Chapter 41
Chapter 41
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Translator: Ebonarch
Chapter: 41
Chapter Title: Chapter 16: Diary (1)
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Dragons were divided into six clans: Gold, Red, Blue, White, Black, and Green.
Even among the same dragons, their personalities varied wildly.
Especially those with opposing colors got along like mortal enemies, and in the case of Blues, they had a particularly bad relationship with Reds.
That said, they didn't hate each other enough to kill.
Living as one under the Dragon Lord, they never desired to slay their own kind.
'But what the hell is this killing intent?'
His skin prickled beyond endurance, and even breathing properly was difficult.
If he weren't used to such situations, he would have fainted.
He seemed to have gotten dragged into something troublesome.
'If it were just getting dragged in, fine. But this could actually kill me.'
Among dragons, Blues possessed the mildest temperament.
Perhaps because of that, they were especially favorable toward humans, feeling emotions toward them similar to what humans feel for dogs or cats.
They just found killing inconvenient, but if they wanted to, they certainly could.
However, being a Blue Dragon, there was some leeway.
'If it had been a Red, Black, or Green, I'd be dead without a chance.'
He would have been slain instantly if he'd encountered the famously brutal Reds and Blacks, or the most insidious Greens.
Was this good luck or not?
Jamie cautiously gauged her mood before speaking.
"Now that it's confirmed I'm not a dragon, could you let me go?"
"I don't want to."
"......There's no reason not to release me."
"Such a bold human."
Mayatrei smirked.
"Usually, when they learn I'm a dragon, they beg for their life or ask for a clean death. Oh, there were cases where they just wailed madly too. I killed those on the spot."
Fortunately, she didn't seem inclined to kill him outright.
Jamie gave an awkward smile.
"Don't smile."
Jamie hurriedly wiped the smile from his face.
Mayatrei snorted at the sight and approached him.
She lifted his chin with her fingertip.
"I could just let you go."
"Then please do."
"With your level of potential, wouldn't it be amazing to turn you into a Dragon Soldier?"
Mayatrei ignored Jamie's words and smiled brightly.
A Dragon Soldier was an artificial lifeform created with a dragon's power, a warrior of immense strength.
The power of a Dragon Soldier depended on the quality of the vessel used as the medium.
"With you, I could probably even make a Master-class one."
"......"
"You're not denying it?"
If she converted Jamie's potential into power to create a Dragon Soldier, it would undoubtedly birth a monster beyond Master level.
"Wh-why pick on a kid?"
"Trying to appeal to me as a human child won't work."
Jamie was at a loss for words.
Was she seriously planning to make him into a Dragon Soldier?
Jamie scowled. It hadn't even been long since he'd gotten a new chance at life. Not to some mere lizard—he wasn't about to lose his life like this, not even to a god.
'I haven't even taken proper revenge yet. I can't die so pathetically!'
To buy more time for conversation, Jamie opened his mouth.
"But why are you trying to kill the dragons? You're a dragon too, sis."
"Oh? Calling me sis now. I told you human ways don't work."
Tch. Jamie clicked his tongue inwardly but smiled innocently on the surface.
Mayatrei thought the brat in front of her was rather cheeky but not bad for a human.
Still, she had no intention of answering his question.
"Don't pry."
But Jamie fired off the next question without hesitation.
"Is it because of that human?"
She halted abruptly.
Jamie turned only his head to look at her. Her vertically slit pupils glared at him with terrifying killing intent.
It was a far more intense malice than when she'd ravaged the cave earlier.
Jamie felt his throat closing up.
Not even a proper groan could escape. Was this the gap between him now and a dragon?
'Damn......'
As his consciousness began to fade forcibly, the killing intent cut off sharply.
"Kuhk! Keheuk—waek!"
As his airway cleared, suppressed breaths came with waves of dry heaving.
His ears rang, and his head spun as if shaken violently.
Through it all, Mayatrei's voice reached him.
"Ask that again, and you won't even get to die or live."
She warned him coldly and walked toward the entrance.
Jamie drooled continuously, smirking with curled lips.
'So that's it.'
It wasn't certain, but he had a hunch.
