RNP Page 17
Page 17
“Go…” Artemis steadied herself and said calmly, “Add male essence to those dragon eggs.”
"Huh?" Latis made the face of someone using an old man's cell phone on the subway. "Don't they do that kind of great harmony movement of life?"
“Generally speaking, no,” Ateliers said uncertainly. “Our family library doesn’t cover this kind of knowledge much, but I’ve heard that female dragons have barbs inside their bodies. Unless they are also dragons, or other higher races, it’s unlikely they would do such a thing…”
"Holy crap?" Latis couldn't help but squeeze his legs together. "Really?"
“Yes, unless the female dragon chooses to release the egg, but that’s a contract that’s more like a unique one.” Ateliers coughed twice. “Back to the dragon eggs, because the chances of a dragon egg conceiving are very low, male creatures who make a contract with a female dragon usually suffer a lot. They have to… well, water the eggs every day. The whole process might take one to two years.”
"What?!" Latis's expression shifted from shock to fear to admiration, before he murmured, "Lake Lou is truly amazing..."
"Lekmoro? Lekmoro!" Serfar shouted, his eyes blazing with fury. "Aaaaah, Lekmoro!"
"What's wrong with her?" Latis asked Arte quietly.
“Not sure, let’s see… Although dragons are not usually mentally stable, she seems to be under some kind of spell…” Artemis looked at the screaming red dragon with equal confusion and couldn’t help but back away from the wall.
"Huh?" Her foot slipped, and she gently braced herself with her hand on the ground. Then she picked up the crumpled letter at her feet and glanced at it.
"A list of sacrifices?" Ateliers pursed her lips. "Fan Yunkun, the son of the Dragonhorn Lord? The young red dragon, the soul of the dead, and me?"
Her eyes darkened, then she continued looking down.
"...Wait, this is... Latis, whose last name is Titania, and he is suspected to be a descendant of the Titans. When he was ten, the city magistrate killed his mother, but failed to awaken him; when he was twelve, his father was interrogated and his body was dumped in the house, but no clues about the Titan remains were found, and Latis did not awaken; when he was fifteen, the village official was bribed to interfere with his meditation process and was publicly humiliated, but Latis still did not awaken; when he was eighteen, the villain Maguire destroyed his farmland and forced him to crawl between his legs, but he still did not awaken..."
Artemis's bright blue eyes gradually churned with raging waves as her anger rose higher and higher until she turned to the next page. Her magic burst forth, crushing the document in her hand into ashes.
"At the age of twenty-one, he used the Black Hat to interfere with her meditation, causing her magic to flow backward and make her dizzy. Taking advantage of her unpreparedness, he pretended to want to blaspheme the goddess and instigated the priest to mark her with the blasphemy, making her realize that she could no longer learn magic and thus remained unawakened."
"The plan was abandoned, and the execution was planned."
Chapter 28 You are a Dragon
A large hand stroked the half-elf's messy silver hair.
Artemis looked up and saw a grinning face looming in front of her.
"Hey kid, what's the matter that makes you so angry?"
Latis hooked his arm around Ateliers' shoulder and whispered:
"You're not also in a state of impotent rage because you can't move those two rich White girls, are you?"
Artemis was stunned for a moment, then shook her head, both amused and exasperated. She stood up, hesitated for a moment, and ultimately decided not to tell Latis the contents of the letter.
“Since my elder brother’s appeal failed, going through the normal channels to appeal is probably pointless. Lord Dragonhorn is dead, there’s no way to verify anything…” She pondered silently. “I heard that for high-ring mages, the headquarters of the Goddess Church offers opportunities to receive divine revelation and cleanse their sin marks. In short, I should just keep watching over my elder brother as he cultivates. The sin marks aren’t that important; what’s important is who’s behind all this… and I don’t want him to worry about that…”
"Ate, Ate! Quickly use your invincible magic book to think of a way! If I don't pick up this money, I'll wake up a hundred years from now and slap myself twice!"
Latis's shout brought Ateliers back to her senses. She watched as Latis began stuffing gold coins into his crotch, sighed, and composed herself before calmly replying:
"As a mage, once you reach the third ring, you are capable of creating a dimensional rift. If the rift is stable enough, you can store items in it. However, you usually don't put anything too important in it, because that dimension might be completely annihilated at any time, and the loss would be huge."
Latis nodded knowingly, thinking to himself:
"Why does the word 'mage' sound a bit like a gopher that digs holes between planes to store food?"
Then, he saw Artemis's magic surge, tearing open a dark purple wormhole in the air.
The treasure chest filled with gold coins was swallowed by the wormhole, and Ateliers clapped her hands decisively. She looked at Latis, a thoughtful expression on her face, then nodded vigorously, took out 20 gold whites, and handed them to Latis:
Here's some pocket money! Ask me for more if you need it!
"okay!"
Latis, holding the gold coins, suddenly paused, "Why do I feel like I'm being kept by the god of gold coins..."
He shook his head, looked at the now quiet red dragon, walked to her side, and asked:
"Are you really not leaving? Your life is in danger here!"
Serfal:
Will someone come to kill the dragon?
Latis nodded and gestured as he spoke:
"Yes, then your head will look like this, like this, and then it'll fall to the ground with a thud!"
Serfal:
"(???) That scared the dragon to death!"
“…So you’d better leave quickly,” Latis thought to himself. “Otherwise, when the priestess arrives, we two blasphemers will have to go back in.”
Serfael waved her dragon claw, and a faint glow enveloped her body. Then, with a flash of white light, her enormous dragon form vanished instantly.
Amidst the collapsed ceiling rubble, a sultry woman dressed in a dancer-like off-the-shoulder feathered top and strappy stockings flapped her rough dragon wings and said smugly:
"Serfal is no longer a dragon!"
