novelraw Chapter 273 273: The Masters [2]
Chapter 273 273: The Masters [2]
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"Um...? Melisa?"
Selene slowly opened her eyes and found herself completely alone in the middle of a dense rainforest. Mist hung everywhere, making the entire place difficult to navigate, and confusion clouded her mind.
Since Louis had recruited her, there had not been a single day when she had been completely alone. Melisa had never left her side, and Selene had always felt happy to be with her friend, whom she loved more than anything.
Yet out of nowhere they had suddenly been separated, and she could not help but yelp like a sad little doggy that had been abandoned. She looked around with trembling lips and felt a little scared.
"Where am I?"
She climbed the biggest tree she could find and looked around, amazed by the vast, nearly endless forest stretching before her eyes.
"Woooow! What is this?!"
She was amazed, but she soon realized she was utterly lost, completely in the middle of a place she had never been to before.
"Hmm..."
She recalled that the Dragon King had sent her here with the mission of growing stronger by meeting the strongest being.
"Who is the strongest being?"
She was still wondering when something began to approach her, smashing the tree she had climbed and forcing her to leap away.
"W-Wha...! Who is it?!"
She landed on the floor and glanced at the giant figure approaching: a massive golden fox exuding vast divinity.
"Grrrr..."
She became wary, baring her teeth as she transformed into her werewolf-like berserk form, ready for battle.
"Be at ease, child."
"...?"
Slowly Selene calmed down as she noticed the giant fox also had some scales on its body and dragon-like horns.
It was not completely a fox, so who could it be?
"Who are you?"
Despite how sudden everything felt, little Selene could sense a connection with this being, which made her rather calm and soothed.
"My name is Akihiro. I am one of the sons of the Dragon King and the Dream-Seeking Fox Demon Venerable."
"Eh?!"
Selene was shocked. This giant dragon fox was actually the son of the Dragon King and... a Venerable? One she had never heard about.
The fox guided Selene toward a large settlement, a massive tribe full of beast people just like her! There were even those with skull-like heads, leaving her shocked.
"We, of the Beast Clan, welcome you to our continent, Vanaheim."
"Ooohhh! I-I had no idea... more people like me! Skull heads too?"
"Those 'Skull Heads' are children of Fenrir the Death Nightmare Wolf God. Their heads resemble skulls because they are Death-Touched."
"S-So I am a descendant of Fenrir?!"
"Perhaps. We will find out more once you meet my mother. We will train you together."
"Mother? Oh, the Venerable?"
"Indeed. My mother, the Dream-Seeking Fox Demon Venerable, is one of the Dragon King's beloved consorts. She had me roughly thirty thousand years ago. Since then I have been overseeing Vanaheim, her homeland, in her stead, and I visit her realm occasionally. Come, she is waiting for us. Despite you never knowing, you have a potent affinity with our Element."
"What Element?"
Suddenly the dragon fox's eyes gleamed purple and pink, generating a portal forged from dreams into a completely different parallel plane of reality.
As they entered, Selene saw countless images, forms, worlds, realms, and more intermixing in an endless sea of pink clouds and black stars.
"Dreams and Nightmares."
Selene gazed at a vast purple and pink palace built from dream and nightmare crystals, surrounded by a dream spirit forest.
As she walked inside, she saw dozens of beautiful fox spirits of pink and golden color roaming the place. Some greeted her while others ran away and hid behind trees made of pink crystals, watching from afar.
Until finally they walked into the vast palace, where Selene and Akihiro were greeted by a beautiful and gigantic pink fox with nine long tails and sharp golden eyes.
She was utterly massive, the same size as the dragons, and Selene noticed she also had some pink scales, iridescent and crystalline. She was kind of a dragon as well.
"H-Hi..."
Selene swallowed hard as she gazed at the pair of sharp golden eyes staring down at her, but then the giant fox queen smiled.
"Welcome to my Realm, my child. My dear son must have already introduced me to you, but I will tell you my name," she said. "Although I once bore the name of 'Belle,' I decided to give it to my first daughter and took upon a new name. I am Tamamo-no-Mae, the Dream-Seeking Fox Demon Venerable."
"T-Tamamo..."
"My dear husband must have told you about this training, yes?" Tamamo asked with a kind smile. "We will begin immediately by letting you join us, the Dream Dragons."
