---

“I’m going to face Dracula. Professor, please hold back the surrounding cavalry!”

“Ah, understood.”

There was a clear reason for Jenis’s judgment. On average, the ability of a vampire lord doesn’t measure up to Jeongjae’s. This was a fact acquired through experience from past battles. However, today’s Dracula was exhibiting a completely different demeanor, and given that the sun had already set, the possibility that Dracula’s power would surpass Jeongjae’s was very high.

Simply relying on overwhelming mana and output, if Jeongjae were to lose in a contest of strength, he would have no other way to overcome it. But Jenis belonged to the category of all-purpose geniuses who could handle three opposing attributes of mana: light magic, dark magic, and even divine power.

Moreover, it would be reasonable for Jenis, who could utilize the strengthened powers of vampires under the cover of night, to confront Dracula. Jeongjae had activated the fire magic circle in both hands and began indiscriminately unleashing attacks toward the incoming cavalry.

“Kyieeeeeek!”

The fierce flamethrower, more powerful than that of a crocodile tank, turned the goblins charging from the front into ashes before they could even react. One of the strongest attributes of fire is fear. In that aspect, while Jeongjae managed to hinder enemies through the flamethrowers, he did not achieve the other anticipated effects.

The intense flames quickly incinerated all vocal organs, leaving no time for proper screams. The goblins who, while engulfed in flames, could still manage to scream, were those who suffered the slowest and most brutally from the flames that clung to their fellows.

Watching his comrades die in a pain that was almost enviable for those who were lucky enough to perish instantly, the goblin bandits maintained their composure as if they felt no fear at all, following the skillful instructions of their riders, avoiding the fire spreading from the front ranks and forming a secondary encirclement.

Judging that he couldn’t achieve the desired effects with fire, Jeongjae took a deep breath and prepared his next spell.

“Let’s see how to deal with this!”

Jeongjae recognized the goblins’ greatest strength: their organization itself. Then perhaps one way to disrupt that organization would be to forcefully scatter it.

He stretched out both hands and used a powerful mental invasion spell against the bandits approaching from the front. A sort of magical betrayal tactic. Jeongjae intended to induce chaos among the goblins, leading them to strike each other with their own weapons due to mental confusion.

While the Grand Mage fought valiantly against the encirclement of goblins, Jenis was engaged in fierce close combat with Dracula wielding a wooden staff. The momentum on both sides was even. However, a closer look showed that Jenis was clearly at a disadvantage.

“You drank the blood of a dragon. It’s impossible to have this level of power otherwise.”

As Jenis barely managed to push back Dracula’s staff, she spoke. The wooden staff of the vampire lord disguised as a goblin shaman had transformed into a powerful dark magic weapon, harder than steel yet lighter than plastic. The greater issue than the weapon itself was the fact that Dracula wielding it had become an inconceivably strong force compared to before.

“You were too scared to drink the dragon’s blood that was right in front of you, huh, newbie?”

“That’s wrong. It wasn’t because I was scared.”

“Then why did you turn away from the source of the strongest power that flows within our bloodline? You must have felt it, the powerful allure of dragon’s blood.”

“Well, if you were human once, you would know, but most people naturally feel a strong attraction to sweet things, you know?”

Jenis spun her staff and said something nonsensical. As Dracula tilted his head in confusion, a cross necklace hidden in Jenis’s chest flew forward, radiating a bright white light.

“But I actually hate sweet food!”

The powerful sacred light beam extending from the cross necklace struck Dracula’s heart, causing him to stagger backwards. Jenis anticipated a fatal wound, but the vampire lord simply clutched the spot that was hit and groaned momentarily, seemingly not suffering a life-threatening blow.

“Damn it, seriously.”

Jenis wasn’t the type to casually curse, especially in front of Jeongjae, but seeing Dracula remain unfazed after taking the sacred light made her exclaim in frustration. Sacred attacks are typically the most fatal to vampires. While it was clear that he had taken some impact, if this spell couldn’t inflict a fatal wound, she had no idea how to hurt him.

As Dracula staggered, regaining his stance, Jenis took a deep breath and composed herself. This battle needed to be viewed in the long term. While both Jenis and Dracula had become stronger during the night, the current advantage lay with Jenis during daylight.

If they could hold out for hours until sunrise, their side might regain the upper hand, or Dracula, exhausted, might choose to retreat.

In any case, dying here was not an option. She couldn’t let anyone die here. With all her strength, Jenis swung her sword to counter the charging vampire lord.

Meanwhile, Jeongjae’s plans were not going smoothly.

“So I said to stab the goblin next to you!”

Jeongjae shouted fiercely while narrowly dodging the spear of a goblin bandit. No matter what protective magic was at work, even Jeongjae’s most powerful mental magic had no effect on the goblins. Helpless, Jeongjae gave up on the mental attack and switched back to physical elimination, regretting having wasted mana just to confuse the enemies.

In a situation where the fight could last for hours, even a massive mana tank like Jeongjae needed to conserve his magical power as much as possible. This mistake was a significant blunder, and one that he couldn’t comprehend why it had happened.

