"Go to hell!!"
The leopard-like dragon's body glowed, and a crackling, ominous sound echoed through the air.
In a flash, I unleashed the power of one of the swords in my hand — a demonic blade imbued with the power of lightning.
I swung the blade and released it at the same time!
The next instant, a thunderclap reverberated through the air.
A roar so deafening it could ruin your ears.
A flash of light so blinding it could crush your eyes.
And a scorching wind that burned the skin came rushing in.
"Bwahaha! There won't be a trace left of them after that!"
Amid the ringing in my ears, I could hear the leopard dragon's triumphant voice.
"My eyes, my eyes—!?"
The other dragon let out a pained scream.
It seemed the flash just now had damaged its eyes.
So blinding techniques worked on dragons too.
While analyzing that, I dashed forward.
The leopard dragon that had attacked me was convinced it was over and had let its guard down completely.
The other dragon was blinded and couldn't move properly either.
I couldn't miss this opening.
I clamped the thunder sword in my mouth and pulled four throwing knives from my Dimensional Storage with my free hand.
Those small-looking knives were actually explosive blades — knives that detonated on impact.
Though small, their power was more than sufficient.
While running, I threw the knives.
From the leopard dragon's perspective, completely off guard, it must have felt like knives came flying out of nowhere through the dust clouds kicked up by the earlier attack.
"Wha—!?"
The leopard dragon's cry and the sound of explosions.
However, its cry sounded more like surprise than pain.
In other words, it was startled but took no real damage.
But that was within expectations.
I burst through the dust cloud.
The other blade in my hand, a magic sword holding the power of fire, was already wreathed in flames.
Gripping it with both hands, I swung it toward the leopard dragon.
"Whoa—!?"
The leopard dragon recoiled involuntarily.
However, despite that clumsy reaction from the dragon itself, the purple lightning crackling around it was already streaming toward me with perfect accuracy.
"Tch!"
I pointed the thunder sword clamped in my mouth toward the sky, using it as a lightning rod.
The purple lightning that had been heading for me was absorbed by the thunder sword, unleashing another blinding flash.
The shock ran through my mouth, teeth, and jaw — all clamped around the thunder sword.
I clenched my teeth — literally — and endured it, then stepped forward and swung the fire blade once more.
But by then, the leopard dragon had already escaped beyond my reach.
"A-Ah, that was close!"
The leopard dragon's flustered voice.
In the time it took me to take one step, the leopard dragon had put about ten meters between us.
Sure enough, this thing was significantly faster than me.
And from our exchange just now, I was certain — this was a Thunder Dragon, a dragon that commanded lightning.
How troublesome...
I clicked my tongue inwardly.
A Thunder Dragon.
Dragons were troublesome in any element, but I considered thunder and dark to be the two most troublesome of all.
Dark dragons were rare in absolute numbers, so you almost never encountered one, which made them the lesser problem.
But Thunder Dragons were different.
They were just as numerous as dragons of other elements.
More than anything, Thunder Dragons had little territorial instinct and would frequently wander into human settlements without warning.
Thunder Dragons were probably the dragon species that the Human Race and Demon Race fought most often.
Their nature was simple and straightforward.
Lightning-based attacks and close-quarters combat that exploited their physical frame.
That was all.
But precisely because they were simple and straightforward, the fight came down to pure raw power.
The troublesome part was, of course, their lightning attacks.
The speed of lightning was beyond what a human could react to.
You could say it was nearly impossible to dodge.
And yet it was devastatingly powerful.
Any half-measure defense would be reduced to charred cinders in a single hit.
Dodging it was difficult. Blocking it was difficult.
True, its MP consumption was correspondingly fierce, but you'd be finished before it ran out of MP.
To face a Thunder Dragon, you needed at least the ability to withstand its lightning as a prerequisite.
I more or less met that prerequisite.
My proficient attributes were thunder and fire.
Because of that, I'd crafted many thunder magic swords and had also acquired resistance to it.
As I'd done earlier, a magic sword of the same element could withstand and even negate its attacks.
However, being able to defend only meant I'd met the minimum prerequisite to fight.
Without it, you couldn't even step into the ring.
In other words, I'd only managed to stand on the same stage.
Whether I could win — that, I didn't know.
The Thunder Dragon's greatest trait was its lightning attack, which was nearly impossible to avoid or block.
Beyond that, the first thing to mention was its speed.
Thunder Dragons had speed that far surpassed all their other stats, and their specialty was using that speed to outmaneuver enemies before hammering them with lightning.
Their physical attack power and magical attack power were both high.
In exchange, their defense — both physical and magical — was the lowest among dragon species.
They possessed the Dragon Scale skill unique to dragons, but because they rarely ever took hits in the first place, the skill level was often at the minimum of 1.
In other words, a fully attack-specialized type.
I, too, could be called an attack-specialized type, though in an unconventional way.
There was nothing notable about my defense.
In terms of stats, you could call me balanced, but my skills were completely skewed toward offense.
In other words, this fight would be a clash between two attack-specialized combatants.
My magic swords against the leopard dragon's lightning.
Which was superior, and who would land the first effective blow.
That was the kind of fight this would be.
...If it were just me and the leopard dragon, one on one.
"My eyes are finally starting to work again. Still all blurry though."
The pteranodon-like dragon shook its head.
"Hey, you! What are you being so calm for?! This thing actually survived my spark! It's bad news!"
"Jerk! Whose fault do you think it is that my eyes are still stinging?!"
"Just shut up and lend me a hand already!"
"Uh, right."
Both dragons readied themselves, no longer letting their guard down.
From their exchange, the leopard dragon might have had higher standing than the pteranodon-like dragon, but the casual way they spoke to each other suggested they were roughly equals.
From here on, both of them would be coming at me without any carelessness.
Not being able to land even a scratch during that perfect opening when they were still completely off guard was a huge mistake.
But it was too early to despair.
They were unharmed, but so was I.
The battle had only just begun.
With my hands slick with sweat, I gripped my magic swords anew and settled back into my stance.