Into A Complete Dragon

At worst, I might have to send this Purple Sphere as high into the sky as possible and detonate it… While thinking that as I chased Caesar, Hubert suddenly appeared at the edge of my vision.

Hubert had apparently slipped perfectly into Caesar’s blind spot. Even though he was quite close, Caesar had not noticed him.

From Hubert’s gestures and eye contact… he was going to divert Caesar’s attention. In that moment, I should strike with the Purple Sphere.

—Hubert, I’m counting on you.

I nodded slightly with that thought and clenched my fist tightly. At that very moment, Hubert made his move. Kicking off the ground with all his strength, he rushed at Caesar and thrust forward with his greatsword.

That attack, which seemed to prioritize speed, apparently unsettled Caesar somewhat. Turning his gaze toward Hubert, Caesar swung his dragon-transformed right arm and blasted both Hubert and the greatsword away.

The moment of counterattack was only an instant, but that was enough. When someone attacks one target, they become extremely vulnerable to a third party’s attack.

The Purple Sphere I had released the moment Hubert struck… hit Caesar squarely in the torso.

“Guh… ghk…!”

Caesar coughed up blood and dropped to one knee. This will finish him…! Thinking that, I raised my sword to deliver the final blow—but Caesar’s body underwent an unexpected change.

His entire body suddenly grew even larger. Sensing danger from that transformation, I stopped my advancing steps, but Caesar changed again.

Caesar’s eyes seemed unfocused somehow, giving him a strange, eerie appearance. Should I attack now or retreat…? As I hesitated between those options, Caesar’s body suddenly shone brilliantly—

“Luca!! Run away quickly—!”

The moment I heard Lady Seremees’s voice, an unimaginable shock struck me, and I lost consciousness.

As I stared blankly while Caesar’s body kept growing larger step by step, it was suddenly enveloped in a dazzling light.

The next thing that struck us was an unbelievable shockwave. As we dropped to the ground to endure it and tried to escape even a little from the blast… when I finally managed to lift my face, there was a gigantic dragon towering before me.

And beside it, Luca lay collapsed without strength.

“Luca!! Luca!!”

Seeing him not move even slightly filled my mind with terrible thoughts, and I desperately ran to him. I knelt beside him and called out frantically, but Luca did not respond at all.

“Luca! Please wake up!! Please!!”

“Rebecca… watch out!”

“Hey! Hurry and carry Luca over here!”

The words from Ann and Hubert—who had blocked the dragon’s attack—snapped me back to my senses. Together with Hubert, I lifted Luca and carried him to where Ann was.

“Ann, please heal him…!”

Before I could even finish speaking, Ann had already cast Heal on Luca, as if she had prepared it in advance. But Luca did not wake up. He did not move even slightly. It even felt like he was not breathing…

“…Ann, Luca…?”

“Heal won’t work. He’s no longer breathing.”

“N-no…”

Those words made it feel as if the ground beneath me was collapsing. My body lost its strength, and I sank down to the floor.

“Rebecca, pull yourself together!”

“But Luca…”

“I’ll save him. I am the servant of the Goddess of Life, remember? I have Soul Reattachment.”

—That’s right. I had been so shaken that I forgot about that ability. If it’s Ann, she might be able to save Luca…!

“I’ll activate the ability immediately, so hold that dragon’s attention for a little while.”

“Ann, thank you…! Leave the dragon to me.”

Even if it costs my life, I will never let that dragon reach them.

“Rebecca, I’ll help as well. But it’s certain that we can’t defeat it. Since we only need to draw its attention, we’ll attack while constantly retreating.”

“Understood, thank you. Then… I’ll handle the attacks with my bow. That way I can strike from a distance.”

“Alright. I’m counting on you.”

When Hubert nodded with his sword in hand, I fired an arrow toward the dragon with all my strength. The arrow flew as if being drawn in and struck the dragon’s eye, successfully attracting its attention.

“GROOOOOOOAR!!”

“Let’s go! Run!”

Even though the arrow hit its eye, the dragon hardly seemed injured. Its eye—supposedly a weak point—was that hard… there’s no way I could defeat it alone.

“Ugh… it’s so heavy…”

Hubert tried to deflect the dragon’s sweeping tail attack and barely succeeded, but the impact seemed to numb his entire body, leaving him unable to move.

“Hah!”

I fired another arrow to distract it, but this time the arrow was blown away by the pressure of wind from the dragon’s wings before it could reach its eye. The wind pressure even reached us… and all we could do was struggle not to be blown away.

—Can this dragon fly?

The moment that thought crossed my mind, the dragon beat its wings with a thunderous sound and rose into the air above the hall.

“GRAAAAAA!!”

“What, that’s possible!?”

“Run! Over there!”

Hubert, whose numbness had faded, practically shoved me aside as we retreated. A few seconds later, the place where I had been standing was engulfed in raging flames.

Can this dragon still use divine magic even in this form?

“Haah… haah… Hubert, thank you.”

“Don’t worry about it. But seriously… how are we supposed to defeat something like that?”

“I want to believe Luca and Ann can somehow manage it…”

Seeing such an overwhelming difference in power made a weak thought creep into my mind—that even those two might struggle.

“By the way, Caesar took damage from Luca’s Temporary Peace earlier, right? Did that disappear?”

“No, it should still remain. If you look closely, he barely moves his left arm.”

“…You’re right. Then maybe if we attack there…”

“Another spell is coming!”

Before we could talk further, we were targeted from above again, and all we could do was run desperately to avoid being reduced to ashes. I wondered how long Ann’s ability would take to activate.

If it doesn’t finish soon, our lives are in danger.