Monsters attack

The next day, the death march continued.

They followed the Dragon Road deeper into the ruins, passing the remains of one city after another.

Pale marble lay toppled among black basalt, and charred beams pierced the dense fog.

The sailors and slaves in the party were silent with fear. Only the crunch of boots crushing dry bones broke the stillness.

Meanwhile, Liu Qian was recalling fragments from his previous life about the ruins of Valyria.

Legend had it that two Valyrian cities, Oros and Tyria, lay deep within the Smoking Sea, and that some of their inhabitants might still be alive.

He had no idea where he was. At least, though, he had found no signs of life nearby.

Liu Qian would wager that a madman like Gerion had no intention of searching for Tyria or Oros. He meant to head straight for the city of Valyria.

Valyria itself stood at the heart of the Fourteen Flames, burying the truth of its civilization's destruction along with clues to what had happened. Something terribly dangerous was surely waiting for them there.

Liu Qian hesitated, wondering whether he should seize a chance to slip away. At the very least, he could not march openly into Valyria with the main party.

What kept him wavering, however, was his uncertainty over whether his current magic power would let him survive alone in a place riddled with danger.

For now, he could not use the ultimate skill that transformed him into a dragon. That required at least a thousand points of magic power. The only skills available to him were [Dragonfire Breath] and [Wildfire].

Could those two skills keep me alive on my own?

He felt lost. He had acquired the system too recently, while that madman Gerion's hunger for treasure far exceeded anything he had imagined. He dared not gamble with his life.

After thinking it over repeatedly, Liu Qian quietly made up his mind.

If he could not acquire enough dragon spirits and magic power to unlock his ultimate skill before they reached Valyria, he would find a chance to slip away.

While Liu Qian was thinking, a commotion arose ahead. The party stopped to rest in a plaza littered with the foundations of enormous buildings.

Before their weary panting had subsided, a horrifying noise rang out.

"Eee-yaaah!!!"

An inhumanly piercing shriek, like nails scraping glass, suddenly erupted from deep within the forest to their right!

Everyone's hair stood on end!

Then came the harsh crack and scrape of dead branches snapping under tremendous force. The fog churned, as though something were moving between the twisted tree trunks.

"You! Go look!"

Gerion frowned deeply and pointed at a guard standing closest to the trees.

The guard's face turned ashen, his lips trembling. Under Gerion's cold stare, he could only tighten his grip on his spear and inch toward that eerie wall of dead trees.

When he was still a few steps from its edge-

Crash!

A dark blue-green shape burst through the dead branches on a gust of bloody stench, slamming the guard to the ground.

Amid the cries of alarm, everyone got a clear look at the monster.

It had a hunched, humanoid torso covered in thick, dark blue-green scales like a crocodile's.

Its limbs were unnaturally long and twisted, ending in black claws that gleamed coldly.

Its bald skull had no hair, only overlapping horny protrusions.

Two blood-red eyes with slit pupils glared from its face, blazing with hatred and hunger.

Thick yellow saliva poured from a huge mouth split all the way to its ears and packed with fine fangs.

"Hiss!"

The saliva struck the fallen guard's face, instantly raising acrid white smoke. His flesh melted like hot wax, exposing the stark white cheekbones beneath.

The guard let out an agonized scream.

"Loose!"

Gerion roared.

Arrows rained toward the monster.

Clang! Clang! Clang!

Sparks scattered across its body.

The arrowheads struck its scales with the ring of metal against metal, bouncing off helplessly or snapping.

Everyone's heart sank. The monster's scales were harder than steel.

"Get in there and cut it down!" Gerion bellowed at his guards.

Yet these normally capable soldiers stood with leaden legs. Not one dared advance.

In that instant of deathly stalemate, another desperate scream rose from behind the slaves.

Everyone turned in horror.

Another, slightly smaller monster had silently slipped down from the top of a huge dead tree like a gecko.

Its withered, clawlike hands had effortlessly pried open a slave's skull. Now it pressed its mouth greedily to the cavity of red and white, making sickening sucking noises.

Hiss... hiss... hiss...

A scraping sound that froze the marrow came from every direction.

Within the dead forest's churning fog, pair after pair of blood-red, slit-pupiled eyes lit up in a dense mass.

Dark blue-green, deep gray, iron black...

Scales of every color flickered between the dead branches.

They stepped out, their hunched shapes forming a moving wall of scales in the mist, completely surrounding the tiny party upon the ashes of the Dragon Road.

Those blood-red eyes locked onto every piece of living flesh.

Liu Qian's heart sank.

He had originally assumed that the creatures hiding among the dead trees were merely jackals or other wild beasts, perhaps too intimidated by the party's numbers to approach.

Now, however, he had to admit he had been overconfident. Ordinary reasoning did not apply in Valyria. Reality would punish anyone who thought otherwise.

Can I escape?

