Chapter 31: Can You Help Me Open the Door?

A week after Isabella’s visit, Leon still hadn’t seen the legendary grandmother.
Leon wondered if perhaps the old dragon queen had gotten lost trying to find her granddaughters’ home?
Rosvitha said that dragons with the same bloodline and power could vaguely sense each other’s locations, so getting lost wasn’t possible.
Then the queen asked, why have you been bringing up my grandmother so much these past few days? Are you that eager to meet the family?
General Leon waved his hand, very smoothly denying it, saying he just wanted to see what kind of dragon could raise such a strange mother dragon.
Rosvitha couldn’t be bothered to argue with him.
The couple continued waiting for grandmother’s visit day after day.
Meanwhile, they kept sending scouts and spies to gather intelligence from the Flame Dragon territory.
If the situation there stabilized slightly, they would immediately set out to find Constantine’s confidant.
Of course, during these days of waiting, Leon wasn’t idle.
He began studying the “martial arts manual” that his master had given him when they exchanged intelligence a few days ago.
“The Nine Hell Gates”
Leon sat cross-legged in the training ground of the backyard, with snacks that Muen had just brought him placed beside him.
The little dragon girl had wanted to stay and play with her father for a while, but seeing that her father was seriously studying a book she couldn’t understand, she left the snacks and obediently ran off to play with the maids.
His daughter was growing up day by day and becoming more understanding, which made General Leon feel deeply gratified.
He lowered his head and opened the first page of “The Nine Hell Gates.” The preface portion of this book contained some inspiration and historical background about how the author developed this martial art.
“Legend says there are nine layers of hell, each representing different human sins. For these different sins, the hell enforcers have different physical punishments.”
“Only sinners who endure the tempering of nine layers of hell and complete their redemption have a chance to pass through the deepest layer of hell, returning to the mortal world or… directly reaching heaven.”
“At that time, those who successfully traverse the nine layers of hell will be like phoenix fire embodied, able to be invincible and victorious in battle with just their physical body alone.”
Reading these forewords, Leon smirked and muttered,
“The title is intimidating, and the background introduction is even more intimidating. In short, as long as you master this martial art, even without magic, your physical strength can break through human limits, huh.”
The ancestors who created various magic, illusions, or martial arts always liked to leave some myths and legends in the prefaces of these ancient texts.
This was to show how amazing their techniques were.
What’s more troublesome is that this style of recording is still mainstream and popular today.
People enjoy and are passionate about analyzing the myths made up by the ancestors, and some even developed religions and beliefs from them.
The Dragon Slaying Academy even created a separate major specifically for studying the myths and legends left by predecessors in magic manuals.
Leon had taken this major as an elective during his school years and graduated with full marks.
The professional professor thought Leon had talent in this area, so when Leon graduated, he repeatedly begged Leon to stay at the academy to help them analyze more myths and legends, to explore the mysteries of human past together, to salvage forgotten things left in the river of history, and so on and so forth.
Leon said, “Old man, are you mistaken? I took this major just to learn more different types of magic. As for those metaphors and myths you mentioned… I just wrote some casual reviews.”
{“Casual reviews”} {“Graduated with full marks”}
If Rebecca had been in the same class as the Captain back then, she probably would have realized earlier that he was someone who could flex in such an imperceptible way.
After finishing the preface, Leon turned to the table of contents.
Just like when he taught Noia, when reading a book, first look at the table of contents. If it’s knowledge he already mastered, mark it with a green line;
Knowledge he wasn’t confident about, yellow line;
Completely unfamiliar content, red line.
Whether this study method works for others is unknown, but for geniuses and top students like Leon and Noia, it’s truly efficient.
After scanning the contents from top to bottom, Leon turned to a position near the back middle.
The last sentence on this page read:
[At this point, your physical strength should reach the following standards (meeting any one is sufficient):
Can maintain steady breathing for more than twelve hours even when severely injured and near death;
Can match a dragon king’s speed in human form;
Self-healing ability has significantly improved compared to before practicing this martial art;
Can fight continuously for more than five hours]
Looking at these reference standards, Leon clicked his tongue and shook his head, “Just need to meet one of them? Then I should… meet all of them, right?”
Three years ago when Victor pierced Leon’s heart and the Silver Dragon clan imprisoned him in the dungeon, he persisted far beyond twelve hours;
Before his body fully recovered, he sparred with Rosvitha and caught up with her Silver Dragon clan known for speed while in a critical state;
Self-healing ability was even more evident. Remember those days when he and Rosvitha would fight at the slightest disagreement – as long as Rosvitha allowed him a few days’ rest, he could make her suffer a bit in their next “assignment.”
As for the last point, fighting continuously for more than five hours.
General Leon had even more authority to speak on this.
Whether it was slaying dragons or ‘riding dragons’, he could fight continuously for five hours.
The former was thanks to good teaching from Dragon Slaying Academy;
The latter was thanks to good teaching from Teacher Melkvi.
In short, Casmode was a good student!
“Upon reaching these standards, you can formally begin practicing the Nine Hell Gates.”
Leon turned to the next page, which contained detailed introduction to the Nine Hell Gates.
“The martial art ‘Nine Hell Gates’ divides the human body into nine stages, represented by ‘gates’ with different names.”
“First Gate, Steel Gate¹—wait, what gate?!”
Leon thought he had misread, put down the book and rubbed his eyes vigorously before looking again.
Indeed.
He hadn’t misread.
……
……
“CawCaw”
Two crows flew overhead, their cries perfectly representing Leon’s current mental state.
No, with all that talk of hell and heaven in the preface, you made it sound so grand and profound.
But when it came to the serious part, you started with something so outrageous? Well…
Although it wasn’t the organ Leon was thinking of, he couldn’t help but laugh at the unexpected wordplay.
“As expected of Master, even the secret manual found at the risk of life is so abstract.”
Leon took two deep breaths, adjusted his mindset, and continued reading.
Fortunately, the names of the next few were quite normal, without any strange wordplay. Leon breathed a sigh of relief.
But when he saw the name of the last gate, his finger paused slightly while turning the page, his eyes fixed on those two simple characters as he muttered,
“Death Gate.”
Leon’s pupils trembled, “Sounds like a technique that would harm the enemy at great cost to oneself…”
He shook his head, pulling back his thoughts.
He couldn’t practice the last gate yet; he needed to master the first eight gates first.
“So, the method to open the first gate is…”
Leon continued browsing the book, finding the corresponding content,
“Opening the first gate requires some external force, preferably from a trustworthy person with Dragon King-level power…”
“Hmm… Dragon King… Dragon King…”
As he mumbled, a name naturally came to his lips,
“Rosvitha?!”