Chapter 43: Blazing Fury

The hunters' onslaught on the dragon's back had been going on for several minutes. Standing atop the majestic body of the Jhen Mohran felt much like climbing a mountain peak. Aside from the occasional tremor, it was nearly impossible to accurately gauge the beast's movements, making it essential for someone to command and determine the right moment to retreat.

Seeing that the Jhen Mohran, initially subdued by fatigue, was beginning to grow restless once more under the hunters' relentless assault, the Fleet Master decisively ordered the horn player to sound the retreat.

The time for a desperate, do-or-die struggle had not yet arrived. Battling a Jhen Mohran was a test of willpower and endurance above all else, and as the commander, he could not afford to be impatient.

"Doo—!"

Hearing the signal, the hunters on the Jhen Mohran's back immediately stowed their weapons. Shouting to one another to alert nearby comrades and ensuring that no one had gotten too carried away to miss the cue, they sprinted toward the creature's tail.

The terrain was lower there, offering a safer departure point to leap into the sea of sand.

A few hunters tasked with carrying the anti-dragon bombs stayed behind a moment longer. They secured the explosives firmly in place, pushing them deep against the edges of the wounds inflicted upon the behemoth.

Then, under the direction of a Hammer user, several hunters pulled the fuses simultaneously.

No further orders were needed. Everyone ran for their lives. Two hunters, possessing supreme confidence in the joints of their legs, leaped directly off the ridge of the Jhen Mohran's back.

The drop was well over ten meters high. Even with the soft yellow sand cushioning the impact below, a slight miscalculation in absorbing the landing momentum could easily result in shattered legs.

Fortunately, apart from Orang, who had managed to join through connections, everyone else was a seasoned veteran, and no accidents occurred.

As soon as the hunters' evacuation was confirmed, the Mighty Dragon Ship and the surrounding sand-skiffs simultaneously slackened the ropes of the binding ballistae and scattered in all directions.

This was done partly to safely recover the hunters who had jumped into the sand sea, and partly to temporarily evade the impending wrath of the Jhen Mohran.

"Rumble, rumble, rumble!"

After a brief delay of a dozen seconds, massive fireballs erupted across the Jhen Mohran's back.

The destructive force was terrifying, far surpassing anything heavy artillery could achieve. Large chunks of rocky armor were blasted into the air, exposing the charred flesh and tissue beneath.

Stretching over a hundred meters in length and unrivaled in the treacherous depths of the sand sea, this ultra-giant Elder Dragon was nearly overturned by the devastating power of the specially crafted explosives.

It halted its momentum, propping up its body with its semi-finned forelimbs, pointing its gigantic tusks obliquely toward the sky, and letting out a roar that shook the entire sea of sand.

"Roar—boom, boom, boom!!"

"It's enraged! Perfect opportunity—use this chance to guide it off its path and away from Lulue!" The Fleet Master spun the steering wheel. "Open fire with the cannons! Draw its attention toward the Mohran-maru!"

"Boom! Boom!"

The artillery, silent for a moment, roared back to life.

The next second, flashes of fire erupted across the Jhen Mohran's body. One of the cannonballs struck dead center into the massive wound torn open by the anti-dragon explosives. Deprived of the protection of thick back armor and tough hide, the shell burrowed deep into the flesh before detonating.

Flying shrapnel burrowed deep into the muscle tissue, and the gushing blood sprayed like a crimson drizzle over the Jhen Mohran's back.

"Roar—!"

No matter how dulled its sense of pain might be—having endured hunters hacking away at its wounds for ages without a notable reaction—the Jhen Mohran finally felt true agony this time.

Orang, who had just managed to scramble back aboard a small sand-skiff, shook the yellow sand out of his hair and gazed into the distance at the ceaselessly howling beast.

The fleet's tactics were versatile, but the core strategy had been passed down and refined by generations of sand-skiff crews.

Bombarding the back armor with cannons was meant to create breaches, while volleying with heavy ballistae served to create footholds.

Once the Jhen Mohran was exhausted through well-coordinated tactics, the vessels would fire binding ballistae to immobilize it. Then, the hunters would board its back to further ravage the wounds while planting anti-dragon explosives.

Once the defensive rock armor was shattered, the armaments aboard the Mighty Dragon Ship could inflict critical damage, turning the conflict into a battle of pure stamina.

