CHAPTER 225(Boss Gauntlet -III-)

Please read the author's notes.

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CHAPTER START---

Sprinting toward the end of the crystal hallway Yang can hear the fighting and see Welf's crimson flames as well as Thalie's green winds battering the arena.

As he's about to exit the hallway, however, he stops. Leaning against the wall for a moment he takes a deep breath and focuses. Acknowledging the pain in his body as if lava was being poured into his veins, lava that could actually hurt him for a change.

Adjusting what remains of his visor, mostly just the back of his headpiece. Kept on mainly to allow better communications with his friends, he wipes the sweat from his brow through the shattered faceplate.

'Almost there, just a bit longer...' he chants over and over as he rushes into the fight.

Seeing Thalie and Welf carefully avoiding each strike and spike, Yang notices that neither of them seems to be on the offensive.

He transforms his Great-Axe into its Greatsword form. Glowing dark blue with purple lighting crackling, and green winds swirling around the blade.

"What do we know?" Yang asks as he rushes Nergigante. Meeting a backhanded swing of black metallic spikes with his own Greatsword. Feeling all the muscles in his arms slowly being overpowered by the monster, all the holes still riddled into his body and unable to heal suddenly feel as if they're burning him, a sensation he's rarely felt since receiving his magic.

As Yang and Nergigante perform an intricate dance of slashes, parries, and dodges. With Yang being extra focused as he can feel his magic capacity and health constantly being chipped away, and barely regenerating, if at all.

"It's never without spikes," Thalie says as she takes a few steps away from the fight to chug a potion, same as Welf. "As soon as it launches them out a new set already grows to replace it, and we can't break them."

"I can," Welf says. "But I don't know how many Void Flames Mosoka can handle before the second prong shatters too, and it's wary of my flames since I've been erasing all the spikes it fires at us."

"Have any of you been hit?" Yang asks while on the back foot in the fight, feeling the monster pressuring him more and more. Already sweating profusely, black and red lightning, pure Dragon Energy, pounces off the monster and attacks him, tearing through his mage armor and stinging his skin. All while the same energy is overflowing into the monster's muscles.

"Luckily not by the spikes," Thalie throws her spear directly at Nergigante.

As it's coming down for a massive claw swipe on Yang the weapon strikes the side of its arm, barely knocking the attack away from Yang before Thalie appears as a golden blur beside the mid-air weapon.

Grabbing her spear she releases a small wisp of green winds to readjust herself in the air and slash downward the moment her feet touch the ground.

Joining her slash Yang brings down his Greatsword, still overflowing with magic as both weapons race toward Nergigante's face.

At the last moment, the monster shifts its head slightly, and the left horn simply skids off the blades causing them to strike the ground as the monster leaps backward.

The indestructible dungeon crystal that composes this section doesn't even get scratched by their combined might. Even after all this fighting, the entire room was flawless, even Nergigante couldn't scratch the crystals.

"What about its belly?" Yang asks as Welf joins them, not missing the concerned look Welf shot him. Thankfully his wounds were perfectly hidden beneath armor, clothes, and bandages.

As they all rush forward they try and overwhelm the monster from all sides, it stays low to the ground and keeps lashing out with its limbs, tail, and wings. The massive spikes keep the adventurers from fully committing to any assault.

"It's too short," Welf says. "The underside is close to the ground so it'd need to jump, but it's never in the air for long enough, and when it comes down it fires off all the spikes so that's a problem too."

"I've got a plan, just be ready to take advantage of it in the air," Yang says as he presses his assault that much more. "Fall back so it can focus me, and be ready!"

"Are you sure?" Thalie asks, skeptical about risky plans with this particular Elder Dragon.

"Trust me, I got this."

As both his allies get back to prepare themselves, Yang stores his weapon into his Inventory, and once again summons his full Elemental Wheel.

Focusing less on his mage armor, mostly using it to quickly dash about with bursts of air and fire, he focuses on using ranged attacks.

Before Nergigante can realize what's going on, it's been hit by fire, wind, water, chunks of ice, lightning, and rocks. Every time the monster gets close enough to charge at Yang, he dashes away.

Staying on the ground but using his magic for mobility he works his way under the monster's skin, seeing it becoming more erratic. Roaring more often, and growling louder and louder. All because it couldn't get to him.

With a quick glance about the battlefield he notices Welf and Thalie are gone, likely retreated into the tunnel to this very arena, completely out of the way.

'Hyrdo Cannon'

He launches a compressed geyser of water directly at Nergigante's face, blinding it for a moment.

'Lightning Wave'

Focusing more on the water a massive surge of purple lighting mixes with it, causing some of the water to become steam long before hitting the monster's face.