Jamie decided to gamble to turn his hunch into conviction.
"Your clan didn't acknowledge him, did they?"
"......"
"So they sent a subjugation force to kill him, and you betrayed your clan to save him?"
Boom—
Mighty mana gouged a massive crater in the cave floor.
Mayatrei's vanished form reappeared right before Jamie's nose.
Her pointed nails flew toward his head at supersonic speed. It was all in earnest. She truly meant to kill Jamie.
Yet Jamie didn't even blink.
"You're soft after all."
A gale-force wind rushed in.
Her emerald hair whipped wildly.
Jamie stared at the razor-sharp nails halted right before his eyes.
"You never intended to kill me from the start, or turn me into a Dragon Soldier, did you?"
At first, he'd thought it was just a dragon's leisure.
Even a Blue Dragon could treat a human like an ant if she wished.
But Mayatrei hadn't. Her threats to kill or make him a Dragon Soldier had all been in a playful tone.
Of course, when he'd truly irked her, she'd gotten fierce, but even then, it ended as a warning.
Just like now.
"Above all, if you were curious about my identity, you could have brainwashed me with mental magic, but you didn't."
If Mayatrei had willed it, Jamie would have become her slave. But she hadn't.
"You're soft. And kind. To the point it's hard to believe you're a dragon."
Mayatrei glared at Jamie with frightening eyes but said nothing.
The earlier killing intent was gone.
She retracted her nails and turned away. Then, glancing back slightly, she warned.
"This is the last time. Remember there won't be a third."
Her words held no emotion.
Jamie sensed she meant it this time and pressed his lips tightly inward.
Mayatrei shook her head as if exasperated and sighed.
"You're a truly wondrous human. Just like him."
"Him......"
"Yes. The protagonist of that ancient legend your humans know."
The human who had caused Mayatrei to settle in this mountain range, the one she was said to have loved.
With sad eyes, she told Jamie.
"What I'm about to tell you now is to correct the rumors you know. So listen well."
She began her tale.
Rain poured down in sheets.
Ras stood atop a protruding rock.
The current was so fierce the rock itself shook.
"Jamie. Where are you?"
He'd boasted confidently to Sears before descending, but there was no sign of Jamie, not even a glimpse.
Currently in his Executor guise, Ras was quite fatigued from resisting the rapids.
But finding Jamie made such exhaustion trivial.
"I'll definitely find you."
Ras threw himself back into the rapids.
"It was 700 years ago now. When I first met him."
Mayatrei reminisced on long-past memories.
"His name was Ganon. A black sorcerer."
"A black sorcerer?!"
Jamie's eyes widened at the words.
Why was a black sorcerer popping up here all of a sudden?
'More than that, why would a dragon fall for a black sorcerer?'
Dragons were the progenitors of white magic. To them, black sorcerers were merely evils who defiled the concepts they'd created.
That was why they'd despised him in the past.
"Surprised, right? A dragon in love with a black sorcerer."
"Yeah, well...... a little."
"But Ganon was different from other black sorcerers. He was very special."
"In what way?"
"Unlike others, he used black magic solely as a tool for his own purposes. Yes. A tool to reach the truth of the world."
Jamie's expression hardened.
He didn't know what truth Ganon sought, but he'd used black magic as the tool for it.
Mayatrei continued.
"And even without black magic, he possessed unparalleled skill among humans. He reached 9th class in a human body, after all."
"......Impossible. Humans haven't produced a 9th class mage in thousands of years."
"Listen well. This is where the reason comes in. Ganon and I adventured far and wide to uncover the truth of the world."
They truly uncovered many secrets.
Not just ancient ruins, but enduring forests, deserts, and more.
They saw much and experienced much.
There were failures, but also successes.
"Ganon was truly remarkable. Humans are supposed to be inferior to us, yet he was never lacking compared to me. In fact, I learned much from him."
Ganon was a human wiser than dragons, who were called the race of wisdom.
Thus, 1 or 2 years passed, and they learned quite a bit. A little more, and they seemed poised to grasp even the truths time itself concealed.
That was when the dragon clan intervened.
"I don't know how they found out, but a message came from the Lord."
