The Dragonslayer (title is a w.i.p.)

Chapter 8

'Good luck fighting with wood on your feet."

"Well, you came up with a better plan!"

'Ditch the hammer."

"I need the hammer!"

'Put the hammer on a big bit of wood and trail it behind you." Armin thought for a moment, then got to attacking a tree with his sword. It soon fell, and he got a strip of bark. Then he put his hammer on it, and lo and behold, it didn't sink in the snow. Then he got one of the branches of the tree and tied it to the wood. They started walking around when they suddenly entered a blizzard. It was very odd, as there was just sort of a cut-off point where it wasn't in effect. After a little bit more walking, they saw it. A gigantic ice dragon, sitting in a nest of eggs that were all as big or bigger than Brashik. They looked up at it to see a gigantic scar, which was when they realised that it was the same one that they had watched fight Muga-Unta, considering the size comparison. That meant this was probably Brek-poig, the dragon lord of ice. The dragon still hadn't noticed them, so Armin decided to creep up on it. Brashik quietly snuck around the front and then flew around its face, distracting it. Armin picked up his sword and slowly pushed it into the open wound. The dragon only cared about Brashik, sending beams of ice through the sky to try and get to it. Eventually, Armin's sword reached something hard, presumably bone. This was where he realised he needed his hammer because, because of the freezing temperatures, its bones were probably quite brittle. He lifted his great hammer and sank into the snow. Armin fought against the great weight and launched the hammer onto the dragon's back. He then shoved his sword into the dragon and used it to climb up onto its back. From there, he dug his sword into the dragon's back. He then saw Brashik fly just overhead. The dragon, now realising it was being attacked, stood up and flapped around like a turkey. It clearly didn't want to take off and leave its nest undefended, so it didn't move much from its spot. Brashik continued to fly around, but now it was more focused on Armin. It couldn't reach its head all the way around and instead blasted the air with ice, instantly turning the gentle snow into razor-sharp icicles. Brashik stood behind Armin and guarded him with his wing. Armin continued to dig his sword in and around in order to make a hole for his hammer. Armin raised his hammer and struck down on the exposed vertebrae. The dragon didn't seem to care at all, and the bones didn't crack, move, or seem damaged in any way. Armin hit it again, and again, and again. He then heard a squeal and assumed that meant he had done something to the dragon; what had actually happened was that it had kicked away something that was trying to get its eggs.

Armin felt the sharp, bitter cold as Brashik was knocked off the dragon's back by a beam of ice. Armin had to act quickly. He thought for a split second, then lifted out his sword and used it to electrify his hammer. The dragon fired a beam of ice at Armin. Armin lifted his hammer. Brashik stood up with an injured leg. The sheet of ice grew ever closer. Armin's hammer burst with electricity. Brashik tried to take off, but failed. The dragon kicked behind it, narrowly missing Brashik. Armin's hammer made contact with the dragon's bone; the lightening bolt instantly melted the icy armour that covered it and all of the dragon's blood that had been completely frozen by the manner in which it fired its ice. The melting of the blood stopped the way the dragon had access to blood, and soon its vital organs would stop working. The force of the hammer shattered its bones into millions of pieces. Armin jumped and grabbed a small amount of the blood for his flask, some of which he gave to Brashik, healing his injured leg. Armin saw the eggs in the nest; he didn't feel right about smashing them, yet he felt it would be better to do so. Before he could come to a conclusion, his thoughts were interrupted by a viscously loud roar. He turned around to see a pack of chupacabras; they seemed to want to eat the eggs. They ran at Armin and Brashik like a pack of wolves. There were 14 in total; 7 went for Brashik and 7 for Armin. Armin held his hammer in one hand and his sword in the other. Three of the chupacabras launched their tongs and wrapped them around his legs and neck, tying him down. Brashik spread out his wings, stabbing two of them, and then moved them around to knock over the ones grabbing his legs. He then used his wings to stab, slice, and gash the remaining 2. He then pecked aggressively and eventually went straight through the skull and head of the chupacabra, grabbing his neck. Armin hammered his hammer at one of the front-running chupacabras, knocking it into the one behind it. Armin then lunged forward, stabbing one of them. He lifted his sword above his head and slammed it down on the one behind him. He then spun around, holding his sword out, slicing straight through another one. He kicked one of them in the nose, knocking it over, and then stabbed it with his sword. Now he was next to his hammer, which he picked up and flung at the final one. Armin hopped on Brashik and began to head back to Dohl Gago.

