Timeless Prominence

Rein entered a tea house named Divine Aroma within the Hall of Heroes Plaza, found his seat, and ordered the lowest priced standard tea-liquor mix. The attendant’s nose twitched with disapproval as if smelling the lowliness of his status, but what could Rein do? He was but an inner advancer.

Then, he closed his eyes and opened his heart.

He entered a white space again that rapidly gained color as a paintbrush began filling in the whole scene with vivid shapes of a memory.

He was naturally in Gent’s body again, and before ‘him’ stood a hundred feet tall flat-topped pyramid constructed from gray stone slabs, with a dusk sun dropping down behind the pyramid.

‘He’ turned around and faced a crowd of humanoids with individually unique draconic horns and scaly features visible across their bodies such as the face and neck.

“Old man Gent,” growled a male dragon. “Why do you block our path?”

“Have you no shame?!” ‘He’ roared with a force that vibrated the very flesh of the dragons before him. “To attack while one gives birth?”

“Old man of a past age,” the very same male dragon refocused his eyes. “This is no longer the Age of the Gods. The human races have been growing stronger. She is the dragonknight that has killed countless of our people. Yet, here you stand, blocking our path! Have you no fear of the first ancestor?!”

“And you believe she has no defenses?” Gent stood his ground, staunchly placing himself between the flat-topped pyramid and the draconic assault force. “You all know the Allfather is here. Do you wish for our dragon mothers to face the same reprisal?!”

“You!” ‘He’ pointed a claw finger at the male dragon. “Stormsurge, was it? Your wife is pregnant, is she not?”

“Old fool!” spat Stormsurge. “Have you grown senile to believe the tales of this… Allfather killing without moving a single finger? Nothing but words spread by the human races to intimidate us. Nothing but exaggeration for his defeated foes to save face!”

“I have made my choice,” Gent stoically hovered before the crowd of dragons-in-human-form. “The situation must not be allowed to escalate. You may attack after the child is born. You are not allowed to attack the newborn.”

Surprisingly, the many dragons only glared at ‘him’, and made no attempts to go past ‘him’.

After a few hundred heartbeats, the faint wail of a child was heard, and soon, a stone door opened as a short and stocky human form leisurely approached with a humongous fifteen feet long and two feet base thick skyward lance in hand.

The failing light was enough to illuminate her features, and Rein’s heart shook after recognizing her. She was that stout and thick figure with hair like a lion’s beautiful dark brown mane within the echoes of the fallen gods vision! He had seen her when he first awakened his origin ability!

A secondary examination, and Rein could see the resplendent blackish-purple bead on her forehead. She was dressed in a clear and shining silvery plate armor with zero inscriptions. That made sense, Rein thought. Inscriptions were supposedly created by Xune. This must be the scene of Xune’s birth, he concluded!

“Will you stand aside now?” Stormsurge’s low voice hummed with repressed dissatisfaction.

“My counsel is for us to return to the dragon realm. Do not say that I did not warn you young reckless fools.” ‘He’ stood to the side with a nod despite disagreeing with the choice of these dragons before him.

“Dragonknight Zelli,” Stormsurge ignored Gent’s warning as he narrowed his eyes at his target. “You have just given birth. Should you not be fleeing like a dog with its tail between its legs?”

“Hah!” Zelli had a deep female laugh compared to those of Rein’s world. Yet, it very much carried a melodic beauty to it. “We dwarves have hardy bodies. If you wish for a fight, then we will have a fight!”

“Now, come!” She spun her lance provocatively that caused the air it swung through to thrum with pressure, before pointing its tip at Stormsurge’s head.

“Diamondscale,” Stormsurge ordered and a male dragon stepped forth and hooked his fingers.

“I am the strongest of flesh in my generation,” he stated with bravado.

“Oh?” Zelli only had a glint in her eyes. “I will allow you a free strike.” Her body turned gray into stone!

“The famous stone-form of the dwarves…” Diamondscale muttered. “But you should not be arrogant as to think you can take a strike from my claws!”

Diamondscale physically morphed into his draconic form, a short-lengthed glittering-scaled serpent-like body with arms and legs, the size of a  small hill.

He circled around Zelli like a tornado before lashing out with a slashing claw. A deep and guttural howl echoed in ‘his’ ears and Rein saw that the Dragonknight Zelli continued hovering in the air unmoved. Instead, the gap between the claws on the dragon Diamondscale dripped blood that burned the vegetation below!

