Ch.893Those Who Are Meant to Fall Will Fall.

I couldn’t believe what gave her such confidence, but Persiella rejected my offer nonetheless.

A truly generous offer to personally tear apart and kill the man who would tell me Bernard’s location, in place of her who would soon be a corpse.

Well then… I have no choice but to kill her, do I?

“Kyaaaah!”

With the collapse of Heaven’s Wall having dampened my fighting spirit, I sharpened it once more and lunged toward Persiella, who was staggering with her wings drooping.

Though my movements had become noticeably slower from overusing various techniques including Skywalk…

“Try blocking this with those precious scales of yours. If you can!”

Even in my current state, finishing off one severely injured Dragonborn wouldn’t be particularly difficult.

“Keuugh…!”

Persiella gritted her fangs and raised her damaged sword. A faint blue-silver afterglow drew a dim straight line as it rushed toward her scaled neck.

As I finally reached within striking distance of her,

“Kyaak-!”

Just as I was about to accelerate with a battle cry full of killing intent by forcefully kicking off the ground—

– Kurrrrrrrr!

The earth between us split open with a thunderous roar.

“Huh…?”

“What is…?!”

Persiella and I were startled and looked down at the ground beneath our feet.

It was like watching a giant who had been lying down wake up and let out a long yawn.

The entire foundation of the training ground shook violently, opening up a bottomless fissure.

– Kwarrrrrrr!

Fragments of the ground shattered by the earthquake poured like hail into the crevice. Like a snow field’s crevasse suddenly collapsing.

“Damn it, what’s happening now…!”

What is this?

Was there a cave underneath?

It was already too late to escape.

With all the mana in the surrounding air completely depleted, even if I spewed Karma flames, the output would be insufficient to lift my body.

In other words, I had no choice but to fall down there. All the way to the bottom of the black cavity where I couldn’t even see the floor.

…Well, it’s not like I’ll die from this.

I clicked my tongue, steeled myself, and swung Durandal toward my enemy while crushing the collapsing ground beneath my feet.

“Kuk…!”

Persiella, who had been trying to pull back to avoid the crevice, raised her sword in alarm and thrust it to meet mine.

– Kkaddeuddeuk!

The two blades intertwined like mating snakes, creating friction and scattering hot sparks in all directions.

“Kiaaaah!”

Persiella spread her left hand wide and swung her claws toward my face. I also extended my left hand and grabbed her wrist, squeezing it tightly.

– Ppadeuk…!

Her scales, crushed by my grip, split in half and scattered like powder.

“Kuk…! Are you insane?!”

Persiella’s face contorted as she shouted urgently, her trapped left arm trembling.

“At this rate, we’ll both fall and be buried alive!”

“So what?”

As long as I don’t die, it’s fine.

Having been buried under the ruins of Wall of Berengaria before, did she think I would now fear something like being buried alive?

I smirked and applied more strength to both arms, pushing her back.

Until the ground beneath our feet completely collapsed, and we fell together into the underground cavity with no visible end.

—-

– Kwarrrrr…!

In the abyss-like cavity.

Amidst the downpour of soil and rock, Persiella and I clashed our swords again and again, burning our Karma against each other.

Kicking away falling rocks to propel ourselves toward each other, swinging our swords, then bouncing back from the recoil, breaking rock fragments with our backs.

– Kaaang!

Each time dragon scales and true silver collided, the flashes of light that burst forth illuminated our distorted and dirty faces.

“You, crazy woman…!”

“Look who’s talking. Even if I went mad, how could I compare to a devil spawn like Hosoin!”

Persiella kept flapping her wings, trying somehow to fly up and avoid the fall, but with just one remaining wing, she could barely maintain balance in midair.

With me constantly interfering, she had no choice but to plummet headfirst underground, proving the old saying that even having wings doesn’t help when falling.

Twenty seconds passed like that.

“Just, die already!”

“You’re the one who should…!”

The only achievement I’d made was breaking Persiella’s sword in half.

I still hadn’t managed to end her life.

If only I could maintain continuous attacks with our swords locked, I might somehow push through and cut off her neck…

– Kaaaang!

…But since we were floating in midair while swinging swords, each collision inevitably sent us bouncing backward.

Thirty seconds passed like that.

Forty seconds.

A full minute.

After repeated momentary collisions while endlessly falling, we finally reached near the bottom of the cavity.

