My Nails Tear the Earth
The dungeon’s interior was swallowed by darkness.
It was a blackness so absolute it could rival a moonless night, utterly devoid of light.
Somehow he could still see ahead, yet that did nothing to change the fact that the dungeon remained pitch-black as ink.
In one corner of that dungeon, a colossal flash of light erupted.
The crimson radiance devoured the dark, flooding everything around it.
Thud.
A shell of condensed mana cracked open, and something enormous stepped down from within.
No—its physical form might have been small, yet the overwhelming presence it radiated planted the illusion of a towering dragon’s bulk in the eyes of anyone who beheld it.
Had the black armor he wore not been shattered into ruin, no one would have guessed how close the black-haired boy had come to death. He stood tall and whole before the man, looking almost unscathed.
The right arm that had been torn clean off was already restored as if nothing had happened. A pair of crimson horns jutted from the boy’s head, and his pupils had slit into vertical slits—fragmentary proof that he was no longer entirely human.
“Y-you little bastaaaaaard!!!!”
The man who had been staring blankly at the sight roared, as if trying to drive every shred of terror from his body, and poured his mana into his staff.
“Goblin Knight! Get that thing out of my sight! Kill it right now!!”
-Kwaaaaaah!!
The Goblin Knight that had been sprawled on the floor answered its master’s command with a thunderous bellow, heaving itself upright and preparing to charge—
“An insect making such a racket. Be silent.”
The boy spoke those words and simply pointed a finger at the rising Goblin Knight.
“<My nails tear the earth.>”
Dragon Claw
KWA-GWA-GWA-GWA-GWA-BOOM!!!
What followed was a spectacle so catastrophic the man’s mind could not keep pace.
The dungeon itself was torn apart.
Crimson mana howled like a storm, shattering everything in the exact direction the boy’s finger had indicated.
When the gray dust finally settled, the chamber looked as though a natural disaster had swept through—nothing remained intact.
The earth was split, walls had collapsed, the ceiling had caved in.
Everywhere lay massive scars, as if some apex predator had raked its claws across the world.
Of the Goblin Knight that had stood in that path, not even a silhouette remained.
Only scattered scraps of shredded red flesh on the floor testified that something had once existed there.
“Ah……?”
Watching his loyal servant—the cult’s secret weapon, an enhanced species—vanish without so much as a scream, the man began thrashing for survival.
Cornered to the brink, the only idea he could seize upon was a hostage play.
He dragged the unconscious blonde girl lying behind him forward and thrust her out like a living shield.
“T-Taylor Winchester! If you want this woman’s life spared, then spare mine!”
At that voice the boy’s gaze shifted, locking eyes with the man.
Under that predator’s stare the man’s legs nearly gave out, yet he clenched his teeth and shouted on.
“I’ll tell you everything—the cult’s secrets, the names of the spies hidden inside the Academy—just please, let me live!”
“Hmm. Is that all?”
“Wha……?”
The boy answered the desperate cry with perfect calm.
“And what exactly am I supposed to do with that? It is of no interest to me.”
As if the offered information meant nothing, the boy’s lips curved into a savage smile. He raised a finger and pointed it straight at the man.
“No. Let us do it this way instead. I shall kill you myself. Consider it an honor.”
“U-uwaaagh!!”
Certain he was about to meet the same fate as the Goblin Knight, the man squeezed his eyes shut in anticipation of death.
Yet the attack he expected never came. After a long moment he cautiously opened his eyes again.
What filled his vision was the boy’s face twisted in a grimace of irritation.
“Tch. You frail little vessel—do not dare interfere with this body’s actions.”
Seeing the boy drop to one knee and mutter as though something had gone wrong, the man decided this was his chance to flee.
While the boy wrestled with himself, the man abandoned the hostage girl on the spot, even hurling away his staff, and bolted from the chamber.
“Don’t make me laugh! I am destined to become His apostle! I refuse to die in a place like this!!”
He ran and ran until he reached the next monster chamber, and only then did a laugh finally escape him.
“Haha, right. There’s no way I would die. I enjoy the favor of the Great One!”
Still speaking, he slumped against one wall, every ounce of strength drained from body and mind after that full-speed sprint.
Leaning there to catch his breath, he noticed the ground in front of him had risen in a small mound.
“What the—?”
He thought he might simply have missed it in his frantic flight, but a glance around the room revealed dozens of similar bulges.
“……What is this now?”
