Chapter 969 — The Beginning of a Shift

He felt his breathing grow a little hurried. Meicen, meanwhile, struggled to her feet with the help of the bar counter. She swayed in place before finally steadying herself, then gave Gaoyang an apologetic look. "I'm sorry, I can't keep you company any longer. I need to go back and run some... small health checks..."

"It's I who should apologize," Gaoyang immediately rose as well, genuine apology on his face. "If I hadn't spoken so carelessly—"

"No. No one can predict at what moment the chains will suddenly tighten around the neck, no one can predict when the wall will appear... The dragons are all used to it," Meicen said with a pale smile. She shook her head, turned unsteadily to leave, but suddenly stopped. She looked back at Gaoyang, hesitated a moment, and then said, "Although I cannot continue discussing it with you, I think... the god is reminding us of something in this way."

Gaoyang was thoughtful. "Reminding us?"

Meicen drew a deep breath. "He does not wish you to get a direct answer from me. That means this answer may be... very special, very important... Perhaps it must be solved by you yourselves, and not through any external aid."

After saying this, she closed her eyes briefly, turned, and slowly walked toward the room's exit.

Her final words reached Gaoyang's ears: "After I go back, I'll try to look up the follow-up records on those signals I reported last time—with your needs as a 'distinguished guest' added this time, perhaps my superiors will approve my application."

Meicen left, leaving Gaoyang standing alone in the vast room. His brows furrowed and smoothed several times, and lost in thought, he began slowly pacing about the room.

...

The god had gone to rest. His avatar vanished within the resplendent holy temple and returned to some hyperdimensional state imperceptible to mortals.

Hragol, however, still stood respectfully before the holy throne, hands at his sides as though awaiting orders.

He knew that though the god had departed, the god's gaze remained—had always remained. Countless eyes watched this ancient land without rest, and beneath the god's gaze every dragon must live with caution. He must remain here in accordance with the duties of a high-ranking dragon priest, keeping watch until the hour demanded by the scriptures.

He stood like that for who knew how long, until at last he had stood for the duration prescribed by the doctrine.

The god was still resting, and it might be a long while yet before the next summons; for the time being, the dragon priest had leisure.

Hragor raised his head and, without a moment's hesitation, walked out of the temple hall—his steps unhurried, yet a faint radiance gradually gathered around him; he stepped into the depths of that glow, and the next second he stood deep within the splendid palace where the Upper Council convened.

Speaker Anqian started awake from a half-sleep, hearing Omega's voice rise in his mind: "Lord Speaker, the High Priest Hragor wishes to meet with you."

Anqian's mechanical prosthetic eye contracted slightly, and he said in a low voice: "...Put him through."

"The High Priest is not on the line—he is outside your door."

Anqian came fully awake. His head shifted, and from the mass of cables and conduits connecting it to his body came the faint sounds of pumping fluid. Two seconds passed before he spoke: "Very well, let him in—decline all other visitors for now."

The mechanical door leading to the hall of the "Mind Throne" opened automatically, and Hragor stepped inside. The High Dragon Priest raised his head and looked at the aged dragon on the platform ahead, whose body bore mechanical modifications everywhere, and gave a slight nod: "Glad to see you are still in good health, Lord Speaker."

"High Priest, it is a rare thing for you to set foot in the Council headquarters in person rather than simply sending me word through the Omega network," said Anqian, several implant components on his head flickering with faint flowing light, his voice reverberating through the whole hall via the amplification devices. "Is there some important matter you must convey in person?"

"The god is resting. He has issued a decree: the inspection tour of the two ancient continents, Kaldor and Mor, is cancelled for this century. The Wayfarer team as originally designated is to be disbanded on the spot and await orders in Talund."

"Why?" Anqian could not help asking.

"There is no why," Hragor said mildly. "Carry it out."

Anqian's gaze settled on Hragor. After several seconds of watching, he withdrew his eyes and said in a low voice: "...I understand."

Yet the High Dragon Priest, having delivered the "divine oracle," did not leave, but remained standing quietly where he was.

"Is there something else?" Anqian could not help asking.

"A second matter—"

Hragor said mildly, then drew from his robes a small talisman—wrought of some unknown metal, its silver-white surface drifting with specks of faint light, yet seeming to have no substance at all; its edges kept flickering into a hazy semi-transparency. It all but floated above the dragon priest's hand, and rather than an object existing in the real world, it resembled a "projection" dragged by some force out of another time and space.

The instant he saw that talisman, Anqian's breath involuntarily skipped half a beat; and the next second, he saw Hragor crush that "talisman projection," poised between the real and the unreal, without the slightest hesitation.

"Hragor! You—" the Speaker could not help crying out. His upper body swayed, the countless conduits and cables attached to him clattering, and even the crystal drapes around the hall, displaying every manner of data, instantly rippled with countless disordered waves.

"The second matter," Hragor repeated, the fragments of the talisman in his hand dispersing bit by bit into the air, "is this: for the next three minutes, we are both outside the god's sight."

The last fragments of the talisman dissolved utterly into the air.

Anqian sat high upon the Mind Throne that was his, motionless as a statue, watching Hragor standing below.

For the first time in more than a million years, he felt his heart pounding again.