Chapter 966: Chapter 965: Those Missed Opportunities

What drew the Voyager from the depths of the universe to this planet was the so‑called "disordered background pulse"—this was very likely a technical term that only the Voyager themselves truly understood, but as for its source, Gawain quickly worked it out.

It was the large‑scale descent of gods upon this planet, and the wars and conflicts that followed.

"When they arrived at this planet, the entire world was already almost beyond salvation. Bloodthirsty gods, dragging along fanatical churches, had turned the whole planet into a colossal Sacrificial Grounds, and ordinary people in that Sacrificial Grounds were like livestock waiting to be slaughtered. Talronde seemed to be the only ’pure land’, yet even there they could only protect themselves by sealing their borders and solidifying their gods.

"Faced with such a situation, the Voyager chose the most drastic means of intervention... to ’dismantle’ the god‑system structure on this planet that had already run out of control."

The Dragon God slightly shook Her head as She spoke.

"Even I know very little about the Voyager, so I do not know what means they adopt when facing different circumstances on other planets, nor do I know whether they have other methods to guide a civilization to decouple from the ’God’s shackles’. I only know that on this planet, they used the most effective method... direct assault.

"In those days, because the Goddess of the Night frequently interfered with the real world, Divine Power repeatedly pierced through the great barrier between the real world and the kingdom, which caused the boundary between the gods’ world and the mortals’ world to blur. All across the skies of the planet there were ’Deep Realm hollows’ and rifts that had not fully closed, and the Voyager launched fierce assaults against all kingdoms through these passages.

"Even to this day, many scenes from that time still remain in my memory... It was a terrible war. The impression the Voyager left on me, apart from power, was decisiveness and coldness. As though carrying out some lofty mission, they swiftly destroyed every existence on this planet that claimed to be a ’God’, and they left a great number of monitoring and protective facilities on this planet—they concealed those facilities, or set them up far from where civilizations lived. At first, we thought they were preparing to completely occupy this planet, yet they did not... after they had done all that, they left without the slightest attachment.

"Leaving with them were the various races that had survived on this planet at the time, their populations already sharply reduced—everyone except the dragons of Talronde."

The Dragon God paused here for a moment, and Gawain immediately asked, "They also did not strike at the Goddess of the Night of the Dragonkin... the reason is what you mentioned before, that the Dragonkin and their Goddess of the Night were already ’bound together’, leaving them no way to intervene?"

"...In truth, that is only our own conjecture," after two seconds of silence, the Dragon God finally spoke softly, "the Voyager left no explanation. Perhaps they refrained from acting because they took into account the solid bond between the Dragonkin and the Goddess of the Night, or perhaps, for some reason, they judged that the Dragonkin were not qualified to join their ’Fleet’, or else... perhaps they only eliminate those gods who have fallen into madness or developed bloodthirsty tendencies, and in their judgment, the Dragonkin of Talronde were targets ’requiring no intervention’.

"But whatever the reason, the result was the same...

"The Voyager departed, leaving the dragons behind. The civilization of Talronde was left on this already ravaged planet, and the Dragonkin became the only ’rulers’ of this world at that time—like a King locked upon His throne, lonely and pitiful, gazing upon this wasteland. One million eight hundred and seventy thousand years have passed. What the Dragonkin have gained and what they have lost... can no longer be clearly told."

This ancient history slowly lifted its mysterious veil before Gawain under the Dragon God’s narration; yet that excessively long span of time had already left countless wind‑eroded scars upon history, and the truth of those days had thus become blurred. Therefore, even after hearing so much, doubts still lingered in Gawain’s heart: about the Voyager, about the Goddess of the Night of the Dragonkin, about that long‑lost primeval age...

He believed there must be still more details hidden in that lost history, more details that could explain the Voyager and the current state of the Dragonkin, but the Dragon God had not told him—perhaps She deliberately concealed them for some reason, or perhaps even this ancient God did not know all the details.

After all, She was not entirely the "Goddess of the Night" of the Dragonkin, but only a... stitched‑together successor that came into being after the great upheaval among the Goddess of the Night.

After a long time, Gawain broke the silence again: "Then that battlefield within the Eternal Storm..."

