Neither Lex nor Fenrir were disturbed by the quaking, but all the Frigals in the room seemed to lose their souls. Cabinets shook, the walls creaked, and dust fell from the ceiling, but fortunately there was no destruction. The tremors from the explosion eventually vanished, but nobody in the room dared to move. It seemed like even the dying patients stopped dying for this duration, but in actuality they were just too frightened to release their pain-filled moans.
But nothing seemed to happen. The Dragons Might did not waver, and there were no massive repercussions, at least as far as Lex could tell. Slowly, the doctors began to move once again, as if testing if there would be a reaction. When nothing happened, they quickly started to tend to their patients again.
In that short, momentary pause, however, everyone was too occupied to notice that the assassin had left the stretcher he had been placed on, and moved through the crowd, somehow changing his attire as he did. Everyone other than the two specifically paying attention to him.
From the hospital the assassin continued, moving at a much faster pace. Lex did not know why he no longer used his invisibility, but considering that Lex had not encountered any other assassin this deep in the castle, perhaps it was not possible.
The longer he followed, the faster the assassin became, as if he was feeling anxious about something and running out of time. After nearly an hour passed, they once again crossed into a new layer of the castle, and suddenly the nouveau riche grandeur that filled every corner of the castle suddenly changed.
From the finest marble floors and walls lined with statues, the castle changed to look like it was a natural cave. There was no even flooring, no decoration and no signs that this was a part of a castle. The cave was also quite warm, by the planet's standards.
As he had completely run out of time, the assassin broke into a run without caring about alerting anyone with his actions. His destination, as it turned out, wasn't far. In a small, branching cave, a small group seemed to be waiting for the assassin. There were a few corpses tucked neatly atop one another, so as to be out of the way.
"You took too long!" one of the awaiting accomplices exclaimed angrily.
"It was worth it! I discovered something incredible. Those Icy abominations have made their way to the castle! While the forces of the noble families fight against the royal family on the west side, the main members of the royal family have gone to the north to fend off those monsters. The central chambers will be completely unattended! We have to move before others figure this out as well."
"Good job, that's valuable information. If that's the case, we don't need to waste time sneaking around. We'll recover the time lost, and then some. What about the King? Any news on the geezer?"
"No, but I think we should proceed as if he's still in the dragon's chamber."
"Based on this information, we can alter our plans a little. Disable all unnecessary treasures and conserve as much energy as possible. From here on out, our top priority should be resisting the Dragons Might. The more time we save, the longer we'll be able to resist the Might once we're inside the chamber, and each second in there is literally worth billions of soul stones!"
Everyone in the group nodded, and each of them seemed to disable an active technique. To Lex's great surprise, the previous group of Frigals began to change. What replaced them were twelve stocky dwarves!
Once all of them were ready, the leader of the group brought them to a formation he had drawn using the blood and organs taken from the nearby corpses. Completely unaffected by the scene, everyone got in the formation, Lex and Fenrir included. If it were anything else, Lex might have hesitated, but he had seen enough teleportation formations to recognize one, even if it was made from blood and guts.
The leader tried to activate the formation, but for some reason it wouldn't activate. He frowned, but did not waste too much time and took out a few more items from a bag and adjusted the formation a bit.
"Why is it using more energy than normal?" he muttered to himself, but did not ponder over it. They didn't have long to begin with.
The teleportation formation activated, and they disappeared. When they reappeared, they were inside what looked like a massive cavern that was actually quite hot, but Lex did not have the time or energy to focus on that.
The intensity of Dragons Might had increased so drastically that Lex felt like he had been punched in the gut. Even with all of Lex's incredible defenses, at this point he felt the influence of the aura as a physical force pressing him down and squishing him like a bug. Fenrir, too, was unable to escape the sudden change and for a few moments his abilities were interrupted.
As soon as he readjusted to the pressure, the pup reactivated its abilities, and turned to look at the dwarves. Fortunately for them, it seemed like the dwarves were taking the pressure much worse than both of them.
The dwarves were all in the Golden Core realm, with only the leader in the Nascent realm, so it made sense that they were not able to immediately recover. They noticed something amiss, but by the time they recovered enough to check, Lex and Fenrir had once again disappeared.
Lex used Harden and other defensive techniques, but nothing seemed to reduce the effects of the aura on him or Fenrir. The dwarves, who had some kind of treasure that reduced the effects of Dragons Might, did not seem much better off than them either.
"How the hell does anyone tolerate this pressure?" one of the dwarves asked, wiping some blood off from the corner of his mouth.
"Normal Frigals cannot," the leader explained, as he looked suspiciously in Lex and Fenrir's direction. "Only the royal family can tolerate this pressure. Why else do you think there is a royal family to begin with? Are they really royal? No, they're just glorified servants to the dragon. No one else can tolerate being this close to the dragon and still maintaining normal body function. Now let's go."
The dwarves followed their leader as he proceeded down one of the paths, seeming certain of his direction. For once, though, Lex and Fenrir did not follow them immediately. With so much pressure on them, it was hard for Fenrir to maintain his stealth, so they would need to resort to regular means: following them in the dark from a distance.
But while Lex was still capable of doing that, upon closer observation, it did not seem like Fenrir was in the condition to do so. It was not the pressure itself that was getting to Fenrir, but now that the strength of the Might had increased, so had Fenrir's aggressiveness.
His thoughts were getting clouded by the desire to lash out at anyone and everyone nearby as his blood rebelled against the overbearing might.
Ultimately, Lex had no choice but to send Fenrir back to the Inn. But, since the pup still felt reluctant to leave, Lex promised to summon him as soon as there was a fight. After all, there was no problem with him being aggressive if there were actual enemies to target.
Even without Fenrir, Lex was wearing his stealth suit made from Orion's scales, so he was sure as long as he kept his distance, he would not be discovered.
Unfortunately, Lex was not too familiar with the dwarven race, so he overlooked the fact that they had a unique racial trait that gave them an incredibly strong affinity with stones, ores, gems and minerals.
Although he was undetectable from this distance, the short while he and Fenrir lost their invisibility left detectable traces on the floor. The leader had picked them up, and though he did not let it show, he began preparing for the worst.
Once the group was far enough down their path that they were almost out of sight, Lex began following them. Even though his vision was restricted due to the darkness, Lex could still see a little.
Silently he followed the group, quite pleased with his decision to follow the assassin, when he felt a strange tremor. With a warning from his instincts Lex quickly leaped back, just in time to avoid a cave-in in the tunnel he was walking through.
He frowned. The cave-in happening right above him was too coincidental, so it was safe to say that he had been detected. He was not too surprised, though he wished that the group had fought him instead of running away. Then he could have interrogated them at least. With his guides separated from him, Lex had no choice but to once again rely on his instincts as he began randomly walking down another tunnel.
Simultaneously, he began to think about the dragon. The dwarves didn't seem worried about it at all, so were they the foreigners claiming the dragon was dead? If so, how could one explain the Dragons Might?