Chapter 170: Freedom

“Master, what should we do now? It seems the other humans are wary of you and intentionally avoiding the Labyrinth. If we spend too much time here, there won’t be enough time to clear the other trial towers.” Uri said after landing on the ground and furling his wings.

William looked at the Flame Dragon ahead, “There are other trial towers like the one in the Labyrinth?”

“Yes Master, there are two more towers, and plenty of loot inside each of them.” he responded with a sigh. Uri knew there wasn’t enough time to clear both towers, but the dragon started to drool when he thought about the number of treasures hidden within each tower.

Dragons were greedy by nature, almost comparable to William’s loot goblin tendencies. Many books depicted dragons as treasure hoarders that stored all of their items in a large room, sometimes even covering themselves with glittering jewels and shiny coins.

This World wasn’t an exception. The only difference was that many dragons here had their own Space Rings, forged by the flames of dragon’s breath and inscribed with powerful Runes by the few rare dragons that had knowledge of Arrays.

Given the size of their bodies, the amount of material required was immense to create a Space Ring, but no dragon could complain since there was much more room inside a Space Ring that could fit on their claws.

Every dragon would make a trip within the first hundred years of their life to the dragon Array Masters to receive their specialized Space Ring, and Flame Dragon Uri wasn’t an exception.

He stroked the old Space Ring on his left claw, the reminder that he had collected thousands of rare treasures over the years easing his mind. He looked at William, who seemed lost in thought.

Two more trial towers? I can’t say that I’m not interested, but there’s not enough time…Not only that, but I’m still waiting for him to show up… William’s mind wandered from place to place as he considered what Uri had said.

William raised his head, “I still need to wait for someone.”

“Wait for who?” Uri asked.

William explained everything about Sect Master Gu Dianlong and how he was enslaved for being too high-profile. As Flame Dragon Uri listened, he became angrier and angrier about William’s situation.

“That piece of shit! How could you not be high profile when he wanted you to place first in the competition?!? That’s just counter-intuitive! Not only that, but to enslave you as punishment is way too extreme!” the dragon flared his nostrils as he spoke.

William covered his ears to avoid losing his hearing. He nodded his head once Uri had finished, “I know, but what’s even worse was Supreme Left’s response. He was thinking about killing me just because I beat his granddaughter in a duel!”

The more the conversation went on, the more ridiculous the whole situation sounded. Uri raised a claw and sent a strand of Mana into William’s body, inspecting the Enslavement Array that had restricted his moves and actions up until recently.

“I can deal with this, but it will take me at least three days, even with my Cultivation Base.” the dragon said.

“Really?” William was surprised, he expected the dragon to be able to deal with his problem but didn’t think it would still take so long. Were even Soul Formation Cultivators so limited on Mana or was there another factor?

“Absolutely. It would be best to do this in a safe area, though, since I will have to put all of my focus into giving you my Mana.

Sorry Master…If I was a human, the process might have been easier for you…”

William waved his hand, “Your help is more than enough to ease my mind. Thank you, Uri. And you don’t have to call me Master, just say Will or William.”

“Yes, Master William.”

“Sigh…”

William used a large amount of Earth Mana to dig out a pit in the Labyrinth large enough to fit both him and Flame Dragon Uri comfortably.

He then reconstructed the roof and spent an hour creating Arrays that would eliminate all traces of their presence. If anyone came within a kilometer of their location, William would be the first to know.

He made sure all of the Arrays were active, then sat down cross legged. Uri took a deep breath, inhaling the ambient Mana in the air as if he was a vacuum, then converted it into waves of Spirit Qi and channeled it into William’s body simultaneously.

William was awestruck as he saw hundreds of strands of Spirit Qi formed in an instant. He opened his mouth to ask about Uri’s Cultivation Technique, but his voice turned into a scream as a sharp pain spread throughout his entire body.

“Ouch!” William yelled out loud. He was caught off guard by the Spirit Qi, not expecting the process of removing the Enslavement Array to hurt.

Uri closed his mouth and stopped channeling Spirit Qi into William.

“Master William, are you alright? I can isolate the pain for you but the process might take an extra day.”

William was touched by Uri’s heartfelt words, “No need. This pain is nothing, I was just surprised.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yes, you can continue now.” William waved his hand to the side to stress his stance.

“As you wish, Master William.”

Uri opened his maw and began inhaling Mana again. The vortex of Mana spun at high speeds as it was rapidly converted and transferred to William.

This time, William didn’t release any screams, only grunting occasionally when the pain spiked. The Spirit Qi strands collected near his chest and began infusing themselves into the Enslavement Array, battling with the opposing Mana inside.

As Uri’s Spirit Qi gained the upper hand, the Enslavement Array began to dim. The edges of the Array became dark, devoid of the opposing Mana.

Many hours passed, beads of sweat forming on Uri’s forehead as the dragon hadn’t worked so hard in a long time. He did his best to maintain the current state of the Enslavement Array but ended up taking a break after a day and a half.

By the end of the second day, William’s Enslavement Array had been completely removed, no longer feeling the presence of the Five Elements Sect Master on his brain. He thanked Uri profusely for his help, who seemed completely drained of energy and his Cultivation level seemed a bit unstable.

William didn’t know this, but Flame Dragon Uri had regressed two levels in the Soul Formation Realm, from level 4 to level 2. Since there were six stages in the Soul Formation Realm, Uri had lost almost a third of his Realm in Cultivation, just so he could assist William with an Enslavement Array faster.

If Flame Dragon Uri hadn’t been weak from being in the trial tower so long, or if he had been patient when giving William Spirit Qi, he would have not suffered as much. Alas, Uri’s loyalty to William and his greed for more treasures led the dragon to hasten his work.

Normally, the removal of such a complicated Enslavement Array would take weeks, even for a Soul Formation Cultivator. Since Uri had burned some of his own Cultivation Base, however, his speed was more than ten times that!

Perhaps if William knew what Uri had done for him, he would have been even more thankful, and even a bit guilty, but Uri had no intentions of bringing it up.

If William could increase his strength further, he would probably be a match for Uri in just a few years!

That was an insane idea when one talked about the comparison between a human and a dragon, but Uri had seen humans do crazier things. His old Master was a great example of this, having battled the entire Dragon Continent by himself.

If William was already so strong, perhaps in the future he would become an even stronger human than Riyald. Maybe William would manage to succeed where others had failed time and time again…

Uri’s eyes refocused to see William standing in front of him with a slightly worried expression.

“Dragon Uri, are you alright?” William asked.

“Ha! I’m more than alright, removing that pesky Array was but a simple task for a powerful dragon like me!” Uri bellowed with pride as he raised his maw and released a small jet of flames.

The roof turned red hot and began melting, but neither William nor Uri were worried. They both had incredible fire resistance and a bit of lava was but a hot shower for the two of them.

William had noticed just now that even his Fire Resistance had improved since he began Cultivating, mostly because of the improvements given to his Fire Affinity, which implied that most of his abilities should have also been improved in some way.

If all of my Magic and all of my physical abilities get stronger as I Cultivate, just how strong will I be before I leave this Ruins?