CHAPTER 404: CHAPTER 404: IT APPEARS I HAVE BEEN FOOLED

"Is that... Ibadon?"

Those features.

Although they had never seen him before, the description that was passed around the lion society was very descriptive.

He was literally a dragon-lion hybrid, the only one they knew for countless years.

Seeing him for the first time was bound to cause anyone to associate him with that name.

The features of a dragon blended well with those of a lion’s. Four black horns sprouted from his head. Two long horns at the top and two shorter horns by the side, giving him a more menacing look.

His pitch black mane which came after the horns flowed back. The gravitational pull that he was generating on his own caused the individual mane strands to stay rooted and orderly, instead of flowing.

His eyes were reptilian, having one pale red slit pupil in each. Those eyes stared straight at the arkship seemingly piercing through the hulls to see the inside.

The massive dragon lion hybrid sat comfortably on top of a moving arkship that had the design of the dragon civilization.

Chloe’s grandfather was frightened.

How could this be?

How could Ibadon of all people be here at this time?

"Stop," Ibadon opened his mouth to speak, causing an extraordinary sound wave to spread out and brush up on the bodies of the arkships.

Instinctively, Chloe’s grandfather and the fifty arkships behind also stopped moving.

The arkships behind and the lion kings inside were also overwhelmed by what they saw. They had no choice but to stop.

If it had been just any dragon arkship, they might not have even cared and would have even started a fight right there and then.

But this was Ibadon.

Ten dragon arkships stopped with Ibadon sitting in one of them. His long black reptilian tail waved about behind him, casting a mesmerizing illusion.

"Didn’t I sense a pulse from this arkship?" Ibadon wondered out loud as he stood up.

A frown appeared on his face as he narrowed his gaze at Chloe’s grandfather’s arkship.

At the end of the day, Ibadon was still part lion, he could definitely feel the pulse that was released when the Conqueror Mode Avatar was activated.

Ibadon, with his terrifying and mysterious powers, was able to see through the metal walls that shielded the inhabitants of the arkships.

He was confused, so he scanned the first arkship where Chloe’s grandfather was in. He saw everything, the chamber worlds, the chamber of command, the engine chamber, the factory chamber, and more.

He didn’t find anything of interest. The only thing that slightly got his attention was the faint weakness that Chloe’s grandfather was emitting as well as the last tiny flicker of golden flame that died off close to his neck.

Besides that, there was nothing, no sign of a Primordial Lion that looked like Noel.

Puzzled, Ibadon turned his attention to the fifty arkships lined up behind. He scanned the interiors, not even giving the lion kings a second glance.

Still, he found nothing.

He thought back to his encounter with that Frost Lioness on that frozen planet. She too had emitted this same pulse.

And now, that skinny lion king in the first arkship had the residual aura of the Primordial Lion.

But, it wasn’t, it was just a decoy.

Less than half a second and Ibadon understood what had happened.

His dark expression relaxed and his fierce gaze calmed down.

"Voldemort, it appears I have been fooled," Ibadon spoke gently as a strange smile crept up his face.

The lions who watched this from within their arkships couldn’t help but swallow their saliva.

"Regent..." Voldemort called, his voice unsteady as he spoke with caution, "Should we..."

Ibadon shook his head as he chuckled, "No need to do anything, our mystery Primordial Lion is very tricky and you’re too weak to be of help to me, no offense."

"None taken, Regent," Regent quickly said.

"I’ll handle everything from here.

The Primordial Lion is smart, but he will die today,"

Ibadon declared with tangible might and authority oozing off of his body. The two wings behind him unfurled, spreading out on both sides of his body.

Each wing seemed to swallow the world, covering every corner of their vision. As the wings were spread out, it was as if all the lights of the countless stars around them were being sucked straight into the wings.

In one gentle motion, Ibadon flapped his bat-like black wings, and the world seemed to end.

Stars for hundreds of light-years were either pushed away or sucked toward him.

The fifty-one arkships in front of Ibadon witnessed something horrifying.

Ibadon opened his mouth, his jaws split apart as his razor-sharp teeth were exposed. Every single one of his teeth which were the size of a tall tree was sharp and pointed.