"That was later, many years after the Voyager left," the Dragon God said calmly. "After the Voyager departed, Talronde underwent a brief period of chaos and bewilderment, but the Dragonkin still had to survive, even though the entire world was already ravaged... They stepped out from behind the closed door, and like scavengers, they began to explore this abandoned planet. They found a great many ruins, and they also found a few small Sanctuaries that seemed to have been built by those who were unwilling to leave the planet, yet under the harsh conditions of that time, not a single one of those Sanctuaries survived...

"Many more years passed after that, and the world remained a wasteland. The dragons temporarily abandoned the search for life in other parts of the world and instead devoted all their energy to the development of Talronde itself. The appearance of the Voyager seemed to open a window for the Dragonkin—a window leading to... the world outside. It stirred the exploratory and inquisitive spirit of many dragons, letting..."

Gawain heard the howling and roaring outside the royal temple suddenly grow violent again, even more violent than at the earlier peak. He could not help but rise slightly from his seat, wanting to see what was happening outside the royal temple Hall, but the Dragon God’s voice interrupted his movement: "Pay it no mind, it is only... the sound of storms."

Gawain looked toward Her and saw eyes as deep as an abyss. He then sat down again, exhaled softly, and spoke on behalf of the Dragon God, "Under the drive of their exploring hearts and curiosity, the dragons developed at a tremendous pace, yet they encountered the backlash of the God’s shackles. Because they failed in time to summarize the patterns of the chains and failed to find a way to break free, this ultimately led to that war in the depths of the Eternal Storm."

The Dragon God gently nodded.

The howling and roaring outside the royal temple eased slightly.

"You mentioned just now that the Voyager took away most of the survivors on this planet, aside from the Dragonkin?" Listening to the sounds outside the royal temple, Gawain fixed his gaze on Enya. "Why did they do that?"

"To be honest, the Dragonkin have spent many years speculating about the Voyager’s motives in doing so—ranging from lofty purposes to sinister plots—but no reliable logic can explain their motives... In the few limited contacts between the Dragonkin and the Voyager, the latter never spoke much about their home planet and traditions, nor did they explain in detail the purpose of their long voyage—also called the ’Voyager Expedition’. It seems they have been sailing through the universe for hundreds of thousands of years, perhaps even longer, and that more than one fleet of theirs roams among the stars. They have left traces upon many planets, yet once they depart from a planet, they almost never return...

"As for taking survivors away from planets... they appear to have done similar things more than once. They possess a vast ’Fleet’, and deep within that Fleet, tightly protected by Voyager warships, there are many races who joined during the course of the ’Voyager Expedition’. Some are refugees from other planets, some are civilizations that voluntarily joined the Fleet, and some boarded merely for a casual journey with the wind... It is said that the oldest members of the Fleet have sailed with the Voyager for tens of thousands of years, but unfortunately, the Dragonkin had no chance to meet those ’passengers’ from foreign lands—they were then stationed in space, responsible for constructing the still‑unfinished ’Firmament’, and did not land on this planet."

The Dragon God’s gentle, low voice went on and on; Her gaze seemed to drift farther and farther away, Her eyes turning vacant—perhaps She had sunk into those ancient memories, perhaps She was feeling sorrow for what the Dragonkin once missed, or perhaps She was simply thinking, in Her identity as a "God", about the future of races and civilizations. Whatever the reason, Gawain did not interrupt Her.

Because Gawain himself had also immersed in a strange train of thought, immersed in a trembling wonder about the Star Sea and the mysteries of the world that he had never imagined.

This world... no, this universe, is not silent. Even with the cyclical threat of the chaotic wave, even with the rule‑bound shackles of the gods, among the glittering stars, the fire of civilization still drifts.

The vast Voyager Fleet, civilizations from other planets, expeditions through the Star Sea... When he had awakened in an ancient tomb, facing a fallen Magic "Middle Ages", he could not possibly have imagined that he would one day hear such concepts in this world, yet now, these things were spread out before his eyes, unfolded before him in the form of history.

The most incredible thing was that the "person" telling all this... was actually a "God".

The journey to Talronde has not been in vain.

Amid this faint undercurrent of exhilaration, Gawain finally could not help breaking the silence: "The Voyager really will never come back?"

