Roswitha flew behind Stah.

Leon leaped forward, jumping onto her back.

Once Leon was secured, the two of them immediately distanced themselves from Stah.

"Is this guy planning a final counterattack?" Leon muttered, eyeing Stah as the latter gathered an intense amount of energy.

Roswitha, still circling in the air, observed Stah closely.

His actions didn’t seem like a final retaliation.

It felt more like... mutual destruction?!

At this moment, not only was Stah amassing energy in his mouth, but even his chest, where his heart resided, began to emit a radiant glow.

"He’s using the power of the Heart-Guarding Dragon Scale," Roswitha said in a low voice. "Stah is planning to destroy everything here."

Leon, unfamiliar with the term, asked, "Heart-Guarding Dragon Scale? What’s that?"

Roswitha hesitated before replying, "It’s complicated to explain. But in short, if we don’t stop Stah, everyone might perish here."

Leon too could sense the horrifying energy Stah was building up.

If he were in his prime, perhaps he could summon an equivalent force to neutralize it.

But now, he only had five-tenths of his magic power left, and the earlier rounds of skirmishes had already drained a significant portion.

If they wanted to stop Stah, they would need to find another way.

"This energy is completely beyond control or estimation. Even Stah himself knows that," Roswitha remarked. "Right now, he’s like a massive, uncontrollable bomb that could explode at any moment. And on our side... we don’t have any energy capable of matching his to offset it."

She knew Leon’s strength well, knew that in his prime, he was almost peerless.

But the current situation was unlike the past.

The Stah, who was intent on dying alongside them, would be the strongest adversary Leon had ever faced.

After a brief moment of hesitation, Roswitha asked, "What’s your plan? Retreat, or stay here to stop him?"

Leon furrowed his brows, methodically analyzing the situation. "Roswitha, you just said it yourself. The range of the explosion is unpredictable, and Noa and the others are still in the sanctuary. We can’t take that risk. We have to stop Stah’s self-destruction here."

Roswitha pondered briefly, then nodded. "Alright. Do you have a plan?"

Leon slowly raised his head and looked toward the vast, blue sky.

Suddenly, a mad idea raced through his mind.

At the distant general’s platform, Ravi had already prepared the spatial teleportation formation.

As soon as Stah self-destructed, Ravi planned to escape immediately through it.

Never in Ravi’s wildest dreams would he have imagined that the old dragon would go to such lengths as to annihilate everything here.

Did he really not understand the terrifying power of what he was doing?

Oh.

He probably understood.

But since everyone would die after he used this move, what did it matter to him?

The Dragon Clan’s inherent obsession and fervor for revenge sometimes rendered them incomprehensible even to themselves.

Especially someone like Stah, who carried the pure royal bloodline of dragons.

They couldn’t bear to taste defeat—especially not one so humiliating.

Mutual destruction was often just another part of how these crazy dragons fought against their enemies.

"Hey, hey, Ravi! Don’t leave me here alone! Lord Uri wouldn’t let you off for that!" Nacho clung to Ravi’s arm, panicked.

Ravi disdainfully pushed him away.

"If you want to live, shut up. Leon Casmod is as good as dead this time. Really dead. His strength is extraordinary, no doubt, but based on my observations just now, I’ve concluded that, at his current level, there’s no way he can muster magic on par with Stah’s. Everything here will be flattened, so there’s no need for us to even lift a finger."

"Y-you’re right! Leon’s doomed. Mission accomplished!" Nacho, now desperate, began fervently agreeing. "It’s just such a pity about Stah. What a valiant Dragon King, reduced to mutual destruction in the end."

Ravi clenched his teeth. "It’s a worthwhile sacrifice. Eliminating someone like Leon Casmod—a monster that shouldn’t even exist in this world—is a trade worth making."

"True, true! I’ve doubted that brat ever since he joined the army. I—wait, what are they doing?" Nacho once again turned toward the battlefield.

Ravi followed his gaze.

High above, dragon-form Roswitha was bombarding the sky with fireballs.

The Silver Dragon Clan soldiers stationed at the border all transformed into their dragon forms as well, joining Roswitha in unleashing volleys of fireballs into the sky.

One after another, hundreds of fireballs disappeared into the clouds.

Fireballs of that magnitude? Ravi mused. They couldn’t possibly harm Stah. What were they doing?

A ritual before their deaths?

Amid the battlefield, Stah continued gathering his power.

Meanwhile, the Silver Dragon Clan persisted in hurling fireballs skyward, one after the other.

Gradually, the once-clear sky began to darken as heavy storm clouds formed.

Plop—

A single drop of water fell onto Ravi’s hand.

He glanced down. "Is it... raining?"

No sooner had that drop fallen than torrents of rain followed.

Ravi observed the Silver Dragon Clan pouring fire into the heavens, analyzing the situation.

"Dragon Flame raises the surrounding air temperature, creating an updraft that leads to the formation of cumulonimbus clouds, which results in rain... So, are they trying to extinguish Stah’s fury with rain? What a joke. Truly idiotic—"

His words were cut short.

No.

That wasn’t it.

They weren’t planning to use the rain.

They were—

BOOM!—

A deafening clap of thunder erupted within the clouds.

That single explosion echoed in Ravi’s chest, leaving him momentarily speechless.

"Lightning... That lunatic... That lunatic is insane!!" Ravi realized something and seemed to lose his composure.

Beside him, Nacho still didn’t understand. "What? Th-then we should run for it, right?"

"No."

A strange smile curled across Ravi’s otherwise grim face. "A spectacle like this... you’d never see it again in a lifetime. How could I possibly run?"

Nacho’s face turned pale. "You’re all insane... The entire Dragon Clan is insane!"

Meanwhile, back on the battlefield, the silver dragon hovered in the air.

Leon stood atop its head, his posture upright, his right hand raised high.

The rain poured harder.

The lightning in the clouds resembled a slumbering beast, roaring awake with fury.

"Lightning, the most powerful and unpredictable element of nature," Leon declared.

"If we want to stop an uncontrollable force like Stah, we’ll need to harness this same chaos."

"Sometimes, Leon, I think you think like a dragon," Roswitha remarked, her tone even.

"No human could conceive of something this insane."

"My dearest Melkevi, it’s neither the Dragon Clan nor humanity—"

Lightning surged and crackled, shaking the heavens and the earth.

The man clad in silver armor leapt from the dragon’s head.

"The madness lies in me."

Clutching the electric fury of the storm, he dove straight into the golden light of impending annihilation.