A cavity so incomprehensibly vast that collapsed soil and rocks had piled up like hills, spreading dusty soil like fog.

—-

‘What is this place?’

It was an incredibly strange space.

Clear groundwater flowed like a river through the middle of the cavity floor, a snow-white mineral-like object sat alone in one corner, and the surrounding walls were filled with blue crystals resembling mana stones.

“Mana…!”

It seemed they weren’t just similar in appearance—vast amounts of mana were pouring from the crystals all around, filling the atmosphere.

Ah, with mana present, flight should be possible.

“…Kenaz!”

I stopped my falling body in midair using Karma flames powered by the combination of Murder Karma and mana.

“Luck… is on our side…!”

Persiella also spread her one remaining wing wide and activated a floating spell to stop herself.

Though our methods differed slightly, we stopped simultaneously as if we had planned it.

In that state, Persiella and I scrutinized each other’s openings with sharp eyes while slowly descending.

Down and down we went…

“…Wait. That, could that possibly be…?”

…Until we realized that what we thought was a mineral mass was actually a living creature.

【 Ahhh….. 】

What I had thought was a snow-white mineral mass slowly raised its body, which had been curled up, while exhaling an exclamation mixed with ecstasy.

– Geugeugeugeung…!

A storm-like breath resonated through the cavity’s atmosphere.

Pure white scales reflecting blue mana light and shining palely.

A massive body over a hundred meters long, four pillar-like legs, and a head that looked like a mix between a snake and an alligator.

A familiar form.

【 Krorarararara-! 】

It stretched its coiled tail backward and roared while spreading its massive wings like curtains.

The immense mana and formless pressure contained in that voice made Persiella and me unconsciously grimace and step back.

“Ha, this is ridiculous.”

Seriously.

What the hell is this now?

[ Things have gotten properly tangled. ]

Indeed.

“Those despicably cunning practitioners…! This, they were hiding something like this…!”

Persiella shouted in a voice filled with confusion while grinding her molars.

I felt exactly the same way.

That crazy old man Diarma. If he had something like this under his house, he should have told me beforehand…!

I gritted my teeth and firmly gripped my sword handle.

A couple of drops of cold sweat ran down my spine.

A tension that seemed to squeeze my heart. The presence of the giant lizard slowly folding its wings was transmitted with sickening clarity.

A dragon was before us.

The ultimate creature that couldn’t even be compared to Nidhogg, which was merely a collection of insect-like monsters using only a dragon’s skeleton.

【 I can feel it…! 】

The creature’s muttering penetrated my mind.

Instead of vibrating vocal cords to make sound, it was the dragon’s unique way of communication—directly implanting its thoughts into the minds of surrounding creatures.

According to the Dragonborn in the original game, this was a technique called “mind-planting.”

【 I can feel it without seeing it. I can know without confirming! The chains of those abominable human gods that bound our wings beneath the earth like an abyss, finally! 】

The white dragon roared once more in joy.

The meaning of its words was unmistakably clear.

Because Elpinel and other human gods had spread Heaven’s Wall, it had been forced to hide underground like a worm, but now there was no longer any need for that.

It’s not just this white dragon before my eyes.

Eight hundred years since Heaven’s Wall covered the sky.

The four dragons that suddenly disappeared without a trace, yet with no records of their subjugation anywhere.

Those monsters that had been hiding, dreaming of the day they could rise again while avoiding the gods’ eyes, must have already realized, just like the white dragon before me.

The shattered Heaven’s Wall can no longer suppress them.

【 Tiresome earth. Longed-for world! Watch closely. Praise loudly! 】

The return of dragons.

What I had intuited when I confirmed the destruction of the fourth wall had become reality.

【 The moment this Amitamir soars once again above the high sky! 】

…It was a bit sooner than I had expected.

—-

Amitamir.

The white dragon before me called itself by that name.

It was a name I had heard before.

A name that Diarma, the forest keeper of the Small Forest, had mumbled.

The name of the first practitioner who, instead of following the Dragonborn’s nature, shed the Dragonborn’s shell through mental discipline that suppressed it, and was reborn as a dragon.

The name of the Dragonborn who could be called the founder of the Small Forest.

【 Be cursed. Swim in curses for eternity! Hateful archenemies, abominable human gods! 】

…Judging by the way it spoke, the story about becoming a dragon through mental discipline seemed to be a blatant lie.