The blades of grass under his eyes slowly took shape and his lips opened slightly, sharing the fresh air with his nose. Yoichi rested his hands on the damp undergrowth and pressed the ground, trying to stand up from his slouched position and revealing the surrounding landscape.

Unlike his last astral journey, this time Yoichi did not end up in that thick forest: around him, low bushes colored by spherical, juicy berries were scattered here and there, alternating with angular whitish rocks.

The young tamer needed a few more seconds to geolocate himself, realizing he had never visited the biome he had teleported to. Beyond the bushes and low trees laden with fruit of all sizes, a grassy valley connected his current location with distant mountains.

Yoichi didn't know the Southborne Mountains that well, but the distinctive shape of their steep slopes and naturally snow-capped peaks made those mountains especially recognizable.

Just from that direction, a cold wind hit his face and hair, making it float free behind his body and giving Yoichi a momentary sense of freedom.

His boots crawled back on the turf, stepping back and letting the cold but pleasant wind carry him like a paper boat on a water stream. Suddenly, under his right heel, that soft, gently curving ground instantly vanished and a feeling of emptiness ran through Yoichi's leg, immediately alerting his sense of danger.

"Huh?!" he gulped, as the hollow sensation traveled down his back and arms, forcing his body to freeze. Spreading his arms and bringing his shoulders forward, Yoichi turned his head back, and what he discovered left him breathless.

Beyond his feet, the ground suddenly broke into a sheer vertical escarpment, and beyond it, a ravine hundreds of feet deep, dug into the whitish stone.

"Holy shit!" Yoichi screamed in fright, turning away and falling with his back to the ground, crawling backward and moving further and further away from the overhang. His heart was beating out of his chest, and although he was aware that he was inside a vision, the anxiety of dying trapped his body and mind.

A rift dozens and dozens of miles long split the valley behind him in two like a deep scar. The blue sky and the beautiful landscape with fruit trees were being erased by the depths of that dark and gloomy abyss.

Taking courage, Yoichi placed his hands on the grassy ground and leaned over the edge, looking below. Huge glowing bubbles exploded through vertical tongues of fire and a river of thick red magma flowed at the base of that hellish white canyon.

"Where the hell am I?" Yoichi thought aloud, focusing on the details of that biome and looking at the steep walls of that ravine to find an answer to his question.

The sunlight that illuminated the rift suddenly faded and a gigantic shadow darkened the sky, getting bigger and bigger and emphasizing more and more the brightness of the glowing magma vein.

Sensing a divine presence he had already felt before, Yoichi stood up and walked away from the rift, turning his gaze to the dark sky of that unknown region.

Therion's mammoth black wings split the sky in a new horizon under his eyes, cutting through the clouds and joining the center of its scaled chest. The Dragon King's neck was bent and its face pointed downward in the direction of its heir.

Yoichi could not help but feel a strong fear: knowing that Therion was not a demon hostile towards him was not enough. The King of Dragons struck fear into all living things, and at that time in history, he ruled the world unchallenged.

The giant black dragon flapped its wings forward. They were black on the outside and red on the inside. A powerful gust of wind forced Yoichi to kneel down in order not to lose his balance.

Therion spread the fingers of its reptilian feet, extending its claws and preparing for landing, stretching its legs downward. With his hands stilled under his face and his eyes narrowed in fear, Yoichi continued to sense his mentor's presence above his back bent in a bow.

*boom* - an earthquake-like vibration spread throughout the valley and small rocks broke off from the edge of the cliff, rolling dizzily into the river of lava.

The heavy breath of the biggest of the dragon demons enveloped Yoichi's body, who took courage and stood up, daring to look up at Therion's face.

His heart was beating wildly and an even more intense feeling than the first time flowed through his veins, freezing his muscles. The young tamer's reflection appeared within the Dragon's reptilian pupil, and through its blood-red eyes, it was able to peer into the depths of his soul.

"Yoichi," the Dragon King called, opening its jaws slightly and emanating a strong heat from its stomach, as if, even in that quiet moment, an everlasting fire was burning in the center of its chest.

"Supreme Therion!" Yoichi obediently replied, kneeling down and lowering his gaze again in submission. Inwardly, the excitement of looking so closely into the eyes of Lumya's ruler made his heart beat out of his chest.

"For a moment I feared you would not show up. I sensed a feeling of weakness and uncertainty coming from deep within your soul," the Dragon King spoke. "Your spirit faltered, if only for an instant," it added as if, once again, it wanted to emphasize the bond with him.

"You speak the truth, my lord. For a few days, I did not feel ready to face the test you recommended me to get ready for. My master was taken away, and without him, I felt alone," Yoichi confessed.

"However, I tried to respond to that pain, Supreme Therion. I began my journey beyond the safe walls of the capital and left behind all that I believed to be safe and unchanging."

"So you think you're ready now?" Therion inquired, continuing to breathe over Yoichi, who was no larger than a small, helpless rodent in his presence.

"Yes, my lord. I am ready now."