Golden Dragon: Six Thousand Years of Empire.

Chapter 189: Dragonized Augustus

"Your Highness Noah!"

"Are you okay?"

When the pressure and divine domain that made the young bronze dragons tremble and the giants tremble in fear gradually dissipated, the scene under the earth had undergone earth-shaking changes. The bloody and dilapidated city that looked like a slaughterhouse had disappeared.

The criss-crossing gullies, newly formed mounds and sinkholes came into view. It was unknown how many times this area had been plowed by the aftermath of the battle between Noah and the incarnation of the Mother of All Snakes.

Now that the power remains, if there is no legend powerful enough to clean it up, it may plague this land for hundreds of years, or even longer.

"fine!"

The third pair of dragon horns, blessed by the Word Spirit·The King's Crown, are returning to their original appearance. The powerful force bestowed by the Word Spirit·The Golden Throne, as deep as the ocean, is gradually fading.

These were two extremely powerful words. The King's Crown could allow Noah to temporarily taste the authority of the Dragon King, while the Golden Throne could make Noah's dragon body burst out in a short period of time, bringing his physical strength to a higher level.

Only these two words of self-strengthening could enable Noah to turn the tide when he was in a bad situation. This was also what made the incarnation of the Mother of Ten Thousand Snakes feel regretful.

Because as long as she can survive Noah's outburst, then Noah will be the one who is defeated, but unfortunately, the power given to Him by the snake-man blood sacrifice is not enough for His incarnation to continue to support it, so He feels regretful.

But it doesn’t matter. As an eternal and immortal being, He has countless opportunities to fail and start over. The cost of His trial and error is close to nothing. He also disdains to engage in meaningless entanglement after defeat because there is no need.

"Let's go back!"

Even after such a high-intensity outburst, in which he repelled an incarnation comparable to a god, Noah did not show any signs of fatigue.

The restored golden dragon form looked energetic, each scale was still flawless, shining with dazzling golden light, and there was not even a single wound on its body.

But when Noah returned to the city of Elisim, the golden dragon, who was already 68 years old and almost 70 years old, fell down directly and turned into an elemental black hole again, frantically devouring the magic power accumulated in the magic buildings. The terrible consumption attracted Selena, the controller of the Mage City.

"Where have you been? Why is your body so depleted? No, your mental energy is also seriously depleted."

The young wizard circled the golden dragon, which had grown to 57 meters in length. Even when it lay coiled on the ground, its height was much taller than hers. She was amazed.

“You’re being drained.”

"I encountered an incarnation of an evil demon."

Although Noah was certain that the Mother of Serpents was of a very high status, he still called her an evil demon, simply because she accepted blood sacrifices.

"Devil? Who?"

Selina raised her brows slightly.

"Mother of all snakes, do you understand? And have you heard of the Setra Snake Empire?"

"Settra? I know. It is indeed a very powerful empire. Unfortunately, it has existed for too long and is on the verge of disintegration."

"Split and disintegrate?"

"Yes, this empire has existed for nearly four thousand years, and it has become so large and bloated that even the internal forces do not understand each other. The number of factions in the empire is beyond imagination.

They worshipped more than thirty gods, and any belief related to snakes would be introduced into the empire. This indeed made Settra prosperous and powerful, but the increasing number of beliefs also led to increasing chaos in the empire.

I have the impression that the Mother of Ten Thousand Snakes you just mentioned is also one of the snake gods worshipped by this empire, and her status is not low."

Hearing Noah's question, Serena's eyes showed a thoughtful look, and then she gave Noah a piece of information that surprised him a little.
"What? Did you provoke the snake people of the Settra Empire? Or did you offend the Mother of All Snakes?"

"I did everything you said!"

Noah informed his adoptive mother of the theft of the dragon egg and his defeat of the Mother of All Serpents.

"that's it?"

