At this critical juncture, a peculiar gleam suddenly flashed in Cassius's golden pupils.
*No.*
*There seems to be... another way.*
Even as a living shadow, and even across different planes, the shadow dragon could not be immune to psychic damage. That was the only avenue Cassius had left to affect him.
With that realization, Cassius did not hesitate to roar:
"Vile shadow dragon!"
"Her Majesty Tiamat is watching all of this!"
Mortifer laughed openly. "The Dragon Queen's favored child? Every red dragon claims as much. It seems arrogance and conceit are universal traits among your kind—even you... are no exception."
His voice abruptly turned cold.
"Cast aside your pathetic living pride, embrace the great transformation, and surrender yourself to the endless shadow!"
"I shall grant you... eternal life."
Mortifer never paused the transformation for a single second.
The surrounding space shuddered with violent tremors—the trembling wails of planar space itself. The natural instincts of the Material Plane violently repelled the shadow's invasion, but under the influence of Mortifer's mighty spell, even the laws of space had to yield temporarily.
Cassius stared intently at the shadow dragon's phantom silhouette. In an instant, he unraveled the mental barriers in his mind, constructing the terrifying illusion of the five-headed dragon.
Without flinching, he locked eyes with Mortifer's ash-white gaze, his golden pupils blazing with a concentrated aura of magical power.
*Whoosh—*
The phantasm pierced through the planar barrier, traversed the Material Plane, and reached Mortifer's true body residing in the Shadowfell.
Terrifying Phantasm of Tiamat
*Roar—*
A colossal dragon nearly a hundred meters tall abruptly loomed before Mortifer's eyes. The monster's wings blotted out the sky, so immense that even a shadow dragon could only crane his neck to look up.
It was a nightmarish amalgamation. The stout, stocky four legs of a chromatic dragon supported a monstrous draconic body, upon which writhed five necks bearing five heads. Each head corresponded to one of the chromatic dragons, its color coating the entire length of its respective neck and embedding into the front of the draconic torso like bands of color.
Her back and haunches gradually blended into three stripes of gray, blue-green, and purple, before merging into a murky dark-brown tail. Her belly and feet transitioned from pale green into the colors of her upper body.
Mortifer was intimately familiar with this terrifying, dread-inducing visage.
—It was the Mother of Evil Dragons, the Chromatic Dragon Queen, the Nemesis of the Gods: Tiamat!
"How is this possible..."
Mortifer gazed upward in a daze, murmuring under his breath.
Seven hundred years ago, when he was still an ordinary black dragon, Mortifer had built a crude altar in his murky swamp lair, offering up the precious iron coins he had hoarded to the Dragon Queen. As one of the chromatic evil dragons, Mortifer had fantasized countless times about drawing the Dragon Queen's gaze, even receiving personal favor from the Mother of Evil Dragons to attain that supreme ecstasy.
Yet the Dragon Queen had never answered.
Back then, he was merely an emaciated black dragon, ranking only marginally higher than white dragons among chromatic dragonkind.
In the end, unable to resist the temptation of power, he chose to throw himself into the embrace of the Shadowfell, transforming into an immortal shadow dragon.
Now, Mortifer trembled all over.
He could not tell whether it was from terror or excitement.
The five-colored, five-headed dragon looked down coldly upon the earth. Fire, ice, acid, lightning, and poisonous gas surged in succession from the maws of those five hideous heads, venting her wrath without restraint.
"No, no, this isn't real!"
"Damn it, this is an illusion!"
Mortifer was, after all, a legendary spellcaster who had studied magic for over a millennium and could cast 9th-tier spells. Even in his shaken state of mind, he quickly discerned the flaws within the Dragon Queen's phantasm.
When the manifold illusory damage of fire, ice, and acid struck him, the power of this 6th-tier spell proved inconsequential to a soul that had settled in bleak darkness for a thousand years.
Yet another concern welled up in Mortifer's heart.
*How could an ordinary young red dragon, even as a True Dragon Sorcerer, possibly wield a spell like this?*
*A divine phantasm of such quality—could he truly be Her Majesty the Dragon Queen's Chosen?*
Mortifer's worry was not without reason.
Shadow dragons were infamous among dragonkind, practically public enemies of their race.
They had forsaken the noble bloodline of dragons, choosing instead to plunge into darkness and become base shadow creatures. Furthermore, no dragon god had arisen to rule over them, leaving even chromatic evil dragons to sneer at them with contempt.
Righteous gold dragons would even actively hunt down traces of shadow dragons, rallying the strength of their kin to eradicate them entirely and cleanse dragonkind of such a "disgrace."
Killing someone who might be a Chosen of the Dragon Queen and provoking the enmity of chromatic dragons was clearly not a wise course of action for him.
"Curse that red dragon..."
Mortifer sank into conflict, and the formation of his descent spell ground to a halt.
He had no desire to provoke an entity on the divine level, yet having just been duped by an illusion brought him a profound sense of humiliation he hadn't experienced in centuries, making him itch to tear the red dragon before him to shreds.
"Are you truly such an existence..."
"Red dragon."
Mortifer's phantom silhouette looked down at the red dragon, his eyes narrowing slightly as if trying to discern the slightest clue from his expression.
Cassius noticed Mortifer's hesitation. He knew that right now, only by acting more confident, more brazenly arrogant, and more like a haughty divine Chosen could he deceive this thousand-year-old monster.
And so, Cassius took a step forward, meeting the gaze of Mortifer's projection without the slightest fear, and declared imperiously, "Vile shadow abomination who tramples upon the noble traditions of dragonkind, you had better consider carefully."
"Can you withstand Her Majesty Tiamat's wrath?!"
Hearing this, Mortifer's dim, ash-white eyes flared with irrepressible fury, as though shadow ghostfire were igniting within them.
"Damn red dragon."
"Curse this Material Plane."
That brief moment of hesitation allowed the plane's repulsive force to act upon the shadow dragon, who was fundamentally incompatible with the physical world, shattering his attempt to descend upon the Material Plane.
He had already harvested thousands of shadowy souls this time; centuries of planning had not been in vain. There was no need to antagonize a foe who might be backed by a deity.
With that thought, Mortifer fixed the red dragon with a deep gaze, venomous malice seeping from his dim, ash-white eyes.
"The planar barrier has been breached by those thousands of vengeful souls."
"This place has already been marked with the brand of the Shadowfell."
"One day, I will return here, and you will be powerless to protect anything you possess."
Mortifer spoke chillingly.
Several twisted vortices appeared around his massive draconic silhouette. The spatial repulsive force forcibly expelled his descending projection from the Material Plane, dragging him back into that lightless realm—the Shadowfell.
Chapter 143