Entanglement

In the face of absolute power, the players' siege appeared utterly feeble. "Boom!" "Boom! Boom!" Brilliant flashes converged in midair in a succession of violent detonations, and several dozen more Arrows of Dragon Slaying streaked toward the Abyssal dragon's chest. Clearly, Singo was far from the only player who had noticed the Abyssal dragon's "weakness," but every one of them had vastly underestimated this boss's true strength. Whether bombs, arrows, or spells, all were reduced to a joke before this mountain-sized Abyssal dragon, whose body stretched hundreds of meters long. In the minds of these professional players, the game developers would never design a boss that was completely unbeatable. Unable to inspect the Abyssal dragon's Challenge Rating, the players had estimated it to be around level twenty based on their average strength and past game progression—still well within the realm of "winnable." What they failed to realize was that in the world of Elezerg, there were no "developers," nor was there any predetermined storyline—only ever-shifting destiny. Against this Abyssal Lord who had seized the body of the Dragon God of Destruction, even millions or tens of millions of players would meet only one end: defeat. "Roar—" Jerlazax threw back his head and roared into the heavens. Surging waves of black energy rippled outward from him, sweeping across the earth and extinguishing all life in their wake. In an instant, the tens of thousands of players who had dared dream of slaying a dragon were slaughtered down to the last person, not even bone fragments remaining. The Abyssal dragon spread wings broad enough to blot out the sky and beat them slowly. For a moment, not just the earth, but the heavens themselves seemed to shudder. *Whoosh—* *Whoosh—* Gales howled with fury, sending sand and stones flying. With each beat of the Abyssal dragon's wings, the sky let out a mournful wail. Under the violent tempest, trees were ripped up by their roots, massive boulders tumbled into the valley, and residual snow whipped wildly through the air. Even the frantically scattering demons were swept high into the sky, completely helpless. For dozens of li around, space was swallowed in churning black smoke. Black-red earthfire erupted from fissures in the ground, as if the world itself had been tainted by that chaotic power and was about to plunge into the Abyss. Dark clouds rolled; fell fire ran rampant. And so, beating his wings time and again, the monstrous Abyssal dragon actually rose, ascending ten thousand meters into the sky to look down disdainfully upon all creation below. His dragon wings, spanning hundreds of meters, blotted out the sun like a pitch-black canopy shrouding the ruins beneath. The surrounding space fractured, and endless chaotic black smoke poured from the rifts to form Abyssal torrents. Converging from all directions toward the Abyssal dragon's body, they coalesced into a colossal vortex ten thousand meters across high in the sky. "Boom, boom—" Heavy panting echoed through the sky like muffled thunder. With each breath Jerlazax took, the fundus vessels inside his body surged with eerie green light, greedily drinking in the surrounding Abyssal power. And the Abyssal dragon's colossal frame continued to swell, growing ever more massive and terrifying. His body length was now nearing three hundred meters, drawing ever closer to the true body of Garyx sealed in the Astral Plane. "Despicable bastard! Begone from the Material Plane!" Locked in battle with demons, the wyrm silver dragon felt the light dim before him. He crushed the demon in front of him with a single swat of his claw, then looked up. At once, shock, awe, terror, and countless other emotions tangled across his weathered draconic face. "Bahamut above... A-a sight like this probably hasn't been seen in nearly ten thousand years..." In his millennium-long life, no living creature had ever grown so colossal. Even Lord Bahamut's avatar was only a hundred meters in length. A dragon of such stature could only have been witnessed during the Dawn Age, when dragons ruled the world and stood as peers to the gods. Back then, dragons and their clans held dominion over vast territories, vying for control of the land, the seas, and the sky. Those competing dragons waged endless wars, and the dragon gods at their prime were locked in ceaseless strife, giving birth to countless immensely powerful beings. "Lord of the North Wind... can His Majesty Cassius truly defeat him?" Pablicheko's voice trembled slightly. It had been an age since this wyrm silver dragon had felt fear. The players tangled in the chaotic melee also noticed the distant Abyssal dragon. Yet rather than fear, they were filled primarily with shock and excitement. "Holy crap, look over there!" "That's insane!" "Th-this boss is way overtuned! Is this thing seriously something players are supposed to beat?" "I heard God Singo and tens of thousands of elite players ganged up on it, and the boss wiped them all in a single pass!" Meanwhile, the celestial reinforcements from the Outer Planes were stricken with panic. Looking up at the