Chapter 270
Chapter 270
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Translator: Vine
Chapter: 270
Chapter Title: The Scent of the Destruction Dragon
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“I, Mage Tower Master…?!“
Association President Aira gaped in shock.
This was a conference room filled with the world’s leaders, heads of national associations, and high-rankers.
How many people could appear there without any presence at all?
She, and the other rankers too.
They all glanced toward the suddenly appeared Sophia.
It was to catch even a glimpse of her, one of the world’s acknowledged strongest.
“Man, this kid’s a riot? Calling her Mage Tower Master now. Where was that ‘Sage, Sage’ talk earlier?”
“Th-that’s…”
Aira broke out in a sweat.
‘Did she see?’
It seemed Sophia had witnessed her excitedly and aggressively rounding up the hyper rankers.
The Mage Tower Master was the eldest among the world’s rankers.
‘Forget that.’
No matter how much of a world hunter association president Aira was, before the Mage Tower Master, she was a firefly before the full moon.
She had no choice but to yield several—no, hundreds of moves.
As Aira wore a lost expression, Sophia waved both hands side to side with a laugh.
“Hehe, just kidding. Why so tense? Goddess of the Dark Moon Aira, everyone knows you’re working hard for the peace of the world’s hunters. And we’re not strangers, right?”
“Yes. Thank you for thinking well of me.”
“Yeah, yeah. So, let’s skip the greetings and get to the main issue? Time’s pressing.”
Boom!
Sophia, standing in the center of the conference room, drew the staff from her waist and slammed it into the floor.
Woooong!
“…!”
Golden light surged from the staff, forming a large hologram in the shape of a roughly 98-inch TV.
And within it.
Rumble…!
The monster’s dynamic writhing was faintly captured.
“Th-that’s…!”
“Is that the monster behind this incident?”
“How big is it?”
“Can we see it in more detail?”
In an instant, the conference room buzzed.
It couldn’t be helped.
The monster’s main body had been hard to approach due to the intense earthquakes.
Yet the Mage Tower Master was scanning it with a single spell.
It was like piercing through the stuffiness clouding their vision in one shot.
“The association’s investigation unit’s info is correct.”
The Mage Tower Master spoke.
“This thing holds power so immense I can’t even estimate it with my magic. And like a bear awakening from hibernation, it’s gradually stirring up the energy that lay dormant.”
“D-does that mean this isn’t even its full power?”
“I don’t know for sure. Circumstantially, it’ll soon reveal itself on the surface, so we’ll confirm then.”
The Mage Tower Master replied calmly and leisurely.
But.
Tremble.
Her wrist gripping the staff was definitely shaking.
* * *
The monster’s emergence, like a catastrophe, impacted the entire world.
Stock markets crashed from war-level anxiety, and food and raw material prices skyrocketed.
└ Yucatan monster triggers financial shock! Scary af
└ Earthquakes are bad, but inflation’s the real killer… Everyone’s hoarding goods. We might starve before the monster even gets us. Can’t buy food at the market anymore.
└ Just kill the monster and it’s over, right?
└ Yeah, what are the rankers doing? Not hunting it. They’ve been treated like VIPs by society all this time—shouldn’t they have duties to match?
└ That’s not the issue. The Mage Tower Master spoke at the conference. Even she said she couldn’t gauge its power.
└ Then we’re really doomed?
└ Looks like it. 14 years was a good run anyway.
People worldwide trembled in fear.
Apocalyptic theories spread, shaking the world, and cults sprang up everywhere.
Young folks who’d built honest careers fell into despair.
Crime rates surged nationwide.
- Catch the monster and everything’s solved!
No one was ignorant of that simple fact, but there was no solution.
The Mage Tower Master had declared it too strong—who could they blame?
Even if there were Demon Kings or Heavenly Demons, they weren’t heroes to begin with.
No one had the right to demand they sacrifice for a suddenly appearing apocalyptic monster.
And, days later.
Kurrrumble!
The ground at the center of the Yucatan Peninsula began to split.
No, “split” wasn’t right—“torn” was more accurate.
The satellite radar showed the ground shredded like torn paper.
At the same time.
“It’s on satellite!”
A marine expert in the conference room shouted.
“The monster breaking through the ground… Huh? Lizard? N-no… That winged thing is…!”
He couldn’t continue upon seeing the screen in the situation room.
- Roooaaarrr!
With a massive roar, it flapped its wings—it was far too gigantic and majestic to call a lizard.
“Th-that’s.”
Everyone’s faces turned ashen.
Their complexions paled.
“…A dragon?”
“Dragon?”
“That’s… something that’s never appeared in any dungeon… A dragon from legends?!”
That’s right.
The one word that best described that existence.
Dragon.
It was on another level from dragons in media, comics, or novels.
The size alone was absurd.
Normally, people pictured dragons as big as a local mountain at most.
No matter how much imagination you used, that was the limit.
“Wh-what dragon’s visible from satellite?!”
“That thing’s almost city-sized!”
“No wonder the earthquakes with it wriggling underground!”
“How do we even fight that?!”
Everyone knew.
Everyone felt it in their bones.
That dragon was strong.
Not just strong—apocalyptically strong for Earth.
“…This is bad.”
Even Mage Tower Master Sophia Silvers tone was flustered.
‘A dragon?’
She, ranked 4th in the world, had never seen a real dragon.
