Eternal Emerald Dragon

Chapter 1195 - 1194 - Strange Corpse

Kora had a profound connection to her race memory, much like Tal. They had been granted new life thanks to Lind and Lord Skinwalker. The latter's Inheritance was a true memory made once more and Lind's interactions changed her and Tal's fates.

Thus, the race memory she could access was far greater than normal.

She had become a Crystal Tier as easy as breathing. It was like she had innately understood how to fight back thanks to the ancestral rocs that guided her.

Tal had put on a display of her impressive stone hide that seemed to become impervious to lightning until she faced the tribulations tied to her Laws and comprehension.

Even so, Kora had a plethora of knowledge most had lost during the Cataclysm and the Fiend War events.

Thus, when the Starlit Empire asked for experts to examine a mangled corpse from the 3rd layer, she was already intrigued. When she heard Lind had dismissed Annabelle's presence, she felt grim determination to find the truth.

What had happened to their kind husband? Had he been consumed by a heart demon at the end? Unlikely as Heaven would not allow such a being to ascend. It would simply wipe it out.

Possessed never advanced once the host was consumed.

There was also the fact that while his attitude was disturbing, it was not wild. It was logical and swift. It was also as if he had expected them to be observing as his actions were too swift.

The odds a Radiant Tier just happened to be near the barrier between layers was too insane to think it a coincidence.

The ship creaked around her as the timbers took the strain of the winds and elements outside. Her clear crystalline window revealed the fluffy white clouds in the blue sky was quite a view but she had become immune to it.

Her golden robes lined in black were more profound as they were made of her feathered body. Her eyes were just like the predator of the sky she truly was.

She swept her golden hair with some black streaks back from her face as a knock came on her cabin door.

"Mistress, we are arriving at the facility." A servant of the Clan helped man the ship and she sent her mental acknowledgement. She already knew as she could feel Annabelle and Cyntilla getting very close to her.

The view shifted as the ship began to dive but she felt nothing as the interior was well controlled by the gravity arrays. The clouds parted to reveal a small range of mountains with various structures built into them.

The mountains looked like a starfield from the sky even during the day. She was intrigued by it but the building she focused on was a single tower with a ring of buildings around it.

She could see beasts and some people working with them. She noted some large birds but they were not of a bloodline she could identify on site.

Some kind of eagle maybe?

She dismissed it as they were all Sky Realms. She moved up the ship to the bridge. The halls were more metallic in the interior as crystal veins glowed with power. The thrum of the power core could be felt even 4 decks up.

She knew the shipwrights were proud of their improvements to Lind's core designs but she still felt they lacked his skill in making a smooth ride. None of his ships rumbled no matter how much power was used.

She got up to the bridge in time for the landing and the exterior hatch was opened.

A demoness with virulent green eyes locked onto her before they embraced.

"Seems like a decade slipped away from us." Kora smirked at her words but she noticed the tension in her sister-wife's shoulders. Give her an army to fight or impossible odds and this demoness would never flinch, but Lind being cold to them was something beyond any of them understanding.

"Focus on what we can do." Kora's words seemed to calm her as they moved into the sunlight. The chaos of the open grounds was full of roars and baying. Kora could understand them perfectly but mostly it was just beasts being ornery.

They felt her presence and stilled. The sudden silence was not even acknowledged by the pair as they swept into the dark stone tower. It was made of the same stone as the mountains.

It had a little sparkle left in it but none of it was concentrated enough to make it look like a starfield during the day.

Supposedly at night it was next to impossible to tell the night sky from the tower.

Kora took it all in as she held Cyntilla's hand. The pair ascended until they came to an area with heavy guard. The soldiers saluted in their presence. They swept open the doors and an older human greeted them.

"Ah, Lady Kora, it has been a century since we last met, I believe." The Emperor Consort was a former servant of Lind. The man was also once a living legend it seemed but lost it all in the end. Still, he had risen once more and many were irked by it.

She, herself, found him very amusing. What was less amusing was what was splayed out behind him on a table.

It was several pieces of a black something and just looking at it made her bestial instincts scream at her to run.

She had never felt anything like it before!

