Under the Red Dragon

A massive steel machine, entirely manufactured, moved slowly across the sand like a box, its treads providing the ability to crawl through the desert, slowly mining spice in the sandworms' territory.

Around the steel body above the treads, sixteen thick, five-meter-wide, twelve-meter-long steel limbs plunged into the sand, extracting the spice-mixed sand from the desert into the pipe openings at the ends of the limbs.

Then, after the spice filter in the limbs filtered out the spice mixed with the gravel, it was transported to the storage tanks on the back of the steel machine, which resembled spider egg sacs but were hundreds of times larger.

Countless filtered-out sand and dust particles were ejected from the pipes of this spice-collecting mining vehicle, causing dust to fly wherever it went.

Several ornithopters, piloted by Harkonnen family warriors, soared in the sky, observing the sandworms' movements to warn the spice mining vehicle at any time.

Once sandworms, capable of devouring any organic matter, discovered thieves in their territory, these technologically advanced Harkonnens could use transport aircraft to evacuate the spice mining vehicle in time.

Other Harkonnen family legion warriors, wearing battle suits and carrying guns and long knives, patrolled the ground to prevent Fremen from attacking and sabotaging the Harkonnen's mining operations.

The battle suits had large hoods like aviation suits, but they were not bulky.

These battle suits integrated defense, life support, and other functions, and were also equipped with levitation devices, allowing these warriors to temporarily levitate in the air.

However, they did not wear Holtzman shields, because the vibration frequency when the Holtzman shield was activated would attract sandworm attacks.

But these Harkonnen family warriors did not notice the huge shadow in the sky slowly passing overhead, like an island of a small city, but shrouded in a magical shadow, like overlapping phantoms in the clouds.

The number of Golden Empire warriors and mages on the island was fewer than before. But the lively scene on the island did not diminish.

Because of the climate, the two white dragons and the blue dragon Dos, who were unwilling to move around too much, stayed on the floating island, patrolling the skies of this world.

"What a wonderful civilization, completely different from the civilization of magic. There is no magical power here, but it seems much more convenient than the civilization of magic,"

The white dragon Gemot squatted on the edge of the island. The dragon's vision allowed these dragons to see the ground very clearly, even in the clouds thousands of meters above.

After continuously stealing spice, through experiments, this spice has become a resource that the Empire is determined to obtain. Originally, these spellcaster legions and dragons wanted to use the Empire's force to forcibly conquer this planet.

But a more prudent approach avoided losses to the Imperial Legion. As the spellcasters delved into the Harkonnen family legion's base using stealth magic, the knowledge they gained, as well as the information passed down by the ancestral red dragon, allowed the Empire to gradually grasp a lot of information in this universe.

This universe seems to be full of humanoid creatures, even all under the rule of various branches of the human race. There are no traces or signs of activity of other intelligent aliens.

No alien intelligent civilizations have been discovered either. Most creatures are as magical as sandworms, but without intelligence.

So the sudden appearance of the dragons is not a good thing, especially since they are creatures that do not belong to this universe. Once they openly start the path of conquest, they may face resistance from the entire universe civilization.

Although the elites of the Golden Empire are powerful enough, their numbers are too small to fight against the power of the entire universe.

The natives of this planet, the Fremen, number in the millions. And the many main stars inhabited by humans, the number is more than billions, tens of billions, hundreds of billions, just a few planets can have that population.

Moreover, in this interstellar universe, there are too many weapons that can pose a threat to the dragons and mages.

"Yes, this is a civilization in another direction, and it naturally has its greatness. This belongs to the memory of civilization, and may become the inheritance in my bloodline in the future, allowing future generations to broaden their horizons."

The blue dragon Dos's originally blue vertical pupils flickered with a bright luster.

After ingesting the spice, the dragons in the dragon group all gained the opportunity to evolve and grow. The brain potential of each dragon was developed, and the physical potential was explored.

They not only have a deeper future, but their intelligence has also increased a lot. Not only are their emotional expressions more abundant, but they also become more fond of thinking.

Of course, increased intelligence does not necessarily mean being smarter. This sentence seems so puzzling when used on other people or other dragons.

But in the white dragon Camid's case, it would not surprise any dragon.

The white dragon Camid's eyes were still filled with clear stupidity as before. His two heads lazily rested on his front paws, yawning, and also interrupted the sighs of the two more intelligent dragon lords.

"I wonder what Calon is doing now. I always feel like he has become smarter. That's good, so I don't have to use my brain!"

Hearing the white dragon Camid's muttering, the two dragons, who had grown a bit more, could not help but crack their mouths open, revealing their fangs.

Before this, perhaps the two intelligent dragon lords could not clearly understand what the ancestral red dragon was doing, but after gaining the opportunity to evolve their brains, and combining the information Calon told them, these two dragons already had some guesses in their hearts.

The white dragon Gemot's mind flashed, those huge starships parked in the Harkonnen family legion base, elliptical, spherical, ring-shaped, or irregular starships like pyramids and stones.

Those starships, completely cast from various hard alloys, ranging from dozens of meters to hundreds of meters in length, may have only represented the powerful military power and creativity of this civilization in the eyes of the previous dragons.

