The Embers of King's Teyvat Journey

The wound was deep, reaching its internal circuitry and mechanics. Sparks mixed with elemental force erupted, creating scorched earth on the ground beside the doll.

"Cough...cough cough!"

After a long while, the puppet, which had been silent, suddenly moved. A cough startled the birds perched on its body and caused the rabbits in the grass to retreat.

"Where...is this?" The stragglers struggled to their feet, and then a sharp pain shot through their minds.

"Hiss—" The skirmisher who had just stood up knelt down on one knee. Coming to his senses, he finally understood what had happened.

"I never imagined that traversing the abyss passage would be so terrifying. If I weren't a puppet, I probably would have gone insane by now."

"Those ground rats are quite capable."

The soldier rubbed his temples and muttered to himself with a sense of relief.

Upon entering the abyss passage, countless memories rushed in. Had he not shut down his consciousness core in time and entered a dormant state, he probably would have gone mad long ago.

"Let's bandage this first." Looking at the wound on his abdomen that was spurting sparks and purple light, the skirmisher pushed aside the outer part of his thigh and took out a simple repair kit from the groove.

This was something the Fools specially provided for him, so that he could perform simple repairs on his injuries in the wild.

Dolls are not like people. If a person is injured, they can easily heal their wounds by finding an alchemist or someone with the Eye of God.

But once a doll is broken, it's truly broken and won't repair itself. So the skirmishers learned to repair themselves very early on.

After a while, the skirmisher's abdominal wound was finally repaired. Looking at the bandage on his abdomen, which was completely different from the rest of his body, the skirmisher suddenly shook his head and chuckled, "Heh, what a terrifying fellow."

"Should the harvest be enough?" The soldier looked up at the sky. He didn't know how far he was from Dragon Ridge Snow Mountain, but the faint golden hue on the horizon reminded him of the existence of the Golden Tree.

Although we only managed to get the name of the Golden Tree this time, obtaining information about a powerful figure like Mongot is not bad.

The stragglers looked around. He was now in a crevice in the mountains, with a rushing river beside him and near-vertical cliffs on either side.

“Liyue?” The soldier glanced at the surrounding landscape. The exposed boulders and brownish-yellow vegetation all told him that this was Liyue.

Looking into the distance, a large tree, a mixture of wood and stone, grew out beside the valley, causing the stragglers to shiver.

Hopefully, no more Aberdo or Montgomery will pop up here.

The soldiers carefully observed the distant tree. The trunk and top of the tree revealed a faint sky blue color, making it look as if jade had grown from the tree.

"Earth veins?" The soldier breathed a sigh of relief. Although he didn't know much about earth veins, encountering something familiar was enough to put him at ease.

Limping along the valley, the stragglers soon arrived beside the large tree. They tapped it gently, but found nothing unusual.

"Maybe it just happened to grow at a ley line node." The soldier shook his head, realizing he was being overly suspicious.

Trees growing at ley lines often exhibit peculiar changes, so it's reasonable that they can emit blue light.

His gaze fell upon a cave in the valley, and the stragglers sighed. He hadn't known how serious his injuries were until he left.

It's so bad it needs major repairs.

"Ha, I never thought I'd be in such a sorry state. It's a really bad feeling." With a self-deprecating laugh, the stragglers walked into the deep cave.

Chapter 284 The Crouching Dragon

2023-11-10

"This hole seems to be quite deep."

In the deep cave, the skirmisher looked back at the faint light behind him and exclaimed in slight amazement.

Who would have thought that a cave you just randomly walked into could be so deep?

Despite the extreme darkness, the skirmisher felt no discomfort. Darkness alone was not enough to evoke the emotion he felt called "fear."

On the contrary, the stragglers were now somewhat agitated. The cave was so steep that after walking so far, they hadn't been able to find a place to settle down.

"Let's walk a bit further, if we still can't find a suitable spot..." The stragglers didn't finish their sentence. If it weren't for his current physical injuries, he probably would have already used brute force to flatten the cave.

Behind him was a cave entrance emitting only a faint light, and in front of him was a dark cave floor. As the stragglers advanced, he grew increasingly impatient.

Just as the stragglers were trying to blast a flat area out of the cave, a bright light suddenly appeared before his eyes.

The light is amber-colored, much like the glow emitted by the unique amber found in Liyue.

"Oh? Could it be an amber mine?" The soldier's face lit up with surprise. High-quality amber is quite valuable, and this place is deep in the mountains.

This was practically a perfect source of funding for the Fools. Stepping forward, what appeared before the skirmishers wasn't a vein inlaid with bright amber, but a jade scepter.

The jade tablet is covered with mysterious runes and a profound, restrained power.

A punch landed on the jade tablet, causing only a few ripples on its surface, with no other effect.

"The power of the Geo Archon?" Sanbing asked, somewhat surprised and uncertain. This was his first time in Liyue, and he had only heard about the Geo Archon before.

Therefore, he was not sure whether the jade tablet was made by the Rock God.

The stragglers looked up at the scene behind the jade tablet. Beyond this small opening lay an immeasurably vast space.

He even suspected that the huge hole had hollowed out the entire valley. On the ceiling and walls of the cave, countless jade minerals, some recognizable and some not, emitted various colors of light.

