624,

An unprecedented battle erupted.

The Great Dragon's fury began to burn. One blast to the left, another to the right—it fired wildly in every direction.

It was practically spitting everywhere without a care for reason, a destroyer of civilization.

But Marcina didn't even bother dodging. The Great Dragon was firing so wildly that Marcina herself wasn't the target at all.

But it couldn't be helped. It was no wonder the Great Dragon was acting like this.

Aiming at Marcina in the first place was no easy task, and the Great Dragon had no rules of combat to follow.

Anyone who dared provoke it would die—and so would every living thing on that land.

Carrying the fury of the strongest race, the Great Dragon launched a wild assault.

Marcina hadn't considered that possibility, so she could only keep unleashing the giant water spheres from before, planning to neutralize the Great Dragon's attacks one by one.

“Hey!! Stop it already!!”

Even as a great mage—and precisely because she was one—Marcina knew her own mana consumption very well.

If she kept fighting the Great Dragon like this, her mana would be drained completely before long.

“Hey!! You still won't stop?!!”

Marcina spun once in midair, and the staff in her hand instantly transformed into an enormous iron hammer.

With one powerful swing, she smashed it straight into the Great Dragon's head.

But the Great Dragon swept its tail around and blocked the hammer, then used its tail to wrap up Marcina's giant weapon.

After pinning down Marcina's staff, human and dragon stared at each other for one second.

Marcina stared directly into Babe's eyes. At that moment, Babe merely tilted its head to the side.

“Ptooey!”

The Great Dragon spat toward a different direction from the one the staff was pointing at.

Marcina saw that tiny spit clearly.

She tried to stop that attack with a giant water sphere, but the instant she swung her staff, the Great Dragon's tail suddenly gave a powerful yank.

That made Marcina too late to swing her staff, leaving her able to fire the water sphere only through her palm.

Unfortunately, the water sphere failed to take shape, and Marcina could only helplessly watch that wad of spit fly toward the homes.

“No!!!”

An explosion followed, but it exceeded the Great Dragon's calculations.

The explosion's range was incredibly small—so small that even the Great Dragon was taken aback.

Looking closely, there was a man standing at the place where the explosion should have occurred.

“Lord Godio! The impact demolished the houses behind us!”

“No one got hurt. That's already good enough!! Don't ask for too much!!”

That attack truly left Marcina dumbfounded.

The roughhousing from before could still be understood. Those had all been unintentional attacks, like something children would do.

But sealing away all of Marcina's defenses just to make absolutely sure the attack hit its target—

That was no longer roughhousing.

“You can't do this! Magic is supposed to bring happiness, not be used to create suffering!!”

“Tch! Don't start saying that now! You shouldn't have lured this dragon over here in the first place!”

A powerful blast of wind pressure burst from Marcina's staff, forcibly making the Great Dragon release its tail.

For the Great Dragon, that attack had indeed been effective.

“Compared to converting attributes through a staff, sticking to your own specialty really packs a punch, huh~”

In response to the strongest dragon's praise, Marcina merely tightened her grip on the staff.

“If I hadn't sent a message like that, how else could I have lured you over here to play with me!!”

The conversation had gone far beyond what the Great Dragon expected, and for a moment, it didn't know how to respond.

“Th-Th-this dragon came here for you to play with?!!”

“What else would it be?! Playing is a basic human activity!!”

Faced with Marcina's utterly self-righteous attitude, the Great Dragon could only let out an angry roar.

“Bullshit! I'm a dragon!!!”

“But if you transform, doesn't that make you human?”

“Damn it!! That counts too?! Then what's the point of distinguishing dragons from humans?!”

“We're all living creatures. Can't we all just love one another?!!”

“Dammit!! How can someone like you even exist in this world!!”

After two or three exchanges, the Great Dragon had reached a conclusion.

It stopped paying attention to Marcina's words and stopped spitting. Instead, it began gathering power in its mouth, preparing to unleash a full-force blast.

A mighty force gathered in its mouth, forming a gigantic sphere of light before shooting toward Marcina.

At the same time, Marcina used her staff as a cannon, forming a huge fireball at its tip.

The two massive spheres of magical power collided, instantly erupting into a powerful shock wave.

Caught in the shock wave, Marcina was blown away.

Marcina shouldn't have confronted it head-on, but a moment of impulsiveness had caused her to misjudge the situation.

“Hmph. Although you do have a little strength among the human race…”

Watching Marcina fly toward the ground, the Great Dragon spoke arrogantly.

“But trying to trade blasts with me? You're underestimating the dragon race a little too much.”

After that exchange of fire, Marcina crashed into a building and passed out.

Meanwhile, the Great Dragon she had provoked continued to burn the earth with its own fury.