"Eh? Join?" Selene asked.
Tamamo served Selene a cup full of her red blood and asked her to drink it.
"Your first trial is drinking my blood and assimilating my bloodline. Thus you will be able to evolve into a Dream Dragon."
Selene seemed hesitant, so Akihiro decided to explain a few things to ease her mind, noticing his mother was, as always, quite rash with children.
"In Ancient Times, Dream Dragons did not exist until recently. Did you know?" he asked with a kind smile, sitting beside her. "It was thanks to the Dragon King reviving my mother in a new body using his own dragon powers that she was reborn as a Dream Dragon. So far there are only a couple of members in our species. Only the strongest and most brave warriors, and the most compatible within our Beast Nation, receive such a gift. We are all characterized by our hybrid beast-like appearances. Most inherit a fox dragon appearance."
"I see..." Selene nodded. Learning more about this family made it easier for her to accept them. "So you are fox dragons!"
"It could be said so, though Dream Dragon is the true name," said Tamamo. "You possess incredible potential, and as a Spiralwalker, if you become part of my family you will awaken incredible strength. However, it will be painful. Are you ready for that?"
"..."
"If you do not want to, that is fine too," said Akihiro. "Mom, we do not have to force her. Why not wait until she is stronger?"
"I am not weak!"
Selene became a little angry and drank the blood until she completely emptied the cup.
"Guh... Guaaaah?!"
BOOOM!
And then her body exploded into pink clouds until a giant silhouette emerged.
She resembled a fusion between Tamamo and her own werewolf appearance, larger, more intimidating, with larger arms and musculature.
She looked quite feral, but the fox-like traits manifested too: three long fluffy tails, a fox-like head with pointy ears, and golden-brown fur alongside pink scales.
"Ooohh?"
Selene was amazed. She sat down and admired her new appearance in awe. She was now big, easily reaching thirty meters in height.
And above all she had awakened her Element of Dreams and Nightmares, exuding them from her body at incredible levels of power.
"Waow..."
"Good girl," Tamamo said as she petted her and kissed her cute head. "Now, shall we begin? Let us move to the Dream Fields! There are plenty of beasts to catch! We will begin by stretching our legs! Later you will forge a Dream Heart and a Nightmare Heart, summon your first Dream Spirits, Dream Weapons, and so on, and much more! We have twenty years, so let us make them worth it!"
Selene happily followed Tamamo as they walked through another portal, landing on an endless and beautiful garden of flowers where strange Dream Beasts roamed.
Her mouth was wide open as she drooled, feeling the desire to hunt, and she rushed toward the beasts, beginning her training eagerly.
♢♢♢♢
Melisa found herself high in the heavens of Yggdrasil, looking around while flying curiously. Unlike most of the others, she had not fallen unconscious through her teleportation to this area, though she felt confused.
In this vast heaven there were only floating islands everywhere as far as the eye could see, and right below her an endless sea of white and golden clouds. The sun radiated beautifully above, illuminating this vast heaven and leaving a holy and divine impression on her.
But even then the girl was rather confused about what she was supposed to do here. The vast sky was beautiful, however, and it made her open her mouth wide in awe as she traveled.
"Where am I though? The sky? This world is so big... it will take me ages to get anywhere... And I wonder if Selene will be alright?"
As she wondered that, she saw something in the vast cloud sky: a large vortex, a tornado, a storm, leading somewhere.
No, rather, there were many of these.
They all exuded wind and light elemental energies, creating immense vortexes leading to different places.
As she traveled, she saw someone flying in the sky.
It was a giant creature resembling a serpent with wings, its size over several kilometers.
It flew through the clouds and into one of the vortexes, letting the winds carry it elsewhere.
"So that is how you travel quickly to certain areas?"
Smiling, she flew further there, but was quickly ambushed, unfortunately.
From the floating islands around her, dozens of figures emerged: giant green-colored wyverns and birds hissing and furiously attacking her.
They all wielded Light or Wind Magic, unleashing catastrophic storms of destructive beams of sunlight capable of easily leveling cities on Earth.
They exuded Divine Power. These creatures that were as common as animals in Yggdrasil were fearful Divine Beasts!
"Yggdrasil is really on another level! Eek!"
