ocean became a battlefield of colliding forces, with enough destructive power to tear apart anything caught in the middle.

Ethan watched, barely breathing.

‘You can’t overpower that thing, buddy.’

The Leviathan had an entire ocean to draw upon. Talon had its own mana, its speed, and its battered body. Every powerful burst of wind cost it precious strength, while the water dragon could attack from almost any direction without giving up its position.

Talon was running out of time.

But the Griffin lowered its head and launched forward anyway.

The Leviathan unleashed its attack.

Water crashed toward Talon from every direction, forming a spiralling wall that swallowed the sky.

The Griffin folded its wings and accelerated.

A compressed blade of wind tore through the first layer, opening a narrow passage.

Talon shot into it, only for the water to close in from either side.

Its speed dropped.

The passage began collapsing.

‘Come on!’

Talon forced another burst of wind through its body. The opening widened just enough for the Griffin to emerge above the Leviathan’s neck.

Straight above the wound.

The monster’s head began to turn.

Too late.

The Griffin folded its wings and plunged toward the damaged scales, compressing the wind around its talons into a razor-sharp edge. But the Leviathan had anticipated the attack and erupted a torrent of water directly beneath the Griffin.

Talon twisted to avoid it, but the water caught its flank, sending it spinning away from the wound and falling out of the sky.

Instantly capitalising on it, the Leviathan’s jaws opened beneath it…