Dragon Raja: Lu Mingfei Returns from the Elden Ring

It was a giant tower, standing on a gentle slope beside a fissure in the earth. The tides of magma rose and fell not far from it, reflecting off its dark body, which looked like an iron core about to melt.

Beyond that underwater ridge, a city emerges on the horizon, centered around a towering tower and bordering a river of lava. Half of the ancient city has slid into the lava river, and the other half is nothing but collapsed ruins, with only the colossal tower in the center standing tall.

Even from the collapsed ruins, one can still see its former grandeur: the continuous buildings, the towering mountain-shaped roofs covered with iron-black tiles, the tiles engraved with swirling clouds and dragons, and hundreds of meters long metal chains hanging from the four corners of the buildings, with black wind chimes hanging from the chains. These chains rise and fall in the ocean currents, and thousands of black wind chimes sway, playing silent music.

From Lu Mingfei's perspective, the city's original layout was still faintly visible. A network of crisscrossing avenues divided the city into different districts. At the center of the ruins was a circular plaza reminiscent of the Roman Colosseum, from which four imperial roads led to the east, west, south, and north. In the center of the plaza stood the colossal tower that had been initially discovered, its surface adorned with intricate reliefs. At its summit were sharp spikes tens of meters long, and similar spikes graced the tops of other buildings. Looking down, all that could be seen was a dense thicket of spikes, like a thorny thicket of cast iron.

According to the records of the Snake-Headed Eight Families, this is Takamagahara, the so-called place where the gods gather. In reality, it is the royal city of the ancient White King's descendants, and now it is a burial ground for the sacred remains. It was originally a city on earth, so it had a long and straight imperial road. One can imagine that in the past, those who came to pay homage to the gods walked along the imperial road, as if on a pilgrimage to the place where the gods resided.

Lu Mingfei heard the heartbeat. From the moment he arrived, the heartbeat had gradually quickened; even as an embryo, the ancient dragon's perception was astonishing. It sensed danger and was accelerating its incubation.

Following the sound of the heartbeat, Lu Mingfei quickly discovered a strangely shaped building ruin in the ancient city.

Like the other structures in this ruin, it was covered in unidentified black shellfish, thousands upon thousands of tiny, snail-like creatures clustered together. They were lung snails, feeding on phosphorus ejected from the volcano and producing protein through anaerobic chemical reactions.

These are the producers in this dragon subspecies ecosystem. Protein is the most important source of nutrition for these marine creatures. Fish feed on this protein, predators feed on fish, and dragon vipers feed on predators. It is because of this protein factory that this bizarre ecological environment can form in the deep sea.

When Lu Mingfei turned his gaze to the ruins, the embryo's heartbeat suddenly accelerated, followed by countless heartbeats echoing through the ruins, causing the entire ruins to tremble.

As the ruins shook, millions of lung snails detached, accompanied by thick, sticky blood. Exposed was an indescribable, monstrous object, hundreds of meters long, half embedded in the seabed, the other half encased in layers of lung snails. The exposed half was the color of luncheon meat, densely covered with tendon- and fascia-like structures, still slightly wriggling. The lung snails had used their mouthparts to bite into this behemoth's body, constantly feeding, mating, and reproducing. Its surface was cracked with horrifying wounds, and the remaining lung snails could be seen clinging tightly to the depths of the wounds.

At the same time, waves surged on the lava river, and the lung snails clinging to the surface of the ruins were peeling off, layer after layer, like molting. The city was collapsing or awakening. Dust and lung snail shells accumulated over thousands of years rose from the ruins with the water flow, forming black waves tens of meters high, like a sea within a sea surging and roaring.

Ignoring all of this, Lu Mingfei reached out and gave a direct command to the enormous, alien "structure." It was actually the Lenin's hull, now possessed by an embryo; a significant portion of the steel had been assimilated by the embryo, but the main structure of the hull remained intact. With Lu Mingfei's gesture, a high-level Word of Power domain was released, and the Lenin's hull began to tremble violently.

Divided by the center line drawn by Lu Mingfei's hand, the left and right halves of the ship bore enormous forces in opposite directions. Soon, the steel structure in the middle reached its strength limit. As a crack appeared and spread, the massive hull began to tear apart from top to bottom, and the flesh and blood tissue covering the steel "exploded".

