Damien was able to move again not too long after the Pegasus picked him up, but he didn't have to let that be known.
He acted paralyzed and enjoyed his free ride to the peak of the mountain, grinning happily to himself.
'This beast is arrogant, but its fur is damn soft…' he thought.
'But more importantly, this means a fast track to the mission target. I only had a strategy to deal with one of them. It would've been bad if we had to continue so suddenly without finding other means.'
Damien and the girls absolutely would've died if they couldn't take time to prepare for a Thunder Demon Crow or Pegasus raid.
'And my guess was right. It looks like that Pegasus is much stronger than the other two.'
Idle thoughts swam through his mind for several minutes as the journey continued. Before he knew it, the Pegasus had touched ground again.
"Dismount me this instant. Do not think you can keep pretending," the beast said with disdain.
Damien rolled his eyes and hopped off its back.
"Don't act so hard while admitting that you let me ride you all the way here while knowing I could've walked."
"That was merely to save time. Humans are excruciatingly slow creatures."
"I can literally teleport."
"And I do not care. Cease your meaningless words and wait for my master's arrival."
Damien smirked at the Pegasus' frustrated expression. It was clear he'd won this bout.
"Your master is the Cloud Emperor?" He asked.
"You do not have the right to refer to the great lord by his title."
"Stop being so edgy and just answer the question."
"If you maintain this attitude when facing my master, you will undoubtedly die."
"Your master is a Demigod. He doesn't have the right to kill me."
The Pegasus' gaze turned hostile.
"This is not your outer world. In this world, your laws cannot rule," it stated heavily, making sure its words bore into Damien's soul.
But the man only shook his head.
"It seems you don't know enough about your master."
"You…!"
Damien turned his eyes to the sky, ignoring the fuming creature to his side.
"You've been here this whole time, haven't you? Why don't you come out and talk?"
His words were directed at nothing in particular, but they received a response all the same.
"I am surprised you could detect me."
It didn't come from the sky.
Rather, it came from the mountain itself.
The very peak they were standing on rumbled and shifted, revealing itself as the massive body of a slumbering beast!
It was a truly massive earth dragon, yet it had wings uncharacteristic of its species.
Its long neck protruded from the mountainside, no longer hidden away, and it turned its eyes towards Damien and the Pegasus.
"Child, I have long known you were special, but it now appears I have underestimated you," it said, its voice deep and rumbling through the air like a true mountain's voice.
Damien frowned.
The creature was definitely impressive. It's strength was greater than any enemy he'd seen in this place, and even stronger than his original level.
Yet…
"It's not you."
This dragon was not the one he was looking for.
"…?"
The beast's eyes narrowed, glaring at Damien.
"It is not me?"
"I didn't come here to talk to the Cloud Emperor."
"Human, you dare?!"
The Pegasus flared up in rage at his words, flourishing its aura to suppress the disrespectful outsider.
Damien responded with the Void, wrapping his body in a film of its aura and dissipating the surrounding suppression.
The earth dragon's eyes widened.
The Pegasus gritted its teeth and tried to push harder, but Damien ignored it.
"I didn't come here to say anything the Cloud Emperor needs to hear. Face me as your true self. This should be enough convincing, right?"
"Hmm…"
The dragon's maw curved into a strange smile.
"I wonder…can you handle the consequences of your words?"
"If I couldn't handle it, I wouldn't have come."
The dragon's smile widened.
"Pegasus, enough."
Its words carried mana of their own, completely dispelling the Pegasus' aura.
"I will give you the chance to achieve your wish, however, whether or not you can survive is up to you."
Damien's expression turned dignified.
He nodded, his gaze directly clashing against the dragon's.
"Come."
"Very well!"
The dragon slowly raised its head to the heavens above and opened its giant maw.
A thunderous roar, more domineering than even the Heavenly Law itself, resonated through the Severed World.
It was deafening and the dragon pressure spread through it was enough to directly blow lesser creatures to shreds, but there was a clear line of reason within it.
An archaic language, almost extinct to the modern world, was being spoken.
[Traverser…]
[…chase the stars…]
[…to the Realm of Dreams.]
VOOOOOOOM!
A massive flux of mana erupted.
Everything went white.
The world around Damien faded away. He felt the familiar sensation of spatial turbulence enveloping his figure.
And…
Clang!
Clang!
Clang!
It was audible.
The sound of shackles shattering in the storm.
Everything once lost was returned. Strength filled Damien's body and soul. He felt like he could rank up right here and now, but there was something still holding him back.
A feeling deep in his chest to not act rashly.
He reveled in the feeling of self he felt, but he realized one thing.
'This is the state I was in before I came to the Severed World, not the state I'll be in when I leave.'
The Blessing of Foundation, Universal Law, and many other gains he made in the sub-universe were hidden behind a new set of shackles.
It was evident that he hadn't been transported out of the hidden realm.
BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOM!
A massive explosion broke him out of his thoughts.
Wind brushed against his face. Bright sunlight blinded his eyes.
When his senses came to reality, he was high in the sky of a new world, above a layer of clouds that separated him from the world's surface.
Naturally, he was falling, but he wasn't in a hurry to stabilize himself.
'That explosion…'
It came from very far away, but the air around Damien was shaking.
'The shockwave hasn't died down, and…'
He frowned, circulating spatial mana through his body.
One With Dimension activated, and Damien sunk into the folds of reality, deeper than the surface layer of space that maintained the realm's stability.
In the next second, everything started quaking.
WHOOOOOOOOOOOOOSH!
A heavy rush of wind laced with apocalyptic mana tore through the atmosphere and destroyed everything; from the clouds to the earth, from the air to space itself.
Damien rapidly set up layers upon layers of Dimensional Cages and built an isolated plane, separating himself just in time to avoid the mana wave ripping through the fabric of reality itself!
His expression was blank as he gazed into the scene outside.
Everything was destroyed.
The world he'd been transported to less than 5 seconds ago was nothing more than an empty hole in the void.
But a miracle unfolded next.
From top to bottom, from the very building blocks of reality to the vitality of the earth, everything in the realm was restored to normalcy within the span of 10 seconds.
A certain term came to Damien's mind when he saw it.
"Impulsive Wave."
