Chapter 8-3
People who had never experienced true battle would never understand that feeling of walking the edge of life and death, where a slight lapse in concentration would cause death. Ordinary people would feel their blood race or their mind tremble in a fight, let alone that environment where you struggled for survival and could die anytime. Only at this moment did Honglu finally understand Xuan’s meaning behind doing this… and its significance towards the final battle.
(I see. It’s impossible to understand this feeling without having experienced this juncture of life and death. In other words, whether it be me or another ordinary team member, we’ll likely lose our judgement ability in the final battle and thus probably die an unjust death. In the final battle, anyone can influence the battle. So even if we die, we have to complete our duty before dying…) When Honglu thought about this, his heart gradually settled down. Although his limbs had all still gone slightly weak, he had still hardened his resolve. He allowed those arrows to whizz past, merely holding the Fiendish Monstrous Spider tight and charging forward. Slowly, the terrain of the valley appeared before his eyes.
Honglu patted the spider below, and it immediately leapt up. It jumped straight to the top of the trees, advancing quickly with a speed several times faster than the speed on the ground before, and he reached the top of the steep slopes in the valley within a short time.
“Now, I just need to quietly wait.” Honglu said to himself. His hands and legs trembled continuously. No matter how prettily he put it, the quivering and nervousness in his heart couldn’t be avoided. He was still a child after all, and this was his first true battle.
Without waiting for a long time, squad after squad of Urgal and human soldiers came running over. They had some slight caution in entering the valley from outside. The soldiers with sharper eyes immediately noticed Honglu on the hillside. Although the hillside was steep, it wasn’t untraversable. It wasn’t too hard for all the various Urgal soldiers here to climb up the steep slope with their physique. Only, that giant spider below Honglu made them jump in fright. Before they could recover, Honglu had already begun reciting an incantation.
(First comes Fireball…)
The Weave magic enhancement had very large limitations. Firstly, strengthening the enhancement didn’t mean that you possessed the abilities. Every ability of each Level had to separately be exchanged for with points and ranked rewards, while the Weave magic itself had a large number of exchangeable abilities. In other words, this enhancement was basically a bottomless pit. Not only that, but the other large limitation of the Weave was the limited numbers of uses per day, a direct inhibition of a Weave user’s power. Even if you enhanced sufficient abilities, the same Level of magic would have limited uses which stopped you from getting stronger continuously. These two limitations made the Weave seem as if something of little value.
But similarly, the higher the price paid, the greater the equivalent power obtained. Due to the existence of the two huge limitations, the power of the Weave was shockingly abnormal. For example, a Level 3 Fireball’s power wasn’t inferior to a miniature air-to-surface missile.
Honglu recited the incantation and two fireballs shot out from his front. The target wasn’t those soldiers, but the thicket behind them. The sole entrance to the valley suddenly exploded loudly, stone fragments shooting all over the place. Together with the burning trees and tree trunk, the entrance was completely sealed.
(Then Ice Storm.)
Honglu exhaled deeply and began the incantation for Ice Storm. As the abstruse and difficult to understand incantation was recited, a layer of snowy white clouds appeared a hundred metres up in the sky. Then, chunks of ice the size of an arm began to fall continuously from the cloud layer. The cloud layer finally slowly dissipated when two hundred or so had fallen.
“What Ice Storm? This is obviously hail!”
Honglu jumped in fright and hurriedly looked at the soldiers below. The area of effect of this Ice Storm was great and the area below happened to be flat ground within the valley. At least twenty soldiers were instantly crushed to death. It was only that the Urgals had powerful bodies, so more of those who died were the human soldiers. The Urgal soldiers cried out as they charged towards the hillside, while some Urgal archers drew their longbows and targeted Honglu, who was at the top of the hillside.
Swoosh!
A light sound. An arrow coincidentally struck Honglu’s cheek. It practically stuck to his temple as it continued its ascent upwards and flew past to to the sky behind. Only long after that arrow disappeared did Honglu finally realize what had happened. Blood slowly flowed from his cheeks...
“AHHHHH! Go die!”
Honglu immediately went insane and began loudly calling out an incantation without even thinking about it. All the attack magics he grasped were unleashed. Ice Storm, Fireball and Ray of Frost all burst out continuously. Explosions re sounded and countless hailstones fell from the sky. After a long time, Honglu was kneeling powerlessly on the ground. Only then did he notice what happened below. The Fireball’s shockwave had caused a crater to be blown open, while the hail had had an even more exaggerated effect. Icicles were densely packed below, and it was hard to imagine any ordinary living thing could survive under this rain of hailstones. “This… really sucks.”
