Chapter 346
Chapter 346: The Two Dragons
Translator: imperfectluck Editor: Pranav
Satisfied, I made my return to the mortal plane from the Frigidwinter Earth. What greeted my eyes were battles nearly at their conclusion.
The undead armies had become nourishment for this newly-born Mars, devoured in large numbers. In fact, the scene of undead “committing suicide” in large numbers as if they had gone insane greatly frightened the living adventurers.
If it weren’t for the fact that Samantha had explained to the adventurers that this was due to the high-ranked Calamity Rankings individual that the wood spirits had hired, perhaps the combat situation would have been even more chaotic amid the adventurers’ mass panic.
Still, things definitely weren’t over. That was because…
“The Titan Giants are truly existences that give one headaches.”
Existences that had surpassed the Myth rank understood that one of the main differences between SemiGods and True Gods was in their understanding of the world’s natural laws. Existences at these levels could, indeed, utilize the natural laws but they’d be restrained by them all the same. A SemiGod that had lived long enough might not be any weaker than a True God without the power of natural laws, but when the amazing power of these laws is taken into account, even the weakest of the True Gods wouldn’t be easy to deal with.
Unfortunately, the weaker True Gods over here were getting beaten up by the not-so-weak Titan Giants.
Blackened all over, Mary’s current appearance wasn’t as golden and shiny as when she had first appeared after being scorched by thunder. On the other side, Solo now appeared half-frozen, practically confirming the fact that Yins was indeed an ancestor to the frost giants. Apart from beast taming, he had an obvious power over ice.
I could understand why the True Gods seemed to be losing. After all, Solo was the God of Music and Dance, while Mary was technically a Smithing God—her Concept included that of Hammers. Neither of them was likely to be adept at fighting, and this wasn’t even taking into account the untold years of combat experience these old, veteran Titan Giants had.
Now, however, came a turning point in the battle.
Because of certain reasons that shall not be stated, the Goddess of Wealth’s battle against the lion divine beast ended far earlier than expected. She chose to battle alongside Mary, and it would be ridiculous for two True Gods fighting two-on-one against a Titan Giant to lose, granted they all were incarnations. However, the thunder Titan Giant seemed to grow wilder and wilder as he fought, filling the entire sky with his summoned thunder. He actually held the advantage.
“We should be able to win.”
This was no guess—it was my judgment based on the situation. Both sides were peak incarnations, held back only by the mortal plane’s limitations. There wasn’t much of a difference foundationally in their power levels. If the thunder Titan Giant really forced the two True Goddesses to the brink, they could simply self-destruct their incarnations, which would seriously injure the Titan Giant.
Meanwhile, the battle between the two dragons at Oak Town’s castle gate ended far quicker than expected. Apart from the fact that Little Red’s anger helped greatly augment her combat strength, Molly was in no state of mind to fight.
Ever since Molly had been forcibly converted into an Inferno Dragon back in the Underground World, although she gained better melee fighting abilities and improved fire dragonbreath, Inferno Dragons had a reputation equal to street rats in the mortal plane. They also possessed negative racial talents, such as Bloodthirst and Berserk. From no angle did this look like a good deal.
Since Molly didn’t want to flee to the Chaos Abyss, she had to think of a method to deal with this problem.
And so, Molly had tried using secret dragon techniques to cancel the Inferno Dragon transformation and return to her pure Immemorial Dragon bloodline. Luckily for her, she had been successful, and this was due to many reasons—she had many secret dragon techniques at her disposal, she hadn’t transformed for long, and the original individual who had converted her had perished.
However, canceling her Inferno Dragon transformation had a price—such a cancellation was the equivalent of slicing off parts of her being that had already transformed into an Inferno Dragon. She had hence lost a large amount of blood and had entered a weakened state that would not end for many years to come. Not only did her power level decrease by at least twenty percent, but she also needed to utilize another portion of her remaining power to suppress the remnant Inferno Dragon blood in her body. All she had left to fight with was half of her original power.
And that was how she was viciously beaten by her own daughter.
