Chapter 167: Paying the Karmic Debt
Translator: RaidenTL
Chapter 167: Paying the Karmic Debt
And so, my double life began.
The term 'double life' has a certain ring to it, but I wasn't doing anything strange.
It was just a fancy way of saying I secretly went to a cave at night to meet with Baek Rang, who was hiding there.
...Does that sound a little weird?
The official excuse was that she needed to relay news of my situation to her wolf pack.
If I had simply left for another place, they could have let me go without issue, but I was currently confined to Mount Hua. She claimed that if she told them that, Chillang-i would just whine endlessly, so she had no choice.
Then why not just say I'm somewhere other than Mount Hua?
I had the thought but didn't bother voicing it.
After all, I had a few things to gain from these secret rendezvous myself.
“Oof, you really are heavy.”
“Gek gek.”
The fiery Red Dragon by day, the cool Baek Rang by night.
I had the best pillows one could ask for, ready to be chosen according to my mood.
“...Put your tongue away. You look incredibly sly right now.”
“Gek?”
This wasn't just about personal preference or anything like that; I had my reasons.
The most prominent elixirs in my body were the Hwari and the Snow Ginseng.
While things like the Gongcheongseokyu, the Ten-Thousand-Year Golden Spirit Fruit, and the inner cores of spirit beasts were by no means inferior, I was directly utilizing the powers of the Hwari and the Snow Ginseng.
And as it happened, the Red Dragon and Baek Rang wielded fire and cold energy, respectively.
Of course, there was a difference in the magnitude of their power, but the energy I was exposed to wasn't all that different.
If I absorbed fire energy during the day and cold energy at night, my internal energy was bound to accumulate naturally.
And that might just be the clue I needed to evolve into a Crushing Dragon.
“...Hey, I don't mind you lying here, but why do you keep burrowing into me?”
“Gek gek.”
“There you go again, acting like a child only when it suits you.”
The greater the surface area of contact, the better I can absorb the cold energy.
Lying on Baek Rang's lap, I endured this "harsh training" while munching on the meat I'd hunted.
Food was easy to come by now.
The meat the Red Dragon caught for me was good, but I also hunted for myself during my free time.
Perhaps because I had hunted the Fire Rats, beasts I'd never seen before began to flock to Mount Hua, allowing me to hunt a diverse range of prey.
Of course, they all hid as if they were dead whenever the Red Dragon was active during the day, only roaming about when she soaked herself in the lava, but that was no problem for me.
My active hours were at night, anyway.
I would hide in the darkness, creep up on my prey, and lunge. A quick snap of the neck, and the hunt was over.
Mount Hua was littered with fire and lava, so I was often discovered midway, but the outcome never changed.
Even if they knew I was there, they couldn't stop me.
I was stronger now than I had ever been.
My body was whining, begging to evolve, but I was holding it back.
As they say, patience is bitter, but its fruit is sweet. I did my best to ignore the urge to evolve.
I had a feeling that becoming a Gomodo-Salamander would be crossing a point of no return.
I could just picture the Red Dragon losing all restraint and pouncing on me.
It was dangerous, in more ways than one.
Even if I were to evolve into a Salamander, I had to do it after escaping from her.
The best-case scenario, of course, was evolving into a Crushing Dragon.
I hadn't found the key yet, but spending my time like this seemed to be gradually bringing about some changes.
As I suppressed my evolution and continued to train and hunt, I could feel power accumulating deep within my dantian.
I was reminded of Old Man Compy and the dinosaurs and lizards under his command.
They were a group that didn't evolve despite being at a high enough level to do so.
I felt like I was starting to understand why.
Suppressing evolution was, in itself, a form of training.
“Gek gek.”
Unable to control my overflowing power, I did have a tendency to over-hunt, but it was fine thanks to Baek Rang.
She would freeze the meat with her cold energy, and we'd give the leftovers to the wolf pack.
Not a single piece of meat went to waste; it was all consumed frugally.
As expected of Baek Rang. I've thought it before, but she's so practical.
Is it because she's the eldest sister of the wolf pack?
By the way, her den wasn't that close to Mount Hua. Wasn't it tiring for her to come every day?
