Dragon Raja: Lu Mingfei Returns from the Elden Ring

The golden pupils burning in his eyes intensified once more, gradually shifting from gold to crimson gold.

With the second burst of blood, his physical attributes and the effect of zero time increased simultaneously, instantly leaving several narrow bloodstains on the unsuspecting Friedrich. His white hunting suit, which hadn't gotten wet in the rain, was now stained with blood.

Friedrich swung his sword, and rainwater gathered, creating an explosion from a high-pressure water jet that interrupted the fight, forcing both men to retreat.

Only then did Angers have the energy to observe the surroundings and the situation of Uesugi Kotsugu and the others. The sky was gloomy under the torrential rain, but strangely, the scenery dozens of meters away completely disappeared into darkness, with only this small area still having light and visibility, as if someone had used a black box to isolate the entire block from the outside world.

The fact that Uesugi Yue, Caesar, and Chu Zihang were not in their original positions indicates that this was not a simple trick like an illusion, but may involve spatial rules.

"The path to godhood..." Friedrich wiped the blood from his chest. His blood was thick and black, and it bubbled when exposed to air. "For so many years, humanity has been slaying dragons on this path that has been blocked by the Black Emperor. So your failure is inevitable, because you are pathetic, lowly, and arrogant."

Even though he was the one who was injured, he still acted as if victory was assured.

"Don't you still need the little toys your master gave you?" Angers saw through his secret. "A mask that can enhance one's bloodline, is this the favor you received for betraying your friends? You're truly pathetic."

“Hilbert Jean Angers,” Friedrich said in a low voice, “I have never considered you friends, so how can I talk about betrayal? And... today you are the one who is going to die. In the name of God, I grant you peace. Be grateful.”

"Enhance your bloodline?" The rainwater in his hand slowly condensed and turned into a solid object—an ancient mask. "How could you understand? The power of the supreme is to change the rules of the world. This mask contains the concept of Odin. Compared to that, your exploration of alchemy and the power of words to the extreme is nothing more than a child changing from throwing mud to throwing stones."

He held a mask in his hand, facing the inside of the mask, which was covered with vein-like raised lines, against his face, and said softly through the mask, "Human ethics, cognition, morality, philosophy... are all based on limited sensory summaries. You are like blind people groping in the dark to find your way around the world."

He put on the mask, and the whole world seemed to stand still for a moment.

That wasn't an illusion. Despite being in time zero, the tense Ange truly felt a sense of "stagnation," or more accurately, a feeling of obstruction. In the worldview of dragons, elements are not only the medium through which natural laws are utilized, but also the basic substances that make up the world. Now, the elements that make up this world are rippling because of the arrival of a great will.

If this power were to become even stronger, it would become a royal domain.

An elemental storm is forming, making it a gloomy day for ordinary people in Tokyo. The rain is pouring down, and thunderstorms and rain clouds seem endless as they converge on the megacity. The Tokyo Metropolitan Meteorological Bureau has issued a warning, advising Tokyo residents to stay at home to avoid danger.

The torrential rains have not yet reached the point of threatening the Tokyo metropolitan area's drainage system, which cost 2400 billion yen to build. However, the meteorological bureau officials have spies planted by the Snake-Headed Eight Family, and the Japanese people are now horrified to find that two turbulent currents have appeared above their heads, which is equivalent to two typhoons colliding over the city. In nature, this situation can result in three outcomes: a weak typhoon rotating around a strong typhoon, two typhoons rotating around the same center, and two typhoons merging.

The problem now is that two turbulent elements exist simultaneously, constantly clashing and rubbing against each other, which is going to be a major headache for the Japanese.

Within the central cloud layer, local wind speeds reached hundreds of kilometers per hour or even higher, with vortices and thunderstorms occurring more frequently than imagined. Fortunately, the thick rain clouds obscured everything; otherwise, everyone in Tokyo would have experienced the same "ghostly" feeling that the Japanese mixed-race people are currently feeling, which would have triggered terrifying chaos—chaos more destructive than disaster.

Angers glanced up at the sky, taking in the thunderstorm and the forming hurricane. His anger vanished, his eyes calm. The verbal provocation, the sudden attack, the burst of blood—all were part of his carefully planned scheme. He had been waiting for this moment. When Friedrich put on his mask, he would be uncontrollably enveloped by some kind of "will" for a fleeting instant; this was information provided by Fingel.

For ordinary hybrids, this flaw is fleeting; for those with zero time, it is magnified dozens of times; and for Angers…

“I have no say in alchemy, and as for throwing stones…” Angers said in a low voice, “Want to see the strongest Time Zero?”

Friedrich's body expanded rapidly, but the speed at which the scales emerged from his skin and the speed at which his muscles rippled gradually slowed down.

