Chapter 14
Chapter 14
A back-alley loan office met its doom.
It wasn’t because of some grand feud or territorial dispute.
The reason was absurd.
They simply didn’t give her meat.
The foolish loan sharks evidently thought they didn’t need to keep a promise to the pretty black-haired girl who had followed them.
In the midst of the chaos,
the dragon looked down at the terrified loan sharks as if they were mere insects.
Her crimson eyes burned with relentless fury.
She would never, ever again endure hunger.
No, the very sensation of “hunger” itself was her greatest trigger.
That single reason was enough justification to set the world ablaze.
Through the rising, acrid smoke, the memory of a past, unbearable hunger floated up like a mirage.
From the moment she first opened her eyes to the world, she had been utterly alone.
A cold, damp cave that not even a single ray of light penetrated.
Like the young of any other creature, the dragon hatched from her egg and began to cry.
“Byaaak! Byaaak!”
She cried desperately into the void, but there was no one beside her.
No mother to share warmth, no father to bring food.
The newborn life knew nothing of the world, and no being whispered how to live to her.
All that existed was the merciless clawing of her stomach, twisting her insides in pain.
She was starving.
Her hunger was so severe it felt as if her life would end.
Around her were nothing but cold, hard stones.
She bit them.
With teeth that were not yet fully grown, she gnawed indiscriminately.
Crack.
It felt as if her teeth, not the stone, would break first.
Still, she did not stop.
She could not stop.
She forcibly broke the stones with her teeth and swallowed them.
Her throat scraped as it went down.
…And yet.
Her hunger did not abate.
…
Plop.
A droplet fell from the cave ceiling.
Her head tilted toward the sound.
She crawled across the floor, reaching out her tongue.
Cold, faintly earthy water.
She opened her mouth to catch every drop.
More.
Just a little more.
…
Something wriggled.
She grabbed it and put it in her mouth.
The texture was unpleasant, bursting under her teeth.
…And yet she swallowed it.
She put everything she could see into her mouth.
…And still.
Her hunger remained.
Thud. Thud. Thud.
The heavy footsteps of boots, hunting monsters near the borderlands, shattered the cave’s silence.
A towering man clad in blood-stained armor.
The lord of the northern frontier, Karlus Whitemane, ruler of the frigid northern lands.
He spotted the hunched, trembling, pitch-black reptile… no, the baby dragon, and his eyes flashed with interest.
The surrounding knights drew their swords in alarm.
“Your Grace! Stand back! That…!”
“It’s a dragon! It’s dangerous!”
Urgent cries overlapped.
Yet the frontier lord did not retreat a single step.
Instead, a peculiar smile slowly spread across his face.
“Haha… hahahaha!”
The low chuckle grew louder.
“A real dragon…”
His eyes gleamed as he murmured like an explorer who had discovered treasure.
“This… is every man’s dream, isn’t it?”
For that one absurd reason,
from the day the man—called an oddity by his subordinates—had scooped up the dragon into his arms, her world was completely transformed.
Instead of mud and moss, warm, cooked meat entered her mouth.
She learned how to live alongside them.
Yet even as she adapted, the essence slumbering in her blood did not become ordinary.
A species born to master magic.
As her mind grew,
magic rose instinctively, without being taught.
The first thing the dragon clung to was
a warm body.
Magic to mimic the soft flesh of “them.”
<Polymorph>
Transformed like them, she learned to walk on two legs,
hold a knife,
and decipher the squiggly letters on parchment like them.
Most importantly, she received a warm name: Erika.
Erika was not human, but the northern lord and lady, childless themselves, loved this other being as if she were their own daughter.
Of course, Erika’s appetite was immense, enough to strain the northern domain’s resources.
But in the north, while human food was scarce, the monstrous creatures that would sustain Erika were abundant.
The villagers adored the young lady, who devoured these beasts that ravaged their crops.
“Miss Erika! Today’s my eldest son’s wedding, and we’ve slaughtered a pig. Would you like the hind leg?”
