Chapter 67: Dragon vs Demigod
{Mount Tamalpais--San Francisco, 2nd of May 2005}
The night air was thick and oppressive as I arrived once more at the base of the mountain I had decided to come at night since with my vision it didn't matter if it was night or day and I hoped that would give me a bigger advantage over Ladon since I couldn't use my incantation so as to overpower him in one blow. The trees of the mountain becoming more dense the more I climbed the mountain of despair, finally I heard it.
-ROOOOOAAARRR-
Then I saw it, Ladon once more barreling down the mountain, a protector doing its solemn duty of killing anything it could see. I could swear Ladon, was even bigger than he had been yesterday though that could maybe just be a comparison because the red aura surrounding the beats had definitely grown, its hundred heads, each one glaring with malice and hunger, its tail swinging wildly destroying every other tree which its heads might have missed.
Wait now that I thought about it, Ladon had ripped out most of these trees a day before, how come they grew back so quickly, looking closer it wasn't that the trees had grown back just that the Mist had disguised them as such.
Ladon's heads swayed rhythmically, a hypnotic dance of death. Each head had a pair of glowing, malevolent eyes that seemed to see everything, everywhere. The dragon roared once more the sound shaking my entire body from the inside out.
"Time to end this," I muttered to myself, feeling the familiar tingle of power in my right hand. My tattoo pulsed with power, and I could feel the weight of the spear materializing in my grasp. Shadowy tendrils entered my body fueling me with strength, and even more uncoiled from the trees slithering along the ground, ready to strike.
Ladon's heads reared back, and then the beast struck. A dozen heads lunged towards me, venom dripping from their fangs. I dived into the shadows, teleporting instantly to the other side of its body. The heads crashed into the ground where I had stood moments before, hissing in frustration.
I emerged from the shadows onto one of Ladon's heads, my spear puncturing through its scales. The blade stabbed into the head's brain, this had been my plan, if I couldn't defeat him by overpowering him then I would just take my time. From what little I had seen of him yesterday he used his heads so as to protects its vitals so I just needed to kill of all his heads.
The other heads roared in fury, as one of its heads slumped to the ground.
Another teleport, another lobotomy. But Ladon was learning. The next time I emerged from the shadows, a head was waiting. Venomous fangs snapped inches from my face as I barely managed to teleport away. I reappeared in the branches of a nearby tree, my breath steady I looked down at my shirt now burnt up to the shoulder since some acid had dripped on it from one of the head's mouths.
The dragon's heads were everywhere, breaking through every tree that stood on its path, seeking out its newest meal. I stretched out my shadowy tendrils, trying to bind one of the heads, but Ladon was quicker. Another head lashed out, severing my tendril with a swipe of its fangs. Acidic venom splattered on the ground, hissing and smoking.
I gritted my teeth, feeling the burn of the venom that had splashed on my arm. Ladon's heads were a perfect defense, constantly moving, constantly attacking.
"Come on, Ozzy, think," I muttered, teleporting again as another head struck. I needed a new plan, a way to get kill the heads. And then it came to me.
I held my spear at my side, I withdrew all my tendrils and covered my entire body and spear with it, almost like an armor made out of shadows, then I put my plan into action.
As Ladon's heads surrounded me, I dived headfirst into the maw of the one in front of me, with the form an olympic swimmer if I say so myself. The jaws snapped shut behind me, trapping me inside, the beats. His acidic venom started to burn through my shadowy armor as I slid down its throat, I kept on building layers to it by using the shadows from inside him.
Still I could feel the venom peeling away the shadows faster than I could acquire them, I kept on building upon them but gaps kept forming, Ladon's acid falling onto my skin . It was excruciating, but I pressed on, deeper and deeper into the beast.
I could feel the constricting muscles of its gullet squeezing me, trying to crush me, but my shadow armor held. Just barely. As I was being pushed further down, I began to slash at the walls of tissue around me. The spear was sharp, cutting through flesh and sinew, each stroke causing the beast to roar in agony.
Finally, I broke through a wall of tissue and found myself in a large cavity. The heart of the beast beat ferociously, trying to keep the monster alive. It was massive, slightly bigger than myself, each beat sending shockwaves through the surrounding flesh.
With a deceptive grin forming on my face, I lunged forward, stabbing my spear into the heart. The first blow ruptured it, blood spurting out in a violent torrent. I pulled back and stabbed again, and again, each strike weakening the beast further.
Blood flooded the cavity, and I knew I had to get out before I was drowned, burnt alive by the acid or crushed by the dying spasms of the monster. Concentrating, I teleported outside, reappearing on the ground a few feet away from the thrashing dragon. Ladon's remaining heads flailed wildly, a show of pain and fury, but it was futile.
The blood from the ruptured heart poured out, flooding the chest cavity, it travelled through the dragon's remaining heads as it coughed up blood from each one of its mouth staining the grass red. Ladon's body convulsed one last time before collapsing, the hundred heads falling lifelessly to the earth, blood still spilling from the monster's heads, then as if he hadn't existed the dragon turned to ash.
I stood grinning, where previously the monster's corpse was now was a full greek armor made out of its scales and for the first time ever I could see an aura on an object, it was blood red just like Ladon's had been but on a much lesser scale, the aura slid across the scaled armor making it rather ominous in my point of view.
I withdrew what remained of my shadowy armor, a tendril surged from my shadow handing me a bottle of ambrosia which I quickly poured on my still burning wounds, another tendril handed me a bottle of nectar and I drank it, since it was one of the few ways I could think of to stop the venom that had reached my bloodstream.
Then from my shadow hundreds of small threads started crawling up my body, sewing my wounds shut without leaving a scars, then I focused on the threads as they entered my body's pores and just like I had learnt from my fourth labor, I meticulously grabbed the venom inside my bloodstream and drew it out.
--------------------------
"Finally," I muttered pouring the last of the venom attached in my threads to a gloss bottle, after all you could never have too much venom that's what I always say... well okay I never actually say that but its true.
I walked over to the scaled greek armor, my smile widening, I first put on my shins, then the breastplate, the armguards and finally the helmet. The armor then turned liquid as it started to morph, the breast plate, arm guards and helmet turned into a shirt and hoodie while the shins turned into pants, I could still see the small pattern of scales on each cloth, the red aura swirling through it.
"Ok this is fucking awesome."
[Greek Myth Fact: Today's fact is about greek armors.
The Helmet of Hades, or the Cap of Invisibility, is one of the oldest items in Greek mythology. It was forged by the Elder Cyclopes and given to Hades before the battle against the Titans. The Cap of Invisibility is a cunning device that is first attributed to Hades in the Bibliotheca. The helmet is used by other gods, goddesses, and heroes like Hermes, Athena, and Perseus.
The Armor of Diomedes is worn by the Greek hero of the Trojan War, Diomedes. It was originally crafted for his father Tydeus and blessed by the goddess Athena. After the death of his father, Diomedes inherited the armor.
The Armor of Achilles was forged by Hephaestus. Its magic resides in the precious metals used to craft it. The armor is described by Homer as being bronze and decorated with stars. The armor is most famously described in an exchange between Achilles and the hero Patroclus. After refusing to fight for the king, Achilles lends his enchanted armor to Patroclus. ]
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