He is the leader of the Tantric sect in Chagdu.

Chapter 64 Soaring High!

Chapter 67 Soaring High!

"Escape from the Cage of the Sky"

This is the true meaning of "Agdeu," the truth conveyed by the calls of the birds.

It is a land abandoned by the sky, so those imprisoned here have never been "the offspring of birds".

Rather, it is "the enemy of birds".

Before him, the beautiful girl was still smiling at him, and even walking slowly toward Ai, but a hand suddenly raised silently stopped Anda from getting closer.

"Don't come any closer—"

Ai was still trembling uncontrollably, and he could not do anything more. All his consciousness was used to resist the "hostility" rising from his instincts—the white wings on his back were slightly open like thin paper, and snow-like downy feathers kept breaking off from them and swirling wildly.

At this moment, beneath his feet, the fragrant grass is frozen, and the earth is withered.

The cold was like the dead of winter.

However, the biting cold could not stop the rebellious girl.

Anda slowly moved closer to his side, then poured all her tenderness into him—her light, seemingly weightless body nestled against his chest with an unconvincing force.

Those bright red dragon wings seemed to be resisting their instincts, slowly folding themselves together in an almost struggling manner.

Ai took a deep breath:

I wanted to crush her throat with my thumb.

He looked at Anda, his trembling hand stroking her slender neck, which seemed to bend at the slightest touch.

Anda stared at him, her eyes unblinking, [a creaking sound].

he thought.

[It sounded like a thin twig being snapped.]

That's it—

The next second, Ai's eyes widened suddenly—Rhodes, and even Ash, appeared for a moment, the color contained in the vessel surging in the red liquid in his abdomen, forcibly swallowing the boiling killing intent in his soul back deep into his throat.

"Gurgle—"

A cry came from behind the distant curtain, like a helpless sigh, yet also faintly revealing a hint of acquiescence, as if it had long anticipated this scene, or had already witnessed the birth of this place.

The next instant, the pale white in his eyes faded rapidly like a lucid dream, and the already illusory white wings behind him were blown away by the wind.

"Ugh—I'm so annoyed."

Ai sighed with all her might, almost grinding her teeth in frustration, "Are all those winged creatures idiots?"

He was already gritting his teeth, and could only say in a deep voice, "Aren't you afraid I'll really kill you? The killing intent just now was an instinct flowing in the blood of birds—whether it's the Lord, the White Dove, or the Cuckoo, they all want you dead. Why?"

He asked, "What exactly are those wings on the back of the Agdiu?"

Despite already having guesses, he still wanted to get the answer—or rather, the attitude—from Anda.

"I thought I was going to die—"

Anda's faint voice came from his chest, not muffled, but filled with the joy of surviving a disaster.

"Lot, Lot—"

The girl called his name softly again and again, lifting half her head from Ai's arms, her red wings swaying slightly behind her. Though she had nearly died, she laughed genuinely now. "The truly foolish one is you, Rhodes. Even that highest bird wanted you to kill me—maybe Anda really is some kind of incredibly evil thing?"

"Aren't you afraid that if you let me go now, you'll regret it later?" She winked playfully.

Ai tilted her head.

—Anyway, it's a choice made within a game—does it mean it can crawl through the internet cable into reality and cause me trouble?

He smiled and said nonchalantly, "I'm happy to."

"I see—"

Anda flapped her wings and stepped back from his embrace. "Lhode, you are the agent of that bird, your song is as familiar as your mother tongue, so you should have known from the beginning — the true name of the monster in the revelation."

She blinked. "Then why don't you try to continue reading that book—although it's Agdewey's original text, we actually can't understand some of its contents, which is why we went down the wrong path from the beginning."

—Oh, right.

I haven't finished reading "The Story of the Sky" yet.

The next moment, just as Ai was about to take the book out of her bag, she was quickly interrupted by a breath that was close at hand.

Despite being the one making the suggestion, the girl took the initiative to stop him.

Ai looked up in a daze and saw a pair of golden-red eyes very close to her.

Lot.

Anda smiled and raised a hand in front of him as if to ask for credit.

