Way of the Devil

"Are you sure?"

"Of course."

Tia could not find it in herself to believe in this completely. The Golden Dragon Tribe worshipped the dragon god Ayka. They were the Tribe favored by the dragon god. There was no way that they would associate themselves with a seven-colored dragon.

There was also the Light Church. That was the greatest organization under the Light God. Regardless of how gifted Lu Sheng was, how could he even come into contact with them?

However, Lu Sheng was being quite persuasive. On top of that, the divine region barrier he'd unleashed truly concealed their auras from being tracked down by Sardine.

At the very least, when they unleashed their divination school art, there was no longer that peculiar pressure they felt before.

The exhausted seven-colored dragons finally had a chance to rest.

Lu Sheng arranged for them to rest in a nearby valley. He covered their tracks with a divine region scroll.

He then returned to the mansion.

Jonah had been exercising in her own room. Then, she suddenly charged into Lu Sheng's room, and saw that he was packing his clothes and trinkets. "Why're you packing your things?"

Lu Sheng did not even look at her. He casually replied, "Something came up. I'm getting ready to leave."

It had not even been five minutes since he came back for his things, yet this girl had somehow noticed him…

When he thought about this, his movements slowed to a stop. He looked at Jonah.

"What… What're you looking at?! What should I do when you're gone?" Jonah ran her fingers through her long hair with an annoyed look.

She had finally found a rich man whom she could freeload off without a care. It had barely been a few days, and he was telling her that he would be leaving?

"Why don't you come with me?" Lu Sheng suggested. "After all, you don't have any parents, you're an orphan. All you have to think about is getting your fill and having clothes to wear." He was thinking that her ability might be put to great use.

"Huh?!" Jonah paled. She shook from the shock and staggered backward. "You… You… How did you know?!"

"You've stolen so many things, and even stolen snacks from other people in the middle of the night. Even the clothes you're wearing have another girl's name on them…"

"Wait!" The more Jonah listened to him, the paler she got. She had thought that her cover was perfect…

She had not expected…

Lu Sheng swiftly packed his things and turned to look at her. "Alright, are you coming with me or not?"

Jonah was stunned. Then, she took two steps back in fear. "You… You're not into me, are you?"

"I just think that your sensing abilities aren't bad. If you're not willing, you can stay here. I'll be leaving, then." Lu Sheng carried his little trunk which contained his things. He strode past her and bounded down the stairs.

Jonah hesitated for a moment. She decided that she could not accept this willingly.

"Wait! Wait for me!" She hastily ran after him.

Yuna was carrying the boxed supper as she went up the stairs. She saw the two of them coming down together. Before she could react, Jonah had pulled on her hand.

"That guy is leaving. Stop eating, go after him!"

After all those years of stealing other people's food, Jonah had given herself a set of balanced legs with graceful lines which contained a formidable explosive force ordinary girls could not compare to.

She pulled on Yuna, and they followed Lu Sheng.

The three of them informed Yuya about this and went out of the mansion.

A spacious silver horse cart was already waiting for them outside.

The chauffeur was a bald old man with a white beard. He lifted his hat from his seat at Lu Sheng as a greeting.

"My Lord."

"Return to Dawn City." Lu Sheng opened the door of the cart and boarded it. Jonah hopped on as well, throwing courtesy to the wind. She did not forget to pull Yuna, who looked blank, behind her up the cart as well.

The door was shut.

Some of the people within the mansion were startled as well. They came out and looked at this silver horse cart with slightly stunned expressions.

The cart was not exactly extravagant. It was the standard model. There were no insignia of the nobles as well. It was clearly an ordinary commercial horse cart.

The people from the mansion gave it a few glances at most. Then, they went back to minding their own businesses.

Within the cart.

Lu Sheng flipped through a thick booklet he carried with him. Various symbols and veins were scribbled on its pages.

The others could not even begin to understand what was written.

This was a secret code used by Devil Shadow. Lu Sheng had single-handedly designed this encrypted form of writing. Without the decryption key, nobody would be able to tell what it said.

Jonah glanced at it and quickly lost interest. She turned her gaze back toward the scenery, just like Yuna. They were both bored.

She had hopped on the bandwagon on a whim, but she quickly realized that Lu Sheng was the only other passenger within the cart. If he forced himself on them, she reckoned that neither she nor Yuna could escape.

When she realized this, Jonah started regretting her decision. Lu Sheng did not appear to be interested in her, but men would be men. There was no telling when his urges would strike him.

"Where are we going? Are we heading back to Dawn City?" Yuna retreated every so slightly out of fear. She moved closer to Jonah to gain some sense of security.

"Mm-hm. We're going back to Dawn City." Lu Sheng nodded. He looked at the two girls.

"I have something to attend to there. Why are you here?" He looked at Yuna with slight surprise.

"I… I…" Yuna was stunned. Then, her face blushed. She lowered her head and seemed as if she had been put in a tight spot.

"Oh well, the cart is spacious anyway. As you are." Lu Sheng did not mind. He intended to bring Jonah along. As for Yuna, he would just treat this as giving her a free ride. After all, it was hardly possible that he would have much to do with a mortal in the future.

Jonah inched over and softly asked, "Hey, did you decide to head back to Dawn City after what I told you in the mansion?"

"This has nothing to do with you. I have some personal matters to attend to back there," Lu Sheng replied casually.

Jonah moved her eyes with a smile, and said, "Personal matters? So, my words actually gave you an inspiration?"

"In a way." Lu Sheng nodded. He was unsure what she was getting at.

"You see, I've given you such a great assistance. Don't you just feel like rewarding me with something?" Jonah's tone grew gentler and softer.

"What reward?" Lu Sheng was stunned. He had never met someone as thick-faced as this one.

