Wyrm Lord of Brockton Bay 10 (Patreon)

MERRY CHRISTMAS

And thank you, my pat-reons, for the support you’ve shown me so far. 

-VB-

Dragon 

“Wyrm inbound from the north north-east!” she reported through the wristbands. “Current size: one hundred meters!” 

That was already on the lower end of the scale - no pun intended - for the cape who fought Simurgh in Canberra. 

“{Projected growth rate?!}” one of the Thinkers on site asked.

Dragon checked her sensors and metaphorically blanched. “He’s growing a meter per second!” she reported then a new data made that statement irrelevant. “He’s growing faster now!” 

She hoped to God that this wouldn’t be another Kyushu. Canberra may have been saved because Simurgh retreated after being damaged too much thanks to Wyrm, but Leviathan was different. 

The middle child of the Endbringers did not need to be at the target city to envelope the world in tidal waves.

“Tidal wave inbound!” she reported hurriedly. 

-VB-

Wyrm

The rain started less than three seconds into my flight at which point, I was in southern Brockton Bay. Less than a second after that, the rain began to harder and heavier, and control over my Water Element, one of my four elemental mastery power, began to fray. 

Irritated, I pushed my growth and I reasserted control.

In less than two minutes, I arrived at the northern edge of Boston just as the tidal wave formed on the horizon. I growled, feeling an irrational anger at Leviathan’s control over my water, and took control.

Or rather, I tried. 

The tidal wave died before it could reach the shore as I began to a mental tug of war with Leviathan which I couldn’t even see. My power over water, something I rarely used because I hadn’t seen the need to, pushed at an invisible barrier that deformed at whichever point I took off my focus. Irritated, I pushed my growth again, and I grew longer, thicker, and bigger. My Elemental Mastery grew stronger with myself, but Leviathan pushed its own control higher. 

I kept on growing, but Leviathan matched me every single time.

Seeing as I needed my complete focus for this, I quickly flew over to command tents at subsonic speeds and curled up right next to it. 

Capes and mundanes alike scrambled away from me, but Alexandria was quick to approach me.

“Wyrm, what are you doing?!” she shouted at me to be heard over the thunderstorm.

‘Annoying,’ I thought about the thunderstorm. Was I ignoring Alexandria? Yes. This was my fight to show dominance to the rest of the world. I was not going to heed to the call of the schemer shouting at me. I looked up and focused on dispersing the water molecules in the clouds. 

Leviathan did not like that. It abandoned the control of water in the seas within my newfound range (extending nearly to the horizon in my one mile long form) and took direct control of the clouds. 

At this point, I wasn’t thinking straight. I was an animal. I reacted like an animal. I abandoned the control of the sea to control the sky. 

And Leviathan immediately launched a tidal wave less than half a mile from Boston’s coast. 

Alexandria shouted something at me again as I pushed my growth again, growing bigger, thicker, and longer. I ignored her as I split my focus on both fronts. 

By that point, Leviathan’s new and empowered tidal wave struck the Boston coast and crashed through the first row of buildings with the force of a chainsaw against human flesh. Stone and concrete broke under high water pressure and formed dangerous shards underwater, and I knew this because despite losing effective control radius to control both the sea and the sky, I could still sense the water. 

But I didn’t give a fuck. All I cared about was the fact that someone else was intruding upon my domain.

So I grew bigger. Something crumbled against my body but I ignored it. 

And then I saw it.

Leviathan.

It swam up the shore with its tidal wave. Unfortunately for it, its action brought me closer and closer.

Slowly but surely.

Deeper and deeper into territory of greater control.

I roared as I brought my trap down on it. Control multiplicative greater than my control out in the ocean grasped Leviathan, stealing away its control over water in an instant. I pushed the water out and Leviathan collapsed onto the road. 

It quickly stood up and reared its head up towards me.

I met its gaze, even knowing that it was nothing but a lifeless husk of a drone. 