"Before that, could you please—witness my entire journey?"

A golden-red feather lay in her slender, fair hand; it was a feather that the girl had plucked from the lower part of her bird wing.

Without thinking, Ai silently took it in her hand and watched Anda walk away step by step.

She trod upon the corpses scattered on the ground, stepped over pools of dark red blood, the red on her wings now more vibrant than the blazing sun. "Although we are not the kin of the sky, I will still complete the trial of the birds. Lor will surely understand, won't he? That sky is no longer my future; it is the obsession of all Agdeweys."

"Though I am not a bird, I have wings on my back and will eventually fly."

"I see, I see—"

Ai responded dryly, watching Anda walk away from him step by step. Her already unsteady steps became even lighter, and her pair of bright red wings were raised high under the blazing sun, flowing with an indescribable sacred color.

She treads through everything here that has been denied yet not forgotten, like a withered blade of grass easily broken by the wind, standing at the edge of the cliff in Asuka Gorge.

"Anda————"

He wanted to shout from a distance, but the sudden unfolding of those wings swallowed the rest of his words back into his throat.

He didn't know what else to say—even though the source of Agdeweg's evil was no longer there, the words Ai wanted to say were to persuade her to give up, to leave, to forget everything on this abandoned land, and to go to another, wider sky to embrace her new life.

But how could I possibly offer such a cruel suggestion to erase her unwavering devotion?

Tell her: Everything was wrong from the beginning, and everything was meaningless from the beginning?

"Tsk—"

After a long time, in a distance where time seemed to stand still, Ai could only end the murder with a sigh.

Since we can't stop it, let's offer our blessings!

"Anda-ichi"

He cried out, he shouted, he sang a high-pitched song for this life that challenged the sky with his sharp and high-pitched bird song: "Anda, look at your wings—their holiness and beauty are completely different from the wings of birds, clearly ferocious yet pointing at sinners, clearly dangerous yet closing in on me—"

"You're an incredibly handsome dragon!"

Ai has let herself go—

"I love its colors, its majestic yet cruel shape and contours, the blood stained on its finger bones, your golden-red and vibrant colors—I saw it all. Your efforts, your struggles, your incredibly cool act of rebellion—I saw it all!"

"The lamb's gentleness and tenderness, its silent sweetness, its warmth, its past weakness—I have witnessed it all, I have seen it all—Anda, you were once a lamb, the most timid yet the purest lamb, and you have been reborn!"

"I have witnessed sharp bones growing from the wool of a lamb, delicate wings, and your life raised high toward the sky."

From Lamb to Red Dragon

He roared, "I saw it all!"

The storm raged and roared through the mountain gorges, but the birdsong was higher and brighter than the wind's turmoil, so that the sound was enough to travel across all the mountains, traversing the high peaks and spreading into the depths of the wilderness, perhaps to the ends of the sky, the place where milk and honey began.

What echoes from the empty valley is both reverberation and silence.

Ai's face flushed red, and she even gritted her teeth: "Can't you give me any reaction?!"

I'm so embarrassed!

"...

The silence did not last long.

"Gurgle, whoosh whoosh whoosh—"

At first, it was very small, like suppressed laughter, and then it gradually grew louder. The girl standing on the edge of the cliff bent over little by little, laughing so hard she couldn't straighten up.

Birdsong mingled with laughter echoing between the sky and the earth—"How stupid—"

Amidst laughter, the girl's red wings spread to their limit, those beautiful yet crude wing bones a defiant pointing upwards, like a flame about to burn away everything from the past. The color of blood flowed between her transparent bone membranes. She did not turn back, for her golden-red eyes were already flooded with tears. For a trial-taker about to challenge the sky with her wings, she did not want those falling tears to become a prophecy or a burden. So the girl forced herself not to turn back, not to look at the strange figure behind her, completely without motive yet constantly supporting her.

She tilted her head back, but tears still slid down her cheeks, flowing along her thin, sharply defined jawline.

"Lot, can we wait a little longer?"

Anda said softly.

