Storms were King Ghidorah's breath, and lightning was his pulse.
The golden, three-headed dragon traveled through the depths of the ink-black clouds. Every beat of his enormous wings, spanning thirteen hundred feet, sent a ripple stretching dozens of kilometers through the sea of clouds.
Lightning leaped and darted across his scales like countless tiny silver snakes, winding down along the contours of his wing bones before gathering at the tips of his tailbones and becoming dazzling bolts that struck the clouds behind him. The rolling thunder fell far behind, unable to keep pace.
King Ghidorah's middle head hung slightly lowered, its golden slit pupils half-lidded, as though he were dozing or savoring something.
The lightning within the storm held tremendous energy. Thunderbolts that ordinary people would consider powerful enough to level a city were nothing more than nourishment for his body.
Bioelectricity flowed beneath his scales, seeping into his muscles, bones, and every nerve fiber. Like rain soaking parched earth, a tingling sensation spread from the top of his head all the way to the tips of his tails.
He had not eaten in a long time.
Since crossing over to this planet, he had not eaten anything or drunk a single mouthful of water.
Human food did not amount to so much as a speck of dust to him. The energy in their pork, beef, mutton, grains, and vegetables was not enough for even one beat of his wings.
As a Titan, he had long since transcended ordinary metabolism and no longer needed food to stay alive. All he needed was energy-electrical energy, heat, radiation. His body could absorb, convert, and store any highly concentrated form of energy.
And storms were the best source of energy.
King Ghidorah drew a deep breath, sucking the electrical charges in the clouds into his body in one enormous gulp. The Gravity Beams glands in his throats grew faintly hot, and golden arcs flickered at the corners of his mouths.
He exhaled a stale breath in satisfaction. The expelled air condensed into a white trail of mist among the clouds, which the storm soon tore apart.
His middle head tilted, its golden slit pupils piercing the layers of dark clouds to see the surface below.
A stretch of green.
No, green was not the word for it. More accurately, it was land that had once been green, now churned into a mess, like a rag someone had crumpled into a ball and spread out again.
Trees lay toppled, mountainsides stood bare, and rivers had changed course. Murky floodwater still pooled in some places, gleaming an ominous grayish yellow in the sunlight.
Viewed from above, the region looked like skin savaged by a giant beast's claws, covered in shocking scars.
King Ghidorah remembered. These were the traces left by the superstorm he had stirred up on the day he awoke.
Although the main body of the storm had already dissipated, its aftermath and the violent winds and rains on its fringes had been enough to ravage all surface vegetation within hundreds of kilometers.
Hmm... not too bad, I suppose.
He spoke to himself inwardly. Given this planet's ecological capacity for recovery, damage on this scale would probably heal in a few years.
Trees would grow again, animals would return, and rivers would run clear once more. Time would erase every trace, as though nothing had happened.
It did not matter.
King Ghidorah looked away, paying no further attention to the ruins below. He had never been a being who felt guilty over ants he crushed underfoot, nor one who mourned trees he blew down. They existed, they disappeared, and neither had anything to do with him.
As for the "side quest"-Black Owl had an autopilot mode, so there was no need to worry. That intelligent construct had lain in Apekus's treasury for thousands of years and had long since accumulated sufficient energy reserves. Even without his consciousness inhabiting it, it could act independently according to preset programs.
It could operate independently without his consciousness inhabiting it and carry out simple instructions, such as following, concealing itself, and basic conversation.
That was enough.
King Ghidorah gathered his thoughts and accelerated. Storm clouds churned around him like a cloak billowing in a gale, casting a dark shroud over more than a dozen kilometers of sky. Beneath the cover of the clouds, he adjusted his course and flew deeper into the continent.
On the ground.
A Qiu crouched behind the fallen tree, both hands clamped around its trunk. The wind blew her skirt inside out, exposing the patched underpants beneath.
Her long hair streamed behind her head like a flag. A few strands had tangled around branches, tugging painfully at her scalp, but she had no hand free to untangle them.
The large brown marten hooked its claws into her collar, its entire body hanging around her neck like a scarf. Its fluffy tail swept back and forth beneath her chin, tickling her so much that she wanted to sneeze.
The gray squirrel had burrowed into her breast pocket, leaving only its furry head exposed. Its two little paws gripped the edge of the pocket, its eyes round and its mouth forming an "O."
The other little creatures had each found hiding places of their own-some squeezed into tree hollows, some clung to cracks between rocks, and some simply buried themselves in piles of fallen leaves, leaving only their bottoms sticking out.
The wind was too strong.
It was not the gentle, flower-scented breeze that had blown from afar earlier, nor the all-enveloping wind that made it hard to stand when a storm arrived.
It was a sort of... how to put it... a wind pressing down from overhead, as though an enormous invisible hand were pushing your head down.
The wind carried electricity, tingling against her face. The electrical charge in the air was so dense that A Qiu's hair stood on end like a puffed-out dandelion.
"Is that thing a storm?!"
The wind shredded A Qiu's voice so thoroughly that even she could not hear what she was saying. With difficulty, she raised her head and squinted up at the sky.
The mass of black clouds had already grown several times larger than before, covering almost half the sky. Its edges rolled and twisted, golden lightning weaving through the clouds like thunder dragons imprisoned in a cage.
