The Dragon's Gift
How? Why did a yokai exist inside a forbidden book? Even Bihyung, veteran that he was, could not find an answer.
The same sort of thing as Eodugi? No. Eodugi had been so insignificant that one might have mistaken him for an anomaly. Eodugi would have been a little hurt to hear it, but that was an unavoidable fact. The dragon before his eyes was not.
...This gives me chills. Merely looking at him, the trembling of body and mind would not stop. His half-yokai blood kept whispering that this was beyond him, that the likes of him could never stand against such a being. How could anyone dismiss an existence like this as a mere anomaly and shut it away as a forbidden book? Absurd.
Then what in the world is he?
He was still turning it over when a sound reached him. Thud. He turned his head. Mina had lost consciousness and collapsed.
The instant his gaze snapped back to the dragon, the dragon looked, at that expression, as if he had seen a ghost.
"...Could you explain?"
His teeth ground together, but he held himself in check. He was reading the situation with a cold head. A being of that caliber. If he had meant to kill, he could have done it on the spot. Mina had only lost consciousness. The rise and fall of her chest made that certain. And above all, there is no hostility in his voice.
Dokkaebi were a race that treated struggle like play. Perhaps because half his blood was theirs, he could tell with perfect clarity whether the feeling this yokai turned on him was killing intent or goodwill. Even so, the fact that Mina had come to harm kept needling the Dokkaebi in his veins.
The dragon, watching him, let out a broad laugh, as if pleased.
He went on, with a however.
"Then what was it?"
Even that, the dragon added, he had restrained the moment he recognized how unripe the child's power was.
"...Then why haven't I fainted?"
If it had been enough to drop Mina, then by rights he ought to have fainted too. Even now, look—his legs were shaking under him. But the dragon looked dumbfounded, as if the question itself were a fool's.
...Ah.
Staring at the mighty yokai in front of him, he had forgotten. His own grade was EX. Is my body shaking only because I glimpsed a fragment of the power this being holds? He had erased the dragon's presence, and in doing so had instead peeked at a sliver of his strength. That was why his flesh would not obey him.
Calm down.
The moment he understood, Bihyung gave his body an order. Do not tremble. He has no mind to harm you. The shaking stopped as if the whole thing had been a lie.
The dragon smiled at the sight.
Heh, heh, heh. The dragon who had laughed so then broke into a wide grin. Wow. A face that fierce doesn't get any less fierce just because he smiles, does it?
"More importantly, how are you in a place like this?"
The dragon stared straight at Bihyung.
"...Pardon?"
I'm a what?
A brief silence. Their words had passed each other by. Bihyung introduced himself to set the matter straight, and—
"Even if you ask me..."
He did not say that a game bonus had lifted his ceiling, and that the result was the person standing here. He would not have been believed anyway.
"Am I that unusual?"
Unusual, he says...
Certified special by a dragon of that stature. But think about it—that meant special as a yokai, didn't it? Is it actually all right for me to be happy about this?
While Bihyung held that doubt, the dragon rattled on.
What is he even talking about? Don't you know that even in novels these days, talk only the author understands gets boring? Lore? What's that supposed to be? You win everything?
Of course Bihyung had no way of knowing. The other was a shut-in of a dragon whose years he could not even begin to guess. A dragon who had been stuck in the corner of a room could hardly be any good at talking to people. The dragon simply said whatever he felt like saying, on and on without end.
"...By the way, there's been something I've wanted to ask."
Bihyung tilted his head.
"Why were you sealed?"
The moment the question left him, the air sank cold. Ah. Mistake. The other had shown such an easy manner that he had forgotten. The being in front of him was a dragon. ...Being sealed can't be a good memory. I just stepped on a land mine.
Emergency!
My life... can I even keep it?
He was just about to pull out his gamtu, the cap of concealment, and think of running.
The dragon said it with a bitter smile.
"...Would I be sealed in this space too?"
Then he would rather not hear it. Curiosity isn't more important than staying alive.
Seeing Bihyung give up at once, the dragon let out a short, empty laugh and asked.
"I came into the forbidden book looking for a cultivation method, and ended up here."
A dragon whose era of life was out of joint could not understand what a forbidden book was. But once Bihyung laid it out, clear and orderly—what anomalies were, who the exorcists were, and what the forbidden book was—displeasure began to show plainly on the dragon's face.
Then, from the sky high above, came a sound as if heaven and earth were collapsing.
