Chosen: Beyond Fate

Chapter 23: Dragon

The first to crawl out was a battered electric scooter. Beneath its shattered plastic casing, its wheels twisted and turned, and sparks flew as if it were weeping blood and tears.

Twitching and convulsing, two fingers formed from wheel spokes within the distorted metal and extended outward. Two arms, one long and one short, emerged as the scooter crawled across the ground like a dog. Half of its warped LCD screen formed a face filled with crimson madness. It opened its mouth, spewing thick smoke, and rumbled before lunging!

Immediately after came a second, then a third. One by one, electric scooters transformed amid the smoke and tremors into monstrous creatures with twisted limbs. They crawled forward without hesitation, then latched onto Lawrence, tearing at him with gaping jaws, pulling at him with their arms, and unleashing bursts of electricity.

Then came the blaring of cars. As their shattered shells were cast aside, they surged forward like bulls or elephants, crashing into the writhing monstrosity. As they trampled and crushed him, their engines roared while they spewed thick smoke. They resembled giant spiders, or strange, aberrant birds.

Those steel constructs of gears and machinery howled with fury, converging into a tide. They trampled and pushed against one another, climbing over each other, nearly burying the mutated Lawrence beneath them.

“What the hell is this?!” the monstrous abomination screamed in a fit of rage. Its limbs swept the area, effortlessly tearing apart the machines clinging to him.

The strange Divine Creation saber, Duskbane, cleaved through them like a hot knife through butter. It was unstoppable, as if they were nothing more than a trivial nuisance!

Beneath the giant tree, Ji Jue simply raised his hands and slowly brought them together, issuing his first command to his creation.

“Converge!”

At once, countless grinding metallic sounds erupted. Hundreds and thousands of intricate mechanical pieces converged at a single location. Whether fragments or complete structures, they now connected, interlocked, and riveted together like living beings, forming an unprecedented, massive composite entity.

Ji Jue’s vision went dark. He reached out again, and clenched his hand tight!

Within the torn-apart machinery, new structures began to grow. Limbs formed from the fusion of an electric scooter, motorcycle, computer, phone, and lawn mower. The amalgamation wriggled, contracting to bind and lock its components together. Then came a second, then a third.

On the ever-shifting mechanical structure, faces twisted with resentment and agony emerged, screaming at the top of their lungs as thick smoke billowed. Soon after, they suppressed Lawrence beneath them, then opened their mouths and bit down, causing blood to splatter.

As they feasted on flesh, tasted organs, and chewed bones, this unrestrained, ravenous consumption made them seem even more monstrous than the monster itself. Lawrence screamed and struggled, yet for some reason, from the gaze of those faces, he felt an unprecedented and overwhelming emotion—fear.

“Get off me!”

His Duskbane swept out, but stopped mid-motion.

It stopped?

Minerva!

Letting the saber cut into her palm and fingers, she slowly tightened her grip. As crystals proliferated around the saber, it trembled and screamed. Then, from the center it cracked.

The Heavenforged saber shattered. A stomp followed.

Wen Wen stepped on Lawrence’s head, shaking her head in disdain. “So this is what you call a dragon? You are far too weak.”

Lawrence, gnawed and buried in the mud, forced his mouth open and spat at her before screaming, “You’re so hypocritical, Minerva. So laughable. The Ruins Path you follow is the trail left behind by the dragon! What you pursue is no different from me! Why pretend otherwise?! You lot cling to illusions, placing all your hope in something you’ve never even seen. Little do you know—”

Wen Wen looked down, her face completely devoid of emotion. With an ever-deepening frost, she said, “Something that doesn’t even qualify as ‘human’ will never answer your prayers.”

A high-pitched, piercing sound rang out right behind her. Crystals scraped, proliferated, and grew, forming a crystal wing that reached toward the sky. It spread across the heavens and covered everything, casting the world beneath it in a dreamlike, cold radiance.

Lawrence was shocked, as if struck by lightning. Eyes burst open one after another from his minced flesh, blinking frantically while trying to determine whether this was yet another illusion or his own delusion. No matter what, he could not believe it.

“You... you... you...!” His voice grew sharper and more shrill, as if he was being devoured by a nightmare.

He witnessed with his own eyes everything that was happening to Wen Wen. Her blood had evolved beyond mere blood, and her body was now more than flesh alone. Even her soul itself was laid bare in its true form. She was cold, solemn, brutal, and immense... This was a transformation more complete than his own dragonization!

“What’s the matter? Haven’t you always been chasing after the dragon, Lawrence?” Wen Wen asked. Her cold voice echoed like thunder across the sky, reverberating throughout the domain. “Take this as my final mercy. I’ll let you die by the very thing you’ve been chasing! That should count as a fitting end.”

BOOM!!!

As she raised her hand once more toward the sky, what fell was a rain of ten-thousand-zhang lightning. The radiance of the world condensed between her fingers, forming a crystalline spear so brilliant it could not be looked at directly.

This was the dragon’s breath manifested in material form, Destruction!

At that final moment, Lawrence opened his mouth, as if to shout something, to curse, or to beg. However, it no longer mattered, as no one cared anymore.

Parasites, blood, microbes, monsters; the suffering, hatred, despair, and even the unrealistic dream of becoming a dragon—everything was swallowed by the dragon’s breath.

