WorldSerpent:

Alrighty second chapter as promised, Enjoy

Seeing Lucius choking, not leaving anything to chance and in a last ditch effort Xiaxinia closed the distance in the blink of an eye and gripped Lucius' throat as he stopped it midway during the swallow!  Xiaxinia then followed up with a quick controlled blow to his stomach that forced all the air out of his lungs and forced the orb to come shooting out of his throat and sent Lucius flying into the wall. It was a heavy blow that at the very least broke some of Lucius' ribs but it was a gamble Xiaxinia had to take.

**CRASH**

Instantly they all showed a look of relief, Veranathus had tears of joy as he had just courted death. Everyone was relieved except for Xiaxinia.

"The darkness.....it's not in the orb..." Xiaxinia said as fear crept unto his face, instantly he knew what happened.

"AHHHHHHHHHH!!!!"

Lucius screamed in agony as he fell on his back, his hands gripped tightly on his leather armor, his fingers scraped the armor as if he were trying to dig into his body, Venastrasia's face was filled with horror as well as the other dragons.

She turned and looked at Veranathus who dared not raise his head as he himself was scared and did not know what to do, his carelessness had just caused a catastrophe and he knew this! She bit her lip as she knew it wasn't his fault but she still could not bring herself not to blame him, she fell to her knees in front of Lucius and started injecting Divine Power into Lucius' body, but she could feel no abnormality, then she had remembered what Lucius had told them. Any magic besides lightning will not pick up the abnormality, and there was nothing lightning could do to resolve this situation.

"AHHHHHHH!!!!!"

He once more screamed out as his eyes became red and his finger nails scraped at the armor even more intensely than before, Lucius felt this pain before, it was the same sort of pain he felt when his divine core had merged with the Thunder Rites. Blood began leaking from his eyes, nose and ears. It filled Venastrasia with dread as she covered her both ears and tears began leaking from her eyes. Whenever Lucius had been in danger she was always there and there was always something she could do but now all she could do was watch and worse she had no idea what was happening inside Lucius' body and therefore had no solution.

She cradled him, that was all she could do, Lucius' screaming had not stopped, in fact it was even more intense than the beginning.

Lucius could feel the darkness slowly moving towards his heart, he had no idea how to stop it, violent thoughts and hatred filled his mind, he could feel it urging him to engage in non stop bloodshed.

'KILL...KILL..KILL..KILL....KILL..KILL....KILL...KILL..KILL...KILL'

The darkness had been screaming in his mind, Lucius could feel it attacking all the way to his soul trying to corrupt him and turn him into a mindless beast, Lucius was becoming more and more terrified as his screams rung out and made the dragons flinch and turn their faces. They truly felt sorry for him. They thought they had grown quite accustomed to Lucius' screams because of his training and his abnormal conditions but today, they had seen him under a new level of pain.

Lucius tried using mana to force the darkness away from his heart, but it failed, he tried using lightning and he realized it only made it move faster, he was terrified and he had no options, however he knew he had to get it out or at least away from his heart to which it was moving at a steady pace.

Finally he came up with an idea, it was stupid and it might kill him but it was better than being a puppet for the man he hated the most in the world, it was either life or death, he wasn't going to choose an in between.

Lucius began piling up Positive Lightning Energy in his divine core, he tried to make it small and condensed with a controlled amount of power, something he had failed to do till this day, but now it was either sink or swim either he would die or live. If he made the positive energy too large it would kill him, he had to control it now! Attempt after attempt resulting in failure upon failure, every second it slowly moved toward his heart causing massive pain. The veins in his body rose as kept on bulging and increasing his heart rate..

Lucius had become hopeless, he decided he would use his last resort...having the feeling he was going to die..Lucius raised his hand and touched Venastrasia's face, he suppressed his pain for an instant, just so he could give his mother a nice warm smile...Venastrasia seeing this smile, felt her heart go cold and numb, she knew what this meant.

