Chapter 911: Chapter 910: The Gaze of God
Gawain watched the agent lady wobble and stagger out of the room, her usual elegant and steady demeanor completely gone.
He felt quite guilty about it—he thought he should have stopped her and arranged appropriate medical service and rest care for her, making sufficient compensation in any case—even though it was purely a mistake, he had indeed caused harm to the agent lady, which was unjustifiable.
However, after calmly thinking it through, he decided to abandon the idea—the main reason being the fear that the dragon might die right here...
"Why is she so stubborn..." Watching Melita leave, Gawain couldn’t help but mutter, "If she didn’t want to answer, she could have just refused..."
A moment later, Aunt Heidi arrived at the study upon hearing the news, and as soon as the Grand Governor of the Empire entered, she remarked, "Ancestor, I heard reports saying that the agent of the Mithril Vault was in a state when leaving... Oh—what happened?!"
She noticed the bloodstains splattered in the room and immediately exclaimed.
"Get someone to clean this up," Gawain sighed and looked at the desk ruined by Melita’s blood (which had been used for less than two weeks) "Also, I need to replace this desk—and the carpet."
"Ah? Oh, okay," Aunt Heidi was taken aback and hurriedly agreed, carefully avoiding the bloodstains as she came to Gawain, "Ancestor, did you have a conflict with the agent of the Mithril Vault?"
"No, but I might have unintentionally caused a bit of harm... I may need to compensate her in the future if there’s an opportunity," Gawain shook his head, then his gaze fell on those bloodstains, his eyes changing slightly, "By the way, Aunt Heidi, is it true that dragon blood is quite precious as magic materials with high research value?"
"Indeed it is," Aunt Heidi, albeit confused, still nodded, "A few records from the Ancient Gondor Era mention that dragon blood possesses various magical properties, and its pure magical power can be used to analyze complex crystal structures..."
"Then have someone collect the blood that hasn’t dried when tidying up," Gawain said earnestly, "Can’t waste it."
He admired silently: Melita is his Dragonkin friend, so doing this is also making the most of friendship’s value—in the future, he’ll make sure Melita is included in official documents with the "Dragon of Friendship" title; after all, he’s not planning to let the My Little Pony joke slip...
Aunt Heidi could never discern the odd maneuvers inside her serious ancestor’s mind, so her expression was plain and easy to understand: "?"
...
Outside Cecil Castle, in a deserted valley, a silhouette burst out of the woodlands, encased in turbulent magic power and gusts, stumbling onto a flat sandy ground.
Melita Ponia stopped at this deserted place, suddenly letting out a low growl—a multitude of common flying birds and animals frantically fled from all corners of the valley, even more powerful non-human monsters fearfully joined the escape queue, all living beings in the valley fled far from this place under the dragon’s dominance, while Melita herself was completely enveloped by a suddenly appearing curtain of light.
In the swirling transformation of the light curtain, a blue dragon appeared in the center of the sandy land, bowing down there, her wings droop weakly, the scales seemed to have lost their luster, and even dense blood droplets seeped out from some scale seams, quietly gathering on the sandy ground beneath her.
After injecting herself with several vials of potent enhancers and emergency repair fluids, she slightly relaxed and immediately activated communication with Talronde.
A pale gold communication interface unfolded before her eyes, and from the other side of the interface came the voice of back-line support personnel: "Melita? Why did you suddenly initiate exclusive communication on this line?"
"I can’t fly for now... my situation is a bit bad," Melita said weakly, "Nuoletta, haven’t you received my implant warning signal over there?"
"The monitoring system here was just doing clock calibration, not directed at Loren just a while ago, let me check..." Nuoletta’s voice came from the communication interface, and in the next second, she gasped in shock, "My goodness! What happened to you?! Your heart..."
"I had a rather thrilling conversation with Gawain Cecil," Melita’s voice carried a bitter smile, "His words wounded my heart—three of them..."
"You still find time to joke at such a moment?!" Nuoletta’s voice sounded extremely anxious, "All your auxiliary hearts have shut down, only one original heart is beating, it can’t drive all your bodily functions—how are you now? Can you still move? You must immediately return to Talronde for emergency repair!"
"I just said, I can’t fly for now... I might need the ’recovery team’ for help," Melita said slowly, "Also remember to bring enough ’Surge’ enhancer, I’ve just used up all my quota."
"Alright, the recovery team is online, they’re taking off in ten minutes—with the ’Surge’ enhancer you need. Damn, you might be the only dragon in the past two millennia to get yourself requiring a recovery team during a routine outdoor task... What exactly were you negotiating with that human emperor?" Nuoletta couldn’t help but ask curiously, but quickly added, "Ah, if it’s inconvenient to say, then don’t..."
Clearly, she realized this wasn’t in the upper layers of the atmosphere’s "safe signal zone," considering that this communication might have already captured the Dragon God’s attention, she reminded Melita.
"It’s indeed inconvenient to say here..." Melita thought about the terrifying message during her conversation with Gawain, thought about her abnormal actions and bizarre memory loss previously, even now she still felt apprehensive; she gently shook her head, her voice low and solemn, "Once back, I want... to meet the God, possibly needing Speaker Andar’s assistance to arrange it."
Before her friend on the other side of the communication could speak, Melita heard an old, august voice suddenly intervening in the communication: "I’m online—Melita, you wish to meet the God?"
"Yes," Melita thought for a moment and earnestly said, "I have some questions that I wish to have answered by the God, hoping you can convey it to High Priest Heragor..."
Before she finished speaking, a dignified female voice, seemingly layered with countless voices and carrying irresistible pressure and momentum, suddenly pierced into her mind, and a faint golden phantom seemed to appear before her, her mind booming: "I grant it."
