Chapter 1226: 213. Talent

The entire hollow space roared and trembled, while large amounts of soil and stone continuously fell.

The enormous dragon skeleton was slowly moving every one of its bones, freeing itself from the rock layer.

No one knew how many years had passed, yet that skeleton still emitted a luminous white sheen, without the slightest sign of decay. Its elegant long neck turned, and on that enormous skull where ferocity and beauty coexisted, the deep eye sockets stared at Muen, who before it was as insignificant as an ant.

But Muen’s attention was not on the shocking dragon skeleton itself. Instead, he raised his gaze even higher and looked solemnly at that strange face.

“You are... Harris?”

“Hm? You actually know me?”

The dragon skeleton lowered its head, and the face on its forehead moved closer to Muen.

It was a man’s °• N 𝑜 v 𝑒 l i g h t •° face. At first glance, there was nothing special about it. It was the kind of ordinary appearance that would be difficult to find once thrown into a crowd.

Its only distinguishing feature was that the face was excessively pale, without any trace of vitality, like the face of a dead man who had just been placed into a coffin.

“A certain damned dragon told me that if I encountered an extremely ugly face, then it was probably some fellow named Harris.”

Muen looked him up and down, suppressing the surprise in his eyes.

“But no matter how much I thought about it, I never imagined... that you truly only had a face left. What, do you like this ugly face that much?”

This dragon skeleton clearly could not possibly be Harris’s original body. The only thing that probably belonged to him originally was this face.

But merely by attaching this face to the dragon skeleton, he had actually caused this ancient thing, which had slept within the rock layer for no one knew how many years, to move again.

Was this also a method trained through “hide-and-seek”?

It was a little too frightening.

“Big Sister Dragon even told you about these things. It seems she truly trusts you.”

The pale face had no expression whatsoever. Only its two eyeballs kept rolling around chaotically, making it look rather strange.

“However, I must correct you. This appearance is not something I wished to become. Eight hundred years is far too long. Very few people can completely ensure that their flesh remains immortal throughout such a long process. In order to survive, I could only become this inhuman form.”

“I see...”

Hearing this, Muen nodded with great seriousness.

“I understand.”

“Hm? What do you understand?”

Harris frowned. He had not even said any important information yet.

“I understand... that you are the weakest among those Tars survivors.”

Muen grinned, and the pure-white twin blades spun into flourishes in his hands.

“After all, everyone else’s body is perfectly intact. Why are you the only one with nothing but a face left? You say your flesh decayed, but have you ever properly considered whether the problem might be with you?”

“...”

The two chaotically rolling pupils suddenly stopped and stared at Muen at the same time.

Several veins also appeared on the pale forehead.

“Nonsense! Felimon was clearly the weakest!” Harris retorted.

“You say it was him, so it was him?”

Muen sneered.

“He is already dead. What, you only know how to throw dirty water onto a dead man?”

Boom!

The cliff wall where Muen stood suddenly shattered. A huge pale claw swept across it, and everything it touched was cut open and crushed apart like tofu.

The ancient murals on the cliff wall were reduced to powder beneath this attack filled with fury, disappearing completely into the long river of history from that moment onward.

“What a pity. Those were cultural relics. They broke the moment they were touched.”

Muen withdrew his gaze.

At this moment, he was completely unharmed. Only the hem of his clothes, stained with a little dust, fluttered in the air current. He stood steadily on top of that enormous claw and rose together with it.

“But compared to them, a cultural relic like you is much more troublesome.”

The rocks and murals had become unbearably fragile after the passage of such a long time, but this dragon skeleton remained incomparably hard.

Even the dragon pressure it emitted was equally terrifying. If Muen had not already grown accustomed to Hamreign’s dragon pressure, he might even have been affected by it now.

Remaining undecayed for a thousand years was by no means an empty phrase when applied to this dragon skeleton.

“Muen Campbell... you are even more troublesome than I imagined, whether it is you yourself or that mouth of yours.”

Harris lowered his head. A trace of anger had already appeared in his sinister words.

Priscilla had been right about many things...

This fellow should have been eliminated earlier.

Unfortunately, Avik had actually failed.

“Let us temporarily stop discussing a topic I have heard so often that my ears are almost growing calluses.”

Muen raised his head, his tone as gentle as though he were greeting an old friend.

“Right now, all I want to do is cut you down and then completely destroy this place. You should have no objections, right?”

“Destroy... Ah, so that is why you came. I was wondering why, despite hiding this place so thoroughly, you discovered it so quickly.”

The enormous head tilted slightly, and a mocking smile appeared on the deathly pale face.

