Chapter 393: Escape

"This is a bit troublesome... I hadn't considered this in advance. We might be delayed here."

With a single blow of his hammer, Wang Yu had driven the titanic abyssal beast down into the endless depths of the void. He hauled the corpse of the god of dreams back into the domain covered by his gate.

He had meant to test whether the irresistible pull born of the abyssal creature still lingered in this space. Yet what he saw through the cracks in the void was something else entirely.

An endless sea of water was crashing down into the void, as if the sky itself had turned liquid. It was a deluge that roared with such force it pierced the ears. The water was under so much pressure that it formed steam from the friction alone. Clouds of bubbles burst forth into the air.

No one had ever wondered where the waters of the Tidewall had come from. Now Wang Yu realized that the abyssal pit beneath the Endless Sea perfectly matched the towering wall that had always risen high above its surface. When he brought the Tidewall crashing down, all that water was naturally plummeting into the abyssal chasm below.

He had planned to fly out with magic or an alchemical engines. Now, he saw that his plan would be impossible. Even with high-tier wizardry to dispel the crushing pressure of tens of thousands of cubic meters of water, they wouldn't be able to maintain the spell long enough to reach the surface.

The greater danger lay in the abyssal biosphere itself—the behemoths of the sea, creatures whose vitality surpassed all natural measure. If such giants had been willing or able to venture into the shallows, they would long since have become a scourge on the continent.

But then again, for Wang Yu, who now had the means to slip into the void to evade harm, even such horrors were not true threats. They were nuisances at worst.

"Slow and steady through the void, then. The risk is low, even if it's slow going."

He had made his decision. His door's domain could move with him, albeit slowly. Dragging it around would require significant energy. Still, with the dream god's corpse, which was still brimming with power, he had more than enough reserves to haul their door thousands of meters upward through the sea.

Without pause, he set to work. The god's corpse lent him power as he began to pull the domain upward. The climb was not swift, but steady. He estimated that it would take four or five days to reach the surface. Compared with how long Sieg and Noelle had been trapped in their inhospitable dimension, this was nothing.

"There's a void creature approaching. Wang Yu, what should we do?"

Avia's voice reached him. He glanced outward. Indeed, once they had passed beyond the region the great octopus had claimed, void creatures had begun to appear.

These were warped, shrieking things, with wings and limbs twisted in an erratic manner.

Avia had been observing the void that lay beyond his domain. She had foreseen this moment and had prepared accordingly.

"I don't know," Wang Yu admitted. "Stay on guard. If only a few notice us, ignore them. If there are too many, we'll dodge into the material world through the cracks."

This new power of his was only now unveiling itself in full, and he himself was still groping at its limits. Could these void creatures even breach his domain? He didn't know. It was best to be ready to slip back and forth as needed.

Avia's foresight proved accurate. His domain blazed like a beacon amid the void, much as an evil god's incursion into the material plane would stand out. To void creatures, they looked like easy prey.

More and more gathered. The first few were small and scattered. Then they became larger in size, more grotesque, and more hostile.

Their luminous, rotting eyes, each the size of cities, fixed upon the little door creeping upward. Curiosity, malice, and fear were jumbled up in minds already warped beyond any semblance of sense, making them dangerously unpredictable.

"Damn it, wait—"

Wang Yu broke off, startled. The void above them turned to pure black as it descended like a dome. The host of voidborn was swallowed by that darkness. Then, the darkness itself flowed like a tide, enfolding his domain.

"Lady Darkness?" Avia asked tentatively. She remembered their dealings with the Lady of the Night—but they had never been conducted here, face-to-face in the void itself. Yet this darkness was unmistakably hers.

"It is I," came her answer. "I have found you at last. That wall kept me barred until now. With its collapse, I may now descend in person."

As the darkness closed in around them, their surroundings became clearer. The Lady's divine domain had arrived.

The Tree of the Night towered overhead, its boughs hung with starlight. At its roots stood the Midnight Library, black silhouettes moving within—shadows of the Church of Nightfall's devotees. The Lady's realm fully enclosed Wang Yu's door.

Her tall figure appeared beyond the door's boundary, tapping curiously at its cube-shaped barrier with one hand while holding the Crimson Mark curio in the other. It was through that artifact that she had traced them here.

"What is this? I seem barred from it completely—my power cannot pass through."

She was quite puzzled. She had never seen such a thing in the void.

"One of my new powers," Wang Yu said. "Wait, I can probably let you in."

He willed the door to open. This time, when she tapped its surface, her arm passed through. She stepped forward, entering his domain fully.

"So, even the Lady of the Night couldn't enter without permission. Then those void creatures wouldn't have posed a problem, either," Wang Yu thought to himself. His shoulders sagged with relief.

The Lady, meanwhile, was already having a discussion with Avia and Noelle. Only then did Wang Yu learn that, though he and his companions had felt little time pass, more than two months had gone by in the material plane. Time in the material plane apparently flowed at the same rate as in Sieg and Noelle's deadlands. The world itself had changed in the meantime.

"The Dragon God truly is bound to the abyssal spawn... And did Sieg's sister fail?"

That was unexpected. Even Aurelian, a silver dragon bearing peerless might, had been unable to prevail against the Dragon God.

"Can you carry us upward?" he asked, pointing.

"Of course."

She extended her power. Threads of force dangled down from the Tree of the Night, wrapping around his domain and hauling it upward. They ascended swiftly, far faster than he could have managed alone.

"You've been a great help. Right, there's one more thing. Will this be useful to you?"

