Shi Feng walked out of the Tribe Leader’s house as if he were in a dream. His mind was spinning with the image of the tiny horns on the snake cub’s head.
He was so lost in his thoughts that he didn’t notice the tall figure approaching the tree house.
Suddenly, Shi Feng collided with someone.
He stiffened immediately, his warrior instincts flaring up. He looked up and found himself staring into a pair of emerald eyes so deep and calm they looked like forest pools.
For a second, Shi Feng’s heart skipped a beat. The man in front of him was breathtakingly handsome, with a cold, elegant aura that made the surrounding air feel chilly.
The man was Xuan Long. He looked at the Lion King with a slight expression of confusion.
He couldn’t understand how a powerful beastman like Shi Feng could be so distracted that he would walk right into someone.
Shi Feng quickly regained his composure. "My apologies," he said, his voice a bit rough. "I was lost in thought."
Xuan Long didn’t say anything. He simply gave a small, polite nod and brushed past Shi Feng to go inside the house.
He didn’t care much about the stranger; he was only there to pick up his mate and his new hatchling.
He wasn’t even aware that the man he had just bumped into was a King, or that he was looking at his greatest rival for Su Qinglan’s heart.
Xuan Long rarely spent time in the tribe and knew very little about the visitors.
Shi Feng stood frozen on the steps, watching the man’s back as he walked away. The realization hit him like a lightning bolt.
That is Xuan Long, he thought.
His hands clenched into tight fists at his sides. The resemblance between the man and the hatchling was undeniable, but it was more than that.
The aura coming off Xuan Long was ancient and heavy. The uncanny similarities to the legends he once heard were just too much to ignore.
"How could it be possible?" Shi Feng whispered to himself.
He felt a surge of complicated emotions...shock, fear, and a strange kind of excitement.
He had come here thinking he was the strongest male in the forest, but now he had met a man who didn’t even seem to belong to the world of ordinary beasts.
With a dazed mind, Shi Feng forced his legs to move. He walked away from the house, but his thoughts remained on those emerald eyes.
Then suddenly he began to run. He sprinted through the tribe and back to his treehouse, his heart thumping against his ribs like a drum.
The moment he burst through the door, he ignored everything else and began to rummage through his most private belongings.
Finally, at the very bottom of a heavy stone chest, he found it.
It was an exquisite box made of a dark, ancient wood that never rotted. The lid was covered in intricate, carved designs of a long, coiling creature...a dragon.
This box was the greatest treasure of the Lion Tribe, passed down from generation to generation for hundreds of years.
Along with the box came a legend of deep gratitude and a debt that the Lions owed to a higher power.
Shi Feng stared at the green jade pendant, his mind racing through the ancient stories told by the elders.

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