A Chronometric Defect

They say no news is good news. Is it? I'm quite disappointed. Depressed, even.

My glorious roar doesn't make noise anymore!

On the one clawed hand, I feel proud that I'm powerful enough to rend sound directly out of existence with merely my voice. That's admittedly pretty cool. Godlike, isn't it?

On the other, it means I can't hear my own roar. Back in the town, obviously nobody else heard it because they... Greh, exploded into a cloud of human-related materials. But I heard it. It was truly breathtaking. This time, I knew the exact strength of this barrier since the dragon hunter also knew. He helped build and maintain it. Which meant I could theoretically tune my roar to rupture the barrier and hopefully not much else.

Which worked! Hurrah for self-control.

This time, the city's hundreds of thousands of inhabitants should've been able to hear it. Hundreds of thousands! Sure, Achiton heard it, but it didn't sound so flippin' epic back then as it did in the town.

Plus, isn't a larger audience better? A lot of people in Achiton died long before I roared, and that was already a much smaller city than Tengerii. So many more people could've heard my amazing roar.

Except... It doesn't make sound anymore.

...

...

So, sadly, in a way— my roar has sealed itself. Such unhappy days. What's a dragon to do?

*foof*

(tshshh)

Toy with Mana in a much less impressive manner, I suppose.

Well, this isn't what I expected, so I'll have to act tough. Most people probably don't know what they just experienced— which means they won't be intimidated. Rah, my roar! Why did you leave me?

I fly over to the inscription-covered wall, hovering directly above it, and yell.

"Humans of Tengerii! My name is Pure Evil! You will deliver to me the one called Ainthia or your lives shall be forfeit! Do not make me wait."

(tshshsshshhhhhhhh)

Dang, that's some nice Mana action. Rewh, I can dig it. My roar is gone, but my voice sounds more intimidating than ever. I don't even need to be loud to scare people. Maybe it's not so great for conversation, but in this case, I think it'll work exactly as intended.

I check Pathfinder for Ainthia. Oh, she's still over there? Why is she over there? There's literally not another person anywhere near that watchtower. Which is saying something considering how many people are packed inside these walls.

I tilt my dragon head slightly.

And why does she... Only own a watchtower?

I see her looking around like an idiot. Yes, I'm looking at you. Get your ass over here. I'm just gonna punish you a bit, I don't think I need to go full-on execution. Not after I figured out how to unpack those twenty spells you sent. Twenty similar spells were perfect for spell analysis.

I mean, seagulls? Abso-loot-ly freakin' hilarious. Your team was so obviously attacking me, yet you're over here in the middle of the city's singular nowhere sending me twenty sound clips of seagulls.

Why? I don't even care.

Actually, I do care. I want to know what would possess you to send that to a dragon of all creatures.

I see her eyes suddenly fixate somewhere on the city wall. I can't see where she's looking from this angle. Her face displays a level of absolute heart-stopping terror that I've seldom seen, despite me being a 16 meter tall dragon. She's a high-level inscriptionist and mage, right?

Rh, this doesn't bode well.

I sense the Mana around me. A massive torrent of Mana is flowing through all the inscriptions below. But, they're not functioning. Aitos knows a lot about this, and through him I've learned many things, so I know what's happening.

These inscriptions are damaged at the atomic level. There is, however, a very rare situation where a sigil can continue conducting Mana in a barely functional manner. This creates a dangerous feedback loop: immense amounts of heat slowly melt the sigil's fractured material component back together, but this leads to an exponential rise in Mana consumption, which then creates more heat and further melting. Eventually, the Mana becomes unstable and bursts out of the distorted sigil, which triggers a large explosion relative to the sigil's size. Different sigils cause different effects when they detonate.

I examine all the sigils around the area where she was looki— HOLY HELL!!!

Is that an expansion fixation?! That causes a blast of epic proportions on a single inscription, never mind a city wall covered by a single huge array. This wall... The city's wall is many kilometers long. Worse, I can't stop it without triggering the broken sigil. Anything I do will set it off.

This explosion. This won't take out the city.

The wall's shaped like a ring! The initial blast will meet in the center, create an implosion, and that will then detonate all nearby atmospheric Mana. We're talking the Mana equivalent of a friggin' hydrogen bomb. Or worse.

This'll level the hills surrounding the city, and then just keep going. It'll take out dozens, if not hundreds of towns. It might even destroy Achiton and Haitos. It's a Mana blast, so it'll eat away the soil and bedrock under Tengerii.

The result will be a gigantic canyon.

What... The... Ragh?!

Luckily, back when I was experimenting with radiation spells in Achiton, I thought to create that blast containment spell. It naturally has the effect of isolating Mana-based explosions. Never thought I'd use it because nukes are dumb.

Hreh, they are dumb, but also devastating. My roar can cause plenty of damage without all the ridiculous fireworks. Cool is a way of life; explosions are chaotic drama.

Drama's uncool. Chaos is also uncool.

Explosions are thus doubly uncool.

Disagree?

Come at me! I'll eat'cha.

I cast my blast containment spell with ease. It rapidly flows across the top of the wall. Through it, I feel the whole wall's Mana quickly ramping up in the expected runaway chain reaction.

I urge my translucent spell to slide down the wall's sides, like water flowing over a cliff, until it reaches the bottom. I dig the spell underneath the wall's foundation, entirely enclosing both it and its buried power sources within my blast containment spell. Better safe than sorry.

