Defeating the World with the Power of One Dragon!

The sky above Quine Heights was leaden gray, smoke and low-hanging clouds mingling in a suffocating blend.

The charred ground was pockmarked with pits of varying depths, littered with shattered armor, snapped weapons, and blood that had long since dried black and seeped into the soil. The air reeked of rust, scorched flesh, and iron.

In the distance stood Reebos’s first line of defense, built along a jagged ridge.

It rose like an artificial chasm, blocking the Lothrian army’s path.

Towering gray rock fortresses linked together, their battlements densely spaced, watchtowers stabbing into the gloomy sky like spears.

Perched on those walls, the silhouettes of heavy ballistae and alchemical superguns flickered in the smoke; they let out dull roars from time to time, hurling enchanted quarrels and explosive alchemical rounds toward the attackers. Behind the crenellations, archers and mages scurried, disappearing and reappearing in the intermittent glimmers of magical shields.

The Lothrian battle line crashed against that sturdy defense like a millstone, again and again.

On the surface, soldiers in silvery-gray armor held shields nearly as tall as themselves. Under officers’ commands they formed army-array magic, pale-golden light weaving into shifting curtains of protection.

Led by several of their own legendary-strength heroes, they endured the falling bombardments and pressed forward, slow but resolute.

Yet every advance drew even more concentrated and fierce counterattacks.

Corpses piled up and were torn apart by successive bombardments.

The fight degenerated into a deadly, attritional stalemate.

Lothrian held the advantage in manpower, and morale remained high because the king had personally joined the campaign, but Reebos relied on its formidable terrain and years-honed fortifications like an iron knot that refused to break.

With each passing moment, more Lothrian blood spilled, while the breach remained stubbornly out of reach.

O'Brien was not at the front.

He had taken serious wounds days earlier in an assault on a flank stronghold. Though he had been treated and was no longer in immediate danger, he still needed time to recover his strength.

Now he stood on a slightly elevated observation platform in the rear.

Dust and soot stained his silver-gray armor. His cheeks were hollow, his eye sockets deep, and his thick stubble made him look even more weathered than when he had last spoken with Garoth.

Nevertheless, despite the grim battle, the king’s brow was relaxed.

His gaze was steady, glancing up at the sky from time to time, as if waiting for something.

The sky was shrouded in smoke and murky clouds.

Far above, at heights ordinary people could barely fathom, two sunlike figures writhed and collided.

Each clash sent out a splendid radiance that made the clouds below ripple, and thunderous booms could be faintly heard even on the ground.

They were two Legendaries, moreover crowned Legendaries—beings above ordinary legends.

Crowned Legendaries were regarded among the Romanian nations as the “kings” and pinnacle of legendary power.

At that moment, only Reebos and Lothrian clearly had crowned presences on the plains.

Compared to them, battles between other legendaries, though fierce, paled in comparison.

However, what the Red Emperor was waiting for was not the failure of his own crowned; his crowned was engaged with the enemy crowned in a low-altitude stalemate, neither gaining the clear upper hand.

The king was waiting for a different variable.

From the northwest of the battlefield came an unusual sound.

At first it was a low humming, like a great beast breathing deep within the clouds, or the tremor of air before a distant storm.

Then the hum turned into a sharp, screaming wind. A black speck rapidly expanded, tearing open the heavy leaden clouds.

More and more eyes turned upward, pupils contracting in alarm.

It was a terrifying colossal creature.

It had the hulking skeleton and skull like an ogre, a wide maw filled with teeth.

But its body was not fat; it was built of cable-like, rippling muscles that radiated explosive power. From both sides of its forehead sprouted a pair of backward-curving horns with a dark metallic sheen. On its broad back were wings even larger than its thick body, beating forcefully and whipping up winds that sent dust and stones cascading across the ground.

Not only that.

Key sections of its body—chest, shoulders, elbows, knees—were plated with heavy, dark-red dragon scales as thick as armor. Between the scales a molten glow faintly flowed. A muscular dragon tail lashed behind, tipped with a sharp conical bony spike.

This was the war commander from the Aola Kingdom.

A dragon-blooded Gluttonous Ogre — Karu.

Any newcomer who saw him would never mistake him for an ordinary ogre.

At this moment Karu resembled a dread demon risen from the abyss.

“Tremble beneath Old Karu’s feet, insects!”

The Gluttonous Ogre roared, the sound deafening and rolling down to temporarily overwhelm much of the battlefield noise.

He did not dive directly at the defenses. Instead he beat his wings hard and climbed upward.

Whoosh!

At a certain height, fierce flames erupted from his body without warning, orange and dark-red braided together, enveloping him into a flying ball of fire.

He inhaled deeply and his chest swelled.