The raindrops seemed to freeze in mid-air. As Angers' territory expanded, the world seemed to be paused, and even Friedrich, who was suspected of surpassing pure-blooded dragons, was no exception.

For nearly a century, Angers has never stopped honing his Word of Power. Now, his Time Zero is indeed the strongest. Lu Mingfei can surpass his speed when he activates Time Zero, but he may not be able to unleash a domain with the same acceleration factor.

He held the folding knife in his hand and "slowly" tossed it out. The blade bent under the wind pressure, and the instant it left his hand, a white, misty sonic boom formed. Sharp wind waves sliced ​​through everything around him, raindrops shattered into droplets, and his hot hair and suit shook wildly.

Everything trembled because of this final strike, but Angers' hawk-like gaze remained firmly fixed on Lin Fenglong.

Chapter 199 Fool, Ideal, Menek, Lu Mingfei

Friedrich's face was half covered by fine dragon scales, sharp bone spikes, and thick black veins. He lowered his head, his human half showing a blank expression, while his dragon half was filled with rage. His hand, now covered in black dragon scales and sharp claws, was clenched loosely at his chest, driven by his dragon instincts, but the chest was empty.

The incredibly fast "stone" had pierced through his body, the sharp alchemical blade cutting through the bullet-resistant scales, followed by his soft internal organs. Friedrich's internal organs had evolved to be covered with tiny dragon scales, but the defense of a dragon's internal organs and scales was incomparable.

Not only was the blade highly poisonous, but the gas, compressed at high speed to extremely high pressure, also exploded within his internal organs, like a thousand or ten thousand sharp blades ravaging his body. The folding knife continued forward, piercing Friedrich's body like a real cannonball, leaving a gaping hole in his back that almost severed him in half. Fragments of his body mingled together, the dark red mixture blooming into scattered "flowers" along the direction of the wind.

The effects of Angers' Time Zero were rapidly fading. Friedrich's mind finally caught up with the dragon's reaction, but it was all too late. Just as he said, humanity had indeed been throwing stones all along—faster stones, bigger stones, and exploding stones. But he, who considered himself a god, was killed by the stones of humanity, taking with him what he saw as the truth of the world.

He slowly collapsed, the intense dragonification phenomenon had stopped and was rapidly fading away.

If Friedrich still had the strength to look at Angers, he would have realized that he should no longer be called human, but rather a ferocious beast with horns and bluish-gray scales covering his body, bone spurs piercing his skin, and his face as if covered by a bronze mask.

Angers, dragging his weary steps, approached Friedrich. The rain resumed, the nascent hurricane in the sky dissipated, and the distant black fog hissed in the rain, through which faint outlines of objects could already be seen. The old town, adjacent to the bustling city, continued its vibrant life even in the downpour. Neon signs, streetlights, car headlights… all these lights mingled together in the rain, creating a dazzling, surreal spectacle.

Friedrich removed his mask; even looking up was difficult for him now. Through his blood-red vision, he looked into Angers' emotionless eyes and gave a mocking smile. "Now you can finally die peacefully of old age... Go find a lakeside cottage and wait for death to visit you."

Angers' dragon form was also fading, a state that was a heavy burden for him. Only after confirming that Friedrich had lost the ability to resist did he revert to his human form and say a few words to the guy.

“You must think you’re my obsession, right?” He wanted to pull out a cigar, light it, but the cigar box had already been shattered by the gale in Time Zero—along with his expensive, custom-made suit. He looked at Friedrich’s slightly puzzled expression and smiled faintly. “I’m still alive, indeed so that one day I can use something to commemorate my old friends, but you’re not worthy. I will kill your god, your king, and all the other nonsense. Only then will I have a use for the lakeside cabin. But I won’t wait to die. My little nuclear bomb clearly won’t stop at slaying dragons. I’m at most an avenger and destroyer, but he’s a builder. I can see that he has a much grander goal than I do—a brand new order… an order that inspires longing with just one glance.”

Friedrich paused for a moment, then laughed. "Menek was like that back then, but he died."

"Didn't you say you didn't remember? Do you still remember Menek's name?"

“Because even among a bunch of idiots, he is impressively stupid… utterly hopeless. You are all hopeless, Angers. You don’t understand how great a path I’m on. Like now, do you really think I’m going to die?” Friedrich finally couldn’t help but reveal to the idiots in his eyes the secret that he was a higher life form, capable of resurrection. “And you come here to talk to me about ideals and ambitions. You’re so stupid. Countless years from now, I will still exist, but you and your ideals will be nothing but historical garbage and dust.”

“Haha.” Angers remained calm, unaffected by Friedrich’s provocation. He pulled a folding knife from a concrete block in the ruins. “Of course I know that a rat like you would probably be pissing your pants if you were really going to die… I just came here to tell you that maybe someone like Lu Mingfei is a once-in-a-millennium special person who fell from the sky, but people like me will always appear among humans. There are plenty of them. As long as you exist, someone will always stand up.”

