"Magic Cannons, loaded... fire!" the royal soldiers ordered.
Hundreds of magical cannons fired simultaneously into the air.
Soon, dozens of helpless Exceeds were tragically turned into glowing blue Magic Crystals.
"Kagura, Natsu, Lucy! You must help protect the Exceeds!" Erza shouted loudly while she was busy fighting fiercely against Knightwalker.
After all, the Exceeds were the beloved kin of Happy and Carla.
Now that they had bravely joined the fight against the Royal Army, they were officially allies.
"Leave it to us!" Natsu exclaimed excitedly, bright flames instantly burning to life on his clenched fists.
"But what about that big guy?" Gray asked, pointing his finger directly at the massive Dragon Knight.
"You cannot fight it! Magic is completely ineffective against the Dragon Knight's armor," Coco urgently reminded the Fairy Tail members.
The Dragon Knight was the ultimate magical weapon ever researched by the Edolas Kingdom.
It was a terrifying killing machine, carefully created over several generations of kings at the heavy cost of immense resources and national wealth.
It was made strictly to protect the Edolas Kingdom.
Once the kingdom faced a true crisis, the current king had the absolute authority to unseal the Dragon Knight.
"I will not spare anyone today, nor will I spare a single Exceed!" Faust roared.
His cloudy eyes were completely bloodshot, and his hair was wildly disheveled.
At this point, the king had become completely deranged.
However, Faust remained incredibly confident—he was confident in the supreme power of the Dragon Knight.
After all, this was special armor specifically designed to counter all magic.
Moreover, by physically controlling the Dragon Knight from inside, he felt an unparalleled rush of power for the very first time.
Even if he had to fight against a so-called 'god,' he was fully confident that he could win.
"Disappear!"
Before Faust's angry words even faded away, the Dragon Knight's metallic mouth opened wide and spewed a devastating white shockwave beam several meters in diameter.
"Brave Shield!"
A brilliant golden-red light shield rapidly expanded from the armor on Omegamon's left shoulder, successfully blocking the massive shockwave.
"You guys go help the Exceeds," Raizel commanded his friends.
"Got it!" Natsu, who was currently sitting on a captured flying Legion, nodded firmly.
"Let's go, big guy!" Natsu patted the Legion's back to steer it into the sky.
From the very moment the Dragon Knight had appeared, Raizel's sharp attention had been completely fixed on it.
As soon as the Dragon Knight fired its destructive beam, Raizel instantly teleported himself to his current protective position.
"It didn't work? Then I will just fire it once more! I do not believe you can block my attacks forever!" Faust yelled.
Now totally bloodthirsty and frenzied, he simply refused to accept that his powerful shock beam had been easily blocked by Raizel.
"Take Over: Gallantmon."
Raizel raised his large round shield, and the Dragon Knight's next shock beam was continuously absorbed into the metal.
"What is happening? It is being reflected back?!" Faust's pupils contracted sharply, and his expression twisted into one of absolute disbelief.
BOOM—!
The destructive shock beam was returned in full force directly at the Dragon Knight, accompanied by a deafening roar.
Even the Dragon Knight's massive, heavy frame was violently pushed back dozens of meters.
Its giant metal claws carved two deep, long trenches into the stone ground and kicked up a massive cloud of dust.
"That only tickles!" Faust laughed.
As the thick dust slowly settled, the Dragon Knight reappeared.
Its silver armor was only slightly scratched from the blast.
'Quite sturdy, huh,' Raizel thought to himself.
He had originally just wanted to test exactly how much damage the machine could withstand.
The metal's hardness far exceeded Raizel's initial expectations—it was truly worthy of being called an Anti-Magic.
"Correct! This is the absolute power of the Anti-Magic Crystal!" Faust boasted proudly. "No matter how desperately you Mages struggle, no magic in the world can affect the Dorma Anim!"
"The one who dyes the sky completely black and brings total destruction... the Dorma Anim..."
Many Exceeds watched the Dragon Knight's terrifying form with deep despair in their eyes.
They had fallen from being respected divine messengers down to ordinary cats, while the humans had secretly concealed such devastating power all along.
"That story is from long ago. Not only did it threaten Extalia, but it nearly destroyed the entire world of Edolas," an older Exceed explained.
