The world narrowed to the hellish glow building in the Alpha's chest. The air itself began to burn, scorching their lungs with each ragged breath. Time seemed to stretch, each second a lifetime of impending annihilation.
'I have failed them.'
The thought was a cold shard in Kael's heart. He had led them here. He had pushed for the harder route, drawn the conflict, and now they would be vaporized for his ambition.
Then, a voice. Not a sound, but a presence, vast and ancient and irritated, unspooling in the deepest vault of his mind.
'Pathetic.'
It was Vaelthryx. The dragon's consciousness, usually a distant slumbering mountain, was now a focused, searing brand.
'You have the blood of pacts and the veins of sovereigns, and you gawk at an over-licked newt? It has a spark. You hold the furnace. ACT, LITTLE SCION.'
An image, violent and clear, slammed into Kael's consciousness. Not a spell form, but a principle. A way of being. It was the memory of a dragon in battle, not just using magic, but becoming it. An eruption of primal power that fused body, mind, and mana into a single, devastating instrument for a handful of heartbeats.
Draconic Fury.
It was a technique of desperate, glorious excess. It would burn his reserves to cinders, strain his newly formed core to its limit, and leave him a drained husk. But for maybe ten seconds, it would make him more than human.
The Alpha's glow reached critical intensity. A low, world ending hum filled the clearing.
"EVERYONE BEHIND ME!" Kael roared, not in command, but in warning.
He didn't have time to explain. He stopped trying to control the swirling black gold star in his core. Instead, he ignited it.
Draconic Fury.
Power, raw and terrifying, exploded from his veins.
Black and gold energy didn't just swirl around him it cocooned him. Scales of shimmering, hard light flickered into existence over his skin. His blue eyes bled into pools of molten gold, slitted like a predator's. The air crackled with the ozone of a storm and the deep, resonant silence of the void. He felt strength flood his muscles, speed sharpen his reflexes, and his mana capacity swell to a painful, glorious peak. He was, for this fleeting moment, a sovereign of two worlds.
The Alpha unleashed its cataclysm. A torrent of white hot plasma, wide as a river, roared forth to cleanse the clearing.
Kael didn't dodge. He met it.
He crossed his arms and pushed forward, a tide of controlled unmaking erupting from him. It wasn't a shield. It was a nullification field. Where the annihilating fire met his will, it didn't splash or deflect. It un-became. It returned to the harmless potential of heat and light before it could touch him or the cringing forms of his friends behind him. He walked into the heart of the firestorm, a dark star eating the sun, each step leaving a footprint of scorched, quiet earth.
The Alpha's brilliant, furious eyes widened in reptilian shock.
Kael's ten seconds were burning fast. He could feel the technique's cost, a screaming hollow forming in his gut. He had one shot.
"NOW! EVERYTHING YOU HAVE! ITS THROAT!"
His voice was layered, echoing with dragonfire and cosmic dust.
His team, galvanized by his impossible stand, reacted with breakthrough fueled unity.
Justin didn't aim for scales. He became a silver meteor, his entire body a weapon, shooting not with his sword, but as a sword a lance of pure, honorable intent aimed at the base of the Alpha's glowing neck.
Sophia, screaming a war cry that was half thunderclap, put every ounce of her lightning into a single, blinding spear thrust, following Justin's path, aiming to pierce the fire gland itself.
Lisa and Sora worked in perfect, silent tandem. Lisa flash froze a concentrated patch of scales on the Alpha's chest where Kael's nullification had weakened the ambient heat. A micro second later, Sora didn't throw fire. She warped space, creating a violent compression right over the frozen spot. The thermal shock and spatial pressure combined with a sickening CRUNCH.
Daniel was already there, having shadow stepped up the creature's own colossal tail. As the Alpha reeled from the combined assault, Daniel plunged both shadow blades deep into the soft tissue behind its jaw, seeking the spinal cord.
Dominic, seeing the Alpha stagger, did what he did best. He grounded himself and unleashed not an attack on the beast, but on the world beneath it. He didn't summon a spike. He unmade the ground's solidity. A ten foot circle beneath the Alpha's forelegs turned into instant, bottomless quicksand. The colossal beast lurched forward, its mighty neck stretching down, its vulnerable throat exposed.
Kael's Draconic Fury expired.
The god like power vanished, replaced by a wave of such profound weakness his knees buckled. But he had done his part.
Justin' silver lance and Sophia's lightning spear hit the exposed throat at the same moment Lisa and Sora's combo struck its chest, and Daniel's blades found their mark.
The Alpha's world ending roar became a wet, gurgling choke. Its internal fire, seeking an outlet through ruptured glands and a crushed windpipe, backfired. Light erupted from its eyes, mouth, and the cracks in its chest scales. With a final, ground shaking tremor, the behemoth collapsed, its head slamming into the quicksand beside Dominic, its hellish light dying to embers, then nothing.
Silence, deeper than before, fell over the Gloomwilds.
Then, a single sound.
Dominic, covered in muck and soot, staring at the mountain of dead scales, let out a shaky, breathless laugh. "Haha… finally."
He stumbled over to the first fallen lizard from the initial fight, the one Kael had softened. With a practiced swing of his hammer, he cracked open its skull and fished out a pulsating, cherry red core the size of his fist. He held it up, the fire within casting a warm glow on his weary, triumphant face.
"Finally," he exhaled, the word heavy with months of mining poverty, of calculating every credit, of wearing second-hand gear. "We've struck it rich." His eyes, usually so practical, shone with a rare, unguarded dream. "A Rank 2 core… a full set of them. I can finally get good gear. Real plate. A proper hammer, not this loaner." He looked around at the other carcasses, a grin spreading. "We can all get good gear."
The reality of their victory crashed over them. They had done the impossible. Not just survived. Conquered.
The next hour was a blur of exhausted, giddy work. They harvested. Five Rank 2, Initiate-Tier 1 cores from the regular lizards. And one magnificent, orb sized Rank 2, Tier 3 Alpha Core, swirling with captured fire and primal might. It was a king's ransom. Camila estimated its credit value would make even high nobles blink.
As they worked, Kael sat propped against a tree, utterly spent, his body feeling like one giant bruise. Sora fed him sips of water, her own hands trembling from exertion. Justin and Dominic were comparing core sizes with boyish enthusiasm. Ellora was meticulously healing everyone's burns and cuts, her spirits looking as tired as she felt.
Lisa stood apart, her alchemy notebook forgotten. Her analytical gaze was fixed not on the cores, nor on the strategic implications, but on Kael. She watched the way Sora fussed over him, the easy camaraderie he shared with Justin and Dominic as they celebrated. She saw the shadow of the dragon that had briefly worn his shape. The calculation in her mind wasn't about mana output anymore. It was about something far more complex, something that made the cool, logical part of her feel strangely unmoored. Her gaze lingered, green eyes thoughtful and unsure.
High above, Princess Elara Everglade lowered her crystal. Her hand ached from writing. The final entry was simple.
*Field Test concluded for Team 7-B. Objective: Survival. Result: Catastrophic Success. Note: They did not pass the test. They redefined it. Recommend: Immediate debrief and watchlisting. The variables have become catalysts.*
She watched the group below the commoner miner's son dreaming of solid steel, the noble heir laughing with him, the dragon pact boy sleeping under the watchful eyes of his friends. The Gloomwilds had tested them with thorns, teeth, fire, and treachery. They had answered with unity, fury, and an unexpected, world-shaking kind of grace.
The test was over. But for Kael Osborn and his friends, everything was just beginning.