novelraw Chapter 182: Unexpected Encounter with the Red Iron Dragon, Stronger Than Monsters, Unable to Defeat Even with All Three Stages Activated
Chapter 182: Unexpected Encounter with the Red Iron Dragon, Stronger Than Monsters, Unable to Defeat Even with All Three Stages Activated
As the Bloodhoof Chieftain flapped his demon-like wings and ascended into the sky,
the Red Iron Dragon’s wings trailed comet-like tail flames as it shot towards the clouds at an even faster speed. Then, it abruptly changed direction, crashing straight down like a falling meteor toward the Bloodhoof Chieftain. The Chieftain, in his second stage, did not dodge but roared in defiance, ready to meet the attack.
The scales on the wing membranes rattled sharply, sending out scorching sparks.
The leftover explosive scales looked like red-hot iron.
In an instant, the mighty and astonishing Young Dragon collided head-on with the abyssal monster!
Accompanied by deafening thunder and shockwave gusts, flames exploded across the sky, radiating blinding light and intense heat, like a second sun rising anew.
The Red Iron Dragon flew backward dozens of meters but quickly stabilized.
At this moment, all of its explosive scales were consumed, revealing a body of obsidian-like tough scales. These scales shimmered with molten lava patterns glowing with a dark red light. Combined with its rugged and powerful physique, covered in deadly weapon-like parts, its ferocity surpassed even that of the abyssal monster.
At the same time,
a pitch-black figure burned with flames, plummeting straight down—Balor fell faster than when he ascended, his body riddled with more cracks, molten blood flowing within.Whoosh!
Balor’s demon wings suddenly flapped fiercely.
The fierce wind pressed down on the grass and trees, and boulders flew in the gust.
His falling speed slowed as he adjusted his body, and just before hitting the ground, he dashed straight back into the sky, charging toward the Red Iron Dragon.
“The outer layer of my power-absorbing scales is gone.”
“Now that we’re in close combat again, the advantage is mine.”
Balor stared at the Red Iron Dragon with burning battle intent.
However, facing the ferocious Bloodhoof Chieftain, Garoth flapped his wings and traced a comet-like streak through the air, avoiding Balor. He then dashed toward the ground and skimmed along at breakneck speed.
His blade-like dragon wings swept across the earth.
One by one, Minotaur warriors were cleaved in half.
Bathing in the swirling rain of blood, Garoth spun around and locked his dragon pupils onto an elite commander.
The Minotaur commander’s giant axe cleaved through the ogre’s armor, the blade sinking deep into his chest cavity. Then a hoof slammed the heavily injured ogre flying.
Just as the commander prepared to roar and vent his killing intent,
he suddenly felt a chill down his spine, as if targeted by an overwhelming predator. A gust of evil wind came from behind.
The commander’s pupils constricted sharply as he turned around and saw the Red Iron Dragon’s unstoppable dragon might surging forward like a tidal wave.
The commander growled low, his eyes blood-red, muscles bulging. In this moment of crisis, his focus sharpened to the utmost, gathering all his lifetime skills into the tightly gripped battle axe, swinging it straight at the Red Iron Dragon.
However, the claws came down faster than the axe.
Garoth casually swiped horizontally with a claw.
With a burst of flying blood mist, the commander died on the spot.
The battle had dragged on this long, but the Molten Iron Legion already held a massive advantage.
Since the battle began between Balor and Garoth, the scales of victory gradually tipped toward the Molten Iron Clan. The Bloodhoof troops ran at full speed without rest, exhausting a huge amount of stamina. Meanwhile, the Molten Iron Clan’s attacks on the Bloodhoof Clan’s main camp faced almost no difficulty, effectively waiting at ease.
At first, the gap between sides wasn’t obvious.
But as time passed, in this brutal meat-grinder battle, the Bloodhoof troops’ stamina was severely overdrawn and began to decline, followed by dullness, weakness, and other negative states, causing them to be quickly defeated.
“Don’t run!”
Balor roared, flapping his demon wings in pursuit of Garoth, but his speed and agility couldn’t match Garoth’s.
