novelChaos Abyss Survival Plan
| ← Ch.582 | Ch.584 → |
Translator: imperfectluck Editor: Kurisu
"Sunlight, please kick up the dust of the desert..."
"You really know how to joke everywhere that you go."
"Tsk, in a hellish place like the Chaos Abyss, joking around is the only fun to be had."
Indeed, joking around was the only fun I could have with the current scene before me.
Two weeks passed since I left Snake God Voka's dimensional level. I was now beginning to miss that damp and dark swamp.
All I could see around me was an environment completely opposite from the previous death swamp. Everything was now golden sand with blue sky. The entire ground was golden, with soft sand everywhere. No matter where I walked to, it would always be the same color. Apart from a few white clouds in the sky, there was nothing but endless sand.
I asked Voka for that dragon skeleton, and he actually gave it to us quite easily. He didn't even ask us what we wanted to do with it, but directly gave it to us.
This meant that we wouldn't need to steal from him. There was no need to antagonize Voka and add yet another enemy to the long list of enemies wanting to hunt me down. I heaved a sigh of relief, while Little Red seemed to be truly regretting that she wouldn't be able to have some fun.
It definitely seemed like she had been stifled for far too long. Now that there was nothing and no one restraining her down here, and she didn't need to act like a proper ruler, she immediately went back to being a degenerate naughty child.
However, upon closer consideration, it was only natural that Voka didn't value this dragon skeleton.
He didn't possess the dragon's heart which would be the most important key, nor did he have a dragon bloodline that would help him as a catalyst. Voka also had no interest in learning undead magic. In that case, this dragon skeleton was probably nothing more than a decoration to him. And if his negotiation to join the Hell Faction went well, it was highly likely that he would end up moving. In that case, he might as well give such a heavy and useless piece of luggage to us.
"System, how much longer does she need? Is there any chance of failure?"
[Considering all that she's accumulated, the chance of failure is lower than 1%... ]
However, my System's words made me even more nervous, which my silly cat was unable to take.
"Hey, Little Red is no master jinxer like you, where less than one percent chance of failure means one hundred percent chance of failure. Stop being worried for no reason. Don't get involved. If you do get involved, your negative luck stat might affect her, which would cause the tragedy that you fear most."
Actually, I felt that it was quite normal for me to be so worried. Dragons already had all sorts of strange ways to progress in power level. I had heard of even the most ridiculous methods before, but none were as ridiculous as the method Little Red was now using.
It was said that in order to progress to the job class of rune dragon, a dragon would need to cover their entire body in magic runes first. Apparently, the best possible ritual would also require the dragon to hunt and skin some powerful prey, and then sew that prey's skin on top of their own. Not only would this be tremendously difficult, it also sounded extremely painful. No wonder rune dragons were so famously durable. I suspected that maybe their pain receptors had all been numbed by the rune dragon transformation ritual.
Blood berserk dragons needed to give up their own wings in order to further evolve their teeth and claws. And from what I heard, wings were the single most sensitive part of a dragon's body, comparable to men and their you-know-what portion... Cough, don't mind why I knew what the most sensitive part on a dragon was. Regardless, I didn't really understand the blood berserk dragon job class that well. It was said that dragons who entered this job class would see their speed greatly increasing like the wind, and their claws and teeth would become sharper than swords, being easily able to slice through anything... Was this job class the dragons' version of the Sunflower Manual ~sup~1~/sup~!?
These two dragon job classes were still somewhat understandable, but the requirements for joining the eternity dragon job class were even more ridiculous. The dragon would have to devour all of their treasures and belongings, and then swear an eternal oath to forever refrain from having any personal property. This was even more ridiculous. Even if you had to get rid of all your treasure, why waste everything by devouring it all? Just throw it away instead! Weren't they worried about indigestion? Even if inflation was a problem, there was no need to reduce the amount of currency in circulation like that! Why not give the treasure to me if they didn't want it!
Perhaps now that I have shown you such ridiculous examples of other dragon job classes, Little Red's process for entering her desired job class would no longer seem as ridiculous.
Right now, I had a new backpack among my luggage which contained a dark green dragon egg with some red spots. After Little Red confirmed her process for improving in power level, she had actually reverted all the way back to a dragon egg!
It was obvious that Little Red would now be incredibly weak. It was likely that she had never been so weak before in her entire life. I felt an immense amount of pressure from carrying around the dragon egg-form Little Red. If I accidentally dropped the dragon egg, Little Red would probably turn into a ghost and haunt me for the rest of my life.
"You feel pressure? You just buried her dragon egg in the sand because you wanted to see if the stories about sand being able to fry an egg were real or not!"
