Akevorax returned to the Dragonlands without a single problem, outside of the explanation given to some supreme tiers regarding his devolved circumstances. Unfortunately, all trails of the eternal warrior had been completely destroyed, so much so that only a god possessed means of tailing them. Luckily, the losses to him weren’t so immense that they crippled his future.

When he returned to the cave, he found the four humans there all catatonic, no one able to speak to one another as though they personally decided his fate sealed. Perhaps it didn’t help that the other two members of the party were somewhere on the planet without any indication.

“So you weren’t able to do anything… Was it a Sage?” Mala noticed him first and spoke as soon as he entered earshot range, the words triggered Raccelline to move quickly.

‘Quickly’ in this case meant teleporting onto his back straight away.

“Cornem, turns out even with divinity I didn’t stand a chance. Not unless I made a ton of risks,” his disconnected words hinted towards the few methods capable of even killing supreme tier dragons. However, he was still years away from repaying the orb’s providence, and void flames required very special conditions to even exist momentarily. Once he evolved in such a way that he could control the Divinus-wrecking flames, then the day of the merger would come.

For now, he quietly rested and recovered in the cave with support from the dragons. Life essence was readily available, albeit rarely used as dragons at the 4th growth phase required so much that it’d bankrupt them to utilise.

Akevorax just gulped down a litre of partially diluted life essence every day and rapidly progressed in size and wingspan once more. In fact, after a single month he completely recovered to his towering 8 metre long size. With wings now strong enough to carry the relatively lightweight dragon, he could soar through the air once more and accelerate greatly.

The past month came with even greater revelations though.

Manus soon found out about Salvation’s wilful actions, not infuriated that the elven god attempted to take Akevorax’s life, but deeply unsettled by the prospect of wars on two fronts. The warrior in question didn’t make it very far though, a web of observing demigods picked up on the sudden release of power and captured the fleeing Cornem rank immediately.

While it sounded a bit extreme, in reality every sub-realm near any of the eight worlds was under constant management to ensure nothing too powerful cropped up and casually annihilated a country or two before someone slew it. So, with incredulous tensions about, obviously a Great Sage or demigod immediately left to identify a sudden surge of power, Manus easily tracked the individual, with more than capable subordinates able to trap and execute them.

Taking this individual alive was never even an option, the warrior nearly detonated themselves thrice during the battle when they attempted captures.

Things on the continent were perilous and worth talking about, but as Korridan was the most up to date with the news, following the various geopolitical situations abound, he told it to the group best.

His lecture started a bit messily, “So the overarching struggle is definitely between humans and the eternals, but that’s not worth talking about as much. Rather, the biggest conflict right now is a clear division in the continent itself. The empire of man up north, and the southern ‘alliance’ down, well, south. I say alliance but it’s more like a federation of independent nations, that’s a whole different problem though. Where was I?”

“The biggest struggle being an internal conflict,” Mala chimed in to remind him of the exact place. A fair thing since he really didn’t seem all that used to talking at length about non-battle related topics.

“It goes without saying the southern alliance wants to break the empire’s tax laws, with fair reason I’ll add, since the corruption in that process is almost ridiculous. But they go a bit far as wanting to ‘break’ the empire completely. Fortunately, they have no intentions to go to war. No serious intentions at least, and it seems the eternals have picked up on that too,” Korridan paused at a transitory point for effect. He tried to build tension in the explanation, but lacked the intense enthusiasm or weight in his voice like Mala placed to create that crescendo.

To move on from his lengthy, flat explanations, the two major forces of the continent butted heads several times over the past year.

This was no secret, with the alliance having blown up a few minor ports of the empire as well as bombarding them with some magical artillery. This entire process merely flattened some mountains as an intimidation tactic, but to even further this growing tension, both sides used the conflicts of minor nations as an excuse to fight proxy wars. All of this actually convinced most of the world that a cold war began, overall a smart decision as the eternals recently roused up trouble in the continent.

But as the progression of this cold war remained mostly static or fizzled out in recent months, most quickly realised an obvious truth in retrospect, who was stupid enough to give the enemy an easy victory?

The people in charge of these large forces contained hundreds of Sages and Cornem ranks wary of their lives, and they certainly didn’t want to waste time and energy into fighting fellow humans just to let eternals waltz right over their corpses!

Sure, they absolutely wanted to demolish one another, but their hatred for the underground magnate’s attitude completely eclipsed their dislike for the other side!

Not to mention, they all knew how many Great Sages died these past couple years. While only a couple weaker Primordius ranks died, a whopping 12 Great Sages were killed. The entire empire continent combined only had around 40 of before those deaths, and with over a quarter dead in merely two years…

The general antagonism towards eternals within the higher-ups couldn’t be understated. Ordinarily speaking, most of them could at least live safely after a war so long as they accepted some concessions, like providing for the victor and sealing a portion of their powers. Powerful wizards were always in high demand, so who’d risk killing them?

Another race, obviously!

“Oh, right… I got some information just a few days ago. The eternals were advertising that they moved something of great human importance into their darkness prison’s lowest level. And supposedly there was news alongside it, but most considered it unimportant,” Korridan’s eyes looked away from everyone else’s as though it was hard for him to accept the news himself. The slight waver in his tone showed enough seriousness alone.

“Are they talking about my dad?” Raccelline burst out with a question, somewhat in denial but also smart enough to know that little else of such value existed in the eternals’ grasp. At least, nothing that they’d intentionally advertise.

Mala and Akevorax both nodded to her question, feeling it highly likely, but the two cared more for that additional information Korridan mentioned. Something which unsettled even the beefy warrior.

And when pressed, he finally answered, “They said they captured a ‘high-value human target’... One with close relations to the imperial princess. And placed him at the prison’s depths as well,” Korridan dropped the vague connotations at the end, directly referring to ‘him’ without a hint of vagueness.

“How did they capture Jaren? It should be almost impossible for them to extract him,” Mala spoke with relative certainty as ever Mithril ranks struggled to sneak up on the competent archer. Even those with extreme stealth like Rebecca couldn’t maintain completely stable veils at close range, thus it gave away their presence in those final few steps.

Just like how the progenitor always predicted her movements when she slashed out.

“They should have used her as bait then. Rebecca is great at hiding until a wizard comes out… If she truly changed, then it’s possible she sold him out for her own sake,” Akevorax gave a harsh analysis of the situation. In his heart, the revived Rebecca contained a serious flaw, but the extent of which was unknown. Would she willingly throw away over a decade of memories for self-preservation?

He didn’t know; none of them could answer that. But they wanted to give her the benefit of the doubt, nonetheless.

“The deepest layer then… If I reach the level of demigods I should be able to get in and out safely. But if they can tie me down for more than a few hours, I’ll die anyway,” Akevorax very calmly moved the discussion onto their more pressing matter. Somehow saving Raccelline’s father and Jaren from that prison.

The darkness prison was specially built by the eternals as a means to hold any and all prisoners of other races. As the overwhelming dark elements actually strengthened their race, therefore allowing even Cornem rank guards to secure the Primordius ranks within. Especially the deepest layer of the prison which contained a spatial rift to the dark source, a special type of dimension composed entirely of dark elements and constantly producing more.

All the source dimensions functioned like this, but every last one of them except for the pure source were incredibly hard to utilise. Even here the eternals only dared to open a tiny rift as a way to leak rich elements into their prison!

Mala asked an all-important question, “Can you do that in 5 years?”

“Cornem tier is easy, I can frankly get there in 1 year… If I try, I can probably upgrade a psychic bloodline to greatly speed up my building speed for my Mind palace. My Soul isn’t a huge issue, right now it’s the repair rate of my palace which bottlenecks it. There is a way to get there faster, I suppose…”

“The dragonstone? I thought you’d prefer to use that after reaching master tier properly though?” Korridan recalled a conversation they had some weeks ago, when they questioned Akevorax about using it to regain the power lost through revival.

But since the dragonstone specifically scaled to the dragon’s power, it was most useful if he reached master tier himself before use.

He already had a masterful idea to get back though.

“The evolution might have wiped out my physical changes, but the upgrade to my soul is still there alongside the improvement to my soul armaments,” his tone mimicked that of a teacher asking a question to the class, but the strange smile would send a shiver down anyone’s spine. Expectantly, he asked the question, “How many evolutions do you think I can syphon out of thousands of dragons?”

Of course, this was just his way of doing things by now…

The very next day, prior to the new rounds of mass blood collection, he used the intact teleporter in the Dragonlands to harvest more giant bones. It took just a few minutes for him to break apart another desiccated body in the prymite egg, then teleport back over. Assimilation of the Conquering Juggernaut bloodline came first, a process he already experienced and withstood quite easily, with the help of another leaf from the ice rose.

For a while, a long while at that, the horrid monster which drained blood from the dragons once more appeared… And just a month into the process it began to target some of the weaker cornem tiers. Chaos exacerbated constantly, yet all the supreme tiers turned a blind eye and ignored their complaints.

To have their blood stolen by a little mithril tier dragon who almost died against an unstoppable foe…

They only had their own weakness to blame.

* * *

In the underground stone citadel of the eternals, what began as a hopeful alliance already turned to catastrophe. The eternals failed to exterminate Akevorax, even if the warrior stated in his final moments that he absolutely destroyed the dragon’s brain and heart. With literally one major goal for this whole mission, it should’ve been easy to succeed given a whole empire’s resources like their own… But they actually failed!

How did that even make sense?

And then on top of that, the elven Great Sage in front of Muthzud hardly put on appreciable airs. With a glowing rage, the unbearable condescension in their eyes frustrated what ought to be a mighty, proud emperor. That elf finally said, “So not only was his Soul and Mind somehow able to escape successfully, but you’re saying our lord’s own protection failed to hide your crappy blade? If he was willing to expose himself, then he should’ve laid down his life to ensure a finished job!” The Great Sage hardly took the death of a Cornem rank seriously, even less so given it was an eternal they presumed wouldn’t make it back.

“His escape mechanism was at the demigod level, I don’t see how any of us could’ve dealt with it. Also, who are you to complain? If your god just used less common runes, there’s no way he’d have distinguished them!”

“The human god obtained a high-rank godhood long ago, anything aside from a divine being’s specialisation stood no chance at hiding from that level of power. We only even got you outside this dank pit with those runes,” the elderly elf’s constipated face looked at the dark underground without a single look of impressiveness. Even simpler elven cities eclipsed it in architecture, let alone the best of their best.

And to think this whole empire called it their capital.

Both sides talked with facts purely as a way to poke holes at one another, partly as they blamed the other for this operation's loss and discovery. But that wasn’t even the worst of it, in reality, it all came down to a single fact.

How did this dragon have a method to survive in his circumstance?

Muthzud could only care for such things so much though, and with a snort returned the conversation to its rails, “Given that you’re now completely thrown in with us, will you keep on mediocre aid?””

“We need time to mobilise enough numbers. Only our top ranks will support you, we have no desire to move troops through the Stormwall.”

“And what about the little troubles?”

“Do you want to fight the dragon’s clan lord? I doubt he will play any part in this war though, five years is just too short a time. Even if his talent eclipses everything that has ever existed, as you claim.”

Muthzud’s room of darkness condensed slowly back into a ball of black fluid, then transforming into a humanoid form once more. His true body as an eternal showed, and he donned a robe of cerulean blue and vibrant magenta, albeit a dark splodge of colours in the light-less environment. On his body, silver markings in the shapes of both elegant flowers and scrawny geometric doodles lit up and coated him in a dark grey set of plate armour. This armour almost seemed to radiate intense darkness, as though it was a child of such inanimate objects in the least descriptive sense. An armour of sophistory that existed without form nor purpose, just a delusion of existence.

The two teleported to a pit deep below the citadel, one well known throughout the world as a dangerous prison. However, even though the elf ought to have weakened greatly in such a place, somehow the armour of darkness about Muthzud acclimated them to such a place as well, negating the corrosive dark which ate away at power without end.

“I told you, it was never in my words that he had such potential. But tell me, what 7-year-old creature reaches this level? I have certainly heard no dragon capable of it, and I have killed more than a couple ‘talents’ in my time.” His words attacked the elf, but the other side showed no emotion from this information.

Certainly, they had heard of Akevorax’s fast development from Muthzud before, the eternals watched him grow for 2 years in Trifer before, but to think he was merely 7 years of age.

Given that the divinity gave him full means to fight even the best Starlite ranks too…

“How will we kill him?” The elven Great Sage no longer held back, the death of this prodigal dragon changed the fates of both races immensely. At least, as they stared at the chained and beaten human kneeling on a damp floor in utter darkness, a plan was hatched.

A plan to kill the most frightening creature they’d ever heard of.

And it was made of ice cream.