For a heartbeat—

No one moved.

Ragnar stood frozen mid-step, claws half-formed, the roar still stuck in his throat. He had tried to move. He had tried to reach Kael.

But Seraphina's spell had been too fast. Too absolute.

He realized that she must've known that he would move if he saw Kael in danger.

She had made her attack faster, keeping Ragnar's speed in mind.

Rina's fists clenched until her claws bit into her palms. "…Damn it," she muttered, teeth grinding. "We… We really thought—"

Rovan lowered his hands slowly, his shoulders stiff. "An SS-ranker against an SSS-ranker…" He shook his head, bitter. "We shouldn't have doubted the gap."

Looking at Kael going head-to-head with Seraphina, landing attacks again and again, causing the barrier, which was said to be impossible to budge, to crack, they had started believing that Kael might win.

They had thought that Kael would do the impossible, but now, they could only close their eyes.

Even Ragnar gritted his teeth because he could've acted faster if he hadn't started hoping for the same thing as Rina and Rovan.

Now, the battlefield was silent.

Where Kael had been, there was nothing left.

Ash drifted through the air.

The smell hit them a moment later.

The smell was fresh, like the scent of wood—

"…Wait."

Ragnar stiffened.

Rina inhaled sharply, her eyes narrowing. "That smell—it's not flesh—"

Before the thought could finish—

DUN.

The air thumped.

Not exploded.

Not cracked.

It pulsed, as if a giant drum had struck the sky.

DUN.

The pressure became physical, forcing breath from lungs and bending knees.

Both Rina and Rovan might have fallen off the sky if not for Ragnar rushing toward them and catching them.

Then, they all looked up.

And froze.

A shadow swallowed the clouds.

It was colossal.

Over a hundred meters of black-scaled body coiled through the sky, wings spanning a hundred and forty meters, blotting out the light.

Golden horns curved back from its massive head, and its eyes—

Those eyes burned like molten suns.

Ragnar's blood ran cold.

"A… dragon…"

He couldn't believe his eyes, but the feeling in his bones and his blood wouldn't lie.

'That isn't an illusion!'

He moved instantly, grabbing Rina and Rovan and retreating in a blur.

He followed his instincts, and right now, they told him to run.

Seraphina, however, didn't move.

She couldn't.

Her mind shattered under the sight.

'A dragon.'

An impossible existence—one that she had been researching her entire life.

She had always wanted to meet the dragons, wanting to know what made them special and why they were called the prime of all beings to exist.

But, unfortunately for her, there were no dragons in this world—

Or so it was supposed to be.

Right now, all of those beliefs that there were no more dragons alive were shattered because she could see that the thing above her was a dragon.

It was alive and breathing.

No matter how many times her mind tried to come up with a 'No… this can't be real,' her eyes, which could see the aura surrounding that dragon, shut them down.

The question was, who was this dragon? Why did it come here?

And then understanding struck like lightning.

"…It's him," she whispered.

Above the battlefield, the dragon, Kael, opened its jaws.

Black energy gathered there, dense, violent, restrained only by will.

It was clear now—Kael hadn't died.

At the moment of impact, he had switched places with a wooden doll—one prepared by him on the ground while he fought in the sky.

He had prepared it because he knew that his attack pattern was predictable, and anyone with some intelligence could use it against him.

So, he had teleported himself away from the visible range while teleporting the wooden statue in his place when Seraphina's attack hit.

And instead of teleporting nearby—

He had gone above the clouds so that everyone would think that he had died, although it would only be for a few moments.

The black clouds—a result of his reckless attack around an hour ago—provided perfect cover for his dragon body.

They bought him enough time to charge his breath attack just enough to kill Seraphina.

After all, he didn't want to repeat the mistake from before by using a breath too powerful for even him to control.

Seraphina, on the other hand, broke out of her reverie the moment she saw the black ball of energy gathering before Kael's jaws.

Her instincts screamed danger, and she didn't try to underestimate whatever was coming.

She moved.

A massive shield-type magic circle snapped into existence before her, runes locking together as a blinding wall of light formed—thick, layered, and absolute.

She poured mana into it without restraint.

Above her, Kael's eyes narrowed.

And he breathed.

A torrent of compressed black and white annihilation roared downward, warping space as it descended.

The sky screamed.

The air trembled and burned.

