Re-Awakened: I Ascend as an SSS-Ranked Dragon Summoner

[KNIGHT'S GRACE... EQUIPPED]

[VOID STRIDERS... EQUIPPED]

Void energy erupted across Noah's body. Purple-black light wrapped around him like something alive. The sensation hit immediately. Weight settling against his chest as the breastplate materialized, form-fitting and sleek. Gauntlets followed, wrapping around his forearms, fingers, knuckles. Greaves encased his legs from knee to ankle. Shoulder guards locked into place with a soft click that resonated through his bones.

It wasn't armor in the traditional sense. No bulky plates or restrictive joints. The whole set moved with him, felt like a second skin that happened to be made of void energy and reinforced alloy. The Void Shell activated automatically, creating a barrier he couldn't see but could feel. A subtle resistance against the air itself, like standing in water that wasn't there.

The Void Striders came last. Black boots materialized around his feet, purple wisps rising from the soles like smoke. They felt weightless despite looking solid. When he shifted his weight, the gravity beneath him felt wrong. Controllable. Malleable.

His broken arm throbbed once, then went still. The enhanced recovery from Knight's Grace was already working, accelerating the natural healing his void energy and enhanced vitality provided. He flexed his fingers. Bone knitting together faster than it should. Tissue repairing at visible speed.

[Health Points: 3,105/3,520]

[Void Energy: 14,450/24,000]

[Enhanced Recovery Active: +15% Void Energy Regeneration]

[Void Shell Active: 30% Damage Reduction]

'Two-thirds of my void energy reserves,' Noah thought, watching the numbers settle. 'Knight's Grace is helping with regeneration but I'm still running on borrowed time. This thing adapts, evolves, grows new appendages mid-fight. I need to end this now or I won't have enough energy left for whatever comes next.'

The Harbinger stood across the clearing, wings spread wide, testing their range. The membrane stretched between bone struts that looked too thin to support something that massive. Black blood still dripped from the wounds Noah had carved into its shoulder, thigh, throat. The void energy interference was slowing its regeneration but not stopping it entirely.

It couldn't close the wound for sure but if one looked closely, you could see the effort its body was putting up.

Then the creature moved.

Not running. Flying. Its wings beat once, twice, lifting its bulk off the ground with power that shouldn't be possible for something that size. The first attempt was clumsy, unstable. The Harbinger listed to one side before correcting. But the second wingbeat was stronger, more controlled. By the third, it was airborne properly, hovering ten feet up. Noah watched intelligence burn in its eyes as it realized what it could do now.

It charged.

The Harbinger came at him low and fast, using its wings like a bird of prey diving for a kill. Trees got in the way. The creature's body slammed through them without slowing. Trunks exploding into splinters. Branches scattering. The sound was catastrophic. Wood breaking, air displacement, the creature's own roar mixing with destruction.

Noah didn't run. Instead he activated Void Striders and the world blurred. The human body wasn't designed to move at the speed he was moving.

Mach 1. Then Mach 1.5. Then Mach 2. His body became a streak of motion, the armor moving with him. No resistance from the equipment itself. He felt the transition. Felt reality compress as he pushed past sound barriers. Felt the alien air turn solid against his advance. Trees became vertical lines passing in his peripheral vision. The ground became a blur of color beneath his feet.He was covering distance faster than most fighter jets.

The Harbinger's fist came down where he'd been standing. The impact created a crater six feet across, shockwaves radiating outward in visible rings. Dirt exploded upward in a fountain of debris.

Noah was already behind it. He reappeared with Excaliburn drawn, void energy screaming along the blade's edge. He swung for the spine.

The wings snapped closed.

Not to fly. To shield. The membrane folded around the Harbinger's back like a cloak made of meat and bone. Noah's blade struck the surface with a sound like metal on metal. The void energy carved through the first layer. Membrane tearing, black blood spraying. But before it could reach the creature's actual body, something detached.

Feathers. Hundreds of them, metallic and razor-sharp, launching from the wings like shrapnel. They separated from the membrane before the void energy could spread, each one a projectile moving at bullet speed. The Harbinger's wings regenerated immediately, new feathers growing to replace what had been sacrificed.

Noah blinked backward, displaced himself fifteen feet, but several feathers still caught him. They punched through his armor. Not breaking the Void Shell completely but getting past it enough to draw blood. His shoulder. His thigh. His left forearm where the bone had just finished healing.

[-40 HP]

[Health Points: 3,065/3,520]

'It can sacrifice parts of itself to counter void energy,' Noah thought, already moving again. 'The feathers detach before erasure spreads to the wings proper. I hate it when they are this smart. This thing is problem-solving in real time.'

The Harbinger launched again, but this time it wasn't charging blindly. Its wings beat in controlled patterns, lifting it higher, giving it altitude advantage. Twenty feet up. Thirty. Forty. Then it folded its wings and dropped.