“You want to destroy the formation beneath the ground? If you are capable of doing it, then come. I fear Big Sister Dragon... but I do not fear a little brat whose hair has not even fully grown.”

“You call me troublesome with one breath and a little brat with the next. Do you have a split personality?”

Muen suddenly tightened his grip on the pure-white twin blades.

“As for whether I can do it, we will know after I try.”

Clang—

A bright blade light suddenly appeared and directly slashed toward the dragon skeleton’s skull.

More than half of the hollow space was illuminated once again, revealing the dragon skeleton’s ferocious and enormous full form.

Although this was only a probing slash, it still contained most of Muen’s strength.

Even a dragon skeleton could not possibly clash head-on with Elizabeth, which possessed the attribute of absolute sharpness.

But...

Contrary to its enormous form, the dragon skeleton moved at an unimaginable speed. Its long neck twisted, and the blade light brushed past its skull.

“Heh.”

Harris even had enough time to mock him.

“Time Delay.”

Muen could not be bothered to respond. He merely silently poured in magical power and activated the alchemical core behind him.

The world immediately slowed.

He rapidly flew along the dragon claw, using it as a foothold. Within a single breath, he had already approached the dragon skeleton’s head.

From the two attacks the opponent had initiated earlier, as well as this probing strike, Muen had already roughly grasped some of the characteristics of this dragon skeleton.

For example...

Although it was fast, it was ultimately not a living creature. Because it lacked touch and various other senses, its reactions were much worse.

Just now, Muen had secretly slashed the dragon skeleton’s claw while hidden within the dust. Neither the dragon skeleton itself nor Harris had shown the slightest reaction.

In addition, such an enormous body was ultimately a burden. In terms of speed, Muen still held the advantage.

Therefore, since attacking from a distance did not work, he would directly use Time Delay to close in...

Buzz—

A buzzing sound suddenly came through the air. Because time had been slowed and stretched, the sound had become somewhat distorted.

The scorching sensation and dazzling light arrived faster than the sound. At the same time, the warning of death rang out. Muen instinctively turned his head and swung his blade horizontally.

The dazzling torrent of magic was directly severed by Muen, but the residual shockwave still scorched his skin. Almost instantly, it carbonized part of the flesh of his body, which was already far stronger than that of martial artists at the same rank.

“Magic?”

Muen’s pupils abruptly contracted.

That torrent of magical power was naturally a powerful offensive spell, but what surprised him was not the power of the magic.

It was...

“When was it constructed?”

Chanting, construction, release...

For a martial artist who had already closed in, the necessary stages of using magic were simply perfect attack windups.

Although most experienced mages could omit the first step and cast chantless magic, the construction of magical circuits absolutely could not be omitted.

That was the very foundation of releasing magic.

If there was no construction, where would the magic come from?

Yet Muen had not sensed anything at all.

That spell had seemed to appear from thin air, omitting the first two stages and proceeding directly to release!

He was forced to stop his attack.

“Are you surprised, little brat? Heh heh. It seems you do not understand creatures known as dragons well enough.”

Harris lowered the dragon’s head and once again mocked him without the slightest politeness.

“Where do you think humans learned the current construction-based system of magic?”

“What do you mean?”

“Dragons... are born with an extremely high affinity for magical power.”

The enormous dragon skeleton suddenly spread its wings. Dark-blue patterns of light flowed from its limbs toward its torso, and Muen sensed an enormous amount of magical power rapidly gathering within an extremely short period of time.

“But so-called magical affinity is merely the most insignificant of their advantages.”

“What is truly terrifying about them is that this incomparably tough dragon body can circulate magical power at a speed one hundred or even one thousand times faster than a human body!”

“Therefore—”

Buzz.

Buzz.

Buzz.

Buzz.

No one knew how many buzzing sounds rang out at almost the exact same time.

Muen raised his head in horror and saw one magical array after another suddenly appear out of thin air around the dragon skeleton.

All kinds of offensive spells took shape in the blink of an eye, and every one of them was aimed at Muen.

“N-No way.”

Muen’s cheek twitched wildly.

His premonition of death once again began violently pulling at his hair.

He felt as though he had become a pitiful soldier who had accidentally wandered onto the wrong side of the battlefield and was now being aimed at simultaneously by more than a hundred enormous, pitch-black cannon barrels!

“That is right! Exactly like this!”

Harris’s pale face became fanatical and ferocious as he shouted excitedly:

“The compound, instantaneous, chantless magical arrays that only human Truth-Rank mages can skillfully control are, for creatures known as dragons...

“An innate talent they possess from the moment they are born!”