Volume 8, Chapter 31 – The World Dragon’s Lament

A dark, cold, seemingly endless underground space.

The air was filled with the smell of dampness that had been trapped for a long time and the lingering stench of rotting corpses. If an unprepared person were to step in here, they would surely vomit on the spot. This gloomy, oppressive place was a corner forgotten by the gods. The elements roamed here, disorderly and disobedient. Even the Sea of Thunderstorms was not as deathly silent as this.

But in such a world, there was the faint sound of wind. If one listened carefully, one could even make out a sound like some kind of language.

Near the center of the underground space, close to the ceiling, a ‘dragon’ nearly ten meters long and glowing with a faint green light was circling in the air. And below this soul-body was a decaying corpse bound by countless blue chains, illuminated by the green light.

The World Dragon, a monster from the Age of the Gods that had once foolishly challenged the gods and was sealed by the angels with the water element.

If one were to ask for this dragon’s name, even the dragon itself could not remember it. The long passage of time had made it forget most of the things it had experienced. What remained was a trace of hatred, a trace of regret, and a craving for freedom and a yearning for life.

“Finally… is this day finally coming?”

Circling above what was once its own rotting corpse, the World Dragon, now a soul-body, let out a sigh. Ever since it was sealed by the angels for challenging the gods, it had remained in this sunless corner.

At the beginning of its sealing, it had arrogantly tried to break free from the barrier’s constraints, but it soon discovered that it was futile. No matter how hard it tried, with its current strength, it could not shake the barrier in the slightest. It often fantasized that if it could retrieve its scattered body, such a weak seal would be no match for it. Unfortunately, its body had been divided into several pieces and buried in the corners of the world long before it was sealed. Now, it didn’t even have one-fifth of its former power.

If even its head was so weak, the other parts of its body—except for the heart—would be even worse. After countless failed escape attempts and a period of time so long it almost lost its sense of self, it finally understood the fact of its utter helplessness.

Then, the powerless it began to hate the Goddess, vowing to trample the Goddess and the angels underfoot after it got out. But it couldn’t get out, no matter what. No matter how it cursed the Goddess and the angels, it was still bound by those cold iron chains that held immense magical power. So, driven to the brink of madness by loneliness and boredom, it began to beg the Goddess. As long as she could let it out, it wouldn’t mind being her beast of burden.

The end was still tragic. In the face of what could be called the strongest seal on the continent, even the Goddess could not hear its pleas. In the end, it became what it was now, its body gradually decaying without the protection of magic power, its consciousness leaving its body to become a fragmented soul, able only to watch helplessly as its corpse disintegrated.

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However, the decay of its body actually made the World Dragon ecstatic. After its soul left its body, it discovered that it could actually roam this dark hall in its soul-form. Although if ten thousand people were to come to this sealed place, all ten thousand would say there was nothing here, the World Dragon would not. When it was bound by the iron chains, it couldn’t even turn its head. Every day it opened its eyes, it could only see the unchanging dark wall. But now, it could press itself against the edge of the wall and count the mottled patterns on it. Occasionally, it could even risk the dissipation of its soul to study the magic characters inscribed on the walls. This novelty was its precious treasure. To prevent the fun from disappearing too quickly by looking too fast, it even set a rule for itself: it could only move a tiny, tiny step along the wall each day, and would absolutely not touch any more, so as not to let the joy disappear.

However, even so, the day finally came when all the joy had been savored. After thoroughly exploring the entire underground space, the World Dragon once again fell into boredom. It began to yearn for the sky and the sea, which were already vague in its memory.

After another period of time, it began to place its hopes on the little bugs it had once looked down upon. The World Dragon vaguely remembered that before it was sealed, many creatures whose species it couldn’t name had appeared on the continent. They knew how to create tools and could use magic. If those bugs were still alive and had accidentally found this seal and opened it from the outside, then it would have a chance to be free.

So the World Dragon used the residual magic in its decaying corpse to connect with the ley lines, and through this, it could faintly sense the magic-wielding creatures that existed in the distant land—those insignificant bugs had built cities.