Amidst his continued struggles in synchrony with Jenis, Dracula noticed Jeongjae’s predicament and chuckled.

“There’s no way I can be defeated! The mind control spell bound to those guys was directly crafted by the Demon King himself! There’s no one in the world stronger in mental spells than him! It’s the same for any of you!”

“If we lost to the Demon King, then I suppose there’s no room to complain about unfairness.”

As Jeongjae made a large slash at one goblin with a gust of wind, he muttered. For three years, he hadn’t caught even a glimpse of the Demon King, and seeing him not jumping into the war directly made him wonder if perhaps the Demon King was just a figurehead or not that strong after all, but Walter decisively dismissed such thoughts.

“If I’m correct, the Demon King is too strong to participate directly in the frontline against humanity.”

Walter stated.

“For the Demon King, facing the Dragon Lord requires far greater power and authority than fighting us.”

Because he keeps his position, the lord of dragons is unable to move carelessly, thus it wouldn’t be easy for him to even shift his weight. While one couldn’t necessarily conclude that a “strong Demon King” follows from that alone, anyone who can suppress the lord of dragons simply by being present cannot possibly be weak.

“Excuse me, professor. Could you work a bit harder? I’m really doing my best here.”

Jenis complained while unleashing flames toward Dracula. Jeongjae turned to retort but had to acknowledge that he had been neglectful in his duties upon seeing Jenis personally slash a goblin rider with her sword.

“I’m sorry. I’ll reflect on this.”

Jeongjae sincerely apologized as he incinerated the goblins approaching toward Jenis. The Great Sage generously shrugged and accepted Jeongjae’s apology.

“Things like that can happen during a fight. It’s common for Princess Margaret to save her life while fighting, so don’t hold it against her just for helping.”

“That sounds very Margaret-like.”

Jeongjae sent a goblin flying with a strengthened punch. A fair amount of time had passed since the skirmish began, and even Dracula, who seemed overflowing with energy, was evidently growing anxious over the impending dawn.

The vampire lord momentarily weakened the encirclement using goblins before eyes locked onto the two mages.

“You’re persistent. More tenacious than I expected. I thought I could catch both of you, but it seems I underestimated you as much as you underestimated me.”

“I’ll admit the trap, Dracula. If it was designed to catch just one of us, you would certainly have achieved your goal. However, your plans lack something crucial to capture both of us at once.”

While Jenis slyly referred to herself as a “Grand Mage,” Jeongjae, the original owner of that title, remained unbothered. At Jenis’s current level, she had more than enough qualification to be called that.

“There is.”

“What?”

“There is a trump card that will lead you both to your death!”

At that moment, Dracula pulled out a glass vial filled with the blood of a dragon from his pocket and gulped it down. Jenis and Jeongjae had no idea what would happen next but knew one thing for sure: this was a very bad omen. As Dracula laughed while licking his lips after swallowing the blood of Etrias, enormous wings sprouted from his back.

However, “enormous” was an understatement; it was beyond any descriptive capacity.

Giant legs, a tail, claws, and a head began to emerge.

It was like buildings rising from the ground, or a human morphing into a monster; it was more extreme than a villain transforming into their second form after being defeated in a Power Ranger show.

What stood before them was no longer a mere vampire lord. A colossal dragon, not inferior in size compared to the first great Goljira, towered before them, standing tall and looking down at both Jenis and Jeongjae. Their faces went pale in unison as they looked up at Dracula-Dragon.

“Uh, we don’t have any transforming robots or anything, do we?”

“Professor, are you saying we have some kind of helpful spell or something right now?”

“No, just talking nonsense.”

“In that case, please hold on a bit longer. I’m seriously terrified right now. What is this… I didn’t expect this at all…”

Though visibly looking like a Black Dragon, he did not resemble a typical dragon in any way. Dragons of this world generally appear as giant lizards walking on four legs, yet Dracula’s transformed appearance was that of a wicked dragon one might see in a fairy tale, maintaining an upright posture with wings spread, reminiscent of a poorly reconstructed dinosaur from the 20th century.

Jeongjae thought he was seeing something familiar, but it was familiarity based purely on appearance. He too had no clue what this was or how to comprehend it.

“Um… I’m sorry. I don’t have anything useful to tell you.”

“Can I give you a small hint right now?”

“What is it?”

“Right now, if you don’t run, you’ll die!”

Jenis’s advice proved to be quite useful. The dark lightning that descended from the enormous monster’s mouth struck precisely between the two, creating a massive crater in the ground. Jeongjae and Jenis barely threw their bodies to the opposite side to evade Dracula’s attack. However, both began to question whether it was even appropriate to still refer to this being as Dracula.

“Is there, I don’t know, a time limit or something?”

Jeongjae spoke with a sliver of hope. Jenis nodded as if to affirm his thought.

“At least let’s hold out until sunrise. But if we can’t think of something sharp by then… what do we do then?”

Who knows the answer to that? Jenis’s desperate question faded hollowly into the darkness of the night.

 

---