Beyond the Bloodline-Chapter 367: Diversion

|Gahk—!|

|Ugh...!|

The Lesser Supremes among them couldn’t even form words under the pressure, leaving only the Grand Supreme able to resist and speak through the pain.

|Hold yourself, Scott! We were attacked as well!|

|And I’m supposed to believe that the prison containing the criminal you had repeatedly requested access to, going as far as issuing threats, was suddenly attacked less than 12 hours after I stepped away... and you had nothing to do with it?|

Miranda’s aura pressure intensified, and the wounded Grand Supreme groaned in agony, unable to properly resist as the force aggravated his already severe injuries.

|Calm down, Miranda. Heilong is still here.|

Richard’s voice echoed, and only then did the Supremes register his presence, eyes widening in disbelief as none of them had expected another Hybrid to suddenly appear.

Unbothered by their shock, Miranda maintained her crushing pressure on the Dragons, turning instead to Richard, who was holding up a bleeding, battered humanoid dragon.

|I know he is. The issue is that an attempt was clearly made on his life. And it nearly succeeded.|

And indeed, just as Miranda had said, Heilong had come within a hair’s breadth of death.

How did she know? Well, anyone with eyes could see the gaping hole in his chest where his heart should have been.

The only reason he was still alive despite such a catastrophic wound was due to the Prison Realm itself forcefully keeping him alive.

The Prison Realm had been modified to counteract incidents where a prisoner attempted suicide or was targeted for assassination in an effort to ’silence’ them by attaching protective links to specific high-profile prisoners.

If they ’took damage’, this link would flood them with a constant stream of life-attributed law energy, forcibly keeping them ’alive’.

It wasn’t fool proof, as an attack strong enough to overcome the protection could still kill them, but the true strength of this measure was that no one knew it even existed!

This wasn’t part of the Prison Realm’s original design.

Miranda had secretly enlisted Sarina to use her Demonic Life Authority to implement it, and hadn’t told anyone, not even Jamie.

That was the only reason Heilong’s body, despite being in a state the law of death recognised as ’dead’, was still functioning, with his soul still anchored to it.

Without that, someone would have succeeded in killing Heilong before he could stand trial and have his crimes revealed to the entire universe.

Richard also noticed the link, silently commending Miranda’s foresight as he turned toward one of the nearby wardens who had been frozen in place by Miranda’s overwhelming aura.

|You... hand me the log for this prison.|

Now freed from the suffocating pressure Miranda had been exerting, the man hurried over and handed Richard a tablet containing the necessary details.

Richard took it, absorbed the stream of information with magic, then scanned the surroundings, his expression darkening into a frown.

|I’m detecting multiple prisoners dead or unconscious, but none missing.|

He placed Heilong’s body and soul in a stasis using magic, then teleported to the injured Dragons and spoke.

|Stay your hand for a moment, Miranda.|

Turning to face the Dragons directly, golden magic flowed from his hands, pouring into their bodies and flushing out the residual foreign energy embedded in their wounds to allow their regeneration to begin.

|From what I understand, you were here because you wanted to speak with Heilong, and that’s likely why you were present when this place came under attack.

What exactly did you witness? Let’s clear up any misunderstandings before they take root.|

Ideally, Richard would have preferred to question the Wardens directly, but on their way here, Miranda had shown him the damage report she’d received, which stated that all the wardens closest to the explosion that had torn apart a section of the realm were already dead.

From the Dragons, Richard gathered that they too had been attacked while pressing to see Heilong.

They had been speaking with one of the Head Wardens when another Warden suddenly approached, claiming he had received an order to relocate certain prisoners.

When the Head Warden stepped aside to speak with him, the Grand Supreme leading the Dragon delegation—the one who had originally nominated Heilong for the post he once held, noticed something off and pointed it out.

"Didn’t the Prison Realm’s rules say all Wardens must move in pairs at all times?"

That was indeed a standing rule, and any Warden who violated it was immediately dismissed. Even the Head Wardens were not exempt from this, which was why there were always Head ’Wardens’ rather than a single Head ’Warden.’