“My turn.” That was all Dragonknight Zelli said as she dashed in a straight line through the air at Diamondscale. The dragon opened his mouth wide and spat out a torrent of fire, but Zelli was unbothered and barely broke her pace, splitting the torrent with the very tip of her lance.

Her form visibly shrunk into the size of a peanut as her skin was wrapped within a blackish-purple shell. Then she vanished right as Stormsurge snapped at her.

Many eyes flickered around attempting to find the location of Dragonknight Zelli, only to be drawn back to a screaming Diamondscale.

Diamondscale seemed to have lost control of his magic and fell onto the ground with a loud boom, his serpent form writhing in agony.

Rein’s heart beat like a drum as he saw Diamondscale’s body begin spurting blood as an invisible lance punctured holes in all parts of his body. 

Then the serpent form was split in half along its length, and the peanut-sized Zelli, her stone-form now caked in crimson reappeared from the mangled internal flesh of Diamondscale.

“The toughness of dragons? Only so-so,” so stated Zelli nonchalantly as crimson blood dripped off her floating stone feet.

“Attack! As discussed!” Stormsurge ordered with anger.

Five figures behind him flashed to his front and transformed into the dragon forms.

Within a single heartbeat, the five spat torrents of fire at Dragonknight Zelli. Zelli responded by teleporting right next to a dragon and a single extension of her lance into the head sent that dragon falling to the ground, dead.

“All!” Stormsurge gestured, sending the remaining fifteen dragons behind him forward, all spitting fire to transform the whole area in a blazing inferno.

Rein observed as he saw that Zelli, now bathed in such intense heat, found her stone form a white glow. The dragons were attempting to melt her into a puddle! A few more dragons fell, but soon, Zelli could no longer remain in her stone form.

Stormsurge breathed a sigh of relief as he observed stone Zelli becoming nothing but a soft glowing red fluid that dropped onto the cold hard ground, a puddle that would be weathered by future storms.

And yet, as he turned his head triumphantly towards Gent wishing to mock the old dragon for his earlier warning, that  fluid suddenly regained the shape of Zelli’s body and a magma lance elongated and pierced Stormsurge’s skull in one strike!

“You are all blessed to witness the dwarves’ growth,” sounded Zelli’s deep and melodious voice. “This is the magma form.” Then she teleported again as her molten body was wrapped in a blackish-purple shell again. Another dragon fell to the ground with multiple holes in their skull.

Rein discovered that he, as Gent, could no longer sit still. ‘He’ opened his mouth and released a continuous mind-numbing roar.

Dragonknight Zelli attempted to teleport towards him, yet she visibly struggled to form the blackish-purple shell around her body. Every single wave of Gent’s roaring sound also sent sparks repeatedly dancing across her magma form.

Finally, she retreated to stand before the flat-topped pyramid as her magma form dissipated.

Gent ceased his actions as well.

“The legendary ‘Dragon’s Divine Lightning Roar’. You must be Gent.” She simply greeted with hooked fingers and a tilt of the head. “The human ancestor spoke of you.”

“I will now be leaving with my younglings and my fallen,” ‘He’ stated and gestured for the survivors to retrieve their fallen brethren.

“I think not. These are our spoils of war!” A different voice entered the fray. Rein saw a new figure coming out of the pyramid. A handsome man of gold and silver shoulder-length hair that slightly flowed in the wind like a divinity. His body was also wrapped in a gold and silverr-white robe.

“Xane.”

“The legendary Gent.”

“Husband,” Zelli looked up lovingly at the significantly taller man that to Rein’s eyes seemed closer to modern humans. “Be careful.”

“Just a charlatan,” commented a dragon as she suddenly darted forward to attack the Allfather.

Rein observed as this other dragon performed the form-dancing methods of the dragons. She shifted from full dragon to half to human form repeatedly, striking hard in dragon form using the  weight of a dragon’s weight, while using much more deft and precise skills in human form.

Yet, none of her attacks struck as the Allfather flickered repeatedly in the same spot as if he did not even have to move a single step to dodge her attacks.

All of a sudden, the female dragon crashed down onto the ground limp, shaking the firmament.

“I will be leaving with my younglings and the fallen,” Gent repeated, unswayed. At the same time, Rein, within the dragon’s body, saw the world around slow as the dragon activated a lightning art that wrapped around ‘his’ whole body.

“Forgive me for this discourtesy,” the Allfather tilted his head.

