Eternal Emerald Dragon

Chapter 1588 - 1587 - Nar Peninsula

Lind had left to clear his head after the annoying issue was dropped into his lap. While he wanted to rant and rave a bit, his emotions clearly did the work for him as despite being stronger than him, the 3 elders flinched at his power.

He was guided to a courtyard with a sprawling set of rooms surrounding it. The streaming sunlight was pleasant to his senses and he did not mind the demonic materials. The demonic Qi was as useful to him as any other.

The odd violet coloring was odd to him. He then noticed a flower bed and saw the vibrant colors he had been missing in the forest.

He saw lotus, blossom, and even a few roses mixed in an arrangement to please the eye and excite the Qi in the air. It was masterfully done and he appreciated the natural array.

In fact, aside from the palace and ruins he had walked through, the inclination seemed to lean towards them. While natural arrays were sometimes chanced upon in the wild, intentionally making them was exceedingly difficult.

Lind, as a weaver, never understood how to make them at all, but Annabelle had shown him her process when she grasped a few. Even as a Sovereign Tier, he had zero understanding of it!

Inscriptions or other more artificial methods he could deduce or follow enough, as he had with the spear to repair it, but he could not create them to save his life!

He found a bedroom decorated in pale blues but it did not contrast with the dark violet of the stone base. He also had forgotten how ornate cultivators could be after living with dragons for so long in the wild and beasts in the forest of the Under Lands before that.

He assumed a lotus position on the bed and began to simply meditate to clear his mind. It was too big.

Aside from that, he had been given some maps to study. They were not up to date but they were hardly to have changed in the broad strokes.

It was only then that he came to appreciate something. Haro had said the Wild Sea was far from any continent but he had not truly grasped what that meant until he had a map.

The distance between continents in the Divine Lands was bordering on ridiculous to the absurd. If it took centuries to get to where he had arrived from the mainland, it was hardly different from the rest of the world!

There were 3 main continents and a massive collection of smaller land masses. The smallest one would be large enough to house his entire origin mortal realm!

The term island was drastically different now!

He had been on a speck, a dust mote! He knew there had to be some like that but Haro confirmed such tiny places would be either dominated by a beast race or destroyed casually by some other beast race intentionally or not.

While he wanted to study it in detail, for the moment he was focused on the named Southern Continent. Instead of a proper name, it was given its direction based on the passage of the sun being east to west as well as the moons.

There was also the Eastern Continent that he was apparently supposed to arrive on but the Judgement Tribulation had not allowed it for some reason. The last great landmass was the Northern Continent but it had the least detail of the 3 .

For some reason the western area was the least land and it was spread out over small parts instead of a whole but it had a name of Western Lament for the entire grouping.

There was also an artificial place marked as somewhere between most of the continents but it had no name attached. Its location did not seem fixed either.

He pushed all his curiosity aside and focused on the western coast of the Southern Continent. There were several bulges and recesses with no uniform shape to it but a few sharp lines indicated the result of a battle between Divine Realm cultivators occurred there.

The most southern side on the western coast had a sudden protrusion that looked small compared to the rest of the landmass but Lind knew it would take him years to fly across it at the width!

The scale was just insane and it finally made sense why sects could not claim supremacy. It was just too much! There was no way to defend such massive tracts of area and it meant that rivalry only existed in areas rich with resources.

That same rich area, however, would draw all kinds of powers and thus the idea of classifying powers in the Divine Lands became rather moot. Either they existed, or they did not!

Factions, or alliances, were the true backbone of the higher echelons. He also now understood that those factions were not just members but organizations in and of themselves composed of mostly Divine Realm cultivators only.

Haro also confirmed that while some factions were stronger than others, it was generally measured by how many Master Tiers they had confirmed.

He noted that last word too, confirmed. That meant some factions were assumed to have more but held back or maybe they had less.

There was no real way to know when a Divine Realm fades, there was no corresponding public display. They were just gone.