The moment the Dragon said this aloud, the Head Wardens finally realised that the man standing before them had come alone, and before they could respond, he suddenly unsheathed a sword and attacked the Dragon Supreme.

What’s more, that man turned out to be a Supreme Realm existence in disguise, and his sudden attack had instantly killed the two Wardens while severely wounding the Dragon.

Perhaps taking that moment as a signal, several Lesser Supremes burst out from folds in space and launched an assault on the Dragon’s group, an assault that ultimately led to the massive explosion Richard and Miranda had sensed all the way from Argent.

The attackers had used the chaos of the blast as cover to make their escape during the time it took Miranda and Richard to arrive.

|From what you’ve described, it sounds like their goal was to eliminate both you and Heilong...|

Richard said as he studied the Dragon closely, before adding,

|Your injuries are far worse than those of the other four, as if the bulk of the attacks were focused on you. And then they tried to finish off Heilong too...|

At those words, the Dragon immediately moved toward Heilong’s body, his eyes widening as he grasped just how critical the other dragon’s condition was.

He also spotted the now-frozen link connecting Heilong to the realm itself, a link channelling life energy into his body and the only thing keeping his soul tethered to it.

Yet, he knew that this wasn’t a standard practice within Zanerth Prison Realms, and with that realisation, his gaze immediately shifted to Miranda, who was silently surveying the rest of the realm with her eyes.

|Mirand—!|

The Dragon’s voice caught in his throat as Miranda’s expression suddenly contorted, and she instantly used cosmic energy domination to seize control of all ambient cosmic energy and expand her perception across the entire Galaxy Cluster.

|It was a diversion. Their real target was someone else.|

Her voice rang out, the simmering anger within it causing goosebumps to rise on all who heard.

Then, almost as if on cue, clones and avatars of several Supremes from other races began to appear, drawn by Miranda’s unrestrained aura and the sudden revelation of Richard’s presence.

They arrived just in time to see Miranda turn toward the Giant Supremes and declare,

|Eldros is missing.|

|!!|

|...what?|

While the giants were busy being confused by Miranda’s words, Richard quickly connected the dots and reached the same conclusion as Miranda.

The attack on Prison 3B, where Heilong had been incarcerated, had merely been a diversion meant to facilitate Eldros’ breakout from Prison 3D.

’Perhaps silencing Heilong was just a secondary objective. But why? Miranda already extracted his memories and uncovered everything there was to know...’

Miranda hadn’t kept that fact hidden, so with that in mind, silencing Heilong seemed pointless since there was nothing left for him to reveal.

’Or... is that really true? What if there are still things he can reveal? Things Miranda couldn’t detect when she scanned his memories?

Things that maybe weren’t even stored in his ’memories’ to begin with?’

The moment that thought crossed Richard’s mind, Miranda spoke up again.

|I decided to play nice, and this is the bullshit that happens.|

’Uh-oh... Miranda’s snapped.’

That was Richard’s immediate thought, just as Miranda raised a hand to her ear, channelling cosmic energy into the stud earring she wore before speaking into it.

|Initiate Plan B—Activate the Soul Trackers. Mobilise all forces across all domains immediately.|

Eyes widened at her command. Then, turning toward the newly arrived Supremes, she declared,

|I’m done playing nice. From this moment on, I am ordering a search of ALL your domains for the missing Giant—beginning with the Giant Territories.| 𝚏𝗿𝗲𝐞𝐰𝚎𝕓𝐧𝚘𝘃𝗲𝐥.𝐜𝚘𝕞

A tense silence followed Miranda’s final declaration, until it was broken by the thunderous voices of the elder Giant Supremes.

|YOU OVERSTEP!!|

|You have no authority to command any searches of our domains!|

Their auras erupted, cosmic energy rolling forth like tidal waves. But Miranda met their pressure with her own, her gaze turning icy as she locked eyes with them and stated,

|That’s where you’re mistaken. I don’t need authority or permission granted by you. I am simply informing you of what will happen, regardless of your opinions.|