The piercing green light shot straight through the entire Dreamlike Forest.
Adrian Vale and Raven Shaw both turned back instinctively.
A pillar of green radiance surged into the sky, and at the same time, the ground began to tremble.
Crack. Crack.
The sound of splitting wood and tearing earth rang out again and again.
Then, from every direction touched by that light, dragon roars began rising one after another.
At once, the Ancient Azure Dragon before them grew even more furious.
"Damn it! Something's happened to the first Divine Tree!"
"This is all because of you, you little beast!"
"I'll make you wish you were dead!"
Boom!
A heaven-shaking roar echoed from the distance. The green light rapidly dimmed, then vanished completely.
Pfft!
At the same moment, the dragon in front of Adrian suddenly spat out a mouthful of blood.
Each drop hung in the air, suspended unnaturally, drifting without falling to the ground.
That majestic dragon, which had looked so untouchable just moments ago, had clearly been affected.
A slow smile appeared on Adrian's face.
"If I'm not mistaken, your life force is tied directly to every Divine Tree I've encountered on the way here."
"Now that the first Divine Tree has cracked, you've already lost part of your life force."
"That means my chances just went up again."
Hearing that, the enraged dragon gradually stilled. Its enormous eyes locked onto Adrian as it spoke in a heavy, ancient voice.
"You cannot win."
"You have no idea what kind of being stands before you."
"I have known fear in the prehistoric ages. I have watched terror spread through the wilderness. I have felt the passing of endless years."
"Even your human race is nothing more than a speck of dust born within the desolation."
"So tell me—how exactly do you plan to defeat me?"
Adrian's expression turned dismissive.
"The first Divine Tree is already broken. Do you really think the second and third will stay intact for long?"
"And once all four Divine Trees are gone…"
"Do you think you'll still be alive?"
A furious dragon roar split the air.
Lightning danced between the dragon's whiskers. Overhead, the storm clouds seemed to find a perfect conduit, and bolts of thunder began crashing down across its body.
"I possess one-seventh of my original strength, and even so, I command thunder itself."
"How dare a crawling thing like you put on airs in front of me?"
The dragon slowly raised one claw. Lightning coiled around it, thicker and brighter with every passing second.
"I'll reduce your body to blackened ash in an instant."
"This game ends now. I'm done wasting time on you."
Then it swung its claw.
Buzz—!!
A vast mass of lightning gathered in the sky and took the shape of a giant thunder-claw, slashing down toward Adrian.
In that instant, every possible escape route around him—and even the sky above him—was flooded with lightning.
A cold smile tugged at Adrian's mouth.
"Every piece of flesh can become my weapon."
"Every living thing made of flesh can become my food."
The kagune covering Adrian's body turned a deeper crimson. At the same time, they grew denser and harder.
Shhk! Shhk!
Then countless scarlet filaments began spinning out from them.
In the blink of an eye, those red threads wrapped around Adrian completely.
From a distance, he had become a giant crimson sphere of flesh.
Thin scarlet patterns spiraled across its surface like veins.
Thump. Thump. Thump.
The enormous red sphere began to pulse—like a living heart beating in midair.
Blue lightning engulfed it and bored inward madly.
But at that very moment, the red patterns on the surface began rotating at high speed.
Soon, they formed a huge vortex, swallowing all the incoming lightning into the sphere itself.
Dragon Nation's viewers clenched their fists so tightly their knuckles turned white.
"Did it work?! Did Eat-Stream Adrian Vale really block all of that?!"
"Is he okay in there?"
"He should be! He was already hidden deep inside the red sphere from the start!"
"So this is Adrian's defense? It's insane!"
Foreign viewers, on the other hand, nearly lost their minds.
"How can all that lightning fail to kill him?!"
"That dragon kept talking about how ancient it is—so why can't it kill a kid who looks barely twenty?!"
"Doesn't living longer mean you're supposed to be stronger?!"
"Don't tell me Adrian Vale survived again. No. That can't be possible!"
Back in Dragon Nation, inside the live studio for I Came to Watch the Divine Domain, Bingbing's eyes shone brightly.
"It looks like Adrian really did survive that lightning attack."
"At the very least, he's still capable of facing the dragon head-on."
"Professor Luo, what do you think?"
Professor Luo took a deep breath and nodded.
"From what we can see, Adrian is still holding on."
"And more importantly, one of his earlier attacks clearly forced part of the dragon's life force to drain away."
"As time goes on, the dragon's life force will only continue to weaken."
"That means victory is absolutely possible."
Bingbing nodded hard, then turned toward Captain Ryan Cole.
"Captain Cole, what's your view on the dragon's weakening state?"
Ryan Cole stared at the screen without blinking.
"This dragon only has one-seventh of its original life force and power to begin with."
"Now it's been wounded, and the first Divine Tree has already shattered."
"You can tell just by looking at it—it's much weaker than when it first appeared."
"The balance is shifting toward Adrian."
He paused, then added quietly,
"And I have a feeling Adrian is still holding something back."
"He's waiting for the right moment to strike."