"GRRRAGGH!" Nergigante releases a feral growl of annoyance as the purple lighting fails to even penetrate its hide, only drawing out some of its Dragon Energy to automatically counter it.

As Nergigante rushes through the water Yang is constantly moving backward, his Chaos Mark already fully active, eyes glowing blood red. Physically boosted past any of his previous limits as he now actively tries to draw out as much energy as possible from the Chaos.

When he notices enough water covering the monster, 'Ice Age.'

The Hydro Cannon becomes a cylinder of ice, along with the monster being trapped in a small iceberg.

Using the few seconds it takes Nergigante to break out and continue rushing toward him he makes it to the other side of the room.

As chunks of ice go flying all over the crystal floor, the monster looks across the room to see Yang with four boulders, each the size of two busses, all floating above him.

As he stands on the ground he focuses on them and reaches out, as if grabbing the air.

Making a crushing motion with his hands, the boulders begin to crack, sending the sound of a landslide across the room as they rapidly shrink until they're not much bigger than Yang himself.

As the monster rushes forward to clear the distance.

'Gale Stream'

An absurd amount of green winds is generated by Yang who tries in vain to push Nergigante back. The monster easily muscles through the attack and makes it within a hundred feet of Yang before the next attack.

'Meteoric Buckshot'

All the super-compressed boulders break apart and fire pebbles like machine guns.

Using the winds to accelerate them even more the howling winds are accented by hundreds of little 'pop' sounds as they shatter the sound barrier.

Focusing all the stones on Nergigante's face, more importantly, the eyes. Yang forces the monster to flinch. Not because they could hurt it, but all animals will instinctively protect their eyes, something he knew very well.

Nergigante is forced to keep its head lowered, barely able to see Yang as it continues to muscle forward.

'What's it gonna take to bring this thing down...' Yang furrows his brows as the last of his rocks are fired off.

"Fuck it," Yang focuses on creating a small flame in his hand that quickly becomes a sphere of blue fire, constantly becoming denser and denser.

As Nergigante finally makes it to him he pounces forward to slash down in a wide swing.

With his teeth showing just slightly, annoyance almost overflowing, Yang mutters out two words for his allies to hear as he crushes the flame in his hand.

"Pressure Damage."

BOOM!

A surge of fire and noise fills the room.

Nergigante's claw slams onto the crystal floor as Yang disappears into the screen of blue flames.

The constant explosions and changes in air pressure cause the attack to be blinding and deafening.

With the entire room filled with fire and having no breath attack for itself, Negigante constantly shifts in place, constantly roaring in anger and frustration, becoming more and more irritated with the cowardly prey.

Feeling the black and reg Dragon Energy on its body react, the monster spreads out its wings while releasing a deafening roar.

The Dragon Energy had reacted to Yang's Lightning Blade. A crudely shapen lightning weapon extends from his hand as he leaps through the blinding flames and swings out.

The spikes on Nergigante's wings pierce Yang's leg, just barely sinking an inch into his flesh after piercing his armor. All while the blade of purple lighting slams into the monster, and does nothing.

Reacting almost instantly Yang is able to rocket back into the flames before the spike can do any more damage, disappearing once again.

Being mostly unaffected by Yang's efforts, Nergigante simply conserves its energy, waiting for the ocean of fire to drop. Knowing it couldn't possibly find him within.

BOOM!

An explosion overpowers the constantly cracking magic and growling within the flames.

Nergigante reacts too late and receives a chunk of metal slamming into its face.

The monster snarls, and the flames finally drop.

Now standing at the furthest point from the monster, again, Yang has four more Adamantite ingots floating in front of him. Purple lighting constantly bounced from him to the metal hunks, keeping them airborne.

'Railgun'

BOOM!

Another Adamantite ingot shatters the sound barrier and rockets toward the monster.

Nergigante reacts just as quickly, swiping it out of the air.

'Jötunheimr' a chilling cold seeps into the room as the monster begins rushing Yang all over again.

'Railgun'

BOOM!

Another ingot, this time Nergigante simply barely through the attack, using its scales to tank the blow.

Two more times this happens, and then the monster feels the effects.

Jötunheimr, the sapping chill in the air. While it was mostly immune to such things, Dragon Energy instinctively reacts against outside forces. It immediately bounces from the monster into incoming magic in the form of red and black lightning. And now it was being used to fight this absurdly cold temperature.

If not for Yang containing this move to the arena both his allies in the connected hallway would be struggling since their armor isn't air-tight anymore.

Why doesn't he have Ice Element instead of his current Water and Cold Elements?

