Chapter 390 - 390: Ren VS Water God Dragon (Part 2)
The sudden shift in the atmosphere left the three Dragon Eaters profoundly disoriented. The overwhelming magic they had been tracking had abruptly changed its very nature.
A second terrifying pulse of energy washed over them—a dense, suffocating force that rivaled the overwhelming might of the Water God Dragon.
Boom—!
Two unfathomable forces collided in the distance. The sky instantly warped, churning violently as heavy, dark clouds surged across the horizon. It was as if heaven and earth themselves raged against the clash.
The ocean below churned in response to the oppressive pressure. Towering waves spread in all directions, crashing into one another and shattering into a heavy, torrential rain.
"There's another guy?!" Kiria gasped, her feral eyes widening in surprise.
She could barely comprehend the sheer scale of the shockwaves tearing through the air. Another being of this absurd caliber had suddenly appeared, and the two were already engaged in an apocalyptic deathmatch.
"Could it be one of the other Five God Dragons attacking the Water God Dragon?!" Madmole guessed, crossing his heavily armored arms over his chest to shield his face from the biting wind.
"Let's go! Let's take a closer look!" Skullion Raider commanded, his tone calm but laced with underlying intrigue.
Skullion immediately led the pair forward to observe the battle from a higher vantage point. They needed to ascertain the exact identity of the second combatant. If two of the Five God Dragons were fighting and both ended up heavily injured, this little expedition of theirs would yield an unimaginable profit.
The three dark mages quickly reached a jagged cliffside where they could clearly observe the turbulent battlefield. They took extreme care to mask their magical signatures, ensuring they didn't get close enough to risk being discovered by the battling behemoths.
Then, through the clearing mist, the trio saw him. He was a man seemingly made entirely of blazing golden particles, fiercely engaged in close-quarters combat with the Water God Dragon.
"Who the hell is that guy?!" Kiria muttered, her jaw dropping slightly.
All three of them were completely baffled. They had traveled across the entirety of the Guiltina continent and had never seen or heard of a mage possessing such terrifying, radiant power.
"Is he another humanoid Dragon?" Madmole asked, his brow furrowing beneath his helmet.
The trio assumed the golden-shrouded opponent simply had to be a humanoid Dragon. In their minds, anyone capable of fighting the Water God Dragon head-on without instantly dying would surely have to be a monster of the exact same caliber.
Down below, Ren was locked in an intense, bone-rattling melee with Mercphobia.
The Water God Dragon had lived for four hundred years, and they had by no means been a peaceful four centuries. Although the dragon now appeared to be a polite, refined, and amiable entity when uncorrupted, his past was forged in blood.
In the ancient era, he had fought desperately just to survive. Bearing the legendary title of one of the Five God Dragons meant his raw strength inherently rivaled that of the other cataclysmic deities; even weakened, the drop in his power was negligible.
Four centuries of brutal combat experience, coupled with a Dragon's indestructible physique and a volume of Dragon Force that far exceeded any ordinary magic power, made his physical strikes undeniably terrifying.
While Ren hadn't lived for centuries, he possessed the ingrained muscle memory of over a dozen top-tier experts from entirely different dimensions. Combined with the godlike speed and reflexes of Minato Namikaze's Kurama Link Mode, he met the Water God Dragon head-on.
Fists clashed against watery, razor-sharp claws, sending localized shockwaves rippling across the surface of the sea. Ren wasn't just holding his own; fueled by instantaneous bursts of speed, he was actually gaining a slight advantage in the melee exchanges.
[Akarin's Note: 'Negative Emotion Sensing' is a unique sensory ability granted by the Nine-Tails' chakra. Unlike standard magical tracking or Observation Haki, which senses energy or physical presence, this allows the user to literally feel the malicious intent, hatred, or greed of others, making stealth entirely useless against them.]
The moment Kiria and the other two approached the cliffside, Ren had already detected them. In his Kurama Mode, his perception of good and evil was terrifyingly acute, easily comparable to the absolute top-tier Observation Haki found in the world of the Pirate King.
"Hmm?" Ren raised a golden eyebrow, his glowing cloak flaring in the wind.
He could practically taste the foul stench of their avarice. It seemed those three rats from Diabolos were planning to sit back and reap the benefits while the two combatants exhausted each other.
"Don't mind those three rats, Ren!" Mercphobia suddenly roared, his voice echoing with dual layers of draconic power. "You are strong. Very strong! This is the first time I've ever met such a powerful human! Don't let irrelevant fellows disturb our battle!"
The Water God Dragon had naturally discovered the three dark mages lurking on the cliffs as well. Now that he was operating at full power, every single drop of the nearby sea served as an extension of his own senses.
Mercphobia grew increasingly excited as their high-speed exchanges continued. Battling Ren brought him a long-lost thrill, a primal rush of adrenaline he previously only felt when fighting to the death against the other Five God Dragons.
"Alright then!" Ren shouted back, a confident smirk playing on his lips.
Truthfully, Ren was far too lazy to bother dealing with those three pests right now. While their strength as Fifth-Generation Dragon Slayers was decent by normal standards, to him, it was merely that—decent. If he were completely serious, all three of them combined wouldn't last a single round against his current speed.
Ignoring the spectators, Ren and the Water God Dragon continued their earth-shattering battle.
The terrifying fluctuations of magical energy and dense chakra instilled absolute, paralyzing fear in all nearby marine creatures, sending them fleeing into the abyssal depths.
Up on the cliffs, Kiria, Madmole, and Skullion now wore incredibly solemn expressions. The reality of the situation had finally set in: the Water God Dragon had never been fighting them seriously.
