Is this also a dragon’s magic?
That burning gaze that wouldn’t leave me, and the plaintive voice ringing in my head. For a moment it even felt like time had stopped.
Even in this lethal instant, with Varen looking only at me, I couldn’t answer him at all.
THUD!
What set the stopped time moving again was another blast rolling through the tower.
Only then did I snap back to myself and force my eyes off Varen.
The crossbows traced stubborn, elegant curves as they hunted him. They finally struck the dragon’s body, pressed flat against the tower.
“Ngh! Ghk!”
Varen’s groans grew louder as the bomb-bolts hit in succession.
Even a dragon with ironlike hide wouldn’t be able to withstand much more.
And there was a bigger problem than that.
“Ah—wait! Varen, you have to get off the tower!”
Dozens of explosives detonated on the outer wall, and the whole building shook.
The tower was a slender stone construction thrust straight up into the air. Structurally it was very vulnerable to external shock.
Cracks began to split the ◆ Nоvеlіgһt ◆ (Only on Nоvеlіgһt) great stone blocks where Varen clung.
At this rate not only was Varen in danger—both of us could be crushed to death under a collapsing building.
“Please, Varen! Clear your head and listen to me!”
“Ceryl... I... to Ceryl—ugh....”
“God—enough! Stop saying my name and run, you idiot! We’ll both die if you keep this up!”
What I’d thought was sturdy masonry began to lurch once the midsection stones cracked.
The rooftop—the topmost point—took the worst of the whip from the swaying. It was getting impossible to keep my balance.
In a pinch I grabbed the crossbow beside me and crouched low. It was ridiculous to cling to the weapon meant to kill Varen like a lifeline, but I had no other choice.
“Ceryl... Ceryl, wait....”
Crack, crack. A different sound than before.
I thrust just my upper body out and looked down.
The dragon was clawing into the wall, climbing the tower.
Those talons—sharper and stronger than any tool—were methodically pulverizing the stones that made the wall. The fractures in the tower spread all the faster for it.
“The tower— the tower’s coming down! You’ll get crushed to death like this! Please, pull yourself together, Varen!”
Varen was nowhere near himself. His usual quick wits were gone; not a shred of reason remained.
Only the objective of reaching me seemed to be left; slowly but faithfully, he drew closer.
Even as his position shifted bit by bit, the magic missiles didn’t lose their target.
“Kh—khrk, ngh... Ceryl....”
I’d already counted dozens with my own eyes. Even while taking blast after blast, Varen kept crawling toward me in silence.
I clenched the syringe case in my hand again.
To save both him and me, I had to wake the drugged dragon’s reason.
If I was dead either way, all that was left was to throw myself at the sliver of a chance.
I set my will like iron and climbed up onto the trembling outer parapet.
“Ha....”
A deep breath leaked up from my center through tension. The entire day flickered past like a lantern show.
Falling into a trap. Nearly getting violated by a brute. Cooking up Natural Tear Gas to break out of the tower. Facing Elfera....
And now, jumping off a collapsing tower onto a dragon.
KWA-BOOM—
The ensorcelled crossbows even auto-loaded. I watched the tireless bolts stream for the dragon.
The distance from here to Varen was roughly ten meters. If I got tagged by a crossbow in mid-drop, my last card would fail.
My head knew it. So what.
“What a— what a goddamn brutal day....”
I fixed my eyes on Varen hanging on the tower and moved to step—
But instead of the solid step I’d braced for, the floor dropped out. The cracks eating the structure had already reached the roof.
Only now did I truly see the rooftop giving way in real time. Weapons that had been bolted down rolled wildly.
A crossbow the size of a cannon scraped past me and tumbled over the edge.
Every frame burned onto my retinas like a photograph.
In that split second, what flashed through my mind was resentment.
“This isn’t it!”
Damn it—crushed under rocks without doing anything.
If I’d jumped a little sooner, maybe that would’ve been better.
The floor vanished and my center of gravity with it; my body lifted into empty air. I flailed all four limbs, but there was nothing to catch.
The top of the tower was dizzyingly high. If I fell from here, there’d be no bones left to gather.
“Aaaaaah! Help!!”
On the threshold of death, I squeezed my eyes shut.
My last hope was the out-of-his-mind dragon catching me out of the air....
“MyaaAAArk!!!”