She’d only heard of their existence through Delaila.
‘Dragons existed on this Earth too?’
Snap!
“Guh!”
With the sound of mana cutting off, Sophia groaned.
Her scanning magic had severed upon the dragon’s emergence.
‘Insane.’
Others trembled, but her terror was greater.
Her deep understanding of mana let her grasp just how horrific that power was better than anyone.
Shaking her head in dismay, she spoke.
“Elder.”
To the elder who’d come with her.
“As of now, summon all Magic Tower personnel! This isn’t about settling scores. It could literally be Earth’s end!”
Kaboom!
As the dragon soared into the sky, the earthquakes stopped.
Vibrations lingered, but the ground no longer shook like before.
However.
- Roooaaarrr!
The awakened dragon’s roar brought fear worse than death to nearby survivors.
* * *
Rumble…!
Savoring the cool breeze after so long.
- Grrr…
The deep brown dragon bellowed.
The dragon’s identity: Earth Guardian Dragon Brias.
Floating in the air, Brias surveyed the land with eyes fierce enough to chill the spine.
- It’s been a while. How long was I asleep?
Flap, flap!
Beating its wings to awaken dormant cells, it assessed its body’s state.
Then it realized.
Roughly 66 million years had passed.
- Hm.
A span even dragonkind couldn’t endure.
The reason it could: one.
After the last Dragon Clan War, all its power had been sealed…
Slowing its body’s aging.
Heh.
The dragon’s lip curled.
- So, in the end… it came to that?
The fact that it alone breathed here meant one thing.
All other dragons were dead.
The Earth Guardian Dragon liked that.
Dragons were inevitable beings.
Their domains endlessly vast, unable to be sated even by a world.
Thus, only one dragon per world.
More than two would inevitably clash.
- But.
Rumble.
The Earth Guardian Dragon’s brow furrowed.
- Traces of dragonkind remain in this world?
It realized then.
Why it, dormant, had awakened.
Why its peaceful hibernation ended, instinct driving it to rise.
- A dragon’s scent.
Survival instinct.
- And… the scent of a Destruction Dragon.
Ah.
Brias shuddered.
What was a Destruction Dragon!
The clan’s calamity, a predator devouring nearby kin at birth.
- Close call.
Even kin, yet called dragons’ natural enemy.
Fortunately, the Destruction Dragon was newly born.
- Then it’s a hatchling…
That made it doable.
It was an ancient dragon among ancients.
One that survived to the end of the Dragon Clan War, immensely powerful.
A full-grown Destruction Dragon would be tough, but a hatchling?
A hatchling—hatchling in other words—was easy.
Even the mightiest predator was weak without protection.
- Kee-roooaaarrr!
The awakened dragon roared ferociously.
* * *
At that moment.
- Roooaaarrr!
Vinasa cutely roared and tore into an ogre’s head with sharp teeth.
Splurt!
Blood burst, brains spilled.
Yet it gleefully massacred.
I could’ve swept them, but didn’t.
“Good job.”
If it grew to adult dragon by destroying that much.
Better let it farm the exp.
“Phew.”
Step, step.
A week had passed wandering the boss aura’s central vicinity.
The dungeon was larger than expected.
Traps everywhere were annoying, the cave maze complex.
“You brat. How long you planning to stay here?”
The old man had felt the Destruction Dragon’s power over the week.
A hatchling’s body was tough enough ogre claws couldn’t scratch.
Dragon Fear was a magnificent AoE crowd control befitting why dragons were dragons.
And what of Hatchling Tongue?
It flaunted diverse, flashy magic that put my curse efforts to shame.
Proof why dragons were lords of magic.
Arin said she gained insights from Vinasa’s spells too.
“We’ve seen enough—time to go? Staring at these gross meatball guts is making me nauseous.”
“I want to leave too, but…”
Sadly, no way out.
After some time, the entrance itself sealed.
Meaning.
“We gotta wait for the boss to drop to leave.”
Clear the dungeon mission, entrance reopens.
Sea Guild members moved frustratingly slow.
“How long we gotta wait? Why not just kill it yourself?”
“Nah, c’mon.”
I knew the weak’s heart best.
How hard they fought for S-rank dungeon bid rights.
Me strong, so snatch boss and bail?
Like stealing kids’ New Year’s money.
“Plenty more prey around. Let’s wait a bit longer.”
By Pure Azure Heart Method sense.
They were nearing the boss room soon.
Tough dungeon, but cooperating doggedly, reward in sight.
That’s why I waited.
If no hope, I’d have stepped in and cleaned up.
- Kee-ek, kieeek!
Vinasa, finishing corner ogre legions, chirped excitedly.
Hurry.
Gimme tastier food, its cry said.
And then.
[Someone activates the ‘Two-Headed Statue’!]
[Special condition achieved!]
[Boss ‘Twin-Head Ogre’ (SS-grade) appears in the dungeon!]
“Huh?”
I was shocked.
SS-grade?
‘SS-grade’s constellation fragment level…’
Sea Guild couldn’t handle it.
Suddenly.
“Kkyak!”
“Urgh!”
“N-no way!”
Hunter screams reached my hyper-sensitive ears.
‘Whoa.’
Guess.
I had to step in.
Swoosh.
I readjusted my mask, removed from stuffiness, and turned direction.
- Kirurururu!
Vinasa roared excitedly.