Isaiah
“Okay.” Aalam sounded impatient and Isaiah was feeling the same way as they both looked at Mila, her hand still on the Shadow Thief’s ring. “Is the last item what I think it is? You’ve been describing everything else for over ten minutes now.”
Mila turned to look at them and smiled. “What do you think it is, Aalam?”
“A whole lot of blood from a B rank life aligned dragon, maybe a Forest Dragon.”
“No.” Mila shook her head. “Close, but you’re underestimating both the type of dragon and how much of its body is in there.”
Aalam looked thoughtful for a few seconds. “The whole body of a B rank Life Dragon.”
Mila shook her head again, looking mildly disappointed. “That’s a bit of a reach, but in the right direction.”
“Alright then.” Aalam looked at Isaiah, then back to Mila. “My third and final guess is the heart of a B rank Harmony Dragon.”
Mila just stared at him for a second. “You knew the right answer from the beginning and were just playing with me, weren’t you?”
“Mostly.” Aalam smiled smugly and then, to Isaiah’s relief as he didn’t know much about dragons at all, he explained. “It had to be valuable enough that the War Dragon King could use it to help him advance to A rank, yet weak enough it could fit in that ring.
“Nana Xara probably had more to go on for her original guess, maybe more knowledge about Harmony Dragons and War Dragons, but I was able to figure out what her guess was from the additional contextual clues.
“Given the same resource would be useful for both the War Dragon King advancing to A rank and Isaiah advancing his race to E rank, suitability for the War Dragon race would have to be high, but that alone would leave four options. Then the fact it had to be life aligned given Nana Xara recommended the Knight skill limited those options to only two. And I could eliminate a Harmony Crystal by asking about dragon blood.”
Mila nodded. “According to Nana Xara, she made the guess because she happened to know the exact class of the War Dragon King from before her death, so she was able to determine the resources he’d need to give himself a good chance at advancement, and the heart of a B rank Harmony dragon is the only one it seemed possible for a C rank to steal.”
Aalam nodded. “But it’s not like Isaiah can just absorb a B rank heart on his own, even if it is that of a Harmony Dragon, the gentlest of all dragon bloodlines, so we’ll have to use the two Legendary grade artifacts from the quest as well, along with one of the array formations built into the inheritance.”
It finally registered in Isaiah’s mind what they were talking about when Aalam said it explicitly. They’d acquired, without his help at all, the heart of a B rank Harmony Dragon, the type of resource the entire Palazin Galaxy cluster would fight over, yet they were going to give it to him.
“No, no.” Isaiah quickly started saying. “Such a valuable resource, shouldn’t you use it for yourself?”
Mila took her hand back from the ring and looked to Aalam, smiling slightly, while Aalam was looking at Isaiah like he was an idiot.
“Why?” Aalam asked the question and Isaiah saw Mila’s smile grow a bit wider.
“The heart blood of such a B rank dragon should have the ability to help you advance to a very powerful race, right?” Isaiah spoke out the first reason that came to his mind.
“My race is all about soul power and equal affinities for all elements, and I’ve already set its advancement path, so why would I contaminate it?”
Isaiah looked to Mila, then back at Aalam. “What about for Mila?”
“She has the same race.”
Isaiah got the distinct impression Aalam was thinking less of him with every word he said, but he couldn’t just take such a valuable resource. “The heart blood could also give you a powerful bloodline, right?”
“A Fabled grade one.” From the way Aalam said the words, even though Universal Standard was obviously not the language the man was most comfortable with, it sounded like he was looking down on Fabled grade bloodlines. “Mila and I both have Mythic grade bloodlines. So why would either of us want to downgrade?”
And there it was. Mila had said they’d be able to offer better resources than any force which would take him, and he hadn’t quite believed her. Sure, after he learned she was the apprentice of the Yin Yang Sage, that had changed, but he’d thought any truly impressive advancement resource would go to the two of them first, or Aalam’s sister, which would mean he’d only get what they didn’t want.
This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.
He just hadn’t realized that even if he’d only be getting resources they didn’t want, those resources would include Legendary grade skills and materials, along with normally impossible to find resources like dragon hearts, so he started to tear up. “Thank you.”
Aalam looked over to Mila. “If he doesn’t want the heart, could we sell it? I imagine we could trade it for something more useful.”
Isaiah looked on in horror, but then he saw the expression on Mila’s face, a look of mild disappointment filled with acceptance, as she started to explain why that would be a bad idea. “We’d have to wait until we were B ranks ourselves to sell something like that. It’s too hot an item and even gaining access to those with enough money to buy it would be impossible, not to mention how anyone with that amount of money could kill us with barely an effort.”
“Oh. Right.” Aalam nodded. “So, we want an Essence of War and a Dragon Enhancing Catalyst, right?”
