The moment Lin Xuan dashed forward, an abrupt surge of heat enveloped the area, followed by a golden pillar of light piercing into the heavens.
Staring at the towering beam, Lin Xuan was momentarily stunned.
Awakened...
The once-dark alley was now illuminated like daylight. The radiant figure of a Seraph expanded outward, pressing one of the ghost-faced monsters to the ground. The creature let out a blood-curdling shriek.
A divine, sacred aura swept toward Lin Xuan, carrying an overwhelming sense of oppression. His golden pupils constricted, and his dragon blood began to boil within him.
As the divine aura enveloped him, Lin Xuan first felt an insatiable craving—a primal, visceral hunger, as though a starved man in a desert had stumbled upon an exquisite feast.
But then came another wave of emotion: fury.
A rage that sprang forth unbidden, ignited by the divine aura, as if it were a direct challenge to his very existence.
In his mind, Lin Xuan suddenly found himself seeing through the eyes of the Black King. The skies were a grim mix of ash and fire, and a lone, withered tree stood desolate, its skeletal branches sprawling outward.
A colossal black dragon lowered its head, surveying the dragon's domain beneath it. Its subjects bowed low, their reverence absolute. The world seemed to echo with the dragon’s voice alone.
As a monarch, it could not tolerate provocation.
Raising its head once more, the Black King gazed at the moon in the night sky.
Upon that moon, a being watched back—a figure whose presence was marked by pure, radiant wings that stretched to obscure the heavens.
The two figures stared at one another, silent yet speaking volumes.
Elsewhere, countless gazes turned toward the golden light pillar. Shock and disbelief were etched onto the faces of those who saw it.
Just as the light began to fade, a colossal shadow appeared in the sky.
It was a black dragon—towering, incomparably vast.
With wings that stretched wide enough to shroud the world, the dragon’s form exuded both terror and majesty.
The dragon’s entire body glimmered with scales as dark as obsidian, their luster both menacing and magnificent. Its wings, horrifyingly, bore thousands of hanging corpses, swaying gently like wind chimes with every wingbeat.
When the dragon’s eyes opened, its golden pupils gleamed in the darkness, an announcement to the world of its arrival.
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On his way toward the light, Zhao Kongcheng came to a stunned halt, drenched in sweat.
What... is happening?
The golden pillar—he was certain—was from the Mortal Divine Domain, a hallmark of Michael’s divine relic. But what about the black dragon appearing in the same location?
This massive being exuded an aura that matched at least a Klein-tier powerhouse.
Zhao Kongcheng gripped the medallion in his hand tighter as his feet continued moving. Regardless of what awaited him, he had to go. If this creature meant harm to the people of Daxia, he would fight it, even if it cost his life.
Yet as Zhao Kongcheng approached, the black dragon’s immense figure shifted its gaze toward him for a brief moment, then vanished into nothingness.
When Zhao finally reached the site, all that remained were two youths standing opposite one another and a heap of bloody remains between them.
The ghost-faced creature had been utterly crushed into a pulp the moment Nidhogg’s shadow manifested.
One of the youths had faint traces of golden light flickering in his pupils, his body radiating vigilance.
The other stood calmly, his eyes closed, exuding a faint aura of majesty.
Then the boy opened his eyes, his golden slit-like pupils glancing briefly at Zhao Kongcheng. Recognizing him, Lin Xuan’s pressure dissipated, and his dragon-like pupils reverted to normal.
Lin Xuan gave Zhao Kongcheng a small nod, though his mind was a whirlwind of thoughts.
Lin Qiye’s awakening had triggered the surge of dragon blood within him. It was as if he’d momentarily merged with Nidhogg’s perspective, glimpsing profound and mysterious visions.
Through this experience, Lin Xuan reached a startling realization: in this world, he alone was destined to take Nidhogg’s place.
The godhead, the divine throne—all of it would one day be his.
His bloodline’s path to purity pointed toward the seat of the supreme god, aligning perfectly with what he had sensed before the gravestone.
When his bloodline purity reached 99%, he would ascend to the level of a supreme deity.
Sealed within his blood was Nidhogg’s very essence, waiting to be fully awakened as his purity advanced.
This essence was a source of laws, a foundation for ascending to divinity.
During the brief moment he had merged with Nidhogg’s memories, Lin Xuan had felt it clearly—an unmistakable presence residing within him.
It was the Black King’s essence.
Though Lin Xuan had never seen such an essence before, he recognized it instantly for what it was. Pure, unadulterated, it belonged to Nidhogg, the Deathwing.
Should others discover that someone as weak as Lin Xuan, still at the Zhan tier, carried a supreme god’s essence, it would provoke a storm of gods vying for it.
What truly astonished him, however, was how much his bloodline purity had increased—from just witnessing Nidhogg’s memories, his purity had jumped by 5%.
This growth wasn’t solely due to the destruction of the second ghost-faced monster, though that had contributed 1%. The other 4% was simply from being connected to Nidhogg’s shadow, stirred by Michael’s divine power.
Such results cemented Lin Xuan’s resolve:
Stick to Lin Qiye. Milk him dry.
A simple awakening had brought him such immense growth. His current purity had reached 10%, enabling him to unlock a second ability.
Of course, he would need to return to the gravestone in his mind to decipher the inscriptions and fully understand it, just as he had with Time Zero.
That could wait.
For now, Lin Xuan shifted his gaze to Zhao Kongcheng.
First, he needed to address the current situation. The earlier commotion was far too conspicuous—he’d have to come up with a plausible explanation.