Deviant: No Longer Human

"You don't know where she is?" Wang Xiao finally asked, with a mix of frustration and disbelief, after realizing that although the dragon knew about a woman named 'Yuriko' and what had transpired that day, as she had witnessed it, she had no clue where Aurora might be.

'I can find her; she must be somewhere on the Tibetan Plateau,' Aura replied earnestly, her eyes reflecting a spark of hope.

Wang Xiao's gaze sharpened as he nodded slowly. "Why haven't you found her until now, then?" He couldn't mask his surprise at the apparent hypocrisy; on one hand, she professed that Aurora was her only friend, yet on the other, years had passed without her making any real attempt to rescue her.

The dragon, sensing his skepticism, snorted indignantly. 'If I go there alone, I'd be killed before I even laid eyes on her.'

Wang Xiao's eyes narrowed further, calculating.

This Yuriko seemed strong, but he remained unfazed.

At her strongest, she might match Athene's level, or even if she was several times stronger than Athene, it would certainly pose a challenge for Wang Xiao, but not an insurmountable one.

His primary concern was that exerting his full power might risk fracturing the very planet itself.

He suddenly understood why these immortal beings restrained themselves in their conflicts; for them, the Earth was too fragile a stage to bear the full brunt of their might.

"We can go now. Take me there, and I will deal with Yuriko. You focus on rescuing her," Wang Xiao commanded with resolute authority, leaping onto the dragon's broad back and linking with her mind through telepathy.

"Rrrr..."

Aura hesitated as Wang Xiao mounted her.

Once stripped of Aether, she had grown more docile, and when Aurora used her as a mount, she hadn't resisted, even with the additional burden of Wang Xiao.

But that was a memory from a quieter past.

Now, her strength fully restored, a trace of her old pride flickered in her eyes.

Yet it quickly dissolved into a resigned acceptance as she acknowledged the vast gap between her power and Wang Xiao's.

Despite this, reassured by Wang Xiao's overwhelming strength, she acquiesced to his plan.

With a vigorous thrust of her massive wings, Aura lifted off, ascending swiftly into the sky.

The sheer force of her wings split the air, casting giant, shifting shadows over the landscape below.

Bam!

Wang Xiao's eyes widened as the acceleration pushed them forward, breaking the sound barrier in a thunderous boom.

"ROAAAAR!"

Aura's jaws opened wide, and she released a ferocious roar, channeling it into a beam of light that pierced the transparent air ahead.

Wang Xiao, initially baffled by her actions, his thoughts racing, "What is she targeting?" His confusion cleared when he saw a crack form in the fabric of space where the beam collided.

Crack... Crack...

The crack widened, rapidly evolving into a vast chasm that birthed a small wormhole, warping the space and time around it.

Wang Xiao gripped Aura's scales tightly, his mind filled with anticipation and strategy.

'Hold tight,' she commanded through their telepathic link.

Whoosh!

With a surge of raw power, Aura dove into the wormhole.

Colors and lights blurred around them, streaking past like paint flung across a cosmic canvas.

________

Whoosh!

Above the Polar Plateau, the air was bitingly cold, and a massive snowstorm raged, swirling blizzards of ice and snow that obscured the world below.

High above this raging storm, where the chill seemed to pierce through to the very bones of the earth, a small tear in the fabric of the sky flickered like the mouth of a dragon—an ethereal portal to the other side of the Earth.

From this shimmering rift, a majestic white dragon emerged.

Aura unfurled her wings fully, stretching them wide against the stormy skies.

The motion was so powerful and graceful it seemed as though she was screaming with excitement, reveling in the freedom and the energy of the ice elements around her.

The cold air whipped past them, making Wang Xiao's eyes flutter open, his hair whipping wildly around his face.

"I thought we were going to Tibet?" he questioned, his voice laced with confusion.

The landscape below seemed more like Antarctica than anywhere near Tibet. Everywhere he looked, there was only ice.

'I need your help first,' Aura conveyed without further explanation, and then dived straight toward the icy ground, causing Wang Xiao to shake his head in bemusement.

Five minutes later...

"This is the help you need?" Wang Xiao stood on the frigid ice sheet, the cold biting into his bones. No human could survive here without protection, but what caught his attention was a small crater holding two large, fist-sized eggs.

Aura, slightly embarrassed, explained her request. 'Use your energy to fasten their growth, even by a few years. It would save me a lot of time.' Her voice carried an unintentional tone of arrogance, as if it were ingrained in her very nature.

Normally, dragon eggs took a decade to hatch, but with Wang Xiao's help, she believed the process could be halved.

Wang Xiao's expression darkened. "I didn't know there was another of your kind alive..." He muttered, his grin spreading across his face in a way that made Aura recoil slightly.

'We dragons are capable of parthenogenesis; this is what has saved our species through hundreds of millions of years. And now I am the last hope for my kind!' she clarified urgently. She didn't want Wang Xiao to take any liberties with her children.

Giving birth required an immense amount of strength, and after laying eggs, dragons would enter an infertile period for the next thousand years.

This made each opportunity to propagate their species incredibly precious and rare.

Wang Xiao shook his head.

He could easily refuse, citing the very valid concern that exhausting his strength before the main event could be dangerous.

Yet, as his gaze settled on the towering dragon, her massive frame slightly bowed and her large eyes filled with a plaintive, almost whimpering plea, a spark of "inspiration" struck him.

"Okay, I will help you this once," he declared, his voice carrying a blend of determination and a reluctant acceptance.

Turning back to face the dragon eggs, he observed them with renewed interest.

One egg boasted a delicate violet shell dotted with tiny, darker specks, giving it an almost celestial appearance.

The other was a deep, glowing white, its surface etched with strange, mysterious patterns that seemed to pulse faintly with hidden life.

With measured steps, Wang Xiao approached the eggs, each footfall resonating softly against the icy crust beneath him.

Behind him, Aura, the dragon, watched with bated breath.

Her immense body, usually a symbol of strength and power, now seemed to quiver with nervous anticipation.

Her breaths came in thick clouds of steam that fogged the frigid air, each puff echoing her anxious heartbeat.

As Wang Xiao extended his hands towards the eggs, the air around them seemed to quiver around him.

Aura's eyes remained unblinkingly fixed on his every move, her colossal wings adjusting subtly to maintain her balance.