A Benevolent Evil Dragon

I am between a mountain and a hard place. Not only is the body building fishman right in front of me, but there's smaller ones behind me and the humans to the side, meaning if I light up the place they will see the dragon eating fishmen and I don't think that'll end well. I was hoping I could clear the place and pretend to be Edith, but now I need to leave this area.

Behind is a no go, the other tunnel in this room is also starting to swarm with the fishmen and it doesn't look like big and ugly will let me turn tail and run anyways. So, I catch a second wind and don't run back or to the side, but rather I run straight at the bastard as pressure builds in my tails. It looks ready to jump at me, with that annoyingly large mouth, but instead of biting into flesh, it bites into a splash of acid. The monster instantly screams bloody murder as I jump over it and dive straight into the water pit behind it.

This was a gamble, but remembering all the holes I've gone past, there was only one hole big enough for him to get underwater and this was the second. The gamble paid off as all the fishmen were up above, at least for a while, so I had free reign to swim away, or in this case walk on the rocky floor of the water. I can't swim fast enough, especially with this body, to escape those things. Even now I doubt I can do that, but I don't need to escape, I just need a new arena.

I see the monsters start to get into the water and swim extremely quickly my way. I can't outswim them. Fighting against so much water is impossible… so I stop fighting it. I can't speak, but I can still manipulate mana, and just a bit of air mana being pushed out of my lungs with a bit of my oxygen is enough to give me what I need. I make my flight rune, but with water mana instead of air and with air instead of lightning. Air is still fast, even if less so than lightning, so I suddenly see myself outspeeding the anglers, but just barely.

Water flows in all the right ways around me and I am suddenly the fastest swimmer in the south of The Kingdom of Kaminsk. I almost laugh, but feel my lungs burning instead. I am running out of air, my body burning through it rapidly. I see the flood of fishmen following behind me as I burst out of the water, into an open area, only to be hit by the stench of decay. It's a sort of den, one with many nests filled with eggs. I see anglers lounging around them, at least until I came in. They hiss at me, ready to attack, but despite that I am glad. This place is perfect for my needs, if a bit macabre from the carcasses floating about. At least I know why they need people with mana, the eggs are absorbing it.

I prepare my own reserves, knowing that any moment now… there it is. A few fishmen came out of the water before him, but big and ugly, minus his lower jaw, still ended up being one of the first to catch up and come out. It's clear it didn't like the splash of acid, but it was hardly enough.

I cough as I am hit again by that feeling of exhaustion, but now I realize that it's not tiredness. I have more than enough mana to stay conscious and I keep absorbing more from my surroundings, plus it's only been a couple hours of walking through tunnels at most. The bastards are venomous and I got chewed on real good. This is the first time anything like this has worked on me and I don't know of a proper way of cleansing it, so I resort to what I do know. I pump mana through my body, moving it myself where my heart fails, forcing my body to act when it should be paralyzed.

I jump to the side and evade a slash from the big one, but this nesting area is filled with holes for the fishmen to crawl out of. One hit dodged means three hits landing. One fish dead means five hits landing. I use my venom claws when I can't land more than scratches, I spray the little bit of acid I have in me in an arc, buying some space. I get pushed back by all their attacks and end up trampling eggs and slipping in the gooey fluids, which only infuriates them more.

I am a beetle getting swarmed by ants, but this hive has a giant to land some solid hits when their scratches aren't enough. I am out of fluids, so I am stuck doing physical damage. I am starting to regret not developing actual spells with all elements. I have utility wind spells at the ready, basic water manipulation should come easy, but I don't have powerful damaging spells memorised and manipulating the runes into shape is not doable while I spit out blood.

I am forced to use my defenses to buy time. I am too sluggish, I can't both cast spells and keep my body functional… But I don't need to. My head jerks to the side as the big guy punches me off my feet, making me crush three of his own. I pull away from the world to get some time to think.

First, I am not getting my adrenaline boost no matter what happens. Either their venom stops it from happening, or I messed something up about myself. Secondly, I pull back whatever combat memories I can conjure up. I am still linked to my brain so I can pull some hazy memories from it without having to burn myself into remembering them. This is the first time I've had to deal with such attacks. The human soldiers, the only enemies that actually came in such numbers, kept their distance and jabbed at me from safety, making it easy to focus on attacking them in a similar manner. These things however are climbing all over me, actually damaging me without a care for their lives.

I won't even need to search the tunnels after this, I think these are all of the fishmen from everywhere, answering to their big boss. Now, how do I deal with them? Now it is even worse than before, I don't have as much fire in me for a big heat spell, and even if I did I don't have the focus for it. I need something simpler… Quicker. I need to be a dragon.

A claw cuts deeply into my side and I am forced to activate my defenses fully. Keeping myself moving is not an option anymore. They'll tear off my wings and tails if I let them. I buy myself seconds with the protections, but those are some precious seconds. I rip away all the light and sound that I have in myself, happy I didn't waste either, then let out the first complex breath I've ever figured out.