"..." Latis was silent for a moment, then shouted, "Anyone can tell you're a dragon, right?!"
Serfar touched the dragon horns in his curly hair, wagged his tail, and said in surprise:
"(???) How could this be..."
"Look at yourself, don't you look like a dragon?!"
"(﹁﹁) You are the dragon! You are more of a dragon than me!"
"Damn... well, never mind." Latis looked back at the half-elf's silver hair and pointed ears, then at his own tattered straw robe, which looked like it had been opened after days of wear and tear, and sighed.
"This scene can only be described as 'The Three of Us'... I just hope that Londia is an inclusive big city..."
He and Artemis collected the remaining seeds and headed towards the room where the magic circle was located.
……
“My memory of the teleportation array in Herod City is a bit hazy,” Arterifus said as she walked, her fingers, clad in black leather gloves, fiddling with the ends of her hair.
“When I was very young, the number of people visiting Herod City had already been decreasing year by year. I was very afraid of people with all sorts of ferocious faces when I was a child, so I rarely participated in social activities. When I grew up, people said that I had a strange personality, so I rarely used the teleportation array.”
"Why?" Latis asked curiously. "Arte, don't you like to wander around?"
“Hmm!” Arterifus nodded, a slight smile on her face. “I like to go out into the wilderness and search for ancient ruins or traces of labyrinths. It’s been a long time since any labyrinths have been discovered on the continent of Atlantis… Speaking of teleportation arrays, those arrays lead to social centers in various countries and regions. People like me with an elven appearance can’t escape the fate of being forced into social interactions no matter where I’m teleported to.”
“I see.” Latis exclaimed in sudden realization, “Then does that mean the portal to Lundia will also lead to…”
"It should teleport you to the Golden Hall in Lundia, which is the exhibition and evaluation venue for modified and newly created spells."
"Huh, what's that?" Upon hearing details that had never appeared in the simulator before, Latis suddenly became very curious.
“Well… it was more of a celebration for the mages who relied on the magic network,” Arterifus said somewhat sadly. “The Golden Hall showcased the effects of their spells offline, while on the magic network, mages from all over the world could simultaneously use new spells and experience them firsthand. The magic network is truly a very convenient medium for communication among mages, especially compared to the old-school mages.”
“I can only imagine what a grand event it will be.” Latis patted Ateliers. “Don’t worry, second brother, if you ever have any inspiration for a modification technique in the future, I’ll help you spread it all over the world and name it after you!”
Artemis nodded slightly, then shook her head and said:
"My mind is no longer on this matter."
"Ah...revenge?" Latis thought to himself. "Speaking of which, Ateliers will probably be teleported to another country soon, just like in the simulation, right? How am I supposed to tell her that going to another country might mean failure?"
Serfar walked in front, pushed open the door, and suddenly turned around and shouted:
"(???) This room has so many doors, Serfal is lost again!"
"No, sis, are dragons really that stupid?" Latis thought to herself, rushing forward and glancing inside the room.
The spacious room was laid out in a uniformly divided hexagon, with sixteen doors lining the walls. Seven or eight doors were rotten or broken, with only remnants hanging askew from their frames. The rest of the doors were tightly shut, with only a few dim rays of light escaping from the cracks.
“You’re right, this is indeed the teleportation array for Herod City.”
Artemis stopped at the doorway, a glint of light flashing in her aquamarine eyes, before she sighed:
"They've already been downgraded..."
"Let me see." She walked into the room, slowly circled the room along the wall, and said:
"This door leads to Lundia, the adjacent door leads to Senhai Territory, those two lead to other countries, and the spatial coordinates of another door are unstable, so I cannot be sure."
“Then, Art…” Latis hesitated for a moment before asking, “Are you planning to leave Norard to plot your revenge?”
Artemis stared at Latis for a moment, then suddenly remembered the letter that revealed Latis's past. A deep blue undercurrent swirled in her eyes, and she pursed her lips, saying:
"No, I will go with you, to Londia together."
Chapter 29 Then what am I?
"Arte, don't go... Oh? You're going to Lundia too!"
"Hmm. Didn't you want to learn spellcasting from grimoires? I'm the only old-school mage in the world, and I promised to teach you, so I'm going to Lundia too."
"Great! But let's get this straight, I don't have the money to pay your salary... wait, what about your grudge?"
"I'll take my revenge once you're strong enough. Besides, as you said, I have a lifespan of a thousand years... Tsk, it feels like I can outlive my enemies until they all die..."
"How can that be considered a 'power fantasy' novel? Here's what we'll do: you should also cultivate diligently, and in two years we'll emerge from seclusion together, each with two legendary masters, making our enemies kneel down and call us 'daddy'!"
“…” Arterifus covered her forehead and sighed, “Just kill him easily… No, two years of legendary status, brother, you overestimate me.”
“Your belief is your magic!” Latis said solemnly. He pushed open the door, looked at the golden hall across the spatial turbulence, and waved his hand. “Come quickly!”
"No!" He pointed at Serfal, who was charging at him. "I wasn't talking about you, big sister, stop!"
The portal creaked and then swept the three of them inside.
In its thousand-year career, it has seen everything, even transported elephants. It's just that sometimes it feels like it's leaking some spatial fragments after stuffing an elephant in... But let's not dwell on the past. Now it's just transporting three people at the same time, including two tiny girls who look incredibly light. A piece of cake...
No, what's that so heavy?! The space tunnel is about to burst!
The steel frame is cracking, it's coming off, it's coming off! Ahhh!
boom!
Grayish-purple fragments of space were scattered all over the ground.
……
……
Latis stared blankly at the sky, letting out a deathly sigh in the orange-red sunlight of approaching dusk.
"My brother, my gold coins, my magic..."