26 - Dialong(2)

As the green light faded away, Lele's eyes fell upon a tall figure before him. Standing at over six feet tall, the humanoid creature possessed an athletic build with lean, toned muscles visible beneath his skin. His hair was a vibrant shade of emerald green, long and wild, cascading down his back in waves. His piercing gaze locked onto Lele, revealing a pair of glowing yellow lizard eyes that seemed to hold a fierce intelligence.

Despite his imposing presence, the dragon in human form seemed almost ethereal, with a faint shimmering aura surrounding him. He wore a form-fitting outfit of deep forest green, adorned with intricate gold designs and markings that resembled the scales of a dragon. As he moved, his movements were fluid and graceful, as if he were still embodying the same powerful energy as in his dragon form.

Without hesitation, the dragon unleashed a powerful blow, but Lele was ready and managed to defend himself. Despite this, he was still pushed back a couple of meters by the sheer force.

Lele reflected, "This new method of manipulating mana coating is incredibly difficult. I have to constantly shift my mana based on where he'll strike next. It's nearly impossible to do so on the fly. For now, I will evenly distribute my mana for defense and concentrate it in my fist when I attack."

Meanwhile, Dialong was shocked and bewildered. He had initially thought that his newfound strength was due to his use of mana coating, but now he was certain that his opponent was growing stronger by the minute. "Why is your mana density increasing?" he asked in disbelief.

Lele looked at Dialong with confusion and asked, "Mana density? What are you talking about?"

'It seems he's not even aware of it.' thought the dragon. 'I need to end this fight quickly. He's already reached 2/3 of my mana density compared to the beginning where it was half at most.' With a stomp of his right foot, the dragon called forth "Earth Pillar!"

A massive column of dirt was formed to Lele's left and flung towards him, but his inhuman reflexes allowed him to narrowly dodge it. The pillar hit a nearby building with such force that it almost caused it to collapse. Lele's heart raced as he realized how close he had come to being crushed by the clump of dirt. Dialong, however, was unfazed as he expected him to dodge. He had only used the earth pillar to create an opening, and it had served its purpose. Lele regained his footing, but he was momentarily off-balance and vulnerable. Taking advantage of this, Dialong rushed in with his hands transformed into two razor-sharp claws, ready to slash Lele's chest. But as he made contact, something unexpected happened. Instead of tearing flesh and drawing blood, Dialong found himself staggering on his feet, his attack having been completely missed. "What the hell just happened?" he thought. "How did he attack me?'"

Lele's fists glowed with yellow light as he executed the jab, the boxing technique his coach had drilled into him. His fist moved with such speed that not even Dialong's eyes could track it. Before his opponent could regain their composure, Lele delivered a devastating body shot that sent the dragon hurtling into a nearby car.

Dialong spat out a bit of blood, but a big smirk appeared on his face. "You clearly have no fighting experience."

Lele felt warmth spreading from his lower abdomen and looked down to see a massive cut gushing out blood. During his last attack he had concentrated all his mana coating in his left fist, which had dealt a considerable blow to the dragon. However, in that moment, Dialong had retaliated with his claw, causing a deep wound that was made worse by Lele's lack of protection from mana coating. Lele collapsed to the ground.

The dragon breathed a sigh of relief. Although he had been at an advantage throughout the fight, he had felt extremely stressed every second of the encounter. He decided to deliver the finishing blow and be done with it, but before he could move closer, a powerfull yellow aura surrounded what he thought was an unconscious corpse.

[Notification: You are enduring an incredible amount of damage and pain. As a result of your perseverance, your damage reduction has increased from Level 1 to Level 4.]

Lele's eyes blazed with a fierce determination as he stood up, his body battered and bruised. No trace of his once joyful personality remained as he faced the dragon. In that moment, to Dialong's eyes, Lele transformed into an apex predator, a terrifying monster with a will to survive that surpassed all reason. His clothes were drenched in blood, his body covered in wounds and broken bones, and yet he remained standing, refusing to back down. Remembering his master's warnings, Dialong realized why he felt so unnerved during the fight. His master had warned him, ' "Dialong, among the young dragons, you are one of the strongest, but don't let that get to your head. Humans are terrifying, I'm sure that in books you read about some of their classes in particular one of the most terrifying is the Invictus class. If you ever encounter a human with that ability, just run away. It's strictly forbidden to fight someone with that class." When Dialong asked why, his master explained "those with the Invictus class have a terrifying ability: when facing someone stronger than them, their mana density PERMANENTLY increases until it matches their opponent. That's why it's classified as one of the few nonstandard classes." '

He now fully understood the gravity of the situation. He had previously dismissed his master's warning after all… aLPàò+ç+òèò67843, but now he was certain that his opponent held that nonstandard class. "I must kill him here and now!" he thought, realizing the danger of allowing his opponent to grow into an unstoppable force.

At this point Lele's mana density almost matched Dialong's and the fight erupted once more. The dragon generated 8 earth spears that he hurled against Lele. Instead of dodging or guarding he directly punched them, shattering them to dust. As soon as he leaned forward shivers run down Dialong spine and he tried to create some distance between him and the human. However his efforts were in vain. Lele, thanks to his incredible speed, vanished from his position and reapered on the left of the dragon. Dialong immediately retaliated by throwing a fist at Lele's face, however under his shocked and terrified gaze Lele caught his fist midair and tightened his grip. Dialong fist was shattered, this time instead of a roar a scream of pain filled the air. Lele, ignoring the fact, started to pummel Dialong down. The one sided massacre went on for almost ten minutes as the dragon barely held on to his life. Dialong barely managed to defend himself using his earth powers and arms, but eventually ran out of stamina and was destroyed by clean hits. Dialong saw a fist coated with a yellow unwavering light slowly approaching his abdomen. 'I see… This is how I die. At least it is a warrior's death.'

Lele's body, sustained only by his willpower, finally gave out and he collapsed onto the ground after delivering the final blow.