In an instant, absolute silence enveloped the entire communication line, all "persons," including Speaker Andar, quieted down, a tense and solemn atmosphere filled the communication channel, even within this silence, it seemed full of reverence.
Melita felt her sole surviving biological heart twitch, shivering all over, she gulped down a mouthful of saliva with difficulty: "God... My Lord..."
"Relax," the voice continued, "Once you return to Talronde, you can come to see me anytime."
The next second, the voice along with its pressure departed, everything seemed just an illusion—it left so swiftly, almost deliberately telling everyone on the communication line: I’m gone, continue your talk.
Yet no one dared truly relax, Melita heard her friend’s tense voice break the silence: "Just now... was God’s intervention..."
"Looks like you’ve had a unique experience," Speaker Andar’s voice followed, "Melita, rest well on-site, stay safe, the recovery team has taken off, they’ll reach you soon, discuss anything further upon your return."
Then, the elderly dragon Speaker also left the channel.
For a moment, only Melita and her friend who served as a support personnel remained in the communication line.
The effects of the enhancer had been fully realized; the pains and abnormal signals within her body were temporarily alleviated, while Melita’s thoughts surged unrestrained. Eventually, she set aside all her worries, temporarily hid the communication interface, adjusted her posture, and lay quietly on the ground, her eyes fixed on the Dark Mountain Range already swallowed by nightfall.
Above the Dark Mountain Range, the night shrouded the sky, stars twinkling, embellishing the entire expanse.
After a long while, she suddenly heard her friend’s voice beside her: "Melita, are you okay?"
"Haven’t you ended the communication yet?" Melita gently moved her neck, "I thought you had already gone offline."
"I’m a bit worried about you," Nuoletta said. "I happen to have no other communication tasks here, and other dispatched dragons gave up the line after hearing about your incident... By the way, Pector is staying in the Moss Woods region, he’s got nothing to do, should he come lend a hand?"
"No need... I wouldn’t want to be laughed at," Melita promptly said, "The enhancer is working, I’ll just stay here quietly for a while."
"Alright then..."
The channel remained silent for a few minutes, then Melita couldn’t help breaking that silence again: "Hey, are you still there?"
"Yes."
"I suddenly wanted to ask you... Do you know what it feels like to have only one heart beating inside you? A heart not undergoing any augmentation, one that started beating from when you hatched from the dragon egg?"
"Me? I can’t remember..." her friend said, puzzled, "I replaced my original heart quite early... Dragons retaining their primitive hearts into adulthood, like you, are probably rare..."
"Indeed... I’m an antique of sorts," said Melita, unable to suppress a laugh but quickly grimacing in pain, "Ahh... it still stings a bit."
"So watch your pride – hey, you still haven’t told me," her friend’s voice sounded, "What’s it like relying solely on a primitive heart?"
"...Very vulnerable, every heartbeat is unsettling, your entire existence hangs by that sole fragile fleshly organ, giving me the feeling of dying at any moment, and I am afraid it might cease, without a backup pump to sustain life..." Melita said in a low voice, the distant stars reflected in her gemstone-like eyes, with stars slowly moving against the night sky backdrop, "But... there’s also a curious sense of reality. A genuine feeling of being alive, living in a real world."
"I often think there are too many implants inside me, nearly every critical organ has implants aiding operation, even every muscle and bone... This makes me feel like I’m no longer myself, but rather a copy made of machines and auxiliary brains, a ’Melita Ponia’ living within the same body, a parasitic monster made of steel and polymer hiding within my flesh and bones... But now the parasite’s heart has stopped entirely, my own heart is supporting this body... The feeling is rather nice."
Her consciousness blurred, feeling drowsy, and in this half-dream state, she heard Nuoletta’s voice fuzzily coming through: "You’ve taken too much of the enhancer, becoming sentimental... But you did say one thing right, the feeling of dying at any moment is indeed real..."
"Goodnight..." Melita drowsily uttered.
Under the side effects of the enhancer, she finally fell asleep.
A faint golden light screen appeared out of nowhere the moment she fell asleep, tightly shielding her defenseless body, while above the light screen, amidst void, hundreds of thousands of eyes seemed to emerge faintly, coldly floating, staring unswervingly at the blue dragon protected by the barrier.
...
Within Typhon borders, in the center of a town near the eastern desert, the chapel of the War God stood quietly in the night, with its black iron spires pointing skyward, resembling a sharp sword beneath the starry sky.
A regular priest carrying a portable lamp strolled within the chapel, checking the state of each room and corridor.
Behind each door lay rooms as usual, only his footsteps echoed along the long corridor as he gradually approached the end of his patrol, where the priest’s chamber lay ahead.
In the clerical hierarchy of the War God Sect, the "War God Priest" is a higher-level cleric compared to regular priests, usually serving as wardens of local chapels, as is the case here.
Faint light emanated from behind the door at the corridor’s end, the door distinctly left ajar.
"Priest Costo hasn’t retired yet at this hour..."
The patrolling priest curiously muttered, stepping forward briskly.
Yet halfway along, a strange sound, akin to human moaning in torment, or perhaps murmuring in sleep, reached his ears.
With the special intuition of the Transcendent, the priest instantly felt a chill up his spine, followed by a surge of foreboding.
Something’s wrong!
Realizing this instantly, the priest quickened his steps, rushing to the door at the corridor’s end, as the scent of blood reached his nostrils.
Disregarding church protocols, the priest decisively applied triple protection over himself, prepared a rapid alert spell, and then pushed open the ajar wooden door.
Behind the door, only a shapeless mass of flesh lay sprawled on the ground, gradually losing vitality...