Melisa flew with her four feathered wings with incredible skill, avoiding direct damage while using the power of her Spiral and her Incarnation to fight and defend.
Her Spiral of Hope was currently at Tier 4, pretty strong, allowing her to exert and manipulate vast quantities of Fantasium.
After having stabilized it into a Spiral of Fate, her power had more than tripled as well, and her Incarnations, Cherubin and Angel, floated around her, defending her from all attacks.
The little Cherubin, made of white porcelain, fired arrows everywhere, while the Angel, wearing armor and holding a lance, eliminated foes mightily.
In a matter of minutes the flock of hundreds of Divine Beasts fell to their demise, and Melisa let her Soul-Bound Weapon, the Golden Scepter of Light, absorb their Divine Cores and corpses, growing stronger.
This power coursed back into her body, enhancing her growth and allowing her to develop a Divinity of Holy Light and another of Hope in seconds, making her gasp due to the sudden power boost from something so simple.
"Wow, Yggdrasil is truly amazing!"
As she gazed around, feeling her Divinities growing by the second, she felt something, a tingling sensation. Her Divinity of Hope guided her somewhere, connected to her Spiral of Hope. She knew her path was there.
She took the vortex leading to the northwest area of the sea of clouds, and as she traveled through the sky and felt rather liberated despite being lost, she suddenly fell into a giant floating island.
"Gyaaaaahhh!"
As she panicked, thinking she was going to get really hurt, a large figure emerged, flying toward her and catching her with his two hands.
"Woah?!"
As she gasped for air, she realized she was sitting on a giant hand covered with golden scales, resembling the raptorial legs of a falcon, but it was a hand.
With sharp black nails and four fingers, it was gigantic, easily fitting her on top of it and perhaps a whole street.
"W-What... Who are you?"
She looked up, realizing a giant humanoid bird-like creature was carrying her gently. He smiled at her, showing his face which was very bird-like, with a sharp and long golden beak and sharper green-gold eyes.
He was covered in beautiful green, white, yellow, blue, and red feathers, and had six enormous feathered wings on his back alongside a long feather-covered serpentine tail.
"Name's Emerald. I am the King of the Wind Dragons! Nice to meet you, little one. You must be Melisa, right?"
"Ahhh! A-A Dragon King!"
"Hahaha, indeed. I was about to go look for you. My bad. I think Drake got the wrong coordinates and sent you to a completely different place. You must have felt lost. I am sorry."
"O-Oh!" Melisa was shocked about how polite and kind such an almighty being was. "It is nothing, Your Highness... Thank you for saving me."
The almighty Wind Dragon King nodded, quickly spreading his wings and flying at lightning speed, leaving thunder and winds behind him.
Melisa noticed his features and a large pair of golden horns growing from his head, and a crown made of divinity of green and gold above his head.
All Dragon Kings had their own crowns above their heads, which were also a source of great power, a manifestation of their Ascendancy Laws.
"Where are we going?"
"To my mother's palace. There is also a visitor there."
"Eh?"
Melisa saw the vast floating island, its jungles and the many dragons living here, which all resembled Emerald a little, though they had their own distinct features such as longer beaks, more serpentine appearances, more wings, or less wings. Some did not even have arms, being very bird-like. But despite their mixed appearances, they were all incredibly powerful Divine Wind Dragons.
Emerald descended and landed in a vast temple of stone and vines, where many wind dragons gathered in large flocks, playing, laughing, and so on. They greeted her with curious eyes, but Emerald made sure they would not touch her because she was small and scared.
Once inside the temple she met not one but two enormous figures, tall, powerful, and gigantic dragons that commanded not one but two families.
"This is my mother, the Primordial Dragon Mother of Wind Dragons, Alf," Emerald said.
"Hello, my young one. It is nice to see you. Drake has spoken to me about your potential and has sent you here for me to teach you the ways of the Wind alongside my children," she said with a gentle voice.
She was unlike her children, resembling a giant feathered serpent. She still had legs, though: four mighty legs. But her long body, serpent-like face, and colorful rainbow feathers spread across her body and decorating her chest and neck made her look completely different.