"Can……"

Before Friedrich could say anything more, a folding knife had already plunged into his head, and the deadly poison invaded his nervous system, instantly killing the body's life force.

……

Odin looked up and saw someone looking down at him from the clouds.

During the standoff, Lu Mingfei kept trying to break through that space, while Odin kept trying to impact Lu Mingfei's will. The effect of that alchemy was to immerse one in the past. No matter how powerful a creature is, as long as it is still trapped in the dimension of time, it will always have a time when it is weak. At that time, killing it is as easy as killing an ant.

However, Lu Mingfei is not Genjiro. Lu Mingfei's Grand rank is even slightly higher than Odin's. Even if Odin personally uses alchemy, without being able to utilize the sound of the clapper, it can only have a slight effect on Lu Mingfei, such as imprinting a certain image or sentence in his mind.

However, the feedback he received was always the same: the image of being looked down upon. The young Lu Mingfei stood on a mountain peak that soared into the clouds, casting a faint, condescending gaze through the mist. No matter what he did, he could not shake the other party in the slightest.

"Why did you look at me like that?" Odin asked.

The sound of sharp cutting could be heard from the stairwell. After discovering that the stairwell had collapsed, the Japanese finally brought in heavy machinery.

"What?" Lu Mingfei frowned.

“In that illusion, when you look down, you can see everything that terrifies, confuses, and angers you… Even I couldn’t remain calm when I was trapped in the abyss.” Odin seemed less concerned about Lu Mingfei’s psychological state than about the Japanese half-blood, Genjiro, or this laboratory that cultivated Deadpools. “Why?”

Lu Mingfei realized that Odin was already considering retreating, so he simply stopped putting effort into alchemy. His alchemy skills couldn't be fully utilized in the bustling city anyway, which was one of Odin's calculations.

“I have killed fear, I have reclaimed anger,” Lu Mingfei said slowly, lifting Yuan Zhisheng by the collar to meet his gaze. “Nothing can confuse me anymore.”

The surging spiritual energy around them grew increasingly active; if the royal domain had been a calm surface, it had now become a raging torrent. In the world of dragons, creatures of higher bloodlines exert spiritual pressure on those of lower bloodlines through eye contact—essentially a form of spiritual invasion. Lu Mingfei was very familiar with this aggressive way of using power.

His eyes blazed with an unprecedented light, and at the same time, the unconscious Genji slowly opened his eyes, his expression filled with confusion and fear. Golden flames burned in his eyes, so intense that they almost became tangible flames.

In the deepest part of that dream, Genji was enveloped by an almost endless stream of memories and emotions. He couldn't comprehend them, only feeling the tidal wave of pain—endless pain—with his remaining consciousness.

His consciousness began to disintegrate...

"Wake up."

After an unknown amount of time, a ripple appeared in the blank space, from which the first consciousness was born, and Yuan Zhisheng suddenly awoke.

He was soaked in sweat, and everything in his vision was blurred.

Chapter 200

Odin smiled slightly at the increasingly focused, bewildered look in the eyes of the nascent soul. "You are the first human to emerge unscathed from the illusion of the mortal realm in thousands of years... Although it's hard to say you truly emerged unscathed, you've seen it yourself, haven't you? The status of the person beside you is far beyond that of dragons. Perhaps, in his presence, dragons and humans are the weaker ones who should cooperate."

Lu Mingfei's eyes narrowed, and a section of the broken, thick steel frame beside him instantly accelerated to supersonic speed.

The force it bore came from the King of Bronze and Fire. When it shot out, it was a jet of scorching metal. However, it still could not pass through the barrier of space. The material at the tip of the jet was compressed and spread outwards, blooming along the transparent wall. The center was a bright spot of light, and the color gradually dimmed towards the end of the "petals". The outermost edge was solidified black iron filings.

Faced with this deadly flower, Odin simply smiled and turned away.

Genjiro didn't understand Odin's words at all. He was still immersed in despair. In that long period of time, the curse of the White King, the nightmare of his brother being a demon, and the humiliation of his family were just a drop in the ocean. Even the originally beautiful life of seclusion in France seemed pale and faded.

"Why?" He frowned.

What puzzled him was that the resolve he had forged in the face of the war between his family and the demons now seemed somewhat absurd and empty. Compared to his identity as the young master of the Snake Clan, he had always preferred to be the head of the Executive Bureau, or rather, a demon slayer. A demon slayer only needed to keep swinging his sword, because the darkness was like mud, and demons and monsters came from all directions.

