Chapter 57: High Dragoneut

“I’m Bezel, the fourth in line to the Estent Empire’s throne.”

The man with an extraordinary presence around him said that. In other words, the man in front of me is from the Estent Empire’s Royal family.

I immediately used my analysis skill.

【Analysis Result: Bezel Dragnil: The third son of the Estent Empire’s Dragnil Imperial Family. He boasts top-class strength amongst his nearly 100 brothers. He is known as an influential person in the empire and he has a lot of support from the people: Rarity B】

【Status】 Name: Bezel Dragnil Race: High Dragoneut Age: 25 years old Magic Attribute: Fire Magic: Fire Arrow, Flame Bomb, Flame Chain, Flame Wall Skills:  Dragon Transformation ▹ Special: Small Dragon Breath ▹ Advanced: Body Strengthening, Super Sensation ▹ Intermediate: Dragon Beheading Slash, Sword King Technique, Fist King Technique, Fang Strengthening, Leadership Evolution: Does not meet the conditions 【Evolution Condition: Fist King technique (Special Grade), Limit breakthrough (Beginner), Dragon breath (Beginner)】

Without a doubt, he is the strongest enemy I met so far. There are also many skills that I have never seen before. Moreover, his race is even a High Dragoneut. If I got careless, there’s a possibility that he may defeat me.

“What’s wrong, human? Did you get scared when you saw me?”

“I’m not scared. I was impressed that you trained well though.”

“You’re pretty discerning for a human. It’s a pity to kill you.”

“Well, I also feel that it’s indeed a pity.”

This man named Bezel apparently loves muscles too. It’s a shame to think that we might have become friends if he is not an enemy.

“Big brother! Kill that man quickly!”

“Karl, Shut up! You are the cause of this operation failure. Do you think you can order me to wipe your ass?”

“B-But … ku-uh!”

Karl glares at me. Even though they are brothers, their hierarchical relationship seems to be firm. Bezel then pulls out the sword on his waist as he slowly approaches me.

I was fascinated seeing the pulled out sword blade.

“White sword?”

Bezel’s sword has a white blade and it is shiny. It looks like it’s made of ceramic. It is about 2m long and about 40cm wide. It’s a size suitable for calling it a greatsword.

I immediately check it out using my analysis skill.

【Analysis Results: Flying Dragon Bone Sword: Flying Dragon’s bone is known to be lighter and harder than Mithril. It’s rarity value is high because it is difficult to obtain: Rarity A】

The Bull King sword seems to be more valuable. However, determining which one has the better performance as a weapon is still unknown.

“This is a flying dragon bone sword. It’s made from a precious dragon bone. It loses to magic steel in terms of hardness, but instead, it’s hard to break and pretty durable.”

“A dragon’s bone huh. It’s quite interesting.”

“Let’s see which is stronger, your black sword or my sword.”

Bezel grins. Apparently, he also saw that my sword is unusual.

“Here I go, human.”

“Bring it on!”

Both of us stepped forward, locking our swords against each other. A sharp sound echoed out and sparks scattered with the clash.

“To stop my sword like this, neither you nor your sword is normal!”

“It’s a given! I’m Shinichi Tanaka!”

“Kuhahaha! Interesting! It’s really a shame to kill you!”

Using his skill, Bezel exhales a small dragon breath from such a close range. The intense flame radiation burns my skin. However, it’s not that unbearable.

“You can endure my dragon breath huh. Then, how about this!!?”

Bezel’s power rises rapidly. It’s probably the body strengthening skill. My sword begins to be pushed back.

“I too have that body strengthening skill!”

This time, with the skill limit breakthrough, I was the one who started pushing Bezel’s sword. Surprised, he jumps back and stops our close fight competition.

“You’re stronger than me? Hmmm, in that case, you’re not a human.”

Bezel has a sharp intuition. No matter how strong my skills are, humans and high dragoneuts have different basic abilities. Thus it is unbelievable for a human to win by comparing strength.

“Now now, I’m roughly a human though.”

“Such a clever lie. Well, I welcome an enemy who’s on par with me.”

Our swords clashed against each other again. It seems that he activated his super sensation skill this time as his reaction speed is increasing. Of course, I also used my super sensation skill. As our swords struck against each other, sparks scattered too. The sun is already setting and it is now getting dark. Every time we crossed swords, it becomes a bit brighter, and for a moment, Bezel’s face stands out from such dark background.

I already lost count of the blows we have exchanged.

“My younger brother came back defeated. The way it is now, we really have to rethink the invasion strategy for this kingdom.”

“You should. If you want to run away, now is time.”

“That joke is not funny. We, the Dragnil Royal family, do not concede defeat. It’s better to commit suicide than to expose our lives to shame.”

As he swings down his greatsword, I see through its trajectory so I avoided it at the last minute. I swiftly jumped back and I then slashed my sword into his shoulder.

“Aggh!?”

I took some distance away from Bezel. Bright red blood was dripping from his shoulder. It was finally a decisive blow.

“I’ll commend you for being able to hit me. However, it will be impossible for you from here on.”

Then his skin changed. After the small green scales covered his entire body, the bleeding wound on his shoulder quickly closed. The atmosphere around him also became more powerful and I felt something like a pressure from him.

“This is the Dragon Transformation that can only be used by High Dragoneuts.”

He moved at a rapid speed, he then slashes his greatsword sideways. I barely avoided it with my danger detection skill. I rolled on the ground and fired a thread bomb as I get up.

“What the heck is this!?”

A large amount of sticky thread wrapped around Bezel. However, he quickly burned himself using the small dragon breath.

“This cheap trick won’t work on me!”

The burnt threads fall to the ground. The man wrapped in flames seemed to have an increase on his flame resistance due to becoming a dragon.