She had a huge pair of colorful wings right above her shoulders, and her eyes shone with golden brilliance. She had a beak too, a mighty and sharp one, resembling a hybrid between a bird and a snake. She looked stunning in her own right and was majestic too. Her size surpassed hundreds of meters as she walked out of the gigantic ruins.
Beside her also stood a tall and gigantic golden dragon, more typical in appearance to what one would associate with a dragon: four legs, two wings, and so on, covered in glistening golden scales and possessing sharp blue-gold eyes glistening like stars.
"And I am Asga, the Primordial Dragon Mother of the Light Dragons," she spoke kindly. "Our beloved husband had told us about you... Drake seems to have invested a lot into your growth. Seeing the peril that awaits us, we must do our best to help you grow into a powerful child, one inheriting our bloodlines, no less."
"M-Me?!" Melisa panicked. "Um... wait, did you say husband? A-Are you... with the Dragon King?"
"Drake took a lot of consorts over his life..." Emerald laughed. "It is mostly due to his position as Dragon King. He has... uh, well..."
"Duties imposed on him by Tiamat," said Alf with a gentle smile. "He ended up taking all of us primordial mothers as his consorts so we could birth more children of each of our families, thus increasing the population of dragons, which was greatly in decline before. That is his duty..."
"Beyond duty, however, he is a loving man, and we always love to see him," Asga said with enamored eyes. "When he asked us for this favor, after we had not seen him in a couple of hundred years, we agreed immediately."
"Drake has saved Yggdrasil and worked tirelessly to maintain it and help it grow into the beautiful world it has become now... we are forever indebted to our beloved husband, and we love him dearly," Alf said with a kind smile. "Like he once adopted my son Emerald and helped him grow, we shall repay the favor and adopt you into our two families."
"E-Eh? Eeeeh?!" Melisa cried in disbelief after she started to realize what was happening. "N-No way..."
"For now, drink this," said Alf.
"Our blood," Asga continued.
Both primordial mothers offered Melisa large cups full of their blood, which she had to drink hesitatingly, closing her eyes and chugging them down.
"Eugh, my tummy hurts—Ugh?!"
FLAAASH!
And as they thought, she was incredibly compatible with the blood. Melisa absorbed the Wind Dragon and Light Dragon bloodlines, and through her amazing Spiral of Hope, her Affinity with Light, and her awakened affinity with Wind, she combined them both.
RUMBLE!
The little girl suddenly transformed into a giant yet beautiful thirty-meter-tall dragon, a majestic Wind and Light Dragon hybrid, with a slender serpent-like body, fluffy white and gold feathers covering her entire body, and a tiny golden beak, with glistening emerald-gold eyes.
She had three pairs of wings, and once she realized what had happened she screamed in disbelief. Melisa had gone through her evolution before, but her transformation had been into just a little angelic spirit, so she had never truly taken a monstrous form as she evolved her monster form.
Until now!
"No way! I am huge...! Wooaaaah! I think I am going to puke..."
"Hahahah, calm down," Emerald said, patting her back. "It will be alright. We have a lot to teach you."
"It is wonderful. The fusion went well," said Alf.
"I told you so!" Asga nodded. "Alright then, Melisa. Let us begin with... are you okay?"
"Guueeeehh..."
At the end, Melisa's first impression of the dragons was terrible after she ended up puking on the floor and passing out.
Feeling terrible about what they had done, the primordial mothers and Emerald made sure to help her rest and healed her until she woke up feeling better.
It was only after a week of resting and acclimating to her new environment and form that she began training her Wind and Light Powers and learning much more from her new masters.
♢♢♢♢
Louis looked at the portals closing one after another after the different members of House Frostbane were teleported away. He felt slightly worried about them, but he knew they would be in good hands from now on.
"Alright, I have sent them all to their destinations," said the Dragon King with a nod. "They will be trained by those I have hand-picked specifically to help them evolve and improve their specializations. Some of them may return as dragons too."
"I see. I guess you are not missing the chance to add them to the dragon family, huh?" Louis laughed.
"Spiralwalkers like them are incredibly valuable. I am sorry if it sounded a little underhanded. Becoming dragons will surely make them stronger," said Drake. "And... well, as Spiralwalkers that will become Dragons, the Draconic Records will also improve dramatically."