In an instant Lucius gathered  Positive Lightning Energy in his divine core, not caring about the amount as he couldn't control it...and generated an equally large amount of Negative Lightning Energy and merged it within the greedily absorbed it very much like it had absorbed the earlier lightning.

This time however, the darkness gained and incredibly powerful increase in speed and went speeding directly towards his divine core.

**BOOM**

*COUGH* *WEEZ*

Instantly his divine core shook, mouthfuls of blood spurt out from his mouth as his eyes went white and cracks appeared in his divine core....Lucius was without a doubt dying, his body shook violently as the explosion inside of him raged and sent cracks through out his body, all of the dragons could feel his soul shudder and their faces became pale.

Lucius stopped screaming and his eyes were lifeless..

Venastrasia shook him a few times, and her eyes were blank.

"Lucius?....Lucius wake up....wake up Lucius.....wake up..........LUCIUSSSSSS!!!!!"

**ROAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRRR**

Venastrasia screamed as her voice subconsciously imbued with Thunder,it shook the entire surroundings all the way to the Capital of Astarte...without a doubt everyone in the Capital of Astarte heard the scream, though they may not have heard what it is the voice said, they clearly heard a scream that awoke every living thing from it's slumber and sent fear down their spines. Other Dragons covered their ears as the force from the scream blew apart the cave and destroyed half of the mountain as she held Lucius in her arms..

The mountain had begun shaking as if it were collapsing, as the dragons flew out of the cave they watched as Venastrasia's Aura went haywire, her hair flared in the sky, she had been bursting at her utmost limits. This is the Venastrasia they ultimately knew, A powerful being capable of destroying anything she set her eyes upon, it had been so long since they had seen her this way, their hearts had been filled with fear. They knew Venastrasia had became much softer when she took care of a fragile life like Lucius, but they truly know what sort of monster she could become.

"MOTHER! CALM DOWN!!"

A voice broke her insanity instantly, it was Veranathrax's voice. A head was peering out of Lucius' body. Her eyes met the jet black dragon's face and only then did she calm down but she still had a horribly terrifying face on, her aura was still active however and once more Veranathrax spoke.

A case of theft: this story is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

"Mother don't worry he's still alive! His divine core is badly damaged however I am keeping it together, if you continue to burst forth so much power it might complicate things!"

Hearing this only now did she stop and she looked at him, his eyes were indeed lifeless, she placed her head on his chest and she could still hear a faint heartbeat..The sound of those weak beats were like music to her ears, tears had filled her eyes.

She instantly flew off the mountain holding Lucius as she rushed towards another mountain not too far away, the other dragons following after. Veranathus...did not know what to do...he just flew blankly as he indeed suffered, if he had ended Lucius' life because of his stupidity, he would never be able to forgive himself much less Venastrasia. After all, he was one of Lucius' uncles who Lucius was so proud of...it was then Xiaxinia patted his back and gave him a small smile that seemed to say not to worry.

Venastrasia ordered the dragons to dig a cave and ordered some to fetch pelts to remake a bed, this nostalgia filled the dragons as they remembered the first time they were ordered to do this, it was pretty much the same as the first time. Lucius was courting death and they were making a place for him to stay and rest. It was not any different than the last time.

A few days had passed and Venastrasia did not let Lucius out of her sight for a single second as she clenched onto him, her once beautiful hair became disheveled and the edges had started splitting. Yet she did not move, her eyes a bit lifeless staring at the pale face of her son, she had cried so many times already and she just wanted him to be safe as usual and she started regretting not being around.

****

Inside of Lucius' divine core....

Veranathrax was flying about searching for the darkness, though he was currently healing the cracks in Lucius' divine core, but he still had to destroy the darkness...After moving around for a while he finally found the black cube box and he flew straight into it...

