The steady mountain rain continued to fall over Solitude Spire.
Without the apocalyptic crimson lightning of the Ancestral Blade, the autumn drizzle felt gentle, cool, and peaceful once more.
Water streamed down the dark cedar shingles of the cottage roof, rushing toward the western corner.
*Drip. Splat.*
Right above the porch stairs, the broken wooden gutter leaked like an open faucet.
A steady stream of gray rainwater splashed against the cedar steps, spraying fine mist directly toward Felix Vance’s dry woolen slippers.
Felix stared at the puddle.
He let out a quiet, tired sigh.
"I can't take this anymore," Felix muttered, pushing himself up from his low wooden chair. "The splash radius is getting worse. If my slippers get soaked, my comfort stat drops by at least fifty percent."
He stretched his arms beneath his yellow dragon-scale poncho.
The waterproof scales rustled softly, shedding stray moisture droplets with effortless ease.
He stepped down from the dry porch boards, walking across the wet clover lawn toward the mud trench.
Patriarch Ao Cang was still kneeling in the dirt.
The twenty-foot draconic titan was staring blankly at the neat pyramid of ten grey iron ingots, his massive horned shoulders trembling with quiet, hollow grief.
"One hundred thousand years of bloodline cultivation..." Ao Cang mumbled to himself, his voice sounding like dry gravel rolling down a cave. "The sacred bone of the Great Sky-Swallowing Leviathan... reduced to cold, unranked metal..."
Felix walked right past the kneeling patriarch.
He didn't spare the ancient sovereign a second glance.
He crouched down in the wet clover beside the neat stack of iron ingots.
"At least the system neatly stacked them," Felix muttered. "If I had to pick these up one by one out of the mud, I would've uninstalled right then and there."
He pulled the AetherDeck from his poncho pocket and unlocked the screen.
He swiped his thumb to the right, switching from the Inventory tab to the Base Construction & Crafting interface.
The screen flashed with a crisp amber layout:
Felix smiled.
"Now we're talking," Felix murmured. "A twelve-foot fluted downspout with curved splash control. That's real quality of life right there."
He tapped the glowing `[ CRAFT ITEM ]` button with his right thumb.
*Ding!*
A soft, golden chime rang out from the AetherDeck's speaker notch.
In the grass, the ten grey iron ingots dissolved into a bright, swirling vortex of pale golden light.
The raw molecular structure of the metal twisted and folded in mid-air, shedding every last trace of slag and impurities.
The ancient leviathan marrow lingering inside the iron resonated with the ambient spiritual rain, transmuting the grey metal into thick, lustrous celestial brass.
Two seconds later, the light vanished.
Sitting cleanly on the wet grass was a magnificent twelve-foot fluted drainage pipe.
It was forged from heavy, mirror-polished brass that gleamed with a deep, warm honey luster.
Attached to its sides were three heavy-duty mounting brackets shaped like stylized dragon talons, along with a wide curved elbow designed to divert rushing water smoothly away from foundations.
Felix's passive Inspector HUD immediately projected a neat tooltip over the hardware:
【Item: Mythic Brass Downspout & Drainage Kit】 【Durability: 500,000 / 500,000 (Indestructible Residential Tier)】 【Traits: Absolute Hydrodynamic Flow, Anti-Clog Non-Stick Interior, Mythic Splash Dampener】 【Inspector Note: Premium residential plumbing crafted from the recycled essence of an ancient god-slaying weapon. Possesses zero combat offensive value, but can smoothly channel up to forty thousand gallons of apocalyptic celestial rainwater per minute without vibrating, rattling, or splashing your footwear. Guaranteed rust-free for the next ten thousand years.】
Felix nodded with deep satisfaction.
"Five hundred thousand durability," Felix murmured, tapping the brass pipe with his knuckle.
*Clang.*
The sound was deep, resonant, and solid.
"No vibration, no rattling in heavy wind, and an anti-clog interior," Felix said happily. "That's how you engineer home improvement."
Patriarch Ao Cang slowly turned his horned head.
His bloodshot eyes locked onto the gleaming brass pipe resting in the clover.
His draconic soul, already battered by the sudden loss of his supreme weapon, felt an icy dread crawl down his spine.
Deep within that brass downspout, he could feel the ancestral pulse of the Sky-Swallowing Leviathan.
The same ancient power that had once cleaved mountain ranges and terrified astral emperors was humming quietly inside the curved metal cylinder.
"No..." Ao Cang whispered, his jaw trembling violently. "What... what did you reforge it into? Is that an ancient sealing pillar? A divine cannon to bombard the heavens? An imperial staff of eternal domination?!"
Felix looked at the giant draconic patriarch like he had lost his mind.
"It's a downspout," Felix said flatly. "For the roof. Because it's raining."
Ao Cang blinked.
"A... a what?"
