The journey deeper into the Dragon Lands was no longer a march; it was a descent into an active oven.

As the Iron-Horse Mark II rolled farther into the canyon, the temperature didn't rise linearly; it spiked with every mile they covered.

The air outside grew so oppressive that the red rocks themselves seemed to sweat, shimmering with a violent, mirage-like distortion that bent the light.

Inside the carriage, the atmosphere was stifling. The cooling runes etched into the chassis, which had been humming softly before, were now glowing a frantic white-hot. They buzzed angrily, fighting a losing battle against the ambient temperature of the domain they were trespassing in.

"It's… unnaturally hot," Lyra gasped, leaning her head back against the seat. She was fanning herself with a large leaf she had conjured from wind mana, but even the conjured air felt like the breath of a furnace.

"My skin feels like it's drying out. Even with the thermal regulators Brokk gave us… I feel like I'm cooking in my own armor."

Damien sat by the window, his eyes narrowed behind his sunglasses. He wasn't sweating as much as the others, thanks to his Celestial Life Physique constantly regulating his vitals, but he could feel the pressure.

It wasn't just heat. It was mana. Thick, heavy, suffocating Fire Mana that saturated every particle of dust in the air.

But as he looked out the window, he noticed something else. Something far more telling than the heat.

Silence.

For the last hour, the constant threat of the canyon had vanished. They hadn't seen a single Magma Scorpion skittering across the rocks.

There were no Rock Golems bursting from the cliff faces. Even the skies were empty of Wyverns.

The canyon, previously teeming with lethal monsters that had nearly wiped out the Silver Lance, was now completely, terrifyingly empty.

'It's the Silence of the King,' Damien thought, glancing at the map on his system interface.

"Monsters aren't stupid. They have survival instincts that humans lack. They know exactly where the apex predator sleeps. "

"The hotter it gets, the closer we are to Ignis. His passive aura alone is driving every other living thing away."

They traveled for another hour and a half. The wheels of the carriage began to hiss as they rolled over sand that was hot enough to melt lesser metals.

The rubber-like alchemy compound on the tires was starting to soften.

Suddenly, a notification pinged loudly in Damien's mind, drowning out the rumble of the carriage.

[System Alert!] [Warning: Massive Energy Signature Detected.] [Target: Ancient Red Dragon (Juvenile).] [Distance: 500 meters ahead.]

"Stop," Damien ordered, his voice cutting through the heat.

Leona pulled the reins hard. The frost-resistant horses, who were now frothing at the mouth and trembling with a primal terror that defied their training, skidded to a halt. They refused to take another step.

Ahead of them, the canyon walls fell away, opening up into a massive, circular basin.

Damien stepped out of the carriage. He expected a towering mountain or a volcano spewing ash.

Instead, he saw a desert of glass.

In the center of the basin stood a colossal mound of sand and fused obsidian glass, rising like a buried dome.

It was massive, easily the size of the Royal Palace back in the capital. Heat waves rolled off it in visible ripples, distorting the horizon.

"The Nest," Damien whispered, adjusting his coat. "It's buried here. He probably terraformed the area to make a sauna."

He turned to the side of the carriage where Kaelen was riding. The Silver Lance leader looked like he had seen a ghost.

His arm was in a sling, his armor scorched black from the earlier battle, and his face was pale with dread.

"Kaelen," Damien called out.

"Y-Yes, Young Master?" Kaelen stammered, his eyes fixed on the ominous mound. He could feel it, the pressure radiating from that place was enough to crush a man's will.

"Your contract is fulfilled," Damien said, reaching into his Void Gem. He pulled out a final, heavy bag of gold, double the remaining balance. He tossed it to the knight.

"We go on foot from here. You and your team... turn back. Immediately."

Kaelen caught the bag, the weight of it anchoring him to reality. "Turn back?"

"Or stay if you want to melt," Damien said simply. "You decide"

Kaelen didn't argue. He didn't ask for a bonus. He didn't offer to stay out of chivalry.

