Chapter 227: 227: Catching a shadow [pt1]
Amane's voice was neutral and light when she threatened the dragon-possessed kid, but her threat was quite real and heavy in her voice.
But despite that, the one possessing Derek only scoffed at her words and did not look scared at all.
"You might pretend that you have left your past behind, but it has weird ways to catch up with us when we least expect it to. Perhaps, you should keep my warning in your mind and be prepared to meet it head-on."
Derek went quiet after he finished speaking and Amane had no intention of continuing the conversation either.
They both stood at a stalemate and looked at the dragon shrine. As much as Amane wanted to speak against Derek's words, she could not do that.
If she recalls what all happened to her since she came to possess this body, Amane has to say that she has a lot of encounters with her past. One of those encounters had just slept with Amane just now.
Above Amane's head, Moony made small circles as she flew around them. The dragon was keeping an eye out for things and serving as Amane's emotional guide.
"Anyway, this is something that you must figure out for yourself in the future, Harbinger of Calamity. It has nothing to do with the present situation. For now, we should focus on the dragon shrines."
Amane forced her head out of the wicked thoughts of the past and into the present. There was a lot she needed to get done right now. Every second mattered she wanted to find out the culprit behind these dragon shrine breaks.
"You are right. Can you give me some space so that I can try and track down the owner of this weird energy?"
Amane asked and Derek took a step back. Amane's nails bit into her hand and blood flowed from her wounds. A few drops fell on the ground before they shined and expanded into a circle.
It shined brightly before a rope made of aura snapped out of it. That rope looked around for a few seconds before it headed toward Moony and pulled her body down.
It was a shocking moment and Amane hurried up to catch Moony's body.
Enjoy exclusive content from empire
"Hmm, this is the most curious thing to happen. Seems like the magic thinks that it is this young one who made a break. But that cannot be true. This young one hasn't even started its mounting yet. There is no way she would have been able to break the seal."
Derek's words made sense. Amane also knew that Moony had not been responsible for this dragon shrine break.
"Hmm, can it be the parent's magic that was used to break these seals? When I found Moony, the sun dragon of the crystal islands was dead but her remains were not found. Those who took her remains could be responsible for this break?"
The more Amane spoke these words, the more confident she was because this was the case. Nothing else made sense inside her mind.
"That might be the case this time. Dragon younglings' magic resembles their parents until their first mounting and growth period. It is likely why your spell failed to have an effect."
Amane sighed as things became more complicated for her.
Even if she sent Moony away, it was likely that all the tracking magics would lead back to her. So that was out of the question to perform.
"We might have to manually keep a check on things if we cannot track down the culprit. It would be a bothersome task as there are 108 dragon shrines all over the country alone."
Dragon shrines had been made as a form of protection by ancient people and a single dragon could power up to about 10 shrines.
Dragons might be rare in Amane's time as well, but their power had been massive and they had kept to themselves.
"Someone is desperate the wake up the most ancient dragon, the mother of all dragons. We don't know how that old power would react to this new and changed world so we cannot allow that to happen."
Amane had heard of it before - the one being sealed by all these dragon shrines. Rabelais, the mother of all dragons was almost a god in the making. She had too much power but also a short temper.
Due to this, she was often devastated when she woke up from her fits of rage and found a lot of dead bodies surrounding her. She had asked to be sealed by her first few newborns and then she had gone to sleep.
Of course, that was the common story that was told to the common people. Who knew what the real reason behind her sealing was?
"Our mother is not a generous soul and it is dangerous to try and make her up. It would serve you all better if you forget about her existence."
"How weird. I thought that legends of ancient times had all but faded away from the minds of people of this era. The one who is pulling the strings could not be a normal human being. I wonder what their real identity is?"
Amane pushed herself to her feet and stood up. She looked back at Derek's small body and extended her hand to him.
Derek looked surprised to see that hand but he accepted it nonetheless and stood up.
"Be careful. Whatever you are planning, make sure you see it through until the very end."
Derek disappeared back into the forest while Amane decided to stay at the dragon shrine to observe it a little more.
There were too many tiny details Amane needed to look at and not enough time to do all that. But she still tried her best to commit the whole shrine to her memory before she had to go back.
As soon as Amane disappeared, someone else walked toward the dragon shine and looked at it with a disappointed expression. They took out a small knife and tried to pierce the seal that was left on the shrine but it did not break.
They tried again, but they felt a hand circling their neck from behind.
"I know that a rat was following us around the whole day. And look, I finally caught you. Now let me see what your real identity is."
Amane's hand held her stalker's neck and put pressure. The stalker tried to break free of her hold but Amane did not let them go.
But within a few seconds, the body in Amane's hold went lax before breaking down into a black matter.
"Tsk, shadow servant. I should have expected my opponent to use such shallow tactics."
Shadow servants were tricky to use since they required very specific material as well as fine control over one's powers. It meant that the one behind this problem was not a noob who did not know what they were doing.
"Things just became a lot more complicated than before. I should look around this place."
Amane quickly looked around a few more nearby shrines. Only to find more shadow servants trying to break the seal with the help of a dragon dagger. The dagger was made up of the remains of a sun dragon so it carried its power.
The last time Amane had seen the dun dragon of the crystal island, she had been thrice the size of a commercial airplane. It would take a long time before the one using her would run out of materials.
"I need to find the body and burn it if I want to take care of this mess swiftly. I don't know how long it would take for the remains to be used up naturally."
Thankfully, there were ways to track down a dead body and they did not require much preparation. Amane could start the tracking tonight if she wanted to.
But first, she needed to go back and inform her other two companions of what was going on. Maybe they would have a better solution to this problem.
Both Sakura and Charlie were waking up from their nap when Amane came back home. The sun was also beginning to rise and it casted the whole world into a beautiful shade of gold.
"Good morning, Yoko. were you out the whole night? Did something happen? You look a little disturbed."
Sakura was the first one to notice that something was wrong and she instantly sat down to hear Amane out. Charlie followed seconds later and waited for Amane to start speaking.
Amane quickly concluded her findings and looked toward the other two to get their opinion.
"Hmm, this is a big after all. We cannot let these people keep on doing what they are doing with the dragon's remains. It has too much magic inside it."
Charlie agreed to the search and even Sakura had to agree with a rather reluctant expression on her face.
"I will go ahead and prepare the ceremony now. We need to plan out a full-scale attack at the place so I will be counting on you both. Also, make sure you do not let this information slip out to others."
Amane was faced with two offended expressions. Both Sakura and Charlie seemed annoyed with her but they did not say anything regarding being questioned.
The whole village ignored Amane as she walked around in search of what she needed to find. But she could feel their eyes glaring into her skull.
It seemed like the village wanted her gone as soon as possible.