Reincarnated as a Dragon's Egg

The rate at which Jornes has been shooting off [Ruin] has decreased. As I thought, she doesn’t have enough MP to spare while she's maintaining [Angel Mirror].

I already learnt how to deal with [Ruin] from fighting the slime, so she might have also judged that there was little point in shooting it at me haphazardly. At any rate, it’s certain that she’s now forced to pay close attention to her remaining MP.

Jornes’ stone body is very resilient, so it’s hard to damage her without taking damage myself. To make matters worse, even if I manage to get a good hit in, she’ll just return it with [Empath], forcing me to heal too. As a result, running away and waiting for her to exhaust herself with [Angel Mirror] is by far the superior option.

Thanks to my baby dragon strategy I’ve fortunately gained some distance. The rate of [Ruin] attacks is continuing to fall. I’ll do my best to run away until she’s gotten closer, then I'll use my skills to somehow break free again. It’s a dirty way of fighting, but there’s no way I can fight her [Angel Mirror] head on.

…I’m a little concerned by just how infrequent her [Ruins] have become. I know her MP is getting tight, but was it that bad? I thought for sure she’d use a [Magic Scale Magnification]-amplified [Ruin] to block my path, as I wouldn’t be able to just fly straight through it. I was desperately trying to think of a countermeasure, but it doesn’t seem like that’s what she’s working towards. Is she about to use some other skill?

Glancing backwards, I see a black magic circle deploying out of Jornes. That’s… Gravity magic!?

『[Gravidimension].』

Suddenly, black light races through my surroundings, and space begins to warp. There’s no other way for me to describe what is happening. The scale of it is too vast, and the activation too quick. My body is caught up in the twisting space, causing sharp pain to shoot through me.

I try to escape, but my body only moves forwards a tiny distance. My scales tear, and blood squeezes out of my body like a wrung towel.

I-I can’t move…! It feels like I'll be torn apart if I don’t push back with my muscles and [Autoregeneration]. What is this insane power?

【Normal Skill [Gravidimension]】

【Uses a gravitational mass to warp space itself.】

【The mana cost is immense, but as it uses the distortion of space as a weapon, it is incredibly powerful both on offensively and defensively.】

I don’t fully understand the skill explanation, but it seems like a stronger version of Lilixira’s [Gravillion]. The power and binding force are strong, and it took hold incredibly fast, without any advance warning of where she was targeting. Jornes probably also boosted it with [Magic Scale Magnification]…

But, there’s no way the MP cost of this will be light for her. She hadn’t used it before, so why use it now that her MP has gotten so tight that she's refraining from even using [Ruin]?

Jornes brandishes her claws and charges towards. The [Gravdimension] finally weakens its hold on me, but there’s no way I can get away in time. Her attack will catch me while I’m almost entirely defenceless.

Jornes’ claw rips through my body.

“Guuh…!”

The damage dealt is stupidly heavy…! She hit me with the full force of the apocalypse’s attack power.

I can’t regain my balance! [Autoregeneration] won’t make it in time! This is no time to be frugal with my MP. I need to give my all to survive the next moments.

Pulling back, I use [Autoregeneration] and [High Rest] at full throttle, while also curling up and protecting my body with my wings and forelegs. The second claw attack mercilessly tears through my wing and foreleg.

The force of the attack pushes me away, and I open my wings to make use of the boost. I hurriedly use [High Rest] and [Autoregeneration] to recover, while using [Dragon Mirror] to gloss over the damage and keep my body functioning. I’ve managed to get away by the skin of my teeth, but it’s another matter if she uses that skill again.

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[Irushia]

Species: Apocalypse

Condition: Poisoned (minor), Cursed (major), Paralysed (minor)

Lv: 105/175

HP: 4453/10386

MP: 1662/8405

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That burst of recovery burnt through a lot of my MP. To rapidly recover while also maintaining my ability to function, it costs me over a thousand MP. But if I let my guard down, my HP could have been reduced to zero in an instant. There was no way I could afford to hold back.

However, Jornes must have paid a tremendous amount of MP to hold me in place like that. She’s also constantly paying for [Angel Mirror], so she’s got to be getting close to running out too.

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[Jornes Liarm]

Species: Abbadon

Condition: Spirit, Angel Mirror

Lv: 150/150 (MAX)

HP: 9433/9802

MP: 1321/6253

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As I thought, she’s nearly out. If anything, she might have lost more MP in that attack. She knew the cost of [Angel Mirror] would catch up before she could kill me, so she hurried to use [Gravidimension] to attack.

That [Gravidimension] was her final struggle… No, is that really the case? I think she still has enough MP for one more [Gravidimension].

If I get stopped by [Gravidimension] again, it’s almost certain she’ll hit me with another series of attacks, forcing me to focus on healing again, since I’ve no choice but to keep my HP at maximum in order to survive her follow-up attacks.

If I take the hits the same way as before, it’ll probably cost all my remaining MP. I won’t have enough left to properly recover afterwards, and I’ll have no way of dealing magic damage once she returns to her abbadon form and regains her complete physical immunity.

…Have I already been checkmated?

For some reason, Jornes didn’t use [Gravidimenison] until now. There seems to be a decently long casting time, so perhaps she can only use it safely while I’m flying away…. But she had [Angel Mirror] to protect herself at the start of the battle, so there should have been an opportunity. Ah, I know why now.

If she had shown me [Gravidimension] from the start, I would have fought in a way specialised to counter it. It’s a costly skill for her, so she mustn't have wanted me to let me develop any countermeasures. She probably also wanted to test whether I had any skills that would allow me to escape from the [Gravidimension].

In addition, Jornes is specialised around counters, so she probably doesn’t have a lot of skills that can deal a decisive hit. She might have wanted to keep [Gravidimension] in reserve to deal a finishing blow.

She used [Karma Mirror] to sound out my methods of attack, and then [Angel Mirror] to go on the attack and cut down my remaining MP. She waited for my MP to get low enough to be killed by two [Gravidimensions].

I had thought I was fighting her effectively, but I was wrong. From the start, her objective was to force me fight to her tempo, gradually wearing down my MP.

…A second [Gravidimension] will be coming right away. From Jornes’ perspective, there’s no reason to give me time. She won’t want me to think of a countermeasure, and most importantly, she’ll want to strike before I can fully recover.

Should I swiftly attack her to disrupt her casting? No, the resiliency of her stone body makes that a bad idea. It’s not as though [Dimension Claw] would be enough to stop her. It’s also impossible for me to close the distance in time.

Should I quickly try to gain more distance? No, she moves faster thanks to the paralysis. No matter what I do, I don’t think I can escape from the vast area of her [Gravidimesnion].

Something… There must be something I can do. This is the critical moment. Whether or not I can endure this attack determines who wins the fight.

『[Gravidimension].』

At the same time as her thought, the space around me begins to distort.