But in the eyes of the current dragons, they can already touch the meaning of some things behind them.

These humans have mature technology. In the knowledge that the dragons understand, humans have relied on 'faster-than-light engines' for interstellar travel for countless years, and the highest speed they can reach is close to 1,500 times the speed of light.

Such speed is unmatched by these dragons. Only in the face of legends who have mastered the rules can there be such incredible actions, because these humans also master the basic physical laws of the universe.

But now the Leo Empire has invented the Holtzman engine, which has the ability to jump through space like folding space. As long as there is a safe route, it can almost instantly reach another planet.

This also means that once the Golden Empire and the Leo Empire break out into a head-on conflict, the Leo Empire's infinite interstellar fleet can quickly arrive.

There are very few soldiers in the Harkonnen family legion in front of them, and very few high-tech creations, just because the Harkonnen family lacks intelligence.

They thought that there were very few natives of this planet, the Fremen, and that many high-tech creations were not suitable for use on the desert planet, so as not to damage the magical, unique, and unrepeatable ecological environment that produces spice.

Once a direct war breaks out, the high-level mages of the Golden Empire, at around level 14, can create high-level scrolls that are enough to withstand the power of low-level atomic weapons such as nuclear bombs, but they cannot guarantee that they will not suffer significant losses in the face of more advanced weapons.

Moreover, there are many legion warriors and low- and mid-level mages among them. Not only the ancestral red dragon, but other dragons are also unwilling to have their strength greatly damaged here.

So the blue dragon Dos and the white dragon Gemot can understand Calon's cautious actions. Although they do not have the ability of the ancestral red dragon to calculate the future by passing through the infinite past and present information, the developed brains of the dragons make them more intelligent.

The white dragon Gemot wagged his tail, as lazy as a big cat, sweeping back and forth on the ground.

"Calon wants to use that Paul Atreides, the bloodline heir of a grand duke of the human empire, to carry out a top-down rule change and gentle reorganization from within the human empire,"

"These human civilizations can unanimously resist external civilizations, but there is no excuse to resist an emperor of the human empire, especially when that emperor has the support of another civilization and has the power of dragons."

"At that time, not only these precious spice resources, but this universe of humans, which has almost infinite times more creatures than the Akaniia world, will also be our ladder and provider."

The blue dragon Dos's vertical pupils flashed with the light of wisdom, and he grinned, revealing his fangs: "It seems that Calon wants to subdue this grand duke, just like subduing the gnoll leader Yugu to control the gnoll tribe, as the king who rules the human civilization,"

"But Calon's own light is too dazzling. Once he appears, those Fremen will definitely no longer listen to the orders of this grand duke. How is he going to maintain the dragon's majesty, be held up and climbed up by the Fremen, but also make those Fremen sincerely submit to that grand duke as their king?"

"That's a problem,"

The white dragon Gemot fell into thought like a human, "Before absolute force, wisdom is as important as strength. I should think about how Calon would do this."

The white dragon Camid didn't think there was anything to discuss about this matter. He only felt that these two dragons were too noisy, so he shook his two heads and shouted: "I only need to ensure that I have enough force, and Calon is my brain, hey, countless times stronger than you two!"

The blue dragon Dos and the white dragon Gemot looked at each other, somewhat speechless.

"Forget it, Calon has things he needs to do, and we have things we need to do. We need to find a suitable location to establish a space-time beacon as soon as possible so that we can travel smoothly to and from the empire's homeland."

……

The ancestral red dragon's huge body stepped on the sand, and wild geese flew by, leaving no trace. Only his maidservant followed him.

From the north of the Dune planet to the south, after inspecting many locations along the way, Calon stopped at this place.

Before him was an endless desert plain. Although it was called a plain, it was actually just a small undulation of many continuous dunes.

This is the place that those Fremen must pass through when going from north to south, and it is also the most likely passage for millions of Fremen in the south who want to step onto the northern battlefield.

Because under this vast desert plain, there are abundant underground aquifers. In places with underground aquifers, sandworms will not stay.

Although these sandworms are magical, after many experiments by the spellcasters of the Golden Empire, they found that a large amount of water is actually a deadly poison for them.

Spellcasters only need to use a large amount of water to eliminate these huge creatures hidden at least hundreds of meters underground.

But the sandworms' larvae, the sandtrout, need to consume a huge amount of water to grow, which is also the reason for the planet's desertification.

This magical transformation surprised Calon as well.

The ancestral red dragon's dark golden pupils flickered with light. Through the information carried in the sky and the earth, he could feel the Fremen's respect and faith in the desert on this land. The belief brought by the magical creature of the sandworm is proof of the Fremen's fear of heaven, earth, nature, and great power.

He also felt the Fremen's desire and pursuit for water and forests. In the god-making rhetoric spread by the Bene Gesserit sisters.

The ultimate savior Messiah will descend from the sky, bringing the Fremen abundant water sources, bringing them green plants, and transforming this entire desert planet into a paradise where the Fremen can set foot and live.

The Leo Empire naturally has the ability to transform such a planet, but for the sake of spice, they gave up this idea.

