Chapter 830: The Genesis of Dragons
Of course, a sufficiently strong Authority could still break through since she wasn’t yet at full power, but it still made a significant difference, reducing much of the damage Arthur would otherwise take.
Because of that, the Stellar Guard on Arthur’s left hand had been gathering dust for the past 43 years.
Well, 43 years if counting the time spent within the Training Pocket Universe Barda had created. Outside, it had only been 15.
Either way, he hadn’t needed to rely on the Stellar Guard thanks to Celestia’s Integrated Armour.
"The location is somewhat troublesome, since there is the chance it’s not simply lying around and may actually be in the possession of a Main Entity or another being of comparable power," Arthur muttered with a light frown.
"If it turns out to be with someone, come back and tell me. I will get it for you."
Berlal said this after hearing Arthur, with every intention of coercing it out of whoever might be with it.
"Watching the last fusion inspired me with an idea for something, so this one might be useful as well," she added.
"Oh, no problem. I’ll make sure to do that."
Arthur certainly wasn’t going to refuse the assistance being offered to him by this ultra-powerful dragon.
"Also—"
Berlal began to speak, but suddenly fell silent, and hearing her, Arthur lifted his head and asked.
"Also?"
"..."
The dragon didn’t answer him. She only looked upward at the sky, staring in silence.
It didn’t take him long to realise Barda had also gone silent, and before he could ask what was wrong, a Cosmic Gate ripped space open and Gindry stepped out, her expression dark as she heaved a weary sigh.
"Goodbye, peaceful days."
"Stop jinxing it, Gindry," Wyndella said as she stepped out after her.
"There is nothing left to jinx anymore," said Gervod, following behind Wyndella.
Moments later, another Cosmic Gate opened as Raikis stepped out, sighing as he spoke.
"Clench your teeth, guys. Someone’s about to take a beating."
"Hands up if you think Raikis should be the scapegoat."
Gindry’s sudden suggestion had every dragon raising their hand, with Barda even lifting both.
"What on Aeturn are you all talking about?"
Arthur cut in, unable to contain his curiosity any longer, and at his words, Barda sighed and said.
"Right, you’re here."
"Shouldn’t he be away from here now?" Gindry asked, but Wyndella shook her head and replied, "He’ll be fine."
"Hope he won’t have an existential crisis or something."
"I’m sorry, what the fuck?!" Arthur interrupted after hearing Gindry’s unsettling remark, unwilling to dismiss how dangerous it sounded.
At that point, Barda grabbed Arthur, pulling him up and placing his hands on the godslayer’s shoulders before leading him away from the beach umbrella. At the same time, Celestia silently disappeared from where she was, but Arthur didn’t mind since he could still sense her location.
"You see, Arthur. The Cosmos is a really big place."
"Yes... I know that..."
Arthur was confused, not understanding why Barda was suddenly bringing up this random fact, but the Blue Dragon continued speaking without explaining.
"In that really big place, there are a lot of levels of power.
And personally, I believe every man has gotta have the ambition to climb those ranks of power."
The clouds above slowly began to darken, the light of the star Chazat orbited dimming as Barda patted Arthur’s chest and went on speaking.
"In your case, your main drive is ’survival’. To become strong enough to breeze through all the bullshit the gods back in your home Multiverse have planned.
But while you have the right motivation, it’s better to also have a ’target’ to aim for."
"Can you stop beating around the bush already?"
Barda chuckled at Arthur’s reply, and at that moment the ambient concentration of cosmic energy began to rise.
It wasn’t a slow and faintly perceptible rise, but a sudden spike, reaching a level Arthur was certain the him of 15 years ago wouldn’t have been able to endure without collapsing.
One could only imagine the kind of chaos unfolding across the rest of the planet, where there were billions of beings weaker than he was.
"What the hell is going on?"
Arthur asked with a frown, and at this, Barda smiled wryly and carried on with what he had been saying before.
"As I was saying, it’s better if you have a ’target’ level of power you aim to reach. That final destination. The end of the road where you’d lay down your hat and rest."
Barda raised his gaze towards the dark clouds with lightning flashing through them as he spoke.
"Look up to the skies, Progenitor godslayer, and behold the Ultimate target you should achieve in your quest for power."
No sooner had Barda spoken than Arthur felt a chill crawl down his spine, goosebumps spreading across his skin as his instincts screamed for him to flee.
However, he was also completely frozen still, unable to do anything but watch as the skies parted, reality itself tearing apart as a streak of light descended from outer space and crashed onto the beach with a thunderous impact.
A storm of immense cosmic energy erupted from the point of impact, waves of power tearing through the land and causing it to crack and buckle, the terrain only holding together because of the presence of the dragons surrounding him.
Then, Barda’s voice echoed in his ears.
"Behold, the Genesis of Dragons."
And almost as if in response, a furious True Voice thundered across the land.
|YOU SIX OLD FOOLS!!!!|
The rage in the voice was palpable, shaking the Draco Sirus universe itself with immense force and bringing about a multitude of disasters across its expanse.