Abyssal dragon beating his wings high above, an astral deva with a flawless form and pristine white wings spoke with a grim expression: "Such a monster... No, this is nothing less than an abomination!" "Ye gods... is this world truly doomed to perish? Must the survival of the Material Plane truly rest upon the shoulders of an evil red dragon?" "Boom—" Cassius unleashed a cone of flame, creating a roaring sea of fire that once again incinerated the hundreds of demons before him to ashes. Tens of thousands more winged demons swarmed in. Cassius tucked his wings. Wrapped in roaring flames, he plowed through the fiendish swarm like a crimson chariot, carving a thick gray-black trail through the sky as charred fiends rained downward. Immediately after, the colossal red dragon beat his wings, rocketing upward on scorching gales and surging spatial forces like a flaming comet soaring into the heavens. *Whirrr—* Piercing sonic booms rang out as cone-shaped vapor clouds trailed behind the red dragon in a straight line. In mere breaths, Cassius likewise reached an altitude of ten thousand meters, facing off against the Abyssal dragon from afar. Yet before the nearly three-hundred-meter Abyssal dragon, even Cassius—who had surpassed the racial limits of red dragons to reach forty meters in length—could not help but look diminutive. Jerlazax fixed his gaze upon the distant red dragon. An eerie, covetous glint shone in his deep eyes, billowing black smoke spilled from his gaping maw, and a twisted grin still lingered at the corners of his mouth. "Cassius— Hahahaha! Have you finally thought it through and come meekly to my door—to be eaten by me?" Cassius's gaze instantly turned chillingly cold. He beat his draconic wings with steady rhythm, flames churning within his pale gold pupils. "Heh. Jerlazax, you're celebrating a bit too early. Years of planning, a long-accumulated vengeance... did you truly think I would have no way to deal with an Abyssal mongrel like you?" Wasting no words, the red dragon let out a low growl. Terrifying energy gathered in his throat, and the dragon crystal embedded in his chest blazed with blinding brilliance. At this moment, he was like a second sun in the sky, driving back the chaotic black mist for thousands of meters around. "Boom—" A thunderous crack of bursting air resounded as a pillar of blinding white flame tore across the sky, piercing effortlessly through the chaotic curtain of smoke and shooting straight toward the Abyssal dragon's chest. "Arrogant— Utterly arrogant!" Jerlazax viciously swiped his massive claw through the air, instantly drawing endless chaotic power onto its razor-sharp talons. Several torrential black currents surged forth, blocking and annihilating the blinding white column of fire. Then, accompanied by shrill shrieks, thousands upon thousands of bloodstained spears flew from the gaps between his scales, hurtling toward the distant red dragon. Each spear was drenched in blood, vibrating violently in midair with a howling cry and carrying an uncanny, dreadful power. Those were the Spears of Vengeance! The boundless vengeful power accumulated over tens of thousands of years by this Abyssal Lord known as the Demon of Vengeance was now poured out in full. Converging from every direction, the thousands of Spears of Vengeance flew toward Cassius with unstoppable momentum, raining down like a dense, violent deluge. "Roar—" The red dragon roared as he raised a massive fiery spirit shield, turning into a crimson afterimage that darted swiftly through the tempest of incoming spears. "Stubborn, ignorant red dragon! Even now, you fail to comprehend the greatness of the Abyss! In that case—I will personally make you feel the true nature of the world! Make you understand my purpose!" Jerlazax did not pause. The Abyssal dragon flapped his wings toward the red dragon, sending another endless expanse of chaotic dense fog sweeping forward. Should any mortal creature touch even a wisp of it, they would be infected by that chaotic Abyssal power, driven into uncontrollable frenzy, and stripped of all reason. The red dragon spun sharply in midair, evading hundreds of vengeful spears aimed at his heart in an instant. Yet the chaotic fog rolled forward like tempestuous waves, seeking to trigger the Abyssal curse dormant within him. Cassius beat his wings, churning up a scorching hurricane that blew the fog before him apart. "Roar!" With a resounding roar, a golden crown manifested above the red dragon's head, the silver-white gem set within it shimmering with radiant light. Crown of the Supreme True Dragon— Sacred Wind! *Whoosh—* At once, a biting northern gale swept across, and moonlight-like silver-white radiance burst from Cassius's crown, sweeping the surrounding black miasma clean. In Cassius's claws, the authority of the Elemental Plane manifested. Raising it high, the fire within his pale gold pupils blazed all the fiercer. With a drawn-out roar, fiery patterns like flowing magma surfaced across the red dragon's crimson scales. Sunburst, Meteor Swarm, Incendiary Cloud, Fire Storm, Burning Stone Haze... In an instant, more than a dozen