Thick, syrup-like black blood burst open in the violent currents, resembling a mountain made of black blood that was slowly collapsing. Large amounts of blood flowed along the seabed and the cracks in the city... Besides the lung snails, something else was also feeding on the dragon's blood.

Lu Mingfei heard countless joyful sounds, hidden beneath the city's foundations, cheering for the nourishment of dragon blood, as if the entire city had come alive because of it.

According to ancient records provided by the Snake Clan, dragon corpses do not decompose for many years after death. Therefore, the dragon race used alchemy to preserve the remains of their own kind, using them as guardians of cities. This was a forbidden technology. Until ancient Egypt, humans attempted to use this technology to preserve the corpses of pharaohs and nobles in an attempt to make them immortal. However, they could only preserve the bodies, not the activity of nerves and muscles, so they could not create true zombies.

Now, within the foundations of this city, thousands of dragon-like corpses, referred to as "Corpse Guardians" by the White King's bloodline, are awakening.

Crimson mist surged from the ruins, spreading the dragon's blood that flowed beneath. Slender creatures crawled out from the cracks in the ground, tearing away their gestational membranes, their bodies gleaming with a metallic sheen, their pupils a ferocious gold. Unable to rise from their long slumber, they crawled on the seabed, writhing their long, slender bodies. But nourished by the dragon's blood, their bodies instantly regained the power of their primordial past. Suddenly, they leaped up, their long tails lashing as they rapidly burrowed upwards through the cracks.

However, not a single corpse guard rose above the ground. Countless decaying arms stretched towards the sky, like a black wheat field swaying in the wind. Within the wheat field were pairs of wide-open golden eyes, each pair revealing an expression of awe and hesitation.

The lava on the seabed was undulating, and the seawater within the area illuminated by the light also "undulated," as if the earth had cracked open and a crimson aurora was gushing out from it. The aurora radiated from the ground into the sky, and a tiny figure floated in the aurora, his blazing golden eyes looking down on all the ancient dragons that had come to life. Not a single dragon dared to offend his majesty.

In the ancient times, the dragon kings ruled over all races in this way.

Chapter 216 The Sea and the Power of Water

Lu Mingfei didn't immediately search the wreckage of the Lenin for what he wanted. The corpse guardians near the blood of the ancient dragon embryo couldn't resist rushing forward. Under the temptation of the ancient dragon embryo's blood, even the pressure of a dragon king would weaken. This is the essence of the dragon race: greedy and brutal, with greed surpassing brutality.

Each drop of this blood, mixed with the high temperature and pressure of the seawater, is enough for a fallen member of the Fierce Demon Clan to complete their evolution, but someone abandoned it here, merely as a sacrifice for the White King.

Blood flowed through the cracks of the city, and the corpse guardians crawled into the cracks to suck it up, their countless long tails sticking out and swaying like countless writhing maggots on a large piece of rotting flesh.

The White King has undoubtedly left. The ancient dragon embryos, whose developmental abilities were stripped away by the mastermind, reacted violently to Lu Mingfei. How could the White King, who had been reborn after consuming dragon blood for more than ten years, tolerate the mere King of Fire and Earth swaggering around in its city?

Lu Mingfei expanded his perception to the entire city but found no other strong elemental reactions or spiritual forces.

He beckoned, and a corpse guardian that was sucking dragon blood was suddenly pulled up by an invisible force. It stared at Lu Mingfei with a look of fear and confusion on its face, with traces of blood still on its face. After consuming the dragon blood, its originally shriveled body was filling up at a speed visible to the naked eye.

Lu Mingfei wasn't trying to observe the Corpse Guardian, but rather something inside it.

As the temperature rose, several cysts quickly swelled on the corpse-guardian's body, and then its sharp teeth tore through the tough dragon skin and scales. Emerging were several slender little fish, their bodies covered in beautiful silver-blue scales, with a gleaming light coming from a long, thin tentacle on their heads.

