Re-Awakened :I Ascend as an SSS-Ranked Dragon Summoner - Chapter 501

Chapter 501: Annihilation
Rain streaked across the interceptor’s viewports as it cut through clouds.

Inside the passenger compartment, Sophie sat reviewing mission parameters on her tablet while Diana checked weapon systems and Seraleth observed the landscape passing below through the viewport.

Three recruits occupied seats along the far wall—Valencia, Marcus, and a newer member named Kira. All three wore their Eclipse tactical gear and carried the focused tension of people heading toward potential combat.

“I still think we should have waited for Noah,” Valencia said, not for the first time.

“Noah, Kelvin, and Lila are handling a Category Four outbreak in the outer districts,” Sophie replied without looking up from her tablet. “That contract came in this morning with immediate threat classification. Multiple witnesses reported coordinated beast attacks on a residential zone. They couldn’t ignore it.”

“And this dragon situation?” Marcus asked.

“Also can’t be ignored,” Diana said. “If something’s impersonating Storm, we need to know what and why. Besides, we’ve got three combat-capable leaders and experienced recruits. We can handle reconnaissance and initial engagement.”

Seraleth turned from the viewport, her expression thoughtful. “May I ask a question that has been troubling me?”

“Sure,” Sophie said.

“Noah and Lila.” Seraleth paused, as if choosing her words carefully. “They seem to share history. Significant history. Does Noah harbor romantic feelings for her?”

The question hung in the air like a grenade with the pin pulled.

Valencia suddenly became very interested in her weapon maintenance. Marcus found something fascinating about the ceiling panels. Kira looked like she wanted to disappear into her seat.

Diana laughed, sharp and genuine. “Oh, this is going to be good.”

Sophie set down her tablet, her expression remaining professionally neutral. “Lila and Noah have complicated history from their academy days. They were close friends. There may have been feelings, though nothing was ever official between them.”

“Because he chose you,” Seraleth observed.

“Because we chose each other,” Sophie corrected gently. “Relationships are about mutual decisions, not competitions.”

“And yet Lila clearly still harbors feelings for him,” Seraleth continued, her tone carrying no judgment, just observation. “I have noticed Noah pays significant attention to her. More than he pays to others.”

Diana’s grin widened. “She’s not wrong. Noah’s been spending a lot of time with Lila since she showed up. Training sessions, private conversations, that whole dramatic scene where he had to extract her from the northern facility.”

“He’s trying to help her integrate with the team,” Sophie said, her voice remaining even. “Lila has skills we need, but she also has issues with authority and teamwork. Noah’s working with her because he believes she can be valuable to the faction.”

“And because he still cares about her,” Diana added. “Let’s not pretend that’s not part of it.”

Sophie shot Diana a look that could have frozen nitrogen. Diana just shrugged, completely unbothered.

“I do not understand human relationship dynamics,” Seraleth admitted. “On my world, if two people wish to be together, they simply are. There is no… complexity.”

“Lucky you,” Diana muttered.

“For what it’s worth,” Sophie said, looking directly at Seraleth, “I’m not threatened by Lila. Noah and I have discussed the possibility of him having other partners. I’m comfortable with that concept if it’s what he wants and if it’s done with honesty and communication.”

Seraleth’s expression shifted slightly. “You would share him?”

“I would allow him to make his own choices about who he wants in his life,” Sophie corrected. “There’s a difference between sharing someone like property and allowing them autonomy in their relationships.”

Diana made a noncommittal sound. “Very mature of you, Sophie. Personally, I think Lila’s a pain in the ass who’s going to get someone killed with her recklessness. But hey, if Noah wants to deal with that, more power to him.”

“You dislike her,” Seraleth observed.

“I dislike people who compromise missions because they can’t control themselves,” Diana said flatly. “Lila went rogue in the north and put the entire team at risk. That’s not someone I trust to have my back in combat.”

“She’s learning,” Sophie said. “Everyone deserves a chance to prove they can do better.”

“She’s had chances,” Diana countered. “How many more does she get before someone actually dies?”

The conversation was interrupted by the ship’s navigation system chiming an alert. Sophie checked the display, her expression shifting to focused professionalism.

“We’re approaching Settlement Gamma-7,” she announced. “ETA three minutes.”

Everyone moved to viewports or display screens, looking ahead toward their destination.

The first thing they noticed was the weather.

Storm clouds dominated the sky above the settlement, dark and roiling with unnatural intensity. Lightning flickered within the cloud banks, creating strobing illumination that cast everything in stark, dramatic contrast. The clouds formed a rough circle maybe two kilometers across, centered directly over the settlement.

“That’s not natural weather,” Diana observed.

“Storm can manipulate atmospheric conditions,” Sophie said quietly. “Create storm systems, generate lightning, alter local temperature. If that’s really him down there…”

“Then we proceed with extreme caution,” Diana finished.

The ship descended through the cloud layer, turbulence shaking the frame despite Seraleth’s Grey family interceptor being designed for adverse conditions. Rain lashed against the hull, driven by winds that shouldn’t exist in this region during this season.