Still, everyone was aware of Molly’s personality. Threatened by the Demon Earl, she had surrendered immediately. When the situation turned awry, she had instantly ditched her new boss. Even though she possessed sufficient power to fight against the Undead Emperors in the Bardi Empire’s capital when she had been blocked by the undead, she surrendered without a fight, under the combination of the undead’s carrot and the stick. Not only that, she wrote a letter to her daughter—one with enmity towards her—pleading for help. To quote Little Red, “Molly keeps talking about how the pride of dragons is more important than anything while rubbing that very pride under her ass. She’s the shame of all dragons.”
So, the moment Molly discovered that her own daughter was far stronger than herself, she immediately surrendered. Yet unfortunately for her, the result was an even worse beating. Upon seeing Molly’s actions that lacked any shred of dignity, Little Red had been angered all the more.
“I—I surrender! Little Ein, please stop hitting me!”
Protecting herself with her wings and arms, Molly repeatedly called out Little Red’s baby nickname, but this cowardly behavior only served to make Little Red even more furious. Little Red used her tails, claws, and fists to continuously deliver combination attacks that viciously pounded Molly’s face.
“…No matter what, I’m still your mother. Can’t you give me some face in front of everyone! You’re still hitting me! You disobedient daughter, I’m going to go all out against you!”
Molly’s resistance made Little Red’s combat fervor rise yet some more—Little Red even started using dragon magic and began spitting dragonbreath directly at Molly’s face.
“…Please stop hitting me—it hurts! Please forgive me! After all, I gave birth to you!”
Molly started pleading again, causing Little Red to thrash her even harder…
“Fine then, we can just die together!”
Molly was filled with ever more indignation and wanted to regain some lost face, so Little Red beat her harder…
From a certain standpoint, Molly was truly unfortunate. If she had been able to keep up a defiant attitude to the end, Little Red would have calmed down after venting through a single beatdown. However, the end result of Molly continuously waffling between pleading for mercy and resisting in anger was that Little Red continuously upgraded the degree of Molly’s beating. In the end, Molly was injured so badly that her scales were dropping off everywhere and her dragon blood was spewing furiously… causing even the spectating adventurers to want to get a piece.
“An Immemorial Dragon’s blood! One liter can be sold for one thousand gold coins! And these dragon scales! Dragonscale armor costs 50,000 gold a suit!”
“Don’t go over there, Captain! You’ll die if you get too close!”
A certain greedy adventurer team captain leered at the dangerous battle and tried to approach it without regards to his life, causing his teammates to restrain him tightly. They wouldn’t let him go.
However, a certain priest suddenly sighed, helpless, as he cast all the Divine Art buff spells he knew upon himself. Ever so carefully he started edging closer, all to gather some of the precious dragon blood.
“Anlan, are you insane? Even if you’re a Goddess of Wealth priest, this is taking things too far! You were never this crazy for money before! This is just suicide! No matter how much you need money, is it really necessary to go to this degree?”
However, the priest named Anlan could only smile wryly and shake his head in response to his teammate’s concern.
“It’s not that I’m crazy for money; it’s that I just received a divine message from Beyana herself. If I can obtain enough dragon blood, she’ll increase her divine favor for me by two levels. And if I fail, then she’s going to send me all the way back to the acolyte priest school and demote me to a novice priest. And if I’m not careful enough and die here, she’ll make me into a God Envoy in her Divine Kingdom.”
Anlan’s teammate’s jaw dropped in surprise as he looked towards the north, where the Goddess of Wealth had displayed herself to everyone and, along with Mary, was currently locked in a brutal battle against a Thunder Titan Giant.
Molly and Little Red were both SemiGods, and an incarnation of a True God would be at a similar level of power. No natural laws existed that forbade True Gods from involving themselves with mundane matters. An Immemorial Dragon’s blood would be precious to even a True God, but shamelessly making a believer risk their life to gather it was something only the Goddess of Wealth could pull off.
“Should I say that it’s expected of the Goddess of Wealth Beyana? That greedy Goddess, even at such a time—”
The person who was speaking was suddenly cut off as his teammates hurriedly covered his mouth. Anlan himself was frightened to the point of shivering in fear.
“Are you an idiot? This is desecration! And she’s so close to us right now, and you even uttered her name out loud! What if she hears you—”
Anlan’s raving shouts weren’t even over when he suddenly stopped. A strange expression manifested on his face as he spoke again to his unlucky teammate who had, evidently, caused his own misfortune.
