Zane walked through the halls with a cold expression. He was pissed that Anne almost died. Taking a deep breath he cleared his thoughts, he needed to stay alert. He also was recovering his energy in this time. With his 32 meridians it was a relatively swift process, he recovered all of his energy in just 10 minutes.
Terran couldn't help but click his tongue in admiration. "Saint dragon's really were comparable to golden dragons…"
Zane didn't bother to respond he just kept his guard up.
*Click*
Zane snapped his head in the direction where the sound came from, it was under Terran's foot.
*PUCHI!*
An arrow came flying from the side of the wall and pierced Terran's shoulder before they could react.
'Seriously?' Zane couldn't help but think that such traps were cliché.
Terran grunted in pain and pulled the arrow out.
However, he ran into a problem.
"It was poisoned." Terran said gravely.
"Although the poison has been diluted due to time, it's still preventing me from healing while also slightly corroding the wound. Be careful and try not to make the mistake I did." Terran warned.
Zane and Anne nodded. Terran was a 3rd martial realm, the poison wouldn't do much harm to him.
They now carefully watched their steps slowly advancing through the hall. The trio had their weapons drawn as they advanced.
*Click*
Anne immediately stepped back. A spike came down from the roof through a spatial portal that opened up above where she was before.
A few minute's later it was Zane who triggered a trap, this time it was an arc trap and a lightning bolt descended. Seeing it was lightning, Zane grinned.
He opened up his mouth and made a sucking motion. The lightning entered his mouth and dissolved into spiritual energy which was then stored.
"Elemental Decomposition… The trademark of saint dragons." Terran muttered gravely. Saint dragons had many innate abilities, one of them being element decomposition. This allowed them to decompose the energy in attacks so long as it's primarily made from one of the elements their saint cores encompass and it's not made by someone much more powerful than them.
Since this was just an ordinary lightning attack, his heavenly lightning saint core could absorb the lightning easily.
They continued walking for half an hour before they found a staircase, and they slowly stepped down it.
Time passed slowly in eery silence until they reached the bottom. They were clearly underground now, the walls were made of stone bricks, etc.
Torches lit up the walls and doors could be seen on either side.
"Let's check one at a time, be careful." Zane said to which the other 2 nodded they searched 1 room after another, triggering a few traps in the process but were able to survive due to their defensive treasures.
Both Anne and Terran had healing pills to help heal their injuries. Anne also handed Zane some as well for emergencies. Although his recovery ability was higher than average, it was still a good idea to have some healing pills.
During this time they found a number of spiritual pellets and spiritual stones. Per the agreement they stored it to be evenly distributed between each other when they left. They also found some body tempering pellets, pills, and herbs. Such things were very common in a draconic household.
They even found a few stalks of dragon grass which they gave to Terran since he needed it the most. Dragon grass had a minimal but noticeable effect on the bloodline of dragons and wyverns. However, to drakes, its effect was moderate and very useful. It served as a way to recover their dragon bloodline's purity.
Dragon grass was usually very rare due to it being gathered for so many years on the 9 islands. It was honestly a miracle a few stalks could be found every year in the wild at all.
Terran was stunned "Why? I'm just an outsider…"
Zane smiled "Without your bow, we wouldn't have made it in here easily. Without your support Anne and I would have died after I suffered exhaustion from using my forbidden skill… You've contributed a lot. So just take it man."
Terran just nodded with a smile.
With that they moved to the final room, when they opened the door they were stunned. A giant undead Dracowolf was resting on the ground.
This was the highest level of undead in the clan, with intelligence as close to a real living being as it can get. It was also the clan's treasure guardian.
What's terrifying was its foundation was clearly at the middle stages of the 1st profound realm.
When they walked in, it was in hibernation, but sensing their presence it woke up.
It growled as the golden flames in its eyes roared to life.
[Tell Anne and Terran to retreat, now.] Alina commanded gravely. Yes, commanded. This was the first time she had ever commanded Zane directly.
Zane nodded he looked to them, "Retreat, now."
"What about you?" Anne asked worriedly.
"I'll be fine, I'm not going to fight it directly." He said to which she nodded slowly.
"Stay safe, please." She said to which he nodded.
She ran up to him and hugged him for a moment before stepping back, all be it reluctantly.
She then turned around and left with a grave expression leaving with Terran.
'Can Terran be trusted?' Zane asked.
[No. In fact, he came here with ill intent. However don't worry, Master won't let anything happen to Anne. While you can be reincarnated again, Anne cant.]
Zane nodded gravely, this made him raise his guard against Terran for next time.
The wolf just watched this quietly, obviously, it understood Zane was sending his companions away to fight it alone. This made the wolf respect Zane even if only a little bit.
"Can you understand me?" Zane asked the wolf. He got a feeling it had intelligence, beyond what those undead drakes from before had. As for why he didn't use his universal communication, it's because that only works with creatures with a brain. This Dracowolf was undead, so it only had a spirit remaining.
The wolf nodded with a low growl.
"The golden dragon realm is now nothing but ruins… It's impressive you've managed to make it through these last million years." Zane said upon getting confirmation.
The wolf growled and shook its head, clearly denying Zane's words just now.
"I'm serious, spread your spiritual sense out across this city. Do you think the golden dragons would tolerate a city becoming this run down? Although the mortal prefecture is their lowest level, it's also the face of the golden dragon clan."
The Dracowolf was stunned by his words, it quickly spread its spiritual sense out. Sure enough, the entire city was empty, let alone the clan mansion.
It tilted its head In sheer confusion. The golden dragons were very powerful, they wouldn't just abandon their world.
It checked if it was an illusion, but after several checks, it found it wasn't… It ran through countless possibilities in its head, but all of them were illogical…
It looked at Zane in pure curiosity now, its previous hostility was gone. It only wanted to know what the hell was going on.