Garoth aimed to win the war at the lowest cost, kiting the Minotaur monsters and ignoring them contemptuously, while targeting the standout Bloodhoof commanders on the battlefield. In an instant, he secured a huge advantage for the Molten Iron Legion.
Realizing he couldn’t catch Garoth even at full speed,
Balor forced down his surging anger and brutal rage.
His second stage wasn’t without cost; the boiling demonic blood made him more irritable and prone to losing reason.
He stopped the pointless chase of the Red Iron Dragon.
The Minotaur monster folded its wings and crashed like a cannonball to the ground, finally landing heavily on its thick hooves.
War stomp!
The ground didn’t crack, not even a fissure appeared, but invisible force radiated from Balor’s landing spot, shattering the surrounding Molten Iron forces into blood mist.
Whoosh!
Balor raised his head and took a deep breath.
Threads of blood-colored energy peeled off the creatures he had killed, flowing like living strands, converging onto him. This boosted his aura slightly, and the wounds from his previous clash with Garoth started healing.
Since he wouldn’t fight head-on,
he would see who could kill faster!
His dark eyes full of violent bloodlust, Balor scanned the surroundings and locked onto the Molten Iron Legion’s followers, focusing on the Gluttonous Ogre Karu.
The Gluttonous Ogre had thick skin and tough flesh. Balor had injured him initially, but Karu was still capable of fighting.
Noticing the dragon traits on Karu’s body, Balor was certain this ogre was a dragon-blooded creature and a core follower. Killing him would surely attract the dragons’ hatred.
The demon wings spread and flapped.
The Minotaur monster shot straight into the sky, charging toward Karu.
At this moment, a crimson dragon shadow moved faster than him and slammed into the Minotaur monster from the side, pushing it skyward.
When Balor wanted to fight head-on, Garoth pulled him back, resuming the kite strategy. But whenever Balor tried to slaughter the followers, Garoth appeared again.
This suited Balor’s purpose perfectly.
He could grow through war, but what he desired most was to kill the Red Iron Dragon before him.
“You finally stopped running!”
His massive bat wings fully spread, and mountain-shaking, sea-roaring power surged inside Balor’s body, allowing him to withstand Garoth’s impact and halt midair.
The giant hand gripping the dragon neck scales suddenly exerted power.
The Red Iron Dragon’s heavy body was lifted into the air as Balor raised his thigh, his knee wrapped in a bloody wind, crashing into the dragon’s abdomen.
If this hit solidly, even steel would shatter.
Suddenly, Garoth’s dragon tail spun rapidly, entangling Balor’s left leg and forcibly diverting the knee strike’s trajectory.
The dragon-scaled abdomen scraped across the knee, scattering sparks mixed with scale fragments like a torrential downpour. Balor followed with a downward elbow strike, his elbow bone like a heavy hammer smashing toward the dragon’s spine.
Garoth’s right wing suddenly rose like a sharp blade, slashing toward Balor’s legs.
Balor’s eyelid twitched as he hurriedly dodged sideways, interrupting the attack. When he looked again, the Red Iron Dragon had already spread its wings and withdrawn.
“Scholar, is running all you can do?”
“Stop! Face me!”
Balor’s demon wings blotted out the sky, black flames surging over his body. Hovering above the battlefield like a dark god,
his imposing posture inspired fierce confidence in the Minotaurs, enabling them to resist bravely even in disadvantage, preventing the Molten Iron Legion from expanding their lead quickly.
Just then,
the Red Iron Dragon stopped and slowly raised its head.
The warm-up was over. Blood surged wildly inside. In this state, activating the Frenzied State amplifies power to the maximum.
“Then as you wish.”
Staring coldly at the monster with his dark eyes, the Red Iron Dragon’s voice was as calm as ever, but carried a hint of danger: “Now, let us truly begin.”
Hearing this somewhat familiar phrase he had said before,
Balor’s heart jolted with a bad feeling.
Sizzle! Sizzle!
Countless golden lightning snakes burst forth from between the dragon scales, dazzling and dense, crackling loudly with the sound of thunderous electricity on the Red Iron Dragon’s body.
Garoth’s scales trembled slightly, muscles bulging inch by inch in the lightning.
His already incredibly strong body swelled again, his fierce and imposing posture almost absurd.
