Chapter 1480: Chapter 1480

"My god, who is it? It's not even light yet... The Saint of the Sage?"

In a cave carved into the wall of the Evergreen Forest, the great dragon Níðhöggr, roused from its slumber, still recognized Jenkins. It rose to its feet, but upon seeing who it was, the red dragon flopped back down with a lazy air, speaking to him through narrowed eyes.

"What brings you here so early? If memory serves, you're not supposed to be in Nolan right now."

"I've come to ask you something. And, of course, you haven't seen me today."

"I haven't seen a soul this morning."

The dragon rumbled with amusement.

"Good. I want to ask you about another dragon. Have you heard of one named Anathasia? No, not a red dragon—a silver one."

He asked, a note of apprehension in his voice.

"That name is quite common," the dragon mused. "Back in my homeland, I knew at least ten dragons by that name. It's as common as Anna, Mary, or Sophie is to your kind."

"She looks something ."

As he spoke, Jenkins used Psychography, forming a shimmering image of the beautiful silver dragon in the air with motes of ice.

The red dragon let out a surprisingly human-like sound of appreciation, even letting out a low whistle.

"A truly beautiful silver dragon. As stunning as the ancient statue in my homeland... wait a minute, she looks exactly like that statue."

Jenkins couldn't distinguish dragons by their faces or bodies. During his recent battle against the great dragons, all those of the same color had looked identical to him. Dragons, however, could easily tell one another apart. It seemed the red dragon before him recognized this particular silver dragon.

"Did you see her in a book somewhere? Ah, yes. Anathasia the silver dragon. A true legend. They say she single-handedly defeated most of her own kind during her time. Even now, her name is legendary. I'm not sure if you can grasp the scale of it, but in draconic culture, she is a myth made real."

"Is she still alive?"

The tale of The Dragon Slayer was set before the Tenth Epoch. Even without knowing the exact length of an epoch, a rough estimate placed the story nearly twenty thousand years in the past. Jenkins knew the dragons of this world were long-lived, much like the dragons of legend, but he wasn't sure if even they could survive for twenty millennia.

"Yes, she's still alive. She discovered a way to transcend the natural lifespan of her kind, making her one of the few surviving ancient dragons. But Anathasia left our world long ago. Rumor has it she was spotted in the Astral Plane sometime during the Seventeenth Epoch."

The red dragon's words were a stark reminder that even great dragons were not immortal. Beneath the gods, all creatures were mortal.

"And do you know if she had a human wife?"

"Yes, that story is quite well-known. In fact, it's the very reason Anathasia fought most of her kin back in her day. And if you're wondering whether the human is still alive... the answer is yes. But not as a human. You understand, I'm sure—mortals have their limits. The tale of Anathasia and her human wife is famous in my homeland, a story as timeless as one of your own heroic epics."

The red dragon let out a cavernous yawn, a gesture that was rather intimidating to the "minuscule" Jenkins.

"So, are you aware that this silver dragon is the origin of the human Dragon Knight families?"

"Of course. Why else do you think I'm so courteous to that human girl, the one named Knight? You don't really think dragons enjoy being used as mounts, do you?"

The red dragon snorted, sending two plumes of white smoke billowing from its massive nostrils.

Jenkins thought to himself. He was relieved to hear they were still alive, but that relief was tinged with anxiety about what his final story would hold. The most update n0vels are published on NoveI-Fire.ɴet

Back in his bedroom at the church in Black Town, a faint light was already filtering through the curtains. It was five in the morning. Dawn was near.

"Well, no matter. I have to face it sooner or later."

Jenkins sat up in bed, steeling himself, and opened the final tale. Its title was "The Madman and the Fool."

A wave of drowsiness washed over him, his consciousness fading to a blur. When he came to, he was no longer in the remote little town. Instead, he stood amidst the ruins of a battlefield, under a sky choked with gloom.

This might once have been a majestic city, its skyline defined by spectacular stone structures. Now, only shattered walls and rubble remained. The smoke of battle hung thick and heavy over the ruins, where the corpses of strange creatures were piled high. The cratered ground was slick with a miasma of sewage and blood.

A light rain drifted down. He looked up, but saw neither sun nor clouds. Instead, a terrifying sight dominated the heavens: a colossal black halo was embedded in the sky, like a ring of burning black fire from which an endless torrent of darkness rained down upon the earth. From the distance, he could faintly make out a clamor of shouts and wails—likely the last survivors of the war, caught in their final death throes.

The story was supposed to be an anti-war fairytale, a conversation between a madman and a fool, the lone survivors of a brutally inhumane war. This was certainly the battlefield, but judging by the atmosphere and the surrounding spiritual auras, this was far more than a simple conflict.

From Jenkins's perspective, the very walls of space seemed to have fractured from the force of the recent battle. The residual spirit clinging to the corpses was more potent than that of most living Enchanters he had ever met. The ambient spirit was bizarre; under the radiation of the giant black halo in the sky, every aura was uniformly shifting to a deep, ominous black.

To him, the world's decay mirrored the fireless apocalypse he had witnessed within the Titan's consciousness during their final battle. The material world itself was being corrupted, twisted into something unnatural—this must be what the end of an epoch looked like. This was a world on the verge of its final doom. The Savior had failed, without a doubt. A true, world-ending cataclysm was imminent. And if he wasn't mistaken, that terrifying black halo in the sky was the cause of it all.

"So, am I just an observer this time," he wondered aloud, "or am I supposed to be the madman or the fool?"

Fighting the discomfort caused by the oppressive black auras, Jenkins scanned his surroundings. Only one word could describe the scene: apocalypse. Everything was destroyed. The battlefield ruins before him were, without a doubt, the same ancient city he had glimpsed while rescuing the halfling diviner.

If this place were restored, it would likely be the very origin of Black Town. As the final entry in the Black Town Secret Records, this story would guide him to the town's ultimate truth.