Rayquaza's aura expands like a green supernova.
The air trembled. Space bend.
What emerged isn't merely a stronger Rayquaza; it feels like an entirely different being altogether, one born for the sole purpose of domination.
There is only one word that truly fits Mega Rayquaza:
Invincible.
Other top-tier Legends, Eternatus with its colossal power, Necrozma clad in prismatic armor, or Zygarde in its perfect titan-form, may only reach the same league.
If they fought for real, no one could predict the victor.
That was the kind of battlefield the world itself would fear.
But right now, only one thing mattered.
Giratina slowly rose from the shattered crater, its six wings flickering with fading shadow.
Cyrus's face twisted as he watched the beast struggle to stay aloft.
The Red Chain had kept Giratina bound just long enough for Dialga and Palkia to strike it repeatedly.
Then Mega Rayquaza's Dragon Ascent had slammed into it like a meteor.
Giratina's armor-like plating, normally unbreakable, was cracked across most of its body.
The black mist that clung to it like a second skin was already dissolving into the air.
If this continued, Giratina wouldn't last much longer.
And Cyrus knew it.
He looked from the battered Legendary to Sam standing across the ruined battlefield.
Despite the destruction around him, Sam's posture was steady.
His Rayquaza's glow pulsed like a heartbeat, radiating lethal pressure.
Cyrus felt something cold settle in his chest.
He was running out of time.
This wasn't how it was supposed to go.
He had sacrificed everything, Team Galactic's years of planning, its resources, its future.
He had even accepted help from Team Rocket, swallowing his pride, just to get the Red Chain.
Everything had led to this moment, to reshaping the world according to his ideal.
He refused to lose at the final step.
"You…" Cyrus snarled, his voice cracking under rage he rarely allowed himself to show.
"Samuel! You ruined everything! You made me do this!"
He snatched a strange vial from his coat.
Its glass shimmered with an unhealthy green tint. The liquid inside pulsed like something alive.
Sam's eyes narrowed. "What are you doing…?"
Cyrus didn't answer.
He uncapped the vial and poured the entire contents onto the Red Chain.
The moment the liquid touched the metal, it hissed.
A sickly aura spread along each link before surging into the bindings around Dialga, Palkia, and Giratina.
The change was instant.
"ROOOOAR!!!" "GRAAAAH!!!" "SHAAAAA!!!"
All three Legends screamed, their voices twisting with rage that shook the sky.
Their original wills, proud, ancient, unbreakable, were smothered beneath the foreign energy now flooding through them.
Their eyes snapped open, glowing blood-red.
Their presence expanded like a storm front.
The ground trembled beneath Sam's feet. Even Rayquaza shifted mid-air, the air pressure around it sharpening like invisible blades.
Sam's breath tightened. He recognized that aura too well.
He quickly checked their Contest Condition, just as he feared, Dialga, Palkia, and Giratina now displayed the same status-BERSERK.
Only one organization in the world could force such a transformation, one that specialized in genetic manipulation and unnatural power-ups.
Team Rocket.
Sam's expression tightened as he watched Cyrus clutch the Red Chain like a lifeline.
"I didn't expect you to team up with Team Rocket," Sam said, voice cool and sharp.
"Let me guess, this device you used to control the trio? The Rockets built it for you, didn't they? They don't help anyone for free. You must've paid a heavy price."
Cyrus let out a cold, humorless laugh.
"There's nothing worth keeping in this decaying world," he spat.
"If sacrificing everything allows me to create a perfect, conflict-free world… then so be it."
So he wasn't even denying it.
Sam exhaled slowly. Giovanni, your ambition really is bottomless.
If Team Rocket was lending technology this advanced, then they were already moving pieces far beyond Kanto.
Sam wouldn't even be surprised if Team Flare in Kalos had made their own deals with the Rockets by now.
Cyrus noticed Sam's thoughtful silence and misread it as fear.
The corners of his mouth lifted with confidence he didn't deserve.
"You feel it, don't you, Sam?" Cyrus said, gesturing toward the enraged Dialga, Palkia, and Giratina.
"This is no longer power you can resist. Leave now, and we settle nothing between us."
Sam blinked, then gave a small smile.
"Is that your offer? You think this level of power is enough to threaten me?"
His tone wasn't angry. It wasn't mocking. It was simply calm, too calm.
And that calmness cut deeper than any insult.
Cyrus's expression warped with fury.
"You are arrogant! You'll regret this!"
He jerked the Red Chain tight. At once, the three berserk Legends shrieked, their enormous forms trembling with barely contained violence.
Sam only chuckled softly.
"Cyrus, you said earlier you wanted to thank me for deciphering the ancient texts," Sam said.
"But honestly… I should thank you, too."
Cyrus froze, momentarily confused.
Sam raised his hand. Energy flickered in his eyes, warm, burning, rising.
"Because of you, I finally understand how to use that power I touched in Kalos."
The moment he said it, the air around him stirred.
That strange force, the one connected to the very origin of Mega Evolution, lit up inside him like a pulse.
When Sam reached out to Rayquaza through that connection, something clicked into place.
Rayquaza roared, the sound echoing like thunder across the battlefield.
Its body flared with emerald light, but this time the energy didn't merely swirl around it; it merged seamlessly, as if Sam's power had unlocked something deep within.
The sky cracked with light.
The delta symbol shimmered overhead, bright and sharp, as if etched directly into the Skies.
Wind spiraled violently.
A blue radiance surged around Rayquaza, its aura swelling in a way even Mega Evolution had never produced before.
"What, what's happening?!" Cyrus stumbled backward.
Sam didn't answer. He didn't look at Cyrus at all.
All of his focus was on Rayquaza.
The dragon's original green scales dimmed, darkening shade by shade until they turned pitch-black, an obsidian sheen that devoured light rather than reflecting it.
Its fins stretched longer, sharper, like blades forged from night.
Golden streaks, brighter than lightning, twisted around its body in ribbons of pure energy.
The battlefield trembled beneath its presence.
The transformed Rayquaza let out an earth-shaking roar, shaking the sky until clouds scattered in terror.
Black rays burst outward. The delta symbol flashed again, towering above the world like a declaration of supremacy.
In the next heartbeat,
Black Star Rayquaza was reborn.
But this was no ordinary Mega Rayquaza.
This form radiated an ancient, overwhelming authority, the absolute apex of sky and storm.
A black flash cut across the battlefield as the colossal dragon's hundred-meter body fully materialized, wrapped in violent turbulence that split stone and air alike.
Every breath it took distorted the atmosphere.
Every flicker of its fins seemed ready to slice mountains apart.
Sam looked up at the black-and-gold titan he had summoned.
"Let's show him," he whispered, "what real power is."
The strongest form of Rayquaza had arrived.
And the world trembled in its shadow.
----------
Want to read ahead.
You know where
patreon.com/ PikaTL (Remove the spaces)