Facing the Green Dragon Queen Aesselas's contemptuous sneer, Erich Zevier's expression remained still as an ancient well.
Compared to the regret he had carried for more than a century, this little verbal attack was nothing.
He had imagined this moment in his mind for far too long.
Fortunately, while his body could still barely maintain its final peak condition, she had given him this chance.
No—perhaps it should be said that the heavens had granted him this chance.
During the previous war, the Spellweaver had belonged to all soldiers, all adventurers, and all civilians of Coldemerald Province. But the Erich Zevier of today acted entirely according to his own will.
He had come today only to kill the evil dragon who had taken his loved ones from him. Whether he succeeded or failed, he was willing to offer up his life.
Aesselas seemed to sense the determination beneath his calm, and the expression on her face slowly faded.
She was arrogant, but she could still tell what kind of enemy was most terrifying.
Her earlier words had been meant to enrage him, to make Erich Zevier remember his family's agonizing deaths. In the coming battle, any emotional fluctuation might lead him to make irrational decisions.
But she had miscalculated.
From beginning to end, aside from the complex emotions he had revealed when he first saw her, Erich Zevier showed nothing else.
He was like a ghost that had wandered the world for over a hundred years, clinging to one obsession and refusing to fade.
Though the Green Dragon Queen raised her guard fully, that did not mean she was terrified of being targeted by such an old enemy.
She was no longer as she had been a century ago. She had broken through to a new stage.
More importantly, during the late period of the war over a hundred years ago, when the man and dragon had faced each other, it had been she who held the advantage even then.
He had only been able to maneuver against her by relying on a family-inherited artifact. Later, when that artifact shattered, she had grievously injured him on the spot. If not for another human epic powerhouse arriving as reinforcement after winning and freeing himself from another borderland battlefield, Erich Zevier would have died long ago.
He was nothing more than a defeated opponent.
The Green Dragon Queen was confident that if she had suppressed him over a century ago, then now, more than a hundred years later, the gap between them would only have grown wider.
After all, few races could keep pace across such a span of time with a naturally gifted, long-lived dragon.
During the last war, Spellweaver Erich Zevier had still been at his peak. He had then been heavily wounded by her in battle, with poison sinking deep into his bones. The fact that he had managed to cling to life until now was already a miracle.
As for maintaining his peak strength—or even advancing like she had—that was simply impossible.
Her eyelids narrowed.
Even across such a great distance, she could sense from Erich Zevier the aura of the poisonous curse she had placed on him over a century ago, a curse he had never been able to remove.
That proved her curse had tormented him for over a hundred years.
After all, that curse had targeted the very path of his profession.
Unless he was willing to abandon his strength, the curse could not possibly be driven away.
That curse had cost her some of her source dragon power and forced the Green Dragon Queen Aesselas to recover for ten years.
Otherwise, she would have advanced to her current level even earlier.
Aesselas did not regret it. Ten years of dormancy was a short time for a true dragon, and it had allowed her to absorb more of her bloodline inheritance.
"In that case, I'll send you to reunite with your wife and children."
Aesselas beat her wings, and a vast sea of dark green clouds surged around her.
A majestic power erupted from her enormous body.
Behind her, a draconic phantom stretching for over a thousand meters began slowly taking shape.
That was the Green Dragon Queen Aesselas's epic Domain: Emerald Kingdom.
Over a century ago, its range had still been within a radius of three thousand meters. Now, it had expanded to a radius of five thousand meters—several times larger than before.
A heart-stopping poison rapidly spread outward with her as the origin point.
Bang!
Within several kilometers, every living creature suddenly burst apart, transforming into clouds of blood mist that bloomed in the air.
Even outside the Domain's range, nearby monsters and humans clutched their chests at the same time.
A suffocating pressure seized their hearts.
Fortunately, after gasping for breath, they barely recovered from that burst of terror.
This was how powerless the weak were before the strong. Even before the latter officially attacked, the mere spread of pressure beyond the attack range was enough to daze ordinary creatures.
This was also why Barry had not concentrated all its soldiers and adventurers in one place. Otherwise, the Green Dragon Queen and several of her strongest subordinates could wipe them all out in one stroke.
Of course, the same was true for the Green Dragon Army. They also had to be wary of humanity's magical cannons and high-level professionals.
It was a little like strategic deterrence, forcing large armies to adjust by either spreading out their troops or condensing them into military formations.