It was, regardless of its status as a drone, something that dared to assume that it could take control over the elements from ME! 

Without anymore waiting, I jumped up from where I had been waiting in a coil and rose up into the sky. A third of my body was still in the coiled state when I hit the peak of my jump. Leviathan jumped up to meet me. 

Just as the tail left the ground, I slammed down onto Leviathan with my claws and teeth. I held on with all of my might and I used fire and air to create my Danmaku curtain around me. Pinpricks of light, a thousand strong, erupted around me and then slammed into Leviathan. Unable to escape from my grasp, Leviathan took all of the hits. 

I tore a chunk of its shoulder and tossed it aside, spewing its false blood everywhere and painting the wet concrete landscape black. It punched my jaw with strength far greater than it should have, and I felt my bone shatter on impact. 

But unlike its youngest sibling, it had no ranged attack to push me off. I controlled all of its water, and with it at the center of my sphere of control, there was no way it could control any water!

MINE!

I roared as my jaw repaired itself on the spot. Fire built up within my maw and I blasted it on the face. I controlled the Air and pushed oxygen into the fire, sending the already asphalt melting temperature higher. Leviathan’s skin began to melt but it wasn’t helpless.

Not by a long shot.

It headbutted me with enough force to topple a skyscraper. 

My jaw scrunched up on the spot, spewing my blood everywhere. The heat around my mouth, however, vaporized my blood instantly, sending high temperature red mist in all directions instead of blood. Before I could regenerate, it struck the side of my head with its tail. My draconic skull caved in on the point but only just. 

I retaliated. I wrapped my considerable self around Leviathan and constricted. Its body fractured where I constricted, and I wrapped tighter. With its arms and legs coiled up, it could not retaliate anymore. 

Protected as I was from my own attacks, I reared my head back with my repaired jaw and blasted Leviathan’s upper body again. 

Then Leviathan did something totally unexpected.

It secreted water from its body. Though water itself was under my command, it provided Leviathan with enough slip to push its way out of my constriction. 

I roared angrily even as I lashed out with my teeth and claws, none of which struck true. My teeth landed a glancing blow on its tail as it jumped away from me, and the follow-up blast of fire from my throat did just as little. 

It did stagger its jump pathway, driving it closer to my body and claws, and I lashed out. My tail, now half a kilometer long, struck blindingly fast for something of its size. The contraction of the muscles alone could be heard even in the midst of this fight.

It did nothing. Leviathan slipped over the tail strike, landed and then sidestepped the claws, and then … ran away. Away from me. Away from the city and back to the ocean.

I chased after it. I pounced, causing tremors throughout the city. 

But then Eidolon got in my face and stopped me. Leviathan ran and dove into the sea.

It was over.

But now, my anger was fully upon the Triumvirate for stopping me from destroying the drone. 

My jaw refused to open. I saw Alexandria grabbing a few of my teeth, keeping my mouth shut. 

I pushed my growth.

I pushed it higher.

And higher!

FASTER!

STRONGER!

And then I stopped as I saw that there was nothing worthwhile to destroy anymore, not even Eidolon.

I grunted and took to the sky. Alexandria let go as I flew away and Eidolon didn’t stop me. Nearly three kilometers long and a hundred meters thick, I flew back home. I began to shrink and it was only when I shrunk down to my Wyrmling form that I was able to think properly again. 

And I allowed myself to grin as I leisurely made my way back to Brockton Bay by flying. 

Unlike with the Simurgh, I showed the world that there was no doubt as to who would win - on the surface - when I fought Endbringers.

I was stronger than Eidolon! Than the whole of Triumvirate combined! 

I was the winner. 

The King.

The Dragon King. 

‘... Is that actually a good name, though?’ I thought to myself. ‘What happens when people really start to call me king or something? That’s going to be super awkward for me. I’ll probably get used to it, though.’

With just a bit of self-doubt and uncertainty, I continued to head home.