But even if the civilization of the Leo Empire wants to transform this planet, it will be a long and arduous process.

However, the ancestral red dragon can make this miracle appear quickly, but he is not here to be the Fremen's savior, he wants to be the god of the Fremen's savior.

"It's here, right here," Calon stopped, looked around, and then his steel-like claws began to beat the sand.

The smooth sand surface under the ancestral red dragon's feet was like a drum of the earth, vibrating with strong frequencies and fluctuations in the red dragon's hammering.

This fluctuation was similar to provoking sandworms, and also similar to sandworms' courtship, spreading along the earth veins in all directions, hundreds or thousands of miles away.

Then Calon stopped and stood in place waiting.

Maybe a quarter of an hour passed, maybe half an hour passed, and from under the yellow sand of the earth, the friction and whistling sounds of sand grains窜动 came from all directions.

They were huge sandworms, gathering from all directions, carrying the magnetic field of lightning and the storm of sand and gravel, separating the golden sand waves of the desert, and rolling in.

Huge sandworms came to the origin of the sound frequency vibration, opened several valve membranes, revealing huge mouthparts and ferocious sharp fangs, and made a gurgling, hollow echo.

Six huge sandworms, like pillars supporting the sky,窜出 into the air. The smallest of them had a body length of 100 meters exposed to the sand surface. In Calon's perception, the body hidden under the sand surface was nearly 80 meters long.

And the largest sandworm was so thick that the orange-red scales on its body looked completely like ancient rock formations, with an overall length of 480 meters.

That dark and deep esophagus was comparable to the entrance of the endless abyss, making people shudder.

The ancestral red dragon's dragon body, which appeared to be extremely strong among dragons of the same age, was so small in front of these creatures, and that huge mouthpart could completely swallow the entire ancestral red dragon in one bite.

But these enormous creatures held their upper bodies in the air because the ancestral red dragon's mental waves resonated at the same frequency as these sandworms, allowing these unintelligent beings to understand the ancestral red dragon's words.

“I want to build a paradise, but I still lack guardians and willing laborers,”

The ancestral red dragon raised its head, its dragon language containing resonant waves, teaching these unintelligent creatures the ability to understand language.

“If you obey me, I can teach you to shed your unintelligent beastly nature; if you obey me, I can teach you to gain the light of wisdom,”

“You are their eternal father, the sacred Shai-Hulud, and you shall also be my eternal servants, messengers of light.”

One by one, the giant sandworms tilted their heads, as if thinking, and slowly closed their mouthparts, their heads turning into cones, the closed point at the front resembling a small eye.

“Glurble, glurble,”

One sandworm seemed to reject the ancestral red dragon's will, reopening its mouthparts and emitting a strange, hollow gurgling sound.

But before this sandworm could attack the ancestral red dragon, the largest sandworm, measuring four hundred and eighty meters in length, suddenly burst out of the ground, opened its enormous mouthparts, and bit at the rejecting sandworm.

The other sandworms also simultaneously attacked the sandworm that rejected the red dragon's will. The fearsome teeth, like cutting machines and pulverizers, instantly cut the opposing sandworm into countless pieces, which were then devoured by the other five sandworms.

“Glurble, glurble,”

The largest sandworm closed its valves, emitting a muffled sound, and pressed its massive head against the sand, bowing before the ancestral red dragon.

The other sandworms also lowered their heads to the sand one by one, emitting gurgling, muffled sounds.

“Since you are to be my eternal servants, then naturally you can be spared the fate of water poisoning,” the ancestral red dragon opened its claws, and hundreds of magical runes, like flowing ribbons of light, were imprinted one by one on the sandworms' massive heads.

Although it would be difficult to give these sandworms other powers such as magic, allowing these sandworms to have the ability to avoid water was now extremely simple in the red dragon's eyes.

Hundreds of magical runes were imprinted on the sandworms' heads, forming a massive magic array, but this magic array did not use magic power, but rather the energy produced by the sandworms during their survival and activity, which Kalon instantly calculated and analyzed could be used to drive it.

“Go, the paradise I am building still needs your strength.” Kalon imprinted the last magic array, patted the head of the largest sandworm, and said in a low voice.

Rumble,

One by one, the enormous sandworms re-entered the desert, using their innate abilities to vibrate the sand, stirring and drilling in the center of this plain, opening up a huge passage directly to the underground water-bearing rock layers hundreds of kilometers deep.

The earth was churning, the sand was flying, but the huge passage would not be refilled by quicksand, because the will of the master of the earth was so at this moment.

After about two hours, a towering stream of water suddenly shot out from the huge passage drilled by the sandworms, like a fountain, sprinkling into this arid desert.

Fafna stepped forward and scattered seeds and planted plants in the gradually moistening sand.

These were giant columnar cacti, white-thorned buffalo gourds, sand verbena, incense bushes, shepherd's trees, and other plants, all of which were planted in the desert by the Fremen and were among the few that could survive.

Water flowed, plants took root, magic diffused, and green shoots sprouted.

“The paradise of heaven has already descended, so when will my messianic warriors arrive here!”

Kalon stood on the desolate hill, and said faintly.