Soul of Searing Steel

In the air, a black dragon larger than any ordinary dragon patrolled in the clouds.

It had a large and strong body. A layer of foggy light covered the surface of its body, allowing the giant dragon to glide in the air without flapping its wings.

It positioned itself above the clouds, far above the rain and the black shrouds. The thick shrouds that were charged with negative energy to the point that even light could not get through them gushed slowly from the cracks between the scales of the giant dragon. The dragon glided slowly in the sky as it was slowly contaminating the clouds and the storm with its negative energy, bringing the presence of death to the sea region.

The seagulls within a few kilometers had disappeared. Only the sea monsters that were affected by the presence of the Dark Abyss wandered in the area.

Death Smoke Grundy did not hate the job it was currently doing as it was the most suitable job it could do.

Among the living beings in the mortal world, black dragons were a species that were the closest to the negative energy. Even the specters born with an outstanding gift were only equals with the black dragons. As masters that were born to control negative energy and the water element, any ordinary black dragon were the villains. They could easily contaminate the water source of an entire city and turn people into zombies. Their evil nature made the black dragons excited and joyful about such incidents.

Grundy was undeniably one of the prodigies among the black dragons. As an evil dragon which had completely destroyed a human kingdom, children trembled in fear hearing its name. That was the case for over a few hundred years. Meanwhile, Grundy's realm, 'the black shroud', became the symbol of evil in many legendary stories.

Using its magic energy to keep itself in the sky, Grundy looked at the layer of clouds above it. There was a light wheel spinning rapidly in the rim of its eyes, allowing the dragon to observe the giant white wheel swaying in the middle of the storm and the waves.

That was precisely its target, the sent by the Church of the Seven Gods.

As a Supreme-tier lord of dragons, Grundy led three legions of berserk dragons in the upcoming battle that was about to begin at the Sacred Mountain in the distant sea. However, because of some obscure reasons, it was sent by the Pentashade dragon elders to guard the Abyssal rift in the depths of Anos Abyss with its old partner 'Dragon of Death' Mandagar. They were tasked to destroy the expedition party sent by the Church of the Seven Gods.

At first, the black dragon was conflicted—should it obey the direct order of its elders? However, after finding out that the human warrior who had beaten the black dragon before was on board, Grundy immediately obeyed the order. A dragon's ability to hold a grudge against someone was far stronger than human's. Their resentment and hatred could stay for many years. In the first battle that Grundy fought after returning from its solitude, it was badly injured by the warrior. It simply could not swallow that.

Therefore, the black dragon agreed to join its old partner which seemed to be a little bit odd as the two of them would join the sea monsters and the abyssal daemons to prevent the holy ark from sailing near the Great Central Whirlpool.

From the looks of it, Grundy believed that its mission was easy and simple. Currently, the Epoch was heavily surrounded by a horde of sea monsters. Even if the ark was able to start sailing again, it would be unable to sail through the sea monsters. Furthermore, the shroud that Grundy was releasing had weakened the forces on board. It would not take long before all of the crew on board of the ark drift into the state of unconsciousness. Their vitality would slowly fade away until death claimed them.

After losing the crew members of the ark, even if the powerful champions remained alive and well, they would not be powerful enough to flee from Grundy.

Purplish lightning occasionally flashed in the clouds beneath the dragon. The violent rumbling thunder vibrated in its ears. When that happened, Grundy shook its giant head a little. Unlike the other giant dragons, the black dragons loved the deep sea of the abyssal sea and the poisonous swamps the most. It has yet to adapt to flying high up in the sky where howling winds and thunderclaps appeared from time to time.

Thinking about its past, Grundy drifted from its focus for a second.

That was the time when the battle began.

Right beneath the clouds, an unnoticeable light of black and red suddenly appeared. The moment the black dragon finally noticed the appearance of the light and turned its attention towards the light, that light had turned the gray rains and clouds crimson red.

The flowing light that moved rapidly appeared beneath the body of Grundy. A human that blazed with combat aura from head to toe instantly launched a clean and direct strike of a Rising Dragon Fist. That fist landed solidly on the belly of the black dragon. Instantly, purplish black scales shattered into shards of broken scales. The thick muscles and the internal organs were deformed and folded under compression of the high impact.

"!!!"

Its eyes and mouth were wide open. Grundy could not even make a sound. It could only spit air from its lungs. The radiating shroud that covered the dragon's body began to flow rapidly—the gigantic body of the dragon suddenly vanished in front of the warrior.

Short-range Teleportation Trigger.

"I knew it's you, Grundy!"

The voice of the warrior was finally heard. Waves of intense sonic boom mixed with the shockwave of the impact moved with flowing light. The rumbling thunder clouds were instantly dispersed by the shockwave. Joshua who was surrounded by his own blazing combat aura stood upright in the air. He looked around him. His red eyes moved around, he searched for the spot where the black dragon had tried to teleport itself to.

A few seconds later, the warrior located his target. He lifted his palm and threw out a hand knife strike. The thick layer of clouds a few kilometers away from him were cut into half, revealing the horrified black dragon hiding behind those clouds, trying to heal itself.

About a hundred years ago, Grundy had fought strong champions in the main continent of the world. It had always been cautious during battles. It never attacked if it was presented with the opportunity to ambush its enemies. It would not go head-on with its enemies if it could plot against its enemies first before taking action. However, if it was ever forced to face the battle out front, every single move it made during the battles was decisive. Grundy would never waste its breath on nonsense with its enemies.

The giant dragon instantly lifted its gigantic draconic claw. Magic runes were crafted on the dragon scales of the dragon's limbs. It appeared just like a Legendary scepter. It cast some spells in the draconic language in a deep and heavy voice, a gray, dark and gloomy light was instantly shot at the warrior.

