Chapter Fifty: Misunderstanding

"Calm down, old man!" Seizing a sense of the bone-chilling and monstrous murderous intent rolling in from behind, Mo Tan quickly turned his head in an attempt to pacify him. "There's definitely a misunderstanding here. I'll help you—"

Buzz!!

The sound of air being violently torn apart cut off the latter half of his sentence. The visibly unhinged old Orc let out a savage, fierce yank on the pull-cord, his entire body leaping into the air. With a spine-chilling momentum, he raised the chainsaw high and brought it down ferociously, incoherently roaring, "Too much talk is useless!"

Although this strike was narrowly avoided by Mo Tan with a sudden, flying lunge, the ground behind them was cleaved into a deep ravine. The piercing buzz of the chainsaw sounded like a death knell, sending a shiver down both of their spines. Even with his remarkably high attributes in every aspect, Cordova lacked the courage to turn around and counterattack.

After all, they were indeed in the wrong!

"This Orc..." The azure dragon Femigel’s reptilian eyes sized up the chainsaw-wielding berserker Orc with great interest, marveling aloud, "Just a moment ago, his physical abilities looked quite ordinary. How did he suddenly gain such formidable combat prowess? Neither his strength nor his speed is something his physical level should be able to achieve."

Dragging Mo Tan, Cordova scrambled and crawled over to the giant dragon’s side. He grabbed onto Femigel's claw and roared at the top of his lungs, "Let's go! Hurry up!!"

Mo Tan hadn't really planned on running, but Cordova was gripping him with a death-grip and earnestly added, "We can talk about feeling guilty later! If you dare to stay here right now, you'll definitely end up dead one way or another!"

"Wait a second!" Femigel muttered in response. "I'm really exhausted, though... You have to realize—"

Vroom-vroom-vroom!!

"Kill you... Kill you..." Crystal-clear drool slid down the old Orc's chin. His eyes had lost focus, and his hands were instinctively and frantically pulling the chainsaw's starter cord. His entire demeanor was morbid and eerie. "Kill you... Kill you!!!"

Femigel’s expression suddenly contorted in sheer terror. He widened his enormous eyes and let out a roar, "What kind of combat power is this?!"

Following that, he violently kicked off the ground, flapping his wings frantically, and took to the air in the blink of an eye.

Two minutes later...

"Kill you! Kill, kill, kill!!"

Standing blankly on the ground, the old Orc mumbled a couple more times, then rolled his eyes and collapsed flat. After a long moment, he began to snore happily. The engineering marvel he still held tightly in his hand gradually stopped spinning, slowly fading into silence.

The surroundings were a scene of utter devastation. Having been completely destroyed three times in less than a short moment, the farm looked just like a war ruin, suffused with an inexpressible sense of desolation and bleakness.

...

High in the sky.

"Ugh... Ao..." Femigel panted heavily, flapping his wings with all his might. He looked exhausted beyond measure. Mo Tan, hanging from the left dragon claw, could even see the dragon sticking its tongue out.

Clinging tightly to the other claw, Cordova let out a long sigh of relief, reflecting with lingering fear, "We finally managed to get away. Exactly what kind of legendary figure is that old man? Even you, Femigel, panicked."

"Actually, he wasn't really that strong. You could even say he was completely harmless..." The dragon's voice trembled slightly. "It's just that his aura felt terrifyingly overwhelming. Phew, never mind that for now; I'm about to drop dead from exhaustion!"

Cordova curled his lip. "You're a dragon, aren't you? How can you get tired so easily?"

"I carried you brat all the way here from the Pillar Mountains, and after transmitting myself back, I flew right back here in the shortest time possible!" The dragon panted without a shred of dignity. "To maximize my speed, I used five Tailwind Runes simultaneously! Then, before I even caught my breath after landing, I hauled both of you back up into the sky. Right now, I'm practically completely out of juice..."

With that, his body suddenly listed to one side, tilting dangerously in mid-air before he managed to regain his balance with great difficulty.

"Are you alright?!" Cordova was terrified, his face turning pale as he said, "Don't you dare whimsically treat us to a plane crash or something! If we fall from this height, even if my friend and I survive, he'll definitely be smashed straight into a loot crate!"

Mo Tan was also startled and quickly urged, "Hold on, Dragon Brother!"

"I can't hold on much longer!" Femigel gritted his teeth, flapping his wings desperately. "We definitely can't make it back to the Pillar Mountains today. Is there any nearby place where I can land and rest?!"

