Chapter 440: Talon?

The Leviathan surged toward Talon after smashing into it with a torrent of water, its jaws wide open.

Ethan’s breath caught.

‘Move!’

The Griffin stirred and twisted at the last possible moment, narrowly avoiding the water dragon’s teeth. The Leviathan’s jaws snapped shut behind it, and the force of the impact sent a shockwave across the ocean.

Talon’s wings faltered.

It barely caught a current before dropping into the sea.

The Griffin was exhausted.

Its feathers hung in ragged strips, its breathing came in sharp, uneven bursts, and the wind surrounding its body had weakened to little more than a flicker.

Meanwhile, the Leviathan, despite the blood running from its neck, remained a colossal wall of dark scales and muscle. It had taken everything Talon could throw at it and was still powerful enough to end the battle with a single clean hit.

Talon was fast enough to avoid most of its attacks.

But it wasn’t fast enough to make a single mistake harmless.

The Leviathan rose higher, dragging a mountain of water behind its head. The ocean twisted around its body, forming a towering column that swallowed the sky.

Talon spread its wings.

The wind stirred.

The Boss Beast struck first.

Its water construct collapsed inward, sending an immense mass of water crashing toward the Griffin from every direction. Talon accelerated into the attack, carving a passage with compressed wind, but the crushing currents closed in faster than it could cut through them.

The opening narrowed.

Water slammed into its wings, forcing them inward and dragging it toward the centre of the torrent.

Ethan’s stomach twisted.

‘Don’t stop!’

For a moment, the Griffin seemed to falter.

Then its eyes narrowed.

Talon pushed harder.

The wind exploded around its body, redirecting the surrounding pressure and converting the force of the water into movement. The Griffin shot upward, burst through the collapsing passage, and emerged above the ocean with barely enough momentum to remain airborne.

Ethan let out a sigh of relief.

Talon was far from finished, its hawk-like eyes locked onto the giant beast. It had found the Leviathan’s weakness, and it refused to abandon the fight before using it. The water dragon turned, its green eyes tracking the Griffin with frightening precision.

It raised its head and gathered another torrent between its jaws.

Talon was directly in front of it.

The Leviathan fired.

The attack tore through the air like a collapsing dam.

Talon swept its wings downward, redirecting the currents around its body. The torrent grazed its flank, ripping away feathers and sending it tumbling through the air.

It recovered, but its movements had slowed further.

For one terrible moment, the Griffin hung almost motionless above the ocean.

The Leviathan surged forward.

Its jaws opened wide enough to swallow Talon whole.

Ethan felt his heart stop.

‘No…’

He couldn’t lose Talon.

Not after it had refused to give up when he had been ready to do so. Not after it had evolved beyond anything Ethan had imagined and thrown itself against an A Rank monster simply to save its master.

‘TALON!’

The Griffin’s eyes sharpened.

It folded its wings.

Then it launched forward with the last of its strength.

Not away from the Leviathan, but towards it, aiming for its only wound.

The water dragon snapped its jaws shut.

Talon slipped past them by a fraction, skimming along the monster’s enormous head. Its talons struck the exposed section of neck one final time.

KRAAAAAAAAAACK!

The remaining damaged scales shattered.

A long section of the Leviathan’s armour split apart, exposing a widening strip of flesh beneath. The monster recoiled, its head twisting violently as more dark blood poured into the ocean.

Talon rode the movement, sweeping around the exposed section before climbing above the water dragon.

Its wings spread wide.

Every remaining current seemed to gather around it.

The air compressed and the wind howled as if literally answering the Griffin’s call.

Ethan’s eyes widened as he realised what Talon was preparing to do.

‘You’re not going to-‘

The Griffin folded its wings and plunged with all the mana and strength it had left.

SWOOSH!

A razor-thin arc of wind formed around its talons, growing denser as Talon accelerated toward the damaged neck. The Leviathan raised its head, summoning a torrent of water to intercept the attack.

Talon twisted through the torrent.

Its incredible vision caught the smallest gap between the converging currents. It adjusted its angle by a fraction, redirected its momentum, and burst through the opening before the water could close.

The Leviathan’s eyes widened.

For the first time, it had misjudged the Griffin’s movements, which were reminiscent of a Skyrend Hawk it had evolved from.

There was no hesitation or retreat – only one final strike.

An ultimate attack with all it could muster, similar to that its summoner had used minutes prior.

SHIIIING!

Talon’s entire body became a giant wind blade and tore through the weakened neck.

The shattered scales offered almost no resistance.

A heavy silence hung as the exposed flesh tore under the pressure of the wind, and the Griffin’s momentum pushed it cleanly through the broken area.

For a fraction of a second, nothing happened.

Then the Leviathan’s enormous head separated from its body.

The water dragon’s jaws hung open as its severed head fell toward the ocean. Its colossal body thrashed violently, sending waves crashing across the battlefield while blood poured from the ruined neck.

The head struck the water.

KRAAAAAASH!

A towering wave erupted around its head, which alone likely weighed over a ton.

The Leviathan’s body convulsed once.

Twice.

Then its movements began to slow.

{Beast Eliminated!}

The ocean gradually settled.

Talon hovered above the fallen monster, its wings wrecked and its entire body shaking from exhaustion.

It had won.

An A Rank Griffin had defeated an A Rank Leviathan in its own domain, against an opponent that had controlled the battlefield and possessed enough durability to withstand an attack that had destroyed Ethan’s body.

Talon hadn’t won because it was overwhelmingly stronger.

Nor had it won because of its vision, speed, or control over the wind.

The Griffin had simply refused to give up even when its body was failing. Its pride had carried it through the final exchange, and so had its determination to protect its master.

Ethan stared at the severed head floating in the ocean.

Then he looked at Talon.

His mouth opened, but no words came out.

Finally, a breathless laugh escaped him.

“Now that’s a fucking beast.”

His eyes burned.

He had thought Talon was the beast he had fallen behind with, the one whose evolution he couldn’t force and whose progress he had struggled to understand.

But Talon had never stopped trying.

And when Ethan had been left with nothing, it had become the one thing standing between him and death.

Ethan swallowed, fighting the pain in his chest.

‘I owe you an apology.’

Talon turned its head toward him.

Even exhausted, the Griffin held itself with unmistakable pride.

Ethan managed a weak grin.

‘Actually, I owe you a fucking feast.’

The scale of what he had witnessed slowly sank in.

If this battle had taken place in a city, the destruction would have been incomprehensible. The Leviathan could have flooded streets, torn buildings from their foundations, and sent entire blocks crashing beneath waves. Talon’s speed and compressed wind could have carved through towers, shattered roads, and turned the space between buildings into a storm of cutting air.

An A Rank battle wasn’t merely a fight between powerful monsters.

It was a natural disaster with two minds directing it, and Talon had just won one.

But not without cost.

The wind around the Griffin flickered, and its wings dipped.

Ethan’s grin vanished.

“Talon?”

The magnificent creature began to descend toward the ocean.

The Leviathan was dead.

But Ethan was still barely floating, his arms destroyed, his mana depleted, and his body one bad breath away from sinking beneath the endless sea.

And the beast that had saved him was now falling out of the sky.

‘I guess now isn’t the best time to celebrate.’