Behind the shadow man, Ray could see that Van was in great pain and the portal above him was almost opened. At the same time, he had noticed the magic circle underneath.

'That shadow man, he must be standing in front of Van because he needs to protect the magic circle.' Ray thought.

Looking at the ground and the tower that they stood on, Ray formulated a plan. If he brought the whole tower down and saved Van, then whatever the Shadow man had planned wouldn't be a problem at all, everything would be resolved.

Gathering the power in his fists, Ray lifted them in the air and was ready to slam them down on the ground, destroying the tower in one hit. He had gathered all of his power so that this seemingly impossible task would be easy for him.

When his fists hit the ground however, shadows rose up from the floor and his plan appeared to be thwarted before it had even begun. The castle walls didn't shake, the tower wasn't destroyed, the impact did nothing. It was as if his entire attack had been cancelled out by another force.

'The black shadow on the ground, that wasn't here before.' Ray noticed. When he looked up from the ground, he could see that the shadow man had both hands on the floor and had spread the shadow to cover the whole of the tower's ground, including where the magic circle was. When he looked over to Van, his energy was still being used to open up the portal.

"You could punch this tower a thousand times and it would never break." The shadow man said.

However Ray wasn't startled, he remained calm.

"Then the answer was simple from the very beginning. All I have to do is get rid of you!" Ray shouted, as large circular fireballs formed in each of his hands. The fireballs weren't the ordinary ones that Ray had created in the past, they burned an intense red colour.

Throwing them at the shadow man, he stood there fearless. The shadow from the man's body started to move and created a barrier and shadows appeared directly behind Ray as well. When the attacks hit the walls of shadow that were created, they had been redirected towards Ray.

"Sen, I always looked up to you because of your strength, and I thought you really would achieve your wish, but it looks like I have become strong enough to achieve it myself." The shadow man shouted over the noise of war and the burning fortress.

"Who are you!" Ray said, running forward with his dragon sword held in his hand. If magic wouldn't work, then he would just have to hurt him the old fashioned way.

Ray swung down his sword which was avoided by the shadow man, then Ray proceeded with a punch soon after. Once again a shadow wall had been raised and when Ray's hand touched the shadow, it started to slow him down as if it had been sunken into the shadow. Ray attempted to pull it away but before he could, he had been hit in the stomach and then soon after kicked by a giant foot.

The power was great and Ray was thrown through the air but before he could land, his body had gone through another shadow and now he was falling from the sky towards the shadow man.

"Maybe this will jog your memory." The shadow man said. Suddenly a tail made from shadows wrapped around Ray's body and held him in place and soon after the man's body started to change and shift, it was as if it was morphing into something else.

As the man grew in size, he leapt on top of another part of the castle and took Ray with him who was still being held by the tail. Finally his gigantic true form was revealed and everyone fighting beasts down below could see it as well.

"It's a..a..a dragon!" Those from the Redwings started to shout and panic.

"A dragon?" Martha thought as she looked up. She wondered if the portal had been successfully opened but it still seemed like it had a while to go. Seeing the dragon, she could see it was black in colour and certain areas of its body had shadow surrounding it. It's tail and the spikes on its back were all covered in the shadow.

"Is that the Shadow's true form, is that what we have been fighting against this whole time, an ancient dragon?" Thinking about this, she was now concerned for Ray as well.

In that settlement, there was a young black dragon that lived there.

"Krad, is it really you?" Ray said in disbelief. He continued to struggle to break free from the dragon's tail. "I thought you had died in the settlement, are the others still alive?" Ray asked, as new hope was ignited inside of him.

"No, they are all dead, and it was all because of me!" Krad shouted. "I should have listened to you. You told us that all humans were evil, but I was just a young dragon and was curious. I was tricked by a human into showing them where the settlement was. I was afraid of what you would think of me, so I showed them while you were away and then they attacked us. They killed all of us, everyone except me.

"I was too ashamed to be the only one that had survived, I ran away after the attack happened, the others saved me even though they didn't know it was me who led the humans there. Then I heard of your rampage, how you wished to get revenge for what they had done. I looked up to you, cheered you on, but then rumours of your death had reached me.

"Ever since then I have done everything in my power to achieve your goal and to make up for my mistakes of the past. That's why I'm bringing all of the dragons back to our former glory!"

Every dragon was able to learn a unique ability, at the time Krad was still a young dragon and didn't have one, so Ray had no clue the power of the Shadow belonged to him. Everything that had happened with the Shadow was the result of Krad unlocking his unique ability and all the trauma that the young dragon had been through.

Although Ray once harboured the same feelings as Krad did, he didn't any more.

"Do you even know what you are doing!" Ray shouted. "What happened when you attempted to bring back a dragon last time? Those skulls and bones were not the dragons that I knew. Their time is done, let them rest in peace! As for the humans, of course there are bad ones and there are those that deserve to die, but there are those that don't as well!"

"And how can we tell the difference between good and bad humans, wait for them to kill us? Your days as a human have made you soft!" Krad shouted while pulling Ray closer to him with his tail, bringing him up directly to his giant razor sharp teeth and nostrils. With each breath, small shadows would appear from his nostrils.

'I'm not strong enough to fight a dragon of his calibre. I still haven't gotten all my strength back, if only I had the last piece of the dragon armour!' Ray thought.

"Don't worry Sen, I won't be killing you now. I want you to watch, because it's finally time for our brothers and sisters to return."

The portal high above in the sky was now starting to open up. It was large and white in colour, with the small centre of it starting to turn red. The centre gradually grew bigger, but then in the distance a small object could be seen falling through the sky, off balance and heading towards the tower.

"Wait a minute, that's-" Ray thought as he could see exactly who it was.

The small object landed on the tower and his blonde hair could be seen along with the gauntlet on his hand, shining as if it was brand new.

"What have I fallen into now?" Gary said, looking around.

********

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