With a flash of light he entered Lucius conscious...Upon entering he saw Lucius being wrapped up in darkness and a Death Knight standing right next to him manipulating it. The Death Knight turned around upon noticing the Dragon-Serpent he instantly released the darkness towards Veranathrax. Veranathrax opened his mouth and began swallowing it whole. The Dark Knight shook, A sweat bead appeared on his face as felt fear run down his spine! He roared angrily

"WHAT ARE YOU?!!! TO SWALLOW MY DARKNESS!! wait....I remember you, you're that black dragon we killed how are you still alive you cursed beast?!!"

Veranathrax simply said.

"What does it matter to you anyway? You are still going to die..."

**CRUNCH**

The Death Knight had been swallowed..he was a soul, Veranathrax understood that, because he was a Spirit, Spirits can absorb souls well it would be more accurate to say for growth souls can be used it was considered taboo in the Spirit World but what he understood was.... that Thor would definitely let it slide, It was a completely one sided fight. Veranathrax began chewing...

"A bit ashy but not bad...What a fool, to attack my brother..however we will be taking this upgrade"

Veranathrax spit out a crystal orb, the orb began glowing as it flew in the air, after absorbing the darkness from Death Knight, it was revealed to be a crystal orb that was possessed by the darkness of a black soul. Naturally once the soul was consumed it would reset to it's default state. As Veranathrax left the conscious realm he took the orb and placed it inside Lucius' Divine core, instantly they both began to merge.

This time there was no pain, Lucius' soul merged with the orb and the orb turned into an azure color, Then the Orb began making whirring sounds....

Venastrasia sat there holding Lucius when suddenly Lucius' cracked Golden Diamond shaped Divine Core flew out of his body, the dragonic language in azure colors written on the stone shone brightly! Suddenly an Azure Orb came out of Lucius' body at the same speed, the two began rotating and slammed together in an instant!

*ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ*

There was absolutely no pain this time! The Azure Orb was Lucius' soul! The Divine core instantly accepted it! As it slammed together it shone a golden blue Light color and as the light dimmed the cracked Divine core had become whole again and what's more was that it's shape had once more changed! It became a Golden-Blue color and had the shape of a Dragon! On both wings had symbols of Dragonic language and one on it's head ...

It's right wing said "Dark"

On it's left wing said "Light"

And on it's head " Heir "

The Golden-Blue Dragon shaped Divine Core then flew back into Lucius chest and his breathing returned to normal...Venastrasia didn't care about what it said she just wanted to know if he would be okay now, Lucius however was still asleep.

Veranathrax then came out of Lucius' body and sat on his stomach.

"Mom, he'll be fine now he just needs to rest...I killed the guy who tried to corrupt him..it was one of Raz Seph's Death Knights it seems his soul was living in the orb and he most likely used the opportunity when the orb slipped from Lucius' hands to try and shove itself into Lucius' throat it wasn't Uncle Veranathus' fault"

Veranathrax wasn't an idiot he knew right away he had to tell her this...He knew all to well his mother's temper. Venastrasia nodded once more with tears in her eyes. She still felt a bit of anger towards Veranathus but at least he wouldn't be killed.

Lucius' snores became loud, bringing a smile to her face.

"Thanks Vera" She rubbed Veranathrax's head and he spoiled himself in his headrub.

"No problem mom, big brother is important to me as well, he saved my life twice and brought me back home"

Venastrasia took Lucius and carried him to the newly dug cave and placed Lucius on the new furry bed. This new mountain the dragons named "Stormblade Mountain", after Lucius of course. Veranathrax had explained the situation to them all and the dragons were moved to tears especially the Three Great Uncles, Veranathus cried more loudly than all of them as he went off to a corner by himself.

After a while....

*NOCK*

Venastrasia had walked up to him and punched him in the head. A noticeable bump appeared on his head, to which he gratefully accepted with tears in his eyes. She then gave him a smile and told him it wasn't his fault, he knew this as well when Veranathrax explained it but he still sort of felt guilty.

After a while ....

*Nock*

Xiaxinia had punched him...

*Nock*

Varathraga had punched him....

After a while...

*Nock* *Nock* *Nock* *Nock* *Nock* *Nock*

All the dragons had punched him. He no longer felt guilty.