But his current feeling is that concentrating his determination on wielding the sword seems to be an oversimplification of the world. Forging oneself into a sword won't accomplish certain things. Often, you don't have a specific target to wield the sword against. The enemy might be invisible, it might be the rejection of the entire world, or it might be yourself. At that time, all you can do is move forward.

Cultivation is a journey, not a training ground for wielding a sword. Even if you wield your sword ten thousand times, you will remain stuck in the same place. More often than not, you should be on various paths, some difficult and some easy. Sometimes there is no way forward, which seems like a dead end. Sometimes the road ahead stretches to the horizon and seems endless. It may be meaningless, boring, or even a long way off... You only have one choice, which is not to give up.

Yuan Zhisheng also saw the look Lu Mingfei cast at him, but he was so engrossed in it that he saw more than Odin did.

Much later, after you've climbed over a mountain peak, looking back, all the mountains seem small, and those seemingly long journeys are now just winding paths among mounds of earth. You suddenly remember, oh, I almost died on that mound of earth, and that's all I feel... That's how Lu Mingfei feels about the past.

Lu Mingfei did not answer Yuan Zhisheng. In his opinion, the guy was just frightened by Odin's alchemy.

This is what Lu Mingfei is worried about. Odin's power does not lie in his own strength, but in the long years he has been lurking in human society. It is not surprising that a "god" who can manipulate human minds like clay, mixed among humans, has even established a dark kingdom.

It's unclear whether the Secret Society's families can find any clues. As a behemoth also rooted in human society, the Secret Society's advantage lies in its numerous families. Like Odin's organization, it's a large tree with many roots, and there will always be some minor details that are related to Odin's activities.

The worst-case scenario is that the Mystic families have also been infiltrated by Odin and turned into sieves.

But thinking of the arrogant, chaste, and self-proclaimed noble Frost, he still harbored a sliver of hope for a powerful family like the Gattuso. Even enemies who esteemed pride and stubbornness could be exploited and trusted.

"We're leaving; the plans have changed," Lu Mingfei said calmly.

Before Yuan Zhisheng could react, Lu Mingfei pressed down on his shoulder, and a bio-field enveloped him. He saw rocks shatter, steel twist, and layers of geological structures flashing before his eyes, until finally he saw the outside light and dark rain clouds.

The Sheqi Bajia engineering team, who were drilling underground, suddenly found that all their machines had stopped working amidst a violent earthquake. As Lu Mingfei passed by, he casually destroyed some random parts and control circuits of these machines.

"Stop work! Stop work!" the foreman shouted. "A tunnel leading directly to the surface has been detected. We're going to the surface!"

"Where did this passage come from?" The technical director asked, looking disheveled and covered in machine oil. "Our machine is broken!"

"I don't know, the patriarch ordered us to assemble on the ground."

……

Leaning against the ruins beside Angers, lay unconscious Uesugi Yue, Caesar, and Chu Zihang. He suddenly looked up at the sky; before someone even arrived, the domain of Words of Power and Discipline had already descended.

The rain clouds were dissipating, and the rain had lessened considerably. First, a black dot appeared on the horizon, and then a strong wind quickly brought it down.

Amidst the howling wind, Lu Mingfei led Yuan Zhisheng, saying, "I encountered a spiritual entity that is escaping. Do you recognize it?"

Lu Mingfei approached Angers and slapped a phantom of flame into his body. Angers' blood-producing mechanism was forcibly activated, and the fatigue and pain left from the triple blood explosion and the mental exhaustion required to reach zero time quickly subsided. But he was more concerned about the spiritual entity Lu Mingfei mentioned. "If I'm not mistaken, it's probably my 'old friend,' and its 'corpse' is right there."

Following Angers's directions, Lu Mingfei found the lifeless corpse and placed the struggling spirit inside.

Friedrich suddenly opened his eyes, his mouth gaping open to a terrifying degree, letting out a hoarse and desperate howl. His body grew rapidly, with complex nerves, blood vessels, and muscle tissues clinging to his bones, their growth trajectory extending in all directions like a tree. His ribs pierced the hard asphalt ground, supporting his broken upper body, while his neck, unsupported by the displaced bones, left his head hanging like a tattered lantern in the middle of a bone cage, his mouth constantly howling.

Finally, his limbs extended along the ground, climbing up the surrounding buildings. His ribs went deep into the ground to form roots. On his body, a "trunk" composed of bones, muscles, and thick blood vessels grew upwards to a height of eight or nine meters. His heart, wrapped in dragon scales, was suspended two meters above the ground, beating at an extremely fast frequency.

"Save...Save..."

Friedrich's lungs, vocal cords, and oral cavity had long since undergone abnormalities, and at this moment he finally managed to produce simple, tangible sounds with great difficulty.

I'll start making up for missed updates tomorrow.

My symptoms are much better today. The doctor said I don't need to continue the IV drip; I can just take oral medication from now on.