Atop the Ancient Tree, following Aki's roar, one Fire Wyvern after another took to the skies. The fire-attribute energy in the air surged violently, and under the lead of Aki, the Flame Rathalos, and the Tempered Azure Rathalos, they flew toward the northern reaches of the Ancient Tree.
There, a dense white mist had already spread, making the nighttime forest appear even deeper and more mysterious.
The destruction caused by the full-force battle of three Elder Dragons was simply too immense—no amount of strict defense by the Ancient Tree's Fire Wyvern group could ensure survival.
Thus, after Logan pressed the seemingly well-informed Chameleos for answers, he learned that the Elder Dragon in the northern part of the Ancient Forest was, in fact, its offspring—a Chameleos that had committed a grave mistake.
In that instant, Logan recalled the young Chameleos from back then.
Although the fact that it hadn't died from Kushala Daora's strike surprised him somewhat, considering that the world was, in truth, rather lenient toward Elder Dragons—so long as they weren't world scourges like Shagaru Magala, or attempting something as extreme as destroying an entire continent—most of the time, they were merely repelled rather than slain.
Once Chameleos made it clear it would not intervene in this battle, and quickly slipped away with the young Chameleos upon realizing this place would soon become a battlefield, Logan decided that the Fire Wyvern group would confront the Chameleos directly. In such a situation, facing the trial head-on might prove far more effective than passive defense.
In the sky, Logan looked toward the distant Kushala Daora. His wings stirred lightly, and through the perception of his Gale Wings Trait, he could clearly sense the increasingly chaotic air currents around him. Even the Gale Wings could no longer steady such violent winds.
Before the ruler of the winds, the Gale Wings had lost their advantage for the first time.
Almost without warning—within a single instant—those sharp gales transformed into a series of massive, pitch-black tornadoes. From several kilometers away, the attack arrived in the blink of an eye.
Without hesitation, Logan beat his wings and charged forward toward Kushala Daora instead of retreating!
Relying on his perception of the airflow and his sheer brute strength, he weaved through the narrow gaps between the chaotic wind currents, closing the distance between himself and the Steel Dragon.
"Roar!"
The metallic, resonant dragon cry echoed, as immense tornadoes tore countless trees from their roots. The pitch-black winds had nearly taken physical form, engulfing Logan in an instant.
Kushala Daora rose with the wind, soaring high into the sky while widening the distance once more. Without the slightest pause, it unleashed another Breath of the Gale.
The tornado that had originally been meant to obstruct Logan suddenly transformed into a whirl of blue-violet flames. The control over the vortex shifted in an instant, and under the searing heat, it turned back toward Kushala Daora in retaliation.
The Gale Breath and the flame tornado collided. Under the chaotic and violent clash of energies, the flame tornado was directly shattered by the condensed Gale Breath, and with a series of detonations, countless ignited fragments of wood scattered in all directions.
After breaking through the flame tornado, the Gale Breath did not lose momentum—it plowed a long trench across the forest below before finally being stopped by a distant slope.
[Bang, bang, bang!]
Amid the bursts of fire, a massive blue-violet fireball traced straight-lined tails across the sky.
Like the strokes of a brush, it arrived in an instant above the cloud layer near Kushala Daora.
Accompanied by a faint inhaling sound, a torrent of Cataclysmic Flame Breath, bound by ring-like wind pressure, shot straight forward, piercing through Kushala Daora's surrounding gale barrier and rushing toward it head-on.
As Kushala Daora's wings beat, an invisible wind pressure forced it backward while simultaneously rising upward to collide with the concentrated blast of the Cataclysmic Flame.
The wind rings that had been restraining the flame shattered on impact. The fire instantly spread, expanding ceaselessly across the wind wall Kushala Daora had raised, extending for hundreds of meters in an instant.
The overwhelming heat drained the moisture from the air, and even Kushala Daora, retreating amidst the turbulence, could feel the scorching temperature.
It was said that Kushala Daora's weakness was poison—but that applied only to abnormal conditions.
Because its scales possessed metallic properties, what Kushala Daora truly despised was high temperature!
