3 Duel

"Traitor!!" Hissed many of the black dragons glaring at the horrifically beautiful Demon Highlord Kitiara.

"Commence attack." The Red Dragon Highlord immediately commanded in a somber tone. He didn't want his warriors to think too much about the shocking appearance of an ex member of their Chromatic Dragon Empire. And as the Demon Highlord of what would probably be an extinction level attack upon their planet, no less.

At his word, a massive inferno instantly radiated outwards from every single red dragon warrior standing upon the battlements. Ravenous flames burning impossibly white turned the first few thousand demons around the fortress into ash before continuing their destructive work outwards.

For a full five hundred meters around the black fortress, every single demon fodder was burned to crisp. A couple hundred thousand demons probably died in that first volley.

It was a terrifying attack that would have broken the spirit of every other army. Except for that particular demon horde, of course.

All that massive inferno achieved was a mere sixty seconds of respite, before the surging onslaught of the demons behind the dead ones reached the walls once more. And apart from a slightly disgusting smell of burnt rotten flesh, it was as if the inferno did not happen.

And oh, that inferno also caused around two hundred thousand wisps of small spiritual energy to surge towards me!

"UWAA!!" I shouted in horror as the deluge of wisps swarmed my spiritual body.

Shwaaa!

However, there was actually nothing to fear. In fact, I could feel my spirit form become stronger as soon as those two hundred thousand wisps entered and disappeared into me.

"Whoa.. That felt pretty good. Not as good as when the golden liquid supreme luck splashed onto me… But pretty good. More! More please!" I called out pleasantly to the dragon defenders.

And as though they heard me…

Thousands upon thousands of sharp earthen spikes shot out from the ground beneath the demon horde within the same five hundred meter radius.

Once more, a couple hundred thousand demons died to the sharp spikes, and their spiritual wisps surged towards me.

This time, I welcomed them with open arms. Like, literally.

"Come! Ahhhh great job! Beautiful!" I sighed contentedly as my spirit grew stronger once more.

By the end of that second attack, my spirit had more than tripled in strength!

It was beyond awesome, and if the battle did not suffer from an abrupt end, I could hardly imagine how powerful my spirit would become by the end of it.

I gazed down at the fortress which was ringed by four hundred thousand dead demons upon spikes, and it made for a terrible sight. But still the flood of demons kept surging forward. What was four hundred thousand to many billions?

Pshhhhh!

Hundreds of thousands of flowers suddenly bloomed on the earthen spikes and released a massive cloud of poisonous pollen. The howling battlecries of the demons immediately turned into shrieks of confusion and pain.

It would be extremely reasonable and extremely logical, even for a massive army of shrieking demons, to pause their attack at that moment. At least to allow the cloud of poisonous pollen to disperse and for them to regain their vision of the spiked ground.

But so great was their absolute fear of their Demon Highlord that not a single demon paused in their frenzied charge. They piled into the mass of screaming demons in front of them and pressed forward, climbing atop each other, and dying by the thousands in the process.

It was an impossibly horrifying scene.

With grim satisfaction, the draconic warriors stopped their elemental attacks to allow the demons below to finish their dying.

For ten full minutes, the demons charged and died in the cloud of pollen until finally, the pollen thinned enough for the demons to see where the spikes were and avoid them.

By then, a million of them lay dead or dying around the black fortress.

But it was not enough to deter the demons, or even slow down their maddened charge.

"Mud." The Red Dragon Highlord commanded.

At once, an unnatural torrential rain fell from the sky while the ground shifted to bring up the most potent soil combination for thick, sticky mud.

"Poison Wind." The Red Dragon Highlord commanded once more.

Whooshhh.

A powerful gale started to grow while even more flowers bloomed and produced even more poisonous pollen.

Water spread outwards to create a huge swath of sticky mud while the poison pollen spread far and wide, blown by the powerful gales.

With just four simple elements, the Red Dragon Highlord created a death zone around the black fortress which expanded the no-man's land many, many times over, reaching demons up to five kilometers in radius around the black fortress.

But as before, the demons kept charging. And dying.