"The Dragonkin have waited for over a million years," Enya said calmly. "The Voyager never returned... The things they left among the stars have all been running on automatic, and in that automatic running they gradually decayed. Such things may already have happened more than once on other planets— I think the Voyager did not leave those things in order to one day come back and take over this inconspicuous little rocky sphere. Though I too do not know why they left those facilities, they probably truly will not return again."

A sudden sense of desolate loss rose in Gawain’s heart.

He seemed to understand why the Dragonkin of old had carried out that plan to cultivate the "Inversion Tide," why they wished to use the Voyager’s legacy to forge another powerful mortal civilization.

Yet some things... once missed are truly missed; blind yet ineffectual "remedial" measures are, in the end, all in vain.

The Dragon God looked at him. After a while, She showed a faint smile: "Do you long for the stars, Wanderer from Outer Realm?"

"For many years in the past, I’ve always been among the stars," Gawain said with a hint of sigh. "To me, this planet... is indeed not spacious enough."

"Is that so..." The Dragon God replied noncommittally, then suddenly let out a long breath and slowly stood up. "It has truly been a pleasant conversation... Let us end here, Wanderer from Outer Realm; it is already late."

"Indeed, it seems we’ve been talking for quite a while," Gawain also stood up. He took out the mechanical watch in his pocket and glanced at it, then looked toward the royal temple Hall’s door, but before he stepped away, he suddenly halted again, his gaze returning to the Dragon God. "Right, if you don’t mind— I have one more question."

"Please."

"The black trap... the black trap that causes many civilizations to suddenly perish after reaching their peak—what is it, exactly?"

The Dragon God fell silent for a few seconds, then slowly said, "Do you still remember that battlefield deep within the Eternal Storm?"

Gawain nodded. "Of course I remember."

After a brief quiet, the Dragon God’s voice, gentle yet carrying a trace of solemnity, entered Gawain’s ears: "At the final moment, when the Goddess of the Night fused into one and the shackles completely solidified, the Dragonkin chose to abandon freedom. They lowered their heads and became my nourishment and slaves— thus they halted at the edge of the black trap, yet already had one foot caught within it.

"And those who refused to bow would face their end.

"They must confront the invincible ’God of Gods,’ have the faith power accumulated by their civilization over thousands and tens of thousands of years annihilated, and perish together with all the culture, legends, myths, and reverence created by their own civilization. As strong as a civilization is, so strong are its gods, and the ’Civilization Extinction Burst’ born from the collision of the two... is the black trap."

Gawain’s eyes widened. When the answer he had pondered over for so long finally rushed at him head-on, he almost held his breath; only when his heart began pounding did he hurriedly speak, his tone growing rapid: "Wait, the ’third story’ you left out earlier—does it mean there is still a..."

"You just said you had ’one’ question," the Dragon God interrupted Gawain. Her tone remained gentle, her expression somewhere between a smile and not a smile. "This is already the second."

Gawain choked for a moment. He wanted to speak again, yet the God before his eyes silently shook Her head at him.

A moment later, Gawain exhaled. "All right, I understand."

He then took a step back. "Thank you for your hospitality, and for your patient answers. This truly has been a pleasant conversation. I think I should be going; my friends are still waiting."

"As you wish," the Dragon God nodded with grace. "Heragor is right outside the door; he will escort you back."

Gawain inclined his head slightly in thanks, then turned around and strode toward the exit of the royal temple Hall.

He could feel a gaze falling upon his back, resting there the whole time, never withdrawn.

At the door of the royal temple Hall, that powerful Dragon Priest with pale-golden hair and a stern face was indeed still waiting in the corridor, as though he had not taken a single step away.

He had once been a certain leader of the Dragonkin.

He had once been a warrior who rose up in rebellion against the gods.

He had once held in his grasp the legacy left by the Voyager; perhaps... he too had once longed for the stars.

"Hello, high-ranked Priest."

"Guest, shall I escort you back?"

"Thank you, and sorry to trouble you."

"Think nothing of it."

If you find any errors ( broken links, non-standard content, etc.. ), Please let us know < report chapter > so we can fix it as soon as possible.