Then, in a brutally arrogant posture, borne on the flames, he plunged like a meteor, dragging a long blazing tail and hurtling straight toward the most imposing, most heavily fortified central fortress of Reebos’s first line.

On the observation platform O'Brien watched, his eyes shifting.

A familiar déjà vu pricked at him.

The scene resembled the intelligence’s description of how the Red Emperor had smashed through Norton Pass in a meteor-like strike.

“Is this Gluttonous Ogre trying to imitate their king?” O'Brien murmured, startled. “Does he have that kind of power?”

As if answering the human king’s doubt, the falling Gluttonous Ogre roared again.

His belly suddenly shone with a dense, almost tangible radiance, spreading through every muscle like a living thing. His already massive frame swelled further; tendons and bones creaked in sickening snaps, and his breath climbed in intensity.

This was the Gluttonous State derived from his Great Stomach trait—by consuming stored energy he could drastically boost his attributes for a short time.

But that was not the end.

A deeper, more primal aura began rising within Karu.

“For the mighty Ignas, for Aola!” the Gluttonous Ogre bellowed.

Beneath the Dragon Throne, Bloodburst State!

Far away in the Dragonback Mountains, the Red Iron Dragon Ignas on a mountain peak felt it. He sensed another heartbeat clearly, and through Karu’s eyes he even glimpsed the Quine Heights battle.

“Fight for me. Show my strength,” he intoned.

Thud! Thud! Thud!

A drumlike heartbeat detonated from Karu’s broad chest, audible to many strong fighters even above the high winds and battlefield din.

Bright, blood-red veins spread from his chest like plant roots, crazily crawling down his limbs. The flames around him took on a crimson tint.

His aura surged visibly into rings of undulating pressure.

His target was unmistakable.

The tallest, most robust central fortress—the nerve center and support of the first line.

Reebos’s legendaries felt unease and threat.

The airborne monstrosity’s aura had climbed to a degree that chilled their hearts, its presence an almost apocalyptic pressure.

Several legendaries rose to intercept, but Lothrian’s legendaries were not going to miss the chance—each engaged an opponent, preventing them from interfering.

Almost as Karu’s aura swelled, Lothrian’s legendaries intensified their assault. Magic and battle techniques glittered brilliantly, tangling the already disadvantaged Reebos legendaries and giving them no opening.

“What is that—?!”

“A great dragon? No... a winged giant monster?!”

“Aim! Aim at it! Don’t let it land!”

Panic and alarm erupted across Reebos’s defenses.

Alarm bells were hammered as if mad, echoing along the ridge.

The central fortress targeted by Karu and its surrounding defensive towers reacted fast. Heavy magical ballistae on the roof, alchemical superguns embedded in the walls, and towering magic towers all adjusted angles simultaneously, locking onto the growing flaming figure in the sky.

Instant—boom!

The fort’s heavy ballistae and magic towers fixed their aim and unleashed thick magical beams and armor-piercing shells toward the intruder.

Faced with the concentrated barrage, Karu did not try to dodge.

He instead drew his wings closer, curling his body tighter to present his dragon-scaled chest and shoulders to the attack.

At the moment the strikes would land, his dark-red dragon scales and the tough skin between them flickered with a dim black sheen, as if absorbing light and blurring his outline.

Devourer Skin.

- When bearing energy attacks, it can absorb part of the incoming energy and convert it into usable reserves.

Boom!

Magical beams slammed into his chest, bursting into brilliant elemental sparks before fusing into him; giant shells struck his shoulders and arms with metallic clashes and explosions, fragmenting on impact, while Karu’s diving momentum was only slightly disrupted.

Not only that, after weathering the fierce volley, Karu did not sag. Instead he seemed invigorated.

He opened his huge maw and let out a resounding belch; his blood-flames leaped higher, and his aura rose again.

Sated.

- By absorbing energy through Devourer Skin or by directly consuming, he obtains abundant energy; when sated he can perform beyond normal limits.

Under the heavy fire he gained some wounds, but his stomach swelled rapidly from ingesting the mass of attack energy, filling with power.

Then he landed with the force of thunder.

Time around the impact point seemed to warp, slowing and becoming dense.

At the final instant, Karu’s distended belly quickly shrank as if something inside had been instantaneously emptied.

Conversely, the blood-red flames around him roared as if doused with a torrent of fuel.

The blaze erupted fiercer than ever, blasting skyward and transforming him completely into a blazing crimson meteor.

Hunger.

- Actively expend the massive energy stored in the stomach; at the cost of enduring intense subsequent hunger, unleash a one-time strike far exceeding normal limits.

Boom!

Centered on Karu’s impact point, the fortress’s magical shields bowed inward inch by inch, lightninglike cracks racing outward until they shattered and a huge breach was blown open.

He curled his body against the recoil’s fissures and slammed down again.