KRRRRRUMBLE—!
Just how insane is that power? Bihyung stared at the dragon in open shock, and for a moment the dragon only smiled, looking thoroughly refreshed.
"Ah, my proficiency..."
Bihyung, who had not caught a single anomaly, felt his stomach twist. Why'd you go and kill them all... damn it. He could not even bring himself to say it. The original tenant of this book seemed to be that dragon, and the anomalies were, in a sense, squatters who had broken in. ...It was absolutely not that he was too scared to speak.
The dragon showed an interest in the anomalies.
"There is one. A cultivation method whose functions I can set as I wish, and that can keep on growing."
The dragon's eyes widened, like a man beholding something marvelous. Then admiration spilled from his mouth.
"Remnants?"
That was the origin. One might also call it the beginning.
They filled that blank page, added the mind's image, and forged it so.
Saying this, the dragon fell into deep thought. The conclusion he reached was only one.
"Pardon?"
"Then isn't that a bad thing?"
It wasn't, though. In the game it had clearly been a hidden piece outstanding enough to guarantee the climb all the way to the 9th Rank. What is going on? Bihyung could not hide his confusion.
Seeing that, the dragon laughed aloud and answered with refreshing clarity.
The dragon's eyes held Bihyung.
Filling those holes was the work of the one who learned it. The dragon said so, and laughed again.
He dumps all the worry on you first, and now he says don't worry. There was much Bihyung wanted to say, but he pressed it down and endured. The fathomless eyes of a dragon who had lived so long, however, seemed to see straight through him.
The moment he said it, the rift in space tried to slam shut. The dragon saw it, and did not move. Yes. His body did not move.
CRACK!
The instant the dragon's energy burst forth, the space that had been closing shattered instead, and its restoration stopped cold.
Beneath heaven, there was no one who could infringe upon his actions. The bearing that seemed to say so was arrogant, and also so natural that it looked as if one simply had to accept it.
The dragon shaped his energy and let two motes of light fall into Bihyung's hands. They were a dragon's scales. Bihyung knew their name by instinct.
"The Reverse Scale..."
A Dragon's Vital Scale — Two
Borne since the age of the serpent. A symbol of incompleteness and cultivation. Merely to possess it aids the raising of Rank.
"But why would you give me these...?"
The Reverse Scale was a dragon's vital point. He could not understand at all why such a thing would be handed over. The dragon laughed, a low heh-heh, and explained.
Thus the Reverse Scale became a dragon's vital point. Damage it, and all of one's cultivation as a dragon might be blown away.
He had risen to the highest place a dragon could climb, and resolved his incompleteness. Thus, to him, the Reverse Scale was nothing more than a memory of the past.
What humans called Rank. What a dragon called the standing of the true self.
Hearing the explanation, Bihyung's eyes flew wide. In short, a buff for raising Rank? Even the game had never had an item like this. Whatever the efficiency turns out to be, the difference between having it and not will be heaven and earth. Enough to raise gooseflesh down his back.
The dragon said so, and squeezed both eyes tightly shut.
The moment the dragon opened his eyes, moisture gathered in them. Eyes full of damp. The droplet that rolled within them soon changed into a single crystal and fell. Bihyung looked at the crystal sphere that had come to rest in his grasp.
Orb of As-You-Wish — an offshoot, not the true jewel
Whatever has been broken, it can restore.
......
The dragon's smile turned toward Bihyung.
"May blessing fill the road ahead of you. Most special half-yokai in the world."
With those words, the dragon made to vanish beyond the rift. Bihyung called after him in a rush.
"If I enter this place again, can I meet you once more?"
He had received much. And there was nothing he could give back. Instinct whispers. Do not let that being go like this. Part this way, and it will remain a burden for a lifetime. Beyond what his half-yokai blood whispered, Bihyung himself wanted to repay the gift he had been given.
"Someday. I don't know how long it will take, but I want to find a way to undo your seal. So please answer me. Can we meet again?"
The dragon looked at the young half-yokai and laughed inwardly. Truly a commendable child. Not even fully grown, he was like an ant crawling the ground compared to himself. Even in a season when he ought to worry more for his own safety, he had a heart that worried for another. The dragon was deeply glad of it.
With that, the dragon vanished beyond the rift. The cracked void, too, was neatly restored to its original form once he was gone.
"......"
Bihyung watched in silence, then clenched tight the treasures in his hand.
Truly, he had received a precious gift.