The dragon was not opening its mouth to chomp him, but even the slight parting of its jaws allowed Lars to peer into the dark depths that were lined by fangs more than twice the length of a human's height.

The… Pink, wingless land dragon blinked slowly, the horns and ridges across its scaled body giving it the appearance of a jagged mountain range. The great beast was half-sitting, looking to be patiently waiting for Lars to wake up.

And as the dragon breathed in and exhaled, the hot air expunged wafted out, causing Lars to nearly suffocate from the stench of… Menthol? Mint? Chewing gum?

The dragon must have seen the look of shock on his face, for the 200 metre long creature //giggled// and smiled, a scene that raised Lars' as this action revealed dozens of sharp life-reaping fangs.

��Little human! You thought my breath would smell like rotting meat? It matters not. Though I am a lady, I do not expect my playthings to have respect or manners of any sort." The dragon's eyes narrowed dangerously as she spoke in a sing-song voice, her tone turning fierce at the end of her sentence.

'Stupid, stupid Lars! You used so many stealth formations but you forgot the most basic thing – smell! It's not only this dragon, just about any beast brave enough could have sniffed you out! Careless!' Lars chided himself and cursed his mistake of hiding with only stealth formations. Thinking quick, Lars considered what he could do, then he realised there were only two choices.

Fight or die.

'Semi-divine realm or not, let's see how the power of a Myth paired with near- Divine law comprehension fares! I don't have any other choice anyway!'

As Lars prepared and looked for an opportunity, the dragon continued to speak.

"I, Frenoshreth, am the overlord of the Northern Reaches! Tell me, human, where have Belic Wildwood and the Sun Lord's energy disappeared to…? Do not fear, as one of my numerous subjects, I won't harm you as long as you do not lie to me. After all, even if I were interested in eating you, you and that girl are too tiny! You would just get stuck in my teeth – not even fit to be a snack!"

Blinking, relieved as well as somewhat offended to not even be worthy of being a snack, Lars was surprised. Did this dragon function as something like a local lord of the north? And… Could he trust it? Or should he just strike first…?

As these thoughts crossed his mind, the dragon Frenoshreth looked peeved as she continued to rant.

"Those impetuous beings…! Just because one is backed by a Divine being and the other //is// Divine doesn't mean they can prance around in my backyard freely! After all, here on Penjara planet, the greatest strength they can exhibit is only at the Semi-divine stage at best! They dare wreak havoc in my territories…! Hmmph! They dare injure my subjects and destroy my land!!"

She lifted her nose up to the morning skies and scoffed haughtily, clearly not impressed with even divine conscients messing around in her home turf.

Blinking again in confusion, Lars shrugged silently and decided to give it a shot. The dragon Frenoshreth didn't seem too sharp in the first place, so why not, right?

Lars cleared his throat, drawing the colossal dragon's attention. Then he spoke eloquently and gave her a full (read: edited) version of the story, of course omitting the parts about himself as the Child of Light, Luca being killed or the Door of Gluttony.

Instead, he exaggerated Belic's strength, attributing it to the enigmatic Terra Root which seemed to have been referring to some in-born capability of Zera's. Finally, he ended by the two opponents wiping each other out, returning to the heavens with only their soul-fragments and memories.

When questioned as to how he and Luca had survived unscathed, he said that the Sun Lord wanted to preserve them as his precious subjects, something which Frenoshreth scoffed at again while shaking her head, but ultimately accepted with a sigh.

She looked disappointed as her great maw turned into an inverted "U" shape and she plonked her great head onto her front claws, causing the earth to rumble and shake violently.

"And I was looking forward to trying out a meal of war angel or divine meat…" she sighed to herself and shook her head, no longer paying attention to Lars or Luca.

Smiling bemusedly, Lars waited for a short while before turning to leave when he perceived that she no longer cared about the two of them.

As he walked away, he too sighed and shook his head while his eyes sparkled mischievously.