He focused on his current target and the information he knew that was still relevant.

The Nar Peninsula was a rich area despite being so remote from more central regions. It also had harbors and trade ports all along both sides.

Fishing was a massive industry not just for food but for cultivation materials that were far harder to obtain inland.

The Glass Palace was located at a rather prominent place. It was the eastern side of the peninsula at the very tip that became like a serrated blade. The narrow inlets allowed natural protection from any beast below the Divine Realm and even from most of the Apprentice Tier.

It also allowed for the nurturing of many locations for rarer items to flourish like pearl koi or other rare species. The deep treasures still had to be hunted by boat or artifact but finding such rare species in easy reach made a natural place to settle.

The businesses merged until they became the Glass Palace and took total control of that section of coastline. Mercantile powers were a bit unique as they could be part of factions or they could be connected to many and thus became a bit untouchable.

Glass Palace fell in the latter category. Their monopoly on so many resources hard to find combined with some clever negotiations led to their rise.

Aside from the cultists and the Unbending Fate Faction, there were at least 3 other factions with direct contact to them and various free powers locally.

As Lind studied the peninsula and its layout, he could see why the kraken and leviathan races used it as their contact point. It was simply easier to find anything they needed and offer things to experts that would not be ignorant of what they had to offer.

Some auction houses or other powers might want something and find it valuable but not truly understand what they were getting and insult the owner that way.

The Glass Palace, for all its nefarious actions, did have those experts. After the demon fox tribes were betrayed, the kraken and leviathans broke off their contracts.

They still used others but they kept an inconsistent eye on the Glass Palace. The next expedition was not for a few decades but Lind would be escorted with Karu in a few years. First, she had to learn some skills from him to protect herself.

She will not have to worry about the pylons but a nine-tailed fox was a highly sought after beast no matter where they were.

The peninsula had once been a haven for them and a place they could negotiate as equals to any prospective offers. Lind was not surprised many simply wanted to take as that was a far too common point of view.

They were going to arrive at a place called Shadow Seal Cove. It was named aptly for the primary residents were a demonic seal race. The area was also famous for the pristine dark sandy beaches that swallow all light at night and let the Void Ocean truly blaze for all to enjoy.

Since it was a beast power controlling it, they had no issues but being a dragon would make him unwelcome.

Apparently several dragon clans enjoyed eating them for fun! He had never had seal meat in either life but he had heard some go on about in both. Still, he had no need for eating unless he wished to or it gave him some benefit anymore.

The fact he was a progenitor would mean nothing to them. Dragons were dragons but the protection of his current hosts would allow him passage at least. Lind foresaw issues leaving but he would deal with them then.

The local area had a few human, demon, and even an aether child run town. They were fairly mixed population wise but each town catered to their leadership alignment. It reduced competition in some sense but also fostered cooperation in the face of external enemies.

Still, the materials provided showed things were fairly direct in the Divine Lands. The strong would take what they could and the weak would ally together to hold on. It was far more vicious than the Celestial Fields he had risen in but he realized his experience was unique.

The Great Bastard essentially wiped the slate clean and forced a do or die situation on the entirety of their worlds.

While things were fairly harmonious at first, as time passed, he had experienced the greed and cruelty of those that lived in the restored areas and wanted more. Were the Divine Lands how his home would become?

It left him feeling sad but he was only 1 man. He could not change the world as he had before. He was nobody to the Divine Lands in general whereas before he was a mighty Immortal Dragon True Lord. He held sway for his acts against the Great Bastard and the benefits he had brought to the entire Celestial Fields.

While the leviathans confirmed he was known in some areas, he had to assume no one knew him anymore. A chagrined smile spread on his face as he recalled that was not quite right anymore.

He had made enemies that knew what he looked like and the cultists certainly knew being connected to the Fiends. So he was well known, just not the way anyone would want to be.

He was a target.