“Oh my, our lady has grown taller again! Here, try this freshly baked pie too.”
Though not enough to completely satisfy the dragon’s infinite stomach, the warmth of people’s care and the northern lord couple’s love kept Erika’s belly full of pleasant warmth.
She thought this peace would last forever.
But beyond the northern blizzards, disaster struck. A rift tore through the sky.
Tens of thousands of monstrous creatures poured through the breach, toppling the northern fortress walls in an instant. The sky turned blood-red, and the castle became a literal inferno.
“Erika! Run!! You must survive!”
Her adoptive father, grasping a broken sword, leapt into the monsters to protect her.
Her bloodied adoptive mother used her last mana to shove Erika into a teleportation circle, sending her beyond the castle.
“My precious daughter… wherever you go, never go hungry… understand? Mom… Mom loves you so much… my baby…”
A blinding flash, and Erika awoke in the damp, foreign forests of the south.
The monsters that had covered the sky were gone.
But so were the warm hands that had caressed her, the laughter of those who had fed her.
All that remained was loneliness… and the return of relentless hunger.
She followed the light in search of food.
After a long walk, she reached a human village and begged for food…
But a stone was hurled at her, accompanied by cold disdain for the stranger child.
“My… stomach…”
Hunger that threatened to rob her of reason.
The same cold, horrifying sensation from the cave returned, gnawing at her insides.
She ate dirt, chewed rotten bark.
But the emptiness in her stomach only widened.
Alone, facing the terror of starvation, she had reached the brink.
“Ah, poor thing. You must be starving. I’ll make sure you eat every meal. Will you come with me?”
A thin, oily smile. A scrap of cheap dried meat held out by a slave trader.
Compared to the meals her parents had given her, it was meager, yet to Erika, starved to the bone, it was divine mercy.
She chewed it frantically and swallowed, fastening shackles to her wrists.
The dragon became a voluntary slave, driven solely by the desperate desire never to starve again.
Yet the sweet promises of the slave trader were cruel.
He did not give meat.
Only a tiny piece of hard bread and pale gruel, three meals a day.
Just enough to prevent death before selling her as a slave.
Betrayal, and the maddening hunger.
But Erika had no strength left to move her body.
The pain seared along her spine,
even the cold despair emitted by her shriveled stomach could not be overcome.
Into that mud of despair and relentless hunger, a man suddenly stepped.
Though unfamiliar,
his face was not strange.
It was the same expression as the slave trader, looking down at her like an object.
He extended a hand without hesitation.
She summoned her remaining strength and struck the disgusting hand in midair.
The fragile human palm tore with the friction.
Yet the man did not give up.
“You… won’t come eat?”
…
“Meat dish.”
…
It could have been a lie.
Yet
she decided to trust him once more.
Someone had given her food without reason, had offered a hand to embrace her.
Surely, somewhere in the world, another odd soul like that existed.
So this time, she did not push his hand away.
The sound of a bowl being set down.
Steam rose.
Warm smells surged without pause.
Her hands moved first.
Without hesitation, she grabbed and stuffed it into her mouth.
Chewing came after. Swallowing came first.
…Then she froze.
The taste was familiar.
Not flashy, not stimulating, yet somehow it choked her throat.
Her throat tightened, her vision blurred.
The more that happened, the faster she ate.
It was warm.
That was all, yet her hands trembled.
Head bowed, she ate silently.
Regardless of who watched, she scraped the bowl clean.
Until it was empty.
Yet the “empty bowl” was a reminder of the cold indifference of the world, where no one looked back at her.
She thrust the empty bowl before the man’s nose.
“More.”
Her voice hoped this warmth would not end.
The dragon’s crimson eyes refocused on reality.
The loan sharks before her were scattered, each nursing their injuries in fear.
Erika, seemingly bored, turned her body.
“…Time to head home.”
Humming a tune, she walked toward the slum house where Nasus would be waiting.
Better not be late, or she might hear another lecture.