Free Web NovelChapter 229: Chapter 200: Egg
Zog knew for a fact that he had just heard something extraordinary. It wasn’t a hallucination.
After years of Furin’s "tutelage," whether he could cast an Illusion Technique was another matter, but he was an absolute expert at telling if he was under one.
The things he heard were similar to what that bird in the Silver-White City State had said: the Magic Goddess had a major problem.
The key thing was, there had been more than one.
’If this is true, then which one was the Goddess I saw during the war of the Divine Race? As a victor of the divine war, She certainly didn’t die in the conflict.’
’And was She the so-called betrayer?’
If so, Zog rather liked the idea of punishing a betrayer.
Besides, the voice from the Divine Remains didn’t sound like it came from any carbon-based life form.
A whole new pile of questions.
But before all that, Zog needed to run a test to see if the effect the Divine Remains had on consciousness worked on all targets, or if he was the only one being singled out.
So he had the Beastman Guard go and touch it.
Physical contact could connect one’s consciousness to the Divine Remains; he had touched several of them himself.
Therefore, Zog wasn’t worried that touching the Divine Remains would pose any danger to the Beastman. At worst, he’d be overwhelmed by the sudden influx of information and feel dazed for a bit before recovering.
Hearing Zog’s order to touch the Divine Remains, the Warrior—who would normally shout "Waaaagh!" and charge at any powerful enemy—hesitated, his hand outstretched.
To the Beastman, this thing was just too freaky.
His incredibly powerful boss, Zog, had been hit by a flash of light and now seemed a bit dazed.
He didn’t know much, but he had read manga. In the manga, after a character was hit by a strange light, their body would be taken over by an evil villain, even if their appearance didn’t change.
’The boss looks just like one of those possessed characters right now.’
’And now he’s trying to lure me into touching it, too. That’s exactly how it happens in the manga! When the time is right, a disgusting and terrifying bug will burst out of my chest.’
’Too scary.’
’I just don’t get why the main characters in those manga are always fighting amongst themselves and like to go off alone.’
"What are you so jumpy for? Trust me, there’s absolutely no danger. At most, you’ll see some weird illusions. Don’t be afraid of that, it’s not real."
Zog gave him a heads-up, just in case the Beastman also heard those things and had a strong reaction.
The Beastman Guard, with an expression of grim determination as if facing death itself, pressed his hand onto the Divine Remains.
And then... nothing happened.
He didn’t see any abnormalities at all.
"How was it?" Zog asked hurriedly. "Did you hear or see anything?"
The Beastman Guard struggled to find the words. "Uh, I saw lots and lots of Inscriptions... just floating there..."
"Alright, you can let go. Those are just the Magic models written inside."
It was obvious the Beastman Guard hadn’t heard what he had.
Zog rubbed his forehead. ’This is trouble. It’s confirmed now. I’m the one being targeted.’
’Over a thousand years old, and I’ve become the chosen one.’
He gave a helpless smile.
Although he really wanted to pick a fight with the current Magic Goddess, the power disparity was immense. Actually doing it was bound to be difficult.
Besides, there was no guarantee that whatever was in these Divine Remains was a good thing. The enemy of my enemy is not always a friend.
He tried to search for the various pieces of knowledge that had been stuffed into his brain. This was the problem with having too many memories: recalling something was like an old mechanical hard drive trying to read a disk. It took a lot of effort to find what he needed.
A few minutes later, he found it, but it didn’t turn him into a walking encyclopedia of Magic. The memories were saved as nothing but garbled data.
Zog felt a headache coming on.
’I’d have been better off without it. Thank goodness a Dragon’s brain has a large capacity; otherwise, my C drive would be completely in the red by now.’
"Alright, alright, nothing’s wrong. Back to your post. Notify me if anything else unusual happens."
"Boss, does it flashing a couple more times count as unusual?" the Guard asked bluntly.
One of the virtues of Beastmen was that they asked when they didn’t understand something and never made wild guesses. It was better to be stupid than to be stupid and opinionated.
"It doesn’t."
Zog left that single word behind and turned to leave the room.
Things had come to this... he might as well get something to eat first.
When faced with too many problems at once, you don’t want to solve any of them. As the saying goes, when you have too many debts, you stop worrying.
Zog went to the Dragon Nest cafeteria, planning to eat and calm down.
As the boss, he didn’t have a private cafeteria.
He got a serving of mashed potatoes, dry-pot potatoes, two braised chicken legs, and a bowl of clear soup.
’Potatoes really are great. It feels like no matter how you cook them, they can’t taste too bad.’
It wasn’t mealtime yet, so Zog sat alone in the cafeteria, eating and thinking.
Deities could be killed, but only if they weren’t supported by the Power of Faith.
The divine war of the last era was arguably the cruelest war Zog had ever witnessed.
What was the easiest way to make a deity lose their faith?
To make them lose their followers, of course.
Thus, the divine war was a war of extinction between different faiths.
Even those without faith weren’t spared. If discovered by believers, they had to either convert immediately or be eliminated.
Because there was no guarantee the faithless wouldn’t start following an enemy faith.
The once-mighty Dragon Race, capable of building a great Empire, had been reduced to reclusive beasts of the deep mountains and old forests, all thanks to that war.
Tiamat had believed they could stay out of the conflict, that She only needed to protect Her own people.
But the conflict did not spare Her.
Zog was one of the few survivors.
Not because he was strong enough back then to protect himself, but because he was weak enough to pass for a non-intelligent Dragon Beast and slip through.
After all, beasts couldn’t provide faith.
It was a disgrace to dragonkind, but no survivor had the right to look down on another. That was how they all made it through.
