The seventh day.
On the surface, everything at Ironblood Horse Grounds was as normal. Morning drills began on schedule. Soldiers marched in formation across the parade ground, their chants shaking the black dragon banners atop the flagpoles until they snapped wildly in the wind.
The four in the barracks went about their usual lives—Zhao Yue helped out in the mess hall, Zhou Pei supported his elderly mother as she basked in the sun in the courtyard, Zheng Chong taught his younger sister how to write, while Ma Qianli and Shi Xiaoyan helped sharpen blades in the armory.
No one told them what would happen tonight.
Lu Chen stood by the edge of the parade ground for a while. His tail shifted restlessly beneath his clothes.
After the salve had been applied last time, the burns had fully healed. The new skin beneath the scales was tougher than before.
Over these seven days, his dragonification had slowly risen to thirty-four percent. At the tip of his third tail vertebra, the beginnings of a fourth had started to grow—a tiny bony protrusion, not yet fully formed, but the tail itself knew where it was meant to grow.
The progress bar for the fourth transformation of Dragon Thunder Nine Transformations, "Tail Growth," had jumped from forty-one to forty-six.
Yun Qingyue emerged from the medicine hut with two jade bottles in hand.
Golden medicinal liquid—the same kind as the bottle prepared before the decisive battle at the Land God Temple. It could temporarily raise Dragon Thunder fusion by three points. This time, she had prepared two bottles.
"One for you, one for Tuoba Shan." She handed one to Tuoba Shan, who had just arrived from the Barbarian King Sect lodge. "Your meridians lack the foundation of dragonification, so you can only withstand half the