Chp.26: The fight of two monsters (part 2)

The two basilisk heads opened their jaws and spat a stream of venom. Normally a basilisk wouldn't be able to throw its venom that far, but thanks to the elevated position and the fact that Haku had modified the venom glands to be able to spit a great distance, the rain of venom still reached Carrion. The man swung his sword rapidly as if executing a slash, and the wind it generated was enough to deflect most of the poison, but several drops still dripped on him.

Carrion grunted as the lethal liquid touched his skin. Even though he was legendary level and thus his god power protected him, and as a result he couldn't take much damage from that attack, it still hurt a lot. The venom ate away at his skin very quickly, exposing the flesh underneath, which though it regenerated quickly was quickly eaten away in an eternal cycle of pain. But Carrion was not a warrior in name only, and he was able to handle pain admirably. "If you think this will be enough, know that..."

The central head, that of a wyvern, in turn opened its jaws and a blue light began to form inside it. Carrion recognized the dangerous fire breath of the wyverns and immediately summoned a ward to defend himself. A gush of blue-and-white flame burst from the creature's throat, with a violence and power far beyond that of any other wyvern, and engulfed it completely. Carrion gritted his teeth trying to keep his protection tight, but suddenly the poison around him (and on him) ignited and exploded with a force even greater than that of the wyvern's fire breath. Carrion was thrown off, his protection shattered, and his entire skin charred.

Haku hadn't only added scales and spines to the wyvern's body: he had also improved its ability to use mana. A wyvern's fire breath would normally already be able to char even a level adamantium soldier; but since Haku had exponentially increased the amount of mana in the mana core by using the blood of an adult dragon, now his fire breath was something incomparable in the whole world, except dragons of course. However, that wouldn't be enough to break the defenses of a legendary level, so Haku used a little trick. In addition to the poison itself, he had also inserted highly flammable liquid, the same commonly used for fire potions, into the venom glands of the basilisks. Once grazed by the flames, it exploded with far greater violence than the original fire. The force generated was at least thirty or forty times the initial one. And since Carrion was literally surrounded by that poison now, he was literally in the middle of a minefield. Not only that, but he also had poison on him: obviously it couldn't be touched by the flames, since Carrion was defending himself with its protection, but he wasn't immune to their heat. Once a certain temperature was reached, even that liquid was inflamed and caused considerable damage to the man.

Carrion gave a cry of pain; his body quickly began to regenerate, replacing the blackened and hard skin with new pink and soft. However, Haku certainly wasn't going to leave him alone and twisted his huge body by moving his tail as if it were a whip. Just as on its back, hundreds of razor-sharp bony spines rose up on its tail. If he had been able to hit Carrion at that speed, with that much body mass and with such weapons, he would almost certainly have broken him in two. Carrion was aware of this and therefore didn't even try to defend himself: he leapt and flew out of the way of the tail. Just in time: the force it generated was such that wherever it passed it raised a cloud of sand fifteen meters high, and even the rocks were reduced to crumbs as soon as they were touched by that lethal weapon.

Carrion knew he couldn't continue to remain on the defensive, or it would end very badly for him. Haku hadn't lied or talked nonsense: the chances of victory were on the side of the dragon. That abominable monster was specially created to fight the legendary levels and designed in every tiny feature to defeat and kill them. If Carrion continued to stay defensive, Haku would keep hitting him until his god power was gone and then he would take him out. Or he might as well have taken him out sooner if he had some other trick on him. If Carrion was to have even a chance of victory, he had to be able to damage the monstrosity at least a little.

This beast was a walking fortress, but even it must have some weaknesses. Probably, Carrion reflected, such weak points were the points that connected one part of the body to another, such as the neck and shoulders. Even though they were heavily protected with adult dragon scales, they were unlikely to have the same level of protection as the rest of their bodies, for in that case it would have been impossible to move their head with such speed and joint. Or even the mouths could be a potential weak point: the inside wasn't protected by the scales as the outside. Of course, there was always the problem of poison and fire, but in any case if exploited well it could become a way of access to hurt that monster.

He had to test his hypotheses to determine if they were correct; taking advantage of the fact that the monster now had its back to him, he lunged at one of the basilisk heads, intending to strike it at the base of the neck. But before he could reach the designated point, Haku raised his wings almost unnaturally and then violently lowered them, generating a double wind that knocked Carrion off balance and sent him flying back. "Ha ha! Do you take me for an idiot?" Haku laughed turning back to him. "I won't let you touch an inch of this body! Your defeat is already sealed!"

