Chapter 485: Chapter 485 – Taming SSS Dragons’ Records
The King asked the experts to withdraw, which they obeyed reluctantly but imdiately…
However, not only did he allow his son Julius, he also let the girls and Zhao follow him for so reason.
The door opened toward a staircase that descended deeper than any of them had imagined possible.
“How far down does this go?” Julius asked, his voice echoing strangely in the cavernous space that opened before them.
“To the other side of the world, hahaha, or so so believe,” Dragarion responded, beginning the descent while carrying Ren. “Though in my opinion it’s less deep than it should be.”
The small fungus jumped ahead of them with renewed determination, as if it were finally approaching its destination. Its movents had beco more deliberate, faster, guiding them through a staircase carved from living rock and with intricate symbols that seed to have been built by a civilization that knew no resource limits for geotric ‘artistic’ finishing.
The craftsmanship was extraordinary and unsettling. The patterns seed to shift subtly as they passed, creating the illusion of movent in static stone.
“Father,” Julius murmured as they descended, “you never let us enter this deep below the castle before… Only stories and…”
“There are many problematic things down here,” Dragarion replied, his tone casual but carrying the weight of secrets guarded for hundreds of years. “So because sharing them would only cause problems. It would serve no purpose except to create unnecessary tension.”
Zhao, struggling to keep pace despite his weakness, listened to every word with the attention of soone whose curiosity was not much less than Ren’s.
“Besides, the mana could ruin your cultivation when you were children if you spent many days here… we’ve gone only about 200 ters so far,” Dragarion estimated. “But it’s just the beginning.”
♢♢♢♢
When they finally reached the bottom of the staircase, they had descended about 500 ters and the mana was as dense as the Silver ring, almost reaching Gold. The children shouldn’t be here for many hours or they could beco poisoned.
Although… Dragarion didn’t bother to check, so he didn’t know that they were all Bronze Rank 1 or 2 doubles who could be fine at this level for a couple days…
What they found at the base of the staircase defied all previous understanding of the underground world.
Within an extrely wide, massive do that occupied all the castle’s terrain and a bit more in its circumference… connected to several “crystal bridges” hung a ‘slender’ structure separated from the world.
A giant crystal tower manifested before them, but it didn’t go upward…it went downward. A massive structure that sank into the earth’s depths with a scale that made even the castle’s largest towers seem like children’s toys.
“This is impossible,” Luna whispered, her voice barely audible as she observed the enormity of the perfectly geotric cylindrical construction.
The tower walls were made of crystal, but not ordinary crystal. It was the densest mana they had ever seen, creating patterns that moved and changed as if they were alive. The entire structure pulsed with energy that could be felt in their bones.
The sight was both beautiful and terrifying. The crystal seed to contain swirling currents of power that ford temporary patterns before dissolving and reforming in endless cycles.
“It’s not impossible,” Dragarion corrected, approaching one of the crystalline bridges. “It’s just different from everything we know. And this is only the upper part.”
Below the bridges could be seen what would be about 1000 ters deep, the end of the solid mana sphere beneath the castle… But the King suggested this was only the entrance to the tower and it continued much deeper.
When they reached the other side of the bridge following the small beast and entered…
There were inscriptions carved into the nearest wall, symbols that none of them could read but that clearly contained important information. Dragarion and his predecessors had spent years studying them during their visits to this place.
“What do they say?” Liora asked, fascinated by the complex patterns.
“According to the best interpretations,” Dragarion traced so of the symbols in what appeared to be a sphere with his free finger, “these speak of a division. Of a wall that separates the two halves of the world.”
His eyes peered toward the tower’s depths, where the crystalline light seed endless.
“This tower, according to different interpretations of the inscriptions, reaches to the center of the world. Or even to the other side…” his voice beca more grave, “the Dragon Gods form an impenetrable barrier that divides the two halves of the earth… According to this, you don’t have to defeat them to go to the other side of the mana rift…”
Julius exchanged a look with Luna and Liora. Like him, they had grown up hearing legends about dragons, but this suggested sothing much more real than they had imagined.
Everything they thought they knew about the world’s structure, about the limits of exploration and discovery, was suddenly cast into doubt.
“Have you tried to reach them?” Zhao asked, his explorer’s instinct awakening despite his weakened state.
Dragarion laughed, but it wasn’t a sound of amusent. It was the laughter of soone who had faced the limits of his own power and found them insufficient.
