Chapter 529
The Floating City Collapsing to Earth
Chapter 529 The Floating City Collapsing to Earth
The Red Emperor's City.
This capital city, nestled in the heart of the Rhine Plateau, resembles a colossal beast lying on the earth. After more than forty years of weathering the elements, it has become the most magnificent urban wonder on the Romanian plains.
On the south side of the royal city stands a colossal building shaped like a square monument.
It was cast from a magical alloy and was covered with intricate dragon patterns. The building was hundreds of stories high, and the watchtowers on each floor were spacious enough to allow a dragon to turn around.
Countless giant dragons flew and circled around the building.
The young red, black, and blue dragons flapped their wings, creating gusts of air as they landed on the watchtower, or they were taking off from the watchtower, their wings spreading out to cover a small patch of sky.
The higher you go, the fewer dragons there are, but the more robust they become, and the stronger their life force becomes.
As you approach the clouds, you can occasionally see the silhouette of a legendary dragon slowly passing by.
Its highest point has already reached into the clouds.
And this place is the symbol of the highest authority in the entire Kingdom of Aura, the Dragon Court located in the Red Emperor's City.
Beneath the Dragon Court lies a magnificent kingdom, with farmland spread out like a chessboard, mines operating day and night, and caravans winding along the roads like ants; within the Dragon Court live powerful dragons, who dwell, fight, and reproduce, forming the pillars of the kingdom; and above the Dragon Court stands the Red Emperor, who controls everything.
call!
A fierce gust of wind swept across the floating clouds, brushing against Garus's scales and making a soft, rustling sound.
At this moment, he was standing on the highest level of the Dragon Court.
Looking out from here, the sea of clouds surges beneath your feet, and occasionally, through the cracks, the mottled colors of the earth are revealed.
Compared to more than forty years ago, the Red Iron Dragon has reached a length of forty-eight meters from head to tail. Its skeleton is more refined, and the exaggerated muscle dimensions that were originally imposing have been toned down, making it look more compact and powerful overall.
The once outwardly fierce and ruthless aura has been somewhat concealed.
His regal bearing was even more imposing than before.
This change was caused by eating almost nine meals a day for three days straight, drinking black oil like water, and forcing himself to exercise.
Even so, Galos's life level still increased by one level.
Although he controlled his food intake, he still consumed plenty of high-energy substances such as black oil, gemstones, and precious metals.
Moreover, his respiratory and digestive systems were significantly enhanced.
With each long breath, Galus draws more free energy from the air, and when eating, the efficiency of his digestive system in converting food energy is greatly enhanced, with very little waste.
"In terms of energy absorption and conversion efficiency, it seems that at present it is only an accumulation of 'quantity' and an increase in 'intensity', and it is still some distance away from triggering a qualitative change."
"This level of evolution will most likely be completed through dormancy."
Galos gathered his thoughts and assessed himself.
As he has grown over the years, his evolutionary talent has also increased.
The problem is that his body is too strong now.
The difficulty of modifying and reshaping a legendary body is on a completely different level from that of a mortal body.
Given the strength and complexity of Garus's current body, it will still take time for him to accumulate changes in order to undergo a significant qualitative change and evolution.
However, he never lacks time.
For a normal dragon, the time it takes to evolve is merely a noteworthy ripple in the long river of its life.
Immediately afterwards, Galos turned his head to look westward, towards the continent of Aurotara.
Today, the true nature of the natural disasters sweeping across the continent of Aurotara can no longer be concealed.
As the war between the elves and orcs intensified, many messages surfaced and reached the land of Atlanta through merchant ships, wandering spellcasters, and transnational intelligence networks.
It was an invisible rage, which elven scholars called the "Curse of Fury".
It lies dormant within the target's body, remaining perfectly normal when not enraged, and can even enhance the host's fighting instincts.
However, it has extremely high infectivity and penetrability.
An angry stare, blood splattered during a fight, or even being in the same room for a short period of time can all become transmission routes.