After listening to Noah's narration, Serena looked calm, as if she had just lost a few coins.
“It’s okay. Although the Settra Empire sounds scary and its overall strength is very strong, it is too bloated. Its internal conflicts and factional struggles have almost exhausted the empire’s power to expand outward.

The snakemen you met are probably just small branches of one of the factions of this empire. Don't worry about them. Settra no longer has the motivation to expand outward.

If you encounter Imperial Snakemen in a plane outside the control of the Settra Empire, it can only mean that these Snakemen are not doing well in the Empire and are excluded to do this thankless and hard work. "

"What about the Mother of All Snakes?"

Noah asked, of course the Golden Dragon didn't care about a group of snake people, no matter whether they were from the empire or not, the key was that evil demon, the other party had set his eyes on him, and it was difficult for him to ignore the greedy look that wanted to eat him.

"She is a little troublesome. The Mother of All Snakes is one of Settra's original and most important beliefs. If she really wants your body and wants to have snake cubs with you, then you will be busy in the future."

Selena laughed.

"But it doesn't matter. You have already offended the entire elven pantheon. Now there is one more Mother of Ten Thousand Snakes. What difference does it make to you?"

"The Elf God has to save face, but this is an evil demon who doesn't care about anything!"

Although the elves like to play tricks and schemes, no matter what they do, they will always maintain their dignity and face and will not do anything too despicable, but the snake mother is different.

"It's okay. You are a metal dragon. At worst you can find a dragon god to pray to. I think any dragon god will be happy to help you."

The young girl said it carelessly, with a look of someone who just wanted to enjoy the fun and not be afraid of any trouble.

"You want money."

Noah said helplessly.

The basic rules of the dragon clan will not change even at the level of gods: they will only do things for money.

Of course, he can also get it for free. As the ancestor dragon, as long as he is willing to contribute his faith, any dragon god will be willing to protect him.

If he could find the Dragon King, no matter which Dragon King it was, no one would reject him and would probably be willing to help him, but the price would probably be to be adopted as a son.

"What else? Who can you ask for help without paying?"

The girl rolled her eyes.
"If you don't want to pay anything, just lie down here. No matter whether it's the snake mother or those long-eared elves, they won't dare to come here and act recklessly. No matter how many incarnations they send down, they can't hurt you."

"This is not something a legendary wizard is qualified to say. Aunt, have you found some particularly powerful backer?"

Noah was amazed. The cost of gods interfering in the material world was very high. Intervening directly with the incarnation of divine power would consume the most resources. Even if you put in 100% of your efforts, you might not get even 100%. Therefore, gods would be very cautious when sending down their incarnations. It is not an exaggeration to say that they are calculating carefully. Therefore, most of the time, the incarnations of gods are not very strong, and they are just guaranteed to be legendary.

It's fine if he's just a little bit stronger than the main culprit who caused the incident, but it's not easy to grasp the scale, because once the situation escalates, if the gods don't increase their investment in time, then it's all over.

There are many cases where the incarnation of God has been beaten to death. Noah just contributed one of them.

The strongest state that a deity can achieve in the material world is the saint form, which is the true descent of the deity.

However, gods in the form of saints usually only appear when a major catastrophe occurs that affects dozens or hundreds of planes, and they are not seen under normal circumstances.

Even so, it does not mean that other incarnations of gods can be underestimated. If the gods invest regardless of the cost and create an incarnation that is close to the level of a saint, it will be enough to sweep across the countries.

"I was born in an ordinary family, and I can't compare to you, the noble ancestor dragon. I am not worthy of talking about any background. I don't have any background. If you must talk about background, it can only be Cassius."

"uncle?"

Noah seemed to be thinking about something, as if he had realized something.

"you are not tired?"

Seeing the dragon still thinking, Serena asked curiously,
"According to my understanding, if a dragon has any major consumption or huge damage, it will recover through sleep. Could the Ancestral Dragon be an exception?"

"This is one of the racial characteristics of dragons. How can I get rid of it? I really want to take a nap now."