As if grasping at a life-saving straw, the World Dragon was joyful for a whole month. It began to look forward to this day with great anticipation. To let the existence called fate hear its desire, it even made a promise: as long as someone could let it out, no matter who they were, it would serve them forever.

And fate seemed to have really heard its prayer. At the moment it made the promise to the distant land in its soul-form, a slight tremor suddenly appeared in the barrier that sealed it. The World Dragon was certain that this was by no means the barrier collapsing on its own due to the passage of time. It had long since discovered that as long as it was not disturbed by external forces, the internal circulation formed by the barrier could be maintained forever. And taking advantage of the loosening of the barrier, the World Dragon—or more accurately, the soul formed by the World Dragon’s head—tried to squeeze out from the loosened part.

Then it failed.

This was a matter of course. The barrier had only loosened a little. To make an analogy, it was like a hole in a huge granary that was only big enough for a little finger to be inserted. Although such an existence would have endless future troubles, it would not cause too much of a problem in the short term. The World Dragon’s current strength was too weak to break through even a damaged barrier.

However, for the almost desperate World Dragon, this was undoubtedly a piece of news as explosive as the Big Bang. It stayed in the seal, full of anticipation, hoping that the people outside would continue to destroy the seal. That way, it would have a chance to get out. Even being a beast of burden for an insignificant creature like a bug was better than staying in this sunless place.

It began to drive the residual magic in its corpse at all costs. Although the World Dragon could connect with the ley lines and sense the magical bodies of the outside world, the price was the consumption of the residual magic in its broken body. In the past, it had been reluctant to do so, because once the magic in its corpse was exhausted, the corpse would disintegrate, and it, existing as a soul-body, might completely perish along with it.

Of course, this was not the most terrifying thing. The most terrifying thing was that it would completely lose the ability to perceive the outside world. In this silent place, being cut off from the world was more terrifying than death. If it did not disappear with its corpse but lived forever, it simply could not imagine what kind of torture that would be.

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And now, as long as it could get out, it was enough.

In the process of perceiving the outside world at all costs, the World Dragon soon discovered that there were indeed people trying to destroy the barrier. This discovery made it overjoyed. It praised them in its heart every day. Even though it didn’t know the name of the person destroying the barrier, it offered a hymn of blessing to them from the bottom of its heart. However, probably because the World Dragon had once offended the gods, its blessings could only have the opposite effect. Not long after it offered its blessing, the person destroying the barrier soon disappeared. In their place, a terrifying monster appeared in the distant city.

It might be inappropriate for a monster like the World Dragon to call a human a monster, but the World Dragon could guarantee on its dragon’s honor that, apart from the Tower of Alexia, it had never seen such a powerful existence. Even when the gods had stood before it, it had not felt such immense magical power. If such an existence were to appear in front of it, a single careless word could get it killed.

Even at its peak, it would not be able to compete with such an existence. The dazzling magic power, like the sun, covered more than half the city, almost blinding its eyes. Since then, in order to save its own life, for its future freedom, the World Dragon no longer dared to extend its investigation to the city area, and instead only searched the area near the mountains. Then, in the last few days, it had discovered that right at the entrance of this sealing barrier, three bugs were investigating and trying to break the seal. This made it ecstatic, but at the same time, it couldn’t help but worry.

The ecstasy was naturally because of the freedom it was about to obtain. The worry was the fear of that incomparably powerful magical body. Who could say that the other party was not one of the angels who had sealed it in the past, or even a god itself? The reason that incomparably powerful magical body had come at the moment it was about to be free was very likely because she had discovered the loosening of the barrier and had come to investigate. If she saw it escape from the seal, she would probably kill it with a single slap before it could even beg for mercy.

Therefore, the World Dragon desperately hoped that the three bugs outside would slow down and let it out after the god had left. Unfortunately, the will of the bugs did not shift with the will of the great dragon. The barrier was still being broken. Finally, the day came when it was discovered by the god.

“Ah, don’t come here! I’m already dead. I just want to see the sky outside. My lord god, I was wrong. Please let me go!!!”

Feeling the violent magic raging in the sky outside, the World Dragon’s soul-body let out a wail and closed its eyes in pain.

It had never imagined that on the eve of gaining its freedom, it would be met with divine punishment.