"A downspout," Felix repeated slowly, enunciating every syllable. "You put it on the corner of the house so the water from the gutter doesn't splash onto the porch. Do you not have gutters in the ocean?"
Ao Cang’s brain froze.
*A downspout.*
*The Ancestral Dragon-Slaying Blade...*
*The divine relic of the First Era...*
*...was turned into residential drainage piping?!*
Felix didn't wait for the ancient sovereign to finish having his mental breakdown.
He leaned down, hoisted the heavy brass pipe effortlessly onto his shoulder, and walked back up the cedar steps onto the porch.
From beneath the porch railing, the three azure flood dragons poked their heads out, watching him with round, starry eyes.
Even the little emerald wyrm hopped along behind Felix's heels, chirping happily like a curious puppy.
Felix set the pipe down by the western corner post of the porch.
He stepped onto the wooden railing, grabbed the leaking cedar gutter with one hand, and snapped the old rotted wooden seam off with a brisk tug.
*Crack.*
He tossed the rotted scrap into the yard.
Then, taking the brass mounting brackets, Felix pressed them against the exterior cedar support beam.
Thanks to the AetherDeck's automated construction assist, the heavy brass brackets slotted into the wood with three satisfying, crisp clicks:
*Snap. Click. Clack.*
The twelve-foot fluted brass pipe slid smoothly into the talons of the brackets, locking flush beneath the roof's cedar eaves.
At the bottom, Felix positioned the curved brass elbow so it pointed directly into the stone rain barrel resting beside the porch stairs.
The entire installation took less than forty seconds.
"Done," Felix said, dusting his hands on his yellow poncho. "Clean fit. Zero wobbling."
Right on cue, a fresh gust of wind swept across the mountain peak, dumping a massive sheet of autumn rain onto the cottage roof.
Water rushed down the cedar shingles in heavy, gray torrents.
It poured into the roof gutter, surged toward the corner, and plunged straight into the open mouth of the new brass downspout.
*WHOOSH.*
Instead of sputtering, overflowing, or spraying mist across the porch steps, the water was swallowed effortlessly by the wide brass rim.
Inside the fluted pipe, the mythic non-stick enchantment engaged.
The water didn't crash or churn; it formed a flawless, laminar vortex that spiraled down the twelve-foot tube in dead silence.
At the bottom, the curved elbow directed the torrential flow into the stone rain barrel with a gentle, melodic trickle:
*Gurgle... trickle... splash.*
Zero water splashed onto the cedar floorboards.
The porch remained bone-dry.
The acoustic dampening of the celestial brass swallowed the chaotic roar of the storm, replacing it with the soothing, rhythmic white noise of running water.
*Trickle... splash... trickle...*
Felix walked back to his wooden recliner and sank into the cushions.
He picked up his porcelain Infinite Cozy Teacup from the cedar table, feeling the familiar, steady 68.5°C warmth radiating into his palms.
He took a slow sip.
*Slurp.*
"Ah," Felix sighed, closing his eyes in pure bliss. "Now that is what I call acoustic perfection. No splashing, no banging metal, just clean ambient rainwater. Best crafting upgrade I've done all week."
Lyra Ashford stood frozen beside the tea table.
Tears of profound, overwhelming revelation welled in the corners of her eyes.
*He... he did not destroy the dragon clan's weapon,* Lyra thought, her chest tight with awe.
*He redeemed it!*
*For one hundred thousand years, that blade was shackled to blood, hatred, and endless slaughter.*
*It knew only the scream of dying souls and the bitter cold of the deep abyss.*
*Yet Senior Brother Vance saw its suffering.*
*With boundless, unfathomable compassion, he stripped away its karmic curse and granted it a peaceful, eternal purpose.*
*Now, instead of cutting down lives, it guides the life-giving waters of heaven safely into the earth!*
*It protects the sanctuary from chaos. It turns the violence of the storm into a sacred, calming melody!*
*This is the highest attainment of the Heavenly Dao!*
*He has beaten swords into plowshares... and god-weapons into rain gutters!*
Down on the wet lawn, Patriarch Ao Cang collapsed entirely onto his hands and knees.
He listened to the gentle *trickle-trickle-trickle* of water flowing smoothly through his clan's former god-blade.
Every drop of water that fell from the brass spout washed away another layer of his 100,000-year-old pride.
He had arrived to conquer.
He had arrived to cleanse bloodline shame.
And now, the greatest treasure of his ancestors was happily functioning as the most efficient rainwater pipe in the known universe.
A heavy, broken sob escaped Ao Cang’s massive chest.
"We were wrong..." Ao Cang wept, burying his draconic face into the wet clover. "For a hundred thousand years... we thought the pinnacle of dragonhood was slaughter..."
He looked up at the quiet cottage porch.
Beneath the warm eaves, his descendants were curled peacefully, listening to the gentle rain, safe and content.
"The Dao of Drainage..." Ao Cang choked out through his tears. "It is deeper than the ocean itself!"