Elegy from Another World

The magical vehicle slowly drove into the depths of the Gloomy Forest and stopped near the hidden entrance to Utopia. We carefully unloaded the dragon, now only its head and torso remained, from the vehicle. Xiao Bei, who had been notified beforehand, manipulated dozens of thick, specialized tentacles, like a nimble crane, to smoothly transport this behemoth into the interior of Utopia.

I had Xiao Bei clear and reinforce a special confinement area in the outer ring beforehand. This area was far from the core living area, with extra thickened walls and floors, and covered with runes to suppress energy fluctuations. Once the dragon's body was in place, more tentacles wrapped around it like living chains, tightly binding its neck and the remaining roots of its torso, ensuring it couldn't move an inch.

To be on the safe side, we also wrapped layers of "anti-magic chains," which we purchased at a high price from the black market in Teferine and are capable of effectively suppressing the flow of magic, around the dragon's body and tentacles. In the surrounding area, newly developed acid-spraying tentacles, magical attack tentacles, and even several magically modified firearms, which had been set up by Tia, were all in standby mode, their muzzles firmly locked onto their targets. The entire prison area was set up like an iron barrel.

Next, the next step was to attempt to communicate with the dragon. The most direct way, naturally, would be to try connecting it to the symbiotic network and reading its memories and emotions. But Xiao Bei immediately issued a warning:

[Lady Liscia, this is extremely risky. The symbiotic network's protocol is designed based on the mental structure of humans or humanoid beings. The consciousness of dragons may be completely different; forcibly connecting could lead to unpredictable consequences, and might even impact or contaminate their fragile consciousness or other members of the network.]

It makes sense. I pondered for a moment and proposed a more risky but perhaps more controllable solution: "Then let's not connect to the main network. Let's use a dedicated, isolated tentacle to connect only me and its brain. I'll act as the 'firewall' and 'translator.' Anyway, my body is durable, so I can cover for it if anything goes wrong."

Xiao Bei's thoughts were filled with worry: [This... is too risky! What if its consciousness is too powerful or chaotic...]

"There's no better way right now," I insisted. "If we don't figure out its details, keeping it around will always be a huge problem. Let's begin."

Seeing my resolute attitude, Xiao Bei stopped trying to dissuade me. A special tentacle, thicker than the others and shimmering with complex runes, slowly extended, one end gently piercing my ear canal, while the other end cautiously probed the area of ​​the white dragon's head below its tightly closed eyes, searching for possible nerve nodes to connect to.

The moment the connection was established, a massive, chaotic, storm-like torrent of emotions surged into my mind!

Unwilling! The humiliation and anger of being defeated and dismembered!

Regret! The self-reproach for failing to protect something important!

Sorrow! A bottomless, millennia-long loneliness and grief!

And... a strange, sleepwalking-like haze, as if consciousness were shrouded in a thick fog.

I steadied myself, as if steering a ship through raging waves, striving to guide this stream of consciousness and attempt to touch the core of its memories. Its memory bank was vast as the ocean, spanning countless years. I traced it directly back to the very first fragment.

The scene unfolds: In a chaotic pool of primal energy, a consciousness awakens in a daze. A cold, emotionless voice, seemingly emanating from the very rules of the world, resounds from the depths of that consciousness:

【Your name is Zoimem. You are a dragon. Your duty is to protect your offspring until they reach maturity.】

The newly formed consciousness responded blankly: "Yes."

The scene then shifts to a warm nest, in the center of which lie three faintly glowing dragon eggs. The subsequent flashbacks, like fast-forwarded film, depict Zoimem's millennia-long guardianship of the Dragon's Cry Cave. She repelled all creatures that dared approach the nest, whether stray beasts or greedy adventurers. Time passed, the world outside the cave changed dramatically, but her life remained frozen, with only the three unhatched dragon eggs as its eternal center.

Occasionally, a faint question would flash through the depths of her consciousness: When did I lay these eggs? Where is my mate? What is the outside world like? But whenever these "out-of-the-way" thoughts surfaced, an invisible force would quietly erase them, bringing her thoughts back to her sole mission of "protection." She was like a machine programmed with a fixed sequence of actions, carrying out commands of unknown origin in long periods of solitude.

Until... our intrusion shattered a balance that had lasted for millennia.

After briefly browsing through this core memory, I was deeply shocked. This was not a naturally born dragon at all! It was more like a created biological weapon or guardian puppet used to perform a specific task! That cold voice, that mechanism for erasing thought, all pointed to a terrifying truth—Zoimem's very existence might be a huge curse or experiment.

After disconnecting, I told Tia, who was standing by with a concerned look on her face, and Xiaobai, who sensed the situation through her tentacles, everything I had seen. They were equally incredulous and bewildered.

"So... she attacked us just because we were getting close to those three eggs?" Tia murmured.

"It seems so. Her underlying directive is to eliminate all threats." I nodded. "Moreover, she seems to be subject to some kind of force that restricts her thought and freedom."

Looking at Zoimem, who was still weeping in her unconscious state, a complex emotion rose within me. She was both a dangerous enemy and a pitiful being imprisoned for thousands of years.

"Tia," I made my decision, "go back to Dragon's Cry Cave again. Bring back her limbs, wings, and those three dragon eggs."

"The dragon egg too?" Tia hesitated. "Wouldn't it be dangerous?"

"The eggs are probably the core of her existence. Bringing them back might give us better control of the situation, and could also provide clues to break her 'curse,'" I explained, while marking the exact location of the dragon eggs in my memory on a magical map and handing it to Tia. "Be careful, there might be some mechanisms in the cave that we haven't discovered yet."

"Understood, I'll go right away." Tia took the map and turned to leave.

Inside the forbidden area, only Xiao Bei, the unconscious Dragon Mother Zoimem, and I remained. I waited quietly, waiting for Tia to bring back the crucial item, and also waiting for this ill-fated white dragon to awaken from her long imprisonment.