CHAPTER 359: CHAPTER 358 - RED FLAG.

The torn stump where the black dragon’s wing had been twitched—then sprouted. Flesh knitted with sickening pops, bones reformed, and sinew stretched taut, and within moments, the wing was whole again, black scales gleaming.

Its molten eyes locked onto Raven, disbelieving and seething.

"You—! How is this possible?!" The beast roared, its voice shaking the sky itself. "You are no false imitation. You are a dragon. Your mana, your blood—everything is dragonic."

The black dragoon couldn’t believe how a human could become a dragon.

That had never happened—no, it was impossible. Without a dragon heart implant, it was impossible.

And an implant of that caliber could only be done by an elder dragon.

But as it thought of a dragon heart, it noticed something.

Its eyes narrowed, pupils tightening to slits as it studied Raven’s furnace-lit body.

"...you lack a dragon heart," it muttered.

Raven didn’t say anything, and Graye, somewhere on his back, focused her on her mana, gathering it all for an attack.

The black dragon, on the other hand, continued. "You have a true dragon’s form, yes. But you cannot hold it. No matter how mighty, a dragon without a heart will always burn out."

Raven rolled his molten shoulders, crimson firelight flickering across his massive chest plates as he finally spoke, his voice like a mountain stone cracking.

"Then I’ll just have to finish this before my time runs out."

"Bold words." The black dragon stretched its wings wide, the shadow blotting the already fractured heavens. "But yes, right now, you are a threat to me..."

Its wings jerked as it leaned forward. "However, what happens when that time ends?"

As soon as it said that, the black dragon launched upward, its wings thrashing hurricanes into the wasteland below.

Raven’s eyes widened as he saw that.

Without a second’s delay, he muttered, "Oh no, you don’t."

Then, his body surged after the black dragon, a living comet of shadow and flame. Graye clung to the ridge of his molten spikes, her small frame looking absurd atop the titan dragon, like a mouse riding a flying warship.

Yet, with her hair whipping back, she laughed wildly, definitely enjoying it.

"Man, being wielded by a dragon feels different,"

Omni, who was held in Raven’s clawed hand, muttered.

The sword was no longer three meters, but scaled to its master’s body: a monstrosity of steel nearly twenty meters long, radiating killing intent sharp enough to split storms.

The black dragon, however, was getting away, so Raven growled, waving his hand as missiles made of fire, water, rock, wind, and voidfire surged forward, hitting the black dragon on the back.

Unfortunately for Raven, none of those attacks did any damage to the beast as the mana barrier surrounding it stopped them dead.

All of those attacks crashed into the black dragon’s scales and shimmered out of existence.

However, those attacks did pull the black dragon’s attention as it turned its head downward.

Looking at Raven, the black dragon wheeled in midair, jaws gaping. A torrent of death surged forth—the same breath it had used on Graye.

In response, Raven inhaled. His chest glowed brighter, cracks of molten black spreading across his torso. When he exhaled—

The Breath of Destruction erupted.

It was straining for him, but he had no other choice right now. He didn’t think Voidfire was strong enough to face death because death was inevitable.

The only thing that stood a chance against the death breath was destruction breath.

And the moment Raven used it, a torrent blacker than death itself roared outward, layered with crimson fissures that pulsed like doomsday itself.

The moment it was unleashed, even the black dragon flinched, twisting in horror.

"That breath...! How do you have it?!"

Raven’s molten eyes narrowed. He didn’t answer. He only pushed harder.

KRSSSSHHHHHHHHHH!

Two pillars collided—death and destruction grinding against each other.

One was inevitable, while the other was the destruction itself.

Both sides tried to overpower each other.

The clash split the sky, and for the first time in centuries, the black clouds of the Ashen Expanse tore apart, revealing sunlight bleeding across the cursed land.

The shockwaves ripped the skies open. Lightning forked across the edges. The world itself groaned.

That was when Raven’s voice thundered across the mana storm. "You’re forgetting something."

Graye’s laughter cut through the deafening clash. "Damn right you are!"

She climbed up Raven’s massive head, balancing with reckless poise. Her greatsword, dwarfed by him yet still massive at 1.5 meters, gleamed as she swung downward with all her might.

From her blade burst an illusionary colossus: a sword of fire, water, earth, wind, and lightning—and at its core, a burning streak of unique purple flame. It descended like judgment.

The black dragon’s eyes widened in pure panic as it recalled how that purple fire could cut through its scales.

It wasn’t something the black dragon feared, but it knew that letting Graye’s attack hit it would momentarily disable it, and Raven could use that moment to slay it.