Even the legendary realm cannot completely stop it; one can easily fall victim to its trap if one is not careful.
If it were just a natural disaster of rage, it would be relatively easy to handle.
The Nausir Empire itself possesses a highly advanced magical civilization. After experiencing initial chaos, it has developed barrier arrays to curb the spread of the virus and even created some potions and purification rituals to alleviate symptoms.
However, the orcs arrived.
After the orcs of the Kantum Empire set foot on the continent of Aurotara in a massive fleet, they immediately launched a fierce attack on the elves.
The war disrupted the elves' epidemic prevention plans and brought the disaster relief efforts to a standstill.
The curse of fury spread again, even reaching the orc army.
Left with no other option, the elves released detailed information about the natural disaster, attempting to make the orcs realize the seriousness of the problem and temporarily withdraw their troops to jointly deal with the crisis.
However, the orcs didn't care about this at all; in fact, they were even more excited.
Most of these barbarians are warlike, and eight out of ten of them take up professions such as berserker or war priest.
Many orcs deliberately infected themselves with the Fury Curse in order to become stronger.
They discovered that when reason is consumed by madness, the fighting instinct is amplified to the extreme, and pain can stimulate the explosion of potential.
They enjoy the feeling of their brains being burned by anger.
As a result, the continent of Aurotara was thrown into complete chaos.
The elves want to control the epidemic but have to deal with the war; the orcs are actively infected while fighting; ordinary civilians are struggling to survive in the midst of this double disaster.
"The madness within me comes from Gorsas, and he obtained it from a falling meteorite."
"The elves explored the starry sky, and then a meteor shower struck the continent of Aurotara, bringing natural disasters and the curse of fury, which is most likely also the Mad Fire."
Red Iron Dragon thought to himself.
It can be largely confirmed that the mad fire originates from the vast starry sky.
Interestingly, the information released by the elves explicitly mentions that infected individuals have a strong instinct to spread the Maniac Fire.
The method is also very simple.
One can infect others with the fury of battle.
However, Gorsas, who was suspected to be the first infected person in Atlanta, did not spread the virus.
The mad dragon used Frenzy Radiation in the battle, but mainly through "Wild Dragon" type spells, combined with Mad Fire to create a mental shock, rather than truly spreading its Mad Fire source.
Galos later adopted a similar approach.
After thinking about it carefully, he could probably guess what the mad dragon was thinking.
'My power, the power of the Mad Fire, is all mine! It belongs only to me, Gorthus!'
It's roughly due to this distorted possessiveness.
Gorsas, despite his confused thinking, managed to suppress the instinct to spread the Mad Fire. However, when he was finally killed, he could no longer suppress it and thus infected Garus.
Galos, too, could not bear to be affected.
After being infected, he immediately put aside everything else and focused all his energy on adapting to the maniacal fire until he was able to suppress it.
The dragon father and son each had their own reasons.
One, driven by insane possessiveness, and the other by extreme rationality, both confined their madness to themselves. Had it been placed on other creatures, perhaps the curse of rage would have swept across the continent of Atlanta first.
Now, the Mad Fire is no longer a problem for Garos.
He gazed toward the continent of Aurotara and felt an invisible call, as if a kindred spirit was resonating in the distance. But the madness in his heart did not boil over; it burned quietly, completely subservient to his will.
By blocking the source of the Mad Fire in the Fairy Wilderness, Galos completely gained control of this power.
Even when his manic rage reaches its most intense and raging point, he will not lose his reason.
His wildness underwent a qualitative change as a result. When activated, he no longer needed to worry too much and could let the mad fire burn freely, converting it purely into an increase in combat power.
Most importantly, Frenzy Fire can also be combined with Mind Skills.
hum!
A faint glow of psionic energy flickered in the eyes of the Red Iron Dragon.
Under his gaze, an invisible fire of madness ignited out of nowhere.
It has no temperature or light and cannot be seen with the naked eye.