The Ghost-toothed Dragon Viper is a legendary creature. According to the research of a professor at Kassel College on the Ice Sea Remnants, dragons used this special subspecies of dragons as a form of torture. Nobles who committed serious crimes would be punished by being bound to bronze pillars and sunk into the deep sea, where a large group of dragon vipers would devour the nobles and bronze pillars together.

This ancient city is home not only to thousands of corpse guardians but also countless Ghost-toothed Vipers, whose arrival in the human world would be a catastrophe. Lu Mingfei has temporarily suppressed them all with his dragon might, but he needs to launch a large-scale, devastating attack to deal with these dangerous ancient remnants.

This is the boundary between the Eurasian Plate and the Pacific Plate, with a very complex geological structure. Even if Lu Mingfei can control a considerable amount of seismic waves over a wide area, he cannot guarantee that releasing the Zhulong or Shiva's Dance will not cause a catastrophic chain reaction. In the worst case, most of Japan's landmass will sink.

He seemed lost in thought, and the next second, he suddenly transformed into a blur. His human body, defying fluid dynamics, cut through seawater at ultra-high speed, generating extremely intense temperatures and bubbles.

Just as one of the corpses closest to the Lenin ruins raised its head, Lu Mingfei appeared in front of it almost instantly, holding a black curved sword in his hand.

After a brief pause, the Corpse Guardian's body split in two. The internal organs and blood at the cut surface floated up due to buoyancy, revealing the bizarre proliferating tissue deep within its body. It was almost a dense mass of blood vessels and nerve ganglia attached to the octopus-like flesh and blood.

This thing is invading the corpse guard's nervous system along the spine. Its activity has weakened after being exposed to seawater, but it still wriggles its bizarre fleshy body like an invertebrate.

Lu Mingfei grabbed it directly with his hand and pulled it off the corpse guard's body. Holding it in his hand was like holding a still-beating heart.

Having been bled for over a decade in embryonic form, and having emerged from a half-dead body, its rapid recovery and subsequent invasion of its surroundings demonstrate an unusual vitality that strongly suggests it is a first-generation species.

I don't know which of the four thrones it is.

Lu Mingfei gently touched the large rune in the flesh and blood tissue. It was a ring, with another ring inside, looking like a wide-open eye.

With the merging of powers, he also gained a part of the four thrones once again... This embryo is one of the twins of the King of the Ocean and Water!

In an instant, the world in Lu Mingfei's eyes changed again. In the world of elements, the water element suddenly became clear and bright. The power that he couldn't feel before, mixed in with the weak water flow, was now as easy to wield as an arm. The water flow brought sound and vision, and he could even sense that the entire ecosystem relying on the lung snail's nest was fleeing from here, with all the conscious and capable creatures fleeing.

He opened his arms, and the seawater automatically gathered into a stream, lifting him to the desired depth.

A disturbance arose among the corpses in the city ruins as they sensed the changes in the surrounding seawater with suspicion and uncertainty.

Serial number 115, Word of Power o Ancient Authority o Return to the Void.

This is a powerful incantation that manipulates massive amounts of seawater; if released at full power, it will cause a massive tsunami. Unlike the Candle Dragon and Shiva's Dance, which rely on elemental power to cause damage within a certain range, the tsunami propelled by the Ruins of Return is more of a natural disaster, causing far more devastation to cities in specific terrains.

At this moment, Lu Mingfei split the power of this word into countless parts. The water flowing above the ruins of the ancient city had been divided into countless sharp blades, waiting for their master to wield the sword.

The real behemoth hidden beneath the ancient city was also startled by this murderous intent. A huge black shadow struggled to rise from the crack, its golden pupils like giant candles, its decaying body clad in ancient armor, layers upon layers of armor connected by bronze chains, and swarms of ghost-toothed dragon vipers swimming in its abdominal cavity, where only ribs remained.

The body of this pure-blooded dragon-shaped corpse guardian is the lair of the Ghost-toothed Dragon Viper. Like hundreds of lamps being lit at the same moment, those are the eyes of the Ghost-toothed Dragon Vipers, and the sleeping little fish are awakened.

At the same time, the Corpse Guardians also began to riot. They were defensive weapons made using the alchemy of the dragon race, and the enemy they were fighting against was also the dragon race. The technicians who made the Corpse Guardians actually tried every means to increase the Corpse Guardians' bloodline suppression against high-ranking dragons.

