1892 Wisdom Against Mana (Part 2)

Yet once the smoke cleared, the Guardian of Mana stood unscathed. His colossal body, over 30 meters (100') high at the withers was surrounded by a multi-colored sphere that had absorbed the power from Roaring Destruction, making it its own.

"Guardian of Mana, remember?" He said with a wolfish smile as he unleashed his Guardian Tier Mirror Magic Spell, Elemental Curse. "Just because you guys are too scared to dabble with the Cursed elements, it doesn't mean that others should do the same."

The six cursed elements had fed upon Leegaain's Spirit Magic to restore their balance and Roghar had simply split them from their opposite element again as soon as they absorbed it, doubling their strength with minimal effort.

Elemental Curse had now the power of two combined Guardian Tier spells that the Fenrir fired against the Dragon in waves. A pillar of Zero froze Leegaain's wings, stopping his flight and making the rest of the pillars hit him like a fish in a barrel.

Cinder vaporized the wings, Choke entered Leegaain's mouth, burning his lungs and suppressing his Origin Flames.  Corruption turned all the minerals inside his cells into acid, eating at him from the inside.

Chaos exploded into countless black spears that filled him with holes so big that Roghar could see through them. Decay made all the wounds fester and rot, creating scar tissue that went beyond the flesh and reached Leegaain's life force.

As the mangled body of the Guardian of Wisdom plummeted in a pillar of smoke, Roghar never stopped chasing his prey. A bite at the base of the neck and a strong twist decapitated the Dragon, putting an end to the fight.

"Let's see if you can survive without a heart and a brain." The Fenrir said while resuming his rush toward the beach.

The whole encounter had lasted barely ten seconds, but they were still ten seconds too long. If Leegaain had noticed him, the other two knew of the Guardian of Mana's presence as well. Roghar had no time to waste and had double tapped Leegaain hoping that Salaark would waste time retrieving his corpse.

Or so he thought until a blast of Origin Flames struck him from the back and his whole body exploded in a ball of fire.

"What the heck?" The Fenrir said while turning around.

Only then did he notice that there was a second head on top of a second neck. What he had previously mistaken for a hump was actually a spare brain that Leegaain had prepared in advance.

"Running away like that is rude." The new head had caught the severed neck in mid-air and was now reattaching it. "I'm far from over and you foiled my trap. I was expecting you to blast me into pieces with a charge."

"Hydras! I forgot you sired those damn Hydras as well!" Roghar replied as five more heads grew from Leegaain's spine.

"Well, yes. I learned a trick or two from them. Guardian of Wisdom, remember?" One head used his breathing technique, Worldkeeper, to heal his wounds and recover his strength.

Another used Body Sculpting to remove the scars from his life force while the others conjured spells in unison.

"Mirror Magic is a nice trick. I'll give it a try as well." The five remaining heads conjured one Guardian Tier Elemental Curse each and aimed them at Roghar.

The Fenrir cursed his bad luck as the uncanny speed of the cursed elements beat that of the activation of his elemental sealing arrays, forcing him to relocate them around himself to stop the onslaught before it killed him.

By the time the magical formations activated, half of his body had already been annihilated.

"Since when did you study Mirror Magic? I thought you were afraid of its madness-inducing effects." Roghar asked while using his breathing technique, Mana Heart.

"I never did. I just learned from you."

When his eyes regenerated, Roghar noticed that Leegaain was standing on floating platforms as well.

He was using Roghar's same spell, staring at him with seven pairs of eyes.

Each one of them had three vertical pupils that crossed each other, forming a six-pointed star. It was the bloodline power that had given birth to Dragon Eyes in his offspring and inspiration to Silverwing for her Hexagram.

Leegaain's Eyes studied the mana flow coursing through Roghar's body, reading the rune patterns of his spells as soon as he conjured them. To them, every spell that the Fenrir kept at the ready was an open book that he could study.

"What you told Salaark is true. You have created more spells than all the rest of the Guardians combined. That's why she sent me. I've learned more spells than all the rest of the Guardians combined." Leegaain said.

"Do your worst, hungry cur. I'll record every one of your prized spells and add them to my collection."

Then, six new elemental sealing arrays appeared around Roghar, nullifying his own and making him plummet toward the ocean. Without Elemental Tide, Leegaain couldn't move his arrays but he could cast more along the Fenrir's falling trajectory.

'If Roghar Spirit Blinks, I can see where he appears and punish him hard. If he tries to Spirit Fly away, I can just force him back inside the array field with regular spells and he'll run out of mana much faster than I do.

'Whatever spell he weaves, I can see it and plan accordingly. This should be checkmate.' Leegaain thought.

Contrary to his expectations, Roghar did nothing. He let himself fall into the ocean, diving into its dark depths.

'Smart son of bitch!' Leegaain thought. 'My Eyes can't see him underwater nor can I follow him without shapeshifting. He must know that water is the weakness of my-'

His train of thought was interrupted when a Warp Steps opened behind him. The Dragon expected Roghar to strike from the dimensional door but all that came out of it was water.

An enormous pillar of water that struck with the energy, mass, and speed of a falling mountain.

The Fenrir had used the high pressure of deep waters and combined it with the limited size of the Steps to further enhance the speed of the blast.

Leegaain was caught by surprise and the liquid sapped his inner fire, further slowing down his reaction time.

As second and a third Steps poured more water on him, pushing the Father of all Dragons inside a fourth that brought him into an air bubble underwater, where Roghar was waiting for him.

The bubble popped the moment Leegaain arrived and the ocean swallowed them both. The water pressure weighed on the Dragon's wings much more than on the Fenrir's fur, making his movements clumsy.

Without air, all of Leegaain's Flames were sealed, turning a mighty Dragon into an oversized lizard. To make matters worse, not only did the ocean drain Leegaain's strength by the second but it also blurred his vision, making his Eyes useless.

Roghar exploited the opportunity to unleash the Guardian Tier spells he had prepared underwater and strike at the Dragon's vitals at the same time to keep him off balance.

His maw ripped one of Leegaain's heads off while the claws scratched away scales and flesh alike, digging toward his heart.