Low power. He wiped sweat from his brow, feeling that the times had changed too fast. "This is not even as much as the reactor powering our current castle, and it is not one tenth of that dragon's output either. What is there to be surprised about?" Bella said casually.
Under the influence of the Magic Staff, Lilith felt as if she had merged with the Crystal. Her awareness rose to another level, letting her observe things she had never seen before. She saw a vague gray world woven from black and white light and darkness, whose true nature she could not understand.
Why she did this in the first place was unclear, perhaps just intuition. She felt that she could do it, so she did. Then she saw the remaining traces of light and darkness, not just one or two, nor a single area.
The entire city below, and even every person in it, was imprinted with light. Every single one was evidence, carrying a strange sensation. Lilith continued to commune with the Magic Staff, drawing a strand of light into herself, and scenes from the past unfolded before her eyes.
As the light flowed, information extracted from it played back like reversed footage, continuously tracing further into the past. Everything seemed normal until a dazzling golden glow appeared.
Golden flames surged outward like a tide, then rapidly converged back into the center, forming a brilliant pillar of gold. Before that moment, the land had looked like the end of the world, with shattered ruins, ravines everywhere, even mountains smashed into fragments of Shard. Within the flood of light, everything merged and restored as if time itself had reversed.
Most shocking of all, civilians who had completely died, even reduced to ashes, were revived within that torrent of light. At that moment, Lilith's Magic Staff reacted, indicating that this record was connected to the original body, namely Belial. Further back, a giant knight leading countless heroic spirits was crushed like trash, while the half bodied Profaned Angel fled in panic into a Abyss Rift.
She continued tracing back with a heavy gaze as the light grew ever brighter. In the end, overwhelming radiance gathered into a blazing sun. It was divine Holy Light at its peak, pure white intertwined with Gold, and a blood red adorned Great Dragon.
With wings spread and a divine wheel manifested, it stood in the air like a god. The image cut off there, and nothing further could be traced, but Lilith memorized everything she saw.
She flew back to the floating city and spoke calmly. "I have the images. Bella, prepare the equipment and let us watch them together." "So fast? How did you do that. And why does your face look strange?" Bella asked, noticing her slightly stiff expression, one she had not seen since Belial left.
That look usually appeared whenever that dragon revealed something bizarre and beyond imagination. A strange feeling rose in Bella's heart that Lilith had seen something serious again. When the screen was set up and the images from Lilith's mind were replayed, both Safas and Bella stared intently.
When they saw time reversing and tens of thousands of people revived, their expressions became just as stiff. The old man's jaw nearly dropped. "What is this? Did that dragon suddenly master time technology. No wonder we could not detect any traces. The entire city itself was reset." "It might not be true time reversal," Safas said. "It could be some kind of Authority, or a restoration that only looks like time reversal."
"Even so, this is terrifying. Repairing everything over hundreds of miles and reshaping hundreds of thousands of souls and bodies. That dragon still exceeds my imagination." He had lived a long time and read countless records, and he could see truths beneath the surface. Yet his expression grew more severe, especially after seeing both Augustus and Elfido appear together.
"What were those two aiming for, to appear there together. There is no way the Lord would personally go provoke that dragon." "And that old thing actually used the power of the Abyss again, yet the people below were unharmed. Can that dragon even remove Abyss contamination?"
The image continued until the golden radiance appeared. Safas's eyes widened as he watched without blinking. That was unmistakably the true goddess Dawn acting directly, otherwise such pure and vast Holy Light would be impossible, followed by the holy white Great Dragon emerging from the light.
He froze again. What was that. It was not any high level Dragonkin he knew, and it was incredibly powerful. If his senses were correct, this area had been forcibly cut out of Augustus's domain.
This was not something raw power alone could achieve. It permanently altered the world's rules, like creating a place where apples would always fall upward. Such an effect would remain forever unless the rules were changed again or the world itself was destroyed.
"What is that dragon?" Bella asked, voicing what both of them were thinking. Lilith shrugged and replied calmly. "It is that Black Dragon. My Magic Staff reacted."
"I think my external audio receiver just malfunctioned. Can you say that again?" Bella blinked and checked past footage, feeling it was more likely she had misheard. Safas reacted similarly, since he had seen that Black Dragon's true form before.
Comparing that ferocious, world destroying image to this holy presence was absurd. The pure Holy Light and sacred appearance were the complete opposite. You could say it was a god wearing a skin and he would believe it.
They found it hard to accept that such a being could change so fundamentally in such a short time. Previously, that dragon shattered common sense within a single domain, not by casually jumping across domains like this. Yet looking at Lilith's expression, they began to accept the possibility that the pure white holy dragon might truly be Belial.
"Old man, do you think BaHammut might have pulled something sneaky back then?" "Although I personally saw where the other half of the Dragon God soul was, what you say does make some sense," he replied.
After all, they were dealing with a god. It was not impossible that the other half of the Dragon God soul had been used as bait. Then he shook his head internally, dismissing the thought. "I will never mistake that radiance. That is the power of the Holy Sword, the power of the former Chosen Hero."
"And the form that Black Dragon displayed was not just borrowing that power. It was more like pushing its very existence to another level." As a former companion of the Chosen Hero, Safas could never misidentify that light. Even so, if the Holy Sword had this kind of power, things back then would never have ended the way they did.
"Lilith, can your Magic Staff still see… huh? What's wrong with you?!"
Bella turned her head and got no reply, then saw Lilith with her eyes closed, the Magic Staff in her hand shining with deep blue light. Her whole body carried the glow that appeared when Magic was active. She showed no response to the outside at all, and when Bella rushed over and shook her shoulder, she was like a doll, silent and unmoving, with only her breathing proving she was alive.
A layer of pure white light appeared, like a protective shell that rejected anything coming close. Bella scanned it while trying to analyze what kind of energy it was. At the same time, her arm began to shift shape, sparks gathering as she prepared to smash through the light and drag Lilith out.
"Don't, absolutely don't touch it!"
Safas hurriedly stopped Bella. "Don't be reckless yet. Lilith is fine for now. I recognize this kind of light."
"You recognize it? So what?" Bella snapped back. "At a time like this, shouldn't we make sure she's safe first? What if you're wrong, or something happens to her?"
"Because this light once appeared on me," Safas said. "I personally received it. And back then, the one who bathed in it with me was the Chosen Hero."
"…What?"
Chosen Hero? After waking up and traveling across The Continent with Lilith, Bella had gathered plenty of related information. When the Lord collected records of past Evil God followers or incidents involving invasions from Abyss, this term appeared often.
Chosen by destiny, protected by the gods, wielding the Holy Sword to purge calamities, every Chosen Hero had been a truly great figure. The radiance they bathed in was the Holy Light of the Church of Holy Light and the God of Light. Besides the Chosen Hero themselves, only members qualified to fight alongside them from the Hero Party could share such light.
"Fine, I'll assume you're telling the truth," Bella said. "But what does this have to do with Lilith? The Chosen Hero hasn't appeared for how many years now?"
"And she doesn't even know any Chosen Hero. Why would that light suddenly choose her?"
Safas wiped sweat from his temple. It was a fair question, and one he wanted answered himself. Something felt off, since Chloe had said the next one was still some time away. Why would his disciple start early?
"I don't really understand it either," he said. "But that god is absolutely a good one. I can vouch for that with my own past."
"At least Lilith will be fine," he added. "And you didn't notice, but she accepted it willingly. Otherwise, she would have left a safeguard."