Chapter 1320: Reaching Deep in the Abyss

For several minutes, he simply enjoyed riding on her back.

He had never really understood why people in fantasy stories became obsessed with riding Dragons until now. Flying was hardly special to him anymore after becoming a Sky Sovereign, he could also cross space through the Void, create portals across absurd distances and travel faster than nearly anything ordinary people could comprehend, yet none of that possessed the same ridiculous satisfaction as sitting on the back of an enormous Dragon while ancient lights moved across her scales.

It was objectively cool.

There was no deeper cultivation truth hidden inside that realization.

No profound understanding of the Dao.

’Riding a Dragon is simply fucking cool.’

Phei stretched both arms behind his head and smiled at the glowing cavern passing around them: "If Maddie asks, I did not enjoy this."

The Dragon Lady’s head shifted slightly.

"I have dignity."

A doubtful feeling crossed the bond.

Phei frowned. "You’re becoming very disrespectful."

There was more amusement. Phei pointed at the back of her head. "This is what happens when you get too comfortable with family. First they love you, then suddenly they think they’re allowed to judge you."

The Dragon Lady’s steps seemed lighter afterward.

That made Phei’s smile fade into something quieter.

He rested his hand against her again: "By the way, where did you live before this?"

The Dragon Lady slowed.

Phei immediately felt the change through their bond.

"I mean before these bastards captured you."

Her entire mood shifted.

The lightness disappeared.

Phei regretted the question almost immediately, but he did not withdraw it. If she truly was going to become family, he wanted to know her. Not merely how she fought, what she could eat or how hard her scales were, but where she came from and what had been stolen from her before this abyss became the only world she remembered.

For several breaths, she gave him nothing.

The Dragon Lady reached deeper and their Soul Bond opened.

Phei did not receive words but distance... immense distance.

A frozen world, though its winter carried none of the cruelty found here. There was light in that cold. Warmth somewhere beneath it. Wide skies. The impression of other presences, enormous and familiar, moving far beyond what his mind could clearly see.

Then came fear; a sudden tearing sensation, something being taken and the warmth vanished before the abyss replaced it.

Phei’s fingers slowly curled against the scale beneath his palm.

"You were young."

The Dragon Lady did not answer.

Phei swallowed the next question.

He had wanted to ask exactly how young she had been when they captured her, but something in the pain crossing between them told him not to.

"Okay."

His voice became quieter.

"We don’t have to talk about it."

The Dragon Lady continued walking.

Phei rubbed her scale gently.

"But when this is over, if your home still exists and you want to find it, I’ll help." Her steps slowed. "We’ll look together."

A faint warmth returned through the bond.

Phei smiled. "And if you don’t want to go back home yet, then you’re coming with me anyway, so either way you’re stuck with me. Family privilege."

The Dragon Lady gave a quiet rumble.

Phei nodded. "Exactly."

Ahead, the luminous cavern gradually became darker.

The blue-white crystal veins remained inside the walls, though something black had begun appearing among them. Thin channels crossed the ancient ice at first, barely wider than Phei’s fingers, before growing broader the farther they travelled. Several eventually became trenches running through the walls and floor, all of them stretching toward the deeper reaches of the abyss.

Phei knew those channels.

He had seen their smaller branches around the place where the Dragon Lady had once been imprisoned.

The Dragon beneath him became tense.

Phei felt the hatred before seeing the faint tremor that passed through her enormous body.

Those channels had carried what was stolen from her the Zone Lord had spent centuries taking.

Phei’s True Void Sense followed the black paths through the surrounding ice. Hundreds joined together farther ahead, converging toward the same hidden depths where the Zone Lord waited.

Some had fed the armies.

Some had nourished the two World Transcendents.

The rest continued deeper.

Phei narrowed his eyes: "So that’s where it went."

The Dragon Lady stopped.

One of the World Transcendent presences moved.

It shifted somewhere to their left, travelling through the ancient frozen structures before stopping beyond several towering pillars. The second moved almost immediately afterward, taking the opposite side.

They were surrounding them.

Phei sighed.

"Well, there goes my brilliant plan to run away and live happily ever after."

The Dragon Lady lowered her body slightly.

Power began gathering beneath her scales.

The three World Transcendent cores remained stored within her, and Phei tapped one scale beneath him with two fingers.

"You might want to use one." Her eye moved toward him. "I didn’t bring snacks for decoration."

Something shifted inside her.

One of the three cores vanished from Phei’s perception.

The change was immediate.

A torrent of power erupted through the Dragon Lady’s body. Blue-white brilliance raced beneath her scales, crossed her enormous wings and gathered along the crystalline ridges of her neck. The entire platform beneath them groaned as her aura surged outward, frost spreading in a violent circle and climbing every pillar within hundreds of meters.

Phei grinned: "That’s my girl."

The Dragon Lady glanced backward.

"My sister."

The glare softened slightly.

Phei laughed. "Yes, yes. Dragon sister. Very dignified."

Her jaws opened and a terrifying cold began gathering inside.

The two World Transcendents stopped moving.

Every crystal vein along the walls flickered.

The Dragon Lady froze beneath Phei.

The pale blue light nearest them weakened first, followed by the silver glow running across the ceiling. One after another, the ancient crystals dimmed as something deeper inside the abyss drew their brilliance away.

Phei looked around: "So the dramatic darkness wasn’t actually for show."

More lights vanished.

The enormous cavern slowly sank into blackness.

Phei stood upon the Dragon Lady’s back, one hand still resting against her while Void gathered quietly around his body. His Primordial Blood began moving faster beneath his skin, and True Void Sense spread through the darkness until the loss of ordinary sight became almost irrelevant.

The last distant crystal died.

Darkness swallowed everything.

Then two enormous eyes opened far ahead.

The pressure rolled through the abyss and made the ancient ice groan from every direction, while the Dragon Lady bared her fangs beneath Phei and released a low snarl that trembled through her entire body.

Phei felt her anger.

He also felt something else from farther ahead; something buried beneath the Zone Lord’s presence so deeply that he almost missed it.

Fear?

Phei slowly smiled and leaned down, patting the Dragon Lady once between two crystalline ridges.

"Well, little sister... looks like the bastard finally realized we came home."