Chapter 38
“Bosaklie was built as a walking fortress, a beetle on dunes, to outrun the calamity that scours the Demon Realm,” said the Ancestor of Ice Spirits.
“I suppose you’ve met it already—a sandstorm more terrifying than the fabled hundred‑meter giants, a grinding mill of yellow grit and death dust.”
“That storm chases Bosaklie like a pack of dune-wolves after a herd. At its eye sits a powerful divine creation, cold as a buried idol.”
“It’s a colossal sandworm. Legend calls it the continent’s first ruler. The gods returned to their heavens, like cranes vanishing into cloud.”
“They handed this land to new lives sprouting from the soil. Those little ones were weak, seedlings in frost, so my kind—the divine constructs—held the reins.”
“Back then, that filthy worm and I tangled threads that never broke. It thought the Demon Realm too small and too dry, a cracked riverbed.”
“It wanted the permafrost on my back, my snowbound cradle. We fought like thunder and avalanche. I tore off two of its legs.”
“It wrenched one of my arms clean, like a branch snapped in storm. We both bled for it. No one walked away richer.”
“Now the wind turns, and I finally get a chance at payback.” The Ancestor grinned at the Little White Dragon, a sparkle like frost in sunlight.
“I’ll send you and the one beside you in. I’ll tangle with that thing for a spell. After that, you stand on your own ice.”
“My reach isn’t that long. I can’t help much past the first clash.”
Relief came first, warm as a lamp in snow; then Lilith shook her head. “It’s enough. I’m already grateful,” she said, soft as falling flakes.
“I have a question.” The Little White Dragon raised one small hand, prim as a schoolkid, sitting straight as bamboo in winter wind.
“What is it?” The Ancestor lifted her head, eyes bright as lake ice, curious what trick the little one would toss on the table.
“I know you’ll drop us into the storm’s heart to duel it, but how do we get inside that thing?” Lilith blinked up, clear as spring water.
“Don’t fret.” The Ancestor waved it off, casual as a drifting cloud. “As the saying goes—seize the… no, wrong one. The mountain keeps its own hidden paths.”
“I’m here, so I can bring you to its face. You follow me, and we dive into that murderous gale.”
“As for the method—words are chaff in wind. Better I carry you in, and you taste it yourself, yes?”
“Agreed.” The Little White Dragon nodded, like a bell chiming in frost. “What should we do now?” She tilted her head at the towering Ice Spirit.
“Don’t ask so much. Just follow.” The Ancestor sliced the air with a hand and led the Little White Dragon and the Black Dragon to Bosaklie’s rim.
Lilith traded a glance with Nidhogg. Suspicion pricked like sand in the boot, but choice was a bare desert. No paths, only the one ahead.
The Ancestor had chosen her lair with care. It looked like the Eternal City’s center, a pebble drowned in a lake, hidden under stillness and cold.
If you didn’t watch the temperature dip, no Demon would wander here, like deer avoiding thin ice. Quiet hid the door in plain sight.
Guided by the Ancestor, Lilith found a narrow path veiled like a snow track. It ran straight to Bosaklie’s edge and ended at a heavy gate.
It matched the one she’d used before, twin stones in the same river. Nidhogg used Word Spirit Magic, her voice a hook, to make the Demon guard open it.
As an apology, the Little White Dragon pinched a delicate ice blossom into being, and set it on the small Demon’s desk like moonlight.
“Ready?” The Ancestor had already leapt, her girl-shape unraveling midair. She turned into a huge white mop head, whirling like a blizzard’s tassel.
She rode the desert gale above the yellow sea of sand, flying toward the far storm boiling beyond the Eternal City, a white kite against a bruise-dark sky.
Nidhogg stood at the city’s edge. In her human shape, the Black Dragon unfurled her wings—two night banners, vast as storm clouds over a plain.
Lilith’s little wings were shorter than her arms, two pale leaves. Nidhogg’s twin pinions stretched like long black towels; Lilith thought they could wrap her whole.
Wind screamed like knives. The Black Dragon held Lilith to her chest. The Little White Dragon tucked in tight, a fledgling under a raven’s cloak.
“I’m ready.” Lilith swallowed, throat dry as dust. “Let’s go, before the lady of ice grows impatient.”
She squinted into the grit. With hawk-sharp sight, she caught the white mop-head circling back, watching them. The storm crept away like a tide.
Time was a tightening noose. “Good,” Nidhogg said simply. The Black Dragon bound her snug, almost crushing, a fortress of muscle and heat.
Her vast black wings hammered the sand-laden air, and they burst upward like an arrow loosed from a shadowed bow.
Lilith didn’t play dead weight. She stirred her Constellation Resonance, tugging on wind and sand like strings, easing Nidhogg’s climb through the gritty sea.
With that tailwind at their backs, they reached the Ancestor of Ice Spirits fast, three specks against a wall of roaring ocher.
“Our target is the storm’s eye,” the Ancestor said. The gale chewed sound to rags, so her voice bloomed in their ears like a whispering frost.
The Black Dragon nodded once, a stone falling into a still pond.
“We’re too far,” said the Ancestor. “First, skim the edge. When the pull grows strong enough to drag us down, I’ll still the roar.”
“I’ll split it like cloth, open a seam, and shove you through.”
