Hearing that Meng Chen was safe, Ning Rongrong's taut heartstrings suddenly relaxed, only for grievance and fury to fill her chest.
"Daddy, who did this?!"
Ning Rongrong wiped the tears from her face and said fiercely, "Was it that old bastard, Prince Xue Xing? I heard you say a while ago that he keeps opposing His Highness the Crown Prince."
"Grandpa Sword, take me to smash down the gates of Prince Xue Xing's residence!"
Seeing their little princess become like this over a boy,
Chen Xin felt his heart ache too, and he could not help reaching out to stroke her head.
"Rongrong, don't be hasty. Prince Xue Xing may use underhanded methods, but he has always been watertight in his dealings. We have no conclusive evidence yet. Still, daring to ambush someone our Seven Treasure Glazed Tile Sect values outside Heaven Dou City... certain people really have forgotten themselves."
Ning Fengzhi rose to his feet, his elegant white robes swaying gently in the breeze, a cold gleam of shrewd calculation flashing in his eyes.
"Send word to our Seven Treasure Glazed Tile Sect's contacts within the City Defense Guard. Have them cooperate fully with the Crown Prince's Residence's investigation. Also, starting today, station two Soul Saint-level covert guards from the sect around Heaven Dou Royal Junior Academy."
"In Heaven Dou City, rules are rules. There are lines that will cost anyone who crosses them their head."
These arrangements were not just for Meng Chen, but for Ning Rongrong's safety as well.
After all, if someone had set their sights on the Crown Prince's people, they might well strike at Ning Rongrong too. It was not the ten thousand safe outcomes one feared, but the single disastrous exception.
Chen Xin shook his head and sighed inwardly.
Thank goodness Old Bones isn't here. With that old fellow's temper, he might turn all of Heaven Dou City upside down!
Ning Rongrong had calmed down considerably by then, but her eyes were still full of worry.
"Dad, I want to visit the Crown Prince's Residence."
Hearing this, Ning Fengzhi shook his head helplessly and looked at Chen Xin beside him.
Chen Xin nodded. "I'll go with Rongrong. Otherwise, this girl probably won't get any sleep tonight."
Dark undercurrents surged through Heaven Dou City.
Yet in a quiet, secluded courtyard in the eastern part of the city, the atmosphere was unusually still.
The courtyard was small, even somewhat crude, with only a single room and a few lonely stalks of green bamboo growing outside.
The room was bare, without even any extra tables or chairs.
Gu Yuena sat quietly on the bed.
An unusual flush faintly colored her normally fair little face.
"Mm!"
With a soft grunt, Gu Yuena's slender, willow-leaf brows suddenly drew tight.
A surge of draconic might poured from her small body. Had she not suppressed it with all her strength, the entire room would likely have collapsed in an instant.
Within her sea of consciousness, a thin fissure trembled violently.
It was the true Dragon King Origin belonging to the Silver Dragon King!
In fact, as the Silver Dragon King, Gu Yuena had already sensed it when Meng Chen used his Golden Dragon Claw earlier.
But with Di Tian away, she could only rush there herself, only to see the Golden Dragon King's reincarnated body on the verge of suffering a grievous blow.
In desperation, the former Soul Beast Co-Ruler had disregarded the limits of this young avatar, which had yet to fully adapt to human rules, and forcibly torn open a tiny fissure in the Dragon King Origin within her.
Otherwise, a mere Soul Grandmaster who had just reached rank twenty-one,
even with a profound understanding of elements, could never have blasted a rank forty-three Heavy Armor Defense Soul Ancestor to death in an instant.
It was precisely by drawing on that sliver of released Dragon King Origin that she had delivered an absolute instant kill with the slightest gesture.
But the price she paid was steep.
Forcing her newly formed, fragile meridians to channel the Dragon King Origin was like making a dried-up stream withstand the impact of a mountain flash flood.
The pain of the backlash spread through her meridians, making Gu Yuena tremble despite herself.
"Condense!"
Gu Yuena bit down on her red lips with her pearly teeth.
She marshaled her Divine Sense Power, forcibly compressing the overflowing Dragon King Origin back into the Sealing Restriction in the deepest reaches of her sea of consciousness.
With the sound of Law Chains closing, audible only to her, that sliver of released Dragon King Origin was once again locked beneath layer upon layer of seals.
"Whew!"
Gu Yuena let out a long breath and leaned weakly against the cold stone wall, fine beads of cold sweat forming on her forehead.
This human body was still far too weak.
Still, she had not come away from this entirely empty-handed.
Gu Yuena tilted her head slightly, looking through the window toward the Heaven Dou Crown Prince's Residence.
The stunning scene that had unfolded in the snow earlier rose unbidden in her mind.
Facing that Shadow Ghost Bat Soul Ancestor's lethal Bat Shadow Kill, the little fellow who normally spent his days waggling his rabbit ears and acting cute before human girls had displayed an almost bestial savagery.
The instant his Spatial Teleportation ended, the sleeve on the boy's right arm had burst apart, revealing Golden Dragon Scales he had yet to conceal completely.
Others might have mistaken it for some Soul Tool, but the Silver Dragon King understood: that was the Golden Dragon King's Golden Dragon Claw.
Although it had only manifested in one part of his body, and although he had deliberately suppressed that power to the utmost,
those utterly pure fluctuations of blood energy and that Shattering Law capable of tearing through every physical defense could not possibly have been false.
"So you haven't turned into a rabbit after all."
Gu Yuena murmured, the corners of her tightly pressed lips unknowingly curving upward.
When she had awakened in the Star Dou Great Forest,
she had sensed the Golden Dragon King's arrival. Following that sensation, however, she had found a child wearing golden rabbit ears whose Martial Soul was a mutated soft bone rabbit.
At that moment, even she had felt a sense of absurd unreality.
As the true king of the Divine Realm's Dragon Clan who wielded the Dragon God's strength and physical body, he should never have become a creature at the very bottom of the soul beast hierarchy, no matter how far he had fallen.
But now, after observing him for half a year and witnessing the Golden Dragon Claw Meng Chen had used in today's life-or-death battle,
she knew that beneath his harmless appearance, that little fellow was still the Destruction Ferocious Beast who had made even the Divine Realm tremble.
He was even more capable of biding his time than she had expected.
"You know how to hide your strength. At least you're not too stupid."
Gu Yuena gave a cold snort, her usual pride returning to her cool little face.
Yet when she recalled how she had cast all caution aside the moment she released her origin, a blush rose on the silver-haired girl's white-jade earlobes without her even noticing.
I only saved him to preserve the Dragon Clan's bloodline and power, so the origin left behind after the great war in the Divine Realm wouldn't be extinguished completely.
Gu Yuena coldly admonished herself inwardly.
It absolutely wasn't because that Spiritual Charm affected my mind, much less because of some supposed bond between members of the same race.
Next time, if that rabbit dares show me that lazy, sly expression in public again, I'll find somewhere deserted and teach him a lesson myself.
Before you continue