“I obviously knew extreme terror would make one lose their rational judgement and even instil anger, despair or berserk emotions like this time. But I still didn’t consider all this in advance and still carelessly put myself in a dangerous situation. I’m really not calm enough. The gap between Xuan and me is still too large. If it was him, a battle like this would only have needed a few seconds…”
Honglu’s battle began quickly and ended quickly, but its effect on Honglu couldn’t be said to be little. The little boy knelt on the ground for a long time, only difficultly standing up when his legs were numb. His eyes continued to look at the bottom of the hillside and he went silent. He finally muttered a long while later, “I understand. My role in the final battle is… Xuan, what an unrestrained gamble, just like everything you’ve done before…”
(Perhaps, letting me reach this conclusion was your ultimate goal…)
Compared to this battle of Honglu that was more scary than actually dangerous, Cheng Xiao looked much more relaxed on his end. With the martial prowess his physique offered and the extremely strong offense of Nanto Suicho Ken, he could easily butcher the human and Urgal soldiers he faced. In truth, the problems he faced were much more troublesome than battle.
“In other words, I’m another surviving Dragon Rider.”
Cheng Xiao was currently eloquently conning the three men before him. Or rather, it should be three people and one dragon. There was the main character Eragon, his uncle, the former Dragon Rider, Brom and the young blue dragon. These three and one dragon were incomparably curious as they looked at this young man whose face was filled with a dumb smile and the young black dragon in his embrace.
The three of them had met another wave of Urgal attacks before, when a squad of eight Urgals had put their all into besieging them. Although Brom was only stronger and not weaker than the Urgals, the other two were basically burdens. They could only continue to run away in the forest, until they were gradually surrounded by Urgal soldiers. Cheng Xiao had appeared at this moment. There was no need to go into detail about what happened next. Nothing more had happened than Cheng Xiao jumping about, and these abnormally violent Urgal soldiers had been diced into pieces in the next second.
This tyrannical battle power made Brom who was urgently hurrying over widen his eyes. Although Dragon Riders were powerful, their strength lay in their mount’s power and the Dragon Rider borrowing the dragon’s magic. If they fought alone without their mount, a Dragon Rider’s martial skills weren’t actually THAT great. At the very least, they weren’t able to overcome a hundred alone.
The three were thus so cautious due to Cheng Xiao’s power. However, the three’s attitude became markedly better after seeing the young dragon in his embrace and hearing he was another surviving Dragon Rider. Although they still had suspicions, there weren’t any hostile sentiments after all. Brom also started questioning the origin of this young dragon.
Who was Cheng Xiao? On ordinary days even if there was no reason to, he would use flowery words to tease the girls in the team. If there was a reason, this fellow would be able to become an outstanding diplomat, or at least a scammer. Although, from certain angles, diplomats and scammers didn’t have much of a difference.
Cheng Xiao was still someone who lived through the Information Age after all. Since the other side had asked the origin of him and the young dragon, he might as well simplify the contents of a few fantasy books and use it to dress himself. Something something about coincidentally chancing upon a dragon egg, meeting Urgals, escaping and growing up, then meeting an expert in seclusion. Then, after joining the martial arts academy, there was the absolutely necessary extremely strong headmaster. There was also the overpowered ability all main characters must have, etc etc. By the last sentence, Cheng Xiao had already been storytelling for two hours.
“Your experiences really are plentiful.” Brom took a while before he responded. Although he had some suspicions Cheng Xiao was playing tricks on him, Cheng Xiao had come with a young dragon in tow. Secondly, he really did have powerful strength, his battle techniques extraordinary. No matter what, an additional Dragon Rider could only be a good thing, so Brom was still polite.
“Speaking of which, is it fine to just be sitting here chatting?” Cheng Xiao laughed mischievously, saying, “I saw a magician that looks like a Shade just now, bringing a troop of several tens of Urgals to chase us. Is it really fine to continue chatting here?”
“Hasn’t it been you alone chatting the whole time?” The three turned pale with fright and practically jumped to their feet. At the same time, a sinister voice resounded.
“Then continue chatting. Dying quietly is infinitely preferable to dying in a struggle…”
From the forest not far away, a thin and weak man dressed in a dark-red long robe took the initiative to walk out. At the same time, one Urgal soldier after another walked out of the forest. At some unknown time, the four had been surrounded. Only Cheng Xiao laughed mischievously as he sat on the floor.
“That’s right. That’s what I always say, dying quietly is infinitely preferable to dying in a struggle…” Cheng Xiao stood up, saying as he mischievously laughed.