I don't know why, but when the eyes of this ancient dragon fell upon Horn's neck, he was overco by an indescribable strange feeling.
It was as if the dark red scar around his neck was searing.
Horn couldn't help but tighten his collar and composedly perford an Ancient Aier salute: "I'm pleased to et you, Lady Cynthia. I really didn't expect that the legendary ancient dragons still exist today."
"Hohoho, quite bold, young man." The body of Red Dragon Cynthia slowly rose from the ground, "When Ottatila first saw this old dragon body of mine, she was so scared she wet herself..."
"Grandma Cynthia!" In the dim firelight, Ottatila's face turned beet red, "I did not wet myself, alright!"
As the red dragon slowly sat up, Horn's head also raised slowly.
Although it was still crouching, it appeared to be four or five ters tall at first glance, aning the dragon's total length might exceed nine ters.
Jeanne couldn't help but step forward and stood protectively in front of Horn.
With grace, Red Dragon Cynthia covered her two supporting forepaws with her long tail, and her gaze shifted to Jeanne: "Another little girl who commands lightning."
Having apparently seen many ordinary witches, Cynthia's gaze remained fixed on Horn: "Hmm, a male witch, are you made by Serafe or modified by her? No, she doesn't have the capability to tamper with this level... Are you a local?"
Feeling the hairs on the back of his neck stand, Horn put on a puzzled expression: "I'm not from Black Snake Bay..."
"Hohoho, you're still playing dumb with this old one?!" Displeased with Horn's evasion, Cynthia bared her teeth and screeched, "You unlucky soul, do you think your cage is much larger than mine?"
"I don't know what you're talking about." Although unsure how Cynthia had figured it out, Horn innocently denied, "I was born in Thousand River Valley, Shangruifo County; could my ancestral ho be Black Snake Bay?"
"Hehe!"
With a peculiar giggle, Cynthia's enormous dragon head leaned down, her hot breath ruffling Horn's forehead hair, her head was no more than a ter away from Horn's face, a single golden pupil staring intently at him.
Blown by breath accompanied with the sll of sulfur, Horn maintained his expression, even with a tinge of solemnity and concealed anger within it: "Lady Cynthia, I co with friendly intentions."
Jeanne imdiately jumped forward, glared at Ottatila, and shouted, "What do you an by this?"
"Grandma Cynthia." Ottatila also hurriedly stepped in to stop it, "Calm down a bit."
The red dragon simply looked directly and calmly into Horn's eyes for a long while before finally straightening her head and shaking her wings in disinterest: "Let's assu this old one made a mistake. Besides, it's ti."
Seeing that the red dragon finally shifted her attention, Horn let out a sigh of relief. Although there were only a few short sentences, the underlying information was quite significant.
Not to ntion the matter of an Ancient Red Dragon really being locked beneath the Celestial Maiden City, just the existence of the dragon itself is revolutionary.
This red dragon could tell about Horn's past of decapitated rebirth at a glance, and considering her behavior of manipulating corpses, it's clear she knows necromancy.
After all, dragons, being mythical magical creatures, it can barely be explained if they know necromancy.
Most importantly, she glanced at him twice and could determine that the soul inside this body wasn't the original owner. Initially, she suspected Serafe was up to sothing, but then quickly questioned if Horn was a "local."
Although Horn denied it outright, her attitude remained ambiguous, either because her judgnt isn't accurate or she doesn't want to fall out, or perhaps both.
In this generally low-magic world, such a high-magic existence is really a huge variable, especially since this dragon appears to be ntally unstable.
If he had known earlier that Lady Cynthia beneath this pit was a red dragon, he wouldn't have co.
"Lady Cynthia, what ti is it? I still have so questions to ask you."
Horn's question went unanswered by Cynthia, but Ottatila explained instead: "The opportunity to gather the Dragon's Breath only cos once or twice a month. If missed, you have to wait until the next month, which is why I invited you down here today."
The frequency of gathering Dragon's Breath only once or twice a month sounded sowhat familiar.
Before Horn could think further, Cynthia suddenly raised her head, letting out a low call.
In the darkness, soone unknown activated sothing, causing starlight and moonlight twinkling with water light to stream in from the top of this underground cave.
Silvery white light sprinkled over the entire conical pit, and the slippery stone walls on both sides seed cloaked with a layer of fluorescence.
It wasn't until this point that Horn noticed both sides of the cave walls were actually carved with rows of peculiar snake patterns, and their arrangent appeared sowhat familiar.