"Draconic Records... I have heard about that but I never accessed it," said Louis. "Is there a problem with me? Even though I have now evolved into a dragon and everything... I still am incapable of going there..."
"Hmmm, there might be a problem with you indeed," said the Dragon King, analyzing Louis.
"What are the Draconic Records?" Mirai wondered.
She and Catrise had stayed behind as their training would be done mostly in Drakeheart Kingdom alongside Louis. Catrise's training partner would be Benladra and Belladaan, and as for Mirai, she would learn from Belladaan, Miranda, and Drake. Louis was going to learn from everyone here.
"The Draconic Records are a special Spiritual Realm where all Dragon Souls are connected," Belladaan explained instead of the Dragon King, stealing his spotlight. "All Dragons can access this Realm of their specific families and then they can either enter physically and rest, form their own territories, farm Spiritual, Divine, and Soul Treasures, hunt beasts, and so on."
"It is our very own Realm, and before I revived the Primordial Mothers, a lot of the dragons that had died went there. You could say it is like their heaven," said the Dragon King. "It was created from the Soul of Tiamat, the Primordial Dragon Mother of All Dragons. And it has grown over the years... It is still an important place for every dragon to strengthen their foundation, divinity, and soul."
"Wow, Dragons sure have a lot of privileges..." said Mirai in disbelief.
"You will be joining their numbers soon, my dear," said Belladaan. "Here, I have prepared for you my blood. If you drink it, you will be able to gain the Chaos Dragon Bloodline, the most compatible for you."
"Really?!" Mirai was shocked, but she nodded, grabbing the cup and drinking the blood instantly. "Phew... that blood tasted... uh? Guh? I feel kind of weird... Heheh—Ah! Aaaaahhhh!"
"Did you drink it so quickly?!" Louis panicked as he saw Mirai screaming and then...
Nothing.
"Ah, I am fine!" Mirai giggled. "Did I scare you? Hahahaha!"
"..."
Louis's eyebrows twitched as he sighed, laughing and petting her head.
"I guess the blood did not work..."
"No, it did."
"Huh?"
Mirai suddenly grew black and dark purple scales around her body, then a pair of long black horns and even a third, menacing red-purple eye.
A long dragon tail and dragon wings also sprouted from her body.
"I think I can turn into a big dragon as well," she said, rubbing her chin.
"Incredible. Unlike others, she assimilated the bloodline so seamlessly?" the Dragon King wondered.
"Naturally, as the daughter of Pandemonium and Chaos, the power of the Chaos Dragon, Ragnarok, originally belongs to her," Belladaan said with a proud smile, nodding. "Yeah, I think I can train this girl well! Miranda, you will also help. Call Drakda once he recovers his power fully."
"I suppose we will be training her, yeah. She has a lot of potential... infinite, I would say. The power of Pandemonium AND Chaos in a single person? And she is also a Spiralwalker! She has as much infinite potential as her young husband," laughed Miranda, her demon tail wagging in excitement.
"As for Catrise, I will be training you myself, my dear," said Benladra. "I will also train my son too, but we will do it in intervals of every one month, alright? Or perhaps every one year, we will see. Catrise should be capable of awakening as an Ice Titan too. Mother, you will help her?"
"Sure thing, dear," Belladaan nodded. "Ah right, Louis! I suppose we have not talked much with you... welcome to the family and all that! Anyway, since you are finally here we will also get to get along and know each other better, hm? Are you excited to finally meet your grandma?"
"I am very happy, yes," Louis nodded with a gentle smile. "I am looking forward to our time together, grandmother Belladaan."
"Aw, come on now, relax! You do not have to be so formal..." sighed Belladaan. "Ugh, Benladra! Why did you raise your son like this?"
"I-I... well, it is just the human manners and such..." muttered Benladra.
"I apologize. It is mostly my fault," sighed Gustaf. "I was a little strict on his growth so he could be a well-mannered young man..."
"Hey, there is no problem in his way of speaking, Belladaan. Leave the boy alone," sighed the Dragon King. "Anyway, Louis, you are coming with me for now! Your brides will remain here for now and learn from my wives."
"Brides?! I am still not married to Mirai and Catrise and I aren't—"
"Yeah, sure, whatever! Come with me!" the Dragon King laughed, grabbing Louis and throwing him through space itself.