Gravity and mass became weapons. The creature fell like a meteor, both fists extended, aimed at where Noah stood. The air itself screamed under the pressure.

Noah waited. Counted the distance. Fifty feet. Forty. Thirty.

[PHASE STEP ACTIVATED]

His body phased out of sync with normal matter. The Harbinger's fists hit the ground where he'd been. The impact was nuclear. The clearing ceased to exist. Stone pulverized. Dirt became aerosol. The shockwave expanded outward in a perfect sphere, flattening everything within twenty meters.

Noah phased back into reality behind the creature, already swinging. Excaliburn came around in a horizontal arc aimed at the neck.

The Harbinger's tail snapped.

The sonic boom from that whip-crack motion created separation before Noah's blade could connect. He felt himself launched sideways. The world spinning. Trees approaching too fast. He activated Gravity Defiance mid-flight, planted his boots against a trunk, used it as a springboard to redirect his momentum.

He came back at the Harbinger like a missile. Mach 2 acceleration compressed into ten feet of space. His fist, wrapped in void energy, drove toward the creature's face.

The wings came up. Both of them, crossing in front of the Harbinger's head, creating a shield. Noah's fist struck membrane reinforced by those metallic feathers. The impact sent shockwaves through both their bodies. Feathers detached before void energy could spread, launching outward in all directions. Noah felt three more punch through his armor.

[-35 HP]

[Health Points: 3,030/3,520]

But he'd created an opening. His follow-up kick came low, aimed at the Harbinger's knee with all the force Void Striders could generate.

The joint buckled. The creature's leg bent backward, bone breaking. It dropped to one knee. Black blood sprayed. For one second, it was vulnerable.

Noah activated Null strike and drove it toward the Harbinger's exposed throat.

The wings unfolded and beat once.

The air displacement was immediate and overwhelming.

Not wind per say.

It was more like a concussive force. The Harbinger launched backward from the force of its own wingbeat, putting twenty feet of space between them before Noah's strike could land. More than that, the backwash caught Noah mid-punch, threw off his balance, sent him stumbling.

The Harbinger's knee was already healing. New tissue growing, bone realigning. Its regeneration was compromised by lingering void damage but still functional enough to repair non-critical injuries.

'The wings aren't just for flight,' Noah realized. 'They're shields, weapons, mobility tools, and force multipliers. Every adaptation makes it more dangerous. I'm running out of time to finish this before it masters aerial combat completely.'

The last part was true. For a creature that just grew wings, it didn't know how to fully use it yet. But the stunts it had pulled so far suggested it was learning, whether through instincts or trial and error, it was learning.

The creature took flight again, but this time its movements were controlled. Almost graceful. It circled overhead, wings beating in steady rhythm, stalking Noah from altitude.

Then it dove.

Not straight down. At an angle, coming in fast and low, using momentum and gravity to amplify its speed. Its fist extended, pulled back, preparing to unleash that shockwave punch at point-blank range.

Noah ran to meet it.

The Void Striders carried him across the destroyed clearing faster than sound. The ground beneath his boots broke from the pressure. The Harbinger's fist came around. Noah saw it, tracked the motion, knew the shockwave was coming.

He activated Phantom Step.

Five copies peeled off from his body, void constructs solid enough to fool perception. They scattered in different directions, each one a target the Harbinger had to account for. The creature's punch hit the nearest copy.

The shockwave went through empty void energy. The construct dissolved.

The real Noah came from below. He'd gone low, using Gravity Defiance to run along the ground at an angle physics shouldn't allow. Now he was inside the Harbinger's guard. His blade came up toward its exposed underbelly.

The tail came around.

The appendage moved like it had independent thought, wrapping around Noah's sword arm before he could complete the strike. The pressure was immediate and crushing. His armor held but he felt his bones protest.

The Harbinger yanked. Noah's feet left the ground. He was airborne, being swung like a club. Before he could blink away, the creature slammed him into the ground.

BOOM.

[-70 HP]

[Health Points: 2,960/3,520]

The impact drove the air from his lungs. His back hit first, then his head. The Knight's Grace absorbed damage that should have killed him but still let through enough force to make everything hurt. His ears were ringing.

The Harbinger lifted him again, preparing for a second slam. Noah activated Phase Step, became incorporeal. The tail passed through him like smoke. He dropped three feet, hit the ground, rolled, came up already moving.

[VOID BARRAGE ACTIVATED]

Purple projectiles erupted from his hands. Dozens of them, filling the space between him and the Harbinger, each one carrying erasure on contact.

The wings spread wide and forward, creating a barrier. The feathers puffed out from the membrane, creating layers of defense. Noah's projectiles struck the barrier and began eating through it, void energy spreading, but the Harbinger was already shedding compromised feathers faster than the damage could reach its actual wings.

