Chapter 1517: Different World

The air around them felt heavy and dry. Dark brown dust drifted through the atmosphere and moved across the barren landscape like a thin veil. The particles struck against their exposed skin, giving them an unpleasant sensation as they stood in the open air.

None of the four Dragonborn had activated their Dragon scales yet so their bodies could still feel the harsh environment directly.

The ground beneath them was dark brown and cracked across countless places. Deep fractures stretched through the dry soil, some of them wide enough to disappear into darkness. It looked as though the land had not received rain for an extraordinarily long time.

Above them, the sky was a strange mixture of gray, brown, and deep red. Thick layers of ash seemed to fill the atmosphere, turning the sunlight into a weak and distant glow. The entire sky looked as though it had once been burning and had never fully recovered from it, only the ash remains.

"Okay..." Eccar looked around. "This can’t be more different from Elyndor."

Erend, Aesa, and Sylven could only grimace.

Eccar was right. Elyndor had welcomed them with beautiful landscapes, vast floating islands, fascinating civilizations, and countless colors. This world offered almost the exact opposite. Everything around them has the appearance of something that had already died.

"What is the name of this world?" Sylven asked.

"It’s... uhhh..." Erend paused as he searched through the information stored in his memory. A moment later, he remembered it. "Valthoria."

"Valthoria..." Sylven muttered while looking across the barren landscape. His expression darkened. "Everything is dead here."

"We can see that," Aesa replied calmly. "What are we supposed to find here?"

"There should be some kind of ancient trial here. We need to find it," Erend answered.

"Okay. I don’t want to stay in this world for too long, so we’d better start moving," Sylven said.

His words reflected what all four of them were thinking. None of them wanted to remain in this Valthoria longer than necessary.

Unfortunately, they had no idea where they were supposed to go.

They had no clear landmark, settlement, and information about where the ancient trial had been hidden. The coordinates had only brought them to the world. They had not provided them with a precise location.

So they eventually did what they usually did whenever they needed to search for something. They flew.

Their Dragon wings spread open behind them, and the four Dragonborn rose into the sky.

From above, Valthoria looked even more lifeless. Vast stretches of barren land extended toward the horizon, broken by jagged mountains and enormous valleys. Scattered ruins stood across the landscape, most of them reduced to blackened stone. Some structures had collapsed completely while others remained standing like the skeletons of a civilization that had disappeared long ago.

Farther away, Erend could see what appeared to be the remains of enormous cities buried beneath layers of dust and ash. Roads stretched between them but led nowhere.

Broken towers rose from the ground like blackened bones. In several places, enormous craters scarred the land, suggesting that something catastrophic had happened here long ago.

The four Dragonborn separated and flew in different directions to accelerate their search.

Erend headed toward a distant mountain range.

The mountains looked almost completely black. Their surfaces were covered with dark scars as though an enormous fire had swept across them in the distant past. Thick layers of ash covered the slopes, several sections of the mountains had collapsed into enormous valleys.

As Erend approached, he noticed that there were actually many remains of ancient structures scattered across the lower slopes.

Stone walls lay broken across the ground. Some buildings had been partially buried beneath ash while others had been reduced to piles of blackened rocks. Whatever civilization had once existed here had clearly suffered something catastrophic.

Erend slowed slightly as he looked over the ruins. "What happened here?" he wondered.

An uneasy feeling settled inside him.

Valthoria did not feel like Elyndor. Elyndor had been dangerous in many places, but there had always been life. Even its most hostile regions contained creatures, civilizations, and signs that the world was still alive.

Valthoria felt different. It felt like a world that had already lost.

Erend continued flying.

Time passed, but he did not receive any message from Eccar, Aesa, or Sylven. He assumed they had not found anything either.

He continued toward the mountains until something suddenly caught his attention.

Something was moving in the distance. Erend narrowed his eyes, and realized that it was a person.

The figure was running across the barren ground at incredible speed. From the way they moved, Erend immediately realized they were not running for exercise. They were fleeing.

And the reason became obvious a moment later, when he saw a monstrous creature was chasing her, or him.

The beast moved on four powerful limbs as it charged across the cracked ground. Its body was large and deformed, with long claws digging into the dry soil as it pursued the fleeing figure.

Erend did not hesitate. His wings beat heavily as he suddenly accelerated toward them.

The fleeing figure glanced backward and saw him approaching, but there was no time to react.

The monster suddenly looked up when it sensed Erend. Its head snapped toward him in alarm.

But Erend was already within range. He raised one hand and released a small firebolt.

The projectile was tiny compared to the flames Erend could normally produce, but he had compressed an enormous amount of Magic into its core. The firebolt shot through the air like an arrow.

It struck the creature directly in the head. The monster died instantly. Its body lost momentum and crashed heavily against the ground.

Erend descended immediately and landed nearby.

He turned toward the person he had just saved. Only then did he realize that the figure was actually a woman.

She was tall and appeared to be exhausted from running. She had fallen backward onto the hard ground and now sat there with one hand supporting her body.

Her eyes remained fixed on Erend with a mixture of astonishment and confusion filling her face.

She clearly had no idea what had just happened. And judging by the way she continued staring at him, she probably had even less idea what kind of being had just saved her.

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