Boom!

Fortress after fortress, reinforced with runes, shattered into fragments and dust.

The entire stronghold trembled violently; top defenses, heavy guns, and soldiers who could not flee were cleared away in an instant by the terrifying shockwave and rock spray.

Smoke mixed with flames and a tide of blood rose into the air.

“I am the Aola Kingdom’s first war general! Tremble, my pitiful little snacks!”

A voice rang from the center of smoke and rubble. Then a massive figure rose.

Karu shook his dazed head, shaking off stones and ash.

His body was hulking, dragon qi billowing, weaving into two thick additional energy arms that uncoiled alongside his original pair.

As his four arms swung, blood-fire roiled and wrapped around him. Two giant eyes burning with savagery and appetite glowed in the dust like a terrible abyssal demon reborn.

This image seared into the minds of all nearby surviving Reebos soldiers.

They trembled uncontrollably with fear.

On the remote mountain peak of the Dragonback Mountains, the Red Iron Dragon Ignas withdrew his gaze from his distant watching, inclined his head slightly, and a trace of approval flickered in his eyes.

“Hm, not bad. He has some of my bearing.”

The result of this battle had already been decided.

Back at Quine Heights—

“For Lothrian!” O'Brien drew the Dawnlight sword with a fierce motion and swung it forward. “The breach is open, all forces—charge!”

The horns of general assault sounded, hollow and exultant, joining the king’s order and spreading through the Lothrian ranks.

At the same time Karu in the rubble did not idle.

He shook his head to clear the dizziness from the recoil, then turned and clenched all four fists, smashing them hard into the massive load-bearing pillars already webbed with cracks.

Thud!!!

After the roar came continuous collapses.

The giant stone columns snapped completely, and half the fortress fell in a crash.

Amidst the dust, the Gluttonous Ogre burst through the broken fortress gap like a leviathan breaking a dam and rushed into the interior of the defense line.

He swung his four massive arms; his tail and wings became weapons, and wherever he passed, flesh was torn, and fortifications collapsed.

A huge breach had been torn into the defense line.

The iron flood of Lothrian surged in behind him.

The stalemate on Quine Heights was broken that day by the arrival of the dragon-blooded Gluttonous Ogre; the first line of defense collapsed completely.

Afterward, night fell.

In a camp set up behind the former Reebos defenses now cleared and occupied by Lothrian, bonfires burned, warding off the autumn chill.

Karu the Gluttonous Ogre sat with Lothrian’s legendaries and some senior commanders, enjoying a brief respite and food after victory.

Of course, “sitting together” was a human term.

Karu sprawled beside the largest bonfire. On a roasting frame before him hung an entire processed warbeast, the size of several bulls, skewered on thick iron rods.

Compared to his size, the surrounding human legendaries looked like infants.

O'Brien sat not far away.

He did not join in the raucous feasting. A cup of warm wine and some dried meat lay before him.

His gaze kept drifting to the Gluttonous Ogre tearing and chewing vast amounts of meat, his mind churning.

Karu’s conduct in the battle had been ferocious to the extreme.

That was partly due to his racial baseline, but also linked to the Red Emperor’s dragon vein transformation—particularly in how the Gluttonous Ogre displayed powers similar to the Red Emperor.

O'Brien’s thoughts turned to the Red Emperor.

If one compared overall strength, that undying dragon still lagged behind human crowned legendaries in depth and variety.

Yet in some extraordinary aspects—unfathomable physical strength, defense, destructive power—even against human crowned players, the Red Emperor had already shown hints of surpassing them.

Crucially, reliable intelligence suggested Ignas had not even advanced into advanced Legendary status.

The Aola Kingdom formed around the Red Emperor seemed to be filled with such over-scale monsters.

Their legendary count was small, but each one could match or even suppress many human ordinary legendaries; moreover, as long-lived species they enjoyed lifespans far exceeding human legendaries.

Such qualitative differences could not be measured by simple numbers.

“If Ignas attains the crowned,” O'Brien felt a chill, “with his power and the formidable lieutenants around him, the whole Romanian plains might have no one who can stop him.”

“No—maybe he does not need to reach crowned.”

“If he becomes an advanced Legendary, with the traits he’s shown, he would already give human crowned enormous trouble, perhaps... be dangerous.”

O'Brien harbored a quiet dread about this possible future.

He feared that under the Red Emperor’s lead Aola’s rise might swallow former pacts and trigger a third war to sweep across the Romanian plains.

Would Lothrian still survive then?

But he knew one reality clearly: he likely would not live to see that day.

Human lifespans were far shorter than dragons’.

Still, O'Brien was not unprepared.