High in the sky, Spellweaver Erich Zevier stood inside the green dragon's epic Domain without changing expression.
No matter what, he was still an epic-level spellcaster. He would not be felled by a green dragon's passive damage.
A Domain's effects were comprehensive. When used to crush lower-level targets, it could quickly clear the battlefield, killing large numbers of low-level creatures or forcing them to lose consciousness, leaving only those strong enough to resist.
But when used against an opponent of similar strength, the battle became a contest between the enhancement effects of each side's Domain.
Different Domains had different emphases. Some involved special rules. Some were enhancement-based, strengthening specific abilities or the body. Others belonged to elemental systems, curse systems, and so on.
The three publicized effects of the Green Dragon's Emerald Kingdom—Life Drain, Plant Animation, and Venom Spores—were actually only its passive effects for crushing and clearing enemies.
Its true core effect was deception.
Of course, this "deception" was not about misleading the opponent through behavior or words.
It was a more fundamental power.
As long as the opponent paid attention to her—whether through sight, hearing, spiritual perception, or any other method—the green dragon could impose a specific long-range influence on them.
Under that influence, the target would be affected from consciousness to body, and even down to the source of their power, causing disorder and confusion.
For example: hallucinations, auditory illusions, a mage's spell effects failing, a warrior's strength draining away—all of these were caused by their power source and body being deceived, briefly betraying their master.
And as the battle with Aesselas dragged on, this deceptive effect would increase in both breadth and depth, eventually causing the target to completely lose the ability to resist.
During the last war, Erich Zevier had personally experienced how troublesome this Domain was.
It was not something that could be avoided by mere awareness.
Even if one realized that one's power and body were losing control, as long as the battle continued, one would inevitably keep being affected—and the effect would only deepen, until one finally fell completely into the abyss of loss of control.
Last time, he had relied on the Zevier family's inherited artifact, the Thousand-Thread Sphere, to weave a barrier around himself and resist her deceptive Domain effect. Then, using his own Domain, Surging Spring, to amplify the power of his spells, he had barely managed to hold his ground against her on the main battlefield.
In other words, relying on one additional Domain-like power, he had managed to fight her to a near standstill for a short time.
But now, he no longer had the Thousand-Thread Sphere. And after more than a century, the green dragon Aesselas had comprehensively broken through. Their levels of strength were no longer on the same plane.
That was how it seemed.
That was how it should have been.
But the corner of Erich Zevier's mouth lifted in a faint smile.
Far away, the Green Dragon Aesselas's originally confident expression suddenly changed, and for a brief moment, confusion and shock flashed across her face.
Her deception had not caught its target.
She could not influence Erich Zevier?
How was that possible?
Her Domain had become stronger, and he had lost the protection of that special artifact.
While Aesselas was still puzzled, Erich Zevier released the epic Domain that had remained dormant within him.
A power that felt both familiar and unfamiliar to the green dragon spread from that old, decaying body.
Aesselas's dragon pupils suddenly contracted.
As former old enemies, she naturally had not forgotten the aura of the Spellweaver's Domain. After all, for her, a hundred years was not that long.
But unlike that pure, powerful amplification Domain from the past, this strange new Domain felt eerie yet familiar.
It seemed to have countless connections with her Emerald Kingdom, yet on closer inspection, it was filled with a completely opposite, contradictory quality.
"Does it seem strange?"
Erich Zevier shook his head.
He had no desire to explain much.
Explaining one's techniques and abilities to an enemy was the most foolish thing one could do.
Even if the enemy might be able to comprehend something through perception, withholding the explanation would still make them more wary and cautious.
Over the years, he had lived under an assumed identity and even faked his death. It was not as if he had done nothing.
He was not as powerful as the green dragon. And at any predictable point in the future, he would not be as powerful as she was. That seemed to be established fact.
But he would not deliberately underestimate her strength just because he hated her to the bone.
On the contrary, if he wanted to kill her, he had to raise her threat as high as possible in his mind, then use all his intellect, willpower, schemes, and time to seek out that almost nonexistent chance of victory.
And this was the answer he had arrived at.
A Reverse Domain.
He had abandoned the powerful mage-specialized Domain he had once taken pride in, endured the constant pain tormenting him at every waking moment, and used the dragon curse that had rooted itself deep into the source of his profession to develop a reverse Domain specifically targeting her power.
You could say this Domain was like a physician prescribing a specific remedy for a particular illness.