In truth, with the battle having progressed this far, it would not have been strange for the Jhen Mohran to simply turn around and leave.

Some scholars had hypothesized that the iconic giant tusk pillar of Lulue might be the remains of an extraordinarily massive Jhen Mohran from ancient times.

Able to sense the lingering aura upon that tusk pillar, the Jhen Mohran would travel here every monsoon season out of reverence or a sense of affinity.

In other words, it was a behavior akin to a "pilgrimage," except that its unconscious passage inevitably wreaked havoc on the city of Lulue, compelling humanity to drive it back.

Another faction of scholars held a different view, arguing that this was purely migratory behavior, and Lulue happened to block the shortest route of its southward migration, thus resulting in the city coming under attack.

Regardless of the true reason, scholars shared one consensus: the Jhen Mohran's primary intent was not to attack the city.

Consequently, upon meeting sufficiently fierce resistance, it would choose to retreat or detour.

Much like a traveler walking along a mountain path who is suddenly swarmed by a cluster of hornets—after being stung all over, their first instinct would be to run rather than hunt down and destroy the hornet nest.

Of course, if that traveler happened to have a volatile temper, they might crush a few hornets to vent their anger before turning to flee.

The Jhen Mohran before them clearly fell into the latter, ill-tempered category. Thrashing its streamlined body, it began to swim through the sand sea once more, its pair of giant tusks aimed directly at the Mighty Dragon Ship, the Mohran-maru.

It intended to flip this nuisance over and grind it to dust!

"It's locked onto us!" a younger crew member aboard the Mohran-maru cried out in alarm.

"Don't panic!" the Fleet Master bellowed. "Full sails, accelerate! Drain its stamina and prepare for the next boarding operation!"

"Understood!"

The crew shouted in unison. The stabilizing outriggers on both sides of the hull were hoisted once again, and the sails billowed to their limits. The Mighty Dragon Ship swung its bow around and sped away, trailing the Jhen Mohran's line of pursuit.

"Roar!"

Yet at that moment, the Jhen Mohran suddenly accelerated, thrashing its massive body. Measuring several times the length of the Mighty Dragon Ship and weighing dozens of times more, the beast unexpectedly burst into a straight-line speed that surpassed the ship itself.

The distance between them shrank rapidly.

Orang and the others, lingering in the distance and awaiting orders, grew tense at the sight. If the flagship Mighty Dragon Ship were flipped over, the small sand-skiffs alone would have no way of driving the Jhen Mohran away.

Fortunately, the Fleet Master had anticipated this.

Relinquishing the wheel back to the helmsman, he roared out commands: "Prepare to turn hard to port! Lower the port stabilizer! Everyone brace for a sharp turn! Await my signal!"

Two hundred meters, one hundred meters, fifty meters...

The gap between the Jhen Mohran and the Mighty Dragon Ship closed relentlessly. Striding onto the stern deck, the Fleet Master could clearly make out the beast's tiny, bloodshot eyes.

"Now!" the Fleet Master roared, sweeping his arm downward.

The helmsman threw the wheel hard over. The high-speed vessel tilted dangerously, teetering on the brink of a capsize, saved only by the simultaneously dropped port stabilizer, which managed to steady the posture just in time.

"Roar!"

Hot on the heels of the Mighty Dragon Ship, the Jhen Mohran attempted to execute a port turn as well. However, its colossal frame lacked the agility of the vessel, and its turning radius was several times wider. It could only watch helplessly as the Mighty Dragon Ship slipped out of its charging path.

Yet the burning wrath of the Jhen Mohran would not let it give up so easily. Its thick, fin-like limbs leveled the sand dunes as it forced itself into a full-power turnaround.

Having spent a lifetime fighting Jhen Mohran, the Fleet Master knew all too well that this moment of shifting posture was when the beast was at its most unstable.

He swung his arm down forcefully once more. "Strike the great bronze gong!"

A short, powerfully built hunter clutching a massive mallet had been waiting for this exact moment. The instant the command left the Fleet Master's lips, he swung the heavy mallet with all his might, striking the gigantic bronze gong, which measured three to four meters in diameter.

"Clang—!"

The piercing metallic shriek, accompanied by vibrations imperceptible to human ears, rippled outward in all directions.