Liu Qian was no hotheaded young hero. The moment the monsters appeared, he had already put everyone else between himself and danger, ready to make a run for it.

Survival was his first priority. Nothing mattered more than his own life.

But cold despair snuffed out the thought of escape as soon as it arose. Harsh, rapid breathing came from behind the party as well-clearly more of the same creatures.

They were surrounded!

Behind them lay only the black forest that swallowed everything. Ahead, dense fog roiled like a dark, gray sea.

Liu Qian clenched the wooden stick he had picked up, his knuckles whitening.

His awareness sank into the realm only he could "see"-that strange entity called the Panel.

Magic power: 500.

In human form, [Dragonfire Breath] consumed one point per second, while [Wildfire] consumed two.

With so little magic power, his active skills might barely handle a few monsters, but everywhere he looked, creatures were slowly emerging from the shadows in such dense

numbers that he could not possibly deal with them all.

Fortunately, the dragon-blood passive skill [true dragon physique] had given him unprecedented strength. He could feel power surging through his muscles. Even in human form, his strength was extraordinary.

Watching Gerion and the others, Liu Qian silently resolved to get a suitable weapon first. He would use brute force to hold off the monsters, then flee into the dead forest once chaos took over.

If the monsters pursued him, he would use the trees to his advantage and hold them off with [Dragonfire Breath].

That was his best option.

Time to think was a luxury in the face of death.

A piercing shriek tore through the oppressive silence.

The monsters moved-not in a probing attack, but in a ravenous tide of fury that instantly overwhelmed those on the outer edge.

Screams erupted at once.

Unarmed or carrying only crude clubs, the sailors and slaves were as fragile as paper before those armored monsters.

A young sailor was knocked down. Hooked claws easily tore through his linen shirt and the flesh beneath. He kicked helplessly, only for those fang-filled jaws to bite through his neck a moment later. Blood splashed across the ground in a horrifying spray.

Another slave tried to fight back with a wooden club. It struck the monster's armored back with a dull thud, failing to leave even a pale mark. Instead, it enraged the creature. A single sweep of its hooked claws gouged away half the slave's face, eye and all.

Amid the chaotic slaughter, only Gerion Lannister and his guards stood firm as rock.

A rapid chorus of metallic ringing sounded as swords left their sheaths.

The well-trained guards quickly closed ranks, standing back-to-back in a tight circle.

Gerion himself stood at the front of the formation, wearing a gleaming breastplate over chain mail, his gaze steady.

"Hold steady! Aim for the joints!"

Gerion shouted.

His sword slashed hard into the forelimb joint of a lunging monster. With a sharp crack, its dark green shell broke apart, revealing sickly gray sinew and seeping black blood like rotten tree sap.

The monster hissed in pain and faltered, but quickly attacked again despite its injury. The two sides plunged back into close combat.

Meanwhile, Liu Qian was searching for an opening.

His sharp eyes caught a guard locked in combat with an especially powerful monster, unable to spare any attention elsewhere.

Liu Qian ducked low and dashed forward, hooking his fingers precisely around the hilt of the spare longsword at the guard's waist.

He recognized the wear on its scabbard. It had belonged to Lennard, the unfortunate man devoured by red maggots the night before.

The cold hilt settled into his hand, heavy and reeking of blood, yet it gave him a measure of reassurance.

Almost at the same instant, a foul gust struck his face!

A monster abandoned the wounded slave before it and lunged at this new threat carrying a sharp weapon.

Liu Qian had no time to assume any stance. Relying purely on instinct and the power surging through his body, he gripped the sword in both hands and swung upward with all his strength!

"Clang!"

A piercing metallic crash erupted.

The tremendous recoil numbed the webbing between Liu Qian's thumbs and forefingers, sending violent tremors through his arms.

His blade struck the hooked claws the monster raised to block him, scattering sparks.

The monster staggered under the unexpectedly powerful blow. A trace of astonishment seemed to flash through its eerie green eyes.

The impact also forced Liu Qian half a step back, leaving his chest churning.

What incredible strength!

He could clearly feel the changes in his body.

This was nothing his formerly frail body could ever have possessed. It was the work of his true dragon physique.

But he also instantly recognized his greatest weakness.

He had brute strength, but lacked technique.

His movements were clumsy, his swings broad and sweeping. He put everything into every strike, exhausting himself. He was nothing like Gerion's veterans, who blocked, deflected force, and sought openings with the least possible effort.

Yet that very incongruity in his fighting style made him stand out amid the chaotic battlefield.

Between lethal sword strokes, Gerion Lannister's emerald eyes swept keenly across the fighting.

He saw the black-haired, black-eyed slave from the East driving a monster back with sheer force, sword blow after sword blow. A ripple disturbed his otherwise steady composure.

Where did this Yi Ti man get such strength?

This made no sense!

Slaves from the East were not numerous in the Free Cities, but neither were they rare. Yet he had never heard of one with such fighting prowess and the courage to use it.