Divine Beast Ascension

Chapter 447: Trip to Razor-hide Clan

Warak squinted. “Why would that help? Aren’t we teleporting there?”

Jarrit shook his head but it was Bradok who laughed and shouted, “Nope! Even better! Just do as he says.”

“Please. A mental map is what I need, the more precise the better. And make sure you indicate a specific area or room that won’t draw anyone’s attention while we’re transported there.”

“... Alright,” sighed Warak, getting a nod from Eeole.

Warak hurried up and shared the mental image. But Jarrit denied it. Warak was forced to create a better map, one far more intricate and detailed. It took the dragon lord almost ten minutes to imagine the scene before Jarrit gave his approval.

“Good. Alright...” Jarrit quieted down and closed his eyes. Suddenly, spatial energy glossed over Jarrit’s entire being. From head to toe, the calm purple energy glided over Jarrit’s skin and clothes. Then, as Jarrit lifted his finger, the energy condensed and formed a tiny blade of essence. Jarrit slowly and steadily drew a wide circle in the air, one large enough for all of them to step through. Nothing seemed out of the ordinary until Jarrit finished and connected the string of spatial essence. All of a sudden, the area inside that circle collapsed on itself. It was somehow dragged into a whirlpool of spatial energy lingering inside the circle. “... Done.”

As Jarrit took a sigh of relief, Eeole placed a hand on his shoulder. “Well done. That was perfect.”

.....

“... What... What is that?!” blurted Warak, clueless yet infinitely intrigued.

“Come on! Let’s hurry!” Without a second thought or any hesitation, Bradok pushed past Warak and leaped into the whirlpool of space essence.

“Bradok-”

“Calm down. He’s doing what we all must. Hurry, the longer you take, the greater the drain on Jarrit,” insisted Eeole, bringing Jarrit through the whirlpool.

Being the last one, Warak hurried to catch up, joining them on the other side.

As the whirlpool closed, Warak blinked. He blinked again. The third time he blinked, Warak rubbed his eyes and dropped his jaw on the floor. “... This... This is-”

‘Exactly where you wanted to go,’ Eeole stated telepathically.

Only then did Warak realize that Eeole, Jarrit, and Bradok had somehow become invisible and untraceable. But he didn’t let that shock him. Warak was too busy trying to understand what had just happened, and how it was possible to cover such a vast distance with a single skill.

‘Hurry along. Lead us into the clan, and we’ll show ourselves once we’re alone with the totem,’ reminded Eeole, pushing Warak forward and forcing him to start moving.

“... Right... But you’d better explain all of this-”

‘I’ll explain this and more after speaking with your ancestor. Then I’ll make you my true offer, just as I did with Treeda and Bradok already.’

“Treeda too... Figures. She’d join just to have your teachings and techniques...”

Warak did his best to shake the nerves and confusion away. The last thing he needed was such a startled demeanor while strolling through his clan, where so many of his kin would see him.

Bradok helped him out, patting Warak’s back, ‘Come on! One must always pay up on their bets!’

“Yeah, yeah...” groaned Warak, finally acting more like his usual self. “Alright. Just follow my lead.”

Stepping down from his clan’s teleportation circle, Warak led the hidden men to the enclosed courtyard’s only doorway. He opened it, startling the guard standing on the opposite side.

“L-Lord Warak!” Instantly, the dragon lowered his huge body and bowed.

“No need for such courtesy. I’m in a rush. I’ll be visiting the totem and immediately returning,” stated Warak, nodding to the dragon guard without so much as a glance. “There’s no need to announce my return.”

“Yes, my lord!”

Warak walked with purpose. His speed was good and everyone would immediately clear the path the moment they spotted their clan head with his golden robes and hair. Still, it took them more than half an hour to traverse the clan’s vast territory and appear at a special tower.

Glancing at the two guards on either side of the double doors, Warak ordered, “No one is allowed in. I’m making an urgent call on the great ancestor.”

“YES, SIR!” Both guards gave full bows, trembling with excitement to hear the clan head say such a thing.

The doors were shut and locked behind Warak. There was no need to activate a silent formation as there was a continuous formation forever active, as one of the formations lining the walls of the entire tower.

Bradok’s visage appeared, like Eeole’s and Jarrit’s, but he slowly walked toward the center of the room. To his amazement, the tower was just a single room. And, in the center, there was an enormous, thirty-krin monument carved from some sort of granite giving off a soft, warm glow. It was carved in the shape of a Razor-hide Dragon wrapped around a jagged peak. Despite being all one color, the strange glow made both the granite and the dragon appear to be alive... as if even the stone was breathing.

“So this... This is a totem...” Bradok was about to reach out and touch the stone. But he stopped himself. Just a breath’s distance from feeling the monument’s smooth finish, Bradok pulled his hand back. “So much vitality. It’s practically alive... No wonder souls can live inside it.”

Warak spoke up, “Wrong. Most souls can’t dwell inside it. They must forfeit their physical body to bind their souls to the totem. And it’s only possible for clan members with a cultivation of a low-king or higher, otherwise, the person might fail to bind to the totem and die in the process.”

“Such is the power of soul stone, one of the rarest of all materials throughout the world,” remarked Eeole, casually walking up. He glanced at the totem with complete nonchalance. To him, this wasn’t anything new or special.

“... So... It’s for the sake of things like totems that we apes aren’t allowed to become kings?” grumbled Bradok, holding back a tear. “To keep us from having things like this, we were slaughtered?”

Blinking, Warak couldn’t hold back a certain question any longer, “Bradok, you know about-”

“Yes. We apes know about the genocide thousands of years ago. At least we ape clan chiefs do.”