But upon hearing this voice, the Levites remained calm and even found the leisure to joke about it.
"Oh, he’s pissed," Barda remarked.
"No shit, Sherlock," Wyndella replied.
"Raikis," Gindry called, grabbing the red-haired dragon and pushing him in front of the group. "I choose you!"
Raikis rolled his eyes as he turned toward Gindry, who shoved him forward, with a deadpan expression.
"Are you being for re—!"
"?"
**BOOOOMMMM!!!
"!!"
Arthur’s vision was suddenly consumed by bright light, his senses completely overwhelmed by the immense flood of cosmic energy that exploded against Raikis’ face.
He was struck by a sensation of weightlessness, spinning uncontrollably through ’something’ until an arm suddenly grabbed him.
"Gotcha."
"!"
Arthur’s senses returned the moment Barda grabbed him, and he looked around in shock, confused as his surroundings had suddenly transformed from a beach to the vacuum of space.
’...eh?’
Arthur blinked again, stunned, unable to comprehend why he was seeing enormous, familiar-looking orbs of cosmic energy surrounded by multi-coloured clouds of cosmic dust and gas.
’Isn’t that...Draco Sirus?’
Just as his mind finally registered that one of the orbs in the distance was the Draco Sirus universe, Barda spoke again.
"Remain here, Arthur."
The man did something to lock Arthur’s existence outside the space-time continuum before turning his gaze toward the direction of his siblings, who were all gathered around a single glowing mass of cosmic energy.
Raikis, who had been struck by ’something’ Arthur could not compute, spat out blood that floated in space as he shouted.
|Oy! Old man! You know even you can’t take on all six of us at once!|
Cosmic destructive energy erupted from his body, dyeing the surrounding space in his colour, and at this, the same enraged voice from before replied.
|You think I’ve done nothing but sleep for the past billion years like you fools?!|
A storm of cosmic energy erupted, a vortex of power that pushed back Raikis’ destructive power, accompanied by a blinding mass of light that expanded rapidly, growing to a colossal size rivalling the surrounding universes.
In an instant, it reshaped itself, forming a gargantuan five-winged dragon with black and red scales and ten elongated heads, all roaring simultaneously.
Cosmic light gathered within each of its massive maws, radiating with an intensity that made the surrounding space tremble, before erupting in a simultaneous discharge of blinding energy a second later.
|Shit! Wyndella!|
|I know!|
The Creation Dragon immediately discarded her humanoid form, returning to a massive white draconic body, erupting with a wave of cosmic energy that turned the darkness of space into pure white.
—Fifth Concretization: Aspect Apotheosis—
|Genesis!|
Reality bent to her will, the vacuum of space where universes floated transforming into a vast expanse of white as the universes appeared to shrink into small dark orbs.
Gervod, having also abandoned his humanoid form, roared and generated a ten-layered shield of green cosmic energy, all at the exact moment the beams of light reached them, colliding with a blinding flash that made Arthur close his eyes, cosmic energy spilling across space as reality fractured under the immense power.
An array of cosmic magic spell circles appeared in an instant, each enclosed a single ring composed of countless compressed rings of light.
By the time Arthur registered the circles forming, they had already unleashed dozens of barrages, high-level attacks of every conceivable element in the cosmos, striking the black and red dragon and resulting in a fiery explosion.
Yet, the dragon charged out unscathed, vanishing in an instant, four of its heads snapping at the space Gervod had occupied half a second earlier, two more unleashing breath attacks toward Wyndella, while the remaining four lunged at the enormous crimson dragon, Raikis.
Its tail whipped to cut through the wave of darkness from behind, and as its wings flapped, cracks echoed as some invisible and incomprehensible power Gindry had released was broken.
Suddenly, the enormous black and red dragon’s body flattened, transforming into a pane of glass with the image of the giant dragon etched on it.
A blue dragon appeared from thin air and struck the glass, shattering it, and the ten-headed dragon’s body reformed, tumbling through the whiteness as the crimson dragon descended upon it, its sharp claws seizing two heads each.
Destructive cosmic energy condensed as Raikis unleashed a point-blank breath, but before it could even travel far, a shield of cosmic energy formed, reflecting the strike and blasting Raikis’ head backwards.
Simultaneously, Wyndella crashed into the ten-headed dragon from below, Barda froze it in place for half a second, and Gindry bit down on its tail shooting toward Berlal, allowing both her and Gervod to sink their teeth into one of the ten heads each, tearing them from the neck and staining the whiteness with crimson blood.
The stump of the neck Gervod ripped out began to decay, scales and flesh crumbling to dust, but the withering suddenly halted and started to reverse, flesh bubbling outward as the giant heads began to regrow.
Raikis’ tail stabbed into the stumps, tearing through them while he bit another neck, and the dragon simultaneously unleashed breaths toward all the Levites.
Barda skipped through time to evade, but the attack from the present skipped time with him, striking in the past and preventing him from stopping the attack from being unleashed.
