"...Shit. A True Seeing power suggests dracolich."

"Glowy and creepy too. Auuuuugh."

"...You think a dive bombing run is still our best bet?"

He glances to Emes (the more scholarly of the two), who says, "I'd avoid getting too close, it can paralyze people with its gaze - exact range unknown, likely between thirty and sixty feet. At that size its breath weapon is probably a seventy-foot-cone or hundred-and-forty-foot-line of unknown damage type. It is probably a spellcaster. It is probably a much better spellcaster than any of us, if you can kill it from - hm, a greater range than one thousand and two hundred feet - I'd suggest doing that, most spells don't have a wider range than that. It is also going to be intelligent, and if it's actually a dracolich - killing it won't put it down permanently, and might be more likely to make it mark us as enemies, but also might trap it in its phylactery or force it to move to a weaker body, colossal dragon corpses can't be easy to find. Dive bombing it - if you can surprise it and cross that distance in under six seconds, its reaction time is probably slower than yours, assuming it doesn't have - I don't even know, bullshit like Time Stop memorized."

"Your magic is kind of scary, you know. Bombing accuracy and speed suffers a lot if we have to do it from twelve-hundred. That's level bombing. A good dive-bombing profile is six seconds of dive, release weapons at four or five hundred feet, pull up and zoom away in another six to ten seconds. And we only have so many bombs. I do have my lightning, range two to three hundred, but I have no idea how much good that will do."

"I really wish I could copy some of you lot's stuff. Maybe it'll click with practice."

"- The chances of it having a long-range offensive spell it can cast that fast are low, the dive-bombing might work. Making it very clear we're not mice might work, too. The lightning might make that clear, might risk not injuring it fast enough to keep it from catching up with you. This thing is easily twice the weight class we usually punch in, I only know theory about how to even kill one." And a lot more theory than usual admittedly, and fucking hell now she wants a close look at its phylactery - "Though if we kill it instead of chasing it off, we'll have an opportunity to find its core and keep it dead." Or figure out the unfortunately unwritten process for lichdom.

"How sure are you guys this thing even wants to kill us? I mean, it's flying toward us and looks creepy, but, like, Zulu raiders look creepy and most of the time they just posture at each other and then go home."

"I am deferring to local expertise on this one, Ghost. Emes, hitting fast and hard and then running way is what we're good at. I'm inclined to go with the dive-bombing plan."

"Lichdom is a process that involves consuming souls to maintain and increase power and immortality. Potentially it's bored, and running away makes us fun to chase, at the end of which it plans to bat us around like a cat with a mouse. Potentially we entered its territory and it's making sure we leave. Potentially we look tasty."

"...Yeah, being at the mercy of a soul-consumer sounds like a bad plan. I want to try and alpha-strike this thing. Okay. So. My idea is, us three split off and keep flying until we find some clouds. We go high and maintain position over the dracolich. You three keep leading it, if possible set up some kind of damaging or slowing ambush or trap. When the time seems right and the dracolich is focused on you, all three of us make a dive-bombing attack and release two fifty-pound bombs. I have trouble imagining that it can shrug off three hundred pounds of boom. If it's still alive, it'll be extremely pissed off. So we circle around and make our best remaining attacks with guns, mana-blasts, and lightning, and you guys join us. Kill it fast or we're not going to kill it at all."

"We can do that. Enough summons in its path should at least slow it down, or force it to use up limited resources like spells. I also remember reading a trick someone managed, summoned a wall in front of a group of dragons during the last war - most of the bigger ones are slow to turn. We can pull something similar."

(Fortunately, there's clouds about here and there, mostly high over their position - it's the sort of day that's neither perfectly clear nor overcast, but hovering calmly in the middle.)

This sucks. Not that fighting Neuroi was much better, but she mostly understands the threat Neuroi pose.

She wants to run away. Far, far away from this blight-zone and pawn some of the stuff she looted from that town and just carry packages or something. But she'd still be in the land of weird unknown crazy dangerous magic, and if anyone comes to the rescue of Cat, she won't be nearly as high on their list of priorities. And she won't have backup or anything without them.

Uuuuugh.

She forms up with the other two high in the sky, tense but quiet.

There are ways to make yourself less likely to be noticed while flying. They try to stay between the sun and the dragon, and behind clouds besides. Elanor stays in radio contact with Emes, checking in every couple of minutes. The three flyers settle in to cruise and wait for the perfect opportunity, assuming the dragon doesn't notice them and come after them, that is.

The dragon seems to have decided that the party now throwing flying summons and walls of fire (which it just barrels through) is much more interesting, at least.

They do not appear to be injuring it. At all. Even with magical attacks.

(If the dragon sees the fliers it isn't bothering tracking them.)

Well, this attack is all or nothing. Sadly, that's not a new feeling.

"Down we go, girls. Emes, if you can slow it more, now."

The dive run is set to lead the dragon just a little bit, diving out of the sun. Eighteen hundred feet. Fifteen hundred. Eleven hundred...

The dragon slows down a little, courtesy of a rather large air elemental that Emes throws in its face.

It doesn't seem to be paying much attention to the witches.

"Bombs away, pull up up up-" They zoom off to the side of the dragon, missing by less than 200 feet, enduring the G-forces and immediately going to get altitude back.

Six tightly packed metal canisters of boom fall, whistling slightly. One hits the back of the bone dragon's head. One misses and explodes on the ground twenty feet away from it. One hits its left leg. Three hit its torso. All of them explode.

It roars, thrashing and flailing mid-air. Its ribs are heavily damaged, its skull nearly destroyed. It catches itself before it falls, tattered wings whipping wide, and arcs around, shaking its head -

And then turning, and starting to fly away to the north.

"Guys, it's running. But no more bombs. Pursue and go for a kill, or leave off?"

A quick back and forth, and "I'd leave off, it's unlikely to be able to heal itself at all quickly, and we don't want it turning around."

"You're the experts. That thing is damned tough, though. Let's head back, girls, but stay alert."

The dragon slowly dwindles into the distance.