VBNWDW - Chapter 84
Chapter 84
It was said that the Dragon Clan possessed formidable power, enough to contend with the gods and remain undefeated. Yet, humans who had truly witnessed the full extent of a dragon's strength were almost nonexistent, left to imagine their might through sparse descriptions.
But at this moment, a chilling pressure, like the torrential rain itself, swept over the city of Anthelia.
A deafening boom echoed from the horizon. A purple bolt of lightning, like a giant python, slithered through the clouds, abruptly bleaching the world in a deathly white.
From the nobles and the Temple of Light down to the commoners and livestock of Anthelia, all who felt the sweep of the dragon's might trembled uncontrollably. Their legs buckled, forcing them to their knees as cold sweat poured down their bodies!
It was a fear etched into the very soul, the boundless terror of a weaker species before a superior being.
One could still grit their teeth and fight against a slightly stronger opponent, but in the face of a god, the very thought of resistance was impossible. All one could do was kneel, prostrate, and tremble.
—ROAR!
Even more deafening than the thunder was the dragon's furious roar. Marble-sized raindrops froze in mid-air, and the distant river began to boil. For a fleeting moment, the very ground seemed to shudder. Even newborn infants could only stare wide-eyed, not daring to make a sound.
Everyone felt the dragon's unbridled rage, a hatred that screamed of flaying her enemies, tearing them limb from limb, and grinding them to pulp.
It was said that a single spell from a Great Magister could easily destroy a city. What, then, could an enraged adult dragon do?
Duke Naist collapsed in his study, feeling as if a million needles were piercing his soul, riddling his body and consciousness with countless wounds.
In the distance, the Temple of Light suddenly emitted a low hum. A gentle and sacred light element spread out, enveloping the area a hundred meters around the temple.
The people inside breathed a sigh of relief and were about to scramble to their feet and wipe away their sweat.
A cold snort echoed between heaven and earth.
Bang!
The elements in the space seemed to coalesce, crashing against the temple like a ripple in water. The protective barrier, which had appeared so solid, instantly cracked.
With another thunderous crash, the barrier shattered. The vast power of the light element illuminated the entire city before being utterly extinguished.
All resistance had become a joke.
With a casual wave of her hand, Yueqing tore the space around her. Metis, whose poison had been temporarily suppressed, was placed into this pocket where time stood still.
Then, she stepped out onto the air as if treading on an invisible platform. The night seemed to seep into her, dyeing her black dress an even deeper shade. The raindrops around her would pause for a brief moment just before they touched her, never once staining her.
Someone realized with terror that this city, which had once given them an infinite sense of security, was now like a stone teetering on a cliff's edge. Its survival or destruction rested on a single thought.
This was a dragon?
High above, the silver-haired woman in the black dress, as cold and beautiful as a goddess, hovered over a lavish mansion. Her calm voice carried a bone-chilling cold as she spoke: "The Abner Family."
Perhaps the earlier elemental chaos had disturbed the thick clouds, for the rain grew heavier, quickly submerging the steps halfway.
Someone scrambled out, splashing through the water, and knelt on the ground, shouting, "Lord Dragon, I…"
Before he could finish, Yueqing simply raised her hand. There was no flashy display of light, just a simple, effortless gesture that caused space to warp for an instant.
The people in the mansion didn't even manage to utter a single syllable before they were seemingly sliced apart by a million shards of glass. Flesh and shattered bone rained down together. Who could believe that those piles of mangled meat had been living, breathing people just a second ago?
Yueqing lowered her hand, and that patch of space collapsed with it, creating a massive crater out of thin air that obliterated all traces, as if they had never existed.
The Abner Family, annihilated!
She moved on to another location, her pace unhurried despite her fury, like an executioner slowly swinging his blade during a sentencing.
"The Bonnie Family."
This time, the culprit was allowed one more sentence.
Duke Bonnie roared, "I didn't know! I had no idea what they were planning! I wasn't involved!"
"Oh."
A single, indifferent syllable was his only reply before the same punishment descended.
The faces of the others grew even paler. They knew the dragon had already made up her mind. All excuses were just feeble struggles. Even if someone truly hadn't been involved, they would still be judged as an accomplice.
Who on earth came up with this idiotic idea?
They cursed inwardly. How could anyone be foolish enough to provoke a dragon's partner?
But they knew the truth even better. It was their own insatiable greed, their ignorance, their arrogance!
They thought that since no dragon had made a move in centuries, they were only bound by some superficial obligation, showing up to sign a contract before going back to sleep. They reasoned that even when the previous king and queen were murdered, only a few culprits had been dealt with.