The surviving Ancient Dragons were all the ones who had been the least warlike.
Zog detested that war.
And he detested the Magic Goddess.
She now had hundreds of millions of casual believers and as many as a million devout followers. How could he possibly make Her lose Her faith?
But neither historical records nor legends mentioned the Magic Goddess’s demise.
That meant the goddess who died, at the very least, didn’t die in a way that caused a huge commotion. It probably wasn’t by exterminating Her followers.
’Perhaps the Divine Remains contain a record of it.’
The problem came back to the same point: the Divine Remains gave him garbled data that he couldn’t understand.
Zog stood up and cleared his tray.
’I’ll set aside grand ambitions like deities and revenge for now. First, I’ll live my own life and proceed with the plan to promote the game consoles and electronic pets.’
Not the kind you just feed donuts.
The kind like a Digital Monster Machine.
Here, they should be called Magic Elemental Pets.
’Linking pet raising to game console achievements... getting a platinum trophy in a game could reward you with pet resources. That could be very interesting.’
’Better effects, better interaction... I could even use a Golem to make a physical pet.’
He tossed his spoon, chopsticks, and bowl onto the tray. And an egg.
’Wait, why is there an egg?’
Zog stared quizzically at the egg in his claw.
’Where did this come from?’
He examined the egg in his hand closely. Judging by the patterns on its shell, it should be a Dragon Egg, just a bit small.
Moreover, he couldn’t feel any life from it, nor did it have any smell.
So far, Zog had only had a similar feeling from one other thing.
’Is this egg the Spirit Body of the Red Middle Divine Remains?’
He’d never heard of other Divine Remains’ Spirit Bodies starting out as eggs.
Zog didn’t rush to connect with the egg. Instead, he first returned to his room and contacted Furin, just in case something unexpected happened during the connection.
He opened the Chatting Spell, typed "Danger, urgent!" and hit send.
Furin teleported over directly. The moment she saw Zog, she asked anxiously, "What’s the danger?"
Zog showed her the egg.
"Are you kidding me?" Furin felt her blood pressure rising. She had used a huge amount of Magic Power to teleport here.
"Oh, I get it. You stole someone’s egg, and now they’re coming for revenge. Which Dragon’s egg did you steal? This one looks a little malnourished."
"No, this egg is..."
"Don’t tell me you laid it?"
"I’m a male Dragon, I can’t lay eggs! This is the Spirit Body born from the Red Middle Divine Remains," Zog explained.
"So it’s something like the Deer Spirit from the Northern Domain? It doesn’t really look like it," Furin said, puzzled.
"It is a bit different. I’m going to try and connect with it now. If something unexpected happens, use physical means to separate me from this egg," Zog instructed.
Seeing Zog’s serious expression, Furin stopped joking.
"I’m ready."
"Good." Zog activated his Spirit Power, slowly letting it seep into the Egg Spirit Body.
「Holy Magic Cathedral」
The absolute core of the Church.
On the magnificent dome, a painting depicting the Magic Goddess creating Magic was filled with Divinity.
The Bishop of the Twin Towers City stared at the painting, lost in thought.
He knew he had been summoned to the cathedral today, and it most likely wasn’t for anything good.
Because he had introduced games and Demon Vision to his country, many people had their eyes on him.
Perhaps today was the day they would make their move against him.
He didn’t know if he would still be a Bishop when he walked out of the cathedral.
Or, to be more pessimistic, whether he could walk out at all was in question.
He knew the methods of the Judgment Court.
’Perhaps cooperating with the Zog Group was the wrong bet. Although it brought economic benefits, my power hasn’t seen a substantial increase, and I might even be in danger.’
’Great Goddess, if this is truly your will, please show your lost believer the way once more.’
The Bishop followed a cleric to the center of the cathedral, where Pope Saintino was waiting.
The Pope got straight to the point. "Confess your sins, and you will be allowed to return to the Goddess’s side."
The Bishop knew what that meant: confess, be executed by the Judgment Court, and have the small mercy of not being tortured.
"I have committed no sin."
"You have confused the faithful and spread the word of an Alien God."
"I have held lectures on Demon Vision and conveyed the Goddess’s teachings through games. The Red Middle Church also received the Church’s approval. I am innocent," the Bishop said, his tone resolute.
"The Judgment Court will pass sentence on you."
"I request a Goddess’s Judgment."
At these words, Pope Saintino’s expression shifted slightly.
A Goddess’s Judgment—a method of adjudication that had been absent from the Church for many years.
One would pray to the Goddess and await Her response; the great Deity would then deliver the most just verdict.
However, the Goddess had been gone for a long time. No one had received an oracle from Her anymore.
But the judgment was sacred and took precedence over the Judgment Court.
"Very well."
The Bishop walked before the Holy Image and knelt piously, but he offered no prayer.
’If the Goddess knows, She will naturally help me. If this is my fate, then I will end my own life before Her Holy Image.’
Time trickled by.
"Judgment Court..." Pope Saintino had lost his patience.
Fully armed clerics from the Judgment Court walked over to the Bishop’s side. What awaited him was an inhumane "cleansing."
The Bishop closed his eyes, preparing to cast a Magic spell at his own heart.
"Innocent."
A hollow and ancient voice echoed from above the cathedral.
The Pope and all the clerics immediately prostrated themselves on the floor.
A hundred years had passed since they had last heard the Goddess’s voice.
In that century, the Church had reached the brink of collapse due to factional strife.
The Goddess truly hadn’t abandoned Her people.
Tears blurred Pope Saintino’s eyes.
After a moment of calm, the Goddess issued a second oracle.
"Let all the faithful... use the internet..."