It was an extremely obsessive method.
The overwhelming majority of his current power could only be fully used when facing this evil dragon. Against any other epic-level opponent, its effectiveness would be greatly reduced.
Erich Zevier's Reverse Emerald spread rapidly.
That power infected Aesselas's vast and powerful Emerald Kingdom like poison.
The Green Dragon Queen's face changed. She felt her independent Domain being invaded, an unknown "toxin" rapidly spreading through it.
Everything seemed to be slipping out of control.
Sensing the aura on Erich Zevier, she finally realized something.
A trace of regret flashed across her majestic green dragon face.
She understood why he possessed this power that countered her to an almost unreasonable degree.
Normally, invading a Domain like this was nearly impossible. Everyone's Domain transcended from their own source of power, so every Domain was fundamentally different.
Perhaps one could crush and shatter another person's Domain, but to invade and devour it like this—where you were in me and I was in you—was utterly beyond common sense.
But the curse she had left in him had become the best possible teacher.
Though she did not know how much effort he had spent, the current result was clear.
Her curse had failed to kill him. Instead, through destruction and rebirth, the Spellweaver had developed a Domain power that shared the same origin but manifested in reverse.
At that moment, she admitted that she had underestimated the power of hatred among human emotions.
Perhaps precisely because short-lived races had such brief lives, they could create more possibilities within limited time.
High in the sky, two vast Domain powers intertwined.
On the ground, the war was also reaching a fever pitch.
Taking advantage of the intervals when the magical cannons were destroyed or entering cooldown, the Green Dragon Army began pressing forward in force.
Armies, large and small, surged toward the walls from every direction.
Barry Adventurers' Guild President Matthias Monroe withdrew his gaze from the clouds.
At this point, all he could do was trust in the strength of his predecessors.
Bzzzz!
An invisible ultrasonic wave swept across the battlefield ahead.
The human soldiers and adventurers struck by it had blood gush from their ears like fountains. Before long, their faces turned pale, and they collapsed limply to the ground.
Seeing this, Monroe instructed the others to tend to the wounded, then used a precisely timed force rebound to launch himself into the air.
He leaped toward the enormous bat in the sky beyond the wall.
The Rot-Wing Dragon Bat.
The vanguard general of the Green Dragon Queen.
A draconic bat-type monster of the lesser dragon species, and like him, a being standing at the peak of the transcendent tier.
An opponent like this could not be allowed to attack freely. Otherwise, before long, all the defensive forces on the surrounding walls would be slaughtered.
"Beast! Die!"
Monroe shouted as he leaped high.
At some point, a heavy scepter had appeared in his hands.
The end of the scepter released dazzling holy light.
If it hit, even something as powerful as the Rot-Wing Dragon Bat would suffer severe injuries.
Forced by necessity, the Rot-Wing Dragon Bat had no choice but to interrupt the sonic attack it was launching and agilely veer to one side.
With Fly magic supporting him, Monroe pursued closely.
His bold and forceful posture was also meant to boost the morale of the defenders.
The Rot-Wing Dragon Bat's earlier long-range ultrasonic attack had killed and injured many people.
On a section of wall beneath Monroe, Alia and the others glanced up at the president's battle, then quickly looked away again. They controlled a large long-range ballista mounted on the wall and fired at the giant beasts charging across the plain below.
However, they could not help thinking of Gauss.
Gauss had been gone for a week now.
They did not know how he was doing.
Their side had plenty of troops and strength, with many adventurers, soldiers, and powerful professionals stationed here. They also had the advantage of terrain and magical cannons. But Gauss had gone deep into enemy territory alone.
Had he encountered danger?
The only thing they could do for him now was pray that everything went smoothly.
And at this moment, deep in the distant Jade Forest, inside a dark, damp cave untouched by sunlight, Hephaestus was curled up, protecting Gauss in the open space enclosed by his body.
Gauss had fallen unconscious shortly after leaving the dragon nest.
Fortunately, the awakened Hephaestus was not stupid. He continued following the orders Gauss had left behind and flew deeper into the forest.
Before the pursuit forces arrived, he found a large river, dove into it, and completely concealed their aura.
This cave was one he had found after swimming underwater for a long time—an underground cavern hidden along a special subterranean river.
Hephaestus opened his eyes slightly and looked at Gauss, whom he was guarding in the middle.
"Master… when will you wake up?"