"Ah, I see you are reacting the same as the dragons and phoenixes. I have someone here who had a different reaction though." Oz held out a hand to a young man that was a light figure. His hair was shimmering white and Kora felt like nothing could be hidden from his golden eyes.

"It is my great honor to meet you both." A young woman was in the corner but Kora smiled at her as pieces came together.

"You have been quite busy hiding from us, Son-in-Law." Her words actually made Cyntilla smirk as the young man began to sweat a bit. Oz cackled but the young girl blushed. "Jur, come here. I missed you!" The slim girl leapt into her arms and Kora felt wetness.

Lind's reaction was not what any of them hoped for but answers would have to wait.

"So, other beasts feel the need to run from this thing, even dead?" Oz nodded but then pointed at Bori.

The Soul Flame Phoenix boy looked grim as he pointed at the mangled corpse.

"That thing was never alive." His sentence drew all eyes to him as several experts were picking apart a limb that clearly a taloned fist while another was looking at wings. It was all signs of a beast but the boy said it was not.

"Explain please." Cyntilla prompted him but Kora held up her hand as her eyes glowed. She suppressed her revulsion as her race memory answered her call.

She looked at the 4 limbs, tail, and wings of the corpse. The head was either missing or too mangled to recover. Yet, she felt like it never had a head.

An image slowly formed and rage came from her bloodline.

She came back to the present and her fingers glowed. A shape was projected by her as she used her memory to manifest what she had seen.

It was hunched over and impossibly thin all over. It was built for efficiency in movement and killing. That was it. It had no other purpose.

The knowledge of what it was left her cold but confused.

"It is not a living thing at all. Young Bori is right. It is an organic weapon made by the Fiends. It is specifically made from withered corpse flesh." Nearly all the people holding a sample dropped it and backed off.

It was made from the remains of Fiends consuming people?!

Oz was frowning, however.

"You mean they need fresh corpses to make these things if they are destroyed on a regular basis?" Kora nodded but that was the source of her confusion. Theoretically, even if they prepared ahead of time, the numbers were limited. A few billion sounded large but after a million years, the things should all be dead.

"I think I know the answer to your confusion." Bori stepped up and chose 2 lumps of flesh. He used wind Qi to carefully move them away from the rest of the corpse before spiritual Qi appeared.

He carefully condensed a liquified form of it and let it fall on only 1 piece of flesh.

The reaction was instantaneous. The lump transformed quickly into a section of torso and the other lump, that had not taken the drop, was absorbed to increase its mass! The remaining pieces suddenly felt alive!

The flesh wriggled for a time until it went stone dead once more.

"It is a void of life. It is ready to absorb it at any time and consume it. Even a Radiant Tier could not resist it." A new voice spoke up and a very pregnant woman waddled in. Her gorgeous face looked grim at the newly dead corpse.

"So why isn't it absorbing when being touched?" Kora asked the obvious question as this feature was not in her race memory. It was Bori that answered.

"It is but taking through the flesh of a cultivator without resistance is impossible. It is only getting tiny threads I can see but it is insufficient to heal it. If it was whole and active, all of us would be totally unable to stop it." People backed off even more and Cyntilla dropped 2 formation plates to isolate the table further.

"Share such things sooner!" The harsh reprimand from the demoness seemed uncalled for to Kora. She figured out something that others had missed.

"Lind crushed it, barehanded, like it was a bug. How?" Bori pondered it but it was a much softer voice that answered.

"Papa's soul and harmony are one. The Qi that made this thing is destroyed just from touching it." Jur was red eyed but all nodded. The perfect predator was now faced with the worst kind of prey.

Poisoned beasts defended themselves but plants worked by being poisonous to potential predators! Lind was that way now. They wanted his soul but it would kill them stone dead!

The reason the beast could not heal was because its very foundation was destroyed!

Kora had some answers but that still left the more pressing for her and her family. If the soulless beast was the reason no Radiant Tier descended, then why was Lind so cold to them? Was it to protect them?

She doubted it. A heartfelt warning and explanation was his normal methods but this had been a simple cut off and departure.

"These beasts will try to invade when Radiants ascend. They will also likely try if they descend. We will need to address this. Some cannot wait." Oz was already moving on but the Frey Clan members were immobile. They still had no answers to the question burning in their hearts.

What happened to Lind Frey?