Chapter 1: Son of Red Iron

On the Atlas Continent, in the Saier Wilderness.

A black-feathered, red-beaked eagle flapped its wings, soaring through the sky, passing over lush mountain forests, a crystal-clear emerald lake, and an endless wilderness; it slowed gently mid-flight, finally landing on a rugged cliff, preening its feathers while gazing downward.

This place was a massive circular crater, as if struck by a meteorite.

The central area contained forests and rivers, while all four sides were steep, protruding cliffs.

The black-feathered eagle tilted its head, its gaze puzzled, seeing reflected in its vision a creature at the bottom of the crater, constantly summoning all its strength to hurl its flesh-and-blood body against the mountain rock.

From head to tail, it measured about six meters in length, possessing scales and horns, with both wings and a long tail; it was unmistakably a young dragon, yet its appearance was somewhat peculiar, unlike any common breed.

Its head resembled that of a Red Dragon, complete with the Red Dragon's swept-back dragon horns; the difference was that the base of the horns was encased in shovel-shaped metallic bone, forming an angular structure akin to a knight's helmet.

Its dragon scales were layered upon layered, with a black base shimmering with silver light; the surface bore faint patterns, displaying a dark red luster reminiscent of molten lava flowing across an iron plate; the edges of the scales were as sharp as blades, refracting an obsidian-like cold light as they rose and fell with its breath, giving the whole an intensely metallic texture.

Though a young dragon, it already radiated a ferocity and power far surpassing ordinary beasts; its four limbs, tail, and wings were exceptionally strong.

Boom!

Garos, whose wings were far broader and thicker than those of an ordinary young dragon, flapped them with increased speed and crashed headlong into the base of the cliff before him; gravel scattered in a shower, and dust immediately billowed up.

Shaking his head and body, he pulled his head and upper torso out from the rock.

Garos shook his dragon scales, dislodging small pebbles lodged in the gaps and dust clinging to the surface, then ceased the Rishan behavior that had puzzled the black-feathered eagle, resting beside the large hole he had just created.

"Becoming a dragon type, it has been six years without me even noticing."

Garos silently sighed within his heart, looking down at his dragon claws, opening and closing them repeatedly.

It, or rather he, was not a normal dragon.

First, he was a hybrid of Red Dragon and Iron Dragon, evident from his peculiar appearance.

However, although Red-Iron Dragon hybrids were rare, they still fell within the normal range.

Both Red Dragons and Iron Dragons were paragons among evil dragons, all worshipping strength and power.

One was the head of the Five-Colored Dragons; the other was the head of the Sub-Iron Dragons.

Although under normal circumstances, fierce competition existed between these two dragon types, each often disliking the other, and battles would erupt upon any encounter, yet, as evil dragons alike worshipping strength, it was not impossible that after fighting for a while, they suddenly took a liking to each other, the battle turning into flirtation, and then, with dry wood meeting fire, they could not hold back.

The reason it was said to be abnormal was even more critical: within this Red-Iron young dragon's body resided a human soul that had transmigrated from another world.

That's right, Garos was a transmigrator.

He could not figure out why he had transmigrated and had no desire to ponder it too deeply, for it was meaningless; moreover, the dragon body was far stronger than the human one, and Garos, as if reborn, had long accepted the reality of becoming a dragon.

Influenced by the Dragon Inheritance, six years of dragon life.

His human soul and dragon nature had now fused, indistinguishable from one another, forming a personality dominated by dragon nature, loving the pursuit of strength and power, yet also possessing human logic and wisdom; he had the dragon's resilience and strength, but lacked the disadvantages in character such as excessive arrogance and conceit, or a pathological obsession with treasure.

In short, it was this:

Take the essence, discard the dross.

Raising his dragon claw, Garos carefully stroked his head, which he had just spent a long time ramming against the mountain body.

The fine scales on the faceplate and the dragon horns on the crown of his head felt even more solid to the touch.

"Although not very obvious, my body has definitely become a bit stronger."

The young dragon nodded in satisfaction, his tail covered in blade-like dragon scales swaying left and right, sweeping dense scratches across the ground.

Over the six years, Garos constantly studied his dragon body.

Apart from the various supernatural abilities inherent to dragon bodies, he was pleasantly surprised to discover that perhaps due to the Red-Iron hybrid blood combined with his human soul, some unknown and marvelous reaction had occurred, granting him an innate talent that other dragons lacked.

— Adaptive Evolution.

This talent was not obvious; initially, its effect was negligible, almost imperceptible, and Garos had not realized he possessed such a talent before the age of two.

Even now, it was limited; it required day after day of accumulation, countless repetitions of training, tempering, and adaptation, to achieve one effective evolution, and the degree of evolution was not large, requiring corresponding food intake to replenish energy.

Over several years, it had only made Garos's physique far stronger and harder than that of a normal young dragon, giving his scales a metallic texture even now.

But.

As Garos continued to use it, and as he grew older, the talent itself was also growing and evolving; the effect of each year was better than the previous one, and its upper limit remained unknown.

As everyone knows, any evolution-type talent is extremely buggy; Garos was full of expectation for his future.

"With the long life of dragons, the trait of growing stronger with age, combined with my Adaptive Evolution talent, one day, I will evolve and strengthen to an unimaginable degree."

Garos thought happily.

Turning his head to glance at the thick mountain body, the strong young dragon moved his four limbs, created some distance, and then crashed into it again and again; dust flew, and gravel scattered in all directions.

The beautiful future was merely a daydream for now.

As for now... well, let's continue with Rishan.

This was one of Garos's daily training methods.

Other methods included, but were not limited to: flying into the sky and then free-falling to crash down, jumping into a fire pit to burn himself, letting the Iron Dragon Mother whip and strike him with her tail, holding his breath completely in deep water and struggling to suffocate himself, and so on.

Time passed slowly.

The sun gradually tilted westward, finally sinking into the embrace of the distant mountains.

The night sky, hung with countless stars, descended; two moons, one round and one crescent, simultaneously emitted a bright moonlight, making the world in the darkness not appear dim.

After the Rishan training ended.

Garos departed from the front of the obviously collapsed and sunken hole.

There were many, many such holes around, all masterpieces of Garos.

By the crystal-clear, mirror-like lake, Garos's arrival startled away a large number of birds and beasts.

He paid it no mind, drank a large amount of water heartily in big gulps, then raised his head to gaze at the twin moons.

Of these two moons, one had phases of waxing and waning, changing with the sky; as for the other, it was always like a perfect jade disc, unchanging—the 'False Moon'.

The False Moon was actually an extraterrestrial magical fortress constructed by the Elf Empire 【Nausil】.

Besides this False Moon.

There were many other twinkling stars; although they seemed no different from other stars, in reality, they were various 'satellites' crafted by the empires through magical means.

(End of this chapter)