She could easily skip a day... why did she keep coming?
Just as I was pondering this, Baek Rang yawned and spoke to me.
“Awoo... Right, you said you caught the Guardian, didn't you?”
“Gek gek.”
“But your body is the same? The rumors can't be false... Are you perhaps staying in this state on purpose?”
I liked Baek Rang in many ways.
For one, I got to touch her fluffy fur. I also got to see her cold pouch, which was no less impressive than the Snake Queen's. And she was so practical.
Above all, she was incredibly sharp.
No wonder she's the leader.
If she didn't have a pack and was small like Tus and Pus, I would have given her one of my scales and taken her with me. Then I could pet her fur whenever I wanted to relax.
“Gek gek.”
I gave a slight nod.
“Hmm, you're already big enough. What on earth are you trying to become?”
Baek Rang's eyes scanned my body.
Her gaze traveled from my head all the way to my tail, then started back up toward my head again.
No, it stopped midway.
She was staring intently at a certain spot.
Gulp.
Baek Rang swallowed.
Her tail began to wag gently.
“...This is troubling, in so many ways.”
I didn't know what she was thinking, but her face was slightly flushed.
“I'm getting tired. Shall we sleep now?”
“Geek...”
That meant she was about to change from her human form back into a wolf.
“You like this form an unusual amount, don't you?”
But I didn't mind.
It meant I could fall asleep hugging her soft fur.
I prepared to go to bed.
The Red Dragon by day, Baek Rang by night.
I had to divide my time properly to get a good night's sleep.
If I slept too much during the day, the Red Dragon would question me, and if I slept too much at night, Baek Rang would be disappointed.
....
...Why am I even worrying about this?
Maybe I've been here too long. I've been having strange thoughts lately.
Baek Rang curled up and pressed herself against my side.
“Awoo...”
It was cooler here than elsewhere, but this was still Mount Hua; there was no need to stick so close.
But I didn't point it out.
It meant I could touch this furball as much as I wanted.
“...Hey.”
“Gek?”
“You know, sometimes you gently bite the nape of my neck when you're sleeping.”
I do?
“...Never mind. There's no way you'd know what that means.”
“Gegek?”
What the heck? She's the one who brought it up.
“Forget it. Just sleep.”
“Geeeeng...”
I curled up as well and fell asleep.
Every time I woke up, my body was covered in fur, but it was probably nothing to worry about.
*
With Baek Rang at night.
And during the day?
“Little one. What do you think is in my thigh that you keep burrowing into it?”
With the Red Dragon.
After filling up on Baek Rang's cold energy, wasn't it only natural to fill up on the Red Dragon's fire energy?
This was absolutely not for my own selfish reasons. It was for training.
If I had my way, I'd love to have both the Red Dragon and Baek Rang here and frolic with them, but that was next to impossible.
I wasn't sure about Baek Rang, but there was no way the Red Dragon would allow it.
This place was now effectively the Red Dragon's territory.
Baek Rang was an intruder who had secretly entered that territory.
Of course, she stayed in a cave near the mountainside, not the summit, and she never came during the day when the Red Dragon was active, so they hadn't met yet.
But what if they did, by some chance?
Nothing good would come of it. The fate of an intruder in a dragon's territory was all too obvious.
While I'd been here, I'd seen a few spirit beasts overcome their fear of the Red Dragon and climb to the summit of Mount Hua. A horse wreathed in flames, a giant snail whose body was made of lava, things like that.
Thanks to them, I learned what horse meat and snail meat tasted like.
They were burned to a crisp by a single breath from the Red Dragon, who hadn't even taken her dragon form. And these were spirit beasts that supposedly wielded fire.
The Red Dragon's power was beyond my imagination, and she did not tolerate other beings approaching her nest.
Therefore, Baek Rang and the Red Dragon must never meet.
She only let me pester her like this because it was me. If the Red Dragon saw Baek Rang, the wolf would go straight into her stomach.
And there was a high chance I'd be going right in there with her.
“Gek.”
“Can you make a sound other than ‘gek’?”
It felt a little strange, seeing the ever-so-dangerous Red Dragon now trying to teach me how to speak.
“Geueoong.”
“...Not that.”