Balor’s pupils constricted sharply.
He saw Garoth’s figure blur and vanish on the spot, his retina only catching a golden afterimage.
The next moment, dragon claws were right before his eyes! Each hooked claw like a blade.
Besides the golden lightning, strands of black-red aura wrapped around Garoth’s dragon arms—his dragon might.
Where the dragon might flowed, Garoth’s Frenzied State body was further strengthened.
Enhanced by the dragon might’s rotation, his claw strike was lightning fast.
Crash!
Balor’s arms hadn’t even raised in time.
His chest and abdomen were hit by the dragon claws.
His black iron-like tough skin instantly tore apart, his sternum and ribs cracking.
He didn’t even have time to cry out in pain.
Garoth’s spinning wing slash, the Dragon Wing Blades swept toward Balor’s neck.
Faced with a lethal threat, Balor instinctively lowered his head.
Clang!
With dazzling sparks flying, the wing blade took a notch as the price, chopping off half of Balor’s left horn.
“My horn!”
The horns were both weapons and crucial aesthetic features for Minotaurs, extremely important.
The demon bull raged in a berserk counterattack, smashing a heavy fist toward the dragon’s head, but Garoth collided at an even faster speed with a lowered head.
Bang!!!
The dragon horn pierced Balor’s abdomen, blood pouring out.
In Balor’s pitch-black eyes appeared a streak of scarlet.
He roared wildly; the blood flowing from his body did not spill onto the ground but instead ignited, and the lava-like cracks on his body glowed a brighter red.
If previously his demonic blood was just boiling,
now it was fully ignited.
At this moment, Balor had entered a desperate three-stage battle mode, fighting with no mercy.
Black demonic flames clashed fiercely with golden lightning.
The demon bull’s palms clasped into a hammer, smashing toward the Red Iron Dragon’s widely exposed rear head, carrying terrifying shockwaves.
Before the strike landed, the Red Iron Dragon withdrew its horn and countered with a powerful strike of its right claw.
Level 1 Dragon Might rotation!
Enhanced claw strike!
Boom crack!!!
A ring-shaped shockwave swept the sky, tearing apart the clouds.
Balor’s finger bones shattered inch by inch, and Garoth’s claw scales were ground to powder. Two streams of blood spilled from high above, steaming into red mist amid the clash of golden thunder and demonic flames.
The real battle had just begun.
Balor’s shattered finger bones were wrapped by demonic flames, growing sharp bone spikes.
He grabbed Garoth’s right claw with his other hand, and his burning knee rammed toward the dragon’s reproductive area.
There were dragon scales there, but much weaker than other scales—one of the dragon’s major weak points. Yet, the Red Iron Dragon did not dodge, instead raising its hind leg and fiercely crashing into the demon bull’s legs.
Both were ruthless fighters. Their eyes shot electric sparks as they stared fiercely at each other, neither yielding, their expressions resolute!
With two dull thuds, Balor’s testicles were instantly crushed into mush, and his thigh bones cracked. Even though the burning demonic blood weakened the pain, Balor couldn’t help but let out a wretched cry.
What made it worse
was that the dragon scales his knee struck were not fragile but harder than expected. They only cracked and dented under the fierce knee strike without breaking completely.
The Red Iron Dragon shuddered and gasped sharply.
But that was all.
His day-and-night honing of his weaknesses had shown its proper effect at this moment.
Due to unbearable pain, Balor’s body bent forward, his vision darkening.
Garoth naturally wouldn’t miss such a golden opportunity.
His left claw surged up, tearing open the hard skin beneath Balor’s ribs.
The dragon claw gouged into the gaps of Balor’s ribs, knuckles squeezing like steel pincers.
The demon bull let out a deep, pained roar as his ribs snapped with a crisp sound mixed with muscle tearing. He swung his right fist, surging with black flames, smashing toward the enemy’s head.
Garoth flapped his wings sharply and retreated.
Avoiding the heavy punch, he forcibly tore out three of Balor’s ribs with flesh still attached.
Blood rained down, instantly turning into fierce flames.
Balor’s aura rose again. His originally pitch-black eyes now fully blood-red, filled with violent madness, seemingly oblivious to pain.
