Mai Sakatoku and the figure behind her, the mysterious Boss, silently watched everything unfold. As he stared after the fleeing traitors, he remained silent for a long time.
Even he had been surprised by the resurrection of that white figure. It was an enormous and unexpected gift.
"Boss, what do we do now? Should we pursue them?" Mai asked the mysterious figure behind her.
"No. I'm far more curious about the person standing behind those two."
The figure of light raised his head toward the sky and allowed the two Dragon Kings to escape. He understood that those Dragon Kings were merely pawns placed before the throne. The true commander, the one directing and planning everything from behind the scenes, had chosen not to meet him personally.
Instead, that person had simply sent two pure-blooded Dragon Kings to offer him a greeting.
"How times have changed. Someone is actually capable of commanding two pure-blooded Dragon Kings at once. Interesting..."
The mysterious figure murmured to himself before turning toward Mai.
"It's time to withdraw. There's no longer any point in remaining here."
"Understood."
After receiving her orders, Mai vanished from the Ice Cellar, which was already on the verge of collapsing.
"The Board of Directors will probably lose their minds when they hear that the Ice Cellar collapsed."
Outside the Ice Cellar, the blond man from the Gattuso family quietly muttered to himself as he watched the facility crumble.
"That's something for all those important people sitting high above us on the Board to worry about."
A slightly playful voice came from behind him.
The blond man turned and saw the masked man waving goodbye.
"This is where we part ways, buddy."
"Goodbye."
The blond man smiled and returned the wave.
He made no attempt to ask about the mysterious man's identity. He was far more concerned about how he was supposed to report what had happened to his superiors.
Was he supposed to tell them that two Dragon Kings had suddenly appeared, along with a super hybrid who had briefly fought one of them to a standstill?
Even if he dared to submit such a report, the people above him would still have to be willing to believe it.
Meanwhile, the two mysterious women who had taken the Dragon Bone Cross arrived at a U.S. military base not far from Cassell College.
"We got the Cross."
Erii walked into the base carrying the Dragon Bone Cross, which was larger than her entire body. She spoke softly to Jovian, who sat near the entrance waiting for them.
Having completely usurped the divine throne, Erii could now control her EX. She could speak freely like anyone else.
However, after spending so long in silence, she was still unaccustomed to using many words.
"I could have taken the Dragon Bone Cross from Cassell College by myself."
"But I encountered someone along the way. That person was extremely dangerous, and there was something vaguely familiar about him."
"When I looked directly at him, I even felt an impulse to submit. Most terrifying of all, he could purify another person's bloodline. He temporarily elevated a lowly hybrid until she nearly reached the level of a pure-blooded dragon. It was unbelievable."
Compared to the quiet Erii, Xia Mi chattered endlessly like a parrot.
Jovian did not find her irritating. On the contrary, Erii's silence and Xia Mi's talkativeness complemented each other perfectly. They were ideally suited to working together.
"In any case, congratulations on successfully obtaining the Dragon Bone Cross."
Jovian waited patiently for Xia Mi to finish before congratulating the two heroes of the operation.
"Oh, there's no need to be so polite. We're close enough that you can show your appreciation with something practical."
Xia Mi smiled playfully at Jovian.
"How about giving me the entire Dragon Bone Cross?"
"Heh."
"Half for each of you."
Jovian merely smiled before repeating the agreement he had established with Xia Mi.
"Tch. You're so stingy. I was only joking. Why couldn't you joke back?"
Xia Mi pouted unhappily.
In truth, she had not been joking at all.
"Strictly speaking, Norton and Constantine are also your brothers. You're really comfortable eating his corpse?" Jovian asked, ignoring Xia Mi's childish displeasure.
"Honestly..."
"I have far too many brothers and sisters."
"Every one of us loves the others deeply."
"But dragons like us are destined to be alone. To ascend to the supreme throne, we must inevitably kill one another. Only the strongest among us can reach the summit."