“I’ve gone farther than most… maybe than anyone else in known history,” he admitted. “I managed to stealthy peek from the Diamond ring toward the Adamantium ring. But the last three rings…” he shook his head. “They’re practically beyond the reach of any human.”
His voice beca more serious as he explained.
“From the vein chamber we can see the silhouette of the world and our half has 10 rings in a mural. The last 3 rings are recorded in many texts as the SSS rings. The first is the realm of the Supre Dragons… the 8th ring, Mithril. There, beasts have transcended what we consider physical and operate on levels of ethereal power that defy my fighting comprehension.”
He paused, his eyes lost in mories.
“The second is the domain of the Supre Sovereign Dragons. The upper corporeal one the less ‘mundane or earthly’ of the first 9 ‘stairs to heaven rings’, forged from the alloy of Mithril and Adamantium. Ancient texts give it various nas: Mythradant, Aetheradamantium, Adamirion. They all an almost the sa thing: absolute strength, unbreakable, light, magical, brilliant, divine, almost ethereal, the divine substance of the heavens… that sort of thing… they admire it as almost unattainable perfection.”
“And the third?” Luna asked the king weakly, her curiosity overcoming her shyness toward powerful adult figures above her status.
“The Divine ring,” Dragarion responded. “The realm of the Supre Sovereign Shaddai Dragons. Where, according to those old legends, resides the power that keeps the two halves of the world separated.”
As he spoke, Dragarion continued guiding them deeper into the structure, following the small fungus that seed to know exactly where it was headed.
“Of course,” the king continued, “I attribute much of the mythological perception to simple ignorance. The beasts I’ve defeated, no matter how powerful, have been beasts in the end. Intelligent, yes. Powerful beyond common understanding, absolutely. But gods?”
He shook his head.
“I don’t discount that the other side of the world might be sothing interesting. Being divided by dragons of such power certainly suggests there are things there that might be worth knowing. But I doubt it’s so kind of ‘paradise’ where souls rest after death as many suggest…”
They stopped before another door, this one made of the sa crystal as the walls but clearly designed to open only under specific circumstances.
“This tower,” Dragarion placed his hand on the crystalline surface, “is powered by the densest mana vein in the world.”
The door responded to his touch, sliding aside to reveal an enormous chamber that glowed with intensified light.
“Although,” Dragarion admitted as they entered, “this is literally just the tip of the iceberg.”
The chamber was circular, with walls that curved upward until they were lost in the intense blue light.
The world mural was there…
In the center, a column of light rose from floor to ceiling, pulsing with energy that made the air itself vibrate.
“This is where the mana that accumulates in the castle’s crystal chamber cos from…” Julius murmured, amazed by the flow.
Just above this energy was an enormous chamber full of people in charge of managing the city’s crystals.
The flow fed hundreds of crystal processing units of different density levels. No one knew how these units worked… but they had always done so, feeding the city with regulated but virtually infinite daily production.
“Without the three upper rings, we can only access this first chamber,” the king explained. “And this only gives us access to a small part of that light flow, which is the central vein.”
The mana flow in the ceiling divided into 2, one large and one small, the larger one feeding another enormous closed door.
The group could imdiately feel the presence of the energy column. It was like being near a storm, pure power that threatened to overflow at any mont.
“It’s massive,” Zhao murmured, observing how the light moved within the crystal like currents of luminous water.
“And it’s connected to Yino’s,” Dragarion added, his voice loaded with a revelation he had guarded for years. “During my first exploration trips to the depths, I managed to glimpse with my mana eyes at the crystal tower’s bifurcation about 5000 ters deep in the first bottom of the dark rift, in the division between the platinum and diamond rings.”
He moved closer to the column.
“Actually the tower is a single creation with two heads that end beneath the two castles, ours and theirs…” he revealed. “This tower is directly connected to the one beneath Yino.”
Everything they thought they understood about the conflict between kingdoms, about the fundantal structure of their world, was suddenly revealed to be built upon foundations far more complex and ancient than any of them had imagined.
Like it ? Give it a power stone！
┻━┻ ︵ヽ(`Д´)ﾉ︵ ┻━┻ – It’s free and you help a lot
Have so idea about my story? Comnt it and let know.
Thank you so much for reading!
(∿°○°)∿ ︵ ︵ ︵ ︵ ︵ ǝʌol
User Comments
0 comments from readers