Evil

One. Last. Gambit.

887 lives remaining.

I cracked my neck as I body slammed the dragon, forming light constructs with the Luciferous imprint and stabbing them into its open wounds.

The dragon switched tactics to ranged, shooting hundreds of pressurised droplets at me,"GLUTTONY!"

In an instant, some droplets turned into mana for me to use whilst others punctured my organs, killing me repeatedly as I stood up time and time again, charging forward whilst I sent light constructs straight at him alongside blood constructs with the aid of my Sanguine imprint.

Slowly but surely, I was beginning to whittle it down but I feared-

268 lives remaining.

I breathed heavily as I felt my mind slowly being broken. Dying repeatedly was mentally taxing, compounded by the overuse of mana and the stress of facing a rank 9 only made it a recipe for disaster with it having been only eight minutes being the cherry on top of this disastrous pie.

Seeing that its master was being attacked, it wanted to rush to aid her but I prevented it from heading back to help. This only infuriated it as its attacks got increasingly vicious,"God...fucking DAMMIT! HOW MUCH FUCKING MANA DO YOU HAVE?!" I growled in frustration as I landed another punch, knocking the thing back a few centimetres before it came back with murderous vengeance, its claws caving my chest in as I staggered back and died, only to revive once more to repel it.

"VIGOUR CRYSTAL!" In an instant, the triangles shot up to seventy purple triangles as my punches got doubly fast, landing punches powerful enough to send it flying into the wall as large craters had formed. My wounds head but alas-My mana had been overexerted.

193 lives remaining.

BAM!

The claws slammed me into the ground once more as the pain grew even more. It seemed the pain grew more heightened than numb,"Haaa! Haaa!" I hyperventilated as I dealt a staggering right hook, the dragon crashing into the wall, its entire body raw and bleeding.

Another minute had passed.

My eyes turned to Charlie's fight. It was clear even she was struggling to hold her advantage. Fifteen minutes most definitely wasn't enough.

Can't go on...Like this or I'll fucking die for real!

Suddenly, an idea crossed my mind. One I really didn't want to use simply because of the crippling pain that had been vividly described to me in detail by Tom.

It seemed it would be my last resort.

But I could hold on for a bit more,"COME ON YOU SON OF A BITCH!" I dashed headstrong once more into battle's fray with the agitated and infuriated dragon. While my mana and wounds repeatedly healed, it was a different story. They were piling on slowly but surely.

104 lives remaining.

The dragon needed to end it soon, frantic as it saw its master being severely injured by Charlie. It let out a string of combos which cut down my lives by another 33 as I dropped to 71 lives.

"HOW LONG MORE CHARLIE?"

"I NEED MORE TIME! TEN MINUTES!"