Within a closed off room which contained double the mana density than normal, a special and expensive room meant for training mana development, Logan, Jade, Storm and Jin sat.
Every one of them, in just under a year, had rapidly grown however because the three cycles had seemed fast, they had thought it would have been a little less than half a year but each step was harder and harder and required increasingly more mana requirements that slowly F rank mana was having a hard time to supply.
Finally they finished a week ago and rented this room to finally grind and process E rank mana.
Besides Logan, as humans did not change much, the other three had undergone growth each step of the way as they expanded their capacity.
Every cycle caused an evolution as their bodies grew and so did their mana pools. Jade’s 4th cycle only gave her a small increase but her 5th pushed her over the limit of a goblin and from the height at his mid thigh she jumped to that of a short but beautiful young teen. Her race became a Hobgoblin Healer as a result of all the different kinds of healing skills she learned. When they had gotten to that limit she had gone with Logan and trained extensively at the expense of many monsters. From learning reconnect severed bones and even nerves to rejoining limbs at the joints.
Of course it was impossible to revive when the head is cut off but things like bone surgery, organ surgery and many other types of slow and harsh medical procedures were done out in the field.
Every last tool she possessed had their mana channels opened by her in her training and even lesser drakes could not endure the cutting edge of her blades to reach the inner sections.
Among the things she trained was the art of chiropractors, since Logan absolutely loved the process which helped relax his body, as well as acupoint manipulation.
In the process of learning, she actually developed an innate skill in her eyes which allowed her to actually see the inner flow and all the acupoints. She wasn’t a fighter naturally but her natural strength, speed and more were F rank, using it against humanoid targets on the floors below the 20th, she tested the finger strikes to those points and amazing effects happened.
Among them were literally smashing the point and crippling that point, after gaining control the attack could block the flow. One time she struck a few points on the shoulder of an orc and the arm became completely paralyzed and unusable.
She also learned about death strikes. The body’s acupoints helped control the body like nerves, so naturally there are acupoints that represent specific organs. In fact, the heart point represented not only the heart but also the mana pool that was in the same location. Breaking it would instantly damage or destroy the mana pool as well as cause heart problems and possibly even heart attack leading to death.
Other spots are the points to the kidney. If the strike is proper, the mana in the finger can actually blow the point and cause immediate kidney failure.
Of course, obvious points that could be harsh in combat as well were present such as the jaw area where the jaw connects to the skull. It causes loss of motor control as does the ears which causes loss of balance.
Her appearance at the 5th cycle was that of a teen with about 140 cm of height still childish but her female features finally blossomed and he had to have Olivia take her to get proper clothing.
After the 6th cycle when they all understood they reached the limit of this stage of development, she was 155 cm tall and her hair was long and silky black color, her green skin was dull but shined with a healthy color.
Her intelligent black eyes were filled with curiosity of a child as well and she was very attached to Logan.
Next, Jin had grown a bit, before he began, he opened all the mana channels in the ring and drum as well as the hammers. It went to show instantly as his body reacted to the perfected flow and he gained very minor control of lightning and could summon it around the two spirit hammers. Charging them before striking the hammer actually caused a large bolt of lightning to snake into the sky while gathering ambient mana and striked down.
His current size, however, hadn’t grown as much. As he developed through the F rank, the changes he faced were only a small bit of growth reaching just shy of 1 meter of height and looked like a child. His hands grew more humanoid and gave him a better grip and his intelligence shot up. That said, unlike Jade who could speak, even at this point he did not.
Finally Storm had grown in size and matched the lesser drake Olivia originally had to fight with 2 meters of height from the floor to his back and about 10 of length.
A unique feature had formed however upon finishing his development. His mana had begun to gather at his heart and it was signs of his common heart evolving into a dragon heart, or at least a lesser drake heart similar to those Logan obtained.
