Chp.23: Intense fight

"Shit! What is that thing!?" Darbi exclaimed.

Haku didn't know what to answer: he didn't remember ever having seen such an animal. It looked like some kind of lizard with eight clawed legs covered in a shell of thorns. "I assume it's one of those dangerous beasts on the bounty list we stole" he said.

The creature let out a roar. Its sound sounded like a chain rattling on metal. "We can make the questions later! Let's think about helping Kotaru!"

Luckily, the lizard didn't seem very fast; Kotaru had a decent lead. Taking advantage of this, Haku and Darbi threw themselves at the beast and activated a fire rune, generating a large flame. The animal yelped, but the flames didn't seem to bother it much: even it he stopped and backed away, its armor was barely blackened.

At least it had stopped chasing Kotaru. Darbi and Haku caught up with their sister, who had stopped at a safe distance. "Are you okay?" they asked almost in unison.

"Yeah, it couldn't catch m," Kotaru answered breathlessly. "It's not very fast, but it clearly has more stamina than me"

Haku had feared that. The faster you ran, the faster you tired; it was a rule that all living beings followed. Even though Kotaru could outrun the beast, it didn't seem to get tired, unlike her sister. In the long distances it probably would have caught her eventually. Which ruled out the possibility of fleeing: they would only get tired in vain. "Quick, let's use the invisibility runes! We'll run away while..."

"It's useless, I've already tried it!" Kotaru said. "That beast is not fooled. It kept chasing me even though I was invisible!"

Haku observed the lizard. Its eyes were rather small, but the nostrils were extremely large. "It must have a very good sense of smell. After it saw you it must have been easy for it to spot your scent and follow it" he murmured. "It doesn't seem to have good eyesight though. How did it notice you?"

Kotaru looked embarrassed. "I had fallen asleep"

"What!?" both Darbi and Haku exclaimed. "What part of 'we must always keep our guard up' don't you understand!?"

"Oh, don't judge me! I didn't sleep last night, I was very tired, and while taking a bath I was so relaxed that I fell asleep!" Kotaru tried to justify herself. "I only became aware of its presence when it was already charging me, because I felt the vibrations of its footsteps on the ground!"

Haku wanted to slap a paw on his face. That explained everything. If Kotaru had been paying attention she would have spotted the armored lizard long before it saw her... but since she was asleep, the beast had gotten close enough to see her. Once it understood that she was a living being, and therefore a prey, it must have memorized her smell and thanks to that it could continue to chase her even if she made herself invisible.

"Well, maybe it is tougher, but we're faster!" Darbi exclaimed, then lunged at the beast. "We can hit it before it hits us!"

"Darbi, wait! We don't know what it's capable of!" Haku yelled at him, but by now his brother was already charging. The lizard charged back and tried to bite him, but Darbi dodged easily and bit off one of its legs. As he did, however, it was as if his teeth had struck a stone. He didn't even leave a scratch.

The lizard still seemed furious at having let itself be bitten and tried to grab him, but Darbi quickly backed away to a safe distance. "Ugh! It's so hard!" he exclaimed rubbing his jaw. "Perhaps if I aimed at the..."

"Darbi, forget it! That armor is too thick, you'll never be able to penetrate it!" Haku yelled at him. "Attacking it continuously will only put you at risk and tire you! Stay away from it!"

"And how should I do it?" Darbi asked as he continued to move away to avoid the lizard that was trying in every way to grab him.

"Use the fire runes! This will keep it at bay!" Haku answered. Darbi did as he was told and carved a fire rune into his face, then bit off his finger and smeared some of his blood on it. A flame exploded against the lizard, which screeched and backed away. As Haku had imagined, that creature was still an animal, and as such it was afraid of fire even if it didn't harm it much thanks to its armor.

That scene was repeated several times: as soon as the flame was exhausted, the lizard returned to the attack, but Darbi had already carved a new rune and was generating a new flame. "Okay, what now?" he asked.

"Give me a second! I'm thinking about it!" Haku answered as he continued to look at every single inch of that lizard looking for any weak spot. His mind was already weighing all their possibilities, looking for an escape route.

The best choice would have been to use the portable gate. Haku still had it with him in his dimensional bag. With it, he, Darbi, and Kotaru could teleport away from the beast. However, it wasn't an option he wanted to use unless he was totally forced to: since the portable gate could only teleport its user to places the user had already visited, if they used it they would necessarily go back, far back. They would have lost a long way and strayed from their brother and sisters even further. And the lizard might have decided to attack their siblings while they were away. Also, the portable gate could only be used once; the road to the desert was still long, and Haku didn't know if he could use it in the future. There were too many possible scenarios, so he decided he would only use the portable gate as a last resort.

But without the portable gate, there was no escape. Even if they became invisible the animal would follow them using the nose, and likewise would track them even if they managed to outrun him by running.

Wait... the nose!

Of course! If that animal relied heavily on smell for orientation, then perhaps they could use that characteristic to disorient it! "Kotaru, Darbi, do any of you still have some of those very strong smelling flowers that we used to communicate over distance when we were in the forest?"

While they were Karbraland Great Forest, the dragons had sometimes had to separate to carry out their plans: someone had to lookout, someone had to set the trap, and so on. However, this posed problems in communication. So, to warn each other, they used strong-smelling flowers that they kept in their mouths, which were only opened when the time was right. By smelling it, the other dragons knew what their prey was coming. It was a flawed system, but it was the best at their disposal. They hadn't used them for a while, but maybe now those flowers could come in handy. "I still have a few!" Kotaru said opening her dimensional bag. "They dried out a bit, but their smell remained the same!"

