A realm of absolute pitch. No light, no color, no sky—only an infinite void that swallowed all sound. In the heart of this dark expanse lay a mountain of living iron.
He was colossal and serpentine, built like a dreadnought forged for slaughter. Thick, heavily armored limbs anchored his massive weight into the void. His scales were not merely metallic; they were plates of raw, jagged iron, pitted and scarred as if dragged through a thousand ancient wars.
Along his spine, jagged ridges rose like brutal, uneven blades. From his skull, thick horns curved outward like spikes hammered violently into place.
His vast, leathery wings—webbed with thick iron struts—were folded tight against his flank.
The silence held until his heavy, circular eyes snapped open. Small and pitch-black, they lacked both pupils and mercy.
"I know this scent," the Iron Dragon rumbled, his voice like grinding tectonic plates. "What are you doing here… Grandeeney?"
A sphere of soft, radiant light coalesced in the dark before him.
"Well, hello to you too, Metalicana," the Sky Dragon's gentle voice echoed. "Can I not pay a visit to an old friend?"
Metalicana let out a harsh, metallic scoff. "We are meant to conserve our power. Every breath wasted in this mental plane is strength stolen from our recovery."
"A fair point," Grandeeney conceded softly. "Yet I find myself watching the path your son walks. He is reckless, Metalicana. If Gajeel continues down this road of pure violence, he will die. A bitter, lonely death."
"The path Gajeel walks is his own," Metalicana growled, his narrow snout tilting up like carved iron ore. "I forged him into a warrior. What he chooses to do with that power is his decision—not mine, and certainly not yours."
"You are as stubborn as ever," Grandeeney hummed, drifting slightly. "I only hope our children find peace. My daughter, your son, and Igneel's boy. They are Dragon Slayers. Their destinies are intertwined."
"Igneel…" Metalicana's black eyes narrowed at the name. "The only beast in this cursed world I respect. The one who convinced me to go along with this foolish plan."
""It was the only way," Grandeeney reminded him softly. "Leaving them behind was the price we paid to preserve what little time we have left."
"I know," Metalicana muttered, a dark, self-deprecating edge in his tone. "It is just ironic. To save the children we raised, we had to become the monsters who abandoned them. Truly laughable."
Grandeeney went silent for a long moment before her light flickered. "Metalicana… do you ever think of the Asterion?"
Metalicana's brow furrowed. "The what?"
"The Asterion," Grandeeney sighed softly. "The final branch of magical beasts that evolved closest to humanity. Neither true beast nor true human, but something caught tragically in between."
Dragons predated all living things, but the Asterion were unique. Over four centuries ago, they walked among men. They possessed human faces, human voices, and human forms—betrayed only by their dual-colored eyes and a terrifying, unnatural beauty that sharpened as they aged.
"Ah… those cursed creatures," Metalicana grunted as the memory resurfaced.
"To humanity, they were monsters wearing human skin," Grandeeney murmured. "To beasts, they reeked of the very humans who hunted them. Belonging nowhere, they were hunted by both. Their numbers thinned until their very name was erased from history."
Metalicana nodded slowly. "A race defined by isolation. And in the end, forgotten. Though the ancient texts gave them a title before they vanished."
"The Enemies of the Gods," Grandeeney whispered. "A title that made even Dragons tread carefully." She floated higher, her light dimming slightly. "I wonder… what would happen if an Asterion breathed modern air?"
"Do not meddle," Metalicana commanded, his jaw snapping shut with the sound of a closing iron trap. "Igneel would throw a fit if you broke the rules to interfere with human affairs."
"I am merely curious," Grandeeney chuckled faintly. "It has been a full year since we entered their bodies. A year since we left them alone in the cold."
"Yes," Metalicana growled, his mind briefly flashing to the ruthless boy he had left behind."It has."
With a soft chime, Grandeeney's light dissolved into nothingness, returning to her own inner sanctuary. Alone once more in the dark, the Iron Dragon closed his black eyes and sank back into slumber.
Outside the towering gates of the Phantom Lord guildhall, the evening air was cold. A woman stood with her back to the structure she had just abandoned. Her pale skin looked sickly in the dim twilight, her long, messy black hair falling past her shoulders.
Slowly, with practiced, unhurried motions, she gathered her dark locks and tied them into a messy ponytail.
As she did, phantom white butterflies fluttered around her frame, dissolving into light before hitting the dirt.
A vivid image flashed in her mind: a baby with fuchsia eyes, staring up at her from a shattered glass capsule.
'Albion.'
The boy believed himself to be the last lingering ghost of an extinct race. He was wrong.
He was not born of an ancient lineage. He was something far worse. A synthetic nightmare.
A weapon forged through forbidden magical technology, impossible concentrations of Ethernano, and the preserved blood of a race history had long declared extinct.
A slow, twisted smile spread across her face as she remembered the night she slaughtered her own squad to steal him.
"I cannot wait for the tears," she whispered to the empty night. "This entire world is guilty. The world that brutalized me… and the world that created him."
Her mind drifted back years, to the blood of her childhood, to the trembling hands of a five-year-old forced to drive a blade through her own mother's heart.
She tightened her ponytail, her dark eyes hollow and utterly devoid of warmth. Unlike Albion, who fought tooth and nail against his own dark heritage, she embraced the descent. She would walk the path of ruin with a smile.
"First, I destroy the Ebonveil Clan," Metsuri murmured, her voice dripping with poison. "I kill the chief. I claim the title of the strongest shinobi in Metsugakure's history. And I will use Albion's blood-stained hands to do it."
She paused, her smile sharpening into something cruel.
"And to make sure he cuts deep enough… I made sure he hates me...with every fiber of his being."
She turned her eyes toward the distant, dark horizon, where the lawless territory lay.
"To destroy everything, I am going to need worse monsters than myself," Metsuri Ebonveil purred, taking her first step into the dark. "Time to find a Dark Guild."