"Because it was far too dangerous, the humans sealed it away themselves and officially designated it as a forbidden technique," added an Exceed minister who was highly familiar with the kingdom's dark history.
"Take Over: Omegamon."
Since regular magic was completely ineffective against the armor, Raizel decided he would try using his heavy Grey Sword instead.
From inside the cockpit, Faust aggressively controlled the Dragon Knight, continuously firing rapid beams of destructive magical power high into the sky.
It felt like an endless, indiscriminate bombardment.
Raizel, flying high in the air, swung his left arm downward.
Immediately, the massive Grey Sword extended outward from the Greymon head on his arm.
Dodging the magical power beams as he quickly circled around, Raizel suddenly accelerated.
When he approached the Dragon Knight, he delivered two incredibly fast, consecutive slashes directly to its mechanical arms.
"Useless! This is useless!" Faust laughed maniacally.
BOOM—!
Suddenly, a perfectly clean cut appeared right at the joints of the Dragon Knight's giant claws.
The metal limbs detached and fell directly heavily to the ground.
"How is this even possible???" Faust's arrogant laughter abruptly ceased.
The Dragon Knight, now completely armless, looked almost comical.
It resembled a giant T-Rex, but without its tiny, stubby claws.
"Damn it! Damn it! If that is how it is going to be, then you will witness the Dragon Knight's true power!" Faust screamed in rage.
'This guy's magic power seems highly unusual too,' Faust thought greedily.
'Though it does not feel exactly like a Dragon Slayer Mage's magic, it might have other valuable uses.'
'Capturing him alive for my research could yield some very unexpected results.'
Suddenly, the Dragon Knight's entire body began heavily emitting a dark, black-purple magical power.
"Look at the magical power in the atmosphere..." Wendy gasped as she watched the atmospheric energy rapidly gather around the Dragon Knight.
It was not just the atmosphere—even the earth, the stones, and the plants began releasing black-purple magical power, which flowed directly toward the giant machine.
The Dragon Knight acted exactly like a thirsty vessel, rapidly absorbing all the remaining magical power of Edolas into itself.
"It is actively absorbing magical power from the atmosphere? Edolas already has very limited magical power to begin with, and now it is being completely drained like this," Raizel observed closely as the Dragon Knight began its dark transformation.
"It is happening! Look at the blackened sky!" an Exceed cried out, pointing a trembling paw at the sky, which had now turned completely dark.
"Taste the ultimate power of the Dorma Anim's Black Sky form!" Faust announced.
The previously crouching Dragon Knight began transforming.
It slowly rose to its full, intimidating height as its bright silver-white armor turned completely pitch black.
The severed arms magically reattached themselves to the main body, glowing with a bright white light as they gradually reshaped into new weapons.
The right claw transformed into a giant, jagged longsword, while the left claw became a massive, heavy shield.
The Dragon Knight's metal tail also violently shifted its position, moving from its hips all the way up to its neck, falling downward to resemble a dark ponytail.
This was the Dragon Knight's second, ultimate form—a terrifying transformation that was achievable only by violently drawing out the life-giving magical power from the land of Edolas itself.
This new, dark form was the true Dorma Anim.
"Perish now, you little insect!" Faust shouted.
Under Faust's direct control, the seemingly cumbersome Dragon Knight leaped incredibly high into the air, driving its new, giant longsword straight toward Raizel.
"Interesting," Raizel smirked calmly.
He flew straight up higher into the sky, effortlessly evading the heavy sword strike.
Seeing such a massive, towering Dragon Knight actually reminded Raizel a bit of the Phantom Lord guild's Magic Giant, although this Dorma Anim was far more agile and dangerous.
"You got one major thing wrong, Faust—I am not an ant," Raizel's calm voice echoed clearly, reaching Faust's ears inside the cockpit.
Just as Faust was about to angrily retort, the shocking scene unfolding right before his eyes made him completely hold his tongue.
High up in the blackened sky, the massive Omegamon also began to rapidly grow in size.
It expanded larger and larger, gradually reaching the exact same towering height as the giant Dragon Knight.
BOOM—!
Raizel finally landed his giant, heavy metallic feet onto the ground, violently kicking up massive clouds of dust all around them
The true battle of giants was about to begin!