Drako was naturally prideful and ambitious so it went without saying that he was willing to go to many lengths to obtain power, but by the time he had achieved his venomous flame breath, there were much more emotions involved than mere pride.

For one, the Dragons had quickly found out that his hybrid race could not only not fly, but had also failed to obtain their Breath techniques. And as one would expect, he and his children had become a laughing stock that the Dragons would constantly harass.

Resentment grew in his heart uncontrollably and at times he could not sleep because of it. He would sometimes think of the sounds of their rumbling laughter and beating wings and the frustration would cause him to roar out loudly with anger. In such moments, it was impossible to calm back down so he would get up to work on his obsession; his breath technique.

Even when he eventually came up with his venomous flame and gave more than a few Dragons a rude awakening, they would still find the gall to laugh at him because of the still very visible difference in the scale and destruction of his breath technique when compared to theirs.

Those lizards would even say that his smaller fire breath was a sign that he couldn’t even compare to their females, saying that his ‘hybrid race’ was a mistake that had no ‘masculine power’. And although it still infuriated him, the first few times he heard them say that he had been confused by why they would specifically call him weaker than females as if it was something specifically embarrassing.

It was common knowledge that males tended to have slightly bigger muscles and females had slightly better flexibility, but it was also common knowledge that in the presence of Mana, muscles and flexibility meant nothing. Someone in Stage 7 would not be able to best someone in stage 8 because of something as insignificant as those 2 things.

The only time the physical body mattered in a fight was when Anatomy Refinement was involved, or when different species did battle. A fluffy rat and a scaled rhino would never be able to have a fair fight if they had the same exact cultivation level (unless you included bloodlines or laws). But a male scaled rhino and a female scaled rhino both had the same defensive measures, so the fight would come down to who had a better cultivation.

As such, females were not inherently weaker than males. But the way the Dragons spoke you would think it was so. Of course, this was all before their goddess of creation had emerged and silenced all that talk, but still. Why had they ever even spoken like that in the first place?

The first few times he had heard their comments, he would laugh to himself or amongst his friends and call them foolish because of their eccentric ideologies, but when even their females began to ridicule him, telling him to ‘be a man!’ as if he somehow wasn’t one already, he began to suspect that he was missing out on something big and perhaps very humiliating.

He didn’t notice any signs that female Dragons were weaker than male Dragons - even if it was strange that they often had docile or coquettish personalities - but the more they abused his male identity and highlighted his inferiority to their females, the more he began to believe that female Dragons really were somehow weaker, and that it really was an embarrassment that his Fire Breath couldn’t even compare to theirs.

This only grew the more the Dragon race mocked him, so you could imagine how much he wanted to tear off their reverse scales and make them watch as he ate them with relish. But more than that, he wanted to prove them wrong. He wanted to show them that not only was he not inferior, but he was in fact superior to them! He wanted a Breath technique that would make THEIR breath technique look inferior!

So he continued to work hard, even as countless people praised his venomous fire breath and his various children hounded him to teach them.

It was around that time that Raiko came to him for his usual masochistic tendencies, also known as Anatomy Refinement practice. Raiko had heard about the news of his venomous fire breath and had bounded over to him excitedly, asking him for him to shower him in the Breath as if it wasn’t something extremely lethal and was instead just a nourishment.

With how tense and frustrated Drako had been, seeing that goofy face that had unwittingly mocked his power and dignity was enough to make him snap. It ended up in a serious fight that had led to both of them being severely injured.

Of course, with how close they really were it went without saying that they made up at the end and even had a laugh, but the event had still caused his obsession to burn brighter than before. Perhaps too bright.

Because all these events were what finally led to an unprecedented maniacal drive that broke his mind.

A few days after that fight he left his territory without letting anyone know.

In hindsight, it was indeed irresponsible for him to do that, but with how his mental state had been that day it was already fortunate that he did make the decision to find a location where he could not accidentally kill his family or allies. He had left to work on a dangerous idea that he had been priorly hesitating about, something that could potentially end up in a huge magical explosion and the loss of his life if things went wrong.

It was his instincts for self-preservation that had prevented him from enacting it, but that day, all thoughts of hesitation had vanished. The only thing that had been in his mind were visions of a flame that destroyed everything in its path.

He didn’t even know how he reached the clearing he had found and that was how single-minded and insane he had been.

He was so absent minded that if anyone was bold enough, they would have been able to walk right up to him and attack him for free, and he wouldn’t have seen it coming. But they better be either durable or super fast because it was likely that his addled mind would finally sense them and detect them as some kind of training target.

Or perhaps they would have just blown up with him, because the technique he began to employ was called elemental mixing.

As the name suggested, it was the utilisation of 2 or more elements in a single magic act. It was an extremely dangerous practice that required a very high level of proficiency and practice, but how could anyone practise when failure was so dangerous?

The worst case scenario wasn’t even blowing up. There was even the chance of mana deviation that could lead to one mutating into an Abomination, bound to a life of never-ending torment.

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There were only a few people who were lucky enough to be born with - or somehow obtain - an mixed elemental ability that was an innate skill, and that meant they didn’t have to go through a process of trial and error, they just gained the ability completely for free.

The difference between an Innate skill and a technique was fairly obvious. An innate skill was a skill that you were born knowing how to use (or in the case that you obtained it from something like an evolution, knowledge was granted by the Eridius System).

On the other hand, a technique was something that you developed by yourself or learnt from someone else. Most techniques took inspiration from already existing innate skills, but on occasion, some people would make their own technique from scratch.