I felt zero guilt regarding the silly cat's comment. I was just trying out the urban myths; it wasn't like I was actually trying to cook Little Red... Oh, right, it was also said that griffins laid eggs as well, along with vulture demons. Seeing a group of vulture demons flying around my head, I let my imagination run wild.
"You're drooling! Drooling! It's only been three days since you last ate, do you really need to be so ridiculous?"
That was right, I was starving to the point of almost fainting.
This wasn't because we didn't bring enough food on our journey. Rather, it was because we had thrown away all our food right after leaving Snake God Voka's dimensional level. We even burned all the clothes that we had worn there.
As for why? I unhesitatingly got rid of everything consumable simply because Voka was a God of Poison.
This wasn't just because I didn't trust Voka. It was also because I had just been staying in a God of Poison's Divine Kingdom. It was highly likely that something in the Divine Kingdom would be harmless, but the Concept of Poison there would likely taint our belongings to the point where one little item would be capable of destroying an entire country.
This was no story told merely for the sake of frightening children. This was experience obtained from painful tragedies. Food brought from any land of the dead would be the most fatal poison, while gold brought down from the heavens would actually be a venomous snake. These myths were all grounded in reality.
Most things in a Divine Kingdom would become a very part of the Divine Concept or God itself. The Concepts belonging to any Order God or former Order God would be purer, meaning they would be more dangerous. I had no intentions of dying in a humiliating fashion like food poisoning right after leaving Voka's Divine Kingdom.
"Little Red suffered a stomachache for two full days after we left. I'm no durable dragon like she is. Poison that can even make her suffer like that will probably just kill me."
"... Are you certain that it wasn't because of indigestion caused by her being so gluttonous with receiving all the free food she could eat there?"
This sounded so logical that I was unable to counter Harloys!
"Cough, cough, let's talk about the present instead. Where are we supposed to find some food here..."
It wasn't rashness that caused me to throw away all my food. As a veteran adventurer, I was confident in being able to find food in any type of environment. Even in a magma volcano, I could capture some fire snakes or flame tortoises to eat. However, the prerequisite would be that I would still have to see something edible.
On the way here, we saw nothing but sand. I had already captured and tried tasting the rotten flesh of the vulture demons flying above me. In the end, I was unable to even bring myself to take a bite as the vulture demon had rotten flesh, a powerful stench, and parasites within its flesh. But, even the most disgusting corrosive demon flesh would still probably be alright while it was still in egg form, I figured.
Finally, I drooled some more as I looked at the vulture demons above me. Perhaps it was time for me to capture another one and ask it how many family members... er, how many eggs it had?
"Um, as a veteran mage teacher, it's my responsibility to remind an acolyte like yourself about demon studies. It's well known that vulture demons and demon vultures are two completely different species. Demon vultures can be commonly found in the mortal plane as they're a unique type of magical beast. Meanwhile, vulture demons are a complete member of the demon family as they're a special type of evolved demon. Although they do consume the dead, they're still fully demons..."
Alright then, I tried my best to ponder Harloys' words with my brain instead of stomach. I then understood what Harloys was trying to tell me.
"Oh, such a long-winded explanation, but what you meant was that vulture demons wouldn't have any eggs..."
I could only look at Harloys with disappointment. As she was my half-living, half-undead magical pet, she could live without any food and simply feed off of my mana. But, this meant that I was losing energy at double a normal person's rate, hence why I was so starving. My expression became somewhat vacant as I dazedly looked at how proudly Harloys was acting like a scholar in front of me.
"Right, cats and dogs lay eggs as well, right? Harloys, you know how to lay eggs..."
I kept looking at Harloys with a more and more loving and expectant expression. I felt like I had never looked at her so gently before, yet she suddenly became nervous...
"Did you forget about our soul connection? You want to eat slime elf soup? Don't even think about it!"
And then, my cat grew wings and flew away.
"I'm so hungry..."
My stomach was now ruling over my brain. I shakily reached towards the fried egg in my backpack... er, that dragon egg!
"It should be fine to just take two bites, only two bites..."
[No, it definitely won't be fine. Don't suddenly take the bestiality path like a certain someone!]
I was now starving to the point where my brain no longer worked properly. Was that my System commenting, or my little bit of conscience remaining?
But just as I was fighting against myself on whether to eat Little Red or not, Harloys sent me a delighted mental message.
"Roland, there's a piece of food that's all alone... cough, I accidentally used the wrong word due to your influence! I meant that I found an adventurer who's in trouble!"
| ← Ch. 582 | Ch. 584 → |