high-tier spells infused with the essence of the Elemental Plane of Fire were unleashed, surging toward the Abyssal dragon and illuminating half the sky with magnificent fire. "Boom!" Jerlazax stretched his neck and opened his gaping maw wide, spewing vast plumes of black smoke that practically sealed off the space before him. Every fireball, flame pillar, meteor, and stream of magma crashing down from the sky was instantly broken down by the Abyssal power, mutating into a frenzied counter-current that surged back toward the red dragon instead. Cassius slowly opened his jaws as well. Vortices that absorbed all energy appeared before him, dissolving the frenzied onslaught entirely. That was Dragon Absorption! "Bahamut's divine power, Tiamat's bloodline heritage, the authority of the Elemental Plane... Cassius, this hodgepodge of little tricks of yours has truly exceeded my expectations. But in the face of the Abyss's absolute might, everything you possess... is not worth mentioning!" Jerlazax grinned ferociously. Flapping his wings relentlessly, he whipped up gales that swept the heavens and the earth, closing in on the red dragon. "Boom—" Endless shockwaves of wind battered the Anstica Mountains. Wyverns flapped their wings weakly, letting out feeble screeches, while even the silver dragons aloft were tossed about dizzyingly, barely able to keep their balance. "Ahhh—" "Where the hell am I going?!" "I didn't cast Fly yet, wait—dammit, I'm getting blown away!" The Starfallen were hurled hundreds of meters into the air, colliding with uprooted branches, rocks, and grit tossed up alongside them. The red dragon pumped his wings against the tempest, tearing through turbulent air currents at high speed, while the dark red Abyssal dragon pursued closely behind, incessantly unleashing Breaths of Chaos. Yet relying on the superior mobility granted by Aerial Maneuverability and Draconic Agility, combined with the predictive power of the Cataclysmic Dragon Eye, Cassius banked and weaved high in the sky. His flight path was completely unpredictable, evading the Abyssal dragon's breath attacks again and again. Jerlazax roared in fury, "Cassius! You scurrying rat, this tiresome struggling can end now!" "Roar—" The Abyssal dragon let out a deafening roar. In an instant, a pitch-black canopy descended slowly, seeking to force the nimble red dragon down to the earth. Yet the red dragon defied expectations, carving a sweeping arc high in the sky and darting straight toward the Abyssal dragon. Jerlazax chuckled excitedly, the eerie light in his eyes gleaming brighter, as if he could already envision himself devouring the Heart of Garyx and transforming into the Dragon of World Destruction. *Slash—* Flame pierced through the dense chaotic fog. A crimson afterimage streaked past the Abyssal dragon's neck, violently tearing away a large chunk of scaled flesh. Purplish-black blood splattered. The Abyssal dragon reared his head and roared, trembling with fury. "You are courting death!" Yet Cassius continued to leverage his superior agility, circling and wheeling around the Abyssal dragon, waiting for opportunities to strike. *Slash—* *Slash—* Sonic booms thundered repeatedly as chaotic trails of vapor clouds circled the massive, dark red draconic form. Time after time, Cassius launched close-quarters strikes, ripping away chunks of flesh from the Abyssal dragon. After all, not every dragon was as agile as Cassius. Before the red dragon, this nearly three-hundred-meter-long Abyssal dragon was clumsy; every single one of his movements seemed as if played in slow motion. Black-red chaotic fire, thick Abyssal black mist, bloodstained Spears of Vengeance, and rotting demonic flesh surged incessantly toward Cassius, yet none could land a hit. *Slash—* Once more, the crimson afterimage brushed past the Abyssal dragon's back, and another slab of scaled flesh flew into the air. "Red dragon... You must be quite proud of yourself..." Suddenly, that twisted grin crept onto Jerlazax's face once again. He parted his jaws to a grotesque angle, his mouth splitting almost back to his ears. "Awoo—!" A cacophony of chaotic sounds poured from his throat, whipping up a howl like an Abyssal hurricane that made all creation tremble. That was the Blasphemous Psalm! Instantly, Cassius felt a splitting headache. Black-red flames and an overwhelming desire for utter destruction welled up deep within his pupils. Inside his chest, the scorching Heart of Garyx pounded violently, while the crown atop his head hummed with rapid, agitated chimes. Struggle, resist! Gritting his teeth so hard they nearly shattered, the red dragon abruptly unleashed the full might of the Wind of Bahamut. Silver-white radiance erupted outward, holding back the invasion of the Abyssal curse within him. Yet with a thunderous sonic boom, a massive claw tens of meters long swept through the air and slammed violently into the red dragon's body. "Boom!" Under this terrifying, colossal force, Cassius was sent hurtling backward, crashing into a mountainside thousands of meters away and sending shattered rock flying as countless boulders tumbled down.