“Keong keong!”
“What is that one?”
Maybe learning to speak is a condition for evolving into a Crushing Dragon, I wondered. Otherwise, there was no way I'd be struggling this much with something even a passing gecko could learn.
“Geurooong...”
“Your cries themselves seem to have gotten more diverse, but...”
“Gereureureureu...”
“Why can't you speak?”
She looked at me with a slightly serious expression.
“You especially keep repeating the word ‘gek gek.’ Is there something going on that I don't know about?”
The Red Dragon grabbed me under my forelegs and tried to lift me. Given my size, I didn't get lifted very high.
“The strangest thing is, as time passes, I feel like I'm starting to understand your cries.”
“Geeng?”
Isn't that a good thing?
“This is unprecedented... A spirit beast of your level has never been unable to speak.”
The Red Dragon thought deeply for a moment, then clapped her hands as if she'd realized something.
“Ah, could it be because of faith?”
Faith? The Gaegaek Faith?
“That would be troublesome... If you learned to speak and then gained faith, it wouldn't matter, but it happened the other way around...”
“Geeek?”
So faith was the problem? Considering that "Gaegaek" had interfered with my evolution, it didn't seem entirely impossible.
“Faith isn't something that forms so easily. Besides, the chances of a lizard who can't even speak becoming the subject of faith are practically zero.”
“Gek gek.”
“This is complicated. It seems like it would be meaningless for me to teach you how to speak.”
What does that mean?
“Gek gek!”
Then why am I being held captive here!
Other than resting my head on the Red Dragon's thigh and occasionally rubbing my face all over her fire pouch, there's no point!
...Or is there?
Still, if what the Red Dragon said was true, it would be a huge disappointment.
It meant I'd have to live my entire life as a gek-geking lizard.
...Of course, it's normal for a lizard to go "gek gek," but I'd still prefer to learn how to talk.
“Still, there is a way.”
“Gek!”
As expected of the Red Dragon. If there was a solution, that changed everything.
“You should be able to communicate with your followers.”
That was certainly true.
My spiders understood what I was saying quite well.
Tang Soyeong, while not perfectly, also got the gist of my intentions.
“In that case, I just have to become your follower, right?”
“Gegegegek?”
Pus, I'm sorry. It looks like I'll have to give the spot of first follower to the Red Dragon.
“...Pfft, I'm kidding. Just kidding.”
I feel like I can hear Pus crying, 'Kieeeeng.'
“No matter how you look at it, how could I become your follower?”
As if to show she was joking, the Red Dragon lightly patted my back with her palm.
TWACK!
“Geeek!”
From my perspective, it wasn't light at all.
“Aigoo, you're so cute.”
“Geeeeng...”
She grabbed my cheeks with both hands and started pulling them.
“Do you want your big sister to become your follower?”
“Gegegegek!”
The Red Dragon grinned mischievously.
“Hmm, too bad. You know you're about 100 years too early for that, right?”
“Gek gek.”
Let go, you brat. It hurts.
“But if you live with me like this for just 50 years, I might consider it.”
“Gegegegek!”
Fifty years? For a normal lizard, that was more than enough time to die of old age.
......Wait a minute.
What is my lifespan?
Nah, I'm a spirit beast. I'll surely live longer than most humans.
There's no way I inherited the lifespan of a gecko, right?
“So you want to live with your big sister too!”
The Red Dragon pulled me into a tight hug.
She seemed to be interpreting my sounds however she pleased just because I couldn't talk. If she kept this up, I wouldn't just stand by.
If you don't let me go...
Squish.
...I'll let it slide, just this once.
“Aigoo. You're just so cute.”
She rubbed her face all over my body.
It felt strange, like I'd become a pet.
It wasn't bad, but I felt like I was losing my dignity as a divine beast.
“Geeng!”
That's enough!
At my cry, the Red Dragon's movements truly did stop dead.
What was that saying? Even a dog at a village school can recite a poem after three years. It seemed her ability to interpret my 'gek's had improved significantly.
“...Little one.”
The Red Dragon's arms, holding me, tightened.
Only then did I realize.
It wasn't that she had understood my words.
“You smell of another female, don't you?”