The older a Kushala Daora grew, the more its body inclined toward that of solid steel, and the more active its thermal conductivity became. This was precisely why Kushala Daora preferred to inhabit icy, mineral-rich regions.
High heat caused it great discomfort!
That its concentrated breath had been blocked was no surprise to Logan. Watching Kushala Daora once again pull away, Logan also ceased the flow of energy. Amidst the roaring flames, he used the blast's thrust to hurl himself forward again toward the Steel Dragon.
The barrier of hurricane winds greatly hindered Logan's flight. Normal wing-beating flight was nearly useless now; he could only rely on brute strength to forcibly break through the raging gales, trying to drag Kushala Daora into close combat.
In terms of raw energy, Logan's current gap from an Elder Dragon was no longer that vast. Though his total reserves could not match those of Elder Dragons that had lived for hundreds or even thousands of years, it was still more than enough to sustain a full battle.
Kushala Daora's fighting style leaned toward long-range combat. In close quarters—especially against another Elder Dragon—its metallic armor offered little advantage. On the contrary, because of its high energy conductivity, when facing melee attacks imbued with elemental attributes, the intrusion of abnormal energy could disrupt its internal flow.
While Logan's flames were undeniably powerful, they could not match Kushala Daora's capability for ultra-long-range attacks. Therefore, to defeat it, the best strategy was to drag it into close combat and, through relentless bursts of fire, completely disturb its energy circulation, thereby suppressing its ability to command endless storms.
Once both sides had clarified their objectives, the battle became one of advance and obstruction.
The omnipresent gale was Kushala Daora's weapon. One tornado after another, one storm zone after another, formed the most effective barriers to block Logan's advance. Under the scour of the winds, the ground became scarred and desolate. Trees and soil were torn up and hurled into the air. Creatures too slow to flee were swept skyward by the cyclones, only to be flung far away by the violent gusts.
Some unfortunate monsters were caught in the range of Logan's Cataclysmic Flames and were reduced to charcoal midair.
Various areas of the Ancient Tree region ignited from falling embers, only to be extinguished again by the raging winds.
Flames and tornadoes tangled and clashed with each other.
For a time, neither side could overcome the other. Just as Logan had foreseen, this battle had become a collision between disasters—and it showed clear signs of spreading to other regions.
As time went on, Kushala Daora gradually sensed that something was wrong.
From the very beginning, it had fought with full strength. The towering kilometer-high wind walls, the highly penetrative Gale Breath, and the endless stream of cyclones all proved it.
Yet the Elder Dragon before it—one it had never seen before—why were its flames still growing hotter?
In fact, during their breath clashes, its Gale Breath had even been the first to collapse!
Unable to comprehend it, Kushala Daora intensified its energy output, generating even more cyclones and storm zones, engaging Logan in a full-scale struggle of raw energy.
For Logan now, energy was no longer a shortcoming. In a pure clash of power, while maintaining his sunlight state, he could fight Kushala Daora for an entire day.
His stamina was no longer a problem either. After the transformation of Elder Dragon blood, the deepened degree of metamorphosis, and the enhancement from various traits, Logan could already be considered a true Elder Dragon. What he still lacked was merely more instinctive control over his powers, and that immense vitality unique to the Elder Dragons.
Kushala Daora's hurricanes were incredibly strong. Even the scales reinforced by both Charred Body and Marvel Scale could be sliced open by those gales infused with vast amounts of life energy.
Yet his Regeneration was also working ceaselessly. As long as the scales weren't completely destroyed—so long as the muscles beneath remained intact—his conscious defense could hold out until the scales regenerated.
Thus, the greatest toll on Logan in battle was the mental strain.
Gale Wings perceived the turbulent air currents manipulated by Kushala Daora, his mind-eye constantly analyzing the weak points within them, seizing the right moment to break through.
That enormous volume of calculations was what continuously drained Logan's mind—this was the true reason why Blaze had been triggered.
However, given Logan's current parameters, to reach a level where he could fully suppress Kushala Daora would still take some time.
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