They broke through the cloud base at maybe five hundred meters altitude, and the settlement came into view. Or perhaps what was left of it.

It was destroyed.

Not partially damaged or showing signs of recent combat—completely destroyed. Buildings had been reduced to rubble and scattered debris. Entire sections of the settlement looked like they’d been hit by artillery strikes, craters dotting the landscape where structures had stood. Fires burned in several locations despite the rain, creating pillars of smoke that rose to mix with the storm clouds above.

“Where are the people?” Valencia asked, her voice tight.

Sophie scanned with the ship’s sensors. “No life signs detected in the immediate area. Either they evacuated or…” She didn’t finish the thought.

“Or they’re dead,” Diana said bluntly. “Land us on the settlement’s edge. We’ll proceed on foot.”

The ship touched down on what had been a market square, now just a field of broken stone and twisted metal. The boarding ramp extended, and they filed out into driving rain that was cold enough to make breathing uncomfortable despite their thermal gear.

The destruction was worse up close. Sophie counted at least twenty buildings that had been completely leveled. Others stood partially intact but showed massive structural damage—walls collapsed, roofs caved in, support beams bent or shattered. Scorch marks covered multiple surfaces, suggesting intense heat exposure. Other areas were frozen solid, ice coating everything in layers thick enough to encase entire vehicles.

“Spread out,” Sophie ordered. “Look for survivors, bodies, anything that tells us what happened here. Stay in communication range and don’t engage anything alone.”

They split into two groups. Diana took Valencia and Kira toward the settlement’s residential section. Sophie, Seraleth, and Marcus moved toward what had been the administrative center.

The silence was oppressive. Just wind, rain, and the occasional creak of damaged structures settling. No voices, no movement, no signs of life.

Sophie’s tactical scanner showed residual energy signatures everywhere—high concentrations of electrical discharge, extreme cold burns, atmospheric disturbances that matched descriptions of Storm’s abilities. But the signatures were hours old, suggesting whatever had happened here was already finished.

They were examining a collapsed building when the sound hit them.

A shriek, impossibly loud, tearing through the storm clouds above. Not animal, not human, something between rage and challenge.

“Above us!” Seraleth shouted.

They looked up just in time to see something massive falling through the clouds, wreathed in lightning that arced between its wings and the storm system around it.

BOOM!!!

The impact hit three houses maybe fifty meters from their position. The structures exploded, not from collision but from the sheer electrical discharge that accompanied the strike. Lightning fountained outward from the impact point, grounding itself in anything metal or conductive. The shockwave knocked Sophie back a step, her ears ringing from the thunderclap.

When the light faded, the houses were gone. Just craters filled with rubble and electrical fires that burned despite the rain.

“What the hell was that?!” Marcus yelled.

Sophie’s scanner was going insane, energy readings spiking to levels that shouldn’t be possible for anything below Category Five classification. “Dragon-level output. Whatever that was, it hits like Storm does.”

“Diana, you seeing this?” Sophie called through comms.

“Saw and felt it,” Diana’s voice came back, slightly distorted by interference. “That thing moves too fast to track visually. One second it’s in the clouds, next second it’s demolishing buildings.”

The shriek came again, from a different direction. Sophie spun, trying to locate the source, but the storm clouds made visual tracking impossible.

Another impact, this time on the settlement’s far side. The sound reached them a moment later—not thunder but the crash of something massive hitting stone and metal.

Frost began spreading from that impact point, visible even at this distance. Ice crystallized across surfaces, coating everything in layers that grew thicker by the second. The temperature dropped noticeably, Sophie’s breath fogging despite her thermal gear.

“Ice and lightning,” Seraleth observed. “Storm possesses both abilities?”

“Among others,” Sophie confirmed. “He’s a wyvern, not a pure dragon. Faster, more aggressive, specializes in elemental attacks.”

“Then how do we fight something we cannot see?” Marcus asked.

The shriek came a third time, closer now. Sophie caught a glimpse of something massive moving through the clouds—a dark shape with wings that had to span at least twenty meters, moving with speed that defied physics for something that size.

“Diana, we need a plan,” Sophie said into her comm.

“Working on it,” Diana replied. “Thing’s too fast to engage while it’s airborne. We need to ground it.”

“How?”

“You coordinate the recruits. Get them positioned in a triangular formation, maybe hundred-meter spacing. When it makes its next attack run, I’ll use momentum nullification to stop it mid-dive. But for something that big an strong, I’ll only have a few seconds before it breaks free.”

“And then?” Sophie asked.

“Then Seraleth hits it.” Diana’s tone carried grim satisfaction. “Space elf strength plus gravity-assisted velocity should be enough to knock it out of the sky.”

Sophie ran the calculations mentally. It was risky, required perfect timing, and assumed Diana could actually stop something moving at what had to be supersonic speeds. But it was better than standing here waiting to get destroyed.

“Everyone, listen up,” Sophie broadcast to all team members. “We’re grounding this thing. Diana will stop its momentum when it dives. Seraleth finishes it. Everyone else provides support and stays clear of the impact zone. Understood?”

Affirmatives came back through comms.

