[Vol. 8] Chapter 234: The Ancient Dragon and the New Dragon
Feeling that his explanation wasn’t detailed enough, the Sword Saint added more.
“This is a forbidden spell, a type of legendary Tier 10 magic, meant to trap... even actual gods.”
“F-F-F-F-FORBIDDEN SPELL?!!”
Aldrich was so frightened by that terrifying term that his pupils shrank and his knees buckled. He almost collapsed to the floor again. But then the sword-bearing young man next to him spoke between deep breaths:
“However, from what I know, the ancient formation called [Tenfold Illusion Array] is only a trapping array, it doesn’t actually cause harm. And the cost to build it is so enormous that even the full strength of the dragon race couldn’t complete it easily. In fact, it hasn’t been seen in over ten thousand years.”
“The formation we’re in now must be a remnant from a very ancient time, built along with these ruins. After so many years, its power has likely faded to just 20 or 30 percent of its original strength, so it shouldn’t pose any real danger at the moment.”
“Damn... So it’s just a broken-down formation? You scared the hell out of me...”
Hearing those words, the guide finally let out a breath of relief, but then suddenly froze as he realized something.
“Wait, no! Even if it’s just 20 or 30 percent of a forbidden spell, it’s still a forbidden spell! We’re just regular people, how are we supposed to fight something made to trap gods?!”
“……”
Bevis shook his head helplessly, but didn’t say anything to him. Instead, he turned to look at the priestess and the dragon girl beside him. He raised the smooth silver scale he had picked up from beneath the white jade stair and spoke thoughtfully:
“If an ancient dragon formation exists here, then it’s very likely that these ruins were built by the dragon race in ancient times, or at the very least, are strongly connected to them. I just didn’t expect... the legends to be true.”
“What legend?”
Seeing the curiosity in the two girls’ eyes, the Sword Saint paused for a moment before speaking again.
“Miss Violet, as I mentioned before, even though records of the [Tenfold Illusion Array] still exist, it’s almost impossible to recreate it now. One reason is that the formation is too high-level, it needs the direct involvement of god-level beings just to meet the minimum requirements.
The other reason... is that some of the key materials needed to build it have been lost to time.”
The black-haired girl raised her eyebrows.
By this point, it was obvious what the Sword Saint was hinting at.
As a close friend of the Fox God, she could clearly sense that the silver scale in Bevis’s hand faintly held the Law of Space. Though the energy had weakened over the long passage of time, it still gave off a pure aura of spatial power. It couldn’t compare to the supreme divine might of Xiao Kong, but it certainly held the essence of a true Law.
In other words, the owner of this scale was very likely a god-level dragon, and unlike any known dragon clans they possessed power over space.
But how could that be possible? True Laws and divine authority are supposed to be unique.
“That dragon scale... is one of the missing materials?”
Bevis shook his head and lowered his voice.
“I’m no expert in formations, and I don’t know exactly what the [Tenfold Illusion Array] is still missing. I only happened to hear about it once from Her Majesty the White Dragon. But back when I was spending time with Princess Cielru of the White Dragons, I heard her mention a certain... story.”
"It’s said that long, long ago, during ancient times, the dragon race was far more powerful than it is now. Back then, there were nine dragon clans in total, and they ruled over the world. But later, a terrible and mysterious disaster struck. The dragons suffered heavy losses in the war, with many powerful beings dying. Two entire clans even disappeared completely, their bloodlines lost to history."
"After that disaster, the dragon race fell from nine clans to the seven we know today. Many of the powerful abilities from ancient times were also limited or sealed off. For example, this [Tenfold Illusion Array] , I’ve seen all seven types of modern dragons, and none of them have scales like this. Even if it were a mutation, it shouldn’t be possible to suddenly gain such a powerful trait like Space."
"And based on what Her Majesty said that the ancient formation is missing some key materials, I believe this silver dragon scale is very likely a remnant from one of the two lost dragon clans."
“Ancient dragons, huh…”
To be honest, Violet had seen dragons before. And she had to admit, these legendary creatures were indeed powerful. From what she’d learned, even the Spirit Veil Tribe created by Dawn herself might not be a match for dragons in a one-on-one battle, at least outside of their own domain.
If what they saw now was only the weakened version of the dragons after the great disaster… then how terrifying must the dragons have been at their peak?