The black clouds moved absurdly fast-not drifting, not shifting, but flying. Like an arrow loosed from a bow, like a black bolt of lightning streaking across the heavens, they swept over her head at a speed that utterly defied the laws of nature.
"What kind of storm flies that fast?!"
A Qiu could no longer wrap her mind around it. She was not some forest elf who had never seen the world. She had seen thunderstorms, hurricanes, and blizzards blowing down from the north in winter.
But those all came gradually-the clouds gathered little by little, the wind grew stronger little by little, and the rain fell little by little. No storm had ever been like this-on the horizon one second, overhead the next, and far away the second after that.
The storm left as quickly as it came.
After the mass of black clouds swept over her head, the wind abruptly weakened, dropping from a gale strong enough to carry people away to a breeze that could stir leaves.
The sky brightened again. Sunlight spilled through gaps in the clouds, casting irregular patches of light across the ground.
A Qiu slumped behind the fallen tree, gasping for breath.
The large brown marten jumped down from her neck and shook its wind-tousled fur. The gray squirrel crawled out of her pocket, rubbed its face with its two little paws, and gave a squeak.
"Um... are you okay?" A Qiu looked down at the squirrel in her pocket, then at the large marten crouched by her feet.
The gray squirrel patted its chest and squeaked to show how tough it was. The large marten brushed her ankle with its tail, then turned around and began licking its wind-ruffled fur.
A Qiu braced herself against the trunk and stood. Her legs felt a little weak, and her knees trembled.
She shifted her scalp, still aching from the branches tugging at it, picked the leaves tangled in her hair out, and patted the dust and dirt off herself.
Then she remembered something.
She whirled around.
The crooked little wooden house she had spent the entire morning building, with its door that would not close properly and its stuffing of moss-
Was gone.
The wind had not blown it away-not this time. While fleeing in a blind panic, she had used the fallen tree as cover, and the little wooden house had happened to be right behind it, which was to say... exactly where she had just been crouching.
When she stood and looked back, she saw a mess scattered across the ground. Her back had knocked the wooden house's walls apart. Several logs had rolled onto the ground, and moss and mud were strewn everywhere.
The wind had blown the roof's dried grass and leaves all over the place. Some hung from branches, some floated in puddles, and some stuck to her own clothes.
The crooked door that would not close properly leaned against a nearby rock, with a human-shaped hole in the middle where her back had smashed through it.
A Qiu dropped to her knees with a thud.
Her knees struck the muddy ground, sending up a small splash. Mouth open, she stared blankly at the ruins. Her lips trembled several times, but not a single word came out.
"Gone... gone again..."
Her voice was so quiet that even the large marten crouching by her feet did not hear her.
Then she cried.
It was not silent weeping, nor stifled crying with her teeth biting her lip. It was the kind where her mouth opened and the tears fell, followed by snot, and she wailed aloud without a shred of dignity, like a child whose candy had been stolen.
"Waaaaaah-"
A Qiu sat on the ground with both legs stretched straight out and her hands braced behind her, her head thrown back as she bawled at the sky.
Tears streamed down her cheeks, dripping onto her collar and the muddy ground. Snot ran from her nose. She sniffed, failed to draw it back in, and it ran out again. She wiped it with the back of her hand, leaving a glistening streak across her face.
The gray squirrel stood on her knee, holding a leaf in its two little paws and trying to wipe away her tears. But the leaf was too small and became soaked after only two wipes.
The large marten crouched beside her, watching her with its head tilted and its tail swishing against the ground, as though debating whether to comfort her.
"I spent-the-whole-morn-ing-building it-"
A Qiu cried so hard she could barely breathe, haltingly accusing fate of its cruelty.
"The first one-got-blown-away-by-the-wind-the second one-got-crushed-by-me-my-self-"
She sniffed and wiped her face with her sleeve, soaking a large patch of it.
"Am I-just-not-compatible-with-wooden houses-?"
The large marten finally could not hold back any longer. It walked over and rubbed its head against her arm, giving a low whimper that sounded like a sigh.
The gray squirrel threw away the soaked leaf, pulled another one out of the pocket, and kept holding it up.
Several little creatures with big ears crawled out of the tree hollow and gathered around her feet, chattering as though holding an emergency meeting to discuss how to comfort this sobbing forest elf.
After crying for about a quarter of an hour, A Qiu finally quieted down. Not because she had stopped crying, but because she was tired. Her tears still flowed, but her voice grew softer, becoming intermittent sniffles.
She wiped her face over and over with the back of her hand, mixing the mud and tears together until her whole face was mottled like a little tabby cat's.
"All... all right..."
She took a deep breath, then another, and slowly exhaled.
"It's okay... it's okay..."
She patted her cheeks twice, the two smacks crisp and loud.
"If the house is gone, I'll build it again... it's not like I haven't built one before..."
Bracing her hands on her knees, she stood. Her legs still shook, but they were a little steadier than before. She looked around at the ruins ravaged jointly by the storm, herself, and fate, and the corners of her mouth twitched.
Then she bent down and picked up the log that had rolled onto the ground, the one she had spent an hour whittling yesterday, which had originally been the roof's main beam.
"Again."