Gent barely reacted in time as the Allfather dashed right beside him and swung down with a sleek sword in just a twitch of the eyelid! ‘He’ metamorphosed only his arm into an earth brown scaled claw that blocked the sword, which caused a scratch mark on his scales.

If not for standing from Gent’s viewpoint, Rein would see nothing but a flicker.

In an instant, the Allfather had returned to his original position prior to the attack.

“You’re fast,” commented Gent. “Swift beyond belief.”

The Allfather only hooked his fingers as an acknowledgement.

“We will be leaving with our fallen,” Gent stated once again. The husband and wife finally agreed with a nod and turned to reenter the flat-topped pyramid.

“The child’s name?” Gent was curious.

“Xune!” intoned the Allfather as he momentarily turned his head back to meet eyes with Gent.

The scene faded as the dragons collected their fallen brethren.

Rein found himself back in the tea house, his mind filled with wonder. Master Yirn was right-- he could not imitate the methods of the previous user that shared his echo of the fallen gods, that female dwarf named Zelli. He had no such thing as stone or magma form, and he wasn’t sure if he could turn his body into the size of a peanut either.

He left the tea house to the relief of the attendant. Most troublesome were customers who bought cheap beverages and stayed half a day within the tea house. Rein had only come to find a safe place to view the vision, which was over in a single heartbeat in real world time.

As Rein returned to the Hall of Heroes, he could not help but feel that the situation to be absurd. Somehow, the previous user of his origin ability, Dragonknight Zelli, had once fought Gent, whose will passed down the draconic metamorphose bead to him. And now, here he was, standing before the Hall of Heroes supposedly led by the Allfather and Xune!

Rein soon found himself back in his quarters. It was no longer a bland carved-out cave-- he had decidedly spent a small amount of the contribution points he had earned on a selection of furs, sourced from unknown demon beasts. His fingers knew they were of good quality to soften his cave bed.

He crossed his legs to meditate and refocus his mind. He placed the vision he had seen today to the back of his mind. To Rein, the events within these visions weren’t all that important. In his eyes, these past events were just the lingering memories of a dead dragon. His main interest in them was to draw inspiration on his own advancer arts, for his personal strength and goals. The more important task right now was to finalize his plans for Rekcen of the Larne Clan.

Rein had already come up with a plan a few days prior, but as his half-senior Chenhr taught him, he needed to allow a plan to stew for some time such that it can be evaluated and stand up to scrutiny across multiple days if not weeks.

That was proven correct. Initially, Rein had thought of simply bypassing any defense by finding a high vantage point and teleporting directly into Rekcen’s room and mixing the beastkin core sand into the recovering scion’s medicine.

Rein’s origin ability was very much unique in the sense that it could bypass many defenses. After all, two points in space are connected through a chaotic dimension that none could control. All spatial-aligned advancers could do this, but Rein could activate such spatial magics with record speed due to his origin ability.

Influential clans might set up much more elaborate formations such that an advancer might teleport directly into a trap if careless, but House Larne? Rein was confident that House Larne did not have the resources for such traps.

With an extra few days, Rein soon recognized his own reckless nature, and the flaw within his original plan.

He placed himself in House Larne’s shoes-- if Rekcen had his medicine contaminated, who would be most suspicious? Potential competitors of House Larne, and also Rein! Then, the next question might be, how could the young man, Rein, contaminate Rekcen’s medicine without triggering any traps in the House Larne’s lands? The answer would be-- an origin ability!

Rein would be truly fucked if he had recklessly carried out that original plan, even if House Larne could not fully prove their hypothesis.

Thus, Rein now revised his plan. He needed to lay a trail of breadcrumbs to decrease House Larne’s confidence in their guesses.

There were quite a few things in his favor. One, no one knew he had beastkin cores. Thus, if he grinded all of them down into sand and sent it all elsewhere… it would seem very odd for any to accuse him as the source of contamination.

Secondly, everyone in the Green Trout City knew of House Larne’s location due to their status in the city.

Thirdly, Rein now owned a ‘Shifting Mask’ from Baejenh, and could disguise himself far better than before. He had originally planned to buy a set of random clothing to obscure his identity. His original appearance close to House Larne would trigger alarm bells, of which he was certain.

He had long identified that it was the Tehr Medicinal House sending medicine to House Larne-- an easy task observing the comings and goings to House Larne’s residence.

Rein sighed, hoping that what he was about to do would not cause too much collateral damage. His new plan? Contaminate the whole Tehr Medicinal House and also the medicine within Rekcen’s residence.

