Reborn As A Dragon!?

The second I spoke, Ynos already shot forward. His head was lowered as he aimed his horns at my face. My right claw moved before I could think, and I swatted his attack sideways. Ynos didn't seem too surprised. He quickly followed with a swing of his tail, forcing me to retreat a few steps.

No matter how strong my physical body has gotten, it was still nowhere near as strong as Ynos's. A strike from his spiky tail was definitely something I'd rather avoid.

With the distance between us increasing, I took advantage of the situation to launch a few ice spears aiming for his face and joints.

Ynos did not panic, and instead, calmly raised an earth wall to shield himself. I didn't want to give him any time to breathe, nor set the pace of the fight, and so the second my ice spears collided with his shield, my body lunged at him aiming for his hoofs.

Ynos was unaware of my intention, and so as soon as his shield disappeared, canceled by my attack, my claws quickly followed. His eyes widened in surprise, yet contrary to my expectations, Ynos managed to twist his body and swat away my attack.

My momentum sent him flying back to the entrance of the cave, but he was unharmed.

"Not bad, little brother."

With a wide grin, Ynos walked over before speaking:

"I can say the same about you, brother. You are not using mana as much as I thought you would. That makes this so much more fun!"

After saying that, Ynos flapped his wing and shot forward with impressive momentum. I instantly jumped to the sky to avoid clashing head-on, yet it was then that vines broke through the ground and held me by the hoofs.

I easily broke free, but that split second of surprise was more than enough for Ynos; to arrive. I hastily summoned a water shield before me, just in time as his massive horns reached me.

The shield was unable to stop him completely. And I was forced to raise my claws to defend myself against him. The force of the impact was enough to send me sailing through the air, with the wind knocked out of my lungs.

My claws and hooves desperately grabbed at the ground to stop myself, leaving behind long claw marks. Ynos hastily switched direction with his wings, and earth spears suddenly materialized in the air surrounding me.

I quickly summoned ice spears to counter his earth ones and hastily retreated. But it was at that moment that more earth vines broke through the surface aiming to slow me down. I felt the changes in mana as they appeared, yet it was still hard to completely avoid them.

That ended up slowing me down even further. Meanwhile, Ynos was continually raining earth spears at me, whilst I was countering them with my ice spears. Continuous booms echoed throughout the floating mountain as we entered a strange stalemate.

"Well, is that all you are going to be doing now? Where did all your false bravado go to?" I said with a grin, in an attempt to steer his emotions.

Ynos's eyes widened for a second before a savage grin extended across his face. He let out a roar and increased the number of earth spears raining down, but to my surprise, he did not rush ahead.

'Not bad,' I inwardly noted with a smile. 'But It's time to end this.'

I could see that Ynos was gathering mana in an attempt to try something. But I wasn't going to let him do as he pleased. I closed my eyes and relied on my senses to continue fending off his earth spears.

I reached out inside my soul space. The dragon statue resonated as a strand of cosmic mana shot outwards and into the sky. A second later, the sea of cosmic mana descended and surrounded me. I accumulated it all and pulled it towards me.

Ynos seemed to sense that something was wrong, and tried to hasten his plans, but unfortunately for him, it was already too late. With a roar, the cosmic mana burst outwards with my body at the center.

The ice spears disappeared, followed by the earth spears. Anything the mana touched seemed to simply disappear. It even managed to interfere with Ynos's mana.

A second later, the earth and ice spears reappeared, only this time aimed for Ynos from all directions.

"Damn it!" He cursed out and hastily tried to summon a shield to protect him, yet using the cosmic mana, I managed to interfere with that, delaying the process by a couple of seconds.

Those couple of seconds were all I needed as the rain of spears hailed down upon him. "Damn it!" With another curse, Ynos turned to face the attacks with a defiant expression, and let out a savage cry.

Explosions quickly followed as a large cloud of dust rose, making it impossible to see his figure. Still, I was calm. I could clearly sense his mana and his presence.

As soon as the cloud of dust settled, Ynos could be seen standing there panting. His scales were still intact, but he looked tired. Lowering his head in defeat, he spoke:

"That's cheating, brother."

"Haha, hey I didn't go full out you know. Instead of aiming for the mana, I could have aimed for you. That's why I keep telling you, that while it's good that your body is the strongest, you got to train your mana to help compliment it."

Ynos nodded, as I approached and asked:

"Do you think I can stand against your cosmic mana one day, using nothing but my body?"

"This, bastard!" I playfully slapped his head with my tail before answering, "Didn't you hear what I just said?"

A chuckle escaped Ynos's mouth as he nodded. "I did, but brother, It's still more fun to use your body, rather than rely on mana."

Shaking my head, I sighed before speaking:

"Well, I don't know if that's possible. But, if anyone was to do it, then I'm sure it'll be you. Just... Try not to ignore your mana training."

Hearing that, Ynos's face lit up as he happily nodded. Both of us laid down near the entrance, gazing at the horizon in silence.

"So when did you come back?" I asked.

"A week or so? What about you, brother? Where were you?"

"Oh, Let me tell you! You see, it all started when I tried to experiment with teleportation."

"Teleportation?"

"Yes! Teleportation..."