He looked at the mound, felt the terrifying, ancient pressure emanating from it, and nodded vigorously.

"Thank you, Young Master! Good luck! We're leaving!"

Kaelen signaled his team with a frantic wave. "Move! Move out! Back to the town!"

They spun their horses around and galloped away as if the devil himself were chasing them, desperate to get out of the heat zone before their lungs burned up.

Damien watched them go until they disappeared around the bend. Then, he turned to his team.

"Ready?"

"Ready," Isabelle said. Her cheeks were flushed, but not from exhaustion.

Her demon blood was actually enjoying the intense heat; she looked more energized than she had in days. Her eyes glowed with a faint, ruby light.

"Let's go say hello."

They began the climb. The massive sand dune was steep, the sand shifting treacherously under their boots.

Every step was a struggle against the loose terrain and the crushing magical pressure.

When they finally reached the top, they found the entrance.

Unlike an ordinary cave mouth. It was a ventilation shaft, a massive, smooth tunnel lined with glassified sand that led straight down into the hollowed-out dome.

It glowed with a dull red light from deep below.

"It looks like a slide," Leona noted, peering down into the darkness.

"It is," Damien smirked. "Jump."

One by one, they leaped into the shaft.

WHOOSH.

They slid down the smooth glass tunnel, picking up speed as they spiraled into the depths of the earth. The air grew hotter and hotter until it felt like breathing fire.

After a long descent, the tunnel leveled out, and they were deposited onto a soft landing.

They landed in a heap at the bottom.

Damien stood up and brushed the sand and soot off his coat. He looked around, and for a moment, he forgot to breathe.

It defied logic.

They were inside the buried dome. The space was vast, a hollowed-out cavern large enough to fit a city block.

The walls were illuminated by rivers of magma flowing in natural aqueducts along the perimeter.

But the floor... the floor was gold.

Not just a pile. Not just a chest.

It was a sea of gold. Mountains of millions of gold coins, jeweled chalices, ancient shields, diamond necklaces, and statues were piled high like sand dunes.

It was a hoard that could bankrupt the Human and Dwarven Empires combined.

And lying on top of the largest pile of gold, right in the center of the chamber, was a massive shape.

It was Ignis.

He was magnificent.

Easily a hundred feet long, his body was a masterpiece of lethal nature. His scales were a deep, iridescent crimson that seemed to burn with an internal fire, shifting color like cooling magma.

His horns were jagged obsidian crowns that swept back from his skull, and his wings were folded loose against his back like a cloak of leather and bone.

Neither sleeping nor roaring, He was lay on his back, his massive belly exposed to the ceiling.

He was holding a giant golden chalice, likely an artifact from a lost civilization in one claw, tossing it into the air and catching it. Over and over again.

Clink. Catch. Clink. Catch.

He looked incredibly, painfully bored.

He sensed them immediately. The moment Damien's boots touched the gold coins, the chalice stopped in mid-air.

However, Ignis didn't get up.

He simply rolled over lazily, his massive, scaled body shifting the pile of gold with a sound like a landslide.

His massive head slid down a slope of coins until his burning yellow eyes, each the size of a carriage, were level with Damien.

A puff of smoke escaped his nostrils, smelling of sulfur, ash, and old money.

"Hey, kid," Ignis grumbled.

His voice boomed like thunder trapped in a cave, vibrating in Damien's chest, but it dripped with lethargy.

The massive eye narrowed, the slit pupil dilating as he sniffed Damien.

"What took you so long? I smelled that aura hours ago."

Ignis let out a huff, blowing a few gold coins off a nearby pile.

"I thought it was that old woman, Italica, coming to nag me again. I was getting ready to pretend to be asleep."

The dragon shifted, bringing his face inches from Damien.

"But you aren't her. You're just a human. A tiny, squishy human."

Ignis blinked, genuinely confused.

"So speak, human. Why do you smell exactly like her? Did you steal her scent? Or did you steal her treasure?"

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