Inside the Dreamlike Forest, the blue lightning finally dissipated.
But the giant crimson sphere also sank into total stillness, as though the life inside it had been extinguished.
Across the world, humanity fell silent.
Everyone waited for the next change.
Elsewhere in the Divine Domain, Fahai had also learned about Adrian and Raven's situation through the livestream comments, and his brows drew together.
Looking toward the direction of the Dreamlike Forest, he muttered,
"That brat should survive, right? He's that strong. There's no way he'd fall in some mere forest."
"I still haven't had the chance to properly spar with him. There's no way he's dying just like that."
In another location, Wu Liuqi rubbed his panda eyes, yawned, and said,
"Adrian's like a cockroach. Every time he gets cornered, he just crawls back up again. There's no way he dies there."
"Though now that I think about it, I really should find time to give him a proper haircut. The guy's famous enough now that he'd make amazing advertising for my barbershop."
Not far away, Zhang Zhiwei smiled mildly.
"That little rascal really doesn't know how to behave."
"He's already laid hands on a place like the Dreamlike Forest. Once this is over, a lot of creatures are probably going to end up on his menu."
"A dragon that controls thunder, though…"
"I'd really like to spar with something like that."
Crackle! Crackle! Crackle!
Storm clouds suddenly gathered overhead.
Zhang Zhiwei raised his right hand slowly.
Snap!
A bolt of lightning descended straight into his palm, condensing into a small blue orb of electricity.
The crackling sphere rolled across his fingers, jumping lightly from fingertip to fingertip.
When foreign viewers saw that, they were stunned.
"So this is the old Celestial Master's real level?"
"Is he some kind of thunder god sent down from heaven?"
"He can control lightning that easily? How is that even possible?"
"Is this mysterious Eastern power? Does every Eastern person have something like this?"
"That's sorcery! Some terrifying kind of sorcery!"
Most of Dragon Nation, however, was no longer paying attention to Zhang Zhiwei.
Their eyes were fixed on the crimson sphere.
It had remained motionless for a very long time, as though Adrian inside had truly lost all life.
A look of confusion began appearing on more and more faces.
"Don't tell me Eat-Stream Adrian Vale really died…"
"What are we supposed to do now?"
"Why isn't he moving? That dragon shouldn't be able to kill him this easily!"
"What is he doing in there? What is he preparing?"
"Move already, Adrian! If you come back alive, I'll treat you to everything from one end of Dragon Nation to the other. I'll pay for all of it!"
Boom. Boom.
Then, under the eyes of the entire world, the giant crimson sphere began to tremble.
Thump.
Thump.
Each pulse felt like it struck directly inside the hearts of Dragon Nation's people.
Then joy erupted all at once.
"He's alive! Eat-Stream Adrian Vale is alive!"
"Dragon Nation still has hope! The Dreamlike Forest is still ours!"
"I knew it! There's no way he'd die that easily!"
"Get up, Eat-Stream Adrian Vale! Eat that dragon!"
Boom! Boom!
The crimson sphere's pulsing grew faster and faster, as though some terrifying life-form inside it were awakening.
Seeing that, the Ancient Azure Dragon's massive eyes filled with disbelief.
"That's impossible! How could he survive an attack like that?"
"Is he even human?"
"No human should possess that kind of defense!"
"And what is this giant red sphere? Has this thing already evolved into something completely different?"
A cold realization rose in the dragon's mind.
And as that suspicion deepened, its expression turned uglier and uglier.
"Don't tell me… those people from back then have returned?"
"Is this one of them?"
"No."
"I will never allow that era to appear in this world again."
"I refuse to believe this thing won't die!"
In its fury, the Ancient Azure Dragon shot higher and higher into the sky until its massive body disappeared fully into the storm clouds above.
Its roar came crashing down from the heavens.
"I don't care who you are."
"You die here today."
"The Dreamlike Forest belongs to me."
"It can only ever belong to me!"
At that moment, Jason—the one controlling one-seventh of the Ancient Azure Dragon's power from the shadows—had clearly gone completely mad.
Crackle! Crackle! Crackle!
Violent lightning began breeding madly within the dark clouds.
The whole sky turned into a sea of thunder.
Blue and violet bolts tangled together in the air, forming a vision so destructive that no living thing should have been able to survive inside it.
The dragon's body moved back and forth through the storm, while the lightning around it behaved with eerie obedience whenever it touched its scales.
In that moment, the dragon looked less like a creature and more like the ruler of destruction itself.
Humanity across the world was stunned.
"Can something like this really exist?"
"Is there actually a living being that can control thunder so perfectly and not fear it at all?"
"What even is this creature's upper limit?"
"Can Adrian Vale really survive under something like this?"
"What if that thing escapes the Dreamlike Forest one day? What if it reaches our world?"
"If humanity had to fight something like that… could we even endure it?"
Inside the Dreamlike Forest, the Ancient Azure Dragon raised its claw again.
Boom! Boom! Boom!
Massive bolts of lightning, each as thick as a barrel, smashed toward the crimson sphere below.
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