He gestured toward the dream god's husk. He had wielded its lingering power through the Chariot, but could another god—could the Lady herself—claim it? With a thought, he pushed the corpse into her realm.

"This is... the power of dreams. Is it unclaimed? Let me see."

Her hand touched the husk. It dissolved into a thin violet mist that drifted into her divine domain.

"I can feel it," she said. "Its power is drawn to me. I can command dreams now."

Wisps of vapor curled from her hand, shifting into phantasms in a myriad forms.

"Interesting..."

Wang Yu raised a brow. This was odd, certainly. Her domain was adjacent to, but independent of, dreams. Yet given the husk of a forgotten god, she was able to absorb its domain into hers. What logic governed such things?

This wasn't something he could afford to dwell on at the moment. They needed to keep ascending—and then to deal with the events that had transpired in the meantime once Sieg awoke.

Sieg was, at that moment, subject to an adventure of his own. With a single punch, the thick trunk before him snapped apart. Sieg glanced at his own fist, smooth and unmarred, then at the pile of shattered stone beside him. He shook his head slightly.

"Strange... Why am I dreaming of that time? It's been a while since I last dreamt."

His mind was surprisingly lucid; he knew with certainty that this was a dream. And yet the scene was startlingly clear, more vivid than even his own memories.

"Hah... I'd almost forgotten the despair I felt back then, when I realized my mana circuits were born flawed, my true name incomplete. No flight, no magic... all I could do was to train this frail body like a madman."

Murmuring to himself, he walked through the forest he had once used as his training ground until he reached a small brook. There, reflected in the water, was a face far younger and softer than the one he now bore—though little else had changed.

"Funny, really... back then, I trained in human form. Even after that incident, when I carried Noelle to the continent, I kept on using it. Ha! What sort of dragon lives as a human for so long?"

When Sieg had first discovered the flaw in his body, he'd been crushed. He could barely accept himself. Hopeless, he had tried to emulate the black dragons, who were renowned for their lacking magic but monstrous physique, hoping that raw strength could make up for what he lacked.

He had trained obsessively, endlessly repeating the motions he now recalled in this dream. And yet, laughably enough, he had chosen to train in human form. The reason was simple: in that shape, at least, he looked "whole." His draconic body, with its stunted, broken wings, was a reminder too ugly to bear.

His was a small, pitiful pride—but that was part of the nature of growth. It took Sieg years to shift that mindset. On the continent, he had finally begun to accept his flaws—and in so doing, he gained traits rare among dragons: humility, a hunger for learning, and more besides.

"How long did it take me to accept myself? I can't quite recall. But yes... it was only after reaching the continent that I truly began to let go."

He exhaled and stretched out on the ground, lost in drifting recollections. The process had taken years. Dragons lived long, and their hearts matured no faster than their bodies. In truth, Sieg had grown unusually quickly for his kind. And letting go wasn't quite the same as giving up.

Of course, it helped that he had her as his elder sister. If his flaw was one reason he clung to his human form, then Aurelian was surely the other.

The valley trembled with a distant roar. Sieg knew what its source was: Aurelian, mastering her strength. She had always preferred her human form as well—a rarity among dragons—and he had followed her example. But her power... her power had been beyond compare.

"An unparalleled silver dragon, a crippled red dragon, and another red dragon with modest talent. How could we have been a family? It sounds like a fable, like a cruel joke, to an outsider."

His gaze drifted, unfocused, as he muttered to himself. This place... he was somewhere near the center of the Isle of Dragons, wasn't he?

Then, light flared from beyond the clouds—something not part of his memory. A force welled within him. Sieg realized he was waking up.

"Are you awake?"

He opened his eyes to see Wang Yu crouched beside him, with Noelle right behind. Wang Yu's voice reached his ears.

"Mm. Still alive. That's good enough."

Sieg nodded and sat up. His body had already shifted into human form upon waking, though he was still exceptionally weak.

"Rest for now. I'll tell you what has happened in the Isle of Dragons since our departure. It's what your sister told the Lady of the Night to pass on to us. I'll warn you, things are looking grim."

Wang Yu pressed a vial of potion into his hand, then recounted Aurelian's message: the devastation on the Isle of Dragons, and everything concerning Milos and the Dragon God.

Sieg's brows furrowed, his expression hardening. He had already suspected that the Dragon God was in a dire state while in the deadlands—but even he hadn't suspected anything like this.

"My advice is to run. Don't go back. At our level of strength, taking on something like that would be suicide. In the past, we were still at least able to hover near the periphery and lend a hand—but against an abyssal creature? We'll be crushed before we can do a damn thing. Better to leave it to Skyborne City and the other powers once they learn the truth."

Wang Yu waved a hand dismissively as he voiced his stance. He was as pragmatic as ever. What could a man like him, legend or not, do against a being on the level of the Dragon God?

His victories in the void had relied on quirks and tricks. In the material world, his tools were diminished. Strength was strength, weakness was weakness—and one misstep meant annihilation. And in raw power, Wang Yu knew well he came up short.

"...No. I must go."

Sieg fell silent for a moment, then shook his head, rejecting Wang Yu's counsel.

"Well, well. Confidence suits you, Professor."

Their eyes met. Wang Yu could see that Sieg wasn't boasting, nor clinging to pride. He truly believed he had the strength to stand there, even knowing all that awaited him.

"All right then. If you're really going... I might have an idea."

Sieg didn't explain the source of his resolve, and Wang Yu didn't press him. Instead, after a pause, he let slip a thought—something he'd gleaned from the Lady of the Night's account of the Isle of Dragons. If his hunch was right, they might just have a way to intervene, even at that impossible level of strength. That said...