But if a life were to stand in that position, it would feel a surge of anger rising from the depths of one's heart for no reason, reason would be burned away, and the instinct to fight would override all thought.
“I can ignore the weakening effect of magic and directly ignite the Mad Fire in the target’s mind, burning away their sanity. This technique is very effective against mages who rely on calm casting.”
A moment later, the light in his eyes faded.
Galos has also studied the path of a mind mage, but his current level is not high, and he has not mastered many powerful mind spells.
However, with the combination of the Eye of Truth and Madfire, it can already achieve very good results.
However, Galus's primary purpose in pursuing this path was not combat.
There are quite a few things that can affect the mind, such as mania and emotional fruits.
Even though Garus has the "heart of iron" trait, he cannot be completely immune to all influences and will be affected to some extent.
By cultivating spiritual practices, he can better control his thoughts and minimize such influences.
Ultimately, this is all about better controlling one's own power.
Using reason to control power has always been one of Galos's core beliefs.
Immediately afterwards, the red iron dragon looked straight ahead.
It is now dawn.
In the distance, the enormous sun is slowly rising, showering the light and heat it has accumulated overnight upon the boundless sea of clouds.
In an instant, the world was ignited.
The clouds rolled and surged, like liquid flames colliding and boiling with gold. Shadows and dazzling spots of light chased and played on the sea of clouds, creating an extremely magnificent picture.
"Fire clouds pave the way to heaven, only the red crown commands the morning stars."
The dragon let out a low growl.
Then, he lowered his massive head, his gaze piercing through the gaps in the sea of clouds.
Here, he could overlook the entire Crimson Emperor City without any obstruction. As his view continued, the continuous mountain shadows of the Ryan Plateau undulated like the spine of a giant dragon. Further away, the blurry outlines of other countries at the edge of the plains appeared and disappeared on the horizon.
Almost all dragons prefer the feeling of being at the highest point, looking down on everything.
The status of the Aura Dragons is actually reflected in their high position during their time in the Dragon Court.
Ordinary dragons reside in the lower level, elite dragons in the middle level, and legendary and high-ranking dragons in the upper level.
The highest point of the Dragon Court belongs to the Red Emperor.
He is above all other dragons.
However, when this dragon king looked down upon the earth, although he felt a sense of vastness, he did not feel proud of it.
Because he knew that he was also one of those being "looked down upon".
Galos raised his head again and gazed into the distance.
In the higher reaches of the sky, above the Middle-earth, he could see the faint outlines of some colossal cities.
That's Holden's floating city.
Just as Galus overlooked the Romanian plains, the people of Holden looked down upon the entire land of Atlanta.
“This behemoth has become even more powerful in recent years.” Galos’s dragon eyes narrowed slightly as he adjusted his focus to examine the details more closely.
"The Abyss Development Project... has given Holden almost unlimited resources. They have even stopped caring about fighting with other empires and are only focused on their own development."
Over the past few decades, the Kingdom of Aura has experienced tremendous growth.
Besides the benefits of war, it also made significant contributions to the development of the Fairy Wilderness.
Therefore, he was well aware of the benefits Holden could gain from the abyss.
The abyss is indeed dangerous.
Demons, evil gods, dangerous rules, an aura that erodes reason... any one of these is enough to cause the collapse of a mortal kingdom.
But huge risks often mean huge rewards.
Holden has benefited immensely and now maintains a completely detached attitude.
They no longer intervened in the struggle for continental supremacy, nor did they pay attention to other countries, as if the entire material world was no longer of interest to them.
As if sensing something, Hong Tielong suddenly narrowed his eyes.
Immediately afterwards, he took out a communication device that was flashing with lightning from his spatial storage.
This is a communication tool given to him by the Helmod dragonflight, no, now it should be said that it is a blue dragon from the Thunder Kingdom of Brakton.
"Your Majesty Ignas, good day."
After the item was activated, the familiar dragon language was heard.
Galos remembered the voice.