But Carrion was hardly listening. Though he'd been hurling back before he could reach the base of the neck, he'd noticed one detail very clearly: there were gaps between the scales on the neck and shoulder. Extremely small, of course, but still empty. They had clearly been left in to allow the neck to move freely; otherwise it would always be stuck in the same position. Depending on how the neck moved therefore it exposed some of those spaces; if it moved upward, it exposed those below; if it moved downwards, it exposed those above.

A plan quickly formed in his mind. Being a general, he was used to thinking quickly and finding solutions to unsolvable problems. He looked at the spear in his hand and infused it with divine power, then took aim and hurled it at the monster with all his strength. Haku obviously didn't have the time to move: moving that huge body certainly wasn't a quick and easy thing. So he was struck in the chest by the spear, which managed to split the scales a little, but did not penetrate the skin more than a few centimeters; whereupon it came loose and fell to the ground with a clang. Carrion took advantage of that momentary distraction to take flight again and position himself on top of his opponent to be able to lunge at him and strike him. But Haku was smarter and didn't let himself be fooled, and raised all three heads upwards emitting a jet of flames that Carrion barely dodged. "Uh huh! You're gonna make me laugh!" Haku exclaimed after he finished spitting flames. "Do you really think you can fool me with such a silly attack? You underestimate… uh?"

Suddenly he realized that he could no longer move the head that was on the right. He looked down with the other two heads and saw that Carrion's spear was stuck where the neck and shoulder met. It had penetrated exactly one of the exposed points and through it had passed through the neck from side to side, remaining stuck inside and therefore preventing the neck from changing position. Haku's eyes widened. Of course, he had seen it done before! Carrion could partially control his spear remotely. Which meant she must have moved it while he'd raised their heads and exposed the weak spot. But why? It didn't make sense, Haku could have easily pulled it out and wouldn't have suffered any damage...

Haku's gaze and Carrion's met for an instant, and the dragon read absolute triumph in the man's eyes. Then Carrion made a fist.

There was still some divine power left in the spear. Very little. But enough to generate a spark.

For a moment there was silence. And then, a roar. The base of the neck of the right head exploded with unheard-of violence, and even part of the central head was burned, though it was still unharmed thanks to the hard scales. But the head on the right had exploded from the inside, and therefore there was nothing to contain the explosion. With a sharp crack, the basilisk's head fell off his shoulder and rolled to the ground, where it lay motionless, the base of its neck still burning.

Haku grit his teeth; his eyes seemed to sparkle with anger. "You… did you still have poison on your spear?"

Carrion smiled satisfied. It was just as the dragon had said: when he tried to smack it with poison, some of it remained on the spear. Even though most of it was burned, Carrion had managed to save a small part, confident that it would come in handy later. And indeed it had been so: thrusting the spear into the neck of the head on the right, the poison full of flammable liquid had penetrated the soft flesh, where there was nothing that could contain it. At that point it was enough to use a little of the divine power left on the spear to generate a spark, and the venom had exploded with the same violence as before, but inside the monster's neck this time. The result had been that the right head had completely detached from the body and was now useless; even if Haku had been able to reattach the pieces, the base of his neck and shoulder were terribly damaged by now, so they would hardly have been able to reconnect. "A good general learns from the tactics of the enemy" Carrion replied with satisfaction. "To win a battle you have to observe how the opponent acts. And often what seems to be his most powerful and destructive weapon ends up becoming his greatest weakness"

Haku roared in anger. "You... you will pay for this affront! I've had far too much patience with you!"

Carrion's smile faded as he heard the dragon's angry voice and tightened his grip on the sword. Unfortunately he knew that his had not been a total victory: he had destroyed one of the heads, of course, but he had also lost his spear and consequently the poison filled with flammable liquid. And Haku still had two heads anyway. Being able to destroy the others would have been much more difficult. Carrion would have liked to aim for the central one rather than the one on the right, since it was the one that possessed the fiery breath, but unfortunately the presence of the other two heads had prevented him. Furthermore, the central head was better protected than the other two because unlike the others which were attached to the shoulders by force, it was an integral part of that body and therefore already possessed the articulation and position necessary to be able to move even with the neck completely covered of hard flakes.

Before hitting the central head, he had to think about how to destroy the one on the left, just as he had done with the one on the right. His mind started wondering how to do it. Maybe he could use his sword to…

Suddenly an explosion seemed to occur at the point where the severed head was located; sand billowed up in every direction, obscuring the view. Carrion had just time to sense danger and move slightly before something huge passed him and flew skyward.

There was a moment of silence. Then, Carrion's cry of pain was heard across the desert. The man grabbed his right shoulder in pain, which oozed blood in profusion where his arm had been an instant before.

He heard a clatter of jaws behind him and he whirled around. A serpent-like creature with two large membrane-like wings had appeared in the sky, chewing what had clearly been his right arm.