Chapter 1614: Training [1]

There was no need to overexplain what happened then.

Damien had already done something like this a few times.

The young Liqua Clan dragons had been sent to investigate what everyone thought was a treasure. This excursion was a learning experience for them. They weren't equipped to deal with someone of Damien's caliber in the slightest.

As such, they couldn't put up a shred of resistance as he toyed with their existences. No, they didn't even realize they were being manipulated.

The five of them fell unconscious. Their memories changed drastically as an experience they never had became real, and their environment followed suit. A dungeon that "didn't exist" was born in the empty plain, entrenched in the ground and overgrown as if it had been there since the beginning of time.

Damien had their memories already. He could tell why they were here, and since his goal was to throw the Holy Clans off rather than confront them, he made serious efforts to make everything believable.

It was unfortunate that he had to use the more annoying solution, but what could he do? This wasn't his story, but August's. He couldn't act as if he was doing all of this alone.

Nevertheless, he pulled some treasures from his spatial storage and created a few more, imbuing them all with the aura of the Azure Dragon and aging them to match the age of the tomb.

After planting them on the five young dragons, Damien threw them into the dungeon and left them there to wake up whenever they were ready.

Or, when the mechanisms of the dungeon decided to wake them up with a deadly morning alarm bell.

Whatever the case was, Damien finished as quickly and efficiently as possible before returning to August.

He now had some new information on not only the Liqua Clan, but also the heir wars that were approaching.

And both of those things would be very helpful for August's future training.

***

How would the Liqua Clan feel when they realized that their geniuses had been manhandled so easily?

Well, that depended on if they even discovered that it happened.

There were no flaws in the memories and treasures Damien left with those geniuses, so by the time they returned to their clan, nobody would be able to tell that something strange happened.

The lack of time passing between their departure and return would probably be the main issue, but Damien made sure to age the dragons up by a few years to make it seem like they'd been stuck in a time dilation, which would be corroborated by their memories.

It really was a perfect deception.

And for Damien, it was quite convenient.

'The Azure Dragon's memories aren't unlocking in the most efficient way.'

Damien had learned a lot about that senior in the time he'd spent raising August. Things about his life and morals were the most common revelations, but the ones that concerned August were hidden much deeper in the recesses of Damien's mind, almost refusing to come out.

It was the same with the foundational techniques of the Azure Dragon Clan.

Damien was mainly receiving memories from most recent to least. As such, he knew a lot of Qinglong's most powerful techniques and abilities, but since he wasn't aware of the process, he would have to experiment with and learn an entirely different discipline to interpret it all and make it something August could comprehend.

Unfortunately, that took time. Damien was already working on it, but he would need another year or two to become proficient enough to teach someone.

There was a far easier solution to the problem, and the Liqua Clan delivered it to his doorstep.

'It was even more convenient since they were young geniuses. They'd pretty much spent their whole lives comprehending the foundational techniques of the clan and observing examples of their end goal.'

With those memories at his disposal, Damien had the starting point of the Liqua Clan and the ending point of the true Azure Dragon Clan. Trying to figure out how to get from "Point A" to "Point B" was far, far easier than what he'd been doing before.

In fact, with a single week and some dilated time, Damien was able to fully reconstruct the Azure Dragon's techniques.

'That feels like I'm downplaying my efforts.'

It wasn't arrogant in the slightest to say that he'd taken those techniques and improved them beyond what they'd ever been in the past. And more importantly, he'd tailored them for August's use.

'With this, we can start for real.'

Damien didn't need to stall anymore.

And with August's practically insane desire to learn...

'This is going to be fun.'

***

Damien's encounter with the Liqua Clan took no more than half an hour to reach an end. He went back home before August could notice that he was gone.

After the week he spent creating the new Azure Dragon Manual, Damien took August back to Green Green, which had now been renamed the "Viridea Mountain" for the sake of future explorers and cartographers, to start his real training.

Dragons were special creatures. Their growth system was more like "cultivation" than any other species, but they still needed to abide by the system's mandates to grow when they were young.

Eventually, training alone would allow August's power to rise at monstrous rates, but for now...

'If he wants to get stronger, then he has to learn how to kill.'

Damien couldn't get over the discomfort in his heart, but there was nothing he could do.

He had already told August honestly the night before.

"You'll have to do heart-wrenching things for power."

But August didn't flinch.

His emotional acuity was still steadily growing, but his intelligence gave him a more practical view of life than others at his age.

He had already presumed that he would need to lose his innocence if he wanted to enter the world that his father and others resided in.

And his thoughts could be considered both mature and immature depending on the lens they were viewed through.

"Dad, I have to hunt, right?"

He could instinctively feel it. His awakened draconic instincts craved blood.

"Yes, and not just animals. You might have to hunt people when you're an adult, and even dragons if the situation arises."

Damien never lied to August. He tried to sugarcoat his words most of the time, but it didn't feel right in the moment.

And while the prospect did strike fear in his heart, August answered by the moral code that Damien had taught him to live by.

"Dad, I'm not scared to hunt."

"Why is that?"

"Because I'll never hunt unless I have to."

August was firm in his words.

"If someone wants to hurt me or Dad, or if I need to hunt for a necessary cause, then I won't feel bad. If hunting makes me feel bad, then I won't do it."

It was quite a rudimentary way to say it, but it was more than enough.

August was already subconsciously distinguishing between enemies and allies. He was separating himself so that all of his good qualities would only be shown to those who deserved them, while those who stood against him would see a completely different face.

It was a good mentality for a practitioner.

'But for some reason, I can't shake the bitter feeling in my heart.'

Damien realized that his son was growing up far too fast for his liking.

But...there was really nothing he could do about it.

Such was their unfortunate fate, such was the consequence of a lack of time.

Since it was Damien's fault that time had been constrained so wildly, he didn't have the right to complain.

However, that didn't change the feelings he hid deep inside of his heart.