And another thing, if the Primordial Light had supposedly set the limit of mortal power at the demigod level, why would it create a species like dragons, which far surpassed that limit? Wouldn’t that be a contradiction?
Hmm? Wait a minute… “the great disaster”?
For some reason, Violet suddenly thought of the faint images she had seen back in the Chaos Magic Valley, through her Serpent Heart resonance, ancient scenes that showed a great battle between the World-Devouring Serpent and the Primordial Light. But even before the light came down… there had already been life on the earth…
If this was just a possibility, ancient dragons were part of those original beings, and maybe… even had a similar status to the Serpent?
Could it be that dragons… were actually enemies of the Primordial Light?
“……”
Violet quietly tucked away her inner shock. She glanced at her dragon beside her, only to see the little dragon girl still silently staring at the silver scale, showing no special reaction. Just then, she noticed that Aldrich had overheard their muttering and was starting to approach, so she decided to drop the topic for now and change the subject.
“Ahem. No matter who built this ruin or why this ancient formation suddenly activated, what matters most right now is finding a way out as soon as possible. Mr. Bevis, since you know this formation, could you tell us the best way to deal with it?”
The Sword Saint nodded slightly.
“There are three possible methods. The first is to forcefully break the formation using outside power. But since the [Tenfold Illusion Array] is a forbidden-level formation, and it’s especially designed to resist direct attacks, even now, in its weakened state, it would probably still take a true god’s full power to destroy. That makes it the worst option.”
“The second method is much easier. Although the [Tenfold Illusion Array] seems endless, its actual area isn’t very large. We just need to keep searching this zone step by step, using the method I’ll give you, to find the array’s core points. If we collect about half of the hidden dragon scales, the formation should collapse on its own.”
Bevis had explained two methods already, but seeing that Violet didn’t react strongly to either, neither agreeing nor disagreeing, he could only shake his head with a sigh.
“It seems Miss Violet isn’t too impressed.”
The girl smiled lightly.
“I suppose the third method is the best one, right? Since you already had that in mind, why bother talking about the other two first?”
The Sword Saint also chuckled. As if they were in sync, the two of them turned at the same time to look at the golden-haired girl beside them, the one who had been quiet all this time, clearly lost in thought, leaving her a little stunned.
“...Me?”
But Xiao Guang wasn’t stupid. She immediately realized what was being implied and frowned slightly.
“But I was raised by my master since I was a child. I’ve never had any contact with the dragons of this world, let alone the ancient dragon clans. The formations they left behind are just dead tools, can I really control them?”
Violet stood on tiptoe and calmly patted her shoulder.
“Oh come on, just give it a try. It’s no big deal if it doesn’t work. Don’t forget who you are now, if my dear Xiao Guang can’t handle this, I doubt anyone else could. If that stupid thing still won’t cooperate, we’ll just tear it down!”
“Well… since Master said so, alright then.”
The Dragon God nodded, but didn’t ask what she should actually do.
In truth, none of the people present knew anything about this kind of thing. And if anyone could figure it out, it would only be Xiao Guang, because she was born a dragon.
After thinking quietly for a few moments, the dragon girl seemed to sense something. She gently touched the silver scale that Violet was holding and closed her eyes.
It was like ripples spreading across a clear pool of water. The moment her fingertip touched the smooth surface of the scale, visible waves shimmered across it. Then, in the very next moment...
Her entire slender wrist actually sank right into the dragon scale, even though it was only a few centimeters thick!
“What the heck? This thing we just randomly picked up from under the floor is actually a storage item? That’s way too crazy!”
The black-haired girl’s expression also became more serious.
A storage item…? Probably not.
It did look like that, as Aldrich said, the scene resembled using a magic storage ring to take things in or out. But Violet had already secretly used [Information Detection] when she first touched the scale to check it out.
In reality, it was just a scale, a dragon scale. While it did contain traces of space-related energy and some kind of power, it wasn’t made to store items.
Most likely, this strange phenomenon was caused by Xiao Guang’s own unique nature. When she infused her divine sense into the scale, this unexpected result occurred.
As she interacted with the scale, wave-like ripples continued to spread.
After just a few seconds, the dragon girl suddenly opened her eyes, and in her burning golden dragon-pupiled gaze, it was as if a blazing sun had risen, radiating brilliant light!
“Release!”
She called out clearly.
At that moment, countless silver lights suddenly rose from the endless white jade stairs, as if stars were shooting into the sky.