If Mercphobia had exerted even a fraction of his current, world-breaking power, the three of them would have long since been reduced to an unrecognizable red paste.
Although the Dragon Eaters deeply coveted the flesh and blood of the Five God Dragons, they valued their own miserable lives even more.
"He's so strong! Both the Water God Dragon and that glowing golden freak are undeniably terrifying," Madmole stated, taking a cautious step backward. "With our current strength, we couldn't possibly face them. Let's leave quickly before they decide to turn their attention to us!"
Madmole was purely pragmatic. The battle between these two titans had far exceeded their physical capabilities. The Five God Dragons truly lived up to their apocalyptic reputation. Having dominated the Guiltina continent for so many years, they were indeed entities that could not be underestimated.
"Coward! This is a rare, once-in-a-lifetime opportunity!" Kiria hissed, her feral eyes gleaming with a manic, bloodthirsty light. "These are two beings on the level of the Five God Dragons. As long as they fight each other and end up mutually wounded, we can swoop in and devour them both!"
Kiria licked her lips, her razor-sharp teeth glinting in the dim light. "Once we eat them, we'll become the absolute kings of the entire Guiltina Continent!"
Devouring the flesh of Dragons was the only way their unique magic could evolve. They had slaughtered and devoured many lesser Dragons in the past, but the power they gained was still far inferior to the monstrous auras radiating from the two fighters below.
Moreover, almost all the standard Dragons on this continent had already been hunted down and eliminated. That was precisely why their Guild Master had set their sights on the impossible targets: the Five God Dragons.
Madmole sighed heavily and looked at Skullion. He hoped the Ash Dragon Slayer, who usually possessed a remarkably steady personality, would easily persuade the psychotic Kiria to leave.
Unexpectedly, Madmole was dead wrong. Not only did Skullion refuse to stop Kiria, but a sinister smirk stretched across his face.
"Kiria is right," Skullion said smoothly, his eyes narrowing as he analyzed the destruction below.
"Sir Skullion?!" Madmole gasped, genuinely taken aback.
Even Kiria blinked in surprise. She hadn't expected the usually cautious Skullion to agree with her suicidal idea.
"This is an unimaginably rare opportunity," Skullion explained, his voice low and calculating. "Two beings of this caliber are fighting, and it clearly doesn't seem to be a casual brawl. The absolute best outcome for us is mutual destruction, though that's admittedly unlikely."
Skullion crossed his arms, his mind working a mile a minute. "The worst outcome is that they suffer minor injuries and exhaust a massive amount of magic power. It's unlikely that both of them will be left completely helpless, but if even one of them is left vulnerable enough for us to devour, that alone would enhance our strength to unprecedented heights."
Skullion was a deeply composed man, but his rational demeanor didn't mean he lacked ambition. His greed was arguably even greater than Kiria's; however, unlike her feral impulsiveness, he preferred to act upon a calculated, foolproof plan.
Kiria's eyes lit up with predatory glee. "That's right! Ha! Skullion, I'm really starting to see you in a whole new light!"
Madmole groaned, massaging his temples through his helmet. "In that case, I suppose I'll just have to risk my life and accompany you lunatics."
The three of them were an elite squad. Since two had already agreed to stay and wait for an opening, Madmole naturally had to remain and provide his impenetrable defense if things went sideways.
Down on the turbulent surface of the ocean, Mercphobia suddenly pulled back. He took a massive, chest-expanding breath, gathering an ungodly amount of magic power into his lungs before unleashing a heaven-shaking roar directly at Ren.
The Water Dragon's Roar was unleashed as a hyper-pressurized pillar of dark blue water. It could not be underestimated as merely a massive water jet; amplified by Dragon Force, the crushing destructive power of the roaring torrent was absolutely terrifying—dense enough to obliterate entire mountains upon impact.
[Akarin's Note: A 'Tailed Beast Bomb' (Bijūdama) is the ultimate attack of a Tailed Beast in the Naruto universe. It is created by precisely compressing positive white chakra and negative black chakra at an 8:2 ratio into a hyper-dense sphere, which is then fired with apocalyptic destructive force.]
Seeing the incoming attack, Ren didn't even flinch. He casually raised both of his glowing hands, and the surrounding air began to warp and distort.
Particles of red and blue energy rapidly converged between his palms. Within mere milliseconds, a hyper-dense, black-purple Bijūdama formed, vibrating with immense kinetic energy.
Ren thrust his hands forward, and the Bijūdama shot toward Mercphobia's attack like a world-ending cannonball.
Bang—!
The two colossal forces collided violently in the dead center of the battlefield.
The spinning Bijūdama pushed forward with unyielding force, grinding fiercely against the incoming torrent. Meanwhile, the Water Dragon's roar continuously crashed into the dense chakra sphere, attempting to crush it beneath millions of gallons of pressurized water.
For a brief, breathless second, the two attacks hung in a state of perfectly balanced equilibrium. And then, the pressure reached its absolute breaking point.
Boom—!!!
The Bijūdama exploded.
It was like a miniature, blinding sun detonating directly over the sea. A catastrophic shockwave tore through the atmosphere, instantly vaporizing the surrounding ocean into thick, suffocating clouds of white steam.
The dazzling, purple-white light enveloped absolutely everything for miles around. The displaced sea formed a terrifying, sky-high tsunami that spread relentlessly outward from the sheer impact of the explosion, threatening to drown the distant coastlines.
It took quite a while for the violently churning sea to finally calm.
[Akarin's Note:
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