So, the giant dragon twisted violently, wings straining, trying to avoid the elemental guillotine.

But that flicker of distraction was enough.

Raven shoved, and the balance of the clash shifted.

His Breath of Destruction surged forward, overwhelming the death pillar.

The two forces slammed into the black dragon.

BOOOOOOOOOOM!

That attack would’ve split the dragon in two if not for its timely move of placing its wings as shields.

That move saved it, but at what expense?

Its wings exploded—Graye’s rainbow-flame strike cleaving them apart, Raven’s breath detonating into the raw flesh.

The impact rattled the heavens. Blood like molten tar rained in black torrents.

The dragon shrieked, its body spinning helplessly as gravity reclaimed it.

The tyrant, once the terror of the Expanse, now fell, wings obliterated, body thrashing as it plummeted toward the scorched land below.

As it fell downward, the black dragon saw Raven’s huge form flying down towards it, Omni ready to cleave it in two pieces, and the black dragon growled.

A glow burst across its chest, its throat, its maw—light searing through cracks in its charred scales.

"You think... I would die so easily?!" The monster snarled, and with one last act of defiance, its throat expanded. The air warped, mana collapsing inward.

Its death breath ignited again.

Raven’s molten eyes went wide. He could already feel the wave of annihilation screaming toward him, but pulling back wasn’t an option. He had already committed.

"Then I’ll tear you down with me!"

He inhaled, chest splitting with crimson fissures, and exhaled.

The Breath of Destruction roared once more.

Two torrents met midair, screaming black against black. The clash blackened the sky. The heavens peeled apart, ripping clouds into ribbons.

But Raven didn’t stop there.

With a savage roar, he slammed into the black dragon’s chest.

His clawed feet dug into its flesh, crushing bone, while his weight drove the beast faster toward the earth.

Their locked breaths became a single beam, a spear of colliding destruction stabbing downward as both titans plummeted.

The heat between them was so high that the air itself seemed to be vaporizing, and yet, Graye, who was quite close to it, threw her head back, laughing like a madwoman in the storm.

"Perfect timing!"

She leapt from Raven’s spine, her small form vanishing in the chaos, only to reappear sprinting across the black dragon’s body.

Her sword cut arcs of fire and lightning, purple flame trailing as she carved deep wounds into the beast’s scales. She moved like a streaking phantom, slashing, plunging, and vaulting, each strike tearing another howl from the dragon’s throat.

The dragon could feel the pain, so it tried to swat her away, but Raven growled, "Like I’d let you," and waved Omni, cleaving the claw of the black dragon.

Rage flashed past the black dragon’s eyes, and in anger, it pushed its attack with more intensity, almost pushing Raven back.

Almost. Because the moment it used all of its mana in the breath attack—

BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOM!!!

—They hit the ground, shaking the whole world.

The wasteland cratered, the earth buckling, as mountains trembled and dust and smoke erupted into the heavens.

For a long, breathless moment—nothing but silence.

Then, through the haze, a towering silhouette emerged.

Raven stood atop the black dragon’s corpse, his massive chest rising and falling, molten cracks spiderwebbing across his body. Omni was buried deep in the dragon’s skull, pulsing with sinister light.

For a while, there was silence.

Then, Raven exhaled heavily, his voice like stone grinding. "...It’s done."

But his groan betrayed the truth—his heart was hammering too fast, mana flickering wildly. The toll of using this form was coming.

Graye, perched on his shoulder, leaned forward, her eyes gleaming. "So... that’s it, huh? It’s really dead?"

Raven’s molten gaze drifted down at the corpse. He gave a firm nod. "...Yeah. It’s dead."

But then his expression froze as he realized something.

’Fuck!! A red flag!’

Without a second’s delay, he pulled Omni out of the dragon’s head, knowing that a red flag moment only happened when the world was trying to tell the protagonist that things weren’t over yet.

But before he could turn around, the air behind him warped.

His instincts screamed a split second before the world lit black.

FWOOOOOOOOOOOOSH!

A pillar of death breath smashed into his back, the force blasting him and Graye forward like ragdolls.

While Raven hurled forward, Graye shot into the sky like a baseball. She couldn’t even control her body.

However, Raven knew that she would be fine, so he let her be and tried to steady his body midflight.

His head whipped around, trying to see who or what had happened, and the moment he saw it, he couldn’t help but groan.

"Fuck me sideways."

The black dragon, who was supposed to have died, was standing a hundred meters away.

The body Raven had killed was still there, but a new one had now taken its place.