“Yeah.” Mila nodded, seemingly not at all fazed at how fast he moved on after she convinced him.
Aalam then released his aura, the power of his Laws dominating the tiny room they were all in, and he spoke in a voice which resonated with the power of a skill. “Shadow of Planet Hira, do you accept me, the Heavenly Spark Soul King, as your familiar?”
“Yes.”
After Mila responded, both their auras suddenly spiked in power for a second, but then they faded back to normal. Mila, however, seemed slightly more powerful than before and a second later an orb filled with a red and purple miasma appeared in her right hand, the contents of which activated something in Isaiah which made him feel hungry, and in her other hand a transparent glass can of some kind of powder made him feel a similar but different emotion.
Aalam telekinetically took both the orb and the can, pulling them into the Left Hand of the Runescribe, his Heroic grade artifact shaped like a scaled fingerless glove, and then something changed in him and Mila, something Isaiah almost couldn’t sense. It felt like a skill merge, but for some reason it was shared between the two of them, so that couldn’t be right.
Aalam then took out five skill orbs from the Left Hand of the Runescribe, however, and, from the way they glowed, all five looked to be Legendary grade. Two of them he telekinetically passed to Mila, who immediately learned them, while the other three he learned himself.
Then another skill orb appeared in Mila’s hands, this one glowing a soft blue mixed with silver, and she telekinetically tossed it to Isaiah, who caught it.
Knight (F-Legendary) Soul, Humble, Contract
You are not just anyone under your lord. You are his shield and lance.
Effects: Learn the skill Knight (F-Legendary)
Requirements: Free skill slot, Soul +144, able to learn humble soul contract skills, in an active servant or slave relationship with a Lord, possess a combat focused class
“Learn and get better at that skill for now,” Mila told him. “We have some preparations to make before we start the process of enhancing your race and there is a question you have to decide the answer to.”
Mila reached for the spatial storage ring again and brought out a large bathtub-sized container. Then she telekinetically passed it to Aalam. “First, Aalam, you need to drink all the Foundation Establishment Soup we have access to over the next five to six days.” She then brought out something else from the ring, a small skull statue made of some kind of onyx. “While you are digesting, you can also study that. Nana Xara suggests you only use it to focus on darkness Laws for now, as its darkness Laws are less advanced than its death Laws, so you won’t be as affected by it as you focus on not allowing it to alter your path. According to her, this should be relatively easy so long as you keep contrasting your darkness Laws with your light Laws.
“Finally, Nana Xara also recommends cleaning all your channels with your Law Larva of Cleansing as you drink the soup so you’ll have less to clean up later when we get you your cultivation technique.”
Mila then started walking out of the small room, indicating for Isaiah to follow. “Isaiah, come with me and let’s talk. We need to go hunt down Prince Tomin while Aalam gets the formation ready for your race advancement.”
Isaiah followed Mila out of the inheritance and, as they started running, he realized Mila seemed to know exactly where to go, probably never having lost Tomin’s location at all.
“Let me ask you one question first. Then you can ask me what you’ve been thinking about.” Mila spoke as they ran and Isaiah was again reminded of how her Aura stat was way above his, so he couldn’t hide anything from her unless she let him. “You have two possible routes when you upgrade your race. You can either keep your human side and continue as a dragon hybrid, with the best option being becoming a Mettle Dragon Hybrid, or you can drop your human side and become a human form dragon, the best option becoming a Human Form Young Mettle Dragon, both of which will provide quite high affinities for all three of your Laws as well as whatever rejuvenation-based Law you decide on.
“Becoming a human form dragon comes with the advantage of having your race advance automatically just by aging up to B rank, with every advancement also bringing an advance in grade as well, but a Human Form Young Mettle Dragon is only a Heroic grade race, and you will lose your bloodline in the process while your affinity with Laws other than those of your race will go down.
“Staying a Dragon Hybrid on the other hand has the advantage of raising your race to Fabled grade immediately, along with the higher affinities that grants. You won't be considered a monster by the System, which is an advantage, and, more important, you’ll be better suited to cultivation in general, not gaining the monster weakness of incredibly slow advancement of cultivation techniques. The biggest downside, however, is increasing the grade of your race during your next race rank up will take quite a few resources or some rather ridiculous achievements.”
Isaiah was quiet for a few minutes as they ran. “What do you recommend?”
Mila laughed. “Me? I recommend the human form dragon route, but mostly because it would be cheaper for me and Aalam. You’d also get to be a whole lot lazier.
“Nana Xara and Aalam, however, both think the hybrid route would be better, Nana Xara because it would be more exciting and Aalam because your max possible power would be higher and he’s not one to settle for less potential to his own detriment.”