"Good! As soon as I give you the signal, throw them in every direction! This will confuse it!" Haku said, then looked back at the lizard. They would have had only one chance: the animal would quickly realize that the new source of that smell was just flowers. Therefore they had to use those few moments of confusion to kill him. Consequently, he had to find its weak spot.

But how? That armor seemed impenetrable. When Darbi had bitten it, he hadn't even left a mark of his teeth. It covered every single part of the lizard's body, except for the eyes and nostrils. Wait... where were the ears?

While asking this question, the lizard suddenly stopped and seemed to inflate its throat, and then spat a green liquid at Darbi. The dragon dodged it, but as soon as the liquid touched the ground it began to corrode it. "Shit! It must be poison!" Darbi exclaimed. "Haku, hurry up! This asshole is going to fight back!"

"I think I have a solution!" Haku said. "This animal's ears are protected by its armor!"

"So what? How would this help us?" Darbi asked.

"If its ears are covered by its armor, then it must have very keen hearing, or it wouldn't be able to hear anything! Therefore, if we remove its armor from there, we'll have the advantage over it!" Haku answered, starting to carve some fortification runes on one of his paws. "I can see the right spot, it's that little bony bump behind its eyes! Darbi, engrave as many runes of fortification as possible, and at my signal use your claws to remove that protection from its right ear! I'll do the same with the left!"

"Okay, I'll be ready!" Darbi said starting to carve the runes on his scales.

Haku looked at Kotaru: "You instead engrave some nullification runes on yourself! As soon as that creature no longer will have the protection to its ears, it will be extremely vulnerable. It will probably fight with every means at its disposal. Therefore, you will have to support to me and Darbi by preventing it from counterattacking! If it tries to use mana, you must immediately cancel its attacks!"

"Yes, I get it. Don't worry, I've got your back" Kotaru replied as she also carved runes on her scales.

"Now or never!" exclaimed Haku. "Kotaru, throw the flowers!" His sister complied and threw the flowers all around them. The lizard paused for a moment and its nostrils flared as its young looked in every direction. "Now, Darbi! Attack!" Haku shouted running at the animal.

"This time it won't be just a scratch!" Darbi exclaimed, throwing himself against the lizard. With the paw covered in fortification runes, he grabbed the patina of bone that Haku had pointed out to him and yanked it hard. Haku did the same. This time the effect wasn't null: even if with a lot of effort, both of them tore off the bony armor from the ears. Two large holes came to light, while clots of blood oozed from them due to the torn skin. The lizard roared in pain and tried to bite Haku, but he dodged and returned to a safe distance, and so did Darbi. "Now, brother! Shout!" Haku exclaimed, and then he let out the loudest sound that could emerge from his throat.

Dragons possessed extraordinary vocal chords and their lungs were truly sounding boxes. Even though Haku and Darbi were still very young and small, they could already make sounds so high-pitched that they confused creatures with normal hearing. They had proof of this when Haku had used his call to ask for their mother's help because he and Darbi had been captured by humans. Against a creature with sensitive hearing, as this lizard probably was, the sound was incredibly painful.

The lizard screamed in pain as both dragons screamed into its ears. The creature tried to charge them to silence them, but since they were on opposite sides of it it didn't know who to attack first. As soon as it tried to lunge at one of them, the other would come closer and scream even louder, disorienting it even more. The high-pitched sound penetrated the animal's ears so much that its brain began to malfunction, causing nausea, confusion, paralysis and other problems.

Being cornered, the lizard began to spit venom in every direction, but due to the loud sounds it couldn't aim well; the dragons didn't even have to effort to avoid its blows. The animal then tried to use its mana, and its spines began to glow, but before Haku and Darbi could see what it had in store, Kotaru deactivated the attack using a nullification rune. Unfortunately, the armor of the beast prevented the mana core from being hit directly, but Kotaru had already engraved many runes on the scales, so she could continue to block it almost indefinitely.

After five minutes of that torture, the lizard gave up any attempt to resist and flattened on the ground, trying to use the earth to cover its ears. Haku knew it was quite confused by now. While he continued to scream, he pulled from his dimensional bag a javelin that weeks before he had taken from the corpse of an ogre, he moved closer, and then he planted it with all his strength in the animal's ear. Without the protection of bone armor and without the possibility of using mana due to too much confusion, the lizard had no way to stop the spear that penetrated all the way to its brain, destroying it. The creature let out a gasp, and then its body went limp and stopped moving. The life in its eyes shut down completely.

The dragons finally caught their breath. They were so tired that they threw themselves on the ground without any decorum. Haku and Darbi had sore muscles and throats, and Kotaru was also quite tired despite having remained in the rear. "Well... we won" Darbi murmured after a while.

"Yeah... this was one of the hardest battles we've faced so far" Haku said. It was true: that lizard was definitely the most powerful animal he had ever seen, and moreover they had had to face it without a premeditated plan.

They didn't know how long they lay next to the carcass, but it sure was a long time. None of them seemed to want to get up: after what had happened, they felt they deserved a break. When they finally decided to get up the sun had moved a lot in the sky, from morning it had become afternoon. But while they were still getting back on their feet, however, a familiar voice reached their ears: "You killed a great basilisk!?"