Facing certain death, and led by the dragon-shaped corpse guardians, they finally mustered their courage and charged towards the sea. The pure-blooded dragon, who had held a title in life, was now, in a sense, following their general in this charge.

However, Lu Mingfei merely made a downward gesture, and the massive flow of water scattered the army's formation. The leading dragon-shaped corpse guard was the first to be hit, and the water almost pressed its upper body below its abdomen, causing multiple breaks and bends in its body.

The massacre began.

The corpse guardians were shrouded in the smoke and dust stirred up by the water. Countless streams of water crisscrossed and weaved through the smoke and dust. In the blink of an eye, bloodstains pierced through the smoke and dust clouds like thousands of dark red ribbons, which was quite spectacular.

Chapter 217 The Road to the Underworld

Sumeru pedestals are a project under the Sheqi Eight Families. These floating platforms are suitable for long-term operations at sea, such as oil exploration or seabed mineral deposits. Although they move slowly, their immense weight allows them to withstand gale-force winds and even tsunamis. In Buddhism, "Sumeru pedestal" refers to a platform for placing Buddha statues, pagodas, or palaces. These floating platforms are called Sumeru pedestals because they are truly unsinkable.

To establish a base for this deep-sea exploration, the Sheqi Hachike concentrated all six of their "Sumeru" floating platforms directly above the Japan Trench. Layer upon layer of waves crashed against the bottom of the Sumeru platforms, occasionally spewing white foam into the sky. The Sumeru platforms were also connected by steel cables, which were taut like harp strings when the wind came and relaxed and sag after the wind passed.

Although it is in the construction and testing phase, due to Genjiro's strict orders, the construction, use and training of this sea base are carried out almost simultaneously. A considerable portion of the equipment has been transported to the platform by ship and submarine, and the basic command center and combat department have been deployed in a haphazard manner.

In the somewhat rudimentary command center, a man in a white coat suddenly noticed the rising peaks on the monitoring equipment. Several data points were highlighted in red. Kaguya and EVA had noticed these anomalies even earlier than him and had already incorporated these data into their model calculations, concluding that an anomaly was occurring in the seabed—specifically, in the area where the Divine Burial Site and the Ancient Dragon's Heartbeat were located.

The man picked up the yellow-green emergency phone on the center console. "Connect to the head of the household's office. Emergency in the ancient city!"

Just then, someone patted him on the shoulder. The man turned around in confusion and found that it was an excessively young boy. This base was full of the elites of the Snake Clan. Elite means that both technology and experience are indispensable, so there were no people this young.

Moreover, the boy was wearing a black bodysuit without any markings, indicating that he wasn't from Kassel College, as those guys always had school badges printed on their clothes.

assassin?

“Let me explain to Yuan Zhisheng,” Lu Mingfei said gently, taking the phone from the man’s hand without giving any room for argument.

Even many members of the family were unaware that Genji had taken over as patriarch. This young man not only knew about it but also seemed quite familiar with the patriarch. Without much thought, the man instinctively obeyed his orders.

"Princess Kaguya has sent the data. It's probably a small underwater earthquake. Don't stop the operation. Continue as usual..." A young voice came from the other end of the phone, speaking very quickly.

“It’s me, I just came up from the seabed,” Lu Mingfei said. “Listen, the target has left the seabed; we must assume this is part of the enemy’s plan.”

Genji Heavy Industries Building, the patriarch's office.

Genjiro was startled when he heard Lu Mingfei's voice, and the news he heard next made him put down the documents in his hand and wave his hand to refuse the breakfast that Yabuki Sakura brought. He walked to the window, drew back the curtains, and saw the Shinjuku area in the early hours of the morning.

Everything was just awakening from the quiet night, about to enter the bustling daylight. Looking down from above, the streetlights appeared somewhat dim. The neon lights were no longer as vibrant as they had been during the night rush hour, but had softened. Few pedestrians were on the streets, and the scattered figures looked particularly lonely in the empty space.

As the first rays of sunlight rise, the glass curtain walls of the tallest buildings are the first to reflect the dazzling light of dawn, creating a beautiful contrast with the distant sunrise.