Even though she had tried her best to avoid Lot's gaze, a strange mix of sadness and joy overwhelmed her in that moment of emotion. She remembered the revelation—

"The bird of trial, her body must be as slender as a wisp of wind, her bones as light as wheat. Unlike the chosen ones, her wings are complete and whole, her feathers full and vibrant in color, her whiskers like the heart of a rose, the stamen of a rosy rose—when she spreads her wings and soars, her golden-red is more radiant than the blood of the blazing sun."

"My wings are whole and complete."

She murmured.

The Red Dragon's understanding of flight replaced "feathers" with "membranes," and its bone wings, stained with the colors of flesh and blood, now flowed with a crimson substance like broken roses.

"My bones are hollow and light."

Like every trial participant, the wings are both a promotion and a price to pay. Anda hugged her body, feeling the wind blowing on her wings behind her, her feet so light that it felt as if she could leap away from the earth's gravity.

"But I have no eyes to see—"

She took a deep breath.

"But I am already—the final test subject."

she says.

"I want to fly, I want to fly up—I want to embrace my future, I want to go out with Lorde, I want to ride the Flyer One that Lily told me about—I want to eat the waffles and ice cream that Lily told me about in the city, I want to eat hers too—all the new life, all the things that have imprisoned us for life, I don't want to stay here anymore—"

—All my ideals, the future, the sky, and the distance.

"Therefore, I am determined to fly."

Without further hesitation, the song of birds blossomed from her lips like a flower bud—this time, Ai finally understood the lyrics clearly.

—Burning blood to the bone, burning songs as a guide.

—Strive toward the sky, for you are no longer alone—even at the end, there will be cheers.

—The rose soars through the sky, burning itself out—you too will surely be able to touch the sky, Lot.

At the last moment, Anda finally turned around.

She understood this blessing and prayer, and all her courage and determination were born at that moment.

Her eyes were red and swollen, and she let her tears fall to the ground, sink into the soil, and disappear into nothingness.

She said, "Witness me."

A body as light as a feather sways in the wind.

Then, leaning back, the crimson figure, falling without warning, seemed to be swallowed by something, disappearing into the middle of the sky in the blink of an eye.

"install----"

Ai's lips trembled, and her outstretched right hand froze in mid-air.

one second.

Time has never felt so long.

Two seconds—

He began to swallow hard, his heart felt like it was being squeezed tightly by an invisible hand, and even breathing became a matter of doubt.

three seconds.

Five seconds—Ai’s gaze became unfocused.

ten seconds.

My legs are getting weak, but if I were to collapse here in Lot's body, it wouldn't be too embarrassing.

He started to let his mind wander, so he looked up at something higher, like covering his score after an exam and then uncovering it from the last digit, as if that would yield a better result.

He stared intently at the blindingly bright sun. He could still maintain his white beak, but his other eye, belonging to a mortal, was already overwhelmed by stinging and soreness.

How long has it been?

Ai Yi thought blankly.

He dissolved his mind in the scorching radiance, as if in this way he would no longer need to record that ethereal time, or temporarily forget that possibly predetermined ending. He finally couldn't hold on any longer and squinted his eyes. In his blurred vision, which was shrouded in tears, the sun seemed to have inexplicably appeared as an afterimage. A more dazzling golden-red color slowly emerged from the circle, mischievously squeezing into the very center of his field of vision.

So Ai narrowed her eyes again.

—Golden red?

He gaped. The petite girl seemed negligible compared to the sun, but the colors surrounding her were more dazzling than the blazing sun. She was like the most intense flame, rising towards the sun, and even the sun could not overshadow her brilliance.

Whether it was from being moved or from staring at the bright light for too long, Ai felt tears welling up uncontrollably.

"Stupid dragon!"

He shouted loudly towards the sky.

"Anda! You stupid dragon!"

A red dragon circled around him, the sunlight filtering through its transparent wings, its beauty surpassing even that of roses and hibiscus.

A red dragon soared in the sky, its vertical pupil burning with crimson flames.

She swept over Ai's head, carrying a distant promise.

"You'll never leave me behind!"

And there was laughter that seemed to last forever.

Time stood still at this moment.

Just like every story should have a happy ending.

Time stood still at this moment.