Seraphina braced herself behind her shield as the breath slammed into it—

BOOOOMMMMMMMM!!

Light and darkness collided in a cataclysmic explosion.

And the battlefield vanished beneath the impact.

The breath did not stop.

It poured.

A continuous torrent of compressed annihilation—black and white mana fused into something violent and screaming—cascaded from Kael's open jaws, slamming into Seraphina's shield without mercy.

One second.

The city screamed.

Buildings rattled as if struck by an invisible hammer. Windows trembled. People fell to their knees, clutching their heads as the sky itself turned into a blinding canvas of white and black, light and shadow tearing at one another.

Two seconds.

The ground cracked.

Mana storms spiraled outward, flattening trees miles away.

The very air burned, lungs searing with every breath. The world felt like it was being peeled apart.

Three seconds.

From the city below, they could see it.

The vast shadow of a dragon dominating the heavens—wings spread wide, body coiled like a god of destruction—and beneath it, a tiny, defiant figure wrapped in blinding light, being pushed back inch by inch through the air.

Seraphina.

Holding the sky.

Four… five… six seconds.

To the people watching, those seconds stretched into eternity.

Every heartbeat came with the same thought.

'I hope the barrier holds.'

Seven seconds.

Seraphina's shield screamed, while the barrier around the city thrummed.

Runes on Seraphina's cracked and reforged themselves again and again as she poured mana into them beyond what her body should have allowed.

Blood leaked from the corner of her lips, instantly vaporized by the heat.

Eight seconds.

Her feet dragged through the air, pushed back dozens of meters, then hundreds.

Nine seconds.

The barrier above the city started to crack.

Ten seconds.

And still—

It continued.

.......................

Far from the epicenter, Ragnar skidded to a halt atop a shattered cliff, forcibly steadying Rina and Rovan as the world trembled beneath them.

The sky above them was no longer a sky.

It was a battlefield between gods.

Rina stared.

She didn't blink.

She couldn't.

"…I…" Her voice failed her. "…I was flirting with that?"

Her hands trembled—not from fear, but from sheer disbelief.

A dragon.

The thing of legends. Of extinction. Of myths whispered to children.

And Kael—

Rovan swallowed hard, pushing his hair up with a shaking hand.

"Sir," he said slowly, carefully, "tell me honestly… what do we do now?"

Ragnar didn't answer immediately.

His eyes were locked on the sky, instincts screaming, blood roaring, and ancient fear crawling up his spine.

"…We can't take him," Ragnar finally said, his voice low. "Not if he doesn't want to come."

Rovan nodded grimly. "And even if we could… should we?"

The words hung heavy.

A dragon wasn't just a being.

It was a symbol.

The last of his kind.

Attacking him wasn't just a fight—it was a declaration to the world.

Rina clenched her fists. "…If the higher-ups don't know," she said quietly, "they'll make mistakes."

Ragnar exhaled slowly.

"…We return to Grandins."

He looked at the sky one last time.

"And we warn them."

Mana flared.

The three demihumans vanished.

.......................

At the same time, Kael's breath stopped.

The silence that followed was deafening.

Kael closed his jaws slowly, his massive chest rising and falling as heat rolled off his body in waves.

The sky was scorched clean where the attack had passed, clouds erased, space still trembling.

Below him—

Seraphina remained.

Barely.

Her shield was still there.

Cracked.

Fractured.

Runes flickered like dying stars, chunks of light breaking away and dissolving into nothingness.

Her body bore burns along her arms and side, white mana failing to fully mask the damage.

She was alive.

Kael's golden eyes narrowed.

"...Tch," he muttered. "Still standing."

He tilted his head slightly, assessing.

"Maybe I should've increased the output after all."

Seraphina looked up at him.

For a moment—just a moment—their gazes locked.

There was no hatred in her eyes.

Only resolve.

And something like awe.

Then her gaze dropped to the black ring on her finger.

Kael's pupils shrank.

"That energy—!"

It was teleportation.

"Don't—!"

Kael moved.

The world folded as his massive body surged forward, wings snapping, space screaming as his jaws opened wide—wide enough to swallow her whole.

His shadow engulfed her.

His maw closed.

CLAMP.

Nothing.

He felt no resistance.

There was no body.

Only air.

Kael snarled, pulling back as white light faded from between his teeth.

"…Damn it."

Seraphina was gone.

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