376 Chapter 376
Hong Long then said, "How bad is the situation right now?"
This time, Qing Ao's words weren't as depressing as before, "For now, father is still in control of the Azure Dragon Tribe, but brother is slowly gaining strength. The pro war faction is trying to prop him up to take over the Azure Dragon Tribe so they can swing the vote in their favour."
Race supremacy wasn't something that was completely, it was something that had existed in the Dragon Race for a long time. After all, the Dragon Race were simply just too powerful.
The Dragons could gain power that matched the top experts of the universe just with the power of their bloodline, which was something that quite a few dragons were proud of, especially the pureblooded dragons.
There was even a niche group of these race supremacists who believed that pureblooded dragon bloodlines should be preserved and those that had a pure bloodline shouldn't mate with other beasts. It would corrupt their noble blood.
Of course, this was a minority, but they were right that pureblooded dragons were the strongest, so they made up the majority of the experts of the Dragon Race. This meant that they had quite a bit of influence even though they were a niche group.
It was just a good thing that the majority of the leaders and the other dragons believed that peace was the best ideal and that all bloodlines should be welcome, so currently the Dragon Race was controlled by the peace faction, but the margins were slim. Just a single dragon tribe that changed sides would be able to tip the scales.
There were a total of eight tribe that made up the Dragon Race and while they weren't aggressive to each other, they were still split into different sides. Currently the pro peace faction was leading with five tribes, but each of those tribes had fewer experts than the tribes of the pro war faction.
If even a single tribe of the pro peace faction swapped sides now, it would definitely push the Dragon Race into a pro war stance which would be detrimental for the Dragon Race. Even if the Dragon Race thought that they were the strongest race, they definitely were not the strongest.
So that was why the fact that Qing Ao's brother sending him down was a very important matter.
After all, Qing Ao was firmly on the pro peace faction and his brother was firmly on the pro war faction. The two of them were the prime candidates for taking over the position of the Azure Dragon Tribe, so Qing Ao being plotted against like this definitely wasn't a good thing.
Moreover, the Red Dragon Tribe was closely related since the last generation of chiefs were brothers. Namely Hong Long and Qing Ao's father.
There was no real concept of incest and there were plenty of bloodline marriages in the Dragon Race, so most dragons were actually closely related. That was why even though Hong Long and Qing Ao's father were brothers, they had become leaders of two different tribes.
In truth, the dragons didn't know why they were split into eight tribes since there was only a single dragon bloodline, but they were still separated in the end. Each tribe was separated based on the colour of their scale which also determined their elemental affinity.
The elemental affinity of dragons were actually randomly assigned based on genes, so even though Hong Long and Qing Ao's father's parents were a Gold and Black Dragon, they had turned into a Red and Azure Dragon.
Currently, the Red Dragon Tribe was weak since they had lost their chief who was Hong Long, so they depended on the Azure Dragon Tribe a lot. Currently they were the weakest out of all eight tribes.
This was something the pro war faction naturally paid attention to.
They knew that if they could turn the Azure Dragon Tribe, they could also pull the Red Dragon Tribe over, so that was why they supported Qing Ao's brother.
"Father is still able to hold on, that was why he sent me down to this lower realm to try and find a certain thing, but being able to find Uncle Hong is definitely a better surprise." Qing Ao said.
Hong Long stroked his chin as he looked at Xiao Feng in one corner of the array before saying, "How long can he last?"
Qing Ao also looked in the same direction and after a bit of thought, he said, "A few decades, but brother is receiving a lot of resources from the pro war faction, so he's getting much stronger. It won't be long now before he can match father…"
Hong Long nodded before saying, "Then that's fine. Let your father take care of the problem back at the Dragon Race and we'll take care of the matters here. As long as we can bring Xiao Feng back, we'll be able to overturn the situation. It'll all depend on your daughter now."
Qing Ao revealed a bitter smile, but he did know the consequences Hong Long was placing before him, so he didn't say anything else.
While they had been talking, the kids had been focused on fighting the Embryo Soul Realm beast.
The beast that they were fighting was actually a tiger, which was what the previous ruler of the Kunlun Mountains was before Qing Ao had taken over.
Of course, that previous ruler was no longer in this world since taking over means taking their lives as well.
Qing Ao was from a world with a Ruler, so the techniques that he learned couldn't compare to the techniques of a mere upper realm. He had taken care of that tiger in just a few moves.
The plan the kids had to fight this tiger was to use the same array that they used to take care of it, but this time they also had to add Qing Bao Lan to this plan.
Since Qing Bao Lan was a pure blooded dragon and in the Embryo Soul Realm as well, she was actually stronger than the tiger. Normally she would have been able to take care of this tiger herself, but that wasn't the case when she was inside the array.
It didn't happen whenever she tried to make a move, but from time to time, there would be an attack that would come very close to hitting her after grazing the enemy. It almost seemed like they weren't aiming at the enemy, but rather they were aiming at her.
Finally, she couldn't take it anymore as she shouted, "What kind of aim do you have? You almost hit me over fifty times now!"
None of the pets cared about this except for Xiao Feng since he felt that Qing Bao Lan was a nice person since she kept trying to give him food. Also, a part of him felt that she really was a pretty girl…
Xiao Feng asked Brainy in his mind, "What are you doing? Are you really trying to hit her?"
Brainy replied, "It's an accident, she's the one who's misunderstanding me. This beast is much stronger than us so it keeps dodging our attacks at the last second. Because of that, it's diverting them towards her after dodging the attacks."
Xiao Feng felt that something was off, but he still chose to accept this since he believed in Brainy more than Qing Bao Lan. They had been together since the beginning, so Xiao Feng was quite close to Brainy.
Brainy didn't forget to add, "Why don't you cheer her on? She's working so hard to help us after all."
Xiao Feng gave a nod when he heard this and cheered, "Bao Lan, doing great!"
Qing Bao Lan heard this and there was a blush that appeared on her face, but she burst with life energy as she began attacking the tiger to show off as much as possible.
It was too bad that Brainy had expected all of this.
Brainy made sure that its attacks were even more accurate and this time some of them even hit Qing Bao Lan.
By the end of it, the tiger was beaten to a pulp and Qing Bao Lan dealt the final blow, but there were several bruises all over her body that were quite noticeable.
At first Qing Bao Lan wanted to get angry, but then Xiao Feng came over and patted her injuries, saying, "Pain, pain, go away."
When Xiao Feng did all this, Qing Bao Lan couldn't just get angry. Rather she even had a shy look on her face as she raised the parts of her with bruises in front of Xiao Feng to let him do the same for them.
In the end, Brainy's sneak attack had actually brought them closer together, but there was no time to feel sad about this failed plan since they still had other Embryo Soul Realm beasts to take care of.
The adults on the side had clearly seen all of this, but not one of them did a thing since this was a matter between the kids. It would be a blow to their prestige as adults if they had to intervene in such a petty matter.
Lin Fan came forward to collect the corpse before they all headed off to the location of the next Embryo Soul Realm beast.
They still had nine more beasts to take care of today since Lin Fan was planning to head back to Harmony City tomorrow. There was still the deadline for the Hunters Exam that was coming up after all.