Since then, he has asked for the hearts they gathered and promised it would not change his bloodline as he ate them. He completely processed them and the mana was channeled to the heart allowing it to grow but also causing the area near his ribs to start shining like a beacon almost as if showing the heart was there and Logan honestly didn’t like this.
It was a big weakpoint being pointed out.
Finally they gathered up and began the upgrade to E rank.
F rank required nine spinning mana vortex to gather and grind the mana. The acupoints would start at 2 vortices but as the internal space grew so did the number and naturally the compression and quality would grow. It is why Jade was an F rank Hobgoblin but was still pretty strong if she used her basic knowledge of water magic for combat.
At the end, each acupoint had 8 vortex and the one in the mana pool were huge but the next step required that he push these to the upper side of the mana pool and forming a single vortex under every group all over his body it would capture instantly all the mana coming down and compress it all until the nine united into one and the two remaining vortexes merged.
This process was tedious as quantity was required to constantly compress more and all four of them were requiring a lot of mana.
Logan finally felt a barrier as only two vortexes remained and slowly in the acupoints they merged starting from the closest and they pushed into the following one and gathered more and more until it all returned to the mana pool and entered the top vortex finally breaking that limit and they connected.
Instantly the mana reached a compression beyond F rank and compression forced the purity to a new level.
As an explosion went off, that first node of E rank mana began to spin slowly and draw in other nodes before forming a small vortex of its own and the huge one above it slowly began to fall into its own suction.
Like a snake of a powerful breed facing an adult of a weaker breed, it slowly ate it as it grew more in quantity expanding until it swallowed it all but what remained of the mana didn’t even fill 10% of the mana pool.
It slowly calmed down and released the mana and it spread his body and he instantly began to feel the effects.
Maybe as a result of him obtaining it, Jin, the closest to him in magical power since he was composed of Logan’s own mana, reacted instantly and his compression broke the barrier.
His ring instantly began to shine as the mana was absorbed and compressed into E rank until the mana began to flow naturally.
It moved and finally reached the ring.
It began to expand a bit and mana was pulled and formed a second drum. The first drum was 50% bigger in size thanks to development but this one was the original size.
That said, the drum was composed of E rank mana despite being undeveloped meaning it would not face the weakened grinding needed for development. Opening the mana channels would grow it to the size of the developed one.
His body began to glow at this point and he grew a small bit taller but his muscles developed better. The small fangs grew and two long fangs from his upper canines grew out from under his lips showing to the world while a small bit of black adult lion mane began to grow.
Mana gathered and formed a pair of silk pants and a cloth belt to hold it while the hammers grew more detailed and could channel more power.
While the two were adapting, Jade finally achieved the break and her body began to glow as her black hair shined.
After he mana was fully converted, a tiny golden dot formed in the middle of her forehead and began to expand to form a small sideways square that was bright yellow in color with a small black dot at the very center barely visible. It added a strange charm.
Logan finally stabilized and opened his eyes and saw the others breaching the gate and only Storm was left.
He understood the problem, he had E rank potential but anything related to dragons had higher requirements. Of course, even as a crystalback lizard, it was said he could reach E rank naturally so he shouldn’t have trouble but the fact that he evolved and awakened some of his ancient bloodline meant that his body was constantly trying to awaken more.
His heart was glowing brightly making him worried that either his mana pool or his heart would break.
Finally, however, Storm stood up and despite his body in the process of grinding, even discharging some sparks.
“Master…” He groaned.
“Is something wrong?” he asked.
“The scale… the one master got from the first boxes.” He said.
“Scale?” Logan said, confused.
He tried to recall and remembered a scale he had pulled out to test Arashi’s sharpness and had barely left a mark in what they assumed was a dragon scale due to the size. It was left unidentified since it was what he thought.
He took it out of the inventory.
“That… the scale, hold it with the front size facing upwards.” He said.
“Upwards? Like the tip facing your head?” he said.
He said holding it with the tip facing his wrist.
“Place it backwards on my heart.” He said.
Logan was utterly confused but turning it with the scale’s tip facing his head, he walked to the glowing heart and put it against him.
