Chương 100: Reborn as the Dragon — Chapter 100 - A Dragon Has Its Reverse Scale

Su Nian's Advancement Inheritance wasn't finished. But inside the dream, a pain he couldn't name tore through him. Like he was about to lose something he could never get back. It was a razor dragging slow cuts across the inside of his chest, one after another, and then ten thousand insects pouring through those cuts to feed. A hand closing around his throat from outside. He knew. Something was wrong with the Dragon's Nest.

Normally, an incomplete Advancement Inheritance couldn't be interrupted, not unless someone held a blade to your neck. That was the rule for ordinary dragons. Su Nian wasn't an ordinary dragon. Half his soul wasn't dragon at all. And with both halves stacked together, his soul was something else entirely. Something stronger. So he broke through the restraints and woke early. It would cost him.

His inherited magic would be rough, its effectiveness gutted, and he'd need real training time to claw back full proficiency. Fine. His inherited magic was never the point anyway. The first thing he saw was Anna's face. The starlight in her eyes had burned down to almost nothing, a candle guttering in the wind, leaving only scattered ash, and that ash had become bitter, sorrowful tears sliding down her cheeks one by one. She cried so hard it made his chest hurt. Then she heard it.

That voice she'd dreamed about, rough and familiar and not particularly pretty. Anna lifted her head in a daze, and the starlight in her eyes stirred. New wood thrown onto coals that still had heat. It caught. It burned again.

"Bro... brother?" Like she didn't quite believe it yet. She reached out with one soft hand and touched the Black Dragon's face, careful, tentative. Hard scales. Cold. And as he came fully awake, every one of those scales pulled taut, hardening further beneath her fingers. This was real. She wasn't dreaming. Brother was awake. Su Nian's gaze had already moved past her, settling on the players clustered behind Anna. His pale gold eyes reflected their stunned, terrified faces back at them.

System notifications were piling up somewhere in the back of his mind, chiming over and over. He had no interest in them right now. Right now, he wanted to burn something. Dragon Flame, fully charged. The furious Black Dragon launched off the rock platform. His claws hit the ground and a dozen players who couldn't scramble clear fast enough were reduced to wet smears. The entire Dragon's Nest shuddered.

"Brother!" The genuine version of this novel can be found on another site. Support the author by reading it there. Anna's voice, soft and small, came from behind him. Su Nian stopped.

"The Harpy leader and the Cockatrice leader — they're still over there." He looked. Sure enough, Ji Taimei and Brother Chicken were sprawled in a corner, barely breathing. The players around them had scattered. Every feather had been stripped from both of them. Ji Taimei had bite marks across her body. Su Nian's eyes narrowed. His disgust for the Sakura Island players climbed another level entirely. He had a standard. Nobody got to be more depraved than him. Every single one of them had to die.

"HISS, ROAR—" Scorching, sickly green Dragon Flame erupted from his maw. Since crossing into the Young Adult Dragon stage, his breath weapon had grown. More volume, wider range, more force. But he kept Anna's quiet warning in mind and pulled the angle, keeping the torrent off Ji Taimei and Brother Chicken. The players dissolved into chaos.

"Mages, shields! Where are the shields?"

"Baka, are you blind?! I already cast it, did that thing last even half a second?!"

"Priests, get those heals out! Heal!"

"I'll heal your mother's!" Most of the Dragon's Nest turned into a furnace. The players became ants on a hot griddle, shoving and trampling each other toward the exit, jamming up because there were simply too many of them.

"Nobody run!" Meima Gougouzi's voice cut through the noise, strained but commanding.

"There's only one of it. If we concentrate our forces, we can still, " She was already panicking. A few players steadied themselves and gathered around her. Most of the others didn't even look back. Are you serious? Their combined HP couldn't break ten thousand. The Black Dragon's burn damage ticked for three to four thousand per hit. One touch and you were dead. Su Nian had no intention of letting them leave. He wasn't keeping this Dragon's Nest anyway.

From now on, he'd build his new lair directly inside the players' starter village. The thought settled, and his tail swung. CRACK! A massive chunk of stone ripped free from the cave wall. His tail coiled and threw. The rock sailed through the air and hit with a thunderous boom, crushing a cluster of players and sealing the front entrance shut in one go. The Dragon's Nest had two ways in or out. The first was now blocked, the entrance the monsters and Anna used day-to-day. The second was directly above his head.

A vertical shaft. Good for keeping out rain. Built wide enough for his body to fly through. Or it used to be. His body had grown more than three times its old size.

"Choquedeheladas!" A woman's voice, chanting from somewhere nearby. A Frost Shock slammed into the Black Dragon's body, and left a thin rind of ice on one wing before a bright red [Miss] drifted up over his head. Meima Gougouzi gritted her teeth. Fireball. Dragon's Breath. Another casting. [Miss]. [Miss]. [Miss]. A string of them, one after another. How were you supposed to fight something you couldn't even dent? Three days ago that damage was landing. Three days ago she could hurt it.

One advancement and its resistance jumped this much?

"You're the one behind all this?" Su Nian showed his teeth in something that wasn't a smile. He swept another Dragon Flame through the scrambling crowd, then turned and walked, unhurried, toward the woman still casting with a manic look in her eyes. Along the way, a few desperate players made grabs at Anna. His tail moved without him thinking about it. Every player who came near the platform was swatted into pulp. The mage players had already been wiped out in that first breath wave.

"Lapareddelallama!" [Wall of Flame]"Espadadedragóndefuego!" [Flaming Dragon Blade]"Baka! Why — why won't anything land?! WHY!" Meima Gougouzi was breaking apart at the seams. She'd given everything. She'd worked harder than anyone. Why wasn't that enough? With what was left of her defiance, she chanted "EscudoArcanoGulpk" and wrapped an Arcane Shield around herself. Su Nian watched her perform her little tricks with flat contempt. Then he raised one claw and pressed it gently against the Arcane Shield. He squeezed.

The Arcane Shield CRACKED like glass.

"I'm going to make you wish you were dead." He leaned down until his face filled her vision.

"Because you touched my Reverse Scale."

"Zun Haal Viik!" [Dragon Shout: Disarm] The dragon roar hit like a thunderclap from underground, every syllable of the ancient tongue grinding through the air. The dagger Meima Gougouzi had been raising to her own throat, her last option, her escape, jerked out of her grip and clattered to the stone floor. She sank to her knees. She stared up at the enormous, terrible dragon filling her sight, and there was nothing left in her eyes. Only fear. Only regret.

Honestly, I also hope that when things are at their worst, someone can be there. Back then I had to pull through alone. I still hope for it now, so all I can do is put that hope into words. I know it's cliché. I just hope none of you ever hit that kind of despair. And if you do, face it. Or find someone to face it with you. ➤ Next: Repaying Kindness Promptly