After an unknown amount of time, my ears began to ring and my eyes began to open. The world was blurred, and my head was pounding like it was hit with a sledgehammer.
“Oww…”
The ringing in my ears slowly turned into distant voices and the blurs slowly turned into silhouettes. It wasn’t long until I got my bearings and noticed Jezibel hugging my neck as hard as she could with tears in her eyes.
I blinked twice.
“Huh? What happened?”
“You tell us. What happened back there, and how did you survive?” the noble girl said.
I took a look around and noticed we were back in the side tunnel, as everyone else except for the noble looked worried about me. The events of the fight hit me all at once, and I began to tremble lightly.
“Why am I alive?”
Nisos chuckled.
“Like Lady Sept said, you tell us.”
I took a look at my status, and it seemed that there were a number of notifications from the fight waiting for me.
Your HP has dropped to 0.
[Abyssal Cockroach] activated.
Your HP has been set to 1 and will remain so for 3 seconds.
[Abyssal Cockroach] can no longer be activated during this fight.
You have killed an [Abyssal Frost Eagle Lv. 49]!
657,425 EXP awarded!
Experience gain from kill split between combatants based on contribution.
Experience gain divided between [Dragon Shifter] (15%) and [Sovereign of Gravity] (85%)!
You have killed an [Abyssal Tyrannosaurus Rex Lv. 31]!
128,975 EXP awarded!
Experience gain from kill split between combatants based on contribution.
Experience gain divided between [Dragon Shifter] (100%) and [Sovereign of Gravity] (0%)!
Oh. I had a title like that.
“Pardon me, but when that dark sphere swallowed you and the eagle and exploded, it spat out a deformed, mangled piece of flesh that looked less like a living thing and more like the carcasses of several monsters that a butcher threw in a large mana blender. It took just a few minutes for you to return back to perfect shape – much faster than Lady Sept and the rest of us finished off the rex. How did that happen?”
The noble was the one to answer him.
“Dragons have powerful regenerative abilities. It’s one of the reasons for their worldwide infamy, along with their domination of the skies and their advanced magic. More importantly,” she turned to me, “What was that attack you launched? That was clearly not something a rank C, class level 30 something creature should be capable of.”
I sighed.
I moved a little so that Jezibel hugging me wouldn’t weigh down on my neck so much.
“That was the most powerful skill granted to me by my class. It’s called [Black Hole], and it lets me summon a gravity ball with a truly monstrous force of attraction that sucks everything near it inside for a second, then launches it all in a direction of my choosing if I don’t allow it to simply explode. I can ‘only’ use it once a day.”
The others paled at the thought of seeing an attack of such destructive power in the future.
Unauthorized use of content: if you find this story on Amazon, report the violation.
In the meantime, I had another concern, so I switched the topic.
“By the way, why’s she still hugging me so tightly? I am alive and well now.”
Ati gave me a chagrined smile.
“…Maybe you don’t remember the events immediately before you activated this black hole skill of yours, but your last thoughts flooded through our connection. We heard and felt everything in your ‘last moments.’”
I froze instantly, and all color drained from my face.
“E-Everything…?”
The tension in the room shattered as Nisos burst out laughing and Ati tried to hide his own amusement. My cheeks were flushed red with embarrassment as I prayed for all memory of me to be wiped from the cosmos.
The noble was looking at me with a conflicted expression, and seeing my chance for a distraction, I jumped at it like my dignity depended on it.
“What are you looking at?!”
Moments passed as only the guys’ laughter could be heard and my patience was reaching its limits. Just as I was about to explode again, the noble spoke up.
“From the moment I heard a dragon — and the daughter of the infamous frost dragon at that — was going to attend the academy, I was livid. The omens of destruction from the time before even the age of the gods were looking to interfere again in human affairs, and I knew that it could be nothing good.”
My expression slowly cooled as everyone else except for Jezibel paid attention. Even though her words were potentially insulting, her tone wasn’t, so I let her carry on.