As soon as it touched, it shined brightly and Storm roared like a storm.
His body was instantly engulfed in light while the scale was visible. Mana drew extremely fast towards him.
Only the green crystals were left alongside the scale but Logan understood what was happening.
“Another evolution!” He exclaimed.
At once, he could hear cracking as Storm began to grow. His low hung neck began to change as it extended a bit and raised up more like how drakes had.
The spines along the back began to grow but what is more, two sets of ridges along the body of his crocodile-like back began to form crystal spikes. They formed on the upper side forming weapon-like spikes and below just outside of the ‘drag zone’ that crocodiles would be constantly touching the ground. Finally the tip of the tail formed a long dangerous bladed crystal which was perfect to use for attacks like a bladed spear.
Next his length extended to 15 meters of length but his legs expanded and his height grew to 3 meters of height at the lowest area near his forward arms and three and a half on the back leg.
At this point, the scale finally shined like Storm and transformed and expanded into a big plate covering the lower side of his chest. What happened next was shocking because after one plate formed, they expanded upwards on the underside of his neck until it stopped just below his neck before extending down all the way to the tip of his tail.
Instantly Logan recognized the design and his jaw dropped. Any full drake or dragon had this design, lesser dragon breeds did not and in fact, it showed as those without were much weaker.
This was called the reverse scale plates. Dragons were huge creatures, it was easy for smaller and faster beings to get under them and attack their weaker underbelly. The only ever recorded ancient dragon actually didn’t have these but most high ranking ones did as they developed this after the progenitors to protect themselves at a young age from being killed from underneath.
The weakest part of the body instantly becomes the strongest as every plate was equal in strength to the dragon that the common scale this one came from was. This would never work without either a full C rank adult drake or equivalent or B rank full dragons.
The tale has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.
All hatchling dragons obtained a scale when young just as their size starts to get when races like humans can get under them.
The next thing that happened shocked him.
Storm roared as his fangs began to crystalize, as did his claws. His horns began to grow longer and the final change took place.
The crystal fins that looked like that of an ancient spinosaurus ripped out along most of the back except near the shoulder before shining and gathered into a long spike extending out of the back.
It looked completely redundant but it was far from it. These were incomplete wings. This signified that Storm was at least C rank potential as a full drake and if he properly started developing these spikes, they would evolve into proper dragon wings.
He stomped down as the shine vanished and roared in pain but also exhilaration. His claws and fangs were fully crystal but after a moment, a coat of calcium formed around both hiding the crystal fangs while the shining green horns began to hide and black scales formed in layers around it until it was covered.
The same happened to the two spikes fully hiding the crystal. It was an amazing evolution because he had completely jumped lesser drakes, he was some unknown breed of Drake adolescent. He was unlikely to evolve until he reached the limits of an adult drake and ascended as a dragon.
“Master…” He said and his body shined before gathering.
Unlike the small lizardman child, what appeared was a young adult but he was clad in plated dragon scale armor. Only his horned head was revealed and the two spikes on his back exposed like lightning arcs.
“Amazing, was that a drake scale then?” Logan asked.
“I am not sure but it was definitely an adult’s scale. My body feels like it is burning with power but I know that the mana can still be exhausted as it is.” he said.
“That is right. It shouldn’t take more than a week for us to complete the conversion cycle for E rank.” he said.
Everyone understood that they needed the foundation of an E rank to be officially E rank.
That said, E rank mana was impressively strong and it burned their entire bodies as they did the first cycle converting all the F rank mana into E rank.
When they finally finished, their bodies stabilized and it would naturally absorb, compress and purify mana at E rank.
They finally reached their original objective even if much later than they ever thought.
“Is this three or four years since I got the technique?” Logan asked.
“Master obtained the original from your father three and a half years. Master is already 21 and has missed several of what you humans refer to birthdays.” Storm said in his human form.
