Capítulo 742: Let’s hatch this egg.
Strax stood still for a mont, his hand still outstretched toward the egg, as if he could hear echoes that no other being could perceive. The bluish light that enveloped him finally began to dissipate, dissolving into slow, almost lazy particles that floated through the hall like snow ashes.
rcedes took a deep breath—because only now did she realize she had been holding her breath for a long ti.
Strax said nothing.
He simply… turned his head. First to one side, then to the other. Then he raised his snout slightly, sniffing the frozen air like an animal searching for the right scent trail.
rcedes frowned.
“Strax…? What are you looking for?”
He didn’t answer imdiately. He took a slow step, his tail gliding across the frozen floor, his eyes gleaming a deep blue—still carrying traces of the salamanders’ energy.
After a few seconds, he murmured:
“The next room.”
rcedes’ blood ran cold—and that wasn’t a taphor. The air around her seed to drop a few more degrees.
“The n-next… room? Strax, nothing here seems safe, not even as it is. What makes you think that—”
He raised his hand.
Not to tell her to shut up—but to indicate sothing above them.
rcedes followed the gesture.
And then she saw it.
Too high to be natural, too wide to have been made by any creature smaller than a titan, a colossal hole opened in the chamber’s ceiling—or rather, it was sealed by layers and layers of ancient, thick, translucent ice. It was like looking through a frozen window into another world. Delicate fractures crossed the surface, as if soone had struck there forcefully… centuries ago.
Or as if sothing had passed through there.
The ice seed to pulse with the sa blue that had illuminated the egg monts before.
Strax narrowed his eyes, analyzing every detail, every crack.
“There,” he said, his voice deep, almost distant. “The passage isn’t fully active… but it’s there.”
rcedes swallowed hard.
“And you want to climb through THAT?! You’ve completely lost it—”
Strax tilted his head, observing the frozen hole with an almost reverent intensity.
“That’s where the tomb wants us to go. The energy I felt is still moving. The egg knows. I can… hear it.”
The egg in his arms pulsed slightly—like a small heart responding.
rcedes took a deep breath, looking at the hole and then Strax, then the hole again.
“You’ve got to be kidding …”
But Strax wasn’t.
He simply positioned his feet more firmly on the ground, as if preparing to leap—or climb—or destroy a barrier he didn’t even know could still resist him.
The runes on his tail ignited again, though more softly, like resting embers.
“Let’s go up,” he said, without any hesitation.
And the ice above seed… to listen.
Strax didn’t wait.
He simply planted his feet on the ground, straightened his posture, and… opened his mouth.
Upwards.
Directly towards the frozen ceiling, as if it were perfectly obvious what to do.
rcedes blinked twice, incredulous.
“Strax…? Strax, what are you—”
She took a step forward, pressing the egg against her chest.
“What the HELL are you doing?!”
Strax didn’t answer.
But the answer ca in another way.
From his mouth—between his newly elongated fangs, between the runes still gleaming on his skin—a thin wisp of smoke began to escape. It wasn’t ordinary smoke; it was dense, white, heavy, like the breath of a mountain awakening after ages.
rcedes’ eyes widened.
“Strax? STRAX?!”
The air around him vibrated. The floor trembled beneath his feet—not much, just enough to make rcedes’ heart skip a beat.
The smoke grew thicker.
Hotter.
So hot that the blue vapor swirling in the hall began to recede, spiral, flee from him as if ashad to exist near that heat.
“Strax, for the love of—”
And then it ca.
A blast.
Not an ordinary jet of fire, not a wild blaze—but a solid beam of heat, white and gold, dense as condensed light. The impact made the air explode in waves, pushing rcedes back even as she was pinned to the ground.
The frozen ceiling didn’t stand a chance.
The ancient ice, thick as walls, cracked in the first second.
In the next second, it began to lt.
But not lt like ordinary ice.
He lted as if being erased from existence—disappearing in translucent rivers that flowed to the sides, evaporating before even touching the ground.
Cracking sounds cut through the air, deep echoes reverberating off the tomb walls.
Giant cracks spread across the ceiling, illuminated by Strax’s own fire, which continued to blow as if it were rely… breath.
rcedes raised her arm to shield her face, the egg shimring frantically against her chest.
