Eternal Emerald Dragon

Chapter 1724 - 1723 - Nightmare Looming

Karu was staring at Lind. He had just finished explaining what he had been able to do and the likely consequences.

The lower worlds would be safe from some time, centuries in fact, but only if the Divine Lands were not destroyed before then!

While she had lost a lot of the memories tied to her other timelines, a stark memory had come back to her. It was the closest they had come to actually defeating the Great One.

The worlds had all died but there was real hope of still avenging them. If they killed the Great One, the explosive power might birth new ones. It had been a final hope, yet she remembered.

The massive being of shadows and dark laughter.

He had been holding back! He had been holding back all that time and his true power dwarfed them all! As powerful as both of them had become, they were still only ants to him.

Now, Lind had cut off the support to the current iteration and she felt it again. That feeling of a being larger than they had grasped was no longer feeling restrained.

It grew in her as her terror and despair grew.

"Little Karu, are you all right?" Qing suddenly intruded and Karu snapped out of her sinking feeling. Her fox ears also perked up.

Her gentle eyes and kind face brought her comfort. She had met the woman several times yet the current version seemed so much brighter than the others. The loss of life had been much worse for them.

She knew at least a few where Shoti died horribly or was taken by the Fiends. Other variations were no longer as clear but those 2 had always been with him from the beginning.

They did not always survive to the Divine Realm and those versions of Lind always seemed empty of something important. He had been far more driven to kill the Great One too.

"I am not. Could we talk?" Qing smiled at her and took her back to the courtyard they shared with Lind. The peaceful place soothed her as they sat in the open garden at the center of it.

It was a place to meditate and focus on cultivation in nature if they wished. Her beastial instincts calmed as they sat in the slanted sunlight of the afternoon.

They sat comfortably in silence until she revealed to Qing what she had recalled. The woman was a fountain of strength.

"Do you think he will stop holding back?" There was no need to elaborate on who she was asking about.

Karu nodded.

"You all think the Fiends are bad, but they have been holding back to reach the best density of life force needed for his advancement. They may seem terrifying by their nature yet they are only the arms and legs of his path." Lind knew the truth but explaining to people that had never really seen the Great One unleash his full power, it was hard to grasp.

Master Tiers seemed like untouchable beings but they were just as much ants to the true force of the Fiends. They were not a united front nor were they able to fight as well as Lind.

Knowing the threat of the Harmonic Dragons and the 6 elementals if they were allowed to keep growing, the Great One could not afford to wait. If even a handful could reach the Master Tier, it would be a force directly able to fight him on par as Lind could!

That was something that had never happened before, she was sure.

Given that the security the Great one had relied on was now ripped away, no matter how bad the backlash might be, would want revenge on top of recovering any progress he lost.

The fact the other Fiends were not as strong as him did not matter as they too had been ordered to hold back. They were only ever allowed to take what was needed to sustain or advance.

Their numbers were regulated and calculated to perfection after epochs of warfare.

If they were allowed to unleash their full strength, the Divine Lands would suffer horrific losses even if they could kill some of them.

"I know you have faced them most of your life, but you have never seen them fight with nothing to lose. They are incredibly hard to kill if they burn their internal soul force inside them. They will rip souls from living beings and feed them to the Great One directly." She had seen the final days and that was exactly what they did.

They were revealed to be just tools and had no true free will.

It was all for the Great One in the end. All the planning and devastation in their wake served to only advance him.

Karu was speaking and it felt like she was living it again. The memories had become fainter but the end had been repeated so often she could never forget it. She had avoided looking ahead yet now it filled her mind.

A pair of arms grasped her tightly in a hug and Karu realized she was covered in cold sweat and was trembling.

"I have died so many times. You have no idea what it feels like before my Talent kicked in and sent me back. The soul recognizes a predator looking for it. We are heading to that end and Lind just lit a fire under him." Qing nodded but said nothing.

The silence was comforting and the pair simply sat there until Karu felt better.

She extricated herself and then stood up. Her 9 tails waved in rhythm to her steps. She began to move in more intricate ways and her blood stirred as power flowed into her meridians.

Her dantian Mysteries improved as she was close to finishing her Earth Layer. Lind had leap frogged past her yet she knew there were stark differences.

He had somehow condensed far more powerful Mysteries compared to what she could recall. Now, she felt the need to grow.

Power was what she needed so badly and for the first time, she wanted to do something a bit risky. She could recall the feeling of being so powerless. She had seen Lind struggle to save so many and fail.

He then would switch to vengeance and still fail. Death and worse than death over and over until it was all she could see anymore in the future.

She was so sick of it. She was tired of trailing behind and tired of only being an observer. The Talent was gone and now her ancestor had unlocked her bloodline in full.

[I am of the Earth.]

Her blood sang as Mystery energy surged like a tidal wave into her. She moved in a dance like sequence.

Rather than a violent surge of power, it was like she incorporated it all into her movements. Her flesh, dantian, and soul were improved as the new Mystery condensed.

All life called the surface home but she knew Divine bloodlines were different. They were blessed by Heaven but had to take root in the Earth.

She felt her connection to Heaven and Earth increase as the sky rumbled in joy.

The looming nightmare no longer felt like a scythe at her neck. The danger was not gone but she was no longer passive. She did not exist just to reset the timeline but to fight far more than ever before!

Her fur bristled with strength and her dantian became like a sun as something new was born. She had seen so many variations of harmonies thanks to Lind, yet she had never grasped one until the last few iterations.

It was pathetically weak but got her to ascend just enough to help him.

Now, a spark was born unlike anything she had felt before. Crimson gold flame grew and filled the core of her dantian.

It spread and fused with her 5 completed layers and took her to new heights of power. She suddenly understood all the lessons Lind had taught her over so many lifetimes. The elemental theory he had refined and perfected in the current timeline transformed her foundation in a dramatic fashion.

She smiled as she stopped dancing and opened her burnt orange eyes. Her fur now carried the tinge of crimson gold in the white.

The power thrumming in her body made her happy. She snapped out her fist and the air trembled! Her 9 tails instantly grew longer and enacted her most powerful Art.

Dance of the 9 Fates partially formed only to be scattered by an emerald wave. She looked to the entrance to find Lind staring at her in shock. She waved at him as Qing sat serenely on the stone bench.

"How–?" Words failed him that made her giggle but then she became serious.

She told him how his actions triggered her memories of the last days and he slowly nodded.

"I know. The Bastard will not sit idle anymore. He has been single minded on achieving his goal and cut his legs out from under him. He cannot rebuild in a short amount of time. I felt his pain and do not know how long it will take him to recover but I want to condense one more Mystery before taking the war to him." The goal sounded insane but she believed him.

The current Lind Frey was a vastly different person than the ones in her memory. She realized why she loved him at that moment and moved before deeper thought could stop her.

Her lips met his and she could sense his shock but she no longer cared.

Time was running out and she would no longer hold back.

"About time–" Qing's voice broke the spell of her heady feelings and she went wide eyed as she looked up into his emerald eyes. She then giggled and switched to full throated laughter.

Lind looked confused but then she pulled him down into a deeper kiss. He offered no resistance even though he vastly dwarfed her in strength.

"I am still in the room you two." Qing was smiling but Karu sighed as she pulled back.

"I am not holding back anymore. Live or die, I will be with you till the end." Her solemn words made both look at her seriously.

Lind then sighed and nodded. A new horizon was expanding but the danger did not grow less. A major shift was coming and they had to be strong enough to face it or they would be swallowed up by it once again.