The dragon's condition was indeed rather poor. Mo Tan had previously read about the Pillar Mountains in Mage's notes. Although that location was also in the Northwestern Continent, it was quite a distance from the Anca Bazaar. On foot, walking for ten days or half a month would barely be enough to reach it. Yet this dragon named Femigel had managed a nearly round-trip journey in just a few hours—and the second leg seemed to have been flown with the accelerator floored the entire way. It was no wonder he was already sticking his tongue out!

Recalling the simplified map in the notes, he softly suggested, "The Underhill Ruins!"

"Huh?" Cordova blinked. "What did you say?"

And Femigel simply stuck his tongue out in satisfaction (he no longer had the strength to nod). The amplitude of his wings flapping grew slightly wider as he said weakly, "Good idea! The Underhill Ruins are a great spot. Not only are they in the same direction as the Pillar Mountains, but they aren't far from here either. Let's head there! Hold on tight, you two!!"

With that, he mustered the very strength he had used to break out of his shell back in the day, trembling and frantically beating his nearly cramping wings as he flew toward the southwest...

...

At the same time, the Underhill Ruins.

Amidst the broken walls and ruins, four people and a beast were locked in a standoff...

Wan Yang—or as he could now be called, Huo Yanyang—panting heavily, stared at the massive beast before him. He was drenched in sweat as if he had just been fished out of water. In front of him, two Orc warriors held their massive tusk-shaped shields high, standing on guard...

Behind the three battered individuals stood a frail, elderly Orc. Covered in wrinkles, he wielded a bone staff, carried a massive black totem on his back, and wore snowy-white shaman robes that were visibly a couple of sizes too big. He seemed to be squinting and dozing off.

"Mentor!" Huo Yanyang gave a bitter smile as he turned back to look at his scrawny mentor—who also held the title of High Shaman, Mando Stone-Slab—and cried out anxiously, "At this rate, no matter how much the ancestors could bluff, it won't matter anymore. The three of us really aren't going to hold out much longer!"

The latter, however, merely shook his head slightly, gently stroking the bone staff in his hand, and spoke softly, "On the road to the Holy Mountain, every trial holds meaning. Child, you must remember that you are a War Shaman..."

And that was the end of his sentence.

Huo Yanyang really wanted to cry. He was indeed a War Shaman, and a fairly promising newly-minted one in the eyes of these NPCs, but the crux of the problem was that all the skills he currently mastered were support-types, and their usage conditions were absurdly restrictive...

Even if the two tribal warriors by his side weren't exactly weak, this sub-dragon species in front of them wasn't something that could be taken down easily just by Orc warriors buffed with Bloodlust!

"Roar!!" Possessing a small fraction of rock dragon lineage, the sub-dragon species let out a roar, and its rhino-ancestor-like body was instantly covered by a thin, earthy-yellow film. This was one of its few innate racial abilities, and its purpose was extremely singular—making itself much tougher to beat!

It was fortunate that it was so; otherwise, if this thick-skinned, high-defense, powerhouse of a beast possessed even a couple of offensive skills, Huo Yanyang and the other two tribal warriors would likely have perished long ago.

Lowering its massive head, the armored dragon-beast began to paw the ground with its forelegs. This was the sign that it was about to charge!

Striking fiercely twice on the battle drum hanging at his waist, Huo Yanyang cast the two Bloodlust buffs onto the two men in front of him, then immediately shouted at the top of his lungs, "You two scatter! Try to flip it from both sides later, I'll block it!"

"B-But, Lord Shaman..."

"Just do as I say first! I won't die for a while yet!"

"Yes!!"

After the two in front of him flashed aside as instructed, Huo Yanyang drew a bone dagger from the outer side of his boot, then violently slashed it across his arm, drawing a burst of scalding hot blood.

Behind him, the High Shaman revealed an imperceptible smile...

Skill activated: Bloody Battle Wild Song!

The handsome Orc with long red hair wore an expression that seemed somewhat conflicted, but at the exact moment the enemy began its charge, he still wailed at the top of his lungs in a hysterical voice:

"The Great River flows east toward the sea~~~!"

Light red wisps of mist continuously drifted out from his pores, then instantly flowed back, plating his exposed skin in a layer of crimson!

"The stars in the sky map out the Big Dipper~~~!"

His right arm, which had abruptly ballooned in size, slammed fiercely forward. The near-doubling of strength in that split second enabled Huo Yanyang to actually halt the armored dragon-beast's unfinished charge head-on. Although he was still shaken to the point of coughing up three liters of blood and losing nearly half his HP, he successfully stopped the enemy in its tracks!

"Hehehehe!" Huo Yanyang’s rather handsome face was flushed red for reasons unknown, and his bleeding left hand grabbed on, pressing the beast firmly in place. "Map out the Big Dipper~~~!"