He was a mature and far-sighted ruler. From the beginning of the alliance with Aola he had ordered that everything about the Red Emperor Ignas be collected—his early actions along the Serpentine Earth Rift, policies after founding his kingdom, diplomatic style, even scattered sayings.

He had his scholars of psychology and behavior analyze them thoroughly.

Their conclusion: this red-and-iron dragon was essentially closer to lawful neutral. He valued practical gains, but also honored promises and loyalty, protecting recognized allies and subjects. He was not the stereotypical greedy, treacherous, instinct-driven evil dragon.

His expansion and wars had strong purpose and planning, not blind destruction or conquest.

Thus O'Brien’s earlier exchanges with the Red Emperor in the Dragonback Mountains weren’t mere politicking or expedience; he genuinely intended to foster and cement the alliance.

“If Ignas truly keeps order and values treaties as he’s shown,” O’Brien mused, “then his continued growth and the rise of Aola might not be bad for Lothrian.”

He quietly thought, “Perhaps using this special ally we could gain advantages in future upheavals to make up for some of our weaknesses.”

“A powerful but orderly neighbor is more reliable than a cluster of weak neighbors with hidden malice.”

This was one favorable future he hoped to see.

Yet what he most desired was for Lothrian itself to breed another ruler with the greatness of the Holy King—a leader of unmatched capability to reunite the plains into former glory. That was every Lothrian’s highest hope.

But as a king he had to consider all outcomes, even the worst.

“If friction arises and conflict becomes irreconcilable, and Lothrian and Aola take up arms...”

Because of this, O'Brien had had serious and secret talks with his crowned presence.

If signs of total, irrecoverable rupture appeared, then without hesitation, without gambling, they must act with all speed and force to behead the Red Emperor.

If he became an enemy, they could not repeat the fall of Theo Kingdom.

Hesitation, worry, and calculation had cost Theo their nation.

“To deal with such an enemy, either don’t act, or act with thunderous, fatal force,” he had instructed his crowned.

“Future is unpredictable,” O’Brien sighed, draining his cup.

“This is all I can do now: plant seeds, leave warnings. I hope these arrangements will bring Lothrian good outcomes so when I return to the ancestral resting place, I can be at peace.”

As for now, with the alliance intact and cooperation against a common enemy ongoing, to scheme a backstab and eliminate a potential threat preemptively?

O'Brien had entertained such thoughts but cast them aside.

On one hand, their treaty—signed with both nations’ destinies and kings’ names—was not empty; it carried real binding consequences. Betraying it would invite backlash harming national fortune. Unless the treaty was formally dissolved, a covert strike would cost Lothrian dearly.

On the other, O'Brien was not short-sighted. He would not betray a comrade-in-arms merely due to a worst-case future hypothesis. 𝗳𝚛𝚎𝚎𝘄𝕖𝕓𝕟𝕠𝚟𝚎𝕝.𝗰𝕠𝐦

His instruction to the crowned was merely an insurance plan—a last-resort contingency.

He believed that forged in battlefield trials the alliance and friendship between Lothrian and Aola would strengthen and endure long enough for peaceful cooperation.

“Hey, human king, why are you spacing out?” a bass, rotund voice interrupted O'Brien’s thoughts.

He looked up into Karu’s bright, curious eyes lit by the bonfire.

At some point Karu had finished the enormous warbeast and was picking at his teeth with a thick finger, tilting his head to peer at O'Brien.

Karu said earnestly, “If you don’t eat properly, how can you win battles?”

“Eat, eat. Look at you—so scrawny. You don’t compare to our great Ignas. Eat more, get beefier, you’ll be stronger and live longer.”

The blunt words made some legendaries frown.

O'Brien was briefly taken aback, then let out a dry laugh.

He detected no offense in Karu’s tone; the ogre was simply frank.

“You’re right, Commander Karu,” O’Brien said, unbothered, and nodded. He picked up a sizzling chop nearby, bit down hard, chewed a few times, and smiled. “I should eat more to replenish my strength.”

Satisfied, Karu grunted approvingly and went back to his next pile of food.

Night slowly passed in fatigue and relaxation, yet the Quine Heights sky remained shrouded by lingering smoke.

The war was far from over.

Lothrian’s offensive, like a growing snowball, amassed strength and shattered the subsequent two defensive lines.

On October fourth, after days of bitter fighting and heavy losses, Reebos’s defenders were forced to abandon the entire Quine Heights and withdraw strategically into their interior.

The Kingdom of Lothrian won a decisive victory in this crucial battle and seized the initiative for subsequent operations.

At the same time, the war commander sent from the Aola Kingdom had distinguished himself in this engagement.

Lothrian’s soldiers called him “The Fang of Aola,” while Reebos, in reports and rumor, painted him as the “Great Gluttonous Demon.”

These two titles spread rapidly across the Romanian plains as the result of the Quine Heights battle became known.