Simple, water is water, but cold saps energy. While he mostly uses it to create ice, this is its true nature.

Almost as taxing as earth, it affects him just like his Fire Element. But to force it onto his enemies it takes much more magic, virtually impossible on the lower floors, much like Earth. But against Dragon Energy, it was rather useful to draw out a few sparks ever so ofter, at least against an Elder Dragon without a breath attack organ to keep itself warm, like Nergigante.

Seeing Dragon Energy crackling on the monster more than before, he smiles.

"C'mon," he chants as Nergigante approaches once more.

'Flood'

Water erupts in every direction, his Mage Armor suddenly becoming water and releasing a wave just as tall as the monster.

'Aqua Jet'

While Nergigate was surprised he rockets through the water and disappears, only to once again be spotted at the other end of the room.

The monster roars at Yang, once more enraged by his hit-and-run tactics.

With two massive flaps of its wings, it locks onto him.

"Get ready," Yang commands through his visor. He begins moving forward slightly, getting closer to the hallway entrance where Welf and Thalie were waiting.

Yang holds his right hand at his side and forms a swirling tornado of Water in his palm, it carefully dances in his grasp while he pours more and more magic into it.

Unbeknownst to everyone, once again his full Elemental Wheel flickers in and out of its pure white state. Entering and exiting a state of perfect elemental balance, enhancing all his elements that much more.

As the monster hovers in the air, all its spikes, even its two massive horns, and its teeth become jet black. It releases one more fully engaged roar as black and red Dragon Energy crackles across its body, arcing between the massive spikes as it divebombs Yang.

Seeing the attack coming Yang yells out, "Now!"

Welf and Thalie immediately rush out of the hallways as Nergigante and Yang clash.

Crushing the water in his palm, it snakes around his entire arm before expanding outward. In the blink of an eye all the magic he'd been compressing and molding into this attack springs to life in the form of a massive swirling drill. Slightly larger than the monster itself.

Like raging currents swirling from a wide base and collecting at the tip, clashing directly with Nergigante's horns.

'Hydro Drill!'

"RAAAHHHHH!" Yang cries out with everything he has. His Chaos Mark is still in full bloom, eyes glowing just as brightly as the rest of it.

While Welf and Thalie rush forward they see Nergigante stuck in mid-air, fighting against Yang's massive water drill attack.

Wings desperately beating to push through the water, on the other side Yang feels all his bones buckling under the immense strain, his shoulder feeling as if it's about to be shattered from the force.

"C'mon!" Yang grits his teeth and pushes more magic into his attack.

The Elemental Wheel at his back finally stops flickering, and settles for just a moment on a full wheel of pure white magic, perfectly balanced elements working together. Amplifying each other, ascending to new heights.

More powerful than ever before, and more draining as well.

Yang feels as if his magic was a small bowl and someone just drank a mouthful from it. The sudden shift in magical potency causes his Hydro Drill to swirl almost twice as fast and become many times denser, his shoulder feels lighter as the magic begins pushing back more on its own.

Nergigante feels the sudden change as well, and both the other adventurers notice the monster was being pushed back slightly.

Atleast before another surge of Dragon Energy spread out from its core, more intense wing beats pushed against Yang as all its spikes and protrusions began rippling with a slightly red hue.

"Welf?" Thalie calls out for him as they arrive at the clash. Standing directly below the monster as it's locked into the clash.

"I got it!" Welf reassures as he aims Mosoka directly upward, directly at where the Dragon Energy was rippling out from, the monster's core. "I hope you don't break," he says to his weapon as a thin black line of fire shoots upward.

As it's about to reach the monster, however, the crackling Dragon Energy shifts once more. When the Void Flames are about to make contact the energy created a small barrier to block it.

"That's impossible!" Welf is completely caught off guard as he continues using Void Flames.

"I thought you said it's indefensible, not destruction just erases shit!" Thalie shrieks, not usually one to panic but the stakes against this thing were simply too high.

"It's the Dragon Energy," Welf says. "It's throwing itself at the flames before they touch the scales, it can't stop it but my flames need to match the volume of whatever they erase, it's sacrificing itself for the body."

"Fuck," Thalie grumbles. "Why can't Elder Dragons just be simple for once." Launching herself into the air in swirling wind she quickly reaches the curved crystal ceiling and stands on it, facing down directly above the monster.

BOOM!

She descends like a golden arrow to smite anyone below her, with Hokori pointing toward the monster and shining brighter than ever she slams into the back of Nergigante's neck. Unable to pierce the skin or even reach the scales because of all the Dragon Energy overflowing from the monster.