It belongs to the ancient blue dragon Kel'Drog. When Brekton founded his kingdom, he contacted Garros to express his congratulations on the Kingdom of Aura's dominance of the Romanian plains. Garros also offered his congratulations on the founding of his kingdom.
“Keldrog,”
Red Iron Dragon calmly replied, "The Thunder Kingdom was established not long ago. How are you doing lately?"
"Fortunately."
There was a pause on the other end, and the faint sounds of thunder and crashing waves came from the background, as if they were at the beach. "Although there are some minor troubles, they are all under control."
This is another voice.
Deep and rumbling like thunder, even more profound and dangerous than Kel'Thuzad, it resembles a thunderstorm churning at sea, instantly conjuring images of dark clouds pressing down and lightning tearing the sky apart.
Galos's expression turned slightly serious.
"What's your name?"
"My name is Ramirez."
The voice said, "Now, more people call me the Lord of Thunder." After a pause, the voice continued, "Red Emperor, from now on, I will speak directly to you."
"Keldrog, you may leave now."
"Yes, Father." The blue dragon's voice faded into the distance.
Ramiren Helmod, Lord of Thunder.
He is the eldest of the three Helmod brothers, the Primordial Blue Dragon.
After a brief self-introduction, Ramorion got straight to the point: "You should already know that the coastal nations have formed an anti-dragon alliance in an attempt to destroy my kingdom."
A month ago, several kingdoms along the western coast jointly announced the formation of an allied army.
They gathered a large number of legends and legions, with the slogan "Purify the evil dragon and restore peace to the coast." This matter spread like wildfire across the land of Atlanta, and Aura's intelligence department naturally had a detailed report.
"This is a challenge that the Kingdom of Blaketon will inevitably face."
"Garos said."
On the opposite side, the Lord of Thunder seemed to grin, and a thunderous echo resounded from him.
“I am never afraid of challenges, much less afraid of those self-proclaimed righteous alliances.”
"Heh, they came with the glory of the Grand Rank and the oath to slay dragons, and I, just now, together with my blood relatives, gave them destruction."
"Anti-Dragon Alliance?"
"When the last crown body was crushed by me, its flag burned in the downpour, it had already fallen apart."
"The defeated troops are fleeing to their respective countries, and my men are pursuing them, but not killing them, but driving them away so that they can take the news of their defeat back with them."
"Fear will reach their walls before my wings do."
Galos listened quietly.
This must have just happened; Aura's intelligence network hasn't received the news yet.
However, he was not particularly moved by the result.
The fact that the Helmod dragons were able to cause trouble despite being wanted by the Dragon Realm and various kingdoms already proved their strength and cunning.
Moreover, they had the idea of establishing a nation a century ago, but they kept it to themselves until recently when they finally took action. Since they dared to establish a nation, they must have made thorough preparations or had the corresponding confidence.
The only thing that puzzled Galos was that the Raging Dragon Domain didn't seem to have made a move.
The Purifying Dragonflight, led by the Bronze Dragon King, is fiercely opposed to evil and hates evil dragons. They would never stand idly by and allow the Helmod Dragonflight, which is their enemy, to establish a kingdom.
If the metal dragons join the war, the situation in the Kingdom of Braxton is now unpredictable.
Is there some problem within the Dragon Realm? Or did these blue dragons anticipate this and know that the metal dragons would remain silent?
Try asking Ovis when you have some free time; he might know something.
Galos thought to himself.
"Congratulations, Lord of Thunder."
Red Iron Dragon composed himself and said, "Using the bones of the enemy as a foundation is the best way to stabilize the kingdom. However, you contacted me specifically not just to share the joy of victory."
"of course not."
Ramorain's voice regained its composure, but the sharpness befitting a superior predator had not diminished.
"Now that we've cleared the weeds in front of our house, it's time to look at the scenery further out."
"Red Emperor, Garos Ignas, your Kingdom of Aura is now the undisputed uncrowned king of the Romanian plains, the master of the vast northern lands, while my Kingdom of Blaketon has cleared away the obstacles before us, and it won't be long before it can truly control the long western coastline and the rich river valleys, becoming the overlord of the west."