“Right… well we are finally able to leave we just need to check on your racial information and find Olivia.” Logan said.
“Master… I wish to eat an ogre horn and obtain a ranked higher breed. It would feel safer if i had that since i already have E rank. I will soon be gravely limited until I achieve the transformation.” she said.
He looked at her, “We do have some E rank horns but will it still work?” he asked.
“Yes, my quantity is far less than their own. It is always purely based on the amount of mana. If I need to, I can eat two or three if the first does not achieve the effect.” She said.
Naturally Logan had the horns, it was a rare drop but it has a 10% drop rate when you hunt ogre chieftains which exist in all clans and all are E rank.
“Alright.” he said and took out a single horn and she bowed and sat down before swallowing it whole.
As you would expect, when using the E rank level of Golden Lion’s mana development, the speed of grinding can’t be compared to F rank with a single cycle like Storm had done.
The quantity did fill her to 60% so she ate another but from a much stronger member. He could feel the higher quantity and it finally did the trick and despite grinding it all into E rank mana, it overflowed from her mana channels and bridged the gap.
Instantly her eyes shot open as her body began to glow brightly.
She stood as her body began to grow and reached 165 cm of height. He could clearly see her muscles developing and her feminane features grew as well. Finally a small pair of horns appeared initially but shockingly, the yellow rhombus shined brightly and a third horn grew from that point. When it did her entire aura changed as a powerful aura excluded from her.
Her mana began to gather until a golden spherical gem formed on both her shoulders and knees but it was as natural as Storm’s crystal scales. They shined brightly as her power passed through it.
The shine began to dull and an amazing transformation unfolded as a head full of luscious, beautiful white and blonde hair shined under the light.
Her dull green skin was no more and a healthy human like peach skin was left and even the two little fangs that most goblins had in the lower jaw were gone. If not for the horns, you would think she was a perfect human but the aura she released was amazing. He had an idea of what it was. The traces of holy mana had finally been fully assimilated by the mana of the golden lion she trained. This filled her magical presence with a certain pressure and presence.
He knew she had become something amazing and far greater than just a simple Healer Lord. He had seen pictures of that kind of lord and they never had a third horn like her. That third horn was clearly formed by the traces of holy power surrounding her for sure. What she was, he did not know however but it was definitely not a simple healer.
“Wow.” He could only say.
She turned her face blushing, “Thank you, master.” she said.
He snapped out of it and coughed, “Right, now we have two people to check fully. Let’s get going so that we can finally leave the dungeon and adventure for real.” He said.
Jin returned to his mana pool while the others walked with him to the adventurers guild to identify their races.
“Truly amazing, the crystallization that had been isolated to just the scales and the thin spikes that grew expanded. Magical crystal spikes, prime condition for the creation of wings, crystalize fangs and claws, previous ridges turned into sharp cutting edge spikes. So many historically extinct features from maybe tens of thousands of years ago or even prehistoric era.” the identifier said while marvelling at Storm’s form.
“What is the racial name now?” He asked.
“Ah yes. Please wait, there is just so much information that I do not know where to begin.” he said and all around. “Which dragon breed and rank did the reverse scale come from?” he asked.
“We got it randomly from a redeemed chest. I never checked.” Logan said.
“That was a dragon scale!” he said.
He sighed and took a new pair of glasses that had several lenses that rose and dropped and he slowly tested.
“It was a… C rank Thunder Crag Wyvern. Truly a great piece, the affinity matched perfectly and seamlessly fit its role.” he said. “Hmm, the claws and fangs are covered with a small layer of calcium… internal structure, so stable.” he marveled.
It took nearly an hour for him to finish but in return, a lot of different features were examined. For instance, he could directly form entire static fields through his spikes and channeling from the head to tail will cause the bladed tip to form an electrical blade tail and lengthening. Just a casual tail whip would easily maim anything unlucky to be bigger than the girth of the tail as both sides had protruding spikes. The spikes where the crystals had been could channel an incredible amount of lightning forming arcs and can draw and handle entire lightning bolts alone and charging through them would allow Storm to access both thunder orb but a new ability, Lightning Dragon’s Thunder Breath.