Xia Mi sighed, her words revealing the helplessness suffered by pure-blooded dragons.
This was the destiny of dragonkind, an unbreakable fate.
The relationships between the Black King's children were unimaginably complicated. The love they shared was stronger than any love known to humanity. It was a bond forged and hardened across endless ages.
Yet to survive, they had to continue killing.
Did anyone understand what it felt like to devour the person they loved?
It was sorrow and agony, the ultimate loneliness engraved within their blood.
At times, Xia Mi even believed it was a curse placed upon them by their father, the great Black King.
"Since it doesn't bother you, we'll divide it evenly."
"By the way, how are you supposed to eat a Dragon Bone Cross?" Jovian asked.
Xia Mi stared at him speechlessly.
She had no idea how she should answer such a question.
"Eat it however you like."
"Fry it, roast it, boil it..."
"Try anything you can think of."
After a long silence, the exasperated Xia Mi finally answered him.
"Fine."
"In any case, the two of you should divide and consume the Dragon Bone Cross first. After that, we're heading to the mainland."
Jovian shrugged and gave them their instructions.
"The mainland..."
"What are you planning?"
The moment Xia Mi heard his words, an intense sense of danger arose inside her.
Her lair was on the mainland. More importantly, her brother, whose mind had been damaged, was currently living inside the subway system beneath the capital.
Could Jovian's greed truly be that boundless?
Was Constantine's Dragon Bone Cross still not enough for him? Did he now intend to take the Dragon Bone Crosses belonging to Xia Mi and her brother as well?
"Relax."
"I'm going to meet the Chosen One. It's time to introduce ourselves to our newest ally."
Jovian reassured the visibly nervous Xia Mi.
"Our newest ally?"
Xia Mi initially frowned at those words. Several minutes passed before she gradually realized what he had said.
"Wait, what do you mean, newest ally? When did I become your ally?"
"Oh? You don't want to be my ally? Then I suppose you're volunteering to become my subordinate."
Jovian smiled.
"Go to hell."
Xia Mi cursed at him.
"Oh? You've got quite the temper. What am I supposed to say at a moment like this? Let me think..."
"Right. I should say something like this."
"Heh heh heh..."
"Xia Mi, you wouldn't want me to capture and devour that foolish brother of yours, would you? You know what you need to do if you want to prevent that."
Jovian gave Xia Mi his best sinister grin.
"You've been in Japan far too long. You sound like some sleazy anime villain."
Xia Mi waved a hand in front of Jovian as though trying to clear away the stench surrounding him.
"In any case, let's go."
Jovian's expression returned to its usual unreadable calm as he looked at Xia Mi.
"Fine."
Xia Mi appeared to be in a much better mood and readily agreed.
Even Xia Mi herself failed to notice that she had already begun unconsciously following Jovian's lead.
"Sooner or later, I'll mold you into exactly what I want."
Jovian watched Xia Mi's excited back and smiled coldly.
Meanwhile, on the mainland, Lu Mingfei wandered casually along the street with a toilet seat hanging around his neck and a grocery bag filled with green onions and other ingredients in his hand.
No one seemed to remember that today was July 17, Lu Mingfei's birthday.
Even Lu Mingfei himself had nearly forgotten.
Perhaps it would be more accurate to say he no longer cared about his birthday. It did not matter to him. He had rarely celebrated it while growing up anyway.
"Happy birthday, student Lu Mingfei!"
As Lu Mingfei hummed to himself while walking down the street, his phone suddenly chimed.
It was an automatically generated message from Cassell College's system.
"Damn..."
"So the only thing in the entire world that remembers my birthday is a machine?"
Lu Mingfei sounded as though he were mocking himself, or perhaps forcing himself to laugh.
Regardless, he smiled happily as he stared at the message.
At least one machine in the world remembered his birthday. That was surely something worth celebrating.
"Ah..."
After reading the message, Lu Mingfei yawned and casually stuffed his phone into his pocket.
At the same time, he vaguely sensed an intense gaze directed at him.