Then a sharp cat cry ripped the sky.
Shrrrip— With a sound like wind being cut, my free-falling body jerked to a stop.
“Ugh!”
A beat late, a stabbing pain lanced my right shoulder.
Then a cold pressure wrapped my right wrist. Something had grabbed me.
I pried my eyes open and looked up.
And met a pair of lush, peach-pink eyes.
“...Didn’t you run away?”
What had caught me mid-fall was the white snake I’d freed in Theo’s lab.
It had vanished for a moment and I’d thought it had bolted in fear.
The creature was hanging from a crossbow by its tail, and with its other end it had wound my wrist and held tight.
That white body looked far too slender to bear my weight.
“Myaaaang....”
It had snatched me just before I fell, but the strain showed; the white body trembled.
Even so, those jewel-bright eyes never left me. The snake clenched its tiny, toothless mouth and bore down.
My eyes stung at the sight of a creature hundreds of times smaller doing anything it could to save me.
What are the monsters in this world that they can be this pure?
They cling to the humans who saved their lives and circle, looking only for a chance to repay the favor.
“Myang... myaAAArk...!”
With a kittenish sound, the white snake lifted its head high.
Then the long-dangling body began to draw up. What had looked nearly two meters long shortened bit by bit.
“You can adjust your body length?”
“Myaaark!”
I’d thought I was out of options, but a last trick snapped into place.
I looked down—my brief drop had brought me closer to Varen.
“Lower me to the dragon!”
“...Miyaaang.”
“It’s okay! She’s a safe dragon—go slow!”
When it flicked a glance at Varen, the snake’s eyes were full of fear.
So I sold the dragon who’d turned the forest into an inferno as “safe.”
“Ngh— Ceryl... wait....”
Of course the dragon’s face, grimacing as he clawed up, looked savage.
I nodded again to the white snake, and the creature began to unspool its body.
A monster that could modulate its length at will was very useful.
Instead of dropping like lightning, I descended at elevator speed.
“Good—good job. Easy—almost there.”
I fired off quick little praises at the creature. The vibration I felt through my wrist was growing stronger.
If only it could hang on until I touched down on the dragon.
Shiiiik—
As if to stomp my modest hope flat, crossbows kept screaming in.
Closing with the dragon meant entering the blast radius.
With each bang the white lifeline swung wide. In those moments I plastered myself to the wall and waited for the shaking to ebb.
On a knife’s edge, I checked above and below in turn.
The creature was at its limit, the threat was right on top of us, and there were only three meters left to the landing.
I finished the math fast and shouted up.
“Baby—drop!”
“Miyaang!”
The white snake executed my short command without delay.
But because the command wasn’t specific, the opposite of what I intended happened.
“No—drop me! If you fall too, what then!!”
“MyaAAArk!!”
Its tail unwound from the crossbow in a flurry, and the snake and I fell together.
I snatched the flailing white body out of the air, unable to beat the acceleration. The moment I did, the creature wrapped my arm in tight coils, bracing for impact.
At the same time, a nearby crossbow had, of all places, sighted on the dragon’s head. Its aim point, unfortunately, was exactly where I meant to land.
An ironclad dragon could take one more blast.
But a frail human body, hit by something the size of a log, would shatter.
Varen looked up at me falling toward him with eyes bright with joy.
“Varen!”
Save—me!!! I didn’t have time to finish.
Even so, on instinct I tucked the white snake wrapped around my right arm into my chest.
KWAANG—!
The explosion came almost the same instant I hit the dragon’s brow.
I cringed in against the shock—but nothing in particular happened.
With no breath to spare, I pushed myself up. Golden wings had wrapped around the dragon’s head and blocked the crossbow. Barely safe.
Varen had completely covered his head with one wing, but his groan was worse than before.
Because the thin fascia between the wing bones was laid bare. The easiest place on a dragon’s body to pierce.
If the crossbows scored several hits on the same spot like in the forest earlier, they might punch another hole.
I popped the case in my hand at once. Three syringes of blue drug lay neatly inside.
I left one for Ella—who I might meet again—and took the other two, one in each hand.
Then I crawled up toward the dragon’s eyelids, which flickered in pain.
“Ngh... Ceryl, I wanted to—see....”
Instead of answering, I raised the hand with the syringe as high as I could.
“Varen, eyes wide!”
