Help! I'm in Another World and the Dragon Man Want Me To Get Pregnant!
Chapter 69: Shattered Innocence

Chapter 69: Shattered Innocence

What should he do with it?

After some thought, he shifted into his dragon form, carefully grasped the infant, and took flight—away from the town, toward a completely different destination.

There was a facility dedicated to the protection of such creatures.

Yiazmat were already a rare species, laying only a single egg every few years.

Certain organizations worked to protect and raise these young before returning them to their natural habitat.

Ignatius left the hatchling in their care.

By the time he had finished, three days had passed.

Upon returning to town, he headed straight for the guild—only to be met with chaos.

Smoke filled the air.

His breath caught.

"Shen Xinghui!"

He rushed inside, bracing for an inferno—

But there was no fire.

The first floor’s dining hall was packed with people, but no one was panicking or trying to escape.

Something was wrong.

As he tried to make sense of the situation, the Guildmaster, Tudor, descended the stairs.

Their eyes met.

"Ignatius!"

"Guild Master! What’s going on?"

"Xinghui has been kidnapped."

"...What?"

It took a moment for the words to register.

His throat felt dry.

Something lodged in his chest.

His body tensed, refusing to move.

His mind went blank.

"...How?"

Shen Xinghui was obedient and quick to understand reason.

Ignatius had explained the risks, and Shen Xinghui had accepted them.

He knew the dangers.

There was no way he would have carelessly opened the door for a stranger.

Then...

Was it the smoke?

Tudor’s voice cut through his spiral.

"Come with me."

Ignatius forced his frozen body to move, following him upstairs.

The scene outside Shen Xinghui’s room left him speechless.

The room itself wasn’t ransacked, but—

A dark stain marred the floor just in front of the door.

As he approached, a familiar scent hit him.

It was a harmless liquid—one that produced an overwhelming amount of smoke.

"They splashed this all over the door," Tudor explained grimly.

"When Xinghui saw the smoke, he must have panicked, thinking it was a fire. The window’s open, so he probably tried to air it out. But all that did was create airflow, pulling even more smoke inside."

Ignatius’s chest tightened painfully.

He could only imagine Shen Xinghui’s fear.

No—

That boy wasn’t the type to think of himself first.

He was kind.

Selfless.

He had probably tried to warn others of the fire.

Ignatius clenched his fists.

"Do you have any leads?"

"Two unfamiliar men were spotted heading upstairs before it happened. A rogue adventurer had been asking around about Xinghui too."

Tudor’s expression darkened.

"They’re not staying at any of the inns around here—I checked. Most likely, they’re holed up in some hidden property or a lodging provided by underground traders."

"We had one of the Beast Man tracking their scent, but—hey! Where do you think you’re going?!"

Ignatius was already gone.

Ignatius couldn’t wait any longer—he broke into a run.

He should have returned sooner.

If he had left Yiazmat’s child behind back there, he could have made it back faster.

But he hadn’t.

The Dragon Man had sharp noses.

Ignatius knew Shen Xinghui’s scent well.

He ran through the town, following the familiar trace.

The house in question was a small one, facing a narrow alley.

He flung the door open with enough force to rip it from its hinges, and the moment he did, Shen Xinghui’s anguished scream echoed through the air.

"No! No! Ignatius! Ignatius!"

A searing heat rose from the pit of his stomach, as if flames were bursting forth.

He rushed to the room where the voice came from and threw the door open.

The scene before him snapped something inside him.

Shen Xinghui was bound to the bed’s headboard, stripped naked and being violated.

One man assaulted his chest while another had lifted his legs and was forcing filthy fingers deep inside him.

The stifling scent of Shen Xinghui, thick with distress, gnawed away at his reason.

But it did not erode it in the way the perpetrators might have hoped.

No, the direction of his unraveling was entirely different.

It was pure, unfiltered rage.

Shen Xinghui’s wet, dark eyes met his, relief and joy flickering within them.

"Ignatius..."

With that one whisper of his name, Shen Xinghui lost consciousness.

"What... do you think you’re doing?"

Fury roared through him, refusing to be contained.

The men scrambled away from Shen Xinghui, attempting to flee, but he would never allow that.

With a mere gesture of his fingers, binding magic erupted, locking them in place.

The sheer force of his magic required no incantation—it surged forth as naturally as his rage.

The two men, now bound and helpless, wailed in terror, their cries grating against his ears.

Shen Xinghui had screamed too.

He had struggled, pleaded, yet these men had toyed with him, defiled him, trampled him beneath their cruelty.

There was no reason to listen to their begging.

Ignatius curled his fingers inward.

The restraints constricted tighter.

He could crush them with a single motion.

As his hand clenched further, the men’s bodies began to collapse under the invisible force—

"Ignatius, that’s enough!"

A voice rang out from behind him, and suddenly, a hand covered his eyes. In an instant, suppression magic surged through him, severing his wrath for the briefest of moments.

The men crumpled to the floor, and guild members who had entered the room swiftly subdued them, binding them in ropes.

"What are you doing?!" Ignatius spat, his voice still thick with fury.

"Calm down! If you kill them, Shen Xinghui will only be heartbroken!"

"—!"

Those words struck deep, and his mind finally cleared.

The lingering rage still pounded against his skull, relentless, but the ache in his chest was far worse.

He stepped closer and lifted Shen Xinghui into his arms.

The scent alone threatened to push him back into madness—the fevered heat of his skin, his ragged breathing, the tremors running through his limp body.

A glass bottle lay discarded nearby, its scent unmistakable.

Ignatius scowled.

Wombroot Aphroshidite Vine King’s aphrodisiac.