"Muria, are you leaving already?" On the platform of the dragon castle, Renata, in her loli form, looked up at Muria with teary eyes as she tugged at his hair. "Can't you stay a little longer?"
"I have to go." Muria gently blew away the teardrops on Renata's face with a gentle breeze. "I've already stayed longer than planned this time."
Hearing Muria's response, the surrounding giants displayed expressions of disappointment. Even Mia, his personal maid, lowered her eyelids slightly to hide her reluctance. None of them voiced any attempt to hold back Muria.
Only the various chromatic dragons seemed visibly excited about Muria's impending departure. To them, Muria's presence was like a mountain over their heads; he imposed too many rules.
Muria felt somewhat guilty. When he had left previously, he told Cassiopeia that he was just returning to retrieve the legendary metals gifted by the giants, which wouldn't take much time.
But how could he have anticipated that in the library of the Golden Dragon Mother, he would be captivated by a book, losing track of time as he solved the arrays within it?
"Muria, can I come back with you?"
"With me?" Muria paused at Renata's request, then frowned in thought. The Titan Realm was relatively safe for many creatures, akin to paradise. However, it was also home to legendary creatures.
Dragons, apex predators in the outside world and particularly the formidable red dragons, could strike terror just by their presence. But if thrown into the Titan Realm, except for legendary dragons, other dragon kinds—even the powerful red dragons of similar age and rank—would merely be subdued and dominated by the local beasts.
For instance, the great cat Valmont, who had made a pact with Muria, could single-handedly thrash a group of dragons of the same rank. If Renata went to the Titan Realm with Muria, she would likely feel oppressed. Unless she was accompanied by a host of dragons under Muria's command, her experience as a common dragon would be far from pleasant, relegated to the lower echelons of society where power determined status.
"Muria, I also want to go to the Titan Realm." As Muria pondered, Claudia, in her human form, flew over, looking earnestly at Muria.
"Why would you come with me?" Muria asked, surprised by the white-haired, blue-eyed loli's request.
"You've grown stronger, a lot has changed about you since you left," Claudia said, touching Muria's face with her cold hand. "You no longer carry that lazy aura; it's as if your soul has been replaced."
"Hey!" Muria chuckled. Having met three epic titans and witnessed gods of destruction, and now in possession of a mysterious void egg, it was impossible for him to remain unchanged.
"I want to become stronger, Muria. I believe that by staying by your side, I can grow faster." Claudia's face was resolute. "Even though I'm just a white dragon, I want to become the strongest one—not just among white dragons, but among all chromatic dragons."
"You're ambitious." Muria touched his nose; this young dragon had more drive than he did before his epic encounters, whose greatest ambition had merely been to win the favor of a celestial maiden from the Celestial Clan and not to become the strongest.
"However, I can't take you to the Realm right now," Muria admitted awkwardly. "Such matters aren't up to me alone; I need to discuss them with my spirit first."
At this point, Muria's face flushed slightly. Most titans had a straightforward master-servant relationship with their spirits, where the titan's word was law.
Muria's relationship with his spirit, Cassiopeia, was more unusual. Some commands that Cassiopeia deemed unreasonable were outright refused by her. Furthermore, she sometimes enforced actions she considered beneficial for Muria, like arranging daily battles with other titans.
"Wait for my message." After letting Renata off his shoulder, Muria pulled out a silver metallic cylinder covered in luminous runes, tossed it on the ground, and transformed it into a shimmering, rotating one-time teleportation array. Then, stepping into the array under the watchful eyes of the hopeful white dragon and the reluctant red dragon, he vanished…
"You actually came back?" As Muria stepped out of the teleportation array, he was met by Cassiopeia's stern gaze. "I thought you might decide to stay on that little island and never return."
"Cough, Cassiopeia, I was late because a book caught my attention," Muria admitted sheepishly, pulling out the authorless book "Array Breaking Studies" from his spatial ring.
