In Swan’s mind, Iguneel’s ear-shattering wails allowed her to clearly feel the emotions contained within them.
The crying wasn’t mere sadness; it was a mixture of anger and resentment following the trampling of the Dragon Race’s noble dignity.
Swan was momentarily at a loss. She could clearly sense the nearly collapsing emotional fluctuations of the dragon soul within her body.
Taking a deep breath, she struggled to keep her voice calm. Like someone comforting a wronged child, she used the gentlest tone possible to ask within her heart, ‘Iguneel, don’t worry yet. Calm down and tell me, what exactly did you perceive? Why did you say resurrection is impossible?’
Iguneel’s sobbing weakened slightly, but it remained heavy with choking breaths and uncontrollable rage.
‘I… I can clearly feel that the Dragon Origin contained within my remains… has been completely drained!’
‘The thief who stole my physical body didn’t just take it; he also distributed the power of my noble dragon body… to those lowly creatures!’
‘Waaaaah… that’s my body! The very existence I relied on to roam the heavens and earth! How dare they… how dare they defile it like that! It’s too much!!’
As she spoke, overcome by grief, Iguneel began to cry heart-wrenchingly again within the soul space. The tremors of the dragon soul caused Swan to feel bursts of spiritual resonance and stinging pain.
‘Without a complete body containing the power of life’s origin, the resurrection ceremony cannot be started! Swan! I… I can never reappear in this world again!!’
Swan’s heart sank along with her. Her original hope of resurrecting her mother through the secret techniques of the Dragon Race had completely vanished into thin air.
Iguneel’s inability to be resurrected meant that everything she hoped to achieve through those secret methods had become empty talk. Under the weight of this double blow, a massive sense of loss nearly overwhelmed her.
However, after only a moment of despondency, the fire in Swan’s eyes reignited. That fire was named hatred and resilience.
She clenched her fists tightly, her nails nearly digging into her palms.
‘Since resurrection is impossible—’
Swan’s voice echoed in her mind, carrying a decisive finality.
‘Then we will change our goal!’
‘Continue lending your power to me. I will kill those Blood Race bastards who defiled your remains and slaughtered my family, one by one, until they are all dead! Along with the mastermind who stole your body, I’ll drag them out and make them pay the price!’
‘Furthermore, looking at all the clues—the dragon scales on the Goblins, the dragon claw fragment left after Horn’s self-destruction—the Blood Race and the guy who stole your remains clearly have an extremely close relationship! If we follow the trail of the Blood Race, we will definitely find that thief!’
Iguneel’s crying gradually stopped. The unquestionable determination and the shared sense of enmity in Swan’s words were like a faint light shining into the depths of her despairing soul.
Her tone was no longer as haughty as before. Instead, it carried a hint of unprecedented vulnerability and dependence.
‘But… Swan… you don’t understand… that thief, having completely devoured my body, possesses at least 50% of the strength I had in my prime… that is by no means something you can contend with right now…’
Swan immediately countered, ‘Then what about your soul power? If you can lend all your remaining soul power to me, how many percent of your peak strength could I reach?’
Iguneel sighed. ‘It’s impossible, Swan. The essence of your soul is still too weak for the Dragon Race.’
‘Forcibly carrying too much power would only lead to your soul collapsing.’
‘With your current limit… at most… at most, you can safely bear about 10% of my peak power. If you exceed that, you will be torn into pieces by my power before you can even kill the enemy…’
Her voice was full of loneliness. ‘My revenge… you… perhaps truly cannot achieve it…’
Swan could clearly feel the deep sense of helplessness in Iguneel’s tone.
Instead of being discouraged, she offered even more forceful comfort. ‘Don’t be so quick to draw conclusions! Perhaps that thief also can’t fully bear the power of your body?’
‘If he only commands a small amount, perhaps only 10% like me, then don’t I still have a chance to help you get revenge?’
‘As long as there is a glimmer of hope, we cannot give up!’
Iguneel remained silent for a moment before whispering, ‘…Thank you, Swan.’
Although Swan’s comfort carried a hint of unrealistic optimism, the sentiment allowed the dragon soul, who had been lonely for one hundred years, to feel a long-lost warmth.
She knew in her heart that for someone to silently steal her mountain-like remains from the powerful seal placed by the dragon slayer Jellal, the thief’s strength must be extraordinary. It was likely far more than just 10%.
A figure suddenly flashed through Iguneel’s mind—Yize.
Thinking of Yize’s bottomless, terrifying mana capacity that was comparable to a dragon… if it were him, perhaps he really could rely on that massive mana foundation to forcibly devour and transform the power of her dragon corpse…
But that was assuming Yize also possessed the kind of forbidden magic or talent that could transform the essence of a magical beast’s body for his own use. Moreover, it depended on whether Yize’s soul strength could match his mana… if his soul were as powerful as his mana…
Iguneel couldn’t help but wonder to herself, ‘Then that guy… just what kind of species is he?’
The thought even felt a bit absurd to her.
***
Having just teleported back to his room and preparing to study how to repair the [Misty Shadow Cloak], Yize suddenly let out a massive sneeze for no reason. An inexplicable chill ran down his back.
“Achoo! Strange… why does it suddenly feel chilly, as if something incredible is thinking about me?”