“I watched you spend months in the academy winning over public opinion without getting too close to anyone in particular. I was convinced beyond certainty itself that you were up to something nefarious, but I couldn’t figure out what it was. Since when did the notoriously powerful, egocentric, and proud dragons need to befriend humans or play by their rules? I resigned myself to waiting until I could figure out what you were after so that I could stop it. Until now.”
She took a breath and schooled her face before giving me a piercing look that would not tolerate any lies or deception.
“The possibility of Jezibel dying because of your actions terrified you so much that you were willing to sacrifice your own life to prevent it, even if it meant that your mother, your aunt, and your cousin would go through unspeakable grief. Those were acts I would expect from a knight serving under Lady Mett, not the child of her greatest foe from the Celestial War. Your last words showed deep filial love, and that contradicts my initial impression of why my insult to the frost dragon got under your skin so much; I’d thought you dragons and your pride would never let you swallow an insult like that from a ‘lesser being.’ I know with certainty that my God would never lie, much less about the dragons, but you give me a completely different impression from the one I had expected. That also reflects on the one who raised you; the dragons from history that I am familiar with would never be capable of raising such loyal and loving children. So that begs the question; Who are you, Kiara, and why are you here?”
I frowned and stared back at the noble as some tension returned to the room.
“Well, I am not the one overthinking things and making assumptions about others from hearsay. I am here for the exact same reasons I said I am; to learn about the world, make friends, and prepare for a rainy day. How about you stop creating caricatures of me in your head and meet me in the real world instead?”
She scoffed.
“That’s rich coming from someone who refuses to say my name even once.”
I blinked in surprise.
“I didn’t?”
“No, no you did not. You only ever referred to me as ‘the noble,’ that girl,’ or ‘the noble girl.’ You never even spoke to me directly. Instead, you just spoke at me in your conversations with the other three. At least come up with something more creative if my name is so hard for you to pronounce.”
Nisos snickered again, as I struggled to speak.
“Yeah, whatever, Ni-ni-nic…”
Nisos’s laughter boomed again, and even Nicotris joined in this time.
“And you, how long are you going to keep holding on to my neck?!” I turned to Jezibel, desperate to find refuge from the laughter in her.
“YOU ABSOLUTE CRETIN!” she screamed at me, startling all four of us.
“Who in the name of all the gods told you to sacrifice your life for mine?! How was I supposed to live with that on my conscience?! And what in the name of the gods was I going to tell the bloody Frost Dragon?! ‘Your daughter died to save my hide because I was too weak, oopsies, sorry about that?!’ She’d skin me alive and hang my skull on her front gates!” She screamed at me.
“If you were going to die for me, don’t you dare say last words that were going to crush my heart and take my soul with them!”
At this point, she was more sobbing than screaming. I gently hugged her as best I could as she cried into my neck, with tears and snot sliding off my scales.
“Umm, I am sorry I scared you like that…”
“You’d better be!”
“…You know, mom’s actually pretty nice, and I’d love to introduce you guys-”
“What is this, a marriage proposal?!” she quipped back at me.
“You’re just lashing out at anything I say!”
“So what, shut up!”
“…”
“WHAT?!”
I started to giggle quietly, which proved to be infectious as moments later four of us began to laugh while Ati smiled politely.
Getting the stoic falconman to laugh was a once in a lifetime event, and of course it had to happen at my expense. Whatever.
“In any case, I am sorry I dragged you guys to the third layer even though you didn’t want to come.”
Nicotris shook her head.
“No, you were always right to argue to bring us here. Those who seek great heights need to take the risks to match them. I agreed with everything you said, and I continue to stand by my decision even now. In fact, it should be apparent how desperate the need for greater strength is for the other three. The way they are now is only holding us back, and I will not allow them to settle for mediocrity when they have the potential to match us.”
None of them said anything in response to her, so she continued.
“More importantly, the three of them unlocked both their next evolutions and classes. Judging by your initially low class levels even compared to theirs, yours should be too.”