The entire ceiling began to give way—not fall, but recede, dissolve, open like a luminous wound.
And when the last block of ice finally vanished into vapor…
A colossal new hole revealed itself above them.
Black, deep, and pulsing with blue light in the distance.
Strax closed his mouth slowly, as if finishing a trivial task.
rcedes gaped.
“YOU… YOU JUST LTED AN ENTIRE CEILING!”
Strax rely wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, indifferent.
“It was in the way.” And the tomb, silent and ancient, seed to agree.
Strax was still observing the newly lted hole when, without warning, he turned to rcedes.
She was still breathing rapidly, her eyes fixed on the destroyed ceiling—when she felt sothing touch her waist.
A warm hand.
A firm grip.
Secure, but utterly unexpected.
“KYAA—!”
The scream escaped before she could stop it, too loud, too sharp, and imdiately followed by an awkward silence.
rcedes’s face turned so red it looked like she’d swallowed one of his fireballs.
“STRAX! WHAT— WHY— YOU—!”
She stumbled over her words, trying to hide her face behind the egg, as if that would erase the fact that he had simply grabbed her by the waist.
Strax seed… completely oblivious to her outburst.
With his left hand, he held rcedes. With his right, he gripped the egg, lifting it as if it were part of a natural movent.
No hesitation.
No ceremony.
No malice.
Just pure, direct efficiency—typical of soone who didn’t process human nuances even when they scread “kyaaa.”
“Hold on tight,” he said, as if that explained everything and as if she wasn’t about to die of embarrassnt.
“HOLD ON WHAT?!” she protested, shrinking back with his arm firmly around her waist. “Strax, WARN US before—”
She didn’t finish.
Because Strax bent his knees.
His muscles tensed, blue and red runes pulsing across his skin, illuminating the walls.
The air beneath them compressed, hissing like thunder trying to escape.
rcedes let out another muffled yelp, hugging the egg as if it were her only shield in life.
And then—
Strax leaped.
Leaped like a dragon.
Leaped like an ancient beast.
Leaped with enough force to make the floor tremble and a column of steam rise behind them.
rcedes saw the entire hall blur.
The hole in the ceiling grew, approaching too quickly. “STRAAAAX!!!”
Her voice echoed through the newly opened tunnel.
Strax’s leap pierced the newly lted tunnel like a living arrow.
The bluish light of the inner runes flickered on his scales as they ascended—and then, in an instant, erged into the space above.
rcedes barely had ti to blink before her eyes were taken by a sight… completely unexpected.
A nest.
But not an ordinary nest, not sothing made of branches or stones.
It was a titanic structure, ancient, almost sacred—built from the very millennial ice of the tomb, shaped as if the cold had hands.
Strax landed. His claws dug into the ground, cushioning the impact. rcedes let out a trembling sigh.
And then they saw.
The chamber was circular, as wide as the previous hall, but much taller, like an inverted well. The ceiling opened into a do of translucent crystal, letting in a deep blue light that seed to co from so impossible place—perhaps from the heart of the tomb, perhaps from sothing buried even deeper.
But the nest…
The nest glead.
It was made of interwoven, enormous, curved ice blades, forming a kind of circular throne. Each blade was engraved with ancient, pulsating runes, like mystical veins running across its surface.
Between the blades, bluish vapors rose like sleeping breath.
In the center was a perfect concavity, large enough to accommodate not only the egg…
but also a whole newborn dragon.
rcedes’ eyes widened.
“This is… enormous…”
Strax didn’t answer imdiately. He approached slowly, like soone rediscovering a place they know but have never truly seen.
The ground around them was covered in crystallized ice dust, gleaming like ground stars. Tiny cracks in the walls vibrated with energy, as if the very air were whispering welcos.
Further on, small sculptures of salamanders—not alive, but made of pure ice—were positioned in circles, facing the center. Silent guardians, frozen in a posture of eternal vigil.
rcedes swallowed hard.
“Strax… this… this was made for the egg, wasn’t it?”
Strax tilted his head, observing the concavity in the center of the nest.
A soft, almost reverent gleam crossed his eyes.
“Not just for the egg,” he murmured.
“For her. For what she will be.”
The nest pulsed slightly in response, as if it had heard. As if it had recognized the heir arriving.
“I think this is it, let’s hatch this egg.”
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