Indeed, he was developed enough to actually obtain natural dragon magic.
“If you can, try to reach the 60th floor city before surpassing the C rank. Unlike us down here, the city up there possessed developed dragon magic created from research of all innate dragon abilities. It will have a great effect on your growth and improve your chances of surpassing the limits.” he said.
“So the name of the race?” Logan asked.
“Right, as you likely guessed, he is a Drake. His race is the Lightning Crystal Drake (young). Realize that you are still a young drake and not even adolescent. D rank for adolescent and adult is C rank.” the identifier said.
“Okay, now please examine her.” He said.
Finally he turned to Jade, “Huh? Wait… those horns… don’t tell me that she…” he said.
“She was a hobgoblin but I had ogre horns.” he said
He looked amazed but gathered himself up and examined but he was instantly shocked by the presence of her mana.
What they thought was easier was actually much harder and he had to switch glasses several times and spent nearly an hour to draw a conclusion. That said, he was much quieter than with Storm who was just awakening prehistoric dragon genes in stages, something rare to happen without the influence of other dragon’s DNA.
Jade, however, had him serious.
“Finally, I was sweating when I saw traces of holy mana even if it was so little. Thankfully ‘Histour’ worked to tell me all the mutations and evolutions that happened in early stages.” he said wiping his brow of sweat. “Your Hobgoblin became a Lesser Priestess Lord. If she had not been affected by holy water, she would likely have become a Healer or Cleric Lord instead. Her affinities across the board are about 5% except for Light magic which has 30% and water mana with 10%. She has gained several innate skills based around blessing and healing magic. I’ve written down the names and you can purchase the proper spell books in the mage tower. The same can be said about any skills that aren’t dragon skills for your drake.” He said.
He handed over the books with all the information. Each of them took their own books to study their own biology.
They left and checked the books before going to see the prices. As expected though, unlike basic skills, the ones here are quite advanced. Even if they had been expanding their knowledge of magic overall it was still a lot that needed to be learned.
After that they went to the tamer guild where they checked out rider gear for Storm. They were shocked that he was so active in getting this but he was clearly big enough to take Logan and Jade.
Eventually they got the equipment and finally called Olivia and found where she was.
“Wow! You guys feel so different!” Olivia exclaimed. “And you look so beautiful, Jade!” She said shocked as she admired her.
This caused her to blush, she pulled her hair behind her ears and revealed the pointed elven like ears but they were half as long as Elas. If one were to see her, they would think that it was an elf and lord hybrid.
“Have you started making the group?” Logan asked.
“Yeah, father came here after passing me the rules and transferred the ownership and the ritual knowledge. He said that it was likely for our swords to be affected by the legend of the group. I didn’t tell him about the upgrade though. He did say that records of the ancient order had it that the legend swords would only gather the legend to a certain point without the ritual of acceptance into the order. The most would probably be a vague history of the origins if it was the special swords of the order.” She said clearly insinuated.
“You want me to register and follow the rules?” He asked.
“I don’t want to restrict you but doing the ritual will make it much easier for us to gather the legend energy.” She said and drew Hydra. Olivia also returned to E rank and her elementals were nearing that point. Naturally this also meant Hydra had caught up in development after her elemental birds could train themselves. It had a full red mark and strands of purple forming from the red.
It was clearly to show that she had done the ritual before getting ownership of the group’s name.
Logan drew his but the red was still faded and unfilled.
“What are the restrictions?” He asked.
She smiled, “Which level? Are you going to do up to E rank or full Vice leader since you also have the complete art?” She asked.
“What are the restrictions?” He asked again.
She sighed and took out a massive rule book that was basically the same archive she had.
“It is a knight’s order so you should read it as you go but the basics is to avoid committing grave crimes, live for the prosperity of innocents, avoid retaliation in anger especially if it is against innocents, fight for the people and protect against any possible invasion of demons.” She said in the simplest terms.