He rubbed his nose and looked around suspiciously.
***
“Junior Swan, did you find something there?”
Sara’s voice pulled Swan back from her internal dialogue to reality.
She noticed that Swan had been crouching at the bottom of the explosion crater, seemingly holding something in her hand.
Swan subconsciously wanted to hide the dragon claw and scales, but Iguneel immediately spoke in her mind. ‘There’s no need to hide them, Swan. Those remnants are meaningless to me now that my origin is lost.’
Hearing this, Swan displayed the severed finger of Iguneel and the few dim dragon scales in her hand.
“Senior Sister Sara, I found these at the center of the explosion… their aura is very similar to the dragon scale Riya brought to the academy before…”
Sara took them and sensed them carefully. Her expression instantly became incredibly serious.
“Indeed! The aura on these scales is from the same source. These are definitely Iguneel’s dragon scales! And this… this is likely a section of Iguneel’s claw!”
“It seems the case of the missing dragon remains is far more complicated than we imagined. We must report this to the academy’s higher-ups as soon as possible.”
She looked up, her gaze sharp.
Dio’s eyes were also fixed on the dragon claw and scales. A vague hypothesis gradually became clear in his mind.
In his previous life, Swan’s powerful “Dragonification” ability—was its root cause directly related to these stolen remains of Iguneel?
Emma, meanwhile, looked around at the terrifying traces of the explosion with a worried face, whispering, “I wonder what happened to the senior who saved us… and that Blood kin, Horn, is he dead or not… with an explosion this big, that senior might have…”
Everyone’s mood was very heavy.
With a scene of destruction on such a scale, that mysterious senior was likely in grave danger.
The cause of the explosion was also a mystery—was it a mutual destruction? Or did that senior evacuate safely…
Just then, Rose, who had been restrained all this time, stared blankly at the massive, blackened crater.
Her face was filled with extreme terror and a sense of absurdity as she murmured to herself, “No… this is impossible… Master Horn… how could Master Horn… be dead?!”
Through the severance of the bloodline connection, she clearly perceived Horn’s demise.
She knew better than anyone the horror of a Level 4 Blood Pillar. That was an existence that had touched the threshold of the Demon King class!
In the human world, unless an Imperial Sword Saint arrived in person or an 8th-tier Archmage took action, there should be no existence capable of slaying Horn!
That black shadow, whose face couldn’t be seen and who was suspected to be female… just what was their background?!
Could it be… Headmaster Kleya?
But she quickly dismissed the thought. An eighth rank Mage was indeed powerful, but killing a prepared Demon King class head-on was no easy task. Moreover, as the Empire’s final line of defense, Kleya could not easily leave the heart of the Empire.
Seeing Rose in such a lost state with her faith collapsed, half of the weight in everyone’s hearts finally lifted.
Horn was truly dead!
It was only the whereabouts of their savior that remained a source of anxiety.
“It’s getting late. This place is not safe,” Sara said, suppressing the worry in her heart. “Let’s return to the inner city first. Perhaps that senior possesses transcendent strength and left on their own after resolving the enemy.”
This was perhaps the most optimistic guess.
With complicated emotions, the group escorted the dazed Rose and set out on the road back to Betty’s inner city.
Dio looked at this half-sister of his with mixed feelings, eventually only sighing. How to deal with her would be left for his father to decide.
His heart was even heavier.
After six years of hard cultivation since his rebirth, he had thought he possessed the power to change fate, yet he had appeared so pathetic and vulnerable before Horn, who had unleashed his Blood Awakening.
And this was only the existence ranked fifth among the Ten Pillars… how terrifying would the top four be, along with the “High Rank” Kasmir hiding behind the scenes?
Thinking of that bottomless, dark future, Dio felt a suffocating sense of despair.
On the way back, the observant Sara found a scrap of uniquely textured black cloth at the edge of the scorched earth that had not yet fully burned.
“This is…”
She bent down to pick it up, examining it closely.
Because Yize’s [Misty Shadow Cloak] had the effect of distorting visual perception, they hadn’t seen exactly what the shadow was wearing earlier. Sara only vaguely felt that this fabric didn’t seem to belong to Horn’s bloody style.
“Could this be a fragment from the senior’s clothing destroyed in the blast?”
She carefully tucked the tattered piece of fabric away. Perhaps she could find clues about the savior’s identity in the future.
***
When the group finally returned to their temporary residence, they saw Yize sitting in the room. He was frowning and gesturing toward a blackened, damaged, and strangely shaped black cloak (the Misty Shadow Cloak), seemingly studying how to patch it up.
“Junior Yize!”
Emma couldn’t help but shout excitedly as soon as she entered. “Something huge happened today! Everything you said came true! That Kyle really was one of the Blood kin! Even Miss Rose is…”
Yize was startled by the group’s sudden entry. In a flurry, he tried to hide the damaged [Misty Shadow Cloak] behind his back.
This slightly rushed and suspicious movement was caught exactly by the meticulous Sara.
Her gaze fell on the blackened, uniquely textured damaged clothing in Yize’s hand, and then she thought of the fabric scrap she had just picked up. Her pupils contracted imperceptibly.
She stepped forward slowly, her tone carrying a hint of subtle inquiry as she asked softly: