"ROAARRR!!!"
A furious roar echoed from the Dragon King's palace.
As a dragon guardian, having its master taken by humans was the ultimate humiliation.
Shadows loomed heavily; atop the bronze pillars of the dome, dark figures slithered and coiled.
Dragons!
Fifteen meters in length, weighing over 50 tons, its pitch-black scales overlapped like slabs of stone. Fins along its sides flapped like wings, stirring the air with a heavy hum.
Its eyes burned with rage.
That furious roar continued to reverberate through the Dragon King's chamber.
Utterly terrifying.
Even Mai instinctively stepped back two paces.
This was a pureblood dragon—and not just any dragon, but a fully grown Dragon King's guard.
It was doubtful even underwater explosives could harm it.
This wasn't just a matter of raw strength—it was also intelligence.
A mature pureblood dragon was no less cunning than a seasoned hunter.
Ren Asakura and Lu Mingfei's faces remained calm and composed.
Old Tang, on the other hand, was a nervous wreck, hiding behind Lu Mingfei's back.
"Holy crap! Lao Lu, this thing is a dragon? That's insanely terrifying!"
Lu Mingfei rolled his eyes.
You're a Dragon King yourself, and you've got the nerve to say that?
Besides, there was an even more terrifying dragon still asleep nearby.
Samson!
A peak-stage second-generation dragon, second only to Dragon King Norton.
The dragon guardian's fins flapped continuously, bearing no resemblance to typical fish fins.
Its black scales scraped against the bronze pillars, producing a sharp ka-ka-ka sound.
It was a sign of an imminent attack.
Like a serpent, it coiled itself up before a strike—ready to spring, spine taut and muscles compressed, preparing to launch with blinding speed.
It was far beyond the speed the human eye could follow.
And that's exactly what the 15-meter-long dragon guard was doing—loading tension into its terrifying body, moments from lunging forward.
It rose!
A shadow dropped from the dome above!
Its massive jaws opened wide—razor-sharp yellow teeth layered like a meat grinder.
Was it trying to swallow them all whole in one bite?!
Mai swiftly drew her gun from behind her back.
"Bang! Bang! Bang!"
The bullets from her pistol couldn't pierce the dragon's black scales.
Only a few sparks flickered along the shadowy figure's body, which continued charging toward them without losing momentum.
Ren Asakura raised a single finger.
And flicked it forward.
A streak of light flashed across the air.
The dragon guardian's upper and lower jaws split apart—cleanly severed.
And it didn't stop there.
A devastating force surged backward, slicing its massive body clean in half from head to tail.
The cut was unnaturally smooth. The two halves were symmetrical, like a masterpiece carved by the finest artisan in the world.
It rose—and then got instantly killed!
Mai swallowed hard.
A dragon guardian that even bullets couldn't harm—sliced in two like it was nothing.
Then what about a human?
They'd probably be even easier to deal with.
Ren Asakura scratched his head sheepishly. "Oops… looks like I accidentally crushed a lizard."
Lu Mingfei was speechless. He was confident he could kill that dragon guardian himself—
But to do it so effortlessly, and with such elegance?
That was beyond him.
Blood soaked the ground.
The dragon guardian, now split perfectly in half, gradually went still.
Ren Asakura stroked his chin.
"Say, do you think killing Old Tang's house security is kinda... rude?"
Lu Mingfei hadn't considered that at all.
To him, saving Old Tang was the only priority.
"Revive!"
Ren Asakura snapped his fingers.
As if time reversed—
The spilled blood flowed back into the corpse, and the two halves rejoined.
A second later, golden pupils snapped open.
It lived again!
"ROAR!"
As soon as it revived, the dragon guardian twisted its body and lunged at the group like a black shadow.
The next second—it was sliced into 108 equal pieces!
Each segment was perfectly uniform in size.
Another work of art.
"This security guard's kind of overstepping his bounds, huh?"
Ren Asakura waved his hand and revived the dragon guardian once more.
Then it rose again, got instantly killed again, and was revived again.
Mai hadn't expected the legendary, proud, and powerful dragon race to be played with like a toy in Ren Asakura's hands—repeatedly and without effort.
Ren Asakura seemed to be thoroughly enjoying it.
Finally, when he got bored, Ren Asakura directly yanked out the dragon guardian's spine.
"Check it out—15 meters of spine blade!"
Grinning, Ren Asakura twirled the spine around in his hand.
The smooth, polished spine was the hardest and most resilient part of the dragon guardian's skeleton.
You could say that this 50-ton, 15-meter-long body was able to move with such grace and flexibility only because of this spine.
Now, it looked like an enormous sword, with the fin at the tailbone as sharp as a sword's tip.
Ren Asakura looked like a child who'd just gotten a favorite toy, spinning the bone-sword around with flourish.
The flesh and tissue had been stripped clean—immaculately clean.
"Hey Mingfei! Wanna give it a try?"
Lu Mingfei waved his hand, declining. "Not really my kind of thing."
Using someone's spine as a weapon?
That just felt… like some old pervert stuff.
Ren Asakura spun the spine again with flair.
"In the name of anything defiant, behold—I shall drive even Heaven itself mad!"
Lu Mingfei sighed and shook his head.
"Enough playing around, Group Leader. Something's off with Old Tang."
On the other side, Old Tang was clutching the bronze urn holding his brother and looking completely lost.
Flashes of strange visions kept flickering through his mind—
They were Norton's memories.
Once, Norton and Constantine had both been in the Dragon King's chamber.
But as the elder brother, Norton had been born first.
Then, most likely due to something Lu Mingze did, Norton never awakened those memories. Instead, he drifted far across the ocean.
And ended up being adopted by a Chinese-American family in the U.S.
Twenty years later, he became a bounty hunter.
Then he stepped onto the stage prepared by Lu Mingze.
And that's when it all began—
The dragon kings, who hadn't died once in thousands of years, began to fall one by one.
Ren Asakura pointed his spine-sword at Old Tang.
"Hold up, monster! I can tell just by looking—you're not human! Haha! Lost in confusion again, aren't you?"
Old Tang really was confused!
Norton's memories had begun to awaken the moment he saw his brother.
This was the brother he loved most—the one he refused to devour, even in death.
Now, the memories of Dragon King Norton and the memories of Old Tang as a human were blurring together.
He couldn't tell who he really was anymore—
Was he the Dragon King Norton?
Or just a human named Old Tang?
He didn't know.
He couldn't tell anymore!
°°°
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