"Then you can sleep well. As for the snake man issue, I will inform Taidel and ask him to check the nobles in the kingdom."

"So what if it's examined? How many nobles can resist the temptation of prolonging their lives?"

The nobleman named Orff is not the only one. He represents a certain group, a group of nobles who are aging but unwilling to face death.

Treasures that can prolong life without any side effects or damage are too rare for this group.

However, it is easy to find some magical rituals that allow them to continue to exist in the world by changing their life forms, such as transforming into undead and becoming vampires.

In comparison, the snake man's transformation ritual is perfect. The noble who obtains the original blood of the circulating snake can repair his body's injuries and prolong his life by constantly shedding his skin. The temptation of this to the noble is self-evident.

"Since they cannot resist the temptation to prolong their lives, they cannot resist the threat of death either."

Selina sneered. Although she was very contemptuous of the Setra Empire in her words, in reality, she took it very seriously.

Even if the colonial pioneer team came from the Empire, there might not be any strong people among them, but they must have mastered many very tempting extraordinary technologies, and the magical ritual that can transform life forms is just one of them.

"I'll squint for a while."

Noah was not surprised by his adoptive mother's iron-blooded temperament and fell asleep peacefully.

Since the snake man has been exposed, he doesn't need to worry about what happens next, and it is not something he should worry about.

After a short but extremely intense battle, the exhausted Golden Dragon took a nap, but he slightly underestimated his sleep time.

“Ugh~ah——”

The morning sun shone on his face. The boy stretched and yawned. His slightly itchy cheek made him subconsciously reach out to scratch it, but the hard texture that he felt from his fingertips immediately froze him.

"what?"

Alexander rushed into the bathroom quickly, and when he saw the boy in the crystal mirror, who had a childish face but became more heroic as he grew older, he was stunned.

Because on the side of the boy's face, near the neck, there were a few tiny, glittering golden scales. Such scales were very familiar to him.
"Dragon scales?!"

Alexander didn't need to ask anyone. He could tell based on his experience growing up in the Holy Dragon Territory.

"How come I grow dragon scales?"

This is the boy's biggest doubt at the moment. He has forgotten how many tests he has taken since he was born.

Every test result clearly told him that apart from a small amount of elven blood that was no longer noticeable and the dominant human blood, he no longer had any special blood. But now, characteristics of a dragon were emerging in him.

"Theodore!"

After only half a minute of contemplation, Alexander kicked open his brother's room. Seeing Theodore's clean and tender face, and seeing nothing unusual, the boy grabbed his brother's collar.
"Brother! What are you doing?"

Theodore opened his eyes in a daze, and when he saw that his nightgown had been torn in half by his brother, his originally confused look instantly turned into fear, revealing a look of bewilderment and panic.

"Check your body to see if there are any abnormalities like mine."

As Alexander spoke, he took off his brother's clothes. Soon, he stopped while Theodore was struggling desperately. It was not because he felt pity for his brother, but because he had found what he wanted.

There were a few golden scales dotted on the boy's thin shoulders, only the size of melon seeds, but they sparkled brightly in the dim light of the room.
"Sure enough, just like me."

Alexander reached out and touched his brother's shoulder, or more directly, touched those abnormal dragon scales.

"what?"

Theodore finally realized the abnormality of his body.
"Dragon scales?"

The boy, who had lived with dragons since childhood, also recognized a few scales.

"He looks very much like Uncle Shenglong!"

The two brothers discussed for a while and came to a rough conclusion. They were so excited that they went to find their sister to verify it.

"Is there anything?"

The girl in her nightgown looked confused when she saw her brother and younger brother running over to her excitedly early in the morning.
"Evelin, let us check your body quickly!"

Theodore said impatiently.

"What nonsense are you talking about!"

Seeing his sister suddenly change color, grab her collar, and retreat a long distance with a vigilant look on her face, Alexander punched Theodore on the head with some annoyance.

(End of this chapter)