For example, Drako’s venomous fire breath technique was inspired by his [Venom Spray], his [Flame Infused Venom] technique, and the [Fire Breath] technique. Essentially: An innate skill, a technique based on that innate skill, and an unrelated but already-existing low level technique.

With that, he had formed a brand new technique that had astonishing effects.

That was how techniques worked. But this meant that Drako was on his own if he wanted to mix elements.

He had 2 elements, Fire and Wind. When he woke up after fusing with the Supreme Wind Dragon and found out that he didn’t get a mixed element innate skill, it was just 1 more disappointment, not something he had thought about too much about because of the rarity of such a thing in the first place, along with his greater disappointment in more unexpected and pressing matters like his lack of wings.

Of course, since that time the thought of elemental-mixing had naturally crossed his mind a few times, but he had never actually dared to try it because of how risky it had been

But on that debilitated day, he genuinely lost all understanding of the concept known as ‘risk’. Even now he could not fully describe what state he had been in, because first of all his memory of that time wasn’t even linear or complete. It was very, very strange. And second of all, the only thing that had gone through his mind were thoughts of an unmatched Fire Breath and how to achieve it.

The only thing that he did know was that the abnormal mental state had given him an unprecedented level of comprehension.

That, coupled with his own experience and a clawfull of luck, was probably why he was eventually able to grasp success and figure out how to infuse his wind mana into his venomous fire breath technique, creating something that he had called the Inferno Breath. The wind element and fire element had a devastating synergy that made their elemental mixing a terrifying sight to behold.

With his unmatched comprehension in the Fire Laws, he had already known that air was an important component of natural fire, as such, he had already possessed suspicions about what the wind element could do to the fire element if they were used in conjunction, but he still held his doubts because it wasn’t necessarily wind that was important, but instead a certain component that could often be found within it; something the System called Oxygen.

He shouldn’t have possessed the slightest doubt. The explanation by the System had actually ended up making him think that things were more complicated than they were. In reality, the more wind there was, the more oxygen there was. And the more oxygen there was, the more fire there was.

As it turns out, wind had a great amplicative effect on fire, especially when magic is involved.

The Inferno breath was comparable to a True Dragon’s fire breath in scale, and was even more destructive. Furthermore it was a lot quicker. The colour of the flame was a bluish-violet, a rare phenomenon that displayed its enhanced oxygen and temperature, and it was a beautiful sight to behold.

It was this breath that he had been planning to use against the malformed creatures, when he caught sight of the Crystal Dragon and decided to take things a step above…

Yes. There was a step above. Drako wasn’t done. Not at all.

After all, a True Dragon could emulate what he did if they had the same elements as him and the talent to not kill themself in the process, and the result would be more startling than his with their natural Dragon Breath augment. The only thing that would be lacking would be the fiery venom, but in the grand scheme of things that was not something to be too impressed about.

He wanted what he had been seeing in his visions. An almighty destructive flame that could erase Dragons and rearrange landscapes. And so, he continued to practise.

He didn’t know how long he searched for various ways, because like he said his recollection of the entire event was not linear or even complete, but eventually, he found it. The path forward.

It came in the form of an Intent.

In a mental state where pride didn’t exist, he had become absolutely disinterested in the idea of his breath technique being bigger just so that it could be as big as or bigger than Dragon Breath. His desire for size only held on because the bigger the breath, the more enemies it could destroy.

A bigger fire breath was a lot more useful than a smaller one of the same calibre, and that was obvious. But at some point in time, as he continued to manipulate wind and oxygen, an idea began to form in his mind.

What would happen if all the oxygen that went into increasing width and height of the breath, was concentrated into a narrow column that was as fat as his mouth - something like a beam? Wouldn’t the temperature be exponentially more deadly? He could feel it in his bones that it was so. So he tried to do it and he failed.

No matter how he tried to manipulate his mana, nothing would give him the effect of a ‘concentrated beam’. But obviously, that didn’t stop him, so once again time filled with maniacal pursuit began to pass.

Until one day, he obtained a chance epiphany and his mind opened.

The Intent of Compression.

A power that could compress anything and enhance its effects, amongst other things. Understanding of its alien mysteries began to flow into his starved mind like water from the spring of life, along with a distant ‘ding’ sound which he would much later find out was a notification from the system. A congratulations.

From there, he began to slowly implement his newly obtained intent, and finally… finally, he obtained it. The ultimate breath technique.

After using it once, he knew immediately that he had achieved it, especially when his mind began to return to normal and he began to take in the destroyed scenery. The previously healthy plains had completely blackened. Even though it was a scene out of a nightmare, he only felt joy. Joy, an actual emotion.

This joy, along with other emotions like pride, swiftly bloomed within his heart like never before.

‘I… AM DRAKO, GREATER THAN TRUE DRAGONS! I AM… I AM…’ And he tried to think of a word that could describe the sheer level of ascendance and glory that he felt, but nothing in his vocabulary seemed accurate enough. But in that moment, as he looked at all the destruction he had caused, he began to truly, well and truly, think of himself as a being above all lifeforms. And so the word that eventually appeared in his mind was.

‘DIVINE!’

‘...YES! I AM DIVINE!’

‘I AM THE DIVINE DRAGON!’

He felt unprecedented ecstasy, his brain blew up with the feeling of 1000 orgasms ‘compressed’ into 1, and he could no longer contain it within himself, so he tried to roar out loud to let the world know of his elation and triumph, to let the world know that their divine master had been born.

But then he felt a savage pain course through his body.

It was then that he discovered… that he no longer had a face. It had been destroyed in his relentless training and he had been none the wiser.

He was also dying.