Everyone's attention on the battlefield turned to the magnificent sight that was the large black portal above the hill.
It baffled them as to how they could have failed to notice this earlier, but even those players around Draco hadn't sensed anything amiss.
Draco closed his eyes and was communicating with his Black Dragon. Loving Aunt had placed her hand on his back, whispering into his ear, guiding every step of his endeavor.
Draco had only ever relied on his instincts, enabling him to summon gigantic appendages for a single attack by burning all his bloodline energy. What Draco normally used was a powered-up version of the Basic Manifestation Technique, which every member under the Serpent God Inheritance knew by default.
Aunt Fyre was exceptionally well trained in the techniques of the Serpent God Inheritance. She had also been responsible for teaching many of the more talented members of the Lineage in their youth.
However, to use the Advanced Manifestation Technique usually required a few months of constant training. What Loving Aunt did for Draco was what she often did for her students when they were to first learn the technique.
It was sort of a stimulative effect, where she would assist them in channeling the technique so that they could get a feel of it. Then they would begin theory classes then practicals. She had never struggled to help any of those Lineages members and could even cast this for others either simultaneously or continually without tiring… until today.
Two black auras materialized from Draco and Loving Aunt. Despite being only one fifth as thick, her aura took the lead and began to intertwine both of them before they climbed to the space above their heads, condensing into a small ball of blackish miasma. This ball expanded agonizingly slowly, becoming more and more robust as time went on.
Riveting Night was holding five bottles of the Angel's Kiss potion, and a gentle white light began to emerge, surrounding her like a creeping vine. She was stimulating her Goddess of Light Inheritance to change the way light worked in a relatively large area. This light spread out into the vicinity, creating a special barrier.
To outsiders, it still looked like the three Upper Lineage Members were standing in place, helplessly doing nothing, but on the inside, the scene was entirely different.
After almost 10 seconds, Draco and Riveting Night's bodies began to tremble, forced to take out another Angel's Kiss potion, and drink it to stabilize themselves.
Riveting Night was directly altering the light that entered a considerable area that covered herself, Draco and Loving Aunt. If she tried to do this with Control, it would be the equivalent of a person dropping a fridge on someone ten stories down, expecting them to carry it.
She could only rely on her bloodline for this. She had enough raw bloodline strength to execute the technique itself, but the cost of maintaining it was too horrendous. Were it not for Angel's Kiss being an Epic Rank potion which had no cooldown; she would be unable to uphold the illusion.
Draco's situation was even worse. He was building towards directly summoning forth his Black Dragon. Trying something like this in the real world… he would be considered lucky just to survive such a suicidal experiment.
Even if he had received his aunts' extensive training in the real world, Draco would, at most, be able to turn himself into a 100% humanoid Dragon, which was termed a Dragonoid.
(Author's Note: Like this i.imgur.com/BNOwTST.jpg)
The same logic, however, did not apply in Boundless. There were three reasons why Draco was sure he could pull off such a stunt.
The first was the Dragon Soul. Without its help, he was currently at a level where he could barely change one or two appendages to resemble that of a Dragon.
The second was Loving Aunt's help in managing his energy expenditure.
The third and most crucial reason was the considerable supply of Angel's Kiss potions.
Just expanding the portal to manifest the Black Dragon had drained him quickly, so it became perfectly clear that this would be impossible without a cheat item like the Angel's Kiss potion.
Within five minutes, Draco had managed to expand the portal to the size of a small house, but it still wasn't enough. To come this far, he had drained over 30 Angel's Kiss potions, and so had Riveting Night.
The original 298 Angel's Kiss potions had been directly reduced to 238, and the number kept dropping as they both redeemed them from the guild menu.
With the Guild Shop, members could purchase items within the store from anywhere in the world, but putting items on sale required one to be at a Guild Hall or guild property.
By the time ten minutes had passed, the first Knight of Camelot had already perished. At this point, Draco had expanded the portal to the size of a small tower. It was still somewhat miasmic, without a firmly solid shape, although it began to reach that point.
Draco and Riveting Night had consumed almost 120 bottles altogether, sending the remaining count of Angel's Kiss potions to 118. Compared to the amount they had at the start, this was truly a terrifying consumption rate.
After another five minutes, Arthur died with a bitter smile on his face, leaving the Metal Dragon free to cast its eyes towards Draco.
"Drop the barrier, Eva," Draco spoke to her lightly, his red eyes gleaming with confidence.
Riveting Night complied and canceled her light-bending technique, sighing as she fell to her bum and panted a bit heavily.
Loving Aunt also pulled back her hand and unceremoniously dropped towards the ground, completely exhausted mentally and physically to the point of bleeding through her seven orifices.
Draco's raw power had just been too much. It was like using a 3G copper cable to transmit 4G fiber cable tier data. It had overloaded her, despite being successful.
Draco stood on the hill, his eyes meeting the hateful gaze of the Metal Dragon. All the eyes on the battlefield swiveled to him as he lowered his arms and pointed to the Regional Boss.