Slowly, a ring of small mountains made up of dead demons formed at five kilometers out, forcing their brethren to climb up that mountain before they were able to charge in closer to the black fortress where they would die within a couple hundred meters, in the process expanding the small mountain even more.

It was an incredible display of ruthless efficiency on the part of the defenders, and one that I really appreciated. The influx of several million spiritual wisps had strengthened my soul considerably, and I already felt at least ten times stronger than before.

"What do you think, traitor? Will you run out of demons first, or will we run out of mana first?" Sneered the Black Dragon Highlord.

A soft incredulous laughter rang out from Demon Highlord Kitiara as she floated to a standstill a mere kilometer away, completely unaffected by the wind and poison.

At that distance, the dragons could see her very clearly.

"Traitor?" Kitiara said in an amused yet melancholic voice. "Says the usurper of the Dragon Throne."

"I should have killed you when I had the chance! You are a traitor to the Dragon Race!" Snarled the Black Dragon Highlord in deep resentment.

"I agree." Kitiara said softly. "You should have killed me when you had the chance. But as to who the traitor is to the Dragon Race. We both know that it is you."

A powerful looking black ball of crackling energy appeared upon his hands at that moment and with great relish, he flung it towards Demon Highlord Kitiara.

"Eat this Orb of Annihilation!" The Black Dragon Highlord shouted.

The insidious looking crackling black orb shot out towards Kitiara with startling speed and hit her squarely on her face.

Swoosh.

And promptly disappeared into a simple black amulet she was wearing around her neck.

A thin smile of satisfaction pierced the melancholic visage of Demon Highlord Kitiara's face at that moment, and her sorrowful aura dimmed slightly to make room for more bloodthirst.

It was as if the first phase of her plan had gone according to plan.

"Black Dragon Highlord Koja. Come and be my donkey." Kitiara beckoned as the demonic amulet cracked open, and a shadow of what looked like the Black Dragon Highlord Koja slowly coalesced into form behind her.

At the same time, she transformed into a ravishing beauty with beautiful long hair that fell to her knees and an angelic face that contrasted drastically with the bloody invasion she was orchestrating at that moment.

The tight fitting black armor which hugged the perfect contours of her body glowed a grim dark gray and gave off a strange, otherworldly aura.

"As you command, Highlord." Came Black Dragon Highlord Koja's monotone reply. He spread his wings and leapt off his pedestal on the Northern Tower.

Red Dragon Highlord Ren's response was instant and brutal.

KABOOM!!

A massive explosion blasted out near Black Dragon Highlord's head and sent him crashing down to the ground in a dead faint.

Dragons do not pass out easily.

One could only imagine the sheer power that Red Dragon Highlord Ren packed in that explosion which caused Koja to faint so quickly.

"Hmph." Demon Highlord Kitiara replied in a slightly irritated tone at having lost her donkey.

"You would trade your soul and the entire Chromatic Dragon Empire for revenge? Is it worth it?" Red Dragon Highlord Ren asked her quietly.

"I would trade the entire Dragon Race for revenge." Demon Highlord Kitiara replied coldly.

"Doing that would not bring your father and mother back from the dead." Red Dragon Highlord Ren's deep voice rumbled out even as a fearsome amount of fire energy materialized around him.

"It would not. But it would gather every single one of you traitors in the underworld with him, where he would be your king once more and punish you accordingly." Demon Highlord Kitiara raised her slender right hand and materialized her own demonic energy in response.

"While you toil for eternity under the rule of the Demon God? Folly! Everybody save the Demon God loses in this hare-brained scheme of yours!" Red Dragon Highlord Ren rumbled in anger. "I was right to execute the fools Kyros and Chiara, for raising such an impertinent child, if not for their ineptitude as king and queen of our glorious Empire!

"Execute?" Demon Highlord Kitiara's face clouded in barely controlled fury and anguish. "You skinned them alive and threw them to the garhounds, where you kept them alive for three full months of agony before letting them die.

You did not "execute" my father and mother, blood traitor. You tortured them to death. And I am here to do the same to you and your damned Chromatic Dragon Empire. By the time I am done with all of you, you would have suffered a fate ten thousand times worse than my parents!"

"A much deserved fate for two fools." Red Dragon Highlord Ren sneered. "And one you would share by the end of the day."