Accelerate—accelerate again!!
Its wings trembled. The organs that converted dragon energy roared, and even its hardened carapace felt a tearing pain under the extreme pressure.
The Tempered Valstrax had done its utmost, yet as it looked ahead at Logan, whose entire body was covered by a thin layer of crystal and who seemed brimming with energy and still at ease, its eyes turned blood-red.
The earlier discomposure, the earlier sense of powerlessness—those were all fake!
Such humiliation, such despair, made the Tempered Valstrax's wings tremble ever so slightly under high speed and high pressure.
And that very tremor, at this speed, became a fatal mistake.
The entire dragon had already been disturbed by Logan's wake; now it completely lost control of its body, spiraling away from its original trajectory like a rapidly spinning crimson missile, wrapped in vast amounts of dragon energy as it shot straight toward distant mountains.
The Twinkle Tackle that had originally been intended for Logan was instead displayed in another way.
Only, the posture was a bit off, and the aim somewhat out of control.
The moment the Valstrax broke free of its wake, Logan noticed.
After a flamboyant swallow-return that sent him soaring upward, he completed a full rotation and successfully disengaged from the high-speed state.
Before his eyes, the red missile traced a somewhat irregular arc through the air; then, accompanied by earth-shaking tremors, the Valstrax slammed headfirst into a distant cliff, startling a flock of wingdrakes into chaotic, squawking flight out of the forest.
"Roar?"
Logan narrowed his eyes slightly. With an impact like that, with no defenses, even he would have to take some injuries.
Last time, although this fellow had fallen into the abyss, that place was not only an icy-snow region—the bottom was also ocean. Therefore, as long as it could withstand that one hit from Logan, there basically wouldn't be any major issues. But this time...
Driven by curiosity, Logan flew along the Valstrax's falling trajectory.
He quickly arrived at the mountain where it had crashed, and with just one glance he successfully locked onto the Valstrax's position.
Such a huge crater was simply far too conspicuous!
But when Logan entered the crater and looked at that Valstrax—only a small half-section of a wing and its two hind legs exposed outside, with the rest of its body planted into the soil, motionless—Logan's eyes widened.
"No way, right? A dignified Tempered Elder Dragon died just like that?"
The incomparably hard Terastal film on his body retracted back to his chest. Logan gave a small hop to the Valstrax's side, tentatively extended one hind limb, turned his body sideways, and gave the Valstrax's leg a couple of kicks.
The next second!
The Valstrax's two legs trembled, and then it went back into a playing-dead state.
Logan rolled his eyes and pulled his hind limb back.
As long as this fellow was still alive, it was fine. Otherwise, if a dignified Elder Dragon died from a crash, that would probably be a disaster-level joke.
He spun around sharply. The spines on his tail, as if unintentionally, lashed against the Valstrax's ankle, triggering another bout of trembling; then Logan spread his wings and flew up into the sky.
Without a doubt, this time was yet another victory for him!
As for killing the Valstrax... there really was no need.
Although Logan did not know what role the Valstrax played in nature, it was, after all, a rare Elder Dragon that lived year-round in the extreme high-altitude skies. Presumably, it had its own reason for existing within the natural order.
What was more, after that burst of high-speed action, much of the pent-up frustration Logan had accumulated during this period—due to the noise pollution caused by Shara Ishvalda—had dissipated. In his improved mood, there was no need to do anything further.
Not long after Logan departed, once it sensed that Logan's presence had moved far away, a massive surge of dragon energy erupted from the Valstrax's body. Using the force of that energy, it was forcibly yanked out of the ground.
The entire dragon was a sorry sight—covered in dust and grime, with multiple fractures in its armor. The claw of one forelimb had broken nails, and it lay sprawled on the ground, eyes vacant, questioning its very existence as a dragon.
At this moment, the pain in the Valstrax's body was far less severe than the pain in its heart.
Thinking back on itself—on how, ever since answering the summons of nature's will hundreds of years ago and coming to the New World to maintain the ecology of the extreme high-altitude skies—the entire upper sky could be said to have been its domain.
Relying on absolute speed, it had acted without restraint: today eating a Royal Ludroth, tomorrow grabbing a Great Jagras; and whenever it was in a bad mood, it would randomly kick an Elder Dragon that happened to be wandering outside.
Coupled with the New World's exaggerated concentration of life energy—so rich that nearly the entire continent was an excellent site for harvesting dragon energy—it never had to worry about depletion. Its days were free, unrestrained, and indulgent—practically perfect.
But now!
Everything had changed!
Logan's appearance shattered its monopolistic position, and two consecutive defeats in direct contests of speed and technique completely crushed its pride.
Such a psychological wound—who knew how many decades it would take this Valstrax to heal?
"Ao—ao—ao!!"
Hearing the mournful, almost weeping dragon roar behind him, the already distant Logan felt no emotional disturbance at all—if anything, he almost wanted to laugh.
Leisurely flapping his wings, he followed the guidance of the Everstream and flew toward the Ancient Tree region.
...
After most of the day had passed.
By the forest shoreline, Logan stared at the unfamiliar coast, his expression darkening as his previously good mood vanished completely.
"Where… did I even fly to?"
Because he wanted to properly enjoy this quiet time without noise, Logan had not conducted a deep sensing of the terrestrial veins, relying only on his own homing instinct to return.
What he had not expected was that the geomagnetic field of the New World had become chaotic to such an extent that even he was affected!
And this was not some simple magnetic disturbance. In Logan's deeper perception, many tributaries of the terrestrial veins had actually shifted their courses, and even the Everstream, the very foundation of the New World's terrestrial veins, had undergone a slight displacement.
This was an Everstream formed over countless ages—one of the most important lifelines of the entire New World, a critical system capable of affecting every living being that inhabited it.
Yet it could still be displaced by the tectonic upheaval triggered by Shara Ishvalda. One could only imagine how excessive the actions of this fully awakened Shara Ishvalda had been—this was nothing less than forcibly imposing its own will over the entire continent through sheer authority.
Logan did not know whether to say that this thing was insane or simply burdened with too much divinity. In any case, this alone was enough for nature's "boss" to hand down a death sentence to it!
Just as Logan was recalibrating his direction amid the increasingly tangled terrestrial-vein signals, a large black, spiny hedgehog streaked across the sky above with an excited expression, flapping its wings hard as it flew toward the depths of the ocean.
Logan recognized at a glance this "good brother" who had once nearly been killed by him. Back in the Elder's Recess, he had not seen it and had even wondered where the fellow had gone.
He had not expected to encounter it here instead.
Still, with that exuberant look—where exactly was it planning to go?
Watching the black speck at the horizon grow smaller and smaller, Logan seemed to realize something. After carefully sensing the Everstream, he finally confirmed that fellow's flight direction.
That way… was the Hoarfrost Reach!
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