abcnovels
Chapter 552: Sleeping Beauty
Chapter 552: Sleeping Beauty
Chapter 552: Sleeping Beauty
Tick-tock.
The corridor was dark and deep, with a brick-and-mortar color scheme and the sound of water dripping. Rhaegar observed his surroundings, searching for the hiding place of the Bastard Dragonlord.
Whoosh!
A gust of wind hit him from behind, passing close to his ear. Rhaegar's eyes flashed as he ducked to avoid the arrow, twisting his body and kicking with his leg. The crossbow bolt flew back, and a corpse fell behind him.
“Go!” a hoarse voice ordered from the shadows, and the figure moved quietly.
“A hidden arrow can only wound someone by accident very easily.” Rhaegar remained calm, his keen hearing gathering valuable information. The shouting and fighting in the palace had stopped, and Aegon should have moved to a safe place. He could faintly hear the roar of a dragon, accompanied by a loud explosion.
Rhaegar hesitated slightly and wondered, “Do the Great Masters have such means?” These slave masters, whose nature was only plunder and bloodshed, dared to fight against dragons. They might have some tricks up their sleeves.
As he walked, the silence around him grew deafening until the end of the corridor, where a glimmer of light appeared in the darkness.
Crash!
Rhaegar pulled down the curtains at the window, and the blinding sunlight chased away the darkness.“Roar!”
The fierce dragon roar reverberated, causing a faint tingling in his ears. Rhaegar narrowed his eyes and raised his hand to shield himself from the glare. He saw two dragons speeding through the air.
"Roar!"
Caraxes was as domineering as ever, soaring through the sky and chasing after its target at will. Rhaegar was stunned until he saw the opponent and muttered, “Aemond?”
The Sheepstealer fled in all directions, never engaging in a fight with Caraxes. Even brief encounters were quickly over. This style of play perfectly illustrated the word “despicable.”
Boom!
A cobalt-blue Dragonfire flashed past, soaring in front of the Great Pyramid's entrance.
“Kill the Great Masters! Don't let them get away!”
“There’s the Sons of the Harpy!”
Rhaegar looked up and saw the entire city in chaos, with various factions fighting each other. The four gates were sealed, and the Unsullied army began to attack. Dothraki cavalry clashed with slave soldiers, and the streets were filled with corpses.
“These Great Masters are truly mad,” Rhaegar muttered, his mouth twitching slightly in disbelief at the desperate fight of the Great Masters. They actually thought that poisoning and assassination would force the Targaryens to retreat.
“Roar!” In midair, Sheepstealer let out a shrill cry and once again engaged in close combat with Caraxes.
“Daemon, what are you doing?” Rhaegar's eyes were full of incomprehension. Aemond's sudden appearance and the Dothraki cavalry's entry into the city couldn't be mere coincidences. Daemon and Aemond must be fighting over a personal grudge.
Growing irritated, Rhaegar drew his dragon whip and stepped back. He couldn't allow these fools to harm the House's dragons.
Bang! He turned to run out, but collided head-on with a soft body, causing the person to fall unconscious without a sound.
“Daena!?” Before he could take a closer look, a young man with silver hair exclaimed.
Rhaegar stopped in his tracks, his eyes narrowing. Daven's silver hair was messy, and he was carrying a jingling silk package on his shoulder, with shackles on his hands and feet. The silver-haired girl who had just been knocked over also had bright silver hair.
“A descendant of Aethyrys?” Rhaegar smiled, not expecting the other party to walk right into his trap.
Daven froze, looking at the silver-haired man with purple eyes in front of him, and denied, “No, the fake Dragonlord ran away a long time ago.”
“Oh, then who is she?” Rhaegar kicked the unconscious girl and asked, “She's wearing silk and satin, which is not something an ordinary Valyrian could afford.”
Daven panicked and tried to defend himself, “She is my sister, the concubine of the Great Masters, and is very popular.”
