Ajax was caught fully by surprise. Aurexion’s flaming breath was a massive hotspot of Mana that perfectly covered the twisting movent of his body as he put his whole impressive bodyweight into a tail swipe that not only knocked Ajax out but crushed more than a few bones as it sent him crashing into the ground.
“Must you have done that?” Khalysstra huffed, irritated at her nephew, as she took on a humanoid shape to heal Ajax.
Unlike her nephew Khalysstra was much more focused on the magical Stats, the difference in their power ant that her physical Stats were still above his own but her magical Stats utterly dwarfed his. Her millenia of experience with magic also ant that she had picked up more than a few tricks with healing magic.
As her spells flooded Ajax’s body Khalysstra made sure not to let anything go more than three inches past his left shoulder, she didn’t know a human body well enough to even attempt dealing with his werewolf bite problem but everything else would not only be manageable but also quickly solved.
“Yes… cough… I did.” More than a little blood was coughed up on the side. “What was that Mana type, it was Legendary but I haven’t felt it before.”
“Vibration.” Ruinflare answered as he landed next to the dragon. “Quite handy at bypassing solid defenses that don’t dampen blows like your hard scales. I take it you took more than a little damage yourself.”
“I’m not sure what he did there at the end but he clearly changed.” Aurexion admitted. “His speed and power jumped to a whole new level, he was even comparable to
in strength despite the difference in our bodies. What was that?”
“That was what you are currently missing.” Khalysstra said as she healed Ajax, he was already starting to twitch and it wouldn’t be long until he woke up. “You felt his Mana based boosting power, he had it on from the start. But that power just increases the output aning there is a limit to what his body can withstand before it breaks if he pushes too much Mana.”
“[Last Stand].” Ruinflare tilted his head as he examined Ajax. “A fairly well known Skill amongst physically focused beings that survive against bad odds. It isn’t quite as limiting as [Hero’s Mont] but it works similarly.”
Aurexion knew both of the Skills, they were sothing he very much wanted for himself. [Last Stand] was the more versatile of the two working as a power up sustain Skill with a cooldown and a weakness period that followed, the advantage was that the amount of Stamina consud could be increased or decreased during the channel. [Hero’s Mont] on the other hand was an upfront massive Stamina cost with a limited ti, the boost was bigger and there was no constant Stamina drain to manage however. Importantly both Skills did not just boost the power of the body but also its endurance.
“That’s why his spells got weaker at the end there. With his body’s endurance increased he could push his Mana boosting Skill harder, but he can’t handle that much Mana being spent at once so his spells got weaker.” Aurexion reasoned, though silently he complained that he could only analyse the spells as weaker in hindsight, during the fight he couldn’t differentiate at all seeing as all of the spells used sohow piggybacked off the physical strength of the blows they enhanced, the increase in power dwarfed the reduction in Mana.
“Aaaarrrgggghhh…” Ajax moaned in pain as he woke up and tried to sit up. “I’m guessing I lost.”
It took a mont for the last monts of the fight to co back to Ajax. For a mont there at the end Ajax had felt more in tune with himself than ever before. It was a combination of [Last Stand], [Mana Syphon] as well as [Spell Direction] [Battlemage Style] and the new gauntlet to help tie it all together. His spells were coming to him with a fluidity he hadn’t felt before, chaining from one blow into the next even as he swapped weapons and moved awkwardly while winding up the next blow just to ensure [Spell Direction] was satisfied to empower the [Mana Augntation] hit further.
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If he was honest however Ajax could admit he was a little too consud by his trancelike fighting state, he had been completely distracted by the dragon’s breath and didn’t see that tail swipe coming until it was too late.
“I guess there was so wisdom about fighting a dragon.” Ajax couldn’t help but chuckle to himself as he rembered sothing from his ti on Earth. “I needed more dots and to watch the fucking tail.”
“You fought well.” Khalysstra praised Ajax as she helped hit to his feet before backing away and retaking her dragon form. “Better than I expected from the boy I t years ago, you’ve grown well.”
