Zong Shen withdrew his gaze from the lava pool.
A faintly amused curve tugged at the corner of his lips.
Though this so-called bedside table looked crude, the few items casually placed upon it were quite valuable.
With a casual gesture, the gemstones and magical metal ingots rose into the air and flew into the storage space he had prepared long ago.
To him now, these were nothing more than trivial ornaments.
What he truly anticipated was the core collection amassed by that proud red dragon over centuries of operation.
He turned around, his gaze sweeping once more across this seemingly vast and silent throne hall.
The Flame Lord's core treasury would never be placed so conspicuously behind the throne.
Like invisible ripples of water, Zong Shen's perception spread outward from him, seeping into the surrounding rock walls, the ground, and even the deeper earth veins.
Dragons—red dragons in particular—had an obsession with treasure and an instinct for concealment carved into their bloodlines.
They loved to bury their most precious collections in the hottest and most secretive places.
Such locations were often heavily defended, and nine times out of ten, connected to the territory's earth-vein core or elemental nodes.
His perception soon reached several places where energy had gathered abnormally.
Some were side-passage entrances cleverly concealed by magic formations.
Others were hollows behind the rock walls.
These energy signatures varied in strength.
But one of them lay deep beneath the throne hall.
It was an area parallel to the main lava river, where the energy fluctuations were most concentrated.
In his perception, there was a massive cocoon there, wrapped layer upon layer in Runes and elemental barriers.
Surging fire elements pulsed within it rhythmically.
"Found it."
Zong Shen murmured softly.
For someone who had mastered a certain degree of spatial