…

Watching the dark clouds being driven away and scattered by the [Instantaneous Tempest], Yisi nodded in satisfaction.

“Hmph, even the power of a barrier can’t be so strong as to withstand even a twentieth-tier magic,” the sunlight that broke through the dark clouds shone into her eyes, and Yisi couldn’t help but shield her forehead with her hand. “It feels so good to see the sun after so long.”

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Except for the fact that she was drenched from the rain, which annoyed her.

If Camilla were here, she could immediately use the ‘Drying’ spell from her life magic to dry her clothes. Unfortunately, it was too dangerous here, so she hadn’t brought Camilla out.

“Thinking about these things will only add to my worries. I should first see where the problem is.”

Pushing aside the wet feeling on her skin, Yisi shook her silver twin tails, which were tipped with blue, trying to shake off some of the water. Then she rested her fist on her chin in thought.

“According to Cynthia, the sealing barrier was loosened because it was struck by the World Dragon. And because the barrier is composed of the water element, the internal magic power leaked out from the loosened barrier, which is why the heavy rain formed. The solutions are to either repair the damaged part of the barrier with magical knowledge or to forcibly fill the barrier with pure and immense magic power. But no matter which method, if I can’t find the damaged part, it’s all just talk…”

Pondering such things, Yisi, hovering in mid-air, first glanced at the ground, then looked at the [Omniscient Map].

“Whoa, I didn’t notice before. It’s actually this complicated here.”

Putting aside the undulating terrain of the mountains, under the mountain range, layer upon layer of dazzling magic formations were outlined on the [Omniscient Map]. These magic formations were all part of the sealing barrier. From Yisi’s perspective, they looked like a ball of yarn that had just been played with by a kitten. If it were just that, as long as she patiently started from the beginning, she could eventually untangle it. But each small knot of these balls of yarn was composed of many smaller magic formations. In other words, countless palm-sized magic formations were combined together to form a section of a medium-sized magic formation. And the lines formed by countless medium-sized magic formations merged to form the largest magic barrier. Finally, these largest magic barriers were combined together to form a work of art. This work of art was this sealing barrier.

From a purely artistic point of view, Yisi’s heart was filled with admiration and reverence. To be able to outline such a magic formation under more than half of the mountain range, it must have been created through the joint efforts of countless people, plus a sufficiently clever design, to create a barrier where the magic formations did not conflict with each other, and the whole was incomparably vast. In Earth, it would definitely rank among the wonders of the world.

Then, a wry smile appeared on Yisi’s face.

“But from the perspective of an interpreter, this complex structure is definitely a disaster…”

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With just one glance, Yisi knew that she definitely couldn’t do it.

This had already surpassed the limit of what could be accomplished with hard work. It was a problem that she could never solve, no matter what she did.

“No wonder those court magic chanters couldn’t repair such a barrier. Even without the gap between their civilization and that of the Age of the Gods, it would be impossible to decipher it without a few hundred years.”

At this, Yisi suddenly remembered what Cynthia had said, about using immense magic power to forcibly infuse the barrier like a patch to fill the holes.

Yisi couldn’t help but look at the display on the [Omniscient Map] again, then swallowed.

“I didn’t think it was a problem at the time, but thinking about it now, the method of filling it with magic power is simply preposterous…”

With such a complex and vast structure, not to mention that even if she were to be drained dry, she might not have enough magic power to fill the magic formation, first of all, she didn’t even know where the loosening had occurred. If she were to inspect those palm-sized magic formations one by one, she probably wouldn’t find the problem area until she died of old age.

“What are those court mages thinking? Have they found the location of the hole? And even if they have, what method do they plan to use to gather the magic power needed to fill the barrier? It’s impossible for an ordinary person to do…”

Yisi couldn’t help but frown and fall into deep thought.

Then she quickly came to her senses.

Because the [Instantaneous Tempest] had made the dark clouds that had covered the sky for nearly a month disappear, the countless soldiers stationed in the Dragon’s Spine Mountains all turned their gazes to the sky. Some people were even pointing in Yisi’s direction and shouting something. “It’s going to get bad if I stay here any longer. No matter what, I’ll go down and take a look first.”