“Sorry about your forest.” Ajax said with an awkward scratch of his head as he took in his surroundings and smiled wryly at Ruinflare.
“You did more than fight well.” Aurexion said as he approached Ajax and lowered his head so that their eyes were closer to level when their gazes t. “You actually pushed
there at the end. This despite your youth, your lower level and your much lower Stats.”
Ajax didn’t interrupt Aurexion, he could feel it was sothing important, the paranoid part of his brain was telling him to downplay his strength so as to not seem a threat to the Ascended races but his instincts told him sothing else. A single nod was all he returned to the dragon.
“We dragons stand close to the apex of power among the Ascended. Our isolation and infighting along with the long periods of ti we spend holed up with our hoard balances out our power, but dragons do not grow quickly.” Aurexion continued. “For my age I am actually considered weak right now, for my level however I am considered strong amongst dragons. That is because I pushed my Stat gain from our racial ability, perhaps too far.”
Then Ajax felt it. A warm feeling that sohow matched the description of what his brother had once tried to describe for him, not in its entirety as there was no protective aspect to it but rather a feeling of cooperation. Ajax knew what it was, it was the very thing he had been hoping to gain out of his travels through the Wild Lands. It was an offer to form a Bond. One he accepted.
Ajax felt the link between himself and Aurexion form as once he accepted the bond. A brief flicker of the dragon’s emotions was now running in the background, the impatience and sense of superiority, he could only hope that the link from his end was tempering those sa emotions for his new Bond.
“I am about to grow in power at a rate very unusual to dragons.” Aurexion continued the feeling of pride growing stronger through the bond. “The lack of levels in my Skills and the lack of high Rarity Skills are both things you can help
with. Whereas I would be perfect to help you shore up your Stats by running more dungeons, you humanoids have plenty of them in your territory.”
“You can enter our territory!” Ajax was shocked he had forgotten to ask such a basic question before forming a bond. “The deal won’t put a target on you for doing so, right?”
“We are bonded now.” A brief flicker of annoyance flickered so fast through the bond Ajax wasn’t sure he imagined it. “In a very real way you are part of
and I am part of you, a Bond forged between equals.”
“So you can co because you are considered humanoid?” Ajax asked.
“No, but can you think of anyone that attacked or even credibly threatened you?” Aurexion responded, smugness and pride coming through the bond along with a hint of greed. “They now count as an attack and a threat on , giving
free reign to enter and do as I will within humanoid lands.”
“Fascinating.” Ruinflare looked from Ajax to Aurexion and back again. “Though I can’t help but lant sowhat that the human at the forefront of humanoid advancent has once more not bonded with an elental hawk. In the case of your predecessor it made more sense since his lack of magic made his bonding of a shadow elental a much better fit but with your variety of elents you would have fit right in with us.”
“He’s my bond.” Aurexion growled slightly, his tail moving protectively, it didn’t wrap around Ajax but it did form a semicircle behind his back protectively.
“Right, my apology.” Ajax rembered “I did bring a few gifts for my eting with you, ambassador Ruinflare.”
With that Ajax pulled out most of the Mana dense gems and ores he found. He kept the plants and creature parts for himself since they were useful for his [Alchemy] but he didn’t just give them to Ruinflare and instead split them between the elental hawk and Shifty. The gifts had little value for Khalysstra but would be a good starting point for the little dragon.
“So of those look quite good.” Aurexion ntioned as he watched with a hint of pride and greed as his Bond pulled out one Mana dense treasure after another.
“I can always get you more from the dungeon.” Ajax said but didn’t elaborate. “Now I have to wonder, do dragon enchantnts match the ones from the dungeon?” Saying that Ajax took off his gauntlet and pulled out the broken staff to compare the enchantnts on the two of them while everyone else was sorting through his gifts.
“WHERE? Where did you get that?” Khalysstra moved so fast Ajax didn’t even register it until the dragon’s eyes were within a foot of him, that and the shockwave and sonic boom that followed her movent, sothing surprising considering the Mana density of the area they were in. “Why do you have a Death affinity gem?!”
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