The armored dragon-beast let out a low growl, and just as it wanted to fling away this little thing making crazy amounts of noise, it took a log to the head, making its vision swim with stars!

"Lifelong companions~~~!" Huo Yanyang pressed his head down low, wielding a totem pole he had just unhooked from his back, and began beating the face (head?) of this low-tier sub-dragon species with absolute malice. "A bowl of wine~~~!"

The two Orc warriors nearby were beside themselves with excitement. Howling like wolves, they lunged forward, cheering endlessly, "Awesome! Lord Shaman is mighty~~~!"

Ultimately, the armored dragon-beast was merely a sub-dragon of rather weak strength. After the yellow film on its body was shattered by the two brawny men in a flurry of blows, it finally showed signs of defeat. Struck on both sides of its torso in succession, it let out a heaven-shaking roar, opened its mouth wide to spew out something or other, only to have Huo Yanyang shove the totem pole straight back down its throat with a roar of "You have it, I have it, everybody's got it~~~!"

Then...

A resounding dragon roar suddenly rang out in the sky!

The leg muscles of Huo Yanyang—who had just cast aside his shame and prepared to strut his stuff—went weak on the spot. Did this thing really send away the young one only to bring in the old one?!

Watching as that armored dragon was about to be dealt with, a pure-blood one shows up instead?!

Muttering 'hehehehe everybody's got it' under his breath, Huo Yanyang looked up and discovered to his horror that a massive figure really was present in the sky not far away. That was clearly a genuine dragon!

And judging by its rapidly flapping wings and roars that grew louder by the second, it was blindingly obvious that this thing had flown in from afar to reinforce the enemy!

"Yanyang, all of you step back!" the High Shaman, who had been meditating with his eyes closed, said softly. Then, lifting his arm—which was barely thicker than a firewood stick—he raised the giant totem pole (which stood at least two and a half meters tall) with just one hand and slammed it upright before him with a thud. "This is no longer a trial you can endure!"

The three of them immediately abandoned the heavily injured armored dragon-beast and scrambled hastily behind the High Shaman.

"That dragon's emotions are extremely unstable," High Shaman Mando sighed, then gently patted the totem pole before him with the back of his hand. "I must first calm it down before I can communicate with it... Spirits of the earth, please hearken to my call..."

The air suddenly grew heavy, and a moment later, Huo Yanyang and the others saw a dark-yellow halo suddenly appear in mid-air. After hovering slightly above a spot not far from the High Shaman, it began to expand outward toward the dragon, whose oppressive aura was growing heavier by the second!

The other party reacted in time as well, letting out a resounding dragon roar: "What the—!"

Huh?

Why did it seem like he could actually understand that dragon roar just now...

Huo Yanyang was dazed for a second, right before witnessing a scene that utterly shocked him.

The dragon, swept by that halo, shuddered violently and then tumbled straight down from mid-air!

[The High Shaman's power is truly terrifying!]

The two tribal warriors nearby were dumbfounded. Turning their heads back, they saw the High Shaman, whose expression was somewhat stiff, suddenly loom much taller and more stalwart in their hearts!

"The mentor possesses boundless magical powers! Unrivaled in offense, invincible in battle, ruling over the Central Plains, possessing boundless divine might, enjoying eternal immortal blessings, and living as long as the heavens!" Without skipping a beat, Huo Yanyang turned around and knelt before his great mentor on the spot.

Yet why was the great mentor currently wearing such a blank expression...?

"Are you out of your damn mind?!"

The dust in the distance gradually cleared, revealing the icy-blue adult giant dragon roaring loudly at them: "I've been flying for so long I almost died of exhaustion on the road, and when I finally managed to find a place to land, why on earth did you attack me out of nowhere?!"

...

Turns out this dragon wasn't here to cause trouble?

A bead of sweat instantly formed on the High Shaman's temple. He waved his hands frantically and stammered, "A misunderstanding! We were just dealing with a violent sub-dragon species, and accidentally misjudged and grazed you—our sincere apologies!"

The two tribal warriors exchanged a glance, their admiration growing even deeper. As expected of a High Shaman; look at how he phrased that—not a single flaw!

"Oh~ So you guys were just grinding mobs?" Another voice sounded from beside the dragon's feet. Moments later, the group watched as a tall, human-yet-not figure walked toward them covered in dust and dirt. Pausing as he passed the armored dragon-beast, he came to a halt.

Raising a sharp, gleaming, pointed 'staff' high into the air, Cordova nodded at Huo Yanyang and the others, then backhanded the still-dazed sub-dragon with a blow that split its head open, proclaiming loudly, "Then allow me to assist everyone in battle!"

Chapter 50: End