Everything changed when the dragon’s mouth closed around the pulsing black heart radiating malevolent energy and swallowed it.
The black world vanished, and the dragon’s vision returned to the normal world. The night-covered dark peaks of the mountains returned, and the mutated wolves were unconsciously lying on the ground.
A weird feeling spread from the dragon’s chest, melancholy and resentment seeping through his mind, and a sense of cold as if someone stuck a piece of ice into his chest.
The next moment the weird feeling vanished.
Ding!
//
Quest accomplished!
Rating: B
Reward: You have fused with the curse, and you are on top; Special metamorphosis material: Heart of the Curse
//
Only now, Vesuvius noticed a quiet, repeating sound that resounded in his ears. It kept beating in a repetitive rhythm. It was coming from his own body, from his chest.
The dragon’s large clawed hands moved, touching his chest. Two separate sets of beats resounded out, passing through his arm. The cold and malevolent energy seeped out, making the dragon nauseous.
He quickly brought back his hand, utterly weirded out. ‘Is that ugly black heart in my chest? What the? Did the system just give me organ transplantation?’
He felt utterly weirded out, not expecting anything like getting a second heart, ‘Is it connected to my veins pumping blood, or is it just placed inside?’
He couldn’t understand how his body could even accept some random heart so easily without any problems.
Ding!
//
You gained a new ability: [The Curse Heart (LV1)]
Description: Malevolent heart of the dragon turned into a curse after its owner’s demise. The power of all curse magic will be doubled. Allows fusion of draconic and curse magic.
Its full potential will be activated during the following evolution/metamorphosis.
//
Ding!
//
You gained a title: [One with the curse]
Conditions: Fuse with the curse and achieve dominance.
Effects: Its full potential will be activated during the following evolution/metamorphosis; You can control the curse; New Ability [Curse Magic (LV 1)]
Detected presence of [The Curse Heart (LV1)] upgrading [Curse Magic (LV 1)] into [Draconic Curse Magic (LV 1)]
Draconic Curse Magic (LV 1):
Gives access to a unique magic school: Draconic Curse Magic; MAG scaling + 1.1X
//
Instantly connections opened in the dragon’s mind, old ones constantly vanishing and new ones creating. They were all curse beasts in the mountains. The understanding of how the curse worked flooded the dragon’s mind.
‘The monsters are constantly getting born from the energy of the curse obtained from nature and some hidden source, likely remnants of the dead dragon. The monsters can’t leave the area as they would run out of energy if I don’t feed them my blood, which will work as a replacement energy source.’
There was a second thing that made the dragon’s eyes glow in excitement, his whole body trembling from just thinking about what it meant. He felt his senses expand out of his body, spreading and covering the cursed area. It was a vague feeling akin to trying to touch with a hand injected with anesthetics.
‘This almost feels like domain, but not exactly. It is like with the demon baron. Something is missing, and on top of that, it is bound to a specific area. Is it possible that it was the domain of the dragon that died here?’
Still, it made him realise the significance of that, ‘Maybe I can use this as a base, to make it easier to establish my domain or make it stronger.’
Hundreds of glowing red eyes ran in the dragon’s direction, quickly closing towards him.
‘At least now I have as much cannon fodder as I want.’ he already wanted to grin, but he stopped himself at the last moment, ‘So a dragon died here. That is worth exploring.’
POV Alesia:
The small elven girl was lying, sprawled on a simple bed with soft anima pelts pilled all over it. Her heterochromatin eyes were focused on a small vial glowing red from the liquid contained within it.
She carefully held the vial close to her eyes, observing its content, her mouth widely curled in a smile as she whirled the liquid before her.
She couldn’t but feel over the top from just the thought of experimenting with still active dragon blood, material so expensive that no one would even dare to do something like that.
‘It should work when it worked with the blood of regular magic beasts.’ She already wanted to start with her project, knowing that if it worked, it would be one of the greatest discoveries in the field of enchantment in the whole century.
“Hehehe”, a giggle escaped from her mouth as she imagined the chaos that she was going to cause, ‘These humans will be fighting just for an opportunity to become puppets of my master, without even knowing the truth.’
She started to tremble, and her eyes brightly glowed as she tried to suppress her eagerness knowing that she needed more experts to finish it.
Suddenly loud bang interrupted her, making her frown. She hated every bit of it but knew it was unavoidable as the tower’s construction continued. Ideas of runes she could engrave into its walls ran through her mind, the faint smile returning on her face.
POV Muscle Heads:
Five tall persons walked through the still green part of the forest, the branches cracking under their heavy boots. Their muscles were bulging with their heads, and torsos covered in animal pelts glowing in magical energy.
The sound of a snapping twig came from the tree’s shadows. The whole group instantly stopped, vigilantly looking around, their monstrous leader with rough-stone-like skin clenching his fists that were easily bigger than a head of average humans. Above his head levitated a nametag with a fitting name: HumanOgre.
Everything was quiet, the tension almost palpable in the air, no one moving, ready to react instantly.
Suddenly an orange light flashed through the forest. A magma spear flew out of the shadows, heading straight toward the Ogre’s head. His hand snapped in pure reflex, his life force aura materialising and forming a barrier around his fist.
In a blink of an eye, that fist intercepted the spear, the magma exploding and splashing everywhere. The darkness returned to the forest, and the man retracted back his seared black fist.
“Who did this? Come out, cowards, and I will smash you!”
He sounded confident but inside, he was worried seeing how the weird magma burned through his aura, ‘This is not regular magma magic.’. He was almost level fifty-two, but it was the first time he saw such weird magic.
“Come out, the big boss captain is serious!” a thick dumb sounding man with brass knuckle-dusters on his fists swung his giant fist threateningly, his eyes searching through the forest.
Suddenly a person in a black mantle with their face hidden behind a dragon-shaped bronze mask came from behind the tree. His black robes rustled as he walked, his nametag blank as his identity was hidden behind the mask.
He held a long metallic spear with bright glowing runes covering its tip and shaft.
The five bulky men grinned, their eyes falling on the spear he held.
“Hey, noob, nice spear. Give it to us, and we will forgive your attack.”
“Give it to us. The big boss trainer is serious!” the same dumb-sounding player stepped forwards.
Surprisingly the player before them didn’t relent. Instead, his spear ignited in bright flames with lightning arcs shooting out of its tip. “Get out of here, noobs. This is our forest!”
The second shadow wearing the same bronze mask moved from behind the tree, her voice sounding feminine even through the mask, “You will not find any goblins here. You have to go elsewhere.”
“Take your overcompensating bodies and go back to your inn before I throw you out!” A third, much shorter and rounder shadow rolled from behind a large boulder, his bronze mask shiny from how polished it was.
“Come, one vs one!” the player pointed his spear straight at him.
Seeing the weird flames surging around the spear, Ogre felt sweat run down his temple, but then he looked at his four boys firmly standing behind him, his confidence returning, “Hahaha, we are five, and you are three, let’s go boys lets beat them “
The dumb but loyal right-hand man walked forwards, cracking his knuckles, “Now you are dead! The big captain trainer is serious!”
Finally, Ogre’s brain finished processing, realising the identity of the three players, “You are the three noobs from the inn!” his face was malformed into a large grin as he imagined smashing them apart.
“You had your chance. Do you think that we came alone?” the annoying females with staff waved it as if it was some signal.’
The next moment, as if some illusion shattered, a weird chuckling player in red robes, followed by dozen of the black-robed iron-masked players, surrounded them. Giant draconified beasts followed closely behind, magma leaking out of their mouth.
“This is not good, boss. There are lots of them!”