The warrior had already entered his combat mode. So how would he be struck by that kind of attack? The 'Finger of Death' was deflected by the combat aura barrier that covered the warrior's body. The deflected gray light was instantly dispersed in the rain. The mist in the clouds was completely vaporized by the highly concentrated magic energy. The scorching temperature had set the air ablaze and the entire sky turned into a sea of flames.

Taking advantage of that gap, Joshua charged towards Grundy, his combat aura sent out sparks behind him as he moved forward, adding force to the warrior's movement. However, the black dragon was no longer where the warrior saw it. It had activated another teleportation spell and made its way higher into the sky. It was approximately a thousand meters above the warrior.

The distance between the black dragon and the surface of the sea was about eight thousand meters. The atmosphere was extremely thin. Even the temperature in the surroundings was cold and freezing. It was extremely for the elements in this world to affect the summoning of the caster there. However, Grundy was an extremely powerful black dragon. It harnessed the magic energy that it had been charging up in its body long ago and reached out its draconic finger as it began to unleash impactful and powerful spells at its target.

Blazing flames, freezing frosts, lightning, acids, instant death skill, magic energy attacks, petrifying skills, negative energy… all sorts of attacks were bombarding Joshua. The combat aura of the mighty warrior was barely resisting the attacks all at the same time. Not to mention that there were also some invisible spells such as curse and weakening spells among the bombarding attacks.

Flames, lightning, and acids hit the combat aura barrier in a combo. The powerful energy flow had penetrated right through the combat aura barrier. However, because of that, it had also given Joshua an opportunity to evade the attacks. With an explosion, the warrior once again arrived beside the black dragon, leaving a long vacuum pathway behind him.

The black dragon intended to use its previous skill to teleport away from the warrior like it did before to put a distance between itself and the warrior. The battle between them remained in that pattern. On one side, the caster wanted to stay away from the warrior to maintain the pace of battle until the caster could beat the warrior. On the other side, the warrior wanted to get closer to the caster so that the caster would be in the warrior's range of attack.

However, things had changed this time around. Joshua prepared himself well this time, he noticed the dimension of the space began to ripple. Even though it was a moment that would only last less than a second, the warrior noticed and respond to it before it could fade away. He threw his fist into the air. A mighty combat aura was launched out of his fist and crushed the dimensional passage that the black dragon attempted to open with twenty-seven magic nodes. The warrior was also approaching the dragon at a rapid speed. The moment he stopped the dragon from teleporting, he arrived next to the dragon and grabbed tightly onto the right claw of Grundy.

"Roar!"

The black dragon let out a thunderous roar. Then Grundy cast a magic spell in the draconic language with a rapid chanting. The black shroud began to gush from the scales on the giant claw. It was as toxic as the river water in the depths of the Dark Abyss. Other than the black dragon that already modified itself into a half-spectral being, all living being would never be able to resist the effects of the mist.

However, when Grundy noticed that Joshua did not loosen his grip on its claw, it began to panic.

The muscles all over the warrior's body swelled with his own combat aura. It made the warrior who seemed tall and muscular to look even larger and tougher than before. However, Joshua was still small compared to the black dragon in front of him. That small human being sneered coldly at the giant dragon from the shroud that was rapidly charging up with negative energy.

The surface of the skin melted under the influence of the negative energy, and the muscles underneath the layer of his skin started to disintegrate bit by bit. The warrior roared as the black and red combat aura exploded and dispelled the shroud from the warrior. A manifestation of life force, the combat aura was completely the opposite of the negative energy. The two of them were like water and fire that would never mix well together. Only the stronger one would be able to outdo the other.

It was obvious that Joshua's combat aura was much stronger than the black shroud released by Grundy. The warrior's body metabolism began to work its course at a quick pace. As a result, the injuries on his body were healed within a few seconds. Even the muscles and skins that were melted before had grown back. The thing about them was that they had turned even tougher than they were before.

Only the true body of a Supreme being fused with the life force was capable of using such speedy regenerative ability. If it was an ordinary person, that person would have turned years older just to perform it. His life force would have been exhausted instantly.

The power in his muscles were charged, his body completely fueled up with the power of his Combat Aura. He let out a raging roar and opened up both of his arms while both of his hands were tightly locked onto the claw of the dragon. Instantly, the draconic claw was torn apart! The black dragon had sustained heavy damage. Suddenly, it could not float in the air anymore as it could not focus on maintaining its levitating spell. The black dragon spiraled downward like a falling meteor.

Joshua was still holding on to the dragon claw he tore off of Grundy. The half-dead part of Grundy's body that was fully charged with negative energy turned into firewood to fuel his combat aura. The claw seemed to be slowly burned up by the condensed Combat Aura surrounding the body of the warrior.

His red eyes were locked on to the black dragon that was falling towards the sea, Joshua did not say anything. He pushed against the air as the thin air eight thousand meters high up in the sky was like a metallic board that was extremely tough for the warrior to move before he leaped towards his target. The counter acting force he used to push himself towards his target accelerated the warrior's speed to faster than the speed of sound. Without much of effort, Joshua caught up with Grundy.

Lending the powerful momentum of his fall, he struck his elbow onto the spine of the black dragon without any mercy. A crack echoed indicating that the bones were crushed to bits. The giant dragon roared miserably.

On the deck of the Epoch, everyone was casually slaying the sea monsters but lifted their heads at the same time to look into the sky. All they could see was a giant meteor falling towards the sea. The giant meteor released sparks due to the friction with the air.

The sky was painted red.