With Verdell already firmly seated back on her, Scaly didn’t hesitate for a second as she flapped both of her wings and took to the sky. No matter how fun it might have been to run around with an angry toad chasing her from behind, she had no intention of wasting her time being chased around when she could just fly off and avoid the other party entirely. After all, the toad didn’t have a pair of wings and had no way to chase after her, something she was fully intent on taking advantage of to her benefit.
Whoosh-!
Huh? What in the-
"Wha- It can fly!?"
But maybe she had underestimated the SS Rank toad a bit too much, as the second she unfurled her wings a flew into the sky with Verdell on her back, both found themselves in a state of disbelief witnessing the large toad jump up after them. Utilizing some kind of strange mist magic to solidify the thin mist into floating platforms midair that it then used to chase after them.
BANG!
The entire turn of events being so surprising to Scaly that she didn’t have the time to react when the large toad came flying up towards her and ultimately crashed straight into her. Sending her spiraling down towards the ground with Verdell barely holding on as he looked like he was about to throw up from all the spinning, a feeling Scaly herself was also feeling as the ground below approached at a terrifying speed.
Swish-!
Still, maybe because of her dormant instincts awakening at the last second, she just barely managed to stabilize herself with the assistance of her wings and wind magic. Preventing a worst-case scenario of her turning into a dragon pancake with a bit of smashed dwarf on top of it.
Thud-!
Unfortunately, though she managed to slow herself down and prevent the two of them from dying to fall damage, she was unable to stop the momentum entirely, as she still ended up crashing into the mountainside below. Soon enough finding herself rolling down the side of the mountain along with Verdell, who had barely managed to jump up on top of her rolling body and was now trying his best to not fall off by balancing himself on her like a circus performer balancing on top a rolling barrel. Knowing that should he fall off, he would almost certainly end up crushed beneath her large body.
Even worse, even if he jumped off and avoided this fate, there was still the toad chasing them from behind showing no signs of giving up on catching the two of them even as their situation had worsened.
On the contrary, the toad looked more eager than ever to catch the two of them as he jumped down towards the two of them from above before giving chase. The long tongue shooting out from its mouth about to wrap around the two of them only barely missing thanks to Verdell pushing himself to the limit and jumping up to avoid the long sticky tongue of the toad.
The good thing, he avoided the tongue attack, the bad thing, he now found himself balancing on his hands instead of his feet. Barely keeping things together because of his high dexterity.
The even worse thing being that the toad could still launch another tongue attack and it would be far harder for him to dodge a second such attack in his current situation.
"Fire Wall!"
And for this reason, before the toad had the chance to shoot out its long tongue again, Verdell barely managed to balance on a single hand for a second and shoot out a fire wall spell that directly blocked the toad. Preventing it from recklessly shooting its tongue out through the wall of fire.
Of course, this would at most by a few second of time, but this was the only real option Verdell had to stop the tongue from hitting him and dragging him alongside Scaly into the large mouth of the toad.
Using this little time he had bought for himself, Verdell jumped back up and got on his feet again.
"Ah!?"
Just barely catching sight of the abyss that appeared before him as Scaly rolled over the edge with him in tow-
"F-Feather Falling!"
Wasting no time as he directly cast the feather falling spell on Scaly before clamping on to her body that stopped spinning the second, the spell took effect and instead carried the two of them forward over the abyss that had suddenly appeared below them after rolling over the edge.
The good thing was that he no longer had to balance himself on top a spinning dragon rolling down a mountain with a toad trying to wrap its tongue around him and swallow him and the dragon beneath him, while the bad thing was that the dragon beneath him carrying him across the abyss shrouded in a thick layer of mist below the two of them had been knocked out after slamming into the ground and later rolling down said mountain. Meaning that there was no way for him to rely on Scaly to fly the two of them away from the toad that was still chasing after them even as they continued forward over the abyss.
The one positive to the entire situation being that the feather falling spell allowed Scaly to keep her momentum as she was flung over the edge of the abyss. Carrying the two of them forward at a speed that the toad chasing them from behind had a hard time keeping up with.
Of course, it wasn’t just that the toad had a difficult time keeping up with the two of them, but also because it was clearly far harder for the toad to successfully create mist platforms for it to jump on top of over the abyss that had caused most of the surrounding mist to sink downwards into the thick mist below.
Even better, Verdell clearly noticed that the distance between the two of them and the toad was widening with every passing second. The only real thing he had to focus on was ensuring that the feather falling spell remained on Scaly and didn’t end early, as it stopping suddenly would result in a clear decrease in speed and give the toad time to catch up.
Luckily, the feather falling spell wasn’t exactly a draining spell and could only be considered comparable to a normal fireball spell and that was mainly due to the larger than normal size of the target for the spell.
In the end, he was more than capable of keeping the feather falling spell active for hours on end if needed with the mana left in his body. Making him confident in the two of them successfully escaping from the toad chasing them from behind this time around... And indeed, as the chase over the abyss went on for a little over two minutes, the toad had almost completely disappeared into the thin mist at the edge of his vision, causing Verdell to relax on top of Scaly. Knowing that the two of them should be out of danger.
Rumble~!
But as if sensing him lowering his guard and relaxing, the thick mist below them suddenly began churning violently as something massive seemed to be moving below them.
Luckily, maybe because the toad was far larger and directly interfered with the mist, the thing below didn’t seem to notice the two of them and had instead moved towards the toad in the distance... And from how the toad suddenly started panicking and rapidly ascending upwards, it was clear that it had also sensed the danger approaching from below-
RUUUUMBLE-!
Unfortunately for the toad, it was far too slow, as a giant maw over a hundred meters across suddenly emerged from the thick mist and surged upwards towards the toad attempting to desperately escape.
THUD-!
Rumble~
Closing around the toad in question before it could resist in the slightest. Sinking back into the thick mist below a short time later like nothing had happened. Leaving only Verdell as the witness to what had happened. Not knowing what to do, as he couldn’t feel the slightest bit safe looking at the churning mist below slowly calming down again.
Not just because of what he had just witnessed where a powerful SS Rank Monster was rendered completely helpless, but also because the feather falling spell didn’t exactly give him the ability to fly alongside Scaly but essentially slowed down their falling speed.
In other words, the two of them were falling slowly towards the thick mist below and would inevitably end up being swallowed by that thick mist. Potentially alerting that terrifying monster hidden within the thick mist in the process.
Unfortunately, no matter how much Verdell wanted to stop their descent, there was nothing he could do but watch them slowly get closer and closer to that dreadful mist without slowing down in the slightest...