“I see. So it seems.”

“I had a lot of fun fighting you. You should be proud to die in my hands for hurting me.”

The sword that Bezel swung down cuts off my sword and even the rock behind me. It’s probably the dragon beheading slash skill. As for the effect of the skill, an invisible blade extends from the blade itself and it’s such a powerful slash.

My body split into two as it was cut and it then fell to the ground.

“You should have given up seeing the difference in our ability.”

“Hn? I haven’t given up yet you know?”

“Uh!?”

Bezel’s eyes opened wide hearing my voice. The man who should have been killed is currently talking to him as if nothing happened. Moreover, I’m standing up steadily.

“What’s wrong? Are you that surprised because I’m not dead yet?”

“But… I should have cut…”

I’m unharmed. Well, he did certainly saw me being cut, but such laceration is nowhere to be seen. I almost laughed at Bezel’s shocked expression.

“Flame chain!!”

With clinking sounds, a hot crimson chain wraps around his body. Shortly after, Bezel was restrained just like that.

“You’re looking in a different direction.”

As he turned around, me and Erna grinned at him. That’s right, the one he slashed was a phantom Shinichi Tanaka.

First, I have to explain why Erna is here. Erna was doing some support attack with her bow, but when most of the enemies escaped, she used camouflage, a light magic to move closer to me.

Then, at the right moment, she switched an illusion in my place. By the way, camouflage is a magic that can create phantoms and it can also be used to switch places. She didn’t have much chance to use it, but this time, I can say that it was very useful.

“For such magic-! Damn!”

“As an ancestor elf, my magic can’t be broken so easily.”

As Erna had said, Bezel cannot free himself from the chain. It won’t budge even he’s in dragon form.

“Special grade magic, Flare zone!”

Magical power was released around Erna as she raised the staff, and it converged to the staff at once. After Bezel was covered with the hemispherical red space, extreme heat was generated. The ground in the space was melted into a thick muddy red liquid and Bezel’s skin began to burn even with his flame resistance. I don’t feel the heat when I look at it but I know that the red space is already a blast furnace.

“Coward! To trap me here, you–!!”

Bezel yelled.

I never said that I would fight alone in the first place. Besides, there is no reason for me to fight alone. The other party was the one who got the wrong idea.

“Don’t feel bad. I don’t want you to die.”

When I said that, the chain that binds him cracks.

Oi, Don’t tell me… is he trying to break it on his own?

“Unforgivable… For me to… this underhanded trick…”

“Not good! Erna back off!”

After Erna retreated, I readied my sword. The flare zone is already disappearing, and the chains that bind him are about to break. Dragon Transformation is already this terrifying. How a about a real dragon then? Just thinking about what type of monster it would be makes me shiver.

When the chains broke, the red space in the flare zone disappeared. Intense hot air gushed out and it burned the flowering plants in the surrounding. He slowly advances through the ground that was turned into lava, and when he reaches the edge, he takes one foot out like he just got out of the bath.

His whole body was carbonized, and pink flesh was visible from the peeled part. For him to still be able to walk is already a miracle. As expected, no matter how strong he was, special-grade magic caused a lot of damage to him.

“I won’t forgive the woman earlier. After killing you, I’ll brutally kill her!”

“Hmm, can you really beat me in that state?”

“Shut up! Flame bomb!”

Bezel fired a flame bomb and it explodes in the place where I am at. Black smoke rose and a small crater was formed.

“You were not cautious because you thought I couldn’t use magic! Kuhahaha!”

He grabs his sword and approaches the crater. I think he intends to kill me as I’m weakened.

Splat–

I thrust my sword out and stabbed it in his heart.

“……Ah?”

Bezel didn’t seem to understand the why there is a sword sticking out of the smoke. Well, if you think about it normally, I should have been badly wounded and I should have collapsed. Or, perhaps I’m now running away.

Well, unfortunately, I am not normal. When the smoke clears up, my appearance was revealed before him. Bezel trembled all over seeing that.

“T-This is absurd…  you-, without even a scratch…?”

“Magic doesn’t works on me.”

I then touched the magic circle on the sword and a violent electric discharge burns Bezel.

“Gyaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!!”

Even if he is resistant to fire, he will not be able to resist electric shock. Even so, he has a tremendous vitality. He did not die even with a sword pierced into his heart.

Then, Bezel fell to the ground with white smoke rising around him. I checked his heartbeat just in case but it appeared that he stopped breathing completely.

“Now then, for the remaining one, Karl—“

When I searched for Karl, he wasn’t there anymore. He probably ran away by using his brother as a decoy.

“You did it! We’ve driven the empire back!”

Erna hugs me.

“Father is so awesome!”

Pero jumped in right after.

“Pero-sama! Me too!”

It seems that Freya doesn’t mind it. Pero is hugging me, so I feel like she is hugging me as well.

Wooooo! The soldiers and adventurers who were near the outer wall cheered. The battle against Bezel was quite tough but I was relieved and glad that I was able to protect Mana.

It is such a dreadful sight with many corpses lying around the grassland that became the battlefield. Although the damage here is zero, I still need to reflect on my foolishness for thinking that I could win with my edge.

“The empire seems to be stronger than I think…”

I need to become stronger. Otherwise, I won’t be able to protect what I hold dear in my hands.

“Father! My body!”

When I turned to look, Pero’s body is emitting light. It was similar to the light we see during evolution.

“Calm down. It’s just time for you to grow.”

“Will I also evolve?”

“I’m not sure, but no matter what you looks like, you’ll still be my son.”

“Un!” And then Pero’s body was wrapped in a bright light

This is translated by Yume Neiji. Kindly read at yumeineijiworks.wordpress.com.

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