"..."
Igneel closed his eyes in pain, then slowly opened them again.
Looking at Ignia, who showed no intention of repenting, his eyes filled with deep exhaustion and sorrow.
The current Ignia was like an extremely unstable bomb.
Letting him go would only lead to greater disaster. The people of northern Guiltina had already suffered under him.
"Handle him as you see fit, Master Marco."
Igneel sighed and finally accepted reality.
This could not all be blamed on Ignia alone.
As his father, Igneel had failed to raise him properly. But in that era, even letting Ignia survive had been a luxury.
What education could he even talk about?
Honestly, before this moment, Igneel had never dreamed that more than four hundred years in the future, he would still be worrying about failing to educate his son.
Whether that counted as happiness or pain, he really did not know.
After all, he had long since prepared himself to sacrifice everything.
His family and even his own life had no longer been part of the equation. Everything he had done had been for the sake of destroying the Black Dragon.
"..."
Ignia looked at his weary father, but he did not beg for mercy. He did not ask Igneel to plead for him either.
Buzz!
Magic power surged around him, and Ignia suddenly shot into the sky.
He would not beg. He would escape with his own strength!
"Why bother? There's no way you can run."
Marco shook his head and raised one hand.
Golden Bow appeared in his grip, and a Golden Arrow was set against the string.
As Marco drew the bow, terrifying Cosmo instantly gathered around the Golden Arrow. Blinding golden light burst outward, making it impossible to look straight at him.
"!!!"
Ignia, already flying away, felt every instinct in his body scream at once.
His gut told him that if that arrow was released, he might really die!
...
"Marco..."
Igneel's face changed at once.
Marco's reaction was a little too scary!
Sure, he had said Marco could handle Ignia however he wanted, but that did not mean he wanted to watch his son get executed right in front of him.
Boom!
Marco released the bowstring.
A thunderous crack split the air as a terrifying golden beam shot across the sky, tracing the path of the Golden Arrow.
Everything happened in an instant.
Not one person there managed to see it clearly.
In that situation, Ignia had even less chance of reacting. All he saw was a flash, and then his entire world was swallowed by blinding gold.
The Fire Dragon God's huge body dropped from the sky.
His wings were gone!
Marco's arrow had not even been aimed at him. It had passed just above his body, but the aftershock alone was enough to tear through him.
His wings vanished, his scales were badly damaged, and dragon blood rained down with his falling body, making the scene look painfully brutal.
"Ah..."
Natsu stood there with his mouth open, completely unable to find words.
He could not even tell whether Ignia was alive or dead, because his vision was still filled with golden light from that arrow.
"I can't see! I can't see!"
Happy clung to the back of Natsu's head in panic, trying his best not to fall. He had lost his vision too and no longer dared to fly on his own.
That was the price of staring dumbly at the arrow Marco had shot.
Buzz.
Marco vanished and reappeared a moment later, throwing Ignia's broken body onto the ground once again.
Sizzle, sizzle.
The scorching dragon blood spilled over the earth as if it were still burning. Grass and plants nearby caught fire almost immediately.
"I'll take him away and lock him up."
Marco looked at Igneel as he spoke.
This was his way of giving the Fire Dragon King some respect. Ignia would be spared for now.
"Thank you..."
Igneel's emotions were in complete chaos.
There was no helping it.
Everything had changed far too quickly for him.
First came the shock and joy of seeing his son again, then anger and disappointment after learning what Ignia had done.
Then came the grief of thinking Marco was about to shoot his son dead, followed by the relief of realizing Ignia was at least still alive.
Great joy, great sorrow, rise and fall after rise and fall. The Fire Dragon King had gone through two rounds of it in just a short time.
Even someone as old and experienced as Igneel was struggling to keep himself steady.
He was sincerely grateful that Marco had spared Ignia, because he knew very well that, from a human's point of view and from Marco's position, Ignia was absolutely an evil dragon who deserved to die.
The people of northern Guiltina had nothing to do with Marco, but Marco was human.
He had every reason to kill a dragon who wanted dragons to rule over humanity again.
"During the Dragon War, too many tragedies happened. There were even plenty of cases where family killed family because they stood on different sides. Even if you killed Ignia, I would have nothing to say. He brought this on himself. He chose the wrong side."
After thanking Marco, Igneel added those words with a serious expression, as if trying to prove his own resolve.
"Yeah. None of this is something anyone wanted to see."
Marco nodded and casually went along with it.
In his heart, though, Marco felt the Fire Dragon King was forcing himself to save his dignity. Ignia was still alive now, so Igneel could speak like that.
If Marco had actually killed Ignia just now, would the old fire dragon still be able to talk so calmly?
Hard to say.
It was possible.
After all, Igneel really had been willing to throw away everything to destroy the Black Dragon. But saying he would not feel pain would definitely be a lie.
"I'll go first."
Marco nodded to the others, picked up Ignia's battered dragon body, and activated Psychic Teleportation.
The man and dragon vanished in a wave of distorted space.
"..."
Marco left with Ignia, but the atmosphere he left behind was impossible to fix right away.
Igneel looked drained, clearly shaken by something he had never imagined happening.
Natsu and Happy were still stunned too, not because of Marco's power—they had seen enough of that to stop being shocked for long—but because of the whole matter with Igneel's son.
And this was not something they could easily comment on.
Even if they wanted to comfort Igneel, they had no idea what to say.
"I want to go to northern Guiltina too!"
A thought suddenly struck Natsu, and he blurted it out.
He wanted to go to Guiltina and fight real dragons!
Igneel was training him, sure, but fighting Igneel was obviously not as exciting as fighting dragons who were actually enemies.
Just thinking about it already made Natsu's blood boil!
"..."
Igneel was silent for a moment.
Natsu thought he was going to refuse, but the old Dragon King eventually nodded.
"All right. We'll go and take a look."
The main reason Igneel agreed was because he wanted to clean up the mess his son had left behind.
Ignia had been arrested by Marco, but the land he ruled and the trouble he caused still needed someone to deal with it.
Marco had said that the Five Dragon Gods were causing chaos in northern Guiltina, fighting each other over territory.
As the Fire Dragon King and a representative of the dragons who believed in coexistence, Igneel felt he had to go see the situation for himself.
If those dragons were willing to listen to him, then Guiltina's problem might be solved more easily.
Of course, Igneel knew that was probably too naive. Four or five hundred years had passed.
No matter how much authority he used to have, the surviving dragons might not acknowledge him anymore.
Even for dragons, four or five hundred years was a long time. This was not a matter of a few decades.
"Really?! Awesome!"
Natsu was thrilled.
He did not know what Igneel was thinking, but he knew one thing for sure: he was going to fight dragons!
Just that alone made him feel like he had already surpassed the others.
The rest of the group doing special training definitely could not go to northern Guiltina, and they definitely would not get to fight real hostile dragons.
Especially Gray.
Mainly Gray!
Once he had experience fighting dragons in northern Guiltina, Natsu could brag about it when everyone came back from training.
Gray would be so jealous he might die on the spot!
"Hahahahaha!
Thinking about that, Natsu could not help but laugh.
The grin on his face was impossible to hide.