The 3 Beastmasters and Blue looked at their surrounding which had gone entirely dark.
"What… what happened?" Blue couldn't help but shout out loud in fear. He was reminded of something but that couldn't be true at the moment.
"Who… who are you?" the old beastmaster asked.
"Doesn't matter," Ning said with a smiling face. "You 3 have one chance. If you can defeat him, you get to leave here alive. Otherwise… I suppose I won't have to worry about what happens when you do lose to a dragon."
The three shivered as they realized that their life was in the palm of someone that they had ignored so easily. How could they have been so stupid to not realize that a strong senior was in the arena?
'But how did the artifact not work?' the old man wondered. It was supposed to reveal all concealments, and it was a particularly high-grade artifact too. Which was to say…
'He's strong,' the old man realized as beads of sweat dropped from his forehead. They had come here for a beast, and they had encountered a monster instead.
"You two," he immediately commanded. "Get ready to fight for your lives. We will defeat that dragon no matter what it takes."
The other two realized that they were in trouble as well and nodded. "Yes sir!"
Blue realized that he was in a terrible situation as well. If the 3 men beat him, they were safe, but what about him? Would he be safe if he won too?
"What about me? What if I win?" he shouted.
Ning smiled. "I will give you whatever you want."
"O-okay," Blue said and got ready to fight. "I will win this."
Water sprouted out from all around his body as it pooled all around him. As a Water dragon, being in the water gave Blue a significant boost in power that would normally not be possible for anyone else.
At the same time, he burned his blood essence as the power in his increased even more as he prepared to fight.
Blue swung his talons as space ripped in three. The attack flew through the air, reaching the weakest of the three beastmasters.
The older beastmaster suddenly moved his sword and struck the attack, creating a midair explosion that sent out shockwaves that still affected the young man.
At the same time, icicles appeared all around Blue as he shot them out in all directions. All 3 of them worked to stop the attack, but the icicle was so strong that both the weaker beastmasters were forced back with pain coursing through their body.
They attacked back as well, but the ball of water that Blue was inside was working as a sort of defense that they couldn't destroy.
One of them used a fire attack to destroy the ball, but instead, the fire was extinguished before it even reached Blue. The ball was sending out water tendrils to attack whatever was getting too close to it.
Ning nodded to himself as he watched the fight. He approved of the way Blue was fighting.
However, he would have to speed it all up or the True dragon blood he was burning would end soon.
Blue sent out many attacks and so did the beastmasters. Their attacks collided were destroyed by each other, or were simply ineffective against each other's defense.
The three beastmasters were unknowingly stalling and Blue was getting very worried. He was almost all out of the power boost he was getting from the blood essence, so he had to give it his all now.
The ball of water he was in suddenly lost all control, and at the same time, Blue prepared his final attack.
He took a deep breath as he poured out all the power from his blood essence into his throat, and then… he breathed it all out.
Dragon's breath marred the air blue with all the water Qi Blue shot out.
The three beastmasters worked as one to create a barrier to protect themselves, but the Dragon breath was no ordinary attack.
The Qi ripped open the barrier and struck the three that were behind. Two of them didn't even realize what had happened before they lost half of their body.
The third one, the oldest one, lost his left arm, but he managed to save the rest of his body from the attack.
The dragon's breath died down and suddenly Blue felt very lethargic. All the energy in his body was spent. And while he had managed to defeat two of them, the last person was too strong even with the dragon blood to win against.
The old man clutched his arm and forced himself to not think about the loss he had just suffered. He looked towards the dragon that was barely staying in the air and picked up his sword again.
'Just one more slash and i—'
Ning's hand fell on his shoulder. "Good job!" he said, and then the darkness vanished. Light came back in and the old man remembered the situation again.
"I… won, right?" he asked.
"Yes," Ning said. "Good job. You get to leave." He pushed the man along. "Go now."
The old man looked at the torn-up bodies of his comrades, but he didn't stay to mourn or anything. For now, he had to think about himself.
"Thank you, senior," the old man said and flew away. He didn't even look back toward Blue as he knew the dragon would never be his now.
Ning slowly flew towards Blue and appeared in front of him. "You lost," he said.
"N-now what?" Blue asked. "Will you kill me?"
"Yes," Ning said and raised his hand.
Blue closed his eyes as he prepared to be hurt, but all he felt was a soothing energy fill him up. His pain was gone, his wounds vanished, and even his True Dragon blood essence returned.
"How?" he couldn't help but ask in surprise. He looked towards Ning and his eyes narrowed. "… Master?"
Ning got rid of the illusion and finally showed himself. "I'm surprised you could recognize me," he said. "How have you been, Blue?"
