Jalen's dantian was collapsing.
The tug-of-war between the Origin Shard and the Flaming Dragon Core had reached a climax deep beneath the vanished pond, where flame qi still churned violently within the shattered lakebed. His internal realm warped as silver light flared across ruptured meridians. The shard continued its merciless pull, absorbing bursts of the core's ancient energy—and for every ounce devoured, Jalen's body paid the price.
He wasn't just hurting—he was dying.
Veins boiled.
Bones cracked like hollow reeds under pressure.
Even his light qi struggled to stabilize his condition. It was like pouring cool water onto collapsing stars. Futile. His soul felt heavy, blistered beneath the growing storm. The Origin Shard didn't care for mercy. It didn't even acknowledge his pain. It was executing its plan—and he was the vessel, willing or not.
The Flaming Dragon Core retaliated with furious pulses—each one a tidal wave of flame qi, desperately trying to resist absorption. Its pride, forged in the Sky Limit Realm, refused to surrender.
Then Jael, angered by the sight of Jalen's condition, appeared next to Jalen.
And everything changed.
He roared his disapproval—and the core, who held a familial bond with Jael, chose to satisfy the young dragon by halting its assault on Jalen. That's when the Origin Shard grew more aggressive and attempted to force a connection with the beast core. The core, no longer resisting, made a different decision. Instead of merging with the Origin Shard—which had already absorbed twenty percent of its fragments and power—the other eighty percent fused into the dragon boy's chest, striking his flaming core.
Jael didn't scream.
He simply dropped—his small frame folding like a leaf in a flamestorm.
Golden energy crackled across his skin, sinking into his veins like liquid fire.
He convulsed once.
Then went still.
The Origin Shard pulsed—angry, denied.
Jalen exhaled.
It hadn't gotten its way again, which is to devour the entirety of the flaming beast core. Good.
A second later, the sub-realm shattered, and Jalen—now back in control of his body and holding the unconscious Jael—appeared at the depth of the pond. Then, in an instant, the liquid or rather dragon blood in the pond compressed. Trillions of droplets collapsed into one glowing bead, no larger than a pearl, and shot into Jael's heart.
His body trembled. His face contorted in discomfort. Veins glowed with unnatural brilliance. Then… quiet.
Jalen didn't hesitate. This occurrence was bound to draw attention from powerful cultivators above, and he was in no shape to fight anyone. So he vanished from where the pond once stood via reverse flare with the boy and appeared in one of the surrounding mountain areas he'd visited before the pond's formation broke. His body barely held together—each movement cracked open fresh wounds. He caught the boy before he fell, cradling him with hands that bled at the touch. Pain rang through his bones, but his heart remained steady.
He pressed his palm against Jael's chest after laying him down on a stone bed beneath a ridge.
His pulse beat.
Barely.
Jalen exhaled in relief.
The child lived.
He probed deeper—using a sliver of stabilized qi to investigate Jael's condition. After all, a Sky Limit Realm beast spirit core had entered him, and that was dangerous for someone at only the early Star Realm or rather should be.
But it turns out the Flaming Core had fused cleanly into his flaming core but was dormant—hence why it wasn't tearing him apart right now. Jalen guessed it was staying that way until Jael was ready to handle that kind of power. As for the drop of blood now swirling within the boy's spiritual arteries—altering pathways, reinforcing bones, adding weight to his soul.
Had Jael been an ordinary dragon, he would've burst apart. His body would've burned from the inside out, reduced to smoke. But then again, if he had been an ordinary dragon, the sub-realm wouldn't have opened for the Origin Shard to steal some of its powers—thus increasing Jalen's flaming qi not only in quantity but in quality.
The dragon boy—Jael—was no longer merely named. He was claimed.
Jalen collapsed beside Jael, eyes narrowing. His primary core burned like a crucible of molten ore.
But this wasn't just residual flame qi—it was the stolen essence. The twenty percent of the Flaming Dragon Core that the Origin Shard had devoured hadn't submit entirely under his control and so he sit and began refining flame qi instinctively, letting the shard sort the rest.
___
Meanwhile, Back at the Pond
Every cultivator who had stood cautiously thirty feet from its edge now surged inward. Dozens had waited. Hundreds had watched. Now they came—greed sharpening their gait.
They reached the basin and froze.
No pond.
No flames.
Only a crater—and faint lingering qi.
And no dragon or Jalen in sight.
Outrage erupted.
Many turned their anger toward those closest to Jalen: Jaya and Walford, who had stood beside him from the moment he and the dragon essence emerged. That proximity made them targets. Scapegoats.
The crowd's fury festered. But just as tensions peaked, Walford invoked Jaya's true identity—Princess of the Wangchester royal family.
That single title shifted the atmosphere.
Cultivators who moments before teetered on violence now bowed, stepped back, or averted their gazes. Her bloodline carried ancient authority. A confrontation here would spark political collapse.
But it meant nothing to her siblings.
Driven by desperation to reclaim the treasure—and perhaps their own lost honor—one of Jaya's sisters gave a cold command. Her peak Imperial Realm guards acted without hesitation. Their very presence overwhelmed Jaya, snuffing out her resistance without a touch. The sheer pressure of their aura knocked her unconscious, exposing how far the power gap had grown.
Walford fared no better. The guards subdued him with surgical ease. Their goal wasn't conquest—it was leverage. Using Jaya as bait, they gambled that Jalen's emotional ties might force him to surrender what no army could take.
They doubted it would work.
But desperation overrode logic.