###fffFFFFFFSSSSSTTTTTTTT—###

The chain reaction goes critical less than a second after I finish enclosing the wall. A blazing flash of the purest white light sears out from within its confines. Despite the fact this spell is designed to suppress an explosion, and the fact I have more than enough Mana to power it, the sheer immensity of this blast instantly pushes my spell's upper limits.

The walls of my spell flicker into the shape of a cylindrical donut; an inflated beach tube. Its semi-rectangular structure was gone before I even saw what happened.

Luckily, the spell itself holds. The city is still blasted by a wall of hot air, but my spell weakened it.

‡‡‡‡‡‡—TTHHHHHHH•KRAKOOOMMMMMM—‡‡‡‡‡‡

#FOOOOOSHHHH#

The intensity of the blast's searing light is beyond hot enough to set buildings and trees ablaze. Fires begin raging across the entire city. The sound of everything else is drowned out by the explosion's deafening Mana consumption.

‡‡‡‡‡‡—MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM—‡‡‡‡‡‡

Then, the containment spell begins making a high-pitched ringing noise.

‡‡‡‡‡‡—MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM—‡‡‡‡‡‡

###kkkkeeeeeeeeeEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE—###

This means the liquefied rock is close to a causing a BLEVE, or 'boiling liquid expanding vapor explosion' by blowing out the walls of my spell. Such high pitched ringing is the sound of superheated gas atoms banging themselves so hard against my spell that the spell itself is beginning to vibrate.

Can rock boil? Seems it can.

I force a whole lot more Mana into my spell.

‡‡‡‡‡‡—MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM—‡‡‡‡‡‡

‡‡‡—EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE—‡‡‡

The containment spell won't rupture near me, its source of Mana, but if it does give? This city will be cleanly wiped from existence. And then some.

The blast's intensity rises sharply; the containment spell's ringing quickly intensifies. The ground itself starts quaking from the intense vibrations of my containment spell. This sound alone is no doubt torturous to normal humans.

‡‡‡‡‡‡—MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM—‡‡‡‡‡‡

‡‡‡RUUUUUUMMMMMMBBBBLLLLL‡‡‡

‡‡‡‡‡‡‡‡—EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE—‡‡‡‡‡‡‡‡

Then, the blast's intensity falls just as sharply. The ringing noise subsides.

###—MMMMMMMMMmmmmmm•vooheep###

##RUUUUUUMMMMmmbbbblllll##

‡‡‡‡‡‡—EEEEEEEEEEeeeeeeeeeeeeeee—###

Finally! The reaction ran out of usable Mana. Rawh.

I extend the containment spell far out into the distance, opening one end to let off the still-absurd air pressure.

The superheated air explodes upon contacting normal air.

###—eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee•KATHOOM‡‡‡‡‡‡

It creates a large but bearable shockwave.

##HHHSSSSSSSHHHHH##

I circulate some cool air to avoid baking the city in superheated plasma and crackling chunks of...

Well, I'm not sure what that is. It's not Mana or physical matter. It seems to be strongly reacting with the air.

#VSSSSSHHHHHHH#

*fzzzst-kvfzzzzst*

I feel extremely motivated to eat it.

I have no idea why.

I transfer myself inside the blast containment spell and Devour the unknown crackling chunks.

RAGH!!!

Wow. That stuff gave me a huge power boost. I feel like I've quintupled my strength with a single Devour. Maybe more. What in the world was it? I want to eat more of it right now! Rewh!

I suddenly notice my body's size hasn't changed at all.

Hrah? Why not?

...

Guess I'm not able to figure this out right now.

I drop the blast containment spell entirely.

I look across the vibrantly burning city.

The sound of flames now dominates all.

*roooooaaarrr*

Whelp, this sucks. My spell is translucent, so it doesn't need to absorb heat plus blast, but maybe I should add another layer or something. Major oversight.

I cast Water Beam many thousands of times and angle most of them over the city, plus a few around the perimeter.

#KSHFSSSSSSSS—#

The laser-like water eventually reduces in speed enough to become droplets. It rains upon the city as a downpour.

#—SSSSSSSSSS—#

#SHAHHHHHHH—#

Within seconds, most of the fire is extinguished. I cancel my spells, then survey the damage as smoke wafts over the city.

#—SSSSSSSSSSS#

#—HAHHHHHH—#

It seems low, all things considered. A few seconds of blazing inferno isn't enough to kill most people in this world. Plus, while the sound waves were deafening, they didn't contain a spatial component, nor were they large enough to rupture vital organs. Hearing and vision loss is acceptable so long as they remain alive. These injuries can be healed.

I feel so much relief.

#—HAHHHHAHT#

Before today, I never imagined I could come so close to massacring an entire region.

That's not a feeling I want to experience again. I won't become an evil dragon.

... Said the dragon named 'Pure Evil.' I shake my dragon head in annoyance.

Regardless of my intent, I killed again. Why does this keep happening?

Ragh, I thought about helping with the cleanup effort after Haitos.

If I did that, would I cause another disaster?

That seems to be all I'm good at doing with this huge body.

Reh. I'll just do what a dragon does.

I'm gonna go scoop up the dead.

I mean, eat them. I guess.

...

I'm so screwed.