Word Spirit

Lu Mingfei opened his eyes in the darkness.

At some point, the diving bell's door had silently opened. It was probably Little Devil's handiwork.

He floated in the freezing river water like a fallen leaf, and that pale face entered his sight again.

Algae-like red hair drifted through the undercurrent, and the girl still showed no sign of life.

That spear-like tail spike was still lodged in her chest.

"Nono, I'm here to save you."

He forced the words out from his chest, pulling a grim smile onto his lips first.

"So in the end, you couldn't protect me after all... Still needed your little brother to risk his life to save you."

He did not even like her that much, did he? But she had really been good to him.

Looking back over Lu Mingfei's twenty years as a loser, it was not that nobody had ever sincerely treated him well. It was just that, when it came down to it, he could not think of a single one.

Maybe Chen Wenwen and Su Xiaoqiang together counted as half a person?

He pulled another ugly smile at the corner of his mouth.

So you shouldn't die now. You haven't even protected me for that many days.

"Don't be some big-shot boss lady anymore. Let's protect each other instead."

He spoke softly.

"Don't die."

The water pressure squeezed against his eardrums, and the sound of his heartbeat exploded within his skull.

Then, suddenly, it was as if someone had pressed the mute button on the world.

The current froze, and his heartbeat vanished.

Lu Mingfei clearly felt something within his very essence stir, spreading outward in a special form and forming an invisible domain within a spherical space centered on him.

This was "rule."

Understanding dawned upon Lu Mingfei. This method of casting was extremely similar to prayer, yet not quite the same.

The ink-smoke-like blood diffused through the river water suddenly trembled, then was "drawn" back into Nono's wound by an overwhelmingly powerful force.

"Holy shit..."

Lu Mingfei stared dumbfoundedly. He had never expected this cheat-like Word Spirit to take effect in such a way.

It was practically like... reversing time and space!

What happened next nearly made Lu Mingfei's eyes pop out.

The dying girl suddenly opened her eyes, reached behind herself, gripped the bone spike, and forcibly pulled it out of her heart! Then every bone in her body erupted with cracking sounds as she snapped the tail spike in half and casually tossed it into the water.

"Th-th-th-th-th... What kind of effect is that?!! If there was something like this, Lu Mingze should've just had Senior Sister casually take out the Dragon King, right?!!"

Yet Nono made no further movements. She closed her eyes and floated in the water once more, slipping into shock like a sleeping beauty.

Lu Mingfei hurriedly put his respirator on her, then turned to shove Nono into the diving bell, only to find that something seemed to have happened above.

Logically speaking, the diving bell should have been hauled up long ago.

"Forget it," Lu Mingfei sighed. "I'll be a good guy to the end. Machines are no match for manpower. Time for me, Little Lu of 'wind power,' to take the stage."

His Golden Eyes flared brightly, molten-gold light nearly piercing through the riverbed.

One by one, ancient, solemn, and complex words—like countless syllables mashed and compressed together—spilled from his mouth.

Like an emperor of primordial times, he issued a command to the rules of this world.

—Word Spirit: Dustless Realm

Lu Mingfei commanded all living and nonliving matter, forcing the water elements to rapidly retreat from the caster. Like the arrival of a storm, they formed into a sphere, leaving not a single drop of water within the domain.

Then came—

—Word Spirit: Eye of the Storm King

A fierce hurricane erupted behind Lu Mingfei in an instant, forming a massive vortex. Propelled by its force, Lu Mingfei rapidly approached the surface.

Honestly, without the "unlimited mana" cheat Lu Mingze had given him, he would never have dared to use the power of wind so recklessly. Without a Tears Flask, casting five or six combat skills would nearly drain him dry.

The two of them rose at an astonishing speed.

Thanks to the cheat Lu Mingze had given him, he no longer even needed oxygen to survive underwater. He was practically an ultimate lifeform. At this speed, the oxygen remaining in his suit was more than enough for Nono.

The surface of the Three Gorges. The Moniach.

Chaos had already erupted aboard the ship.

First, Captain and mission commander Manstein had fallen completely unconscious from overloading Word Spirit: Snake. Then Caesar Gattuso, the newly appointed first mate and student council president, had been nearly deafened and utterly exhausted. His partner, the Russian imperial princess Zero, had already closed her eyes, with only her hands still gripping the diving bell's cable desperately.

The others had lost their leader and could only barely keep the ship functioning under the original first mate's command.

Then, in the next instant—

Boom!

Something broke through the surface like a cannonball. Driven by the hurricane of Eye of the Storm King, two figures crashed onto the Moniach's deck amid a curtain of water soaring into the sky.

The Dustless Realm surrounding him still retained its oppressive force that repelled water elements, causing the pooled water on the deck to instantly recede and form a dry circular clearing.

The ship rocked violently from the sudden impact. Zero was jolted into letting go of the cable, while Caesar barely managed to keep his footing by bracing himself against the railing.

All they saw was a powerful figure kneeling on one knee as he laid the red-haired girl on the deck. Both of them looked utterly miserable. Nono was drenched from head to toe, her hair clinging to the deck like seaweed, unconscious and unmoving.

The other figure's diving suit had been completely shredded by the storm, leaving only a few strips of cloth.

The man straightened, faint pressure radiating from his body and keeping everyone from daring to approach.

Only Caesar barely recognized him and called out:

"Lu Mingfei?"

The man instantly turned toward him, his molten-gold Golden Eyes radiating the majesty of an Ancient Dragon.

Their eyes met without warning, making Caesar's muscles instinctively tense and his hair stand on end. He nearly fled, but the pride belonging to a noble gentleman steadied his mind.

Lu Mingfei's diving helmet had long since shattered, revealing a familiar, delicate-looking face.

He bared his teeth and smiled at Caesar, a trace of madness in that smile.

Splash!

Before everyone could recover from their shock, that figure had plunged back into the river. Only the girl on the deck and that dry circular domain proved that he had ever been there.

The dutiful original first mate, Grayson, finally hurried to look toward the water's surface, but the shadow there nearly made his heart leap from his chest.

"The Dragon King... is still alive!"

Fear of death spread through the air, and the deck descended into complete chaos.

They no longer had any means of dealing with the Dragon King. Firing Storm Torpedoes without alchemical warheads directly at the Dragon King had been a desperate gamble in the first place.

For humanity's technology, developed over thousands of years, to wound a Dragon King was already an immense honor. The only things that could truly judge it were alchemical blades—the Seven Sins!