Space and dimensional membranes shattered as Louis was launched across Yggdrasil, his eyes widening as his entire body pierced the sound barrier.
"W-What the...?!"
He immediately panicked, turning into his dragon form and crashing into another continent entirely after crossing the immensely vast sea in seconds.
BOOOMMM!!!
Louis crashed through a mountain and then another and another, landing in a massive, country-sized volcano as he drowned in the burning hot magma.
"Uuuggh?!"
SPLASH!
However, he quickly crawled out, flying out with his large wings and landing on the surface, coughing lava everywhere.
He was fine though, just shocked.
A large figure loomed above him as he saw his grandfather in his true dragon form, gigantic but not terribly big. He had reduced his size to match Louis's dragon form.
Both were roughly fifty kilometers large, and yet in the immensely vast lands of Yggdrasil that was not even that big.
"You damn old man, what the hell was that?!" Louis asked furiously, growling.
"Hahaha! Your grandad likes playing rough, son!" the Dragon King laughed. "First lesson, do not lower your guard."
"Hah?! Do you want to fight?" Louis stood up, acting rebellious against his grandfather. "I do not fear you."
"Hoh?" the Dragon King raised an eyebrow. "Now that is precious. Yes indeed, we will fight. This is part of your training. Until your mother and your grandmother are not busy anymore, we will be fighting and exploring all of your abilities. I will teach you all my fighting techniques, cultivation methods, magic, and more. And I will beat it into your body."
"Do you have a grudge against me?" Louis asked.
"I am well aware of the treatment you gave to your cousins over on Earth! Dralma, Amekda, and Yukdra—two of them which are my children and another that is my granddaughter," said the Dragon King. "I have been lenient to you because of what you have gone through, but what you did to them is wrong."
"..."
"I am fine with forgiving you. I already did. But that does not mean I will not ingrain into your skull what it means to be a good person. You get me, Louis?" asked the Dragon King. "You are good, but there are certain things about you that I do not feel quite fit in the family."
"I am who I am and I will never change," Louis said with determination, his aura surging. "You want me to grow softer? To ask for forgiveness to those weaklings that could not even beat a fake dragon? Do not make me laugh, old man. That is the rule of the strong. Be grateful I did not kill them when I had the opportunity."
"Hah... damn brat," the Dragon King smiled defiantly, his eyebrows twitching. "The hard way it is then, eh? Let us dance."
"Come at me!" Louis roared, his aura exploding with immense power.
Grandfather and grandson clashed in an intense explosion of energies, causing the surroundings to instantly flatten, hundreds of mountains disappearing. The nearby volcano simply vanished before their wrath.
Thus Louis's training with the Dragon King began, an arduous and harsh training that would make him miss his days on Earth struggling against the Vultarn High Dominion and the Grievances.
The Dragon King was ruthless, but with each beating Louis received he learned more about how to properly battle with his powers and continuously grew stronger for some reason.
He learned from the Dragon King's techniques and began to copy them, beginning to internalize them and learning his unique cultivation methods.
Eventually he ended up battling against him for three years, followed by several other years where he trained under his parents and Miranda and the rest of the Dragon King's family.
Slowly his Universal Seed began to bloom and expand as he absorbed cosmic beasts and hunted millions of divine beasts.
His level kept rising and so did his class level, continuously evolving his abilities to their limits and beyond, and eventually his body finally evolved into even stronger forms.
From Tier 2 he went to Tier 1, and then...
To Tier 0.
And so twenty years passed.
House Frostbane stood ready with everyone else from the Dragon's Family as they moved toward the giant Dimensional Vortex that had been opened between the three Fantasy Worlds.
After twenty years the Vortex had twisted and warped Spiritias and Zipangu and part of Yggdrasil into a chaotic battlefield.
In Spiritias the war between the forces of the Great Primordial Spirit Beast King, Ruler of the "Old World," and the Limitless Archdemon Venerable, Ruler of the Great Demon Continent, continued raging with even more intensity.
And in Zipangu the invasion of the Great Headless Venerable of Nine Suns only intensified as his army of Bodhisattvas became larger the more territory he took over and refined into his Fantasy Realm.
And in the middle of this chaotic war the Dragon Prince and his grandfather and their family finally descended.
To end this pointless conflict once and for all.
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