Valerian, The Legendary

206 What Happened Here?

Valerian was lurking in the darkness of the forest when he felt a little chill. The young man did not know what it was, but a bad premonition suddenly overwhelmed him. In his mind, an ethereal voice sounded, “Send them away.”

The voice did not make it clear whom to send away, but Valerian could understand that it was intended for the shadow mages with him. The young prince also recognized this voice, the last time it sounded was when he was dealing with the Berserkers in Tenax city.

He did not wish to delay, and taking out his soul communication bead, he left a message for Ignis, “Call back the mages, something is not right, do not send people to investigate, I will deal with it, do not worry, but hurry up.”

Ignis reacted quickly and sent out the message. Although the mages did not understand, they did not have much of a choice, the command was given by their commander. Disobedience was not a choice.

Valerian received word from Ignis that the mage had left. Then he let go of his breath, and noticed that his body was soaked in sweat. There was wind blowing in the forest, yet he was sweating as if he had been standing under the summer sun.

Soon, he began to lose his sense of balance, and even his vision began to blur. Valerian sat down in front of a tree and leaned against it. He said in his mind, “Who are you?”

A chuckle sounded in his mind, followed by a message, “Me? I am You.”

Valerian’s consciousness blurred as soon as this sentence ended, and he didn’t have time to react.

...

.....

Inside the forest, a few Valkyrian soldiers were patrolling the region. Suddenly, the leading soldier stopped in his tracks. He said, “Look over there, what is that?”

The patrol team narrowed their gazes at a point under the tree. They all saw a vague figure clad in black clothes. The leader neared the figure, and the dim moonlight reflected on the silver surface. The troop raised his spear, and with the end of the shaft, he poked the figure.

A person behind him asked, “What is it?”

The soldier replied, “I don’t know, it seems to be a human statue.”

The team got excited, and someone asked, “What is it made of?”

The wind blew, and the clothes fluttered. The soldier with the spear spotted a silver glint coming from under the clothes and said, “I think it is made of silver.”

The patrol team thought they had stumbled over a treasure. They rushed forward quickly and surrounded the so-called silver statue. A younger soldier said, “Leader, I say that we break this statue into pieces and take it away. If it is discovered by other teams, we will be at a loss.”

The leader nodded and said, “You are smart, come, let us break it. Brothers, we are going to be rich.”

The soldiers all exchanged glances and laughed when suddenly they heard a strange clicking sound. They looked around, and the younger one, who suggested the method of looting the statue, froze and said with a stammer, “The... the statue.”

The soldiers all looked at the statue, but suddenly the statue raised his head and spoke, in a shallow tone, “Unfortunately, you cannot be rich.”

The statue stood up, issuing crackling sounds, and continued, “You will be all dead.”

The next moment, the statue raised his hand and swung it at the nearest soldier. The next thing the people noticed was a head flying through the air and landing with a dull thud on the ground.

The statue was none other than Valerian, and his hands had turned into dragon claws. His body was covered with silver dragon scales. His eyes had turned into vertical splits. He was akin to a humanoid dragon.

Valerian opened his mouth and said, “Umm, still weak.”

The soldiers cast him a shocked glance, while they thought he was calling them weak, the boy was calling himself weak. Valerian turned his head to look at the soldiers and revealed an eerie smile. Then his figure flashed, and the forest echoed with screams.

The entire chaos was settled in a few moments. Valerian killed the people and looked at his claws smeared with crimson blood. He stretched his body and looked to his right and said, “Let’s go have some fun.”

He vanished from his place and shuttled through the woods. The boy was very agile, and his actions were very silent. Suddenly, he located a huge camp. This distance was far from the city wall. Valerian smiled and moved ahead without bothering to conceal himself at all.

The soldiers were all alert, they had suffered a defeat, and did not wish to suffer a surprise attack. They spotted a person approaching and immediately reacted, “Who goes there?”

Valerian did not reply, but the alert soldiers picked up the horns tied to his waist and blew hard into them. The sound of the horns alerted the entire camp. The soldiers moved out to see what was going on.

The grandmasters also did not take it easy, they all jumped into action. However, Valerian did not wish to give them the chance to regroup and react. He moved and began to kill the people in his sight.

There was no reasoning behind why he was so bloodthirsty as soon as he transformed into this form. However, the visual impact was indeed strong. Corpses rained down on him everywhere he went; none of the bodies were complete; they were all missing heads or limbs.

Valerian was like a grim reaper, he was killing people without any remorse in his gaze. Usually Valerian avoids killing, but this form of it was simply too gory. The soldiers in his way were all hopeless. They did not stand a chance. The grandmasters could not stand on the sidelines to watch this slaughter, and they also jumped into the fray, however, Valerian was unstoppable, he used the decay magic inside his body to deal with the grandmasters.

One touch was all it took to have the people freeze and gradually turn to ashes. The Valkyrian army was scared beyond their wits. This monster was something they had never seen or come across. A scared yet calm grandmaster wanted to act when they heard loud neighing sounds.

The grandmaster turned around, and he saw a huge number of horses running over to them. He shouted, “Ave! Lupus Deus.”

The leader of the riders yelled back the same phrase. The identities were verified, the incoming party belonged to Valkyrians as well. The phrase The grandmaster yelled, “We need support, hurry.”

The people did not know what made this guy so freaked out, but when they rushed over, they realized that things were far from simple. The Valkyrians all had keen senses, they could smell the blood in the air. The leader said, “Stop. Throw out a light flame.”

The soldier behind him reacted quickly, throwing a flame torch high into the sky. The rest of the torchbearers also did the same, and a dozen torches were thrown up.

The scenery in front of them chilled their blood in their veins. The people did not expect to walk into a slaughterhouse. The grandmaster who called for help was now being held in Valerian’s clutches. The person was shivering like a dry leaf against the storm.

Valerian looked no different than a beast, and the leader of the rider squad said, “Turn back, hurry, we do not wish to die uselessly.”

The squad did not wish to die, they were scared, and it was not without reason. They saw thousands of their comrades lying down in their own puddles of blood. It was like a mass grave. They knew that this entity could not be taken down by them, so they decided to run away. If they all ran away, who would tell the king about it?

However, it was all just a fantasy. The rider squad tried to control the horses, but the mounts did not turn around. They used different mounts than the Wraiths; these horses were war horses, a low-level magical beast.

The quality was compromised to meet the quantity, how can these lowly creatures keep up with the bloodline suppression of a dragon? Valerian dropped the husk of the grandmaster on the ground, and it turned into a puddle of ash with deformed body parts.

Then he walked over to the anxious rider squad. The people did not even find him approaching, they only knew about it when they heard screams echoing. The massacre continued until the sun came up.

None of the soldiers from the two troops of the Valkyrian army survived, and the culprit behind this has since lost consciousness after the job was done. The smile on his face was so blissful, as if he were in paradise.

Ignis had commandeered a search team himself and came to find his younger brother, but when he found him, he wished that he had not come here. Amidst the dunes of mutilated corpses lay a young man, stained with blood all over himself. as if sleeping in the lap of his mother. The scene was not for the faint of heart.

None of the soldiers dared go and check if the fourth prince was alive or not. Ignis gulped and mustered his courage to walk over and place his hand on Valerian’s neck to check his pulse, but the next moment, the silver-haired boy opened his eyes, and his free hand grabbed the neck of the first prince. Everyone froze when Ignis chokingly said, “Val, it’s me.”

Valerian woke up completely and let go of the neck. He saw the purple face of the first prince and then asked innocently, “What are you doing here? What happened?”

Ignis cast a gaze of disbelief and said, “Look around you, and tell me what happened here.”