"Really?" Genji asked softly.

“The White King is in this city, and he has likely been accumulating power for over a decade. From now on, searching for the White King and Herzog is the top priority,” Lu Mingfei repeated before hanging up.

Sakura Yabuki stood by the desk, waiting for Genjiro to finish his call. But after hanging up, Genjiro stood motionless by the window for a long time. Just as Sakura was about to go to the kitchen to reheat breakfast, Genjiro suddenly returned to his desk, put all the documents on the floor, searched around, and found the geological survey report from before.

Only then did a sense of relief appear on his brow, as if he had found a thread in a tangled mess that was pressing him step by step.

He took the breakfast from Sakura Yabuki's hand. "Has everyone at the command post had breakfast?"

“Yes, they eat in the cafeteria, but the heads of the families, like you, eat in their respective offices,” Sakura Yabuki said.

"And you?" Yuan Zhisheng asked.

"I ate at the cafeteria with Crow and Yasha," Sakura Yabuki replied calmly, answering every question.

Yuan Zhisheng nodded before starting his breakfast—a bowl of noodles and a cup of hot cocoa milk, with a golden fried egg topped with scallions and matsutake mushrooms, and the aroma of oil and a faint scent of soy sauce.

"Any updates from Osaka?" he asked again after taking a bite of noodles.

“Not yet.” Sakura Yabuki shook her head. She unconsciously observed Genjiro’s expression, wanting to know his opinion on breakfast. Seeing Genjiro’s satisfied look, she looked away and looked out the window. It was a vibrant scene of dawn. Even the low-lying Tokyo park was already bathed in sunlight.

……

West of Tokyo, the Tama River basin.

A Mitsubishi Type 73 jeep quietly traversed the rugged mountain road. The Japanese Self-Defense Forces' Army and Air Force call this type of vehicle the Type 73 light truck, which has been in service for nearly 40 years. This jeep traveling in this remote mountainous area has clearly undergone special modifications, with a heavy machine gun mounted at the rear, and its camouflage pattern is more suitable for the mountainous terrain near the Tamagawa River.

The driver was a man wearing a dark green helmet. Although he was driving in a densely wooded, rocky area with no roads, his hands on the steering wheel were very steady. He frequently glanced at the rocks or trees along the way, using these natural features and the terrain to remember the route. This kind of memorization was not difficult for a mixed-race person.

Two heavyweight figures were sitting in the vehicle: the "King General" and the "Dragon King" of the Fierce Ghost Clan.

The Snake Clan thought the Ghost Clan was defeated after they defeated some of the Ghost Clan's gangs in the city and destroyed a casino that was used as bait. Little did they know that the Ghost Clan had already found the "Road to the Underworld".

As the vehicle drove to the foot of a low hill, a tunnel entrance was found hidden among unusually dense vegetation. Originally an air-raid shelter built during the war, it is now codenamed "Yellow Springs" within the Ghost Clan, where the Ghost Clan's true elite forces are gathered.

Chapter 218

The jeep drove through the dark tunnel. For a considerable distance, the only lighting in the tunnel was the jeep's headlights. The walls on both sides and overhead were peeling and mottled, and dust and stones had piled up on the ground to form a thick blanket of dust. However, the road conditions were still much better than in the mountains.

After driving for a while in the tunnel, the jeep turned onto a side road going downhill. This side road looked much newer and was built much later than the main tunnel. Although the walls and ground were as rudimentary as the old tunnel, there were already lights along the way.

Finally, they reached the end of the tunnel, where an iron gate blocked their path. The jeep stopped in front of the gate, and after a few seconds, the gate began to rise. It was a gate half a meter thick, and bright, clear light shone from inside. Genji squinted. He had never been here before, nor had Kazama Ruri. As the second-in-command of the Oni Clan, it was clear that the King had deliberately concealed this information from him.

This is a giant space buried deep underground, with metal walls and ceilings covering every corner. Rows of high-powered searchlights are arranged overhead, their light pouring down and making the white walls look somewhat dazzling. Stepping inside feels like gazing at a snowfield under the sun.

The jeep slowly drove in, and Yuan Zhinv's eyes gradually adjusted to the sudden change in environment.