The dazzling lights intertwined, illuminating the space inside the jade tablet as if it were daytime.

The bottom of the cave was abnormally flat, as if the minerals and jade growing freely on the cave walls and ceiling had deliberately avoided the vast cave floor.

"That's... the big tree at the cave entrance?!" The soldier rubbed his eyes, seemingly unable to believe his eyes.

On the flat bottom of the cave, a ley line tree grew out, seemingly cut from the same mold as the cave entrance. In terms of size, this tree was even considerably larger than the ones outside the cave!

But how could such a large tree grow deep in the earth? Just as the stragglers were wondering, he suddenly saw the ley line tree move.

"Boom!"

The soldiers' vision trembled along with the earth, as if the movement of the large tree had summoned an earthquake.

To the stragglers, the tree, which should have stood still, suddenly began to grow rapidly on the spot.

Then, the soldiers saw a huge figure break through the earth's crust and emerge from the ground.

That so-called "big tree" we just saw was actually the tail of this thing!

With dragon scales carved from jade, bright and ferocious dragon horns, and chaotic and insane crimson twin suns, the creature before us is clearly a giant rock dragon hidden deep beneath the earth!

"Damn it! What...what is this thing!" For the first time, the skirmisher felt that his luck was so bad. He first fought with the unassuming Abedo, and then was defeated by Mongot and fled in panic.

He never expected that he would find such a terrifying thing just by looking for a place to rest. How come he never realized that his constitution was so hateful before?

The stragglers quietly retreated a few steps, looking for an opportunity to escape. He didn't even consider testing the dragon before him.

The dragon's body looked like a mountain peak; even without using elemental power, its size meant that you could crush it to death by simply stepping on it.

"Humans...humans. Come...come here. (Hurry...hurry up)." A massive, overlapping voice came from the dragon's mouth; it actually wanted the stragglers to stay.

"What are you?" The skirmisher stopped retreating, his mind racing as he considered what to do next.

"Rescue me... (No... this is unacceptable), and I'll reward you with... immortality! (I... even I myself cannot do this)"

It was as if two dragons were speaking at the same time, but the skirmishers only heard the dragons' allure.

The other sound was too faint to be considered mere background noise amidst the dragon's roar that shook the mountains and forests.

After the dragon finished speaking, it went completely mad. Every twitch of its limbs was like an earthquake.

Flames, water ripples, thunder, frost... all sorts of forces emerged after the jade scepter, destroying the large cave beyond recognition.

Each of those strikes could overturn mountains and rivers, shattering the earth. Yet, they were all buried within the bright yellow jade scepter.

"The power of the gods." The soldier looked at the devastating scene that followed the jade tablet, then at the jade tablet that still stood firm, and swallowed hard in utter shock.

"Liyue, I remember it was Young Master. Did he offend the Clown?" The soldier glanced at him briefly and then fled without looking back.

After witnessing Rota's power, the scattered soldiers developed strong doubts about whether the young prince could obtain the Heart of the Rock God.

……

"Your Excellency is..."

Kaeya, accompanied by the Knights of Favonius behind him, stared intently at Mongot in front of him and asked with some wariness.

It's no wonder he was wary; the guy in front of him looked exactly like the monsters in poems and stories.

“Hmm… you should have seen it before. It’s the same type as that dragon.” Mongot glanced at Abedo’s research notes in his hand and replied casually.

"A dragon?" Kaeya raised an eyebrow.

"It's Lance, the guy who comes here every day to freeload..."

"Lance Xunx!"

"Oh! It's her!" Kaeya suddenly realized. Lance Sanks was always freeloading, which made people who knew her identity automatically overlook her dragon status.

"Haha, it seems she's caused you some trouble." Montgomery closed the book and put it back in its original place.

The print was too small, and it was tiring for him to read. His eyes were already almost touching his chin; if he didn't take care of them, he might go blind.

“It’s alright, it’s nothing compared to the help she gave us,” Abedo replied, shaking his head.

As the first person to know Lance Sanders' identity, Abedo knew how much Lance Sanders had contributed during the Dragon Disaster.

“Then I’m relieved. It seems I don’t need to compensate her for anything.” Menggete nodded.

He knew the personalities of those dragons; every time they came to Rodel, they always gave Godwin a headache.

"So, you're here to find the embers too?" Kaeya looked up at the golden tree not far away, and no matter how many times she looked at it, she was still shocked.

"Of course, it would be even better if you could tell me the location of the King."

As he spoke, Montgomery pulled several bright halos from his cloak and placed them on Abedo's research table.

“We call this runes. You can think of them as polymers of elements that have no usage conditions. They are the source of power in our area.”

"There's no magic ring here, so it can't be used to its full potential. But it's still perfectly fine for research or physical fitness."

"I suppose you could call it a gift from me."

"Is that so?" Abedo looked down at the rune that was shimmering with an inexplicable light, then looked up at the brilliant gold in the sky, the two colors being quite similar.

"A gift?" Kaeya muttered to himself, then took out a map from the group behind him.

He said to Montgomery, “This is our map. You are here now, and Ember is here.”

Looking at the two spots Kaiya pointed to, Mungo nodded. He turned and glanced at the golden tree before disappearing from everyone's sight in a blur.