Rhaegar listened with a smile, his right hand clutching the dragon whip, his knuckles turning white. A woman from the Aethyrys house had indeed married one of the Great Masters.
Daven backed away, begging for mercy, “Don't kill me. My sister has a great body. I'll give her to you.”
“Not bad.” Rhaegar's smile did not reach his eyes, and he whispered, “Unfortunately, you are the root of all evil.” Raising his hand, he whipped out the dragon whip like a serpent.
“No!” Daven's face turned pale and his crotch was already wet.
Crack! The black whip wrapped around his neck, the pale bone piercing the flesh, and his head flew into the air.
“Not worth the fight.” Rhaegar looked down on him with cold eyes. The headless corpse fell, and the silk-wrapped gold and silver tableware spilled onto the floor.
Clang!
A heavy thud echoed through the hall as the items hit the floor. Rhaegar lifted the silk covering to reveal a gray dragon egg, so dusty its true color was obscured. It was covered in a layer of stone skin and smelled of sulfur.
“A fossilized dragon egg,” Rhaegar muttered, his pupils shrinking. He detected a peculiar fishy smell and exclaimed, “Someone tried to hatch it using blood magic?”
He recalled finding a giant dragon skeleton in Sothoryos, near a destroyed evil blood magic portal in a cave. The gray dragon egg had uneven pits on its surface and had already shed some of its stone skin. According to blood sorcery records, this was a method of baptism with blood—the blood of the dragon washing away the slumber of life.
“Obviously, it failed,” Rhaegar observed, pocketing the defective gray dragon egg with a deep sense of vigilance. Blood mages sacrifices harmed themselves and others, depriving living things of their vitality. The amount of knowledge required to master this blood magic was staggering.
Suddenly, he felt a gaze on his back. Rhaegar's senses were keen, and a chill ran down his spine.
“Who is it?” he demanded, turning swiftly to see a figure in a black robe and a blood-red mask. The man stood silently, like a dead man, watching him.
As Rhaegar noticed him, the man cut his pale wrist with a knife. A thick stream of blood spurted out, forming a pattern of tadpoles on the floor.
“Great Lord of Light, hear my call...” the black-robed man prayed in a mumbling voice, clasping his hands together. In his arms, he held a cloth bag containing two more fossilized dragon eggs.
“You're a fraud!” Rhaegar shouted in anger, swinging his dragon whip.
At that moment, something unexpected happened. The tadpole pattern came to life, wriggling into a mock toad that hopped and leapt at him.
Gulp~
Rhaegar pulled the woman to block the strange toad, but it passed through the body and dove into his forehead. In a blink, Rhaegar's dragon whip lashed out, its snake-like tongue piercing the air and severing the black-robed man's neck.
The severed head fell to the ground, the red mask shattering to reveal a pale, old face as dry as tree bark, blood pouring from its seven orifices. On the other side, Rhaegar felt a chill in his head, a dizziness filling his brain. His vision blurred, and he shook his head to stay awake.
A ball of thick black water oozed from the dead man's mouth, emitting a strong, strange smell. “Ghostly stuff, it's from Asshai again...” Rhaegar mumbled, his consciousness fading before he collapsed atop the woman's body. The last thing he felt was the dragon whip piercing the man's head.
The magical material of Valyrian steel mixed with special leather seemed to ignite upon contact with the thick black liquid, instantly spewing flames. As Rhaegar fell into a deep sleep, he faintly heard a mournful wail of resentment.
“Nightmare! Nightmare!” It sounded like the name of a blood mage incantation, but Rhaegar could no longer hear it. The midday sun shone brightly, illuminating the corridor starkly. The three and a half lifeless corpses lay out of place in the bright environment.
The woman, who had been on the verge of being awakened, was knocked unconscious again by Rhaegar's ruthless blow to the head.
“Chirp, chirp...” Birds flew to the window, looking curiously at the scene below.
