GREED: ALL FOR WHAT?

His reign of terror continued until he finally met his match. It was the final fight. The final victor would be determined, and they would gain the help of the dragon spirit. The dragon standing in his way is another unstoppable dragonling like him. She has had as much success and victory as him. But only one of them could go further.

The permission to fight was given. Fourth lunged at her. Lightning erupted out of him, as if they were escaping a cage. There was a thunderclap as his domain was formed around him. The battle was on.

But then the world froze. Everything became still. Fourth was frozen in the air. Even the violent blue lightning around him wasn't spared.

Legion-8 was not surprised by the changes to the world. He has experienced this freezing several times. This is the moment in the ancestral trial where the objective will be revealed.

What he expected didn't happen, though.

A loud voice boomed in the frozen world like thunder. The voice was so loud that his powerful mind was shaken. He was further shaken by what the voice said.

The voice had asked him, "Who do you think will win this fight?"

Legion-8 was surprised. He looked around warily as he asked, "Who is that?"

He is not here in his physical body, so he doesn't have a physical presence. What he has here is just his mind. This has its advantages and disadvantages, but one of its advantages is that he is aware of everything going on around him in this world. Even so, he couldn't sense the person speaking at all.

Actually, no one should be speaking. Everyone should be frozen. That's what had always happened in the ancestral trial at this point.

The voice came again. It defied all common sense to speak again. "I am the one whose trial you're taking."

That didn't ease Legion-8's worries. That reply doesn't clear things up at all.

He muttered to himself warily, "This shouldn't be happening. There is something wrong here."

He was surprised further when the intruder showed itself. Two stars appeared in the trial space. The stars are bright and white, with red and blue lightning zipping across their surface. They were so bright that the frozen world lit up and turned into a white world.

Each star is an enormous thing. They seemed to fix the pressure of their existence on him, so he felt the weight of their presence in the tangible pressure on and around him.

This pressure at least made him understand what he was up against. But it didn't help with his surprise.

He asked in trepidation and fear, "How are you here?"

He knows that the dragons the imprint belongs to will be aware when their trail is being taken by their descendants. But they shouldn't be able to interfere in the trial at all. At least, that's the information he has gained from the many ancestral trials he has undergone.

The voice declared with irrefutable majesty. "I am everywhere I am. I am everything I was and will be. My imprint is me and is here, so I am here."

The world of the trial was fragmented because of the force of that declaration. Legion-8 felt as if a mountain was pressing down on his mind. These symptoms made him confirm who this entity must be.

He tried to look harmless as he asked, "What does a world god want with me? I doubt that I am worthy of your attention."

The voice chuckled and replied, "You are wrong. It has been almost a thousand Origin cycles since a dragon in the egg had a powerful enough soul to enter my imprint. That is enough to intrigue me. I was curious, so I came to see, and I wasn't disappointed. Your soul is too powerful for a dragonling. How did you become so strong without being hatched?"

Legion-8 cursed himself inwardly, "Me and my greediness."

He didn't have to take any trials, but he wanted to, and he didn't stop at one because of his greed. The rewards for passing a trial are the ancestral bestowal and talent. He doesn't care for the protection of the ancestral bestowal. What he wants at all costs is the talent of the dragon ancestor.

Theoretically, dragonlings can use the ancestral trials to trace their ancestors all the way back to the dragon king. The dragon king is the source of all their talents, so the talents of the dragon king can be accumulated if he passes the necessary trials, hence his greed.

He had to do this because his dragon heart could handle every dragon's affinity. So he wanted to have them all. His talent would be a waste otherwise, and Legion doesn't like waste.

All he has to do is find the ancestral trials of the talented dragons that he needs. He had to get those talents so that Soverick would be able to comprehend the laws they were granted access to for him. Then he will use cosmic energy to fuse the laws with his dragon heart.

He can do this because, unlike other dragons, his dragon heart is not fragile. It can take more than one law. In fact, it can take up to ten laws without the assistance of the dragon spirit. The laws fuse with his inner world as if he has infinite potential.

He is certain that this is because of the shard of power because his inner world only became infinite after the ordeal with the singularity of infinite possibilities, but it could also be that his powerful soul had a part to play in the development.

His strong soul definitely has a part to play in why he could take so many ancestral trails. It led him to this moment so far in the ancestry of dragons and finally attracted something he would rather not meet.

He thought to himself with a sigh, "This is oftentimes where greed leads to."

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A/N: I want to point out that Legion-8's situation had already been pointed out in the beginning of the previous volume. If I remember correctly, it was stated that he was participating in ancestral trials. So only the guess that he wasn't anyone of the dragonlings is partly correct.

What we have seen up to now is just a glance into the Tssandulighafan's past.