Hundreds of metallic feathers filled the air between them. The Harbinger beat its wings once. Every single feather became a projectile.

Noah blinked. Appeared fifteen feet left. The feather storm carved through where he'd been, each one punching through trees, stone, anything in its path. He blinked again, appeared behind the Harbinger, Excaliburn already swinging.

The creature spun. Its wings swept around like scythes. Noah had to abort his attack, had to blink backward to avoid being caught by the sweep. That put him on the defensive. Made him react instead of attack.

'It's learning. Every engagement teaches it something new. The wings give it options I can't counter easily. I need to overwhelm it, hit it so hard and fast that adaptation becomes irrelevant.'

The Harbinger's wings folded. Then they snapped open.

BOOM.

The sonic boom from that motion created a shockwave that flattened everything in a thirty-foot radius. Trees bent until they broke. Stone cracked. The ground itself rippled like disturbed water.

Noah took it head-on. The Void Shell absorbed some of the impact, his armor took the rest, but he still felt it. Felt his ribs protest despite the protection. Felt the force travel through his entire body. He slid backward ten feet, boots carving furrows through dirt and stone.

[-55 HP]

[Health Points: 2,905/3,520]

But he didn't stop moving. He pushed through the pain, through the ringing in his ears, and accelerated. Void Striders at maximum output. The world became streaks of color and motion. The human body wasn't meant to process information at this speed, but Noah's enhanced perception made it possible.

The Harbinger tried to track him. Its eyes moved, following, but its body couldn't keep up. Noah came from the left, struck its ribs with a Chi enhanced punched. The impact broke armor, drove the creature sideways. Before it could recover, he was on the right, Excaliburn carving through its shoulder, removing the arm at the socket.

Black blood sprayed. The limb hit the ground, already dissolving from void contamination. The Harbinger roared, spun, swung its remaining arm in a wild haymaker.

Noah ducked under it, came up inside the creature's guard, drove his knee into its midsection with force that would have caved in concrete. Something inside the Harbinger broke. Something important, judging by how it doubled over.

But the wings were still functional. They beat once, creating distance, lifting the creature away before Noah could capitalize. It gained altitude. Fifteen feet, twenty. Blood pouring from its wounds but regeneration already working to seal them.

Noah watched the stump where its arm had been. The void energy had done its job. Black corruption spread from the wound, preventing any regeneration. New tissue would try to form, then immediately dissolve. The arm wasn't coming back.

'It's buying time. Getting distance so it can recover from the other wounds. Can't let that happen.'

Noah ran toward the nearest vertical surface. A massive stone outcropping that had somehow survived the destruction. He hit it at full speed, boots finding purchase through Gravity Defiance, and ran straight up the face. Thirty feet. Fifty. At the top, he launched himself.

Not blink. Not phase. Just pure momentum carrying him through the air toward where the Harbinger hovered. He brought Excaliburn around in an overhead strike aimed at splitting the creature's skull.

The Harbinger's wings swept forward. Both of them, crossing in front of its body, those metallic feathers extending outward like armor plating.

Noah's blade struck the barrier. Void energy met regenerating membrane. The feathers began detaching, sacrificing themselves to prevent erasure from spreading. Noah saw his opening.

He dropped the sword.

Let Excaliburn tumble away. Extended both hands. Caught the Harbinger's wings before they could fully withdraw.

His grip tightened and he activated entropy touch.

Void energy poured from his gauntlets directly into the membrane. This time there was no detaching, no sacrificing parts. He was in direct contact. His power was spreading faster than the creature could adapt.

The Harbinger shrieked. Tried to pull away. Its wings beat frantically, creating wind that howled, but Noah held on. His boots found purchase on the creature's torso through Gravity Defiance, letting him anchor himself despite the lack of solid ground.

Black began spreading from where Noah touched. Not just damage. Erasure. The wings started dissolving from the base outward, void energy eating through membrane, bone, everything.

The Harbinger's tail came around. Wrapped around Noah's throat. Squeezed.

His vision went red at the edges. He couldn't breathe. The pressure was enormous. His enhanced vitality was the only thing preventing his neck from snapping immediately. But he didn't let go of the wings.

The Harbinger's remaining arm grabbed him. Pulled. Trying to pry him off. Its claws raked across his armor, found gaps, drew blood. But Noah's grip stayed locked.

The wings dissolved completely. Just gone. Black space where organic matter used to be. The Harbinger screamed, a sound of pure agony, and released its grip on Noah's throat out of shock.

Noah sucked in air. His vision cleared. And he was falling.

Both of them were falling. The Harbinger couldn't fly without wings. Gravity remembered what it was supposed to do.