At first, she was glad.
It seemed her clan had acknowledged Ganon.
Ganon seemed a bit uncomfortable, but the chance to speak with the entire dragon clan was rare, so he acceded to their request.
The problem came after.
The Lord's judgment.
All dragons moved to kill Ganon.
Mayatrei defended him as best she could, but the dragons ignored her.
Facing incomprehensible aggression, Mayatrei and Ganon fled. But flight had its limits.
"We headed to an ancient ruin we'd scouted long before. A place only one being could enter, where we'd planned to go later."
It was a ruin brimming with immense mana.
Unsure of the dangers within, but better than facing the entire clan, Mayatrei judged.
Ganon worried for her, but she assured him they'd only punish her, not kill, and sent him in.
Thus, Ganon took refuge in the ruin, and Mayatrei, captured by the late-arriving dragons, was sentenced to a thousand years' exile.
"If that had been the end, how good it would have been."
A millennium was long even for dragons, but a deep sleep could pass it.
Yet after a dozen years, Ganon reappeared.
"By then, Ganon had reached the truth of the world."
Ganon confronted the Dragon Lord, staking his life.
Countless dragons surrounded him. No human, however strong, could survive.
Yet Ganon stood proud. He raged at all dragons instead.
'Why do you stand by and watch! Why turn a blind eye to the truth of the world!'
The issue was that all gathered there were ancient dragons over 5,000 years old.
A young dragon might have been swayed, but the elders didn't even pretend to listen.
The extermination resumed.
Ganon didn't fall easily. He broke their encirclement and rescued the exiled Mayatrei.
Then the pursuit began.
"He and I arrived in this land. It was a truly massive mountain. We thought hiding here would buy time, but then that one appeared."
Black Dragon Igoas.
A young dragon, but born with tremendous power.
He ravaged the place mercilessly.
Mayatrei and Ganon had no choice but to fight, battling without rest for days.
In that clash, the great mountain was shattered, forming the current Mayatrei Mountains.
"It was an intense battle, and we ultimately won."
But was it truly a victory?
The dragons stopped pursuing. There was no reason to.
"Ganon had died."
Struck directly by Igoas's breath, Ganon lost his life.
"Yes. In the end, the rumors were true on that point. I wept at his death, and I still weep now."
Her eyes were dry, but a downpour raged in her heart.
"I thought it fortunate it ended that way. But then......"
Mayatrei's eyes narrowed fiercely.
"My clan began erasing everything about Ganon. Not just his life, but every trace that he had existed."
Immense fury emanated from her.
"So for this place alone, for the traces of Ganon that remain here."
Sadness welled up again in her fierce gaze.
"This is why I stay."
Fury toward her clan.
Sorrow for her beloved.
Guilt for failing to protect him.
Hearing it all, Jamie thought.
'The Dragon God intervened.'
Unknown to most, all dragons were priests serving a god.
They worshipped the Dragon God Brahman, their progenitor and creator.
'That's why they tried to erase Ganon regardless of reason.'
The truth Ganon uncovered.
It was surely the misdeeds of the 12 Gods after Diablo Volpir's death.
'He must have learned black magic to use my traces as a key.'
How had Ganon learned of Diablo Volpir?
And how had he uncovered the 12 Gods' hidden secrets?
Questions abounded, but he hadn't told Mayatrei. She simply lived here in torment, harboring various emotions.
"Is Ganon's tombstone here?"
"Why?"
"Even as a black sorcerer, he was a great archmage. As a fellow mage, I want to engrave the fact of his existence with my own eyes."
From the story so far, Mayatrei was a kind-hearted dragon. One who would rejoice at praise for her beloved.
"No reason not to show you. Follow me."
The restraint lifted.
Jamie rubbed his throbbing wrists and followed her.
Arriving at a vast cavern, Jamie's eyes widened.
"That is......"
"What?"
"N-nothing."
A thought had slipped out unwittingly.
Jamie covered his trembling lips with his hand and looked again at the tombstone in the cavern's center.
A single bracelet lay atop it.
'That's my bracelet!'
In the past.
One of Diablo Volpir's three divine artifacts lay there.