They positioned themselves according to Diana’s specifications—a wide triangle with Diana at one point, Sophie and Marcus at the others, Seraleth mobile and ready to move. Valencia and Kira took elevated positions on partially intact buildings, ready to provide covering fire if needed.

Then they waited.

The storm continued overhead, rain falling in sheets that reduced visibility to maybe thirty meters. Lightning flickered constantly within the clouds, creating a strobing effect that made shadows dance and shift.

The shriek came again.

“Here it comes!” Diana shouted.

The shape burst from the clouds directly above the triangle’s center, diving with wings tucked tight against its body like a falcon. Lightning wreathed its form, creating a corona of electrical energy that left afterimages burned into Sophie’s vision.

It was massive. Easily the size she remembered Storm being, maybe larger. Black scales absorbed light, making its true dimensions difficult to gauge. Blue energy pulsed along channels that ran the length of its body, creating patterns that matched Storm’s exactly.

But it was moving so fast that details were impossible to process. One moment it was high above, the next it was screaming toward the ground at terminal velocity.

Diana’s hands came up, her ability activating with visible effort.

The wyvern hit her momentum nullification field and stopped.

Not slowed—stopped. Complete cessation of movement, like reality had been paused specifically for this creature. It hung suspended maybe twenty feet above the ground, wings still spread, jaws open in mid-shriek.

“NOW!” Diana screamed, sweat already beading on her forehead from the strain.

Seraleth moved like a blur, her elven speed allowing her to cross fifty meters in seconds. She jumped, white chi blazing around her entire body, channeling everything she’d learned from that morning’s training into this single strike.

Her fist connected with the wyvern’s chest.

The impact was catastrophic. The sound alone shattered windows in nearby buildings. The wyvern’s momentum didn’t just reverse—it was violently redirected upward, the creature launched skyward like it had been fired from a cannon.

It crashed through three partially intact buildings on its ascent, demolishing structures that had survived the earlier attacks. Debris rained down across the settlement.

Then it hit the ground maybe two hundred meters away, the impact creating a crater deep enough to swallow a transport vehicle.

“Got it!” Seraleth called out, breathing hard but grinning fiercely.

They converged on the impact site, weapons ready, approaching cautiously despite the creature’s apparent incapacitation.

The wyvern lay at the crater’s center, partially buried in debris. Its wings were spread awkwardly, one clearly damaged from the impact. Steam rose from its scales where rain contacted superheated surfaces.

Sophie’s scanner was still reading Category Five energy outputs, but they were fluctuating now, unstable.

As they got closer, details became visible that the creature’s speed had hidden before.

Its left foreclaw was wrong. Not black scales and blue energy patterns like the rest of its body, but gray and malformed, the structure twisted and grotesque. It looked diseased, corrupted, fundamentally different from the creature’s natural form.

Recognition hit Sophie like physical impact.

“That’s not Storm,” Diana said quietly.

Sophie had reached the same conclusion. “I remember that arm. From the defense grid incident years ago.”

The wyvern stirred, its head lifting despite obvious injury. Then it spoke, the voice distorted but unmistakably human.

“Where is he?” The words came out mangled by a throat not designed for speech. “Where is HE?! It’s him I want! WHERE IS HE?!”

The body began to shift, scales retracting, wings folding, mass redistributing. Within seconds, what had been a wyvern became a man in his thirties, muscular and scarred, with gray-black hair and eyes that burned with manic intensity.

His left arm remained deformed even in human form—scaled, oversized, clearly not fully integrated with his body.

“Darius Mercer,” Sophie said, the name coming back from memory. “S-ranked shapeshifter. You were discharged from the EDF.”

“For being too effective!” Darius spat blood, his ribs clearly broken from Seraleth’s strike. “For understanding what real power means! For taking what I needed to become WORTHY!”

He looked around wildly, his gaze sweeping across Sophie, Diana, Seraleth, the recruits. “Where’s the boy? Where’s the one with the dragons? I saw the reports—Eclipse Faction, led by a kid who summons dragons like pets! WHERE IS HE?!”

Understanding crashed down on Sophie. “This whole thing was a trap. You created a fake dragon attack to draw Noah out.”

“To draw out that beast!” Darius corrected, his voice rising to a shriek. “I fought that magnificent creature years ago! It was PERFECT! POWERFUL! I NEED to finish what we started! I NEED—”

His body began shifting again, rage overriding pain. Scales spread across his skin, limbs elongating, transforming back toward the wyvern form.

“If he won’t come to me,” Darius growled, his voice deepening as his throat restructured, “then I’ll MAKE him come! I’ll slaughter his team, destroy his faction, burn everything he’s built until he HAS to face me!”

The transformation completed. The wyvern rose from the crater, damaged but operational, driven by obsession that overrode physical injury.

It opened its jaws, gathering energy for an attack that would obliterate everything within a hundred meters.

But just then, purple void energy flickered at the crater’s edge.

Noah materialized, standing perfectly still, his expression cold and focused. He looked at the wyvern that wore Storm’s face.

Then he spoke one word.

“Nyx…”

Space rippled beside him, reality tearing open to allow something massive to emerge from his domain.

“Ascend.”