The miasmic portal suddenly solidified as a Dragon's head came out. This new Dragon also possessed two horns and bright green eyes, with sleek black scales.
What was truly shocking was that this Black Dragon looked no different from the Metal Dragon in terms of size, stature, and dynamics. The main difference seemed to be that one had metallic scales, while the other had blackish keratin scales.
With a slightly forceful gesture, the Black Dragon pulled its two front legs out of the portal, stomping them on the earth and using them to dig in. It then pulled itself out of the portal with considerable force, which made Draco cough blood and fall to his knees.
The Black Dragon also spat out blackish blood, but just like Draco, it didn't bother about such meager things.
"Go!"
Draco shouted to himself - The Black Dragon - as he took out another Angel's Kiss potion and downed it while keeping another in hand.
It had been bad when he was building the portal, where he had to push its growth with one potion every 10 seconds, yet maintaining the actual Black Dragon required one potion every 5 seconds, assuming it wasn't attacking.
As such, there was no time for posturing or dramatic showboating. The Black Dragon roared and began pulling Worldly Energy like crazy. A huge Orb of Destruction began to build inside its mouth.
The Metal Dragon saw this, and for a split second, it retreated by the smallest margin. The very next moment, it similarly began drawing in Worldly Energy to create its own Orb of Destruction, though the build-up was slightly weaker after it had used this attack earlier.
Gathering enough of the Worldly Energy to form a car-sized Orb of Destruction, the Black Dragon shot it out towards the Metal Dragon, who responded in kind.
As these two beams rushed to each other, Draco roared. "EVA!!"
Riveting Night beat back her exhaustion, conjuring a significant and visible light barrier that covered the top of the hill like a rectangular screen. She spread her arms out wide and braced herself.
Then, the two Orbs of Destruction collided, and the world came to a standstill.
It was as if time had slowed down significantly, allowing one to feel their heartbeat, their breathing, and hear the most minute of sounds.
Whether they were the remaining players of the Four Guilds or the few external players who were spectating, they all felt this strange and unique happenstance.
The NPCs and the two Dragons, though, froze directly as if time had been paused for them.
The two Orbs of Destruction intermingled without pushing each other back, apparently assimilating each other. It was like watching two slimes try to merge together in mid-air but more bizarre.
However, at the exact moment when the Orbs of Destruction merged together into one entity…
They exploded.
There was no epic sound from an explosion, just the visual. Every player could see the shockwave spread out at what seemed to be a snail's pace towards them, which looked like the rings of Saturn were expanding to reach their position.
Still, they could not move or cry out. Though it might be more accurate to say that they could move, it was far slower than the already slow speed of the shockwave that was rushing to them.
These players could only watch with horror as the Metal Golems and the remainder of the Army of Camelot - being closest to the epicenter of the blast - were directly vaporized.
When the shockwave came closer, a feeling of despair and helplessness assailed the members of the Four Guilds as well as the external guilds in the distance.
The moment the shockwave hit Riveting Night's barrier, time resumed in full force, and the power of the shockwave blew over the players on the hill with the momentum of a tornado trying to rip them apart.
Riveting Night's hood was blown back, revealing her celestial beauty, yet no one had any spare time to appreciate such a thing given the dire situation they found themselves in.
Eva's barrier blocked the destruction energy that would vaporize them and delete their accounts, but the physical force of the shockwave still got through for the most part.
They had to ground themselves under the ferocious wind and intense grinding force, which directly drained their HP despite only suffering a meager part of this.
Riveting Night's ears, eyes, and mouth began to leak copious amounts of blood as she resolutely maintained the barrier until her Bloodline Energy eventually ran out.
She unhesitatingly drank another Angel's Kiss potion, which allowed her to maintain the barrier for as long as the shockwave lasted. Eventually, it cooled down and blew over.
As for the external guilds that had chosen to stay, they had been vaporized and rendered practically non-existent, their accounts deleted. They would have to start Boundless afresh and make their decisions carefully from now on.
Riveting Night dropped her barrier and sighed weakly as she fell to the ground loosely. Her suppressed fatigue came back powerfully, leaving her unable to even muster the energy to get up and hide her face.
She and Draco - or any member of the Lineages - were supernaturally strong, but they were not Gods. They still had the sub-human shell that limited them from achieving the same feats as their Progenitors, which was why they would never be able to achieve 100% bloodline purity until that happened.
When one looked at the battlefield, one would naturally gasp out in fear.
The once lush and beautiful Plains of Deriam, which had green grass and small hillocks, had now turned into a barren wasteland with blackened earth. Those hills had been rent to nothing, and the ground was littered with cracks and a blackish miasma that rejected any form of existing matter above ground level.
It was not called 'Destruction' energy for nothing. There was a reason why Black Dragons - beings that naturally produced Destruction Energy - and Caelo - The God of Destruction - had been at the pinnacle of their respective races and categories.
The Metal Dragon lay flat on its back in a large ditch near the edge of the battlefield, barely able to raise itself up from the ground.