“Retaliation in anger… my desire to save my family will be restricted by this.” He said.
“I asked father, he said it will prevent you from attacking those who don’t provoke you but you can attack at any injustice. I’ve read about the era when the knights were successfully established, slavery was the gravest crime for the order. It is just that you will not be allowed to be consumed by anger and attack with intent to kill unless it is a threat.” She said.
He calmed down understanding and feeling much better about this compared to before. It was clear that anti-slavery was an act abhorred by the ancient hero and he made the orders so that even after his death, the people of the world did not revert to it. Sadly the orders collapsed allowing for corruption to spread once more.
“Alright… if it improves Arashi’s growth I do not mind being the vice.” he said.
“Great! I have the altar in my room stored in a bag, we can do it there and then you can take a copy of the rule book that father left us.” She said.
“Yeah, I will leave when it is done. I’ve finally caught up my mana to my body, even if there is some difference, it is minimal.” he said.
Like that they headed back to her room where she took out a magical altar and having learned from her father, she started the ritual. It was the same ritual as her but the authority was lower since she already existed. This would balance out as time goes on because they are, to some extent, still equals. The bond as golden lion knights would grow as their powers grow and their positions will balance.
He drew Arashi and slit his hand and placed it over it. “I swear to honor the code and rules of the Golden Lion and lead the innocent to a brighter future.” He said.
Suddenly mana began to erupt and gather over his body and Arashi and the links to the legend began to expand greatly until the bond was formed but the mana then gathered into an orb.
It gathered there until it expanded and dropped to the side forming a second altar.
“It copies itself?” He said.
“All leaders are given one so that they can actively recruit people. A leader is always above B rank and each B rank is allowed to form his own branch. Until then, they just had a knight’s bond but the change to leader comes with greater responsibilities.” she said.
She took out a scroll with the ritual requirements and a book with information on body constitutions that were perfect for the disciples.
“I guess that is all.” he said as Jade healed his hand to stop the bleeding.
“So you are going to leave right now?” She asked.
“Yeah.” Logan said and looked around the room at the battle beasts and then the goblin. “Do you have ogre horns for your servant?” He asked.
“No.” She said.
Understanding, he took out a few. “Let him advance to E rank and then feed him just the required amount to achieve the evolution. He is likely to turn more towards a lord like Jade compared to an ogre or something crazier.” he said.
“Alright.” She said, solemn that she would separate with him again but she wasn’t ready to go back into the wild. All her elementals needed to reach E rank and then she needed to train to use every one of them alongside the sword arts. It was sure to produce extreme power from the combination but it required a lot of training that she needed to put in. Unlike Logan, she was going to stick around.
As such, he finally checked out after over two years and instead of going down, he headed up and as he had planned, he cleaved a path through the floors to the 40th floor. It was also the first time he rode on Storm’s back and Jade behind him. Like himself, after reaching this point, Storm already possessed Brain Overclock and Lightning Clad.
His more powerful body and resistance to the damage allowed him to handle it with far greater intensity and so the speed was also not slow and he was not impeded by the equipment or weight on his shoulders.
Finally they reached the top floor and crossed the threshold to the boss room, where there was a proper minotaur. It was a weakened version as a floor boss but it was D rank. It carried a powerful double headed axe and armor. It wasn’t sentient, humanoid creatures naturally developed armor and weaponry.
Unlike the first time they entered a boss room, all his battle beasts were equal to Logan and the boss was an estimate of their battle power.
Jin appeared and stretched to start fighting. Of them all, he was like the mage but his skill set was based on magic and his drums so alongside lightning and wind magic, his two highest affinities, he learned the art of a bard drummer and combined it with his magic.
Storm roared as the bulkiest and Logan rushed forward while Jade stood back and took out her staff, that fit her size perfectly now, and began to cast her new blessings and prepare healing magic.