"My budget's running low lately, I mean…" Jonah bared her palm and rubbed her fingers together. "Can you give me a loan? I'll repay you."

"Bam."

Lu Sheng tossed out a dozen gold pieces casually. The pouch containing the gold landed on the table with a low thump.

In this era where a single gold coin could easily feed a family of three for half a month, a dozen gold coins was already equivalent to the annual income of most families.

Jonah whistled. She quickly stashed the coins away.

***

The seven-colored dragons had disappeared.

Besides the dragon queen Eernie, who had been defeated by the demigod Sardine and fallen into a deep abyss, the other seven-colored dragons had vanished overnight.

The demigod Sardine and the red dragons looked everywhere. However, they could not find any trace of them.

However, without their dragon queen, they had nothing to fear of the seven-colored dragons. Without their leader and the protection from the dragon gods, the seven-colored dragons were practically refugees in the main plane.

The other great Tribes were beginning to forget about them. The seven-colored dragons were a unique Tribe that could only attain the legendary-rank at best. It did not matter to them whether they existed or not.

However, a piece of information that emerged from nowhere returned the public's attention to the seven-colored dragons again.

The gist of the information was that after enduring countless difficulties and hardships while escaping from Sardine and the red dragons, they had finally alerted a mysterious seven-colored dragon known as the Arc Light King.

The Arc Light King became the new leader of the Seven-colored Dragon Tribe. He led the other seven-colored dragons and successfully hid them.

Nobody knew what rank this Arc Light King was at. Nobody knew what he intended to do by suddenly showing up in the world as well.

However, as a member of the seven-colored dragons, with his Tribe in such a situation, most of the others were of the opinion that the Arc Light King would most probably think of some way to exact revenge. There were also those who opined that the seven-colored dragons would go into hiding forever after this, never showing themselves ever again.

Rumors spread like wildfire. Several months later, the seven-colored dragons faded out of the public eye. On the other hand, the Light-Shadow War was nearing its turning point.

***

The West Sea.

On the surface of the raging azure seas, a seven-colored dragon soared with wings extended. It soared toward Glenn Island, where the demigod Sardine usually rested.

Lu Sheng sat cross-legged above Tia's head. He looked down at the boundless ocean.

"I can confirm that Sardine has already left," Tia replied softly. "Lu Sheng, what do you plan to do?"

After a few days of recuperating, Tia had successfully recovered from her grave wounds. She even fashioned an artificial limb out of metal and hide to replace the one she lost. It was sufficient for her to use it to support her own weight and go about her daily business.

Lu Sheng took a look at his map, and asked, "Shouldn't there be an island here?"

"It's hidden under the magic formation. This is Sardine's base, after all. The security here is tight," Tia replied. "Can you tell me what you're planning to do now?"

If she had not insisted otherwise, Lu Sheng would have come here all alone.

Although she understood that Lu Sheng was of the divine region-rank and that he was much more powerful than she was, Tia could not rest easy. Hence, she followed him here.

"I'm just going to do a little experiment." Lu Sheng swept his gaze across the sea below. His gaze swiftly penetrated the blurry magic formation, and he saw the immense island underneath.

He took out a translucent blood-colored test tube from his own pocket. Scarlet blood which fluoresced slightly filled half of the test tube.

It was not merely blood. Diamonds the size of sand grains floated throughout the body of liquid. Every single diamond was covered in countless densely packed runes.

This test tube could be regarded as Lu Sheng's greatest masterpiece.

"What this?" Tia clearly felt that this test tube contained some extremely terrifying and vicious thing.

"It's a memory." Lu Sheng shook his head. He stood on the dragon's head and opened the test tube. Then, he tipped the test tube over against the wind.

The scarlet blood liquid flowed along the test tube's wall and out of the test tube's mouth.

The red liquid scattered in the wind. It dropped and wafted into the air above the invisible island.

Peculiarly, the island's formation did nothing to stop the blood from passing through.

The blood triggered some red energy, which gathered above the island. The energy formed a huge light red swirling vortex.

"Oh, rabbit buddha…"

An extremely huge black silhouette gradually emerged from the vortex.

The black silhouette's eyes were peculiar contorting red vortexes. They resembled huge vortexes which swirled in the skies.

"Azuma, respond to the rabbit buddha's call… Come, turn this place into our paradise as far as the eye could see!" Lu Sheng let go of the test tube, which rolled as it fell through the wind.

"Bam."

The test tube suddenly shattered into pieces in midair.

A blood-colored light pillar suddenly dropped onto the center of the vortex at the same time.

The light pillar, which was several dozens of meters thick, penetrated the magic formation and precisely embedded itself into a dense forest on the island.

A leopard which was pinning a rabbit with its paw looked up and stared blankly at the light pillar nearby. It did not seem to have processed the recent turn of events.

"Bam!"

A huge white foot stepped out of the light pillar.

A giant white rabbit more than seven meters tall slowly emerged from the red radiance.

"I… Turs answers the rabbit buddha's summons!"

Blood-red muscles bulged all over the white rabbit's body. The tuft of black fur on its chest was ruffled by the wind. In its right arm, it wielded a black warhammer more than three meters thick.

When it saw the leopard before itself, Turs grinned, revealing its mouthful of sharp teeth.

It grabbed the leopard which had been paralyzed by fear. Then, it shoved the leopard into its mouth and started chewing.

"It's been too long since I've tasted such fresh meat…

"Go, my little ones!" He suddenly raised his warhammer and pointed in a general direction before himself.

"Fuh!"

Behind Turs, giant gray rabbits that were only slightly shorter charged out while wielding iron forks and curved blades.

Countless rabbits with glowing red eyes grinned fiercely. With sharp weapons in hand, they rampaged through the villages and bore down on every living being.

The real War of the Plane had begun…