What was even more terrifying was that Ibadon’s mouth seemed to be getting bigger and wider, encompassing all of space and time in front of them.

Against their will and power, the arkships were sucked into Ibadon’s open mouth.

That was how big Ibadon had gotten, he was big enough to suck fifty arkships into his mouth without any problem.

There was nothing they could do. The arkships burst with fierce light and immense power as they tried to escape the deadly pull.

But nothing could be done.

One by one, they were devoured by Ibadon, swallowed into Oblivion.

Chloe’s father watched as the chamber of command was being devoured by the nothingness. The nothingness crept up his limbs and he could feel his physical body gradually fading out of existence, transformed into some sort of nutrients for his devourer.

Right before he went, sure that he was going to die here, he opened the chat feature of his lion system and sent one last message to his granddaughter.

When Ibadon closed his mouth again, all the fifty-one arkships and the inhabitants ceased to exist.

He shrank back to a more comfortable size. He was still big but smaller than before.

He closed his mouth, effectively hiding those terrifying rows of sharp teeth.

His reptilian eyes glowed green before turning back to pale red.

Just like that, he had ended fifty lion kings.

Satisfied, he flapped his wings again before disappearing into the distance.

The ten arkships of the dragons simply floated there, the dragons within didn’t know what to do.

This was their first time witnessing Ibadon’s power. Seeing him swallow fifty-one arkships at once, they wondered what kind of power he had that allowed the hybrid to do such a thing.

Legends tell that Ibadon had two hearts, one lion and one dragon.

They say he had gotten the powers of one of the ancient and almost extinct Lionheart types that was also similar to a Dragonheart type.

These two hearts forged together to create this abomination called Ibadon.

Imperial Guard Voldemort was having a headache. Not only did he need to reassess his fear of Ibadon, he also had to make some reports to the Dragon Empress.

Ibadon had been fooled, he said it himself. Perhaps, he understood that allowing the Primordial Lion to continue wandering off was not good.

Noel’s trauma was nothing to joke about.

/////

"Detecting a massive null zone at the place where the dragon aura appeared," Exalon’s Prince reported.

Exalon frowned, "What of the arkship, is it fine? That arkship shouldn’t be able to create a distortion field," Exalon said, muttering the last part to himself.

"Your Majesty, we can’t detect the arkships any longer, they seem to have just...disappeared," Someone else reported.

Before Exalon could say anything...

"Your Majesty, the null zone is moving!"

"King Exalon, the distortion field seems to be spreading!"

"Stars are going off course, Your Majesty. Something bad is happening!"

"Your Majesty, the null zine is moving fast!"

"It’s heading toward us, Your Majesty!"

"REDIRECT ALL ORIGIN ESSENCE TO BARRIER ENGINES!"

"Warp engines activated!"

////////

Exalon’s crew was not the only one to detect it. Any other arkship with competent surveillance technology had detected the fast-approaching null zone and the dragon auras.

The battle at Eridoria’s star system came to a halt.

"Spread out!" Ma’abu and Exalon gave out the same orders.

Immediately, the thousands of arkships activated their warp engines and sped away.

But could this save them from the brewing wrath of Ibadon?

"Lions! You never cease to stop annoying me!" Ibadon’s gentle voice reached the ears of every creature at every corner of the galaxy.

The extraordinary sound wave of his voice was even faster than the arkships moving at warp speed.

Oblivion.

A second after the thousands of arkships left the star system, a dark matter swallowed it all.

The star, the shattered planets and asteroids, even the magic shuttles that were left behind.

All of them vanished into the expanding blanket of oblivion.

Unsettling darkness that made one feel as though creepy insects were crawling over the skin, that was what this emptiness looked and felt like.

A black hole, bigger and having more mass than anyone could imagine.

Star dust, planet dust, space dust, photons, everything was being sucked into this ’black hole’

The suction force spread, covering more and more star systems until a whole star cluster practically vanished from the Void Spill Galaxy.

The glowing event horizon that was forming was the only evidence that there was a devouring beast behind them, if not, all any of the lion kings could see was total darkness.

True Oblivion.

"Primordial Lion, feed yourself to me!" Ibadon spoke from the depths of his nothingness.