Chapter 450: Pretty‐Looking Damsel
Seconds trickled into minutes. It was torturous to just sit here thinking and thinking. He understood a bit of what Isolde was going through but didn’t know if his solace was going to work.
He lost twenty-three thousand wraiths and nine thousand Golden Order Knights. That was the biggest loss he had ever faced.
Thousands fought to preserve others, especially the noble knights. Those taken couldn’t return, and just like that, Dirge’s ever-growing Taotie wraiths were gone. All she had left were about seven thousand Taotie wraiths and the eastern dragon. The other two commanders couldn’t make it out of the desert.
Had he known earlier, he would have done everything he could to exhaust his mana.
"Hey, Castle. Aren’t you my actual summon?" Godfrey asked randomly.
"I thought you could talk." Godfrey sighed, rubbing his forehead. He closed his eyes, subconsciously monitoring how mana flowed within the Castle.
This mana came from his physical body. He could feel his core absorbing mana and some of it trickling into his soul space. Time slowly passed, and Godfrey thought he fell asleep in his soul space. Then a subtle golden light flashed.
Like he stood beneath a massive plain. That light grew bigger and brighter, like the sun came closer and closer.
When he opened his eyes, Godfrey found himself lying on a grass field, staring at a vast blue sky with floating white clouds. It was captivating, especially because of the faint silhouettes of winged creatures.
Squinting, he discovered those creatures were actually dragons.
’...It can’t be!’ Godfrey rose to his feet. His eyes grew wider as he looked around. It looked like he had stepped into a fairy land. Hills and mountains decorated the horizons, while the sea spread out in a V shape, growing wider and wider the more it stretched toward the horizon.
He could see some creatures. Some were like rhinos from Earth but two times bigger, some three times as big.
Godfrey was almost inconsequential before these creatures, and although he wasn’t that far away from them, none cared about him as much as they cared about their food, which was grass.
He walked through the midst of these creatures, looking around in disbelief, but it became even more shocking when he saw a vast herd of sheep that almost turned a hill white.
Some were crazily massive, some were small. They all scattered when a group of dragons flew above them, but that didn’t save the unfortunate few that ended up in the maws and claws of the dragons that came out to hunt.
Godfrey just kept walking until he got to an area where the grasses were taller than him. Could he be in Isolde’s Domain?
Was that even possible?
His guess was that this had to be the Castle’s doing. Could it hear him?
Godfrey ran his fingers through the tall grass. This place filled him with awe.
After an enjoyable walk, he found himself at the peak of a green hill, just after the tall grasses, and from there, he laid eyes on a vast plain.
On this plain were trees with white leaves and white trunks. Snow had decorated the hills around this plain, and a faint mist engulfed this white forest.
Turning to the north, he saw that the clouds were no longer white but black. It was because of the volcanoes that populated that region. They were quite far away, but its effect could be seen miles away.
All of a sudden, two dragons began to circle him.
’I can’t really fight them, so do I have to run or...’ He tried summoning Solstice, but the summoning diagram refused to appear.
’Run it is.’
This made him laugh. Godfrey knew these dragons were not a threat to him, but they stopped their descent and flew away, making Godfrey turn, looking for what made them flee.
He found a massive white hornless dragon walking out of the forest. Although they were still far from each other, Grace’s size made up for it.
Godfrey still remembered when this huge dragon was a wyvern flying around a building when they were first introduced.
All it took were a few flaps of her wings, and Grace descended before Godfrey. The fierce gale generated by her wings forced his hair to whip about helplessly.
She looked down on him while he bent his neck in order to stare at her face.
"You’ve grown larger now."
Godfrey said after thinking for a while.
Grace scowled.
"I know what you’re thinking, but she didn’t bring me here. I’m actually here in search of her."
Godfrey was certain that wasn’t what Grace was thinking about, but when he said that, her eyes softened.
"Do you know where she is?"
’At the shore.’
For the first time, Godfrey heard Grace’s voice in his head. It sounded like a woman speaking to him.
Even after everything he’d been through and seen, hearing Grace’s voice in his head felt surreal. He never imagined it that way.
"Your voice sounds nice."
Grace scoffed, turned, and gently flicked her tail at the spot beside him. Then she took a few steps and flew away.
Godfrey watched her for a while, then went toward the shore.
It took a long time of walking, but he eventually got to the shore.
His eyes narrowed when he saw footprints. He followed their trail until he got to the spot where the water washing up on the shore had erased them.
***
"Did Grace direct me to the wrong place? I feel like I’m walking into a volcano... I knew she didn’t like me. Tsk."
Godfrey was about to turn, but he had reached the end of the entrance, and his eyes adjusted to the huge cavern. Then they settled on the red-haired pretty-looking damsel sitting on the hard floor and caressing three baby dragons, while one perched on her shoulder, nibbling at her hair.
Her charming eyes fell on him at that same moment.
Isolde was in disbelief when she heard that voice, but seeing him standing there, they both looked at each other in shock.
And then Godfrey exhaled, his shoulders relaxing like a man who had searched for a long time and finally found what he sought.