At this point, he changed the subject.
"But we all know that the real stage is never just the area where we stand."
"In Atlantis, Middle-earth is the richest land, filled with gems and gold, with the most fertile plains, the richest mineral veins, and the greatest wealth."
"That is the true hunting ground for dragons."
Galos remained silent for a second.
He asked, "What are you trying to say?"
Ramorain spoke slowly, emphasizing each word: "We should turn our attention to places where we can go further, such as bringing Middle-earth under our wings."
Upon hearing this, Galos suddenly offered his congratulations:
"Well then, first of all, I want to congratulate you, Lord of Thunder Ramorion, on officially entering the realm of immortality."
The other side was clearly taken aback for a moment.
Ramirez said, "Hmm? Immortality is one of my pursuits, but I am still a long way from achieving it..." As he finished speaking, he also understood the Red Iron Dragon's subtext.
[You dare to provoke Holden before you've even achieved immortality? How many lives do you think you have?]
After a brief silence, a low laugh came from the other end of the communication device, without any anger.
"Ha, you're worried about Holden."
“All their cities are detached from the earth, perched high in the clouds, like the palaces of gods overlooking mortals, but this also means…”
"The surface? Red Emperor, you should know that they no longer care about Middle-earth."
"All Holden settlements on the surface are abandoned, the mines are closed, the farms are deserted, and even the magic towers have had their cores removed. Those lands are waiting for us to conquer them."
Galos looked thoughtful.
Within Aura's intelligence network, gathering information on Holden is of paramount importance.
He certainly knew Holden's current condition.
Since the last ground city was launched into the sky twenty years ago, they have abandoned all their industries on the land.
It seems that the resources obtained from the abyss are more than enough to meet its needs, and are more convenient to obtain than those from the material world.
Middle-earth now appears to be a land without a master.
Holden’s mines were once overgrown with weeds, their pastures were once overrun by wild beasts, and their fortresses were once just empty walls.
But who can guarantee that Holden really doesn't care at all?
Although other countries were somewhat envious, especially those bordering China, none of them actually made a move.
Everyone was watching and waiting, fearing that this was some kind of test from Holden.
Judging from the Lord of Thunder's words, he seemed to want to be the first to try it out.
The reason for including oneself is most likely to diversify risk.
I know what you're worried about.
The Ancient Blue Dragon's tone was slightly playful, "However, I can assure you that Holden will not care about gains or losses on the surface."
"Right now, they have more pressing matters to attend to."
Lamorion lowered his voice slightly and said with a chuckle, "Transcendent? Heh, it's just temporary glory."
Does this guy actually know some secrets, or is he just pretending to be mysterious?
Galos seemed to be deep in thought.
If it's true, then it is indeed an opportunity.
The resources of Middle-earth are enough to allow the Kingdom of Aura to reach a new level.
But if it's false, or if Ramorion's intelligence is wrong, then the nation that first sets foot in Middle-earth will surely suffer Holden's wrath.
However, as the saying goes, "Kings don't meet."
In any case, he would not set foot on Middle-earth while the Holden Empire was still in existence.
The Kingdom of Aura is developing very well; steady and solid progress is the right path.
Galos was prepared to refuse outright.
But at that moment, his pupils suddenly contracted.
The Lord of Thunder on the other end of the communication device also fell silent, as if he had discovered something and temporarily held his breath.
"this?!"
Red Iron Dragon raised its head and stared intently at the sky.
High in the sky, among the outlines of those floating cities, a small black dot began to sway.
It wasn't a star, nor a bird, but something that had detached from the floating city. It was falling at an angle, its speed increasing under the pull of gravity, and its originally tiny outline became clearer and larger.
It was a tower.
A spire that fell from the edge of the floating city.
This was just the beginning. The floating city began to tremble violently, and then, with the collapse of more buildings, the entire floating city began to tilt and fall toward the ground.
(End of this chapter)