With Nergigante flying downward toward Yang, Yang piercing upward diagonally at the monster, Welf trying to impale its belly, and Thalie performing a perfect vertical drop, they were all in a deadlock for a few seconds, until something began to give.

CRACK!

Thalie sees one of Nergigante's horns that were clashing with Yang's Hydro Drill begin to crack. Her eyes widen in surprise at the sight. "Welf get away now!"

She immediately creates a gust of wind to take her back toward the hallway, seeing Welf already retreating below her.

Just as she expected, both the horns shattered, and the drill made perfect contact with the monster.

Carrying Nergigante on the tip of the drill Yang flies to the other end of the room while releasing a manic cry. Taking out his anger and frustration on the screaming monster as he pins it against the wall and continues pushing forward.

"Wow..." Was all Welf could mutter out as they see the monster's blood and spikes flying everywhere, a pool of blood and water spreading out as Yang bored a hole into the Elder Dragon and completely shreds it into pieces.

But what really surprised them, was the perfected Elemental Wheel at Yang's back.

As his drill shatters the monster crystal all the blood and gore became ash, immediately cleaning up the floor and making it easier for them to walk closer to him.

Yang was down on one knee, desperately trying to catch his breath, absolutely covered in sweat.

As they arrive at his location both his Chaos Mark and Elemental Wheel disappear.

"Since when could you do that?" Welf asks.

"Do...what?" Yang questions between his desperate gulps of air.

"The white Elemental Wheel," Thalie clarifies.

"The what?" Yang activates his Elemental Wheel again, only for the standard six elements to be displayed. "White?"

"Guess it was an in the moment type thing," Thalie says as Welf begins inspecting the Nergigante horns and spikes that dropped.

"I'll try to do it again later, we should get going," Yang immediately straightens up and turns to the exit.

"You mean after we heal, right?" Thalie gives him a curious look.

"Right, yeah," Yang quickly catches himself. "Just need a potion for this and I'm good," he gestures to the stab wound in his leg.

A few minutes later they're all sitting on the floor while Yang is downing Elixir after Elixir, desperately trying to get his magic and health back up but barely feeling any effect.

"You ok?" Welf asks.

"I'll be fine, almost full," he instantly lies. "How come those Void Flames didn't work?" he changes the topic.

"Yeah," Thalie turns to look at Welf. "I thought they were invincible."

"They are," Welf says. "I try not to use them because I don't know how much Mosoka can take, but when I do use them it's impossible to defend against. Completely negates magic and matter of any kind, but the requirement is volume."

"So if something is too big for your flames to reach the other side---"

"Then I'm blocked," Welf finishes for Thalie. "It's not like I couldn't kill Nergigante if I could get my flames to touch it, but it kept throwing more and more Dragon Energy at me, to constantly sacrifice get in the way of the flames, very annoying. And I had to keep my use limited to prevent any more of this," he gestures to the missing prong of Mosoka.

"Any new cracks?" Yang asks.

"No, Mosoka is fine."

"Wait," Thalie says. "But you can't cut through this," she taps the crystal floor of the room.

"Because it's not energy or matter," Welf says, completely confusing his allies. Seeing their perplexed looks he clarifies, "it's a type of space magic, at least that's what I can guess. Had to learn about it while Enchanting."

"Well now I feel better about not being able to break it," Yang says.

Both his allies nod along.

"Alright, let's go," Yang jumps up to his feet, keeping his strong facade up. Barely operating on a quarter of his magic, and even that's being generous.

"Yang, you sure?" Thalie raises a brow at him, noticing him straining slightly.

He gives her a reassuring smile, "I can feel it, she's close, it feels like she's in the next room over, we're almost there, c'mon," he says before walking toward the exit. Ignoring the burning pain, still feeling like lava flowing through his veins. As he has his back facing his friends he closes his eyes and takes a deep calming breath, trying to set aside the pain and focus on that feeling. The feeling of his goal being just within reach.

"Something isn't right here," Thalie mutters as she and Welf get up, sharing a concerned look with the smith. "Let's make sure he doesn't do anything reckless alright."

"Gotcha," Welf says. "He's been getting impatient lately, glad I'm not the only one who noticed."

"Believe me, we noticed," Thalie says. "Better start thinking of how to help Hephaestus break the news to Freya, because I can feel it too, something massive is up ahead, something like we've never faced before..."

END CHAPTER---

Boss Gauntlet complete, I had to cut one monster from it because it ruined the pacing so I hope this fight made up for it. And yes Yang has a lot of moves we don't see because we can't see every single fight on 100+ floors.

[Next chapter Title: The Finish Line]