Lu Mingfei followed the feeling and saw a beautiful girl with long red hair leaning beside a traffic light, silently watching him.
"Nono?"
Lu Mingfei froze when he saw the figure beside the traffic light, then shook his head.
At first glance, the girl truly resembled Nono. Like Nono, she possessed a breathtaking beauty that could make a person's heart stop.
Upon closer examination, however, there were many differences between them.
A trace of invisible sorrow always hid beneath Nono's bold, cheerful gaze. Looking deeper revealed even more complicated emotions.
The eyes of the girl before him were far too pure.
"I actually mistook her for someone else..."
"Heh."
"I wonder what Nono's doing right now."
"Maybe she's vacationing overseas with Caesar."
After realizing that the red-haired girl was not Nono, Lu Mingfei stopped looking at her and allowed his thoughts to wander.
He remembered the first time he had met Nono, then remembered shouting at her beneath the ocean.
"Don't die!"
Thinking about it now was incredibly embarrassing.
He also remembered the magnificent moment when he had sacrificed one quarter of his life to fight a Dragon King and protect Nono.
"One quarter of my life, gone just like that. That little devil really knows how to rip someone off."
"Whatever. There's no point thinking about it now. I should focus on what I'm going to do with the remaining three quarters."
Lu Mingfei shook his head vigorously, clearing away all the chaotic thoughts inside it.
"The person we're supposed to cooperate with is this pathetic loser?"
Beside the red-haired woman at the traffic light stood a girl with a ponytail. She wore a baseball cap, sunglasses, and a face mask.
After examining Lu Mingfei from head to toe, she reached an immediate conclusion.
The person before them was nothing more than a hopeless loser.
"Interesting, isn't he?"
Jovian's voice sounded through the earpiece worn by the ponytailed girl.
"Not interesting. Just painfully ordinary."
The girl shook her head.
She could not understand why Jovian saw anything valuable in a boy who wore a toilet seat around his neck and somehow looked pathetic enough to make ordinary losers feel successful by comparison.
"Ordinary?"
"Look more carefully."
"Take a very close look."
"Look at how amusing it is when a monster desperately forces itself into the life of an ordinary person. It tries so hard to appear normal that it deliberately dresses and behaves even more ordinarily than an ordinary human."
Jovian's voice brimmed with delight.
Merely looking at Lu Mingfei made him want to burst into laughter because the entire spectacle was far too entertaining.
"Are you saying he's also a Dragon King? Which of my brothers or sisters is he?"
After hearing Jovian's explanation, the ponytailed girl studied Lu Mingfei several more times.
Unfortunately, she still saw nothing but a pathetic loser.
"None of them."
Jovian answered over the phone.
"None of them?"
The ponytailed girl frowned even more deeply.
"I still don't see anything unusual about him."
"The fact that he's so ordinary is exactly what makes him unusual."
"To put it simply, this monster is trying too hard. He has overacted his role so badly that he no longer looks ordinary at all."
"Imagine an ordinary human standing in the middle of a gathering of dragons. When everyone around you is a dragon, being the only ordinary human makes you stand out more than anyone."
"That's exactly what happened here."
"That's why Lu Mingfei is already ridiculous without even trying. What a terrible actor."
Jovian laughed loudly at Lu Mingfei.
More precisely, he was laughing at a monster that wanted to become friends with humans, yet feared its own exceptional nature so much that it transformed itself into the most ordinary human imaginable, only to be rejected by humanity anyway.
Its behavior was utterly absurd.
The monster had naively believed that if it became ordinary enough, everyone else would accept it.
It could never understand that its excessive normality was precisely why people rejected it.
That was human nature.
"What should we do now?"
Xia Mi only partly understood his explanation.
"Keep following him. Let's watch the finest performance this terrible actor has to offer."
A smile appeared at the corner of Jovian's mouth.
He was eagerly looking forward to Lu Mingfei's next performance.
A monster playing house with humans was simply too entertaining.
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