“Oscar, the Goddess just sent another divine message. She said she heard everything you said and if you don’t help me obtain two liters of dragon blood, she’ll make you bankrupt tomorrow… True Gods never lie, and based on my understanding of the Goddess and how miserly she is, she’ll definitely do it—ahhh! My glorious Goddess, I didn’t mean it to be desecration! Please don’t increase my task to three liters—I’ll really die!”
Alright then. There were now two unlucky desecrators. But the pitiful part was that their task was destined to fail because someone far more dangerous, vicious, and powerful had arrived.
“Everyone, leave this area. Little Red, restrain Molly for me. I’m going to draw out some of her blood!”
Yep, I had returned. As for the battle between the True Gods and the Titan Giants? I might as well let them take it slowly. Since the True Gods still hadn’t yet self-destructed their incarnations, I knew what was going on. They probably wanted to gather information on the Titan Giants to prepare for the real battle against the Titan Giants’ main bodies. They were all quite busy, so I might as well finish my own evolution Quest first.
What? You’re saying I’ve already completed it? Wasn’t it ‘choose one of three?’ Why would I choose this lower-ranked Quest when I already had a better choice in completing the hunt the Undead Emperor Quest?
“Hmph! After years of digging pitfalls for me, I would be foolish to blindly listen to the System and not see the trap within these Quests.”
This was what my System had said earlier:
[You have achieved the peak of Gold. You have activated more than three bloodline abilities. The combination of your soul and physical body has reached 100%. Soul Imprints have been activated. SemiGod-level undead, Order, and divine powered items detected in the nearby area. Bloodline activation hunting quest has been activated. System Notification: It’s time to show off the true value of your physical body and make those Titan Giants that think they’re physical perfection see what a true Double Diamond Bloodline is.]
[A choice of Quests has been activated. You can pick any of the following three, and your bloodline will evolve based on how well you complete them. Remember, your bloodline can currently withstand undergoing only one evolution.]
[After you complete this bloodline evolution Quest, the path for you to become a Legend shall open. Your War Angel and Original Sin Demon forms shall evolve together with your bloodline.]
Indeed, my System did say that my bloodline could only withstand one evolution. However, it never said that I couldn’t simultaneously use two materials together to evolve my bloodline! And, based on my analysis, the most important sentence in this trap was “You can pick any of the following three, and your bloodline will evolve based on how well you complete them.” Basically, this meant that this was an open Quest just like the main storyline Quests from before, and that the reward was only based on how well I completed the Quest.
If I completed only one of these three choices, although I’d still finish the Quest, my System would most probably insult me in the end with something like “You couldn’t even grab this chance; it’s not my fault!”
“Tsk! I remember all those pitfalls you’ve set for me in the past!”
[Hah, don’t be so happy quite yet. You need more than half of the blood in an Immemorial Dragon’s body in order to evolve your bloodline with the power of dragons. Are you sure Little Red won’t turn on you if you kill Molly? No matter what, she’s still Little Red’s mother. Or are you intending on breaking up with Little Red?]
“Do you really think I’m that much of an idiot? The Quest said ‘Defeat Molly Ein Mezus and obtain an amount of fresh Immemorial Dragon blood that exceeds half the blood in a dragon’s body.’ That means it’s fine as long as I have enough dragon blood and it doesn’t need to all come from Molly. I can simply take some blood from Molly and ask Little Red for the rest. This way neither of them will die. You really think I’d fall for such a simple trap?”
Fine then, the System fell silent at this, which meant that I had been right on the mark. As for the Titan Giant ingredients I needed for the final optional Quest, I glanced over at the five-colored Ultraman fight still going on not far in the distance.
“Go, go! Please fight until both sides are seriously injured! Beyana! Hurry up and use self-destruction, hmm hmm ha hee~! Hurry and take each other out! Hmm hmm ha hee~! Roland’s song version! Hmm? Who are you supposed to be? Don’t bother me, I’m super busy right now!” [1] 1
The priest named Anlan tugged on my shirt sleeve and could only smile wryly as he explained:
“The Goddess heard everything you said just now. She says that she’s taking half of the dragon blood, otherwise she’s going to stop fighting right now and let the Titan Giant come over to deal with you.”
“In her wildest dreams! Tell her that there’s no blood for her! If she wants my life, she should come for it herself!”
Note:
[1] TL/N: If this sentence is confusing, it’s because Roland is humming in the middle.