Dragons begin with courage

Lu Mingfei slowly exhaled, a chill running down his spine amidst the surrounding waves of excitement and amazement. He had resolved the immediate predicament, but had also personally unleashed the floodgates to even deeper mysteries.

Beneath the sugar coating, is it an antidote or an even more deadly bait?

he does not know.

But he knew that from this moment on, he would not only have to face the legacy of the dragon race, but also begin to examine this game of chess that was slowly unfolding around him, full of unknowns and calculations.

Of course, no one knew the doubts churning in his heart at that moment. Everyone's attention was firmly captured by that miraculous map.

The Three Gorges, underwater, deep within the Bronze City.

A massive amount of three-dimensional structural information was being frantically poured into his mind through the "snake" maintained by Ye Sheng, but he clenched his teeth tightly, his gums bleeding—because he "saw" it. The huge, complex, and ever-changing bronze maze had now transformed into a completely transparent three-dimensional blueprint in his consciousness, with every path to survival and every change in the mechanisms crystal clear!

"Directly below! Ye Sheng, Ya Ji, prepare to escape!" He roared the final route back to the surface command center.

"Forty-five meters away!"

"Oxygen remaining—three minutes!"

"The calculated ascent time... is just right! Theoretically, it's perfect!"

Theoretically, "just right" means there is no room for error.

But Aki did not move.

She activated the miniature light inside her helmet, letting its pale glow illuminate her face. Beneath the visor, her lips moved, and a torrent of sorrow welled up in her eyes.

"It's...too late..." Her voice was broken by the sound of the water and her cough, but her eyes were unusually clear, filled with a gentle despair. "There's not enough oxygen for the two of us...You should go, Ye Sheng."

Ye Sheng glanced at the instrument on his arm; the remaining oxygen level clearly showed three minutes. Combined with their rigorous training and their ability to hold their breath underwater for five minutes, eight minutes—a desperate gamble—would be just enough to reach that life-saving spot forty-five meters away.

"Enough! Trust me, Aki! That's enough!" He resolutely opened his mask, letting the river water splash on his face, and shouted hoarsely.

"Not enough..." Aki's tears mingled silently with the river water. She reached out, as if wanting to touch Ye Sheng's face, but then her hand fell limply to her side. "There's not much time left... Let's stay here... I... I have something to say..."

"I love you too!" Ye Sheng abruptly interrupted her, pulling her cold body tightly into his arms with all his might, the force almost crushing their armor. "Idiot! Stop talking nonsense! Trust me! Come with me!"

However, at that very moment—

boom!!!!

It wasn't a tremor from the water or the bronze city, but an indescribable majesty and rage that acted directly on the depths of one's soul! A deep, ancient dragon's roar, seemingly emanating from the deepest part of the primordial hell, pierced through the thick layers of bronze and water, and descended with overwhelming force!

In the endless dark abyss below them, two enormous golden vertical pupils, like pools of lava, slowly opened without warning!

Wherever their eyes fell, the chilling killing intent and the fear stemming from absolute suppression of their life force acted like tangible shackles, instantly gripping Ye Sheng and Aki's throats and hearts! Their blood seemed to be flowing backward, their muscles stiffened, and even their thoughts were almost frozen.

The King of Bronze and Fire.

It awoke. Because of the stolen treasure, because ants dared to lay a finger on the gods' secrets. In those golden eyes that looked down upon it, burned a fury powerful enough to consume the very soul.

There's no escape. Both of them are destined to be buried here.

No, perhaps... one more can leave.

A resolute thought flashed through his eyes. He held Aki tightly and began to fumble for the interface of his oxygen regulator, his movements firm—he would give her all the remaining oxygen he had, and then use the last of his life to buy her even a second more to float to the surface.

Aki seemed to realize his intentions and shook her head frantically, trying to break free, but he held her tightly in his arms.

At that critical moment of life and death—

despair.

A very faint sound, like the second hand of a clock skipping a second, rang out at the edge of Ye Sheng and Aki's perception.

The wind stirred up by the butterfly eventually turned into a storm!

Then, something incredible happened.

Apart from the pair of furious, burning golden eyes in the abyss, and the terrifying dragon's might that continued to emanate, seemingly slowed down countless times by an invisible force, everything around them—the surging undercurrents, the peeling bronze fragments, even their own actions, the rapidly depleting oxygen, the frantically alarming instruments—all fell into absolute stillness.

Time was put on pause.

"What a touching love story." A calm male voice, with a slightly metallic echo, suddenly rang out in the frozen water.

Out of the corner of their eyes, Ye Sheng and Aki, unable to move, barely caught a glimpse of a figure appearing like a ghost beside them. The person was also wearing diving gear, but in an old-fashioned and simple style, with a long, knife-shaped object wrapped in a waterproof cloth slung across their back. He hovered in the still water, as if in another dimension, his gaze sweeping indifferently over the two embracing figures.

"It's a pity the stage curtain has already fallen, and the actors should leave the stage." He muttered to himself, as if explaining to someone.

"Word of Power: Time Zero!"

The next second, the stillness was broken—no, the "space" where Ye Sheng and Aki were located was forcibly "cut" and then "pasted" by some force!

It was like a movie frame skipping, or like teleportation. Without any process, without experiencing the struggle of that forty-five-meter death tunnel, when their senses reconnected, they were horrified to find themselves in the waters above the massive outer shell of the Bronze City, with the dim light of the sky faintly shining through the river surface not far above them!

The oxygen meter readings were strangely stuck at the moment before they "came to a stop." And the bronze jar containing the dragon's secret treasure, which should have been left behind, was nowhere to be found.

On the surface of the Three Gorges, the Moniach.

Professor Mance Lundstedt stared intently at the monitor screen, his face ashen. When the escape coordinates were finally confirmed, he seemed to have all his strength drained away. He flung open the hatch and rushed into the raging storm, letting the icy rain lash his face.

"Captain?" the first mate asked anxiously as he followed.

"We made a mistake...we miscalculated..." Mans' voice trembled, muffled by the sound of rain, hoarse and barely audible. "The escape point is directly below; they can get out...but the surfacing time...plus the limits of breath-holding underwater...there's absolutely not enough oxygen! Absolutely not enough!"

Despair, like the dark river, nearly overwhelmed him. He had personally sent his best student to the brink of death.

However, in the very next moment when his mind was shattered—

Glug glug... Suddenly, a large number of dense bubbles rose from a certain spot on the originally turbulent river surface.

puff!puff!

Two figures emerged from the water, floating helplessly in the pale beam of the searchlight.

It was Ye Sheng and Jiu Deyafei.