So they assumed that even if the dragon insisted on investigating, they could just offer up a few scapegoats. Perhaps she would even be grateful to them for helping her finish her task early so she could return to Dragon Island.
Besides, the black dragon had been gone for over a month. She had probably already flown back to Dragon Island, not bothering to care about Metis at all.
The same scene replayed at the Bonnie family estate. Amidst the blur of blood and water, someone who had snuck out of the house was hiding in a nearby restaurant, trembling and thanking their lucky stars for their escape. They had almost met the same fate as the others.
But in the next second, their face blurred, and they vanished from the world, just like the rest of their family.
The onlookers grew even more terrified. The most frightening thing wasn't death, but having every trace of your existence erased, your entire bloodline extinguished, as if you had never been.
The Bonnie Family, annihilated!
Yueqing continued onward. Those who knew their fate had already broken down. The mentally weak among them went mad, screaming and wailing as they ran through the rainy night.
Yueqing felt not a flicker of emotion. Her expression was cold and indifferent. Why would a god pay any mind to the struggles of ants?
Lightning flashed across the sky. Half of Anthelia teetered on the edge of the underworld.
And yet, Yueqing's mind even had a moment to wander, thinking of that hatchling.
Strictly speaking, she and Metis had only been together like that twice—once before the expedition, and once after a night of drinking.
Although she wasn't opposed to the idea of a child, she hadn't expected it to happen so soon. When she was sober, she would consciously hold back, but when she wasn't…
The dragon's lips twitched. For the first time, she hated alcohol with a passion. What gave her an even bigger headache was that this child might not be very healthy.
Due to their powerful and rare bloodline, dragons had a special sense for others of their kind, especially for an unformed hatchling in the womb. The moment one was conceived, the entire clan would sense it and instinctively move to protect the child.
But today, she had been so close to Metis, pressing against her several times, yet she hadn't sensed the child's existence at all, let alone the other dragons thousands of miles away. If the child hadn't sensed the threat and used its own power to protect its mother, Yueqing had no idea how long it would have taken her to find out.
At this thought, Yueqing's expression grew colder, her thoughts more chaotic.
Was it because of the mingling of human and dragon blood, or was it because she had been drunk, causing the hatchling to be so weak?
She had no precedent to follow. The first queen and her dragon partner had not chosen to have children. Metis's line was passed down from the first queen's adopted niece.
Before that, there were no records of a union between a human and a dragon.
What worried the dragon even more was that the hatchling was already fragile, and now it was expending its power to protect Metis…
Furthermore, she had originally planned to use elemental magic to purge the poison, but now, because of the hatchling, she didn't dare act rashly. She could only use her spatial power to force the poison into a clump and temporarily seal it within a small pocket of space.
Yueqing felt like her entire being was about to explode. She suddenly raised her hand, and the next family was annihilated in an instant, without even a chance to speak. A thousand-meter-deep crater appeared where their estate had been, as if struck by a giant meteor.
If it weren't for the fact that Metis's subjects were still in the city, the dragon would have gladly slaughtered every last person in it.
In the eyes of a dragon, a race famous for being fiercely protective, their partner and their young were the one thing that could never be touched.
At this moment, even a high and mighty god would be dragged from their divine temple to face the dragon's wrath.
"The Iliana Family…" Yueqing narrowed her eyes, looking down.
Ivo, as thin and pale as ever, knelt in the rain and looked up at her.
Remembering her promise, Yueqing snorted coldly. "They are yours to deal with."
She added with emphasis, "Ivo, I expect a satisfactory answer from you."
She pointed a finger, and the space was frozen. Aside from those she permitted, everyone else could only kneel where they were, awaiting their fate.
Ivo rose, bowed, and raised a hand in a salute, expressing her intentions without a word.
Yueqing glanced to the side. The little knight who should have been at home was instead by Ivo's side. After being allowed to stand, she took an umbrella from her ring, opened it, and held it over Ivo's head, leaving half of her own body exposed to the rain.
"Tsk," Yueqing made an ambiguous sound but didn't stop her, turning to walk toward the next family.
Ivo, holding her staff, didn't look at the person beside her. She only said, "You should go back."
The little knight pressed her lips together and said, "I'll hold the umbrella for you."
Ivo's refusal was blunt. "I don't need it."
"But you'll catch a cold in the rain," Mo Wen said.
Ivo's eyes darkened, and she snapped, "Do you have any idea what I'm about to do? I'm going to refine all of their souls and turn them into puppets!"
The little knight blinked. "You still shouldn't catch a cold."
Ivo fell silent for a moment, then said resentfully, "Do whatever you want."