Rustle, rustle.
The moment he realized the mounds were shifting, unease seized him. He pushed himself upright, ready to leave the chamber—
-Kieeeeeek!!!!!!
-Kioooo!!
-Kieeek
-Kyaaak!
Dozens of goblins burst from the raised earth all at once, appearing right before the man.
Regeneration.
The dungeon phenomenon known simply as “regen” had begun.
Freshly spawned goblins, spotting an enemy the instant they entered the dungeon, flew into a frenzy.
-Kieeek!!
-Kioo!!
“Fuck! Mere low-tier trash!!”
Under normal circumstances these were the weakest of the weak, creatures he could have crushed with ease. But not a drop of mana remained in him, and his staff was nowhere to be found.
The outcome was inevitable.
“Get away!! All of you, get the hell away!! Gyaaah!!”
-Kieee!!
-Kyaa!!
“I—I can’t die he—ghk!”
Dozens of daggers plunged into him. His body was carved apart by the razor-sharp blades, and his breath finally stopped.
The ringleader of the Light of Dawn terrorists—who in the game had slaughtered dozens of students and in reality had murdered four—met his end right there.
Ahh, a familiar ceiling.
When I opened my eyes, the pure-white ceiling of the hospital that had taken care of me not long ago greeted me once more.
……Did I not die?
I dug through the last memories before I collapsed, then jolted in shock and stared at my right hand—the one that had been ripped off.
“What the hell happened? My arm’s reattached……?”
I clenched and unclenched the hand; nothing felt wrong.
For a moment the confusion was so complete I wondered if the whole thing had been a dream.
[Winchester’s descendant, have you finally come to your senses?]
“Huh?”
The sudden voice made me flinch and scan the room.
It was a VIP private suite built for nobles, not particularly spacious, so lying down I could see every corner with ease—yet no one was there.
[Weak, foolish, and cowardly on top of it.]
“……Who are you? Stop hiding and show yourself.”
When I asked tensely at the second voice, the speaker sounded amused by my reaction.
[Does it sound to you as though this voice is reaching your ears?]
“What?”
Only then did I realize the sound was not entering through my ears at all; it was being delivered straight into my mind.
[This body is Dragon Lord Beatrix. Once, humans called me the Red Dragon King.]
The name Beatrix was new to me, but the Red Dragon King I knew well.
I had read about it while researching the Winchester ducal house that would become my family.
Yes—in the chronicles of the hero Albans, the wicked dragon was called the Red Dragon King.
Which meant the identity of the voice inside my head was—
“The evil dragon that the Winchester ancestor beat down?”
[Ahem. ‘Beat down,’ you say. What a foul mouth for such a stupid whelp. Do you truly believe this body would lose to a mere human? There were… circumstances at the time. I simply allowed Albans Winchester to win.]
The slight fluster in the voice suggested the book’s account was not entirely false.
[At any rate, what matters now is that this body has taken residence inside your flesh, whelp.]
“Eek?!”
What? I don’t know, I’m scared. Why are you inside someone else’s body?
Of course I myself was also residing inside Taylor Winchester, but I had arrived first, so I would have preferred it if this one left.
[Hmm? Impossible. You are the rightful master of that body. Your soul and flesh are in perfect alignment.]
Beatrix spouted nonsense.
No—more importantly.
“You’re reading my thoughts too?”
[I dwell within you, so of course I can hear them.]
……Apparently dragons had no concept of human rights.
[I am a dragon. Naturally.]
“Indeed. The wicked dragon, the Red Dragon King.”
At my sarcasm the voice grew a little subdued.
[The one conversing with you is certainly Dragon Lord Beatrix herself… and yet, in a sense, she is also not.]
A cryptic, koan-like statement.
“So then, Miss Beatrix-who-may-or-may-not-be-Beatrix, what business brings you to visit my body?”
I still had not even confirmed how I had survived death, and now fresh information kept piling on until my head felt ready to split.
[I do not know.]
“Eh?”
[I said I do not know.]
What kind of answer was that supposed to be?
[I cannot fathom why this body has taken root in yours. The memories remaining to me are all cut short and hazy; there is no way to verify them.]
If even she herself did not know, what was I supposed to do?
[It is inevitable. This body is but a fragment of Beatrix’s soul.]
Ah. So that was what the earlier riddle had meant.
[Precisely.]
I had nearly died in a dungeon, only to wake up and find myself forced to share one body with an evil dragon.