Chp.38: Hopeless fight

The fairies commanded by Fridya flew to the dragon. Face such a monster was madness in the truest sense of the word, but now they had no choice. Even if they stood by doing nothing or tried to flee, they still wouldn't have survived. Therefore, they could only try to buy a few minutes of time and hope that their people managed to save themselves.

"THROW!" Fridya screamed, and all the soldiers shot their bows. A swarm of arrows was hurled at the dragon. The fairies were experts in the use of bows and could shoot up to six arrows in the space of ten seconds. Those arrows were imbued with all kinds of magic, and normally they would do serious damage or kill those who would be hit or maybe even the people nearby, even if they possessed a high level of strength.

But this time, the effect was very different. As soon as they touched the dragon's scales, the magical arrows that would normally have pierced a trunk from side to side shattered as if they were twigs thrown against a marble wall. They didn't even leave a single scratch on the dragon's body.

The dragon didn't seem to have noticed that they had been shot, but they certainly had noticed the arrows flying towards them. The enormous mouth opened in a monstrous grin and laughter emerged from it. The fairies put their hands over their ears in an effort to keep their eardrums from rupturing from the loud sound. But the problem wasn't just the tremendous noise: as soon as they heard the laughter, their bodies froze and shivered, filled with even greater horror and fear than before. That laughter awakened their survival instinct, which filled their minds with terror to convince them to run as far as possible without looking back.

Even Fridya wasn't immune to that effect. She didn't know if it was a spell or if her body simply reacted to the sound of laughter, as if there was an ancestral memory in her blood that associated it with the greatest danger, but in any case her body began to tremble as if her limbs were made of jelly. It seemed that her muscles and bones had become the same consistency as a slime. She was shaking so much that she could barely keep herself airborne. She put her hands over her ears in a desperate attempt to silence the laughter, but there was no way her thin and little hands could block such a powerful sound.

Then, as quickly as it had come, the laughter ceased. The fairies breathed a sigh of relief (however much relief they could feel at that critical moment), but then a deep voice hit their ears: "Is that all you can do, insects? I don't enjoy this game if you put so little effort into it! And when I don't enjoy it, I get bad!"

The dragon's voice wasn't as loud as their laughter and didn't inspire as much terror, but it was still very painful and frightening for the poor fairies. Their vocal timbre was deep and it almost sounded like the beast was chewing metal, and it was easy to tell from his tone and words that they were taunting them. "I'm just starting to warm up!" the dragon laughed, and then their grin became more pronounced and blades of water began to swirl around them.

Instinctively, the fairies all used the mana in their bodies to increase their stamina; the druids cast every single protection spell on all of them, but it was all in vain. The blades of water shot in all directions and pierced the fairy wards as if they were striking a fragile piece of glass. The fairies who were hit by them had huge holes blown in their bodies. Virtually anything struck by the blades was torn to shreds and there was no protection capable of preventing it; all the fairies could do was try to avoid them and hope they didn't get hit.

But just like before, the dragon's attack didn't stop there. As soon as the blades hit the ground, the water that made them exploded and broke free, creating a huge wave. Each blade was made of tens of gallons of pressurized water, enough to wipe out everything within ten meters before dispersing far enough to become harmless. In less than a minute, hundreds of rogue waves spawned throughout the capital, destroying more trees and buildings and killing even more people. The force of the waves shook the ground again; a very slight shock, but that was fatal for many of the trees that were already weakened by the previous earthquake, which collapsed to the ground with a thunderous crash.

Fridya managed to dodge that series of catastrophes by sheer miracle. Each dragon's attack was the equivalent to at least three natural disasters at once. "We have to stop that monster from using magic, or we won't stand a chance!" she screamed. "Quick! Find some nullification runes!"

The surviving soldiers quickly carried out the order; probably, by now they had become completely incapable of thinking and doing as she said was their only way not to go completely crazy. Luckily, the nullification runes weren't hard to find: when the capital was still intact they were carved into the outermost trees of the city, and now even though many of them had collapsed the runes were still intact. The fairies stripped them from the trunks and carried large pieces of bark towards the dragon. The beast stood motionless and watched them, as if they were amusing themselves by observing their futile attempts.

"NOW! ACTIVATE THEM!" Fridya yelled, and the soldiers activated several runes at once. Rays of light burst from them and hit the dragon full-on, but they refracted on their scales. Just like ogre shields, the scales protected the inside of the dragon's body, keeping the mana within it from being affected. Even though the mana on the scales had been somewhat affected, it took less than five seconds for more mana to arrive from within and restore the original situation.

"Ha ha! Seriously, are you planning to kill me with laughter?" the dragon exclaimed. "At this rate, I won't even have to get my claws and teeth dirty with your blood!"

