Growler Draconis stood before his foe, it's large yellow eyes with black eyes seemingly piercing the very essence of his being. Shaking, He was terrified of what was before him but that wasn't enough to keep him down. There was a burning desire within his eyes, the desire for strength to support the weight of his guild, Paroxysm, on his shoulders.

The fear was to be expected though, this was a dragon, a member of a race whose bloodline was considered the deadliest of all with a few exceptions. The unyielding scales, command of the sky, enormous magical reserves, the size to crush the ground with its weight, and of course the signature breath attack that could immediately change the course of battles with its release.

This was a flair dragon, a fire dragon with emphasis on fast attacks and strong burst-like attacks. At the class of an adult, it was no laughing matter and with burst capabilities it only made it worse. Growler was one of the warrior classes, a two-handed magic swordsman. This meant he had large, slow and infrequent attacks that were hard to execute on nimble targets, like this flair dragon. Furthermore, focusing on offence and speed left him with little to withstand the dragon's attacks and trying to deflect the flames with a sword was simply, a bad idea.

"Enter the void and become the essence of space and time, spatial blade."

"A tempest will begin as a gentle breeze, slipstream movement."

Growler's sword turned black while air currents began circling around him.

Leaping forward he struck out at the dragon, looking to land a strike. It struck, carving its tip into a few scales away from his intended target. It's body had only been scratched by the effort and it was already retaliating.

It's stomach grew and a ball of fire was released from its mouth at a mind boggling velocity, it either was insane or full of trust as the dragon's body was going to get hit. And by normal speeds he would of been struck but as he had slipstream movement magic active he was just barely able to evade, setting the pace of this match up in the process.

The dragon was unfazed by its own attack and followed up with more in rapid succession, firing its balls of exploding every few seconds with no signs of slowing down.

Growler pushed it, dodging each and every one of them while coming back around for his so far, inaccurate strikes. Neither seemed in danger of dying but Growler was going to reach his limit far sooner than the dragon at this rate.

Taking a chance Growler jumped and grabbed at the protruding spine, daring to hang on to the beast at a more accurate strike.

Not liking something on its back the dragon turned its flexible neck and fired with open jaws. Moreover, while firing, it flew to the ceiling of its lair, not even bothering to look as it crashed through hanging stalactite.

The back of the dragon was soon a festering mess of lava as the melted rock rolled down its back. Growler had barely managed 3 measly strikes before he had to let go.

The dragon didn't let him go as he pleased though as it sent a whip down its spine so that a part of itself, Growler included, was driven deep into the ceiling above.

Growler not yet off the dragon caught a part of it and was dragged through solid rock.

The dragon sensed weakness and opportunity, pressing itself on for an even stronger rush of attacks.

But growler hadn't given up and as the dragon came close he slashed.

Finding a gap in the scales, Growler slid his blade under the eye and delivered his first real cut to the dragon. Immediately he pushed off before he ran into the part of the dragon covered in magma.

The dragon had felt pain. It did not like pain. It did not like receiving pain from what it thought was a cockroach, and still did.

The dragon stopped its onslaught of fireballs and inhaled greatly, it's stomach growing to twice, no thrice larger than before and growing.

Growler did know what it was but he wasn't going to let it do as it pleased and came at it again. But it was too late to stop it as the dragon launched a fireball greater than any before it straight to the floor's center.

It went off like the bomb it was and nearly deafened Growler's ear in the process.

There was not enough firepower for the explosion to strike Growler in this area but that wasn't its purpose as cracks began to form. Those cracks propagated and enlarged.

The dragon suddenly dived where it had struck. The result? It's weight and impact made all the cracks open wide, wide enough to shoot lava from streams flowing underneath.

Growler couldn't dodge as tiny bits of lava were launched to every corner of the cave.

"Agh!!!!"

The next moment the flair dragon looked his way and fired again and again.

It was Growler's end.

***

Mitch Brumal woke screaming, his body remembering the feeling of fire before being burnt to ashes and ejected from first. As a penalty he would not be allowed to re-enter first for 22hrs and would find his character at a respawn point when he did. The respawn points location would be determined based on past accomplishments and would recover his body to perfect health.

It was an irrelevant point though as the pain subsided, by not actually being real to him anymore. This was his first try at becoming a dragon knight and it had come to a miserable conclusion of failure.

He could of course try again but between now and that day, he had much training to accomplish.

There was a reason that the dragon rider class was one of the hardest classes to acquire.

First you had to acquire a seal at random from monsters. It was very rare and hard to come by, requiring essentially a maddening weak monster killing spree. Once acquired and placed on the body it would give you a unique tracking skill that could be used to vaguely locate a dragon's whereabouts. This time it had been fire so by going near fire, it would flicker as if pushed by wind in the direction of an adult fire dragon.

Once found, the adult dragon had to be killed by an individual. If this was accomplished, the dragon instead of disappearing and leaving behind crystals, would revert to a dragon egg. This was why it needed to be at least adult as anything younger would not undergo the process. It was by far the hardest step as all that was left was raising it which, if you weren't the world’s worst parent, would hatch and fully grow into its adult form within a month to become a loyal mount.

But Growler had failed, that meant getting stronger so that he stood better chances and finding another seal. It would be a long journey.

The door to his room was swung open with, so much force that it bounced off the wall and returned to close itself. Though, it was not before Amy could slip through as she rushed to Mitch's side.

"Mitch! Mitch! Are you alright? What was that scream?"

"*cough* I'm. Alright. *cough cough*"

"Like hell you are. Dammit, what the hell were you doing!"

"Taking a shower."

"Taking a shower?"

"It was a very hot shower."

"Argh, you idiot! Whatever, don't tell me. I'm only the vice-guild leader. Things like, what is guild leader doing? Are apparently not my concern."

Amy starred at Mitch, a stare exceeding the intimidating feeling from a flare dragon.

"Fine! Enough with the scary eyes. I was hunting a flare dragon. I managed to find one but failed to take it down."

"Why would you hunt a flare dragon, by yourself no less. Are you an idiot."

"Maybe, but that is just what it needed to do. Our guild is not the strongest one out there. If I don't get strong, we will get pushed around."

"Idiot confirmed. You are not alone you know. We can help you."

"It was the dragon rider quest."

Amy's perked up at the mention of dragon rider then she began smacking her head against the side of his VR pod.

"So how close did you get?"

"I cut it under the eye once, but it wasn't where I was aiming. That an a few scratches on its hide."

"That's scary, I know how strong you are and that's all you managed?"

"It caught me by surprise when it attacked the ground and spewed lava everywhere but even then, the difference was clear, there was no way I was winning that fight."

"*haa*"

Amy got up and walked over to a sink and grabbed a cloth, wetting it.

Coming closer she began wiping off the sweat from Mitch. "I'll say it again, you are not alone. How can we do nothing when our guild master is doing this much to get stronger for the guild."

After cooling him off Amy helped him out of the pod and onto his bed.

"Get some sleep, tomorrow is a new day."

Amy seeing he was fine now left his room, a face of stone hard determination plastered on her face.