Several more craters appeared. Yueqing finally arrived before the Naist family estate. Because she had deliberately saved them for last, these people were like pigs and sheep under a sharp blade. Having witnessed the deaths of their companions, they were at the absolute peak of fear and despair.
Yueqing, however, was in no hurry to act. A mocking smile touched her beautiful face as she asked, "Duke Naist, what do you think of this outcome? Are you satisfied?"
All eyes focused on the man in lavish clothes in the center of the courtyard. He gritted his teeth and shouted, "Let them go, and I'll give you the antidote."
"Do you think I'm that easy to fool? Do you think I can't recognize the poison?"
From the moment this poison was created, it had no antidote.
Yueqing sneered, "Is the antidote the lives of your entire clan?"
Seeing his lie exposed, Duke Naist's face went white. He suddenly threw out a seventh-tier scroll and roared, "What are you waiting for? Are you going to wait until everyone is dead before you act?!"
The scroll instantly exploded, and a terrifying tornado materialized out of thin air, roaring as it charged toward Yueqing.
In that instant, the clouds overhead were torn apart, revealing the blue sky. The rain was sucked into the vortex, and houses within a hundred-meter radius collapsed or were damaged. Even people on the edge of the city found it hard to breathe.
The next second, the long-silent Temple of Light erupted with a blinding light. A chant, recited in unison by hundreds of people, rose up. But strangely, the surrounding elements remained calm. Instead, the statue at the center of the temple suddenly lit up, and mysterious runes hidden beneath the floor emerged.
At the same time, the tornado, carrying an aura of world-ending destruction, rushed before Yueqing!
But Yueqing didn't even retreat. A glint of light flashed in her gilded eyes, and for a moment, her indifferent, emotionless vertical pupils seemed to reappear.
—BOOM!
The great wind dissipated, and all the stones and wood chips that had been swept up fell back to the ground.
Duke Naist did not despair. Instead, he threw out another seventh-tier scroll. A fire dragon appeared with a roar, its massive body charging toward Yueqing at incredible speed.
"Begone," Yueqing said, not giving it a second glance. A single word was enough to repel it.
She turned her head to look in the other direction, her brow furrowing slightly as if she sensed a vast divine power gathering.
A flash of joy crossed Duke Naist's face, as if he knew what the Temple was doing. He immediately threw out his last scroll. This was the culmination of all the trump cards his family had accumulated over a thousand years.
Yueqing was merely annoyed by the constant stream of scrolls. After waving them away, she finally understood what the Temple was up to.
As the incantation reached its end, the hundreds of people in the Temple suddenly coughed up blood and collapsed, as if their magical power had been completely drained. The Head of the Temple was the worst off, aging in a matter of seconds until he looked on the verge of death.
The runes finally blazed with light. The statue of the God of Light shattered. Though it was still deep in the night, the city was as bright as day. A figure a full hundred meters tall appeared in the sky above the city.
"A projection of the God of Light…" Yueqing finally understood the source of their confidence in using the poison. This was their final trump card: a projection of the God of Light with the power of a demigod.
Seeing this, the people below breathed a collective sigh of relief, their eyes filled with hope. A trump card on par with a demigod was a major threat anywhere on the Chryse Continent.
If a Magister could destroy a city in an instant, then a demigod could destroy a country with a wave of their hand!
The commoners who had been forced to their knees by the terrifying pressure now truly prostrated themselves, not even daring to lift their heads as they trembled and whispered the God of Light's name.
The projection of the God of Light raised its hand and pointed at Yueqing. Its eyes, completely devoid of pupils, were lifeless, a sheet of gray-white.
Yueqing showed no fear. Space warped for an instant, and the hundred-meter-long dragon appeared before the people once more. Its chilling bone wings stirred up a chaotic wind, and white ghost flames swirled around it. A hint of madness flashed in its gilded vertical pupils.
It shot forward with a roar, tearing open spatial rifts of all sizes around it. Its furious cry pierced the plains, sending out invisible shockwaves.
It was actually going to challenge a god!
Everyone stared, wide-eyed. This scene completely overturned their understanding of the world. No matter how powerful a dragon was, it was still a creature beneath the gods. How could it possibly compare to a god?
Even Ivo paused her work, looking up into the distance with a hint of worry on her face.
That was one of the main gods, an immortal being who controlled the laws of the world…
His mere appearance had turned night into day.
And Yueqing was just a newly adult dragon of six hundred years. At that age on Dragon Island, she would still be considered a hatchling in need of protection.
Space flickered, and the dragon appeared before the God of Light. The great battle was about to begin!
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