...
King's Landing, Red Keep.
Viserys lay in his bedchamber, breathing heavily as he took a long afternoon nap.
Bang!
A bird flew headlong into the window, shattering it. Viserys's eyebrows twitched slightly, his breathing became irregular, but he remained asleep.
Hum
Suddenly, a mysterious sensation overcame him. Viserys immediately entered a vivid dream, witnessing two dragons fighting fiercely, their blood and flames coloring the sky.
The next second, the dream shattered, turning into countless tiny grains of sand. Viserys woke abruptly, his eyes filled with mixed emotions, his lips trembling: “Rhaegar...”
...
Lys, Topless Tower.
“Black, green, the descendants of the dragon weave the blood of the dragon.” Helaena, with her silver hair cascading down her shoulders, slowly rocked a spinning wheel.
Hum
A faint sound reached her ears, like the ripples of a clear spring. Helaena stopped, confusion filling her clear eyes. It was as if she had heard or seen something.
Uncertain, Helaena climbed to the center of the carpet like a child and began sewing a new tapestry. In one corner, three cities in a row were burning, several dragons baring their fangs. Skillful with her needle, she added two little figures in black robes, chasing away an ugly toad.
“The maiden's song is sung, the descendants of the dragons weave dragon dreams...” she murmured, continuing her work.
...
Far away, overseas.
Rhaegar lay on the green grass, half asleep. He opened his eyes, and the sun's rays pierced them.
“Hiss!” Rhaegar gasped, feeling a splitting headache. He shook his head vigorously, as if a club had been shoved into his ear and stirred his brain.
“Oh~~” A wave of dizziness surged, and he couldn't help but dry heave.
“Croak.” Rhaegar fell to his knees, a protesting toad croaking beneath him. The pain was so intense he felt he could spit out all the sour water in his stomach.
Rhaegar accidentally made eye contact with a pair of dark, dead fish eyes.
“What the hell!?” Rhaegar almost jumped three feet high at the sudden face-to-face encounter.
“Croak.” A gray, ugly toad lay on the ground, calmly shaking off the vomit covering its body. Rhaegar's eyes widened in surprise.
“What an ugly toad!” It had poor coloring, skin full of pimples, and bulging green eyes.
Suddenly, Rhaegar's mind cleared, and he remembered the scene before he fell asleep. The bastard Dragonlord and his sister were on the run, and he caught and killed them. The black-robed man was also fleeing, and when he saw him, he cast a curse in his rage.
“Damn it, where did you take me?” Rhaegar was confused and slapped his head hard. The key question suddenly slipped his mind. Looking around, he saw that the grassy field stretched as far as the eye could see, with snow-capped mountains in the distance. Rhaegar became more and more bewildered. He reached out, dug up a piece of dirt, and rubbed it. It was cool and moist, proving that the soil was not lacking in moisture.
Rhaegar was completely baffled. Everyone knew that the land in Slaver's Bay was poor. It was impossible for there to be such a pleasant and fertile area.
Behind him, footsteps and the cool call of a maiden echoed: “Gaemon, your father is calling you home.”
Rhaegar turned around and saw a maiden with purple eyes and silver hair in a delicate braid.
“Croak.” The toad croaked and jumped into his arms. Rhaegar was startled and quickly reached out to catch it. He looked down and suddenly realized that his large hands had shrunk, turning into a pair of small, white, delicate baby hands.
“What's going on?” Rhaegar froze and quickly checked his body. He was less than three feet tall, with short, thin arms that had no strength at all. He didn't need to look in the mirror to know that his body had shrunk.
“Gaemon, don't make me ask you a second time.” The silver-haired maiden's face was set in a frown, and her thin body was frail.
“Who is Gaemon?” Rhaegar held the toad in one hand and subconsciously reached for his face. He felt a scar on his left eye, running from the top of his cheek to the bottom, but not touching his eyeball.