"Array Breaking Studies." Cassiopeia muttered the title written in draconic script on the cover. "What is this book? Does it specifically contain knowledge on breaking arrays?"
"This book doesn't have any knowledge about breaking arrays per se; it seems every page carries an array, and you can only turn the page by finding and breaking the array's weakest point."
"Let me see!" Cassiopeia's interest piqued, she took "Array Breaking Studies" from Muria. Then, embarrassingly, she couldn't even open the book's cover.
"What's going on?" Muria took the book back, easily flipping it open to the thirty-fifth page to show Cassiopeia the golden array depicted there.
"I can't open this book." Cassiopeia frowned, her usually pure face wrinkling. "This book you've got is very special."
"No kidding." Muria rolled his eyes; the fact that each page could carry an array spoke volumes about the book's extraordinariness.
"Only you can open this book." Cassiopeia murmured, then noticed a faint, nearly imperceptible glimmer of light in Muria's eyes, which showed no other sign of disturbance.
"Muria, where did you get this book?"
"From my mother's library." Muria looked puzzledly at Cassiopeia; he had almost remembered something when he heard her earlier but then suddenly forgot what he was going to say.
"From Lady Atelis?" Cassiopeia asked.
"Of course." Muria looked baffledly at his spirit. Wasn't that obvious?
"A legendary mage, then!" Cassiopeia thought of the glimmer in Muria's eyes—a sign of being under some spell. She remained silent, deciding not to report this to Muria.
Because it was very likely that Muria's mother, a legendary mage, had tampered with him. As a titan-dragon hybrid, Muria was naturally immune to most magic.
But if a legendary mage deliberately schemed against him, such immunity would be laughable. Moreover, as a mother and a being of a lawful good alignment, like a gold dragon, she would hardly harm Muria. The magic must be beneficial.
"Do you want to learn about breaking arrays?" Cassiopeia looked neutrally at Muria. "If so, I can provide you with some knowledge."
As she spoke, a series of light screens appeared around Muria in the courtyard.
Muria looked around; everywhere he looked, there were light blue screens filled with dense information about various texts and array diagrams.
"These are some of the array-related knowledge collected by the titans!"
"Cassiopeia, I have books on array studies; I don't need these for now." Muria pulled out a stack of books from the Golden Dragon Mother's library from his spatial ring. "I'll look at these after I've gone through these books."
"Alright." Cassiopeia waved her hand, and all the screens in the courtyard disappeared.
"Cassiopeia, I want to discuss something." Muria grinned sheepishly. "I'm thinking about bringing all the dragons I've been raising here. What do you think?"
"All the dragons? Impossible." Cassiopeia's young face showed no emotion. "This place can't accommodate hundreds of dragons."
"I could let some of the dragons live outside." Muria stroked his chin; he planned to bring all his dragons close and take good care of them, rather than leaving them to their own devices.
After all, even the weakest white dragon could enter the realm of legends if it survived the long centuries. Every dragon with pure blood could reach the legendary level if they lived long enough.
"That's possible." Cassiopeia looked at Muria, who was smiling slightly. "But you'll have to figure out how to bring them here yourself. I won't provide a one-time teleportation array."
"I'll figure it out!" Muria frowned, then casually drew an array in the air. "That's not a problem. I can build a teleportation array, but you need to give me the coordinates here."
"No problem!" Cassiopeia nodded. "Here's a tip: the spatial barriers in the Realm are much stronger than in the outside world. Even legendary titans struggle to break through, so whatever you want to teleport, you need to construct a teleportation array that is one level higher than the teleporter."
"That means to teleport a silver-ranked dragon, I need to build a gold-ranked teleportation array to get it here."
"Exactly."
"That's not a problem; it's within my abilities. It just means I'll need to use more materials and elemental crystals. I can start preparing right now!"
Muria cast a spell to shrink into a small human boy, then pulled out a book about teleportation arrays and began to study it carefully. He had a lot of planning to do...
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