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My own ears ring as the flashbang roar echoes in the sealed chamber, causing my attackers to falter. I can't move more than my neck, but I don't need to. I need to kill a large number of them, then pick off the remaining ones. I see the big guy moving my way even though it clearly can't see. I don't have time for a spell.

I have time for only one breath… water won't kill enough of them, the only thing I know to make with water is a burst beam. I need AOE. I need fire. Fire that burns on water…

Breath and magic are different things. Magic needs arguments, needs logic even when it defies it. Even chaos is used in statements. Breath isn't a statement, it's a hope. A quick thought and the hope that whatever mana I push into it will act as I want. Water fire doesn't work, that one I tried many times. But there is one thing I never tried because I was scared, and while I didn't really try, the fact that I have a gem with this attribute and that I ate the songstress a mere few days ago without using all that mana means that I have death for days stored up in me.

My mouth opens and I push flame, death and just a bit of chaos while imagining a hungering flame devouring everything. It's suffocating and painful to push out, but I see a burst of dark flames escaping me, aiming straight for the big guy. Only the faint white outline of the fire and the glowing bacteria illuminate the den now, but that light only grows brighter as I turn my head away from the beast. I start spraying the fire all over myself, coughing out smoke after I run out of mana.

I feel the pain of fire and decay as the anglers scream and writhe around me. I am dressed in fire that would murder me if not for my barrier holding up, but there's only so much mana I can use to feed it. I wait until I am sure that no other of the monsters is burning, then I pull in whatever mana still feeds the fire. I lost count of how many I murdered, but there's still some left.

The big guy is staggering. I think I hit him with some neurotoxin which just makes me chuckle. We're both running on incomplete software now. Only difference is that my venom's deadly and his? I can feel the weakness devouring me, but I don't feel the dread of death that comes with any dangerous situation I face. I laugh and spit towards the bastard, only to receive a choked hissing in return. He still has some ten or twenty guys that are scared, but still look for a way to approach me.

I am out of fire. But I am not out of options. I am drowning in water mana, and now I have very few targets. I know, of course, water by itself might not be enough, so I take a deep breath, shake my head, then start gathering water and earth mana towards the base of my neck. Water moves to my mouth, be it from the source below or from the very air. I feed so much mana into it that there's no way this isn't deadly. Two eager monsters dash from my side, I take their hits, I can't defend and attack at once in my current state.

Rock gets pulverized as it floats up and joins the violent vortex gathering in front of my muzzle. Finally, it is ready and my eyes snap open while releasing the beam of water coupled with sharp shards of stone. I rip three of them in two, making the other monsters pull away and try to dodge, but it's not needed as it takes me two seconds to gather material again.

The big guy finally seems to see well enough to realize his death is coming. He answers by running headfirst, followed by the others. I try to shoot it in the chest, but a fist sends my mouth to the side, causing me to violently bisect the other fishmen. It's now just a battle of two half-dead giants. I can't move. It can hardly move. Normally the angler would win. I can't do anything while being attacked. But I do have a final ace up my sleeve.

I exhale and a mist wraps around me, causing the beast to choke and collapse. The venom was already destroying its insides. The poison mist was just the nail in the coffin. That little bee really earned her gold and gem shard. Who would've thought, eating honey from magical bees was a way to get some mana too. No wonder it was so tasty…

I hear a hiss. It's not next to me, but it is a hiss in this room. I slowly get up, barely able to stand. I see it. Two anglers remain, standing in front of the only nests that weren't destroyed in the fighting. Mothers, likely. There's no easy tell, but the faint glow from below reveals some pattern that I didn't see on the fishmen outside or on the big fella, so maybe that denotes females.

I fall, my head ending up under the water. I calm down and drink a bit, then pull out and just let myself drink in the exhaustion and venom. I look their way, but they are frozen, unsure of what to do. I close my eyes. I am too tired for this. Minutes pass before I hear one of them taking an unsteady step as they get close to me. Instinct makes it hiss in worry as it attempts to attack me, but the mistake was already made.

I lunge and bite its head off, tearing it cleanly from the body. The last one hisses and backpedals as I spit the head.

"Sorry, no mercy from me. You're just beasts following your instincts and I am just a dragon following mine." They obviously don't answer. I don't think I would care if they did. Venom, wounds, rising pain all around and a den filled with corpses, even if most are animals, there's enough innocent humans here to turn my stomach upside down. Any sympathy I might have had in other circumstances is just gone.

I approach the last one and it throws a rock at a bad angle. They really suck at this. When I am close enough for it to slash at me, I bite off its arm, sending it to the ground. For a murderous beast this one is very clear in her priority. There's no running, just protecting the eggs. She really does look like a mother… I step on her leg. She can't drag herself away anymore. I hear it snap and crunch underfoot while she desperately hits me with her remaining arm and tries to bite my face only for me to hit her with the top of my head, impaling her twelve different ways.

It's done. She's dead. All of them are dead. I look around at the destruction… seeing the unborn things that I trampled. They seemed just about ready to develop, explains the many prisoners.

"Fuck…" There's no one to hear me. I tried putting it as survival, tried putting it as a game… This was neither. This was just… "...pest control, in a way." I need Edith. I need to talk to a person… But I need a nap more.