They came from many hidden dragon scales, their lights reflecting on the ceiling above. Eventually, they all came together to form a majestic silver dragon, hundreds of meters long, wings fully spread!
“ROAAAR!!!”
The dragon’s roar was so powerful it made everyone’s ears ring. Though it was made of light, the massive dragon looked and moved like a real, living creature. Its glowing eyes seemed to silently watch everyone below. But after just a moment, the vision faded, the dragon vanished, and the silver lights dimmed. Everything returned to how it was before.
However, something had definitely changed.
The space around them felt different. Hard to describe, but clearly altered. Where once the white jade stairs seemed to stretch endlessly with no end in sight, there now stood a towering stone gate ahead.
Seeing it, Aldrich burst with joy.
“Oh, it’s here! Yes, this is the Seal Gate! Once we go through it, we’ll reach a whole new place, completely different from the outside world. That’s the real ruin! Looks like we really did break free from that giant formation, hahaha!!”
Unlike the guide, who was making a big scene, the priestess calmly exchanged a glance with Bevis and then turned back toward the Dragon God, who had successfully broken the formation.
Strangely though, even though the problem was solved, Xiao Guang didn’t look happy at all.
She was just standing there, frozen in place with her brows deeply furrowed, as if she’d just encountered something troubling.
“What’s wrong?”
“There’s... definitely something wrong with this place,” the dragon girl said softly.
She pulled her hand out of the silver dragon scale. The moment they separated, the scale, which had faint traces of space magic, instantly turned into dust and disappeared before everyone’s eyes. She didn’t seem to care about it. Instead, she looked seriously at the tightly closed door ahead and said.
“I’m afraid… we shouldn’t go inside.”
The black-haired girl slightly raised her eyebrows and calmly asked, “Did you see something inside that dragon scale?”
The dragon girl nodded gently.
“This place, which people now call a ‘ruin,’ was probably once a sacred site built by the dragons for some kind of ritual. But because of some special reasons, it’s now very unstable.”
It seemed that, since others were nearby, Xiao Guang didn’t want to explain too much out loud.
Instead, she lightly held Violet’s hand and used their soul bond to share what she saw directly with her.
It was a strange world, completely different from what Violet knew.
In a dark sky, deep cracks were clearly visible. A huge stone pillar, like a giant holding up the heavens, stood tall on the ground. Violet’s view moved like that of a god, sweeping across everything, and she found that this whole world was broken and disconnected. The space there wasn’t enough to fill all areas, and so it was full of dark voids and cracks that split the entire world into many separate zones.
These zones were like small islands of survival in the fog. Violet saw groups of adventurers carefully exploring, saw mercenaries and guards being hunted and eaten by powerful beasts, and saw survivors cheering wildly after finding treasure, only to suddenly fight over it.
But this… this was just a small part, maybe only a tenth or less, of the entire “survivable” area.
More areas, especially the ones near the huge central stone, remained hidden and blurry, as if something was blocking the view.
A realization slowly formed in Violet’s mind.
So that’s it…
This so-called “ruin” that appeared to the world was actually just a few broken fragments of the full space. Because those pieces were unstable, they drifted out into the outside world.
But those fragments were too fragile. They couldn’t handle the presence of real divine powers or law-based magic. If Violet and her group entered, the whole space might collapse within minutes.
Xiao Guang and Violet might be able to handle such a collapse, but there were many other explorers inside, and even native people who had lived there since long ago.
If the space broke down, the chaotic space cracks could tear everyone to pieces in an instant.
That was probably why the ancient dragon formation tried to keep them out, because its true purpose was to protect the Tomb from being damaged.
Even so...
Something felt strange.
Violet might care about the lives of ordinary people, but she didn’t think that was enough reason for Xiao Guang to look so troubled.
Right now, that dragon girl’s expression almost screamed, ‘I’m hiding something.’
“Xiao Guang, did you see something else in the scale?”
“Eh?! N-no, Master! What I just showed you… that was everything! Haha...”
Stare...
Seeing how obviously guilty the dragon girl looked. How she avoided eye contact, nervously wagged her big tail, and didn’t know what to do with her hands. Violet could only sigh to herself.
After all this time, the little one still hadn’t learned how to lie. She was being way too obvious.
But how should she feel about this? Had her dragon finally grown up a bit?
This might be the first time Xiao Guang had ever tried to hide something from her.
Kind of touching, actually.
Ha~