He stretched out his arm like lightning, his giant palm scraping the dragon tail, using brute force to pull the Red Iron Dragon toward the ground.
Boom! The dragon’s body smashed through rock layers, raising layers of dust storms, scattering or burying both Bloodhoof and Molten Iron combat units.
Balor pursued downward, hooves together like a battering ram, stomping toward the dragon’s chest.
Clang!
Garoth crossed his dragon arms to block.
The black-red scales cracked in spiderweb patterns under the demon’s heavy stomp. The ground beneath caved in again.
The demon bull who finally turned the tide spun and smashed his elbow, his arm like a battle axe chopping toward the dragon’s face.
The Red Iron Dragon tilted its head to dodge and adjusted the angle. Dragon horn and demon bull’s elbow bone collided, sparks pouring down like a rainstorm. Cracks appeared on the dragon horn, but Balor’s elbow broke outright, pierced by the dragon horn.
At the same time,
Garoth’s right claw reached for Balor’s heart.
Rip!
Balor tore off his own arm with brute force. His hooves stomped on the dragon’s chest, using the recoil to flap his demon wings and ascend, narrowly avoiding the heart-piercing claw.
“Coward, why run?”
The Red Iron Dragon’s cold sneer whispered in Balor’s ear.
At this moment, just like before, the situation reversed drastically.
But unlike before, even Balor’s three-stage speed couldn’t match Garoth’s Frenzied State speed.
After rising a little over two hundred meters, a gust of evil wind came from behind.
Balor took a deep breath, his demonic blood burning to the extreme, and turned to face the enemy.
The Red Iron Dragon curled into an iron ball, preparing to collide with the demon bull, golden lightning crashing into the demon bull’s embrace.
The thick dragon horn pierced Balor’s chest and abdomen, and the dragon’s body pushed him forcefully, finally crashing down on a hill.
Crash!
Layers of rock walls collapsed, countless stones scattered, dust swirling.
Garoth pinned Balor into the mountain’s core, pressing his dragon claw on Balor’s head, grinding him into the rock layers.
Balor’s burning demon wings folded like blades, slashing at Garoth’s back but were torn apart instead. His demonic blood spilled onto the scorching rock, steaming into blood mist.
Roar!
The demon bull roared furiously, wrapping its legs around the dragon’s body, its remaining fists pounding repeatedly but with diminishing strength.
Balor had passed his peak state.
His aura was dropping every second, and his wounds were healing and regenerating more slowly.
After a few seconds, two figures broke through the rock from the other side of the hill.
The Red Iron Dragon pressed on Balor, skimming along the ground, carving hundred-meter trenches on the battlefield.
When he finally stopped and his golden lightning retracted and faded, Balor’s body was a pitiful sight, no longer showing any signs of his previous grandeur.
His special horn was broken, his wings shredded leaving only a few bone stumps with hanging flesh. His right leg below the knee had long turned to powder. His chest and abdomen were torn open.
He was barely alive.
“In the borderlands—”
The Red Iron Dragon stood upright, his dragon claw like iron pincers gripping Balor’s neck and lifting his shattered body.
“The Molten Iron Clan is the future overlord, and I will be the sole ruler here.”
The fierce battle stirred the Red Iron Dragon’s emotions, breaking down his long-standing disguise and repression, revealing a hint of ambition.
He threw the broken body to the ground, looking down coldly and indifferently: “Scum, crawl before me and beg for my mercy. I’ll give you a chance to swear loyalty.”
At this point, Balor’s demonic blood was almost completely burned out.
But his extraordinary talent meant that as long as he survived this death zone, he could recover afterward.
His broken body moved, and under the Red Iron Dragon’s cold gaze, Balor slowly crawled toward the ground but suddenly exploded in a final burst:
“Death is but rebirth, glory is with me!”
Balor let out a hoarse roar, gathering his last strength in his remaining arm, punching toward the Red Iron Dragon’s jaw.
Boom!
The dragon tail wrapped in front of him rose up and slammed down heavily, smashing Balor into the earth.
Boom!! Boom!!
After several consecutive slams, with the ground trembling, the barely breathing broken body was completely smashed into radiating chunks of flesh, mixed with rubble and dirt, lifeless.