The Milf's Dragon

The wave consumed Bhiran.

His staff came up at the last second which desperate block and not a proper defense. The cosmic energy slammed into the glowing shaft as its Metal screamed and its Light fractured.

BOOM!

He flew backward. Through the void. Past the ship and towards the moon as it rushed up to meet him.

CRASH!

He hit the surface. Stone shattered and dust billowed as a crater formed around his body, ten meters wide and deep enough to hide a house.

Bhiran groaned and pushed himself up as Moon rocks floated away in the low gravity.

"What the hell?"

He looked at his hands and His staff, Both were intact, barely. But the force... the force of that punch from a Tier 5, one star?

"Crazy one-star bastard!"

He pushed more rocks aside, floating free of the crater as His wings spread to stabilize him.

"Releasing your full force in one punch? Hah! Seems the gardener didn’t teach you anything!"

Then he shot upward. Fast. His staff glowed with its stored energy. He’d end this now, while the fool’s cosmic reserves were empty.

---

In the void above, Gorvax’s head tilted.

His featureless face betrayed nothing, but his posture shifted. A twitch. Almost imperceptible.

He had miscalculated. Owen was too new. Too inexperienced. The fight was too soon.

He raised his hand to intervene—Then stopped.

Because Owen’s face still held a resolute look.

Then The Dragon king’s system flared.

[DING!]

[2,000,000 mana converted to Cosmic Energy]

[Cosmic Energy: 2000 CE]

---

Then Bhiran closed the distance. His staff came down in a two-handed overhead strike that was meant to split Owen from skull to groin.

WHAM!

But Owen dodged.

Momentum Shift carried him forward, through the strike’s arc, inside Bhiran’s guard. The pirate captain’s eyes went wide.

Owen’s fist was already clenched.

Not 100 CE this time. Not the mers force of a one-star.

Two thousand CE, at this point Owen’s strike ventured into the threshold of a Tier 5, Three stars’ attack.

Then he punched and His fist connected directly with Bhiran’s face.

CRACK!

The sound was wet even without the void of space.

Bhiran’s head didn’t just snap back or twist sideways. It was crushed. Like an egg under a hammer. The halo around his neck flickered once, twice, then went dark.

His body floated freely Headless, Arms limp and his staff drifting away into the void of space

The crew’s screams echoed through the comm.

"NOOO!!! CAPTAIN!!!"

"L—let’s get out of here!"

Lunarel’s fingers flew across the holographic interface as the ship’s Engines roared to life and the ship began to turn.

But his eyes stayed locked on the monitor. On Owen’s energy reading.

He noticed in that moment of the second punch that it had spiked From Tier 5, one star to Tier 5, three stars. In an instant. No buildup. No nothing. Just a conversion of mana to cosmic energy instantly. Which was theoretically impossible to do simly.

"That’s... that’s not possible."

He didn’t have time to process it as the hyperdrive was charging. Fifteen seconds to jump.

He looked up.

And Gorvax was standing on the hull.

His robed feet planted on the metal as if it were solid ground. His hand reached into the air and pulled as a scythe materialized. Its blade gleaming with light along it’s black metal.

Lunarel screamed. "EVASIVE—"

Gorvax swung.

SHING!

The blade of the scythe passed through the ship like it wasn’t there. Through metal, through circuits, through the crew’s bodies. Like butter.

The ship split in two.

Then three.

Then four.

Each piece drifted apart, trailing sparks and atmosphere and the frozen bodies of the crew.

Gorvax floated among the wreckage as His scythe dissolved.

Then he turned to Owen.

"You should not have been able to do that."

Owen was breathing hard. His fist was still extended. His cosmic energy reserves were already refilling, m ana converting automatically now, a trickle instead of a flood.

"The conversion. The mana-to-CE exchange." Gorvax’s voice was cold. "That is not a normal function. I did not program it. Dominus did not program it."

Owen lowered his arm. "Regardless, it’s part of my system. Ist something that popped up after I got the CE foundation within me"

"Hmm... Your system should not exist. I should ...study you more" Gorvax floated closer. "...Your race should not exist.... Your abilities should not exist... You should not exist" He stopped an arm’s length away. "And yet, here you are. Converting mana into cosmic energy. Punching above your rank. Killing Tier 5, five-star opponents."

He was silent for a moment.

"Mana, being one of the mana branches of cosmic energy, cannot just be converted back into cosmic energy, without many, many, MANY experiments and supplements. So, your system being able to do that, is too much of an oddity. one that would get us caught in radars"

"We will leave sooner than planned. I need to understand more of what you are and your capabilities. Before the Tribunal finds out."

"Here..." Gorvax said as he pulled an item out of thing air again and tossed it to owen. It was a pair of fingerless gauntlets gloves.

"What’s this?" Owen asked, fitting the gauntlets perfectly into his hands.

But just there, as Owen wore it, he felt a familiar energy within its seams. "Gorvax....what the hell is this? I sense....outer divinity-miasma within it"

"Outer-divinity?" Gorvax questioned. "What is with you lesser world beings and attributing every foreign thing to some sort of Gods or divinity"

"Huh?" Owen titled his head.

"Listen..." Gorvax pointed at the glove gauntlets. "The energy you’re referring to is another branch of energy from cosmic energy, one that compliments the use of cosmic energy well enough to be refined and then used as a weapon."

"It is the refined energy from the cores of beings called Desolate beasts. It will supplement your use of cosmic energy perfectly through your fists. So don’t be afraid of it"

Owen nerves settled down as he now flexed his fists.

"Alright" he said.

Then he looked at the wreckage. At Bhiran’s body, still drifting toward the moon. At the halo, dark and dead.

"What about them?"

"They were vagrants. No one will miss them." Gorvax turned. "Come. We have much to practice."

He flew toward the portal and Owen followed.

Behind them, the pieces of the ship spun slowly through the void.