Chapter 100: Chapter 96: What the Hell (4K)
"My Lady Rose... please spare... forgive... me,"
"I have brought... a... sacrifice..."
But the goddess paid no heed to such pleas, and this direct outburst of divine wrath, this ’sacrificial’ culling, continued to rapidly spread outward.
One by one, Drow trying to escape were immobilized on the spot, like small tomatoes crushed in a juicer, their bodies twisting as they sprayed out geysers of blood.
As this misfortune was about to reach her, Alianna hesitated no longer, lifting the Alchemy Dagger in a Shadow Swirling Slash.
Almost simultaneously, she sliced through the webs that bound Attilicia’s limbs.
Just as she was about to help up this individual, possibly a Silver Dragon, and leap from the towering Spider Temple, the fellow, who moments ago had been suicidal, suddenly sprang to his feet. He then dashed headlong toward the sea of fire outside the domain of the Spider Queen’s divine power.
Is this fellow really seeking death?!!
Alianna was utterly astounded.
But just as the ’sacrifice’ was about to leap out of the Temple’s bounds, a dreadfully cold divine power immobilized him in mid-air.
Not just Attilicia, but also Alianna, who had dared to let him escape.
It’s over!
A chill ran down Alianna’s spine.
However, fortunately or unfortunately, the Spider Queen did not seem to take her betrayal to heart at all.
After all, for a follower of Her—who had once betrayed Corellon and the whole of the High Elves—weren’t chaos and betrayal simply par for the course?
"Hmm? It’s actually a Silver Dragon disguised as a Drow."
As Matron Flavia had predicted before her demise, a Silver Dragon’s Shape Manipulation could not be hidden from a divine gaze.
Rose’s fragment of divine consciousness, descended upon the world, instantly revealed the ’Drow’s’ true nature as a Silver Dragon. Then, in a display of her divine Pride, she reverted him to his original form.
Thus, a six-meter-long young Silver Dragon appeared within the Spider Temple.
Then, something happened that neither the Spider Queen, Rose, nor the Chromatic Dragon Queen, Tiamat—nor anyone else, for that matter—had anticipated:
Attilicia, the Silver Dragon, who had just been a puny figure a mere 1.48 meters tall, suddenly swelled proportionally to a length of six meters. His outstretched dragon claw unceremoniously jabbed through the boundary of the Temple and touched the raging Destruction Flame outside.
In itself, this might have been inconsequential.
But unfortunately, Attilicia, the Silver Dragon, had forgotten to close the alchemical Magic Circle linking to his Dragon’s Treasury in his demiplane! This oversight was due to the sudden collapse of his emotions after he had retrieved the Alchemy Dagger.
That was Attilicia, the Silver Dragon.
A top-tier master alchemist.
The owner of the magical patent for the Sobering Potion...
He had saved for the better part of a century.
A hoard that even the Crimson Calamity Pafila could not exhaust, treasure that filled more than half a demiplane!
This young Silver Dragon was actually even richer than Pafila, the legendary Red Dragon!!!
In an instant, both goddesses held their breath; time itself seemed to still for a moment. Then, almost simultaneously, they reacted and sprang into action.
But Attilicia’s dragon claw had, unfortunately, already reached out a little too far.
And so, they watched as the Destruction Flame outside the Temple, which had been dying down, almost powerless and nearing its ’ebb tide,’ suddenly burst into an insane blaze, much like its master.
It transformed instantly into a fiery vortex, siphoning everything in its path.
Then, all the Drow fortunate enough to witness this spectacle saw a mountainous hoard of gold and silver coins, expensive Alchemical Tools, and all manner of rare Magical Items and luxurious collectibles being sucked from the Silver Dragon’s faintly glowing claw into the fire tornado.
Though no Drow had ever confronted the Chromatic Dragon Queen face-to-face, they now unerringly sensed—as if across the planes—that the legendary Tiamat was, at this very moment, looking insanely delighted, almost bursting with laughter.
In stark contrast, as the treasure was unleashed like floodwaters and sucked into the vortex, it overwhelmed the divine power the Spider Queen could manifest—almost like an aphrodisiac. The glow of the entire Spider Temple began to flicker precariously.
"AH!!!" All the Drow in the Spider Temple cried out in agony as one. Their goddess was torturing them, desperately wringing out all their pain, sorrow, hatred, and Despair to maintain the increasingly difficult link to her divine power.
But soon, one voice, even more fraught with pain, sorrow, hatred, and Despair, drowned out all others:
"AAAAAARGH!!!" Attilicia, the Silver Dragon who had so desperately sought death just moments before, finally realized what was happening.
His lifetime’s hoard was being plundered!
And by none other than Tiamat, the Chromatic Dragon Queen—one of the two beings he loathed most!
This was something even Pafila had never managed to do to him!
To plunder a dragon’s treasure!
This was more unbearable than death itself!
Suddenly, Attilicia didn’t want to die anymore!
Not only did he not want to die, but he also struggled frantically, his large rear comically sticking out, as he tried to pull back his extended claw.
"NO!!!"
"My money, money, money, AAAAAARGH!!!"
He cried out even more miserably and piercingly than David had under a somewhat similar predicament.
But treasure that Tiamat had set her sights on was not to be relinquished so easily.
With a resounding BOOM—