'A pity… And I was looking forward to trying out a meal of dragon meat…'

* * * * *

The first thing Lars did was to revisit the crawler's cave – the place he had arrived at when he entered this world. He quickly retraced his steps and within a couple of minutes, he was at the cave once more.

Now, standing before the entrance to the cave, he recalled the experiences, learnings and challenges he had encountered from the moment he arrived here. And he also could not help but feel trepidation and daunted at the thought of re-entering the cave that had scarred him so greatly.

Breathing in deeply, Lars chest rose as he listened to the sheer silence around him. Before, there might have been the chirping of birds, chittering of insects or various noises in the brush. Now, however, life in the vicinity had been more or less wiped out, leaving destruction everywhere around. Even the mountain ranges were laid waste to, with this cave only surviving because of its distance from the epicentre of battle.

As Lars felt the strong arid breeze and dust blowing against his face, he calmed his heart and stilled his thoughts, letting his thoughts move to all that he had faced and learned.

The moment he arrived, he had faced despair and a sudden rescue – a sense of helplessness against the crawler and then a flash of light that rescued him, one that he now believed was sent by the Sun Lord to protect him as the Child of Light.

From there, he had travelled to Fetch homestead and had learned that there were completely different paths of power, so vastly different that he could not even extrapolate it despite his G.o.dly mind and experiences in manbased cultivation.

He felt sadness as he recalled the warmth and camaraderie of the denizens of Fetch homestead and vowed to exact revenge on the powers of this world.

The powers of this world… Through the battles that unfurled before him, he had approached the edges of the Semi-divine and seen first-hand the might of this lofty realm.

But most of all, he had consumed and combined the powers of this world, the laws and the cultivation methods to be integrated to his own, forming an all new path of power that he had yet to fully a.n.a.lyse and understand.

Lars kept his eyes closed, no longer feeling fearful of the cave ahead after settling his heart and mind. After all, if he could devour Belic Wildwood who was at least a high commander of the Distortion camp, what was a mere crawler…?

Pausing, Lars felt there was something special in the words he had just thought of. He began to frown in rapt concentration, divining something that triggered his heart and mind to spin wildly.

"My path…" Lars whispered softly to himself and s.p.a.ce and time around him began to ripple in response, a natural phenomenon not triggered by any form of power but purely by the laws of the universe.

Lars suddenly began to feel a stroke of inspiration, being rooted in place as he began to formulate an all new path formed of all his learnings, powers and comprehension of laws.

"Earth Pulse…" as he mouthed these words slowly, Lars began to glow with the colours of dirt and nature, a rich brown and a verdant green. His hair began to float gently despite the wind growing still, and he could feel the cells of his body coming alive wildly, responding with sheer virility and vitality of life.

"Sword Arts… Combined with… The War Angel's battle ethos…" his eyes opened slightly and the illusory image of a black katana could be seen spinning in his pupils, flas.h.i.+ng with dark-violet energies.

"Both of these can be considered as the Physical Path… The path of combat, the Martial Path…" his eyes flashed with multi-coloured lights as he spoke these words. Then the brown-green glow in the atmosphere around him suddenly rushed to flow into the sword in his eyes.

The sword greedily drank up all the pulsing glows of brown-green energy and abruptly stopped spinning. However, despite the sword growing completely still, instead of looking calm, it seemed that the sword were a volcano at the verge of eruption.

The katana was still black but was now tinged with the slightest green-brown aura of life �� a blade that seemed to s.h.i.+mmer ever so slightly, like a wild horse about to burst forth in power.

Satisfied with the merging of these paths, Lars could feel the cells of his body advancing once more.

If before, his physique had been at the peak-Legendary state, with this growth, he had already crossed the early-Myth realm – and the activation of his cells was still continuing.

These phenomena continued as his mind transitioned to the other facets of his self, combining with each additional unconscious display of might.

"Now, the path of Light of the Sun…"