Draco's Black Dragon was bleeding black blood from almost every part of its body, but it still stood firm and glared at the Metal Dragon, who could barely move.
It was clear as to who was the winner of this particular bout, though the Metal Dragon still had a good amount of health remaining.
｢Name: Metal Dragon (Dark Knight) – Major Rank Adventurer
Level: 23
HP: 798,309/8,000,000｣
It had fallen beneath one million HP, but Draco's Black Dragon was not looking too good either because the system of Boundless didn't support it.
｢Name: Black Dragon (Draco) – Major Rank Adventurer
Level: 25
HP: 347,907/1,000,000｣
Technically, the Black Dragon should be weaker than the Metal Dragon. After all, Draco's summoning was half-baked and only succeeded through the assistance of others, while the Metal Dragon was a true Dragon.
Even though physically, the Black Dragon looked to be the winner, Draco was really suffering as he lay in a pool of his own blood.
The Black Dragon was a great power to have, especially since he could lock himself up and manufacture Angel's Kiss potions to abuse this ability as long as he had Loving Aunt by his side.
However, the universe was fair. Since he could bring such a taboo existence to life, even if it were in a digital world, he would have to bear all the responsibility.
Whatever damage the Black Dragon took was transferred over to him. Eva might as well have excluded him from the barrier, as he still suffered the brunt of the attack nonetheless.
His only saving grace was his natural and non-system assisted resistance to Destruction Energy, as well as the fact that the Black Dragon's cheat-like defense had significantly mitigated the damage.
The players of the Four Guilds rose to their feet, sharing a look of surprise with each other. The formerly forty players had now been reduced to just ten, namely Slim Fatty, Rambunctious Buttlover, Warm Spring, Kiran and Fitter Cleric, Noble Soul, Gentle Flower, Yui, Panty King, and Wee Cunt.
These ten felt their hearts clench when they saw the remnant Destruction Energy, but their breathing stilled when they gazed upon the now unmasked and gasping Eva who had blood still leaking from her mouth as her eyes remained unfocused.
These players could not comprehend how one human could be this perfect in terms of facial beauty. It was like her skin glowed with perfection and artistry, making all mortal beings instinctively go on their knees with worship.
She was not to be blasphemed.
She was not to be l.u.s.ted over.
She was not to be touched.
Their eyes could only move over to Draco, who exuded a similar aura with a different flavor. Even though he looked like he was lying in a puddle of blood, with his arms struggling to push him back to his feet, he still made their hearts thump. A primal instinct also resonated with their beings.
He was blasphemous.
He was to be l.u.s.ted and desired for.
He was to be dominant.
These two exuded a similar yet different aura, one of them an Ultimate Devil that would make any woman give up her purity. At the same time, the other was a Celestial Maiden, who would make any man give her his life and fanatical devotion just for a moment of her attention.
Despite their own preferences or vices, these ten men and women could only feel like these two were perfectly made for each other, as if the heavens had crafted them with absolute care to represent the pinnacle of humanity. Two parts of an art piece which could not be any more different but perfectly created harmony when placed together.
This banished any desires or greed that entered their minds as they could only feel worship and respect in their hearts.
Draco used Instant Healing and managed to pick himself up to his feet, downing one more Angel's Kiss potion, which restored him fully. He walked over to Eva and cradled her gently as he poured an Angel's Kiss potion into her mouth.
Her unfocused eyes suddenly became clear, and she could only smile bitterly as she whined.
"They saw my face, Draco."
Draco could only laugh and kiss Eva gently. "Eva, that should be the least of our troubles. We still have this Metal Dragon to beat, you know? Besides, look at them. Do you see anyone coveting you?"
Eva faced the ten remaining players, who stared at her with respect and adoration. They were incredibly moved by her perfection and would have prostrated had they not known she wasn't a real Goddess.
When she saw their reaction, Eva realized that her fears might not have been as bad as she assumed. As long as she was unveiled around Draco, the ordinary humans would never feel the urge to covet her, only that they two were perfect.
As for other Lineage members, though…
Loving Aunt and Kiran gazed at Riveting Night with complicated expressions as the mental effect of the Celestial Maiden Inheritance had a much, much weaker impact on them.
To their eyes, Eva was certainly stunning in terms of facial beauty, but not enough to make them feel any adoration or reverence.
Eva frowned but let the matter go. Instead, she turned to face the Metal Dragon with a sharp look in her eyes.
Draco also turned to face it, and his pulsing red eyes gleamed. The Black Dragon - that had been standing in place while frantically healing itself - began to rush forward, heading straight for the Metal Dragon.
For that matter, the Metal Dragon had risen to its feet and somewhat managed to heal some injuries with its horrific vitality and the help of Worldly Energy, but its HP hadn't increased a bit.
All it had regained was combat capability.
The Metal Dragon rushed towards the Black Dragon with all its speed, the two entities stomping on the ground as they moved. The earth shook, and the tremors rocked everyone on the hill as they watched two apex predators determine the superior one.
Next, two Supreme-Rank Dragons collided.