The snake-man guardians hissed, their tails tucked as they retreated into the channel holes behind the stone walls.
Looking at the surroundings, Horn felt a jolt in his heart. He swept his gaze from left to right and even turned around in place before saying softly, "It's similar, so similar."
"Brother, what is similar?"
Drooping his eyelids, Horn shook his head and pointed at the deep pit around him. "Don't you think, this pit looks a lot like our Ethereal Tower? Only it's upside down."
"Hohohoho—" A hoarse and unpleasant laugh echoed as Cynthia's damaged wings stirred the sand at the bottom of the pit, revealing a pool filled with sand almost identical to the Ethereal Tower.
"You call this the Ethereal Tower, but we call it a boundary marker." Moving around the central dry pool, Cynthia stood up with human strength and started pushing the stone slabs on the sides of the stone walls. "The astral realm floats above, the spirit realm sinks below, the world rises and falls like a dreamy bubble..."
With Cynthia's narration, a black and red beam of light completely opposite to the Ethereal Tower began erging from the center of the pool.
Horn and Jeanne imdiately changed color dramatically. If this thing was the sa as the Ethereal Tower, then Horn's head would fly again.
"Wait, I can't..."
"Pause the ritual!"
This black and red beam didn't wait for Horn. It emitted heat and shot into the sand at the pool's center, causing the air to warp as if it were within a furnace, and in an instant, the heap of sand lted into a liquid state.
As the water waves surged, the sand in the pool turned into a transparent liquid, and when examined closely, wasn't this the Moon Pool water from the Ethereal Tower?
"Brother, brother, are you alright?" Jeanne touched Horn's neck with a worried look.
Horn shook his head, indicating he was okay.
But curiously, even though this short ritual was about to end, Horn didn't feel the pulling force he experienced before at the Ethereal Tower.
Looking up at Cynthia once more, though he couldn't see the expression on the dragon's face, for so reason, he felt the curvature of Cynthia's mouth seed to be saying: Are you still acting?
"Don't be afraid, your head is fine." Cynthia lazily moved the stones on the sides with her massive dragon claws. "This place connects to sowhere different. Later, I'll give you the Eye of Concealnt Talisman I made—even in Serafe, there's nothing to fear."
Watching Ottatila pour dragon blood into the pool's water, within seconds, it solidified into small red crystals, which turned out to be Dragon's Breath.
Was Dragon's Breath really so easy to make? Horn instantly felt he lost out.
"Is this alchemy? Is the pool filled with Light Water?" It wasn't until the black and red beam dispersed that Horn couldn't help but ask.
"Light Water is too basic; this is Moon rcury, and this technique isn't called alchemy, it's called dragon speech magic." Cynthia complacently prodded at the sand. "The so-called alchemy is just the process of elves consuming giant dragon's excrent and then defecating it for humans—what you find incredibly mysterious, dragons see as laughably akin to children playing in the mud."
So was Serafe's alchemy actually obtained from Cynthia?
But you have this technology, why aren't you constructing a divine artifact to flatten the church, instead of staying in this dungeon?
Seemingly seeing Horn's confusion, Cynthia swept the ground with her tail and sat down. "How do you think giant dragons went extinct? Most dragon speech magic failed, courtesy of those elves—a disaster to dragons!"
At this, Horn couldn't hold back anymore. "So, are you from the ti of the First El Empire?"
"Of course I am... Hmph, guess." Cynthia curled her tongue around a mouthful of Moon rcury and swallowed. "You hide things from , and I hide things from you, but unless..."
"Unless what?"
"Unless you bring Serafe's daughter here... Don't tell there's none, there definitely is!"
Horn's expression grew solemn once more. How could this old dragon know about Hilov's existence from thousands of miles away?
Calculating the ti, Serafe left Black Snake Bay over thirty years ago, while Hilov should've been born only about twenty years ago.
Could Serafe have predicted he would adopt a witch? Wait, could Hilov be artificially created by Serafe?
But this old dragon previously stated that Serafe couldn't handle such advanced body modification.
The massive red dragon displayed a playful smile. "As long as you bring her here, I'll teach you all usable dragon speech magic. You have such a huge army; wouldn't it be easy to flatten the church?"
"What do you plan to do with her?"
"That's none of your business." Cynthia blew a breath of sulfur-tainted wind. "So, what do you think?"
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