Chapter 6

Learning spells is merely the first step, and also the simplest step.

Increasing a spell's power while keeping or reducing its consumption, raising casting speed, and so on, is what's truly difficult.

Moreover, the further one goes, the harder it becomes.

For example, in terms of casting time, the difficulty of improving from ten seconds to one second is far less than that of improving from one second to 0.1 second.

Therefore, when Lai Ang realized that deeply studying spells was so difficult, he had an epiphany.

The original innate talent could no longer be relied upon; only the current acquired talent 'idle slot' could be relied upon.

After all, if the idle slot is not used, it cannot autonomously let itself improve and grow stronger.

It still requires Lai Ang to painstakingly learn various abilities, turn them into runes, and place them therein, in order to unleash its function.

The active party remains Lai Ang, who still must devote time and effort.

"What I can do is to strive to learn various skills, then entrust my talent to automatically improve them," Lai Ang thought.

It took out the "Small Water Ball Technique" rune, which could no longer be upgraded, from the idle slot, and then loaded the "Zero-ring Trick·Weak Power Amplification" rune.

【Zero-ring Trick·Weak Power Amplification】

【Level: 1 (2/10)】

"If the trick's maximum level is ten, then upgrading this strengthening trick rune to full level only requires eighty-eight days."

After this calculation, Lai Ang couldn't help but recall the large amount of time and effort he had spent to raise it from level zero to level one, and even that step from zero to one was still the simplest step. "No wonder, in the black dragon's inheritance memories, generations of predecessors looked down on almost all living beings and professions, yet uniformly expressed a certain respect and wariness toward spellcasters."

The dull daily life of the dragon's lair passed by.

Eating, sleeping, cultivating Black Water Battle Qi, using the idle slot to hone mental strength, and occasionally exercising together with the energetic second and third brothers.

The second brother Ai Di is fine; the dragon is very honest, or rather quite cunning, understands forbearance, and belongs to the traditional black dragon personality.

However, this guy previously had the black mark of inciting the third brother Sai Jia and Lai Ang to fight, so Lai Ang will definitely not let his dragon lair life be too easy.

As for the third brother Sai Jia, this guy doesn't know whether it's due to some atavistic bloodline or something else, but he eats more each day, and his size and strength keep surging upward.

In terms of pure physical strength, he has already surpassed Lai Ang by several folds, and the size gap is growing larger.

Keep in mind that Lai Ang was born twenty days earlier than him.

However, judging from the dragon race's inheritance memories, Sai Jia's growth rate still cannot be considered an aberrant dragon, since an aberrant dragon must excel in some aspect relative to the group. Sai Jia's case can only be said to be a talent in physical strength among the black dragon clan.

The overall strength ranking of the five-colored dragons, from strongest to weakest, is red dragon, blue dragon, green dragon, black dragon, white dragon.

If ranking solely by physical strength, it should be red dragon, blue dragon, black dragon, green dragon, white dragon, with the black dragon ranking third.

The green dragon's physical strength is slightly inferior to that of the black dragon, but green dragons generally have strong spell talent, being the most likely among the five-colored dragons to produce great mages, so their overall strength is somewhat higher than that of black dragons.

Sai Jia's physical growth speed is estimated to be no worse than that of an ordinary blue dragon, or even a red dragon, and may even slightly exceed them.

However, there are drawbacks; perhaps because his strength is greater, Lai Ang always feels that this third brother Sai Jia is missing a screw in his head, his personality not at all like the deceitful and vicious traditional black dragon, but rather more like a red dragon.

Little talk, just brute force.

To have wisdom is to have strength; to have knowledge is to have strength.

For Lai Ang, he is an excellent, durable punching bag, and unlike the second brother Ai Di, who would secretly curse him behind his back, Sai Jia is instead very enthusiastic about combat.

Even if he is abused.

But as time passes, the level of the "Weak Power Amplification" rune is continuously increased by the idle slot; when Lai Ang spars with him, the number of times he uses the Small Water Ball Technique keeps decreasing (even if used, it's a weakened version, around level five or six, otherwise a full-level ten Small Water Ball Technique would still be too dangerous for the current Sai Jia—if he were crippled, such a good punching bag would be a waste, wouldn't it?).

Giant dragons are especially sensitive to time.

No matter how long they sleep, when they awaken from slumber, their innate biological clock tells them how much time has passed.

They need no sun, moon, or other methods to tell time.

One day, in a dark corner of the dragon's lair, a hatchling whose entire body was covered in dark scales slowly opened its dragon eyes.

It clearly sensed how many days time had flowed over its body.

255 days.

Half a year plus two and a half months.

Yes, from its birth until now, it has already lived through more than half a year.

Twenty-five days ago, the "Zero-ring Trick·Weak Power Amplification" rune, after being boosted by the idle slot, reached level ten, the maximum, just as Lai Ang had guessed, and could no longer be increased.

Subsequently, Lai Ang took off this maximum-level trick rune and replaced it with the Black Water Battle Qi rune that he had successfully cultivated some days earlier.

"Panel." Lai Ang thought. -【Black Dragon】: Lai Ang Xi Er Wa Na Si

【Dragon Race Level (Biological Level)】: First Rank

【Caster Level】: First Rank (mastered spells: First-circle spell 'Water Shield' {level 0}, Zero-ring Trick·Small Water Ball Technique {max level}, Zero-ring Trick·Weak Power Amplification {max level})

【Warrior Level】: First Rank (mastered battle qi: Black Water Battle Qi {level 3 (6/20)})

This is all the fruit of Lai Ang's efforts since his birth.

Although still belonging to the First Rank creature category, in terms of hard power, most unintelligent second-rank beasts and monsters are no match for Lai Ang, such as the wild ox.

If one has wisdom, then it depends on specific combat experience, after all, panel data is panel data, and actual combat is actual combat.

Some beings can exert 120% of their own strength.

Others may not even be able to exert 100%.

Lai Ang, after all, has never truly experienced real combat, nor gone through life-and-death slaughter, so his mindset naturally tends to be a bit more cautious.

"Let's test the destructive power of my full-force burst," Lai Ang suddenly thought.

Then it did so.

In less than a second, the "Level 10·Trick·Weak Power Amplification" was bestowed upon Lai Ang's draconic body.

Then came the Black Water Battle Qi, which, though scant in quantity, is extremely pure and possesses tremendous destructive power.

"Can it only cover a single dragon claw?"

When all the Black Water Battle Qi was mobilized, Lai Ang discovered that his battle qi could now cover only his right claw.

But that is sufficient.

Lai Ang's right dragon claw, without hesitation, swung down at the hard rock wall in front of him.

Because it was too fast, the trajectory of the dragon claw's swing was somewhat blurred and hard to see.

A sharp "screech".

The sharp dragon claw pierced directly into the rock wall, sinking in several tens of centimeters.

Swish, swish, swish—the piercing screech of the claw scraping the stone wall echoed continuously in the corner of the dragon's nest.

After a moment, the sound stopped.

Lai Ang's front, a stone wall of several square meters, had been shattered into pieces.

"This is my power."

Looking at his battle results, the young dragon's eyes seemed to blaze with fierce flames.

As for his uncertain future, he also felt a little less worried.

(End of chapter)