Silence enveloped the scene. Only a flash of blazing light that burned everything in its path flickered before vanishing. A storm erupted, and ash rose into the sky. Countless quantities of writhing, crimson spirit matter evaporated and disappeared, and the giant tree collapsed and shattered, fading into illusion.

Nothing remained except a massive pit, so deep that even its blackened traces were gone. There were no fragments, no remnants of an explosion or destruction. Some portion of matter had vanished forever from this world, leaving not even a single particle left behind.

This was the power of the dragon.

Wen Wen stood before the deep crater. The giant wings behind her had vanished without a trace.

“Ha... that’s why I didn’t want them to come help,” she murmured. Then she tilted her head, looked back, and grinned. “Hey, Ji Jue, remember to keep m—”

Her words cut off abruptly, and her smile froze on her face. Perhaps she no longer needed to worry about anyone exposing this secret.

In the ruins and the blood-soaked mud, Ji Jue sat collapsed on the ground, struggling to breathe and utterly disheveled. The remaining dragon blood was still slowly spreading throughout his body. His flesh twisted and warped, distorting him as a layer of eerie scales began to grow on his skin, gradually stealing away the human light in his eyes.

He was undergoing corruption, a mutation that made even Chosen Ones tremble with fear. He was on the verge of collapse. Yet he seemed completely unconcerned, even though he had already reached his limit.

Ji Jue raised his head. His face, covered in dirt and grime, forced a difficult smile. “What’s wrong, Mrs. Wen? Did I... finally accomplish something today?”

Caught off guard, Wen Wen fell silent, but she suddenly recalled their parting words from yesterday, along with the boy’s smile from that time. Her gaze focused on the certain and calm look he had now.

“Yes. You did.” She reached out and carefully wiped the dust from his face. “It was my honor to have known you.”

“Huh?” Ji Jue froze. He was completely bewildered, afraid she had already accepted his death as inevitable.

Wen Wen straightened up with a solemn expression, took a step back, and once again raised her hand. A crystalline lightning spear descended from the sky, and she pointed it directly at Ji Jue’s face.

“Don’t worry. You won’t feel any pain.” Her eyes seemed slightly red as she softly asked, “Any last wishes?”

Ji Jue’s face turned pale with terror. He screamed, “Hell no, don’t do it! I think I can still be saved!”

What are you doing, ma’am? I thought you were after my body, not my life!

Wen Wen took a deep breath.

“I don’t need to deceive you anymore, Ji Jue. Once corruption begins, it’s only a matter of time until both soul and body collapse in agony.” Her trembling hand steadied as she added, “Don’t worry. I’ll preserve your dignity as a human being.”

“I can live with dignity too! I’m just losing blood, don’t scare me like that!” Ji Jue no longer dared to lie there and play dead. With frantic urgency, the wristwatch’s prompt spammed his mind.

[Detected active aberrant spirit essence within. Extract?]

YES! YES! YES!!! Extract it, damn it, extract it!!!

All the spreading mutations and growing scales plaguing Ji Jue’s body shattered into dust and dissipated without a trace. The supposed irreversible corruption vanished in an instant.

Wen Wen stood frozen in place, staring at what had just happened. After a long while, she nearly forgot she was still holding the dragon’s breath. Only her embarrassment remained, growing exponentially by the second.

“...Huh?”

She sounded like she was sleepwalking. She was completely dazed, more confused than a bewildered cat.

Who am I? Where am I? What just happened? Did I just witness someone’s corruption completely reverse? Something like this would be enough to shatter the worldview of those insane people at the hospital... and I’ve never even heard of it before! What was I just doing?

She felt the urge to look in a mirror, to see if there was a red clown nose on her face.

Damn it... give me back the tears I was about to shed! And also... If I silence him now... is it too late?

Her gaze turned dangerous.

Ji Jue was on the verge of tears. “Mrs. Wen, don’t do this! Think of my family! Spare my worthless life! I’m good in bed, I’m not clingy, and I’m great in bed! It would be such a waste to let me die now!”

Boom!

In a fit of rage, she thrust the dragon-breath spear. It scraped past Ji Jue’s neck and slammed into the stone bricks beside him with a deafening crack.

Wen Wen grabbed Ji Jue by the collar and warned him, “If you want to live to see the sun tomorrow, keep everything about me and the fact that you can reverse corruption buried deep inside you. No one can know. Not even in your dreams can you reveal these things. Understand?!”

“Huh? Wait! I thought you were after my bod— Ahem, got it, got it!” Ji Jue nodded frantically, almost shaking his brain loose. “I just bumped into something and passed out. I don’t know anything!” ƒгeewebnovёl.com

“Good.” Wen Wen nodded back, her smile turning gentle again as she helped straighten his collar and lightly patted him twice on the back. “Bumped into something, huh? Is your head feeling fine?”

“Eh?” Ji Jue stared at her. He was about to say something, but what he saw next was Wen Wen raising her fist. It was small, delicate, and cute... with absolutely no indication of how many people it had killed.

And then...

Bang!

After enduring the Vortex Cultivation Method, spirit matter erosion, a nightmare of despair, the Chosen Rite, a desperate counterattack, and narrowly escaping death, Ji Jue’s vision went black. He blacked out, and the cause of his “death” was friendly fire.

Damn it, they didn’t even turn off friendly fire. Reality really is a garbage game.