Brashik was enjoying the flight, as he was able to just glide all the way back. As they reached just below the clouds, Armin saw a beam of light coming through the white carpet above and going all the way to the ground. When it reached the ground, it started a small fire that was soon put out by the wind. Armin saw a wild Terrorwing, 10 times the size of Brashik when Armin had first found him, though now he had grown quite a bit to almost one and a half times his previous size. The terrorists were already dead. Armin realised this was the work of a light dragon, and if its beam of light was strong enough to pierce a terrorwing's skin, it was most likely to be Treyis-Devi. Armin thought about attacking it, but with the hammer weighing Brashik down, he wouldn't stand a chance, not to mention that he wouldn't be able to collect its blood. He continued the flight, knowing roughly where to find Treyis-Devi.

Once they were there, Armin returned the hammer and walked into the temple to give Whek the blood. After being escorted in, he once again met Whek, wearing the same robe. He gave her the blood.

"Very good," she said, and started pouring it into a glass container. "The next dragon you face will be Ineg-yudel, over the Great Defrian Sea to the south." She sealed the container airtight. "After which you will find Treyis-Devi. You will know it is Treyis-Devi, as it is the only dragon of light. Then you can fight Muka-Unta. Again, bring me all three bloods mixed together." She put the sealed glass container above a fire, and it instantly began to boil. Then she added a white powder and resealed it. Armin was promptly kicked out of the temple and walked through town back to the hotel.

He woke up fairly late the next morning and hopped on Brashik's back immediately after breakfast. They started flying towards the sea, going over many fields and eventually a beach. Once they were on a beach, Brashik landed. Brashik wouldn't be much help fighting the Ineg-yudel since it could rip him straight out of flight, so instead Armin had a plan. He dove into the ocean and swam until he found a dunkleosteus. He led the great fish up to the surface, then hopped on its back, and he had a makeshift boat. At first, it wanted to eat Armin, but when he fed it a small chunk of the flesh of the giant crocodile he had previously been inside of, it soon became docile towards him. He drove the fish using Brashik's reigns until he saw a ripple going the opposite way of the waves. He looked on the horizon and saw a great hurricane over the sea. He heard Whek in his head telling him to keep searching. He started to wonder why she wanted the dragon lords' blood so much and why in such a particular order, but thought nothing of it. This was the leader of a city that worshipped a dragon, after all. He continued swimming in random directions until he found another dragon who also wasn't Ineg-yudel. After half an hour of searching for it, he eventually found it. It was almost a mile tall and barely seemed to be a physical creature at all, more like a collection of hurricanes and tornadoes arranged like a drake that flew above the seas. He drove the dunkleosteus towards it until it got caught in the whirlpool below, then he fired a lightning bolt at the creature. Which did absolutely nothing whatsoever. He commanded the dunklesteus to jump, and jump it did. It jumped so high that they were caught in the dragon's torso tornado. Before Armin could get dizzy, he was flung out. As he went through the air, he fired a thunderbolt at the dragon's head. Still nothing. Armin, still flying through the air, was caught in its arms and then flung elsewhere, only to get caught by something else. He saw how the dragon had no set physical form and was just a bunch of random items caught whirling in the air. All apart from two massive rib bones (presumably from some underwater creature) arranged like bull horns. A physical target was all that Armin needed; he pulled out his sword, aimed, and missed. He was ridiculously dizzy from being tossed around so much. He fired once again, hitting! The bone cracked and fell to the ocean depths. The dragon screeched an ear-piercing scream. The dragon then manipulated the air around Armin so that the sound kept coming back at him. Now he was dizzy and had an insanely bad headache. He fired and missed. Missed again. Over and over, he missed. He missed again and again. He tried aiming above, below, and to the side. Then he stopped. He thought back to how his powers worked, then realised As he was caught in the dragon's claw, he grabbed a random item, in this case, a giant snail. He hurled it at the dragon's head, channelling his electricity through it instead. The snail hit a boat caught in the dragon's head, and the lightning spread through to the dragon's horn, killing it.