Some Green Trout citizens might catch stray damage, but Rein reasoned that most if not all should come out unharmed, unlike Rekcen who was under the dire situation of needing to regrow a whole arm.

He also planned to poison Rekcen first, before contaminating the Tehr Medicinal House. That way, House Larne’s investigation would prevent the contaminated medicine from spreading.

This was not all-- Rein also planned to slightly contaminate all the medicinal houses in Green Trout City. He did not wish for Tehr Medicinal House to go out of business because of his actions. If all medicinal houses were to at least be somewhat contaminated, the Tehr Medicinal House would not be unjustly shut down. This would also give the impression that Rekcen might not be the primary target.

One might consider this a vile plan, but in Rein’s mind that was the only way for him to avoid suspicion.

As preparation, he began grinding down all the remaining beastkin cores that Master Yirn had given him with the pestle and mortar. Once done, he completely shattered the pestle and mortar into stones with his enhanced physical body. The beastkin core sand? He stored that in a few bamboo containers originally meant for carrying water.

He would execute the plan in a few days.

“Rein, my celest!” Suey’s voice called out at the entrance to his cave, and Rein activated the inscriptions with his identity wood slab.

His eyes widened at the sight of the vixen’s attire. Despite the scar across her cheek, she still had an enchanting  beauty with light makeup-- her lips had a light tinge of red as if she had just washed her face with cool lake water.

What shocked Rein was the lack of clothing.The woman wore but lingerie under the thin see-through gray Hall of Heroes wrap robes. A harness had straps wrapping around her healthy olive thighs and her narrow waist, with her crotch completely exposed! Her revealed breasts that would fill Rein’s hands to the brim were only supported by an open-cup red lace. She also wore a set of red heels certainly not suitable for advancer combat, which accentuated her toned calves up to her flat stomach.

In comparison, her twin sister, Jory, was dressed appropriately and observed her older twin’s depraved actions expressionlessly.

Suey, the lady-- no this was no lady. The minx began strutting left and right before Rein, her barely supported  tits jiggling obscenely with every single step.

Rein’s upbringing might have already corrupted him, but the sight of Suey’s debauchery ignited a strong sadistic nature in his heart that he never knew even existed until this day.

He faintly recalled his determination to teach this woman the importance of fearing a man such as him, and with a yank of the arm, pulled the near-naked woman into his embrace.

Rein traced his fingers teasingly up Suey’s spine as the woman whimpered frustratingly into his neck. That caused him to compulsively jerk the woman’s body into a tantalizing arch by forcefully tugging her raven hair with his right hand backwards. His left hand then brutishly ran across her front, firmly compressing her tits that his hand could barely encompass. Suey gasped with a hazy wanton face as he dragged his fingers down across her ribcage and discovered the dripping honey between her legs.

“You crazy woman. Is this what you want? Hmm?” Rein held himself together, rather perturbed that Suey seemed to be reveling in the situation. He once again found himself wondering what this minx wanted-- she had already joined their team and that meant that their members would give her some assistance resisting Supreme Guihnes that the twins had rejected!

“Yesss,” Suey hissed seductively and bit her lips, looking at Rein with doll-eyes.

“Twelve hells.” Rein rejected the idea that this woman was throwing herself at him without a catch. He had no desire to be dragged into hidden trouble!

“Very well!” Rein undid the sash tying the Hall of Heroes robes to her body. Granted, the thin robe was partially see-through anyway, but now, the minx was truly revealed in all her glory.

“Let’s head out to the mountains behind,” Rein said as if this was all but a normal day. “I need to find a location with a strong wood element for my advancer art.”

Suey finally felt some embarrassment and pressed one arm across her breasts while another hand covered her crotch.

“No covering up. Or you had better leave.” Rein could not believe his own words. He was very much imitating some of the debaucherous scenes he had seen as an aspiring merchant.

Suey licked her lips in determination and slightly lowered her arm covering her breasts. Now, her right arm wrapped around her torso below her breasts, further accentuating those quivering pillows. Then she wrapped her left arm around Rein’s waist and looked upwards to tell Rein that she was ready.

Rein himself wrapped his right arm around her shoulders and his right arm hung down, gripping her right breast.

Suey could barely maintain her balance-- she tottered against Rein as she was led up the sloping tunnel towards the mountains!

As for her younger twin sister? Jory was but a silent shadow that followed behind.