Chapter 1509: Strange Lights

The four Dragonborn flew closer to the black rift. With every meter they traveled the presence of the Chaos Realm became stronger. The energy pouring through the opening was different from the Magic in Elyndor. It felt foul and unnatural, crawled across their bodies like an invisible layer of filth while its pressure seemed to twist their stomachs from the inside.

Even the Dragonborn found themselves fighting against a sudden wave of nausea.

"Ugh... this is disgusting," Eccar muttered through their telepathic connection.

Aesa frowned as she kept flying. "The energy feels wrong."

"If an ordinary human came this close it would be bad for them," Sylven began.

"They’d probably already be unconscious immediately," Erend added.

None of them doubted that result. A normal person would have collapsed long before reaching the rift, overwhelmed by the concentrated Chaos energy leaking from the other side.

Erend and Eccar moved closer anyway. They stopped just before the edge of the opening and carefully looked through it.

What they saw on the other side was unmistakably the Chaos Realm. But it wasn’t the same region they had visited before.

The landscape beyond the rift looked strangely unfamiliar, with jagged formations stretched endlessly beneath a distorted sky and strange masses of land floated in the distance.

Rivers of dark energy flowed between enormous structures that seemed to have formed naturally from the ground. The entire region appeared unstable and moving.

"Sylven, do you sense anything?" Erend asked while narrowing his eyes.

Sylven focused his perception toward the rift. He remained silent for several seconds before shaking his head. "No. Nothing connected to the black Dragon."

Eccar looked deeper into the Chaos Realm. "Not even a trace?"

"Nothing I can identify."

Erend stared at the strange landscape for another moment before making his decision.

"Alright. There’s no reason to waste time here, then. Whatever this place is, it isn’t giving us anything useful right now."

Aesa nodded. "Our destination is still farther south."

"Exactly," Erend replied. "We should keep moving."

The four Dragonborn backed away from the rift and returned to their original course. They had barely traveled a few kilometers when another distortion appeared within the storm.

A second black rift tore open, then another, and then the third.

The storm began filling with openings connected to the Chaos Realm. Monsters started emerging from them almost immediately. Some creatures crawled through on elongated limbs while others simply dropped from the openings and spread strange wings. Their bodies varied wildly in shape and size, but they all carried the same foul presence.

But this time the four Dragonborn stopped holding back.

"Let’s make this faster," Erend said. Fire erupted around his body. A massive wave of crimson flames swept through the storm and consumed several monsters at once.

Eccar raised one hand, causing enormous pillars of earth to burst from the air beneath the creatures and crush them against the clouds.

Aesa released a surge of ice that spread through the air in a frozen wave. Monsters caught within it froze instantly before shattering into countless pieces.

Sylven extended both hands and brilliant green Magic erupted around him, then enormous roots and vines manifested within the storm, wrapping around entire groups of creatures before tearing them apart.

The four types of Magic illuminated the darkness from within. Crimson fire. Brown and golden earth. Brilliant blue-white ice. Deep green plant Magic. Their lights flashed inside the storm in colors that had never appeared within the anomaly before.

The battle became one-sided. Every new creature that emerged from the rifts was immediately destroyed. The four Dragonborn moved through the storm like forces of destruction, clearing the anomalies as quickly as they appeared.

—

Far away from the center of the dangerous storm, however, another vessel had entered the periphery of the storm region. An airship bearing the emblem of a different country moved carefully through the outer edge of the storm.

The ship’s crew wore predominantly red uniforms, marking them as soldiers and sailors from another nation. Rain hammered against the vessel.

One of the scouts standing near the forward observation platform suddenly narrowed his eyes toward the distant storm.

"Captain!" he called.

The man called the captain turned toward him. "What is it?"

The scout pointed toward the enormous wall of darkness ahead. "There are anomalies inside the storm!"

"The storm is known to be a nest of anomalies. That’s nothing unusual," The captain said, barely reacting.

The scout shook his head and said, "No, Captain. This is different."

The captain’s expression changed. He immediately stood from his seat and walked toward the outer deck.

The moment he stepped outside, heavy rain struck his uniform. Even though the airship remained far from the heart of the storm, the rainfall was already intense enough to soak the deck.

Several crew members followed him and together, they stared toward the enormous storm.

Then they saw the lights. A crimson glow flashed from deep within the darkness, then blue-white, brown and gold, and green.

The colors appeared one after another before overlapping and illuminating sections of the storm from within.

The crew fell silent. None of them understood what they were seeing.

The captain’s expression slowly hardened as another burst of crimson light illuminated the distant clouds.

"What... is happening in there?" he muttered.

No one answered. The crew of the airship lost for words, realizing that whatever was happening inside the storm was far beyond the usual anomalies they had been warned about. And those were already dangerous enough.

The captain immediately ordered his crew to record everything they had witnessed, both on paper and through the ship’s recording device. The crew members assigned to the task quickly moved into action, documenting the strange lights and the unusual activity within the storm.

Meanwhile, the captain continued watching the distant anomaly. His eyes narrowed when he noticed something even stranger.

The lights were moving. They were not spreading randomly through the storm. They were steadily traveling toward the south.

The captain’s brow furrowed deeply as he tried to understand what could possibly be happening inside the anomaly.

Whatever was causing those lights was moving with purpose.

—