The dragon flapped their wings, but this time much louder than before. It was such a powerful movement that the air around them was catapulted away. It wasn't a spell: that was simple physical strength. The churning air created a shock wave stronger than any hurricane or tornado, traveling in all directions faster than the speed of sound. The fairies were invested by a force beyond all understanding; basically any person who was unable to use mana to increase resistance or to cast a protection was shredded into pieces and thrown at least a kilometer away. The unleashed winds were so strong that every single tree within twenty kilometers was flattened. Everything that had been able to resist up to that moment was destroyed; the fairy capital completely disappeared from the face of the world. The intense winds also carried the flames caused by the dragon's first attack, which turned into a firestorm that began to burn all that was left of the city. The fire was carried with such force that some of the fairies who weren't flying high enough started burning from the heat.

Fridya had managed to resist, but by now she had seriously lost every hope. She no longer even had the strength to give orders. The fairy capital, the city that had existed for countless centuries and that had never been overthrown by any army, had lasted just ten minutes against that dragon. The monster hadn't even had to fight seriously to reduce everything to rubble and exterminate an entire people.

As she watched the gigantic beast stand motionless in the sky, gazing with amusement at the destruction they had unleashed, Fridya thought for a moment to throw herself into the flames below and allow herself to die. She preferred death to continuing to face the monstrosity. The dragon was like a living natural disaster, no, they were more like every single natural disaster at once. That wasn't a hurricane, a wildfire, an earthquake or a flood: it was all of these things combined, but much, much worse.

Fridya found herself shaking uncontrollably. They'd never had a chance. To the dragon, she and all of her soldiers were nothing more than ants that tried to annoy a giant. Fridya had always been sure of her strength; with her level diamond, she was considered the most powerful fairy of all her people. She had never had any doubts that she could face any opponent. Even against the new king of the ogres she hadn't been afraid, she had managed to stand up to him very well and perhaps if the battle had continued she could have even won. But against that dragon, she felt no different than a little and scared kitten. All her strength was useless against that monster. She was an insect, and the creature before her could swat her with the tip of a finger.

"So, is that all?" the dragon said in a disappointed voice. "I was hoping for a little more resistance... well, maybe it is better this way. I want to get back to my territory as soon as possible after all. Then I'd say to end it once and for all"

A light appeared in the dragon's mouth again. They were about to breathe fire again. The city was already completely gone and the few remaining survivors didn't know what to do or where to flee. With that last blow, the monster would have finally completely exterminated the fairy people. Fridya closed her eyes, waiting for the terrible fire of the dragon to fall upon her and reduce her to a smoking lump of coal.

The fire never came; on the other hand, a horrible roar penetrated her ears, threatening to explode her eardrums. It wasn't a roar of pain, more of surprise and anger. Fridya opened her eyes and saw that a small wound had appeared on the dragon's chest. For the beast it shouldn't have been much more than a scratch, but for the fairies it could be called a huge achievement: the dragon's scales had been broken!

Fridya's heart leapt when she saw it. Finally, someone had managed to hurt the dragon! It was just a small cut, but it was still something! What could it have been? All the most powerful spells of the fairies had hit that skin without doing the slightest damage. Suddenly, something detached from the wound, a strange luminous object, which flew away from the dragon and reached what remained of the now collapsed royal palace.

Fridya flew following the luminous trail, and was finally able to see it: on top of the rubble of the royal palace was queen Tytania, surrounded by her royal guard. The luminous object stopped in her hands, revealing itself to be a spear at least two meters long that emitted a white glow that made it impossible to look directly at it without being blinded. "My queen!" Fridya exclaimed. "You took the relic!"

Tytania nodded slightly, not taking her eyes off the dragon, who was checking their wound while they emitted a deep, furious growl. "Fridya, thank you for buying time so far. I know it must have been difficult"

Fridya shook her head: "My queen, you mustn't..."

"YOU, BUGS!" the dragon's voice drowned out all other sounds, as if it were the rumble of thunder. "HOW DARE YOU HURT ME! DISAPPEAR, NOW!"

A fresh torrent of flames emerged from their mouth, searing everything in its path. Fridya braced herself for the worst, but suddenly a strange light enveloped her and she found herself on the other side of the city, away from the dragon's fire. She turned to Tytania and saw that she clutched the remains of a portable gate in her hands. "Did you take those too?"

"I have taken everything that could be useful to us" the queen replied, and then she handed her a dimensional bag. "Here, there are all the portable gates I managed to save. Find all the survivors and give these to them so they can escape. I'll keep the dragon's attention on me"

Fridya shivered slightly. "My queen, you can't do that! You should use these, bring them..."

"I have a few here" Tytania replied showing her belt, where at least five portable gates were tied. "I will use them to prevent the dragon from hitting me. You just have to go and think only of saving what remains of our people. I will escape only when there will be no one left here to deal with that monstrosity"

Fridya stood motionless for a second, then she took off again and moved away as fast as she could. Tytania stood staring at the dragon, who had noticed that they had moved and had already turned towards her, glaring at her with an evil look.