Chapter 44: A Power More Real Than Epic

The sun rose and the moon set, and time quietly arrived five months later.

The morning hemlock hills were shrouded in pale white mist; Garos buried his snout into the dew-covered hemlock needle clusters, cold dewdrops rolling down the gaps between his scales, carrying away the residual heat from last night's training.

Five months ago.

After the adventurers' little interlude.

Garos put away the map, then, as if nothing had happened, continued his usual life: hunting powerful ferocious beasts and monsters, training his physique and excavating spells, interspersed with brief rests.

During this period, the earth spiders constantly went back and forth, bringing back oil earth.

The oil earth was refined by Samantha into black oil, supplied to Garos to consume, becoming his energy source, filling his spirit and vitality with a pumped sensation, and raising his training efficiency.

"Power! Power! Power!"

He took a mouthful of the remaining black oil.

Garos, who had just woken up, instantly perked up, his eyes gleaming, then surged into the sky facing the morning sunlight, going out to hunt in the pleasant morning breeze, fighting ferocious beasts and monsters, hammering his combat skills and battle reactions.

When time arrived at noon.

Garos, having hunted an 8th-level wilderness giant lizard and eaten it clean, began flight training.

Under the golden bright sunlight, Garos's wings shimmered with a cold, metallic hue, yet he could still soar between the heavens.

Relying not on mana, but solely on his own wings.

Through persistent training and strengthening, the flexibility of Garos's wing bone joints was more than double that of ordinary young dragons, and their durability was equally astonishing, allowing him to endure the wilderness sandstorms and fly continuously for several hours without landing.

Today, the item he attempted was a dive stop.

Garos flapped his wings, diving from the sky toward the earth, and when he was tens of meters off the ground, suddenly fully spread his wings, hovering to a stop.

This movement brought a tremendous impact to his body.

As the number of repetitions increased, it eventually caused the membrane at the base of his right wing to tear.

Garos, with an unchanging expression, licked away the seeping dragon blood.

This level of pain had long become a common occurrence.

When the sunlight fell and the twin moons rose, Garos returned to the hemlock hills to conduct the most dangerous resistance training, having Samantha breathe her dragon breath upon him.

The flames breathed by a red dragon were not ordinary fire.

High temperature, domineering, and carrying an extremely strong impact.

Even a fire-type dragon resisting the dragon breath head-on would still suffer not light injuries.

When Garos first resisted Samantha's dragon breath head-on, he would also be blasted away, his whole body burning with pain, but now, due to the further evolution of his buffer scales, it was different.

Behold.

The red iron young dragon bathed in rolling flames; the branding-iron hue of the buffer scales on his body surface grew deeper in the fire and slowly extended upward, yet did not burst, instead absorbing the high temperature and impact.

Two seconds later.

Bang! One buffer scale reached its limit and suddenly exploded.

Fragments burning with fire and gleaming with a branding-iron hue shot out, landing on a hemlock tree, which then emitted a deafening boom, exploding into a ball of fierce fire and blasting it in half.

The current buffer scales.

They could not only absorb impact but also gained the characteristic of absorbing high temperature and then exploding.

Garos renamed them—Explosion Scales.

Currently, this layer of Explosion Scales had not fully evolved; it needed to withstand fire-attribute attacks to explode, and when Garos struck the Explosion Scales purely with brute force, while absorbing the kinetic energy, the temperature of the scales also rose.

After some time.

Garos estimated it would be able to convert kinetic energy into heat, or by absorbing his own mana, transform it into a burst of explosive energy, blasting out as the dragon scales shattered.

Only then would it be considered fully evolved.

When Samantha collapsed from exhaustion, Garos then had the Earth-Breaking Bear attack him with the earth-attribute skills it mastered, exhausting it until it collapsed on the ground, before he shot into the sky again, arriving at the barren mountain arena.

Here.

He used the Silver Frost Ring and the Lightning Tail Ring to train his ice and lightning resistance, while Rishan and the earth continuously improved his defense and muscle strength, interspersed with dragon breath spitting to strengthen the intensity and duration of his various dragon breaths.

When time arrived at late night, only then did this day end.

And Garos did this day after day, every single day, every single night.

Late night, with the full stars like countless eyes, silently gazing upon the vast earth.

Garos lay alone on a rock platform in the barren mountain, during a rare rest period, feeling the starry sky and his own changes.

It had been about a year since leaving the Iron Dragon Mother's territory.

The eight-year-old Garos had reached a body length of 7.2 meters.

His body grew increasingly heavy and strong; his muscles, dragon scales, and bone density far exceeded those of ordinary young dragons.

The branding-iron patterns on his Explosion Scales were gradually extending toward his spine; when the patterns fully arrived, that would likely be the moment the Explosion Scales completed their evolution.

The sensation of electricity under the scales of his dragon tail grew stronger, as if an invisible electric net was weaving.

His wings, through the constant coverage of alchemical items and daily training, saw the traditional lower skin membranes of dragon types become thinner, with dense feather-like fine scales overlapping on top, gradually turning fire-red, and when waved, sparks flew as they rubbed against each other.

None of this happened overnight or formed in an instant.

They were pieced together through tiny, gradual progress, a growth trajectory unique to Garos.

The wilderness held no legendary encounters, only day-after-day accumulation; during this time, every shattered dragon scale told of a power more real than epic.

—This was the true source of Garos's strength.

Compared to this will, legendary alchemical items were merely trivial, optional baubles.

As for Life Level, it remained at 7, with no increase.

Garos was initially somewhat puzzled why, despite so many changes, his Life Level had not increased, but after thinking carefully, he accepted it.

Life Level was merely a reference, unable to measure specific strength; below the legendary tier, everything was still within the realm of mortals.

He estimated that facing his own self from a year ago, also at Life Level 7, he might not guarantee a kill, but he could certainly utterly crush him.

Moreover.

Garos's evolution does not directly raise his own life level, but rather his 'potential'.

Like an adult cat turning into a young tiger.

Perhaps the body size remains the same, but the future prospects are utterly different.

It is normal that his life level has not increased; after all, he is only eight years old.

A seven-level Dragonkin at eight years old; only a Golden Dragon can reach this degree.

And the Golden Dragon is already the single strongest existence among normal Dragonkin, universally acknowledged by the mortal world; it is a breed favored by the Dragon God above all others, born with unique advantages, one that even Red Dragons cannot match. An eight-year-old Red Dragon is probably only around level six, and those of lesser quality are even only level five.

"If I were to face a Golden Dragon of the same level, I wonder if I could win."

Garos gazed at the starry sky, blinked his eyes, and thought to himself.

From now on, it would still be the same life of day after day, constantly training and strengthening himself.

But only five short days had passed.

Garos encountered a problem—the black oil was gone.

For some reason, not a single Earth Spider had returned for two or three days, so no oil-soaked soil was brought back; without the raw material to refine black oil, and with Garos having exhausted the last of his remaining black oil.

"It seems something has gone wrong."

"Could it be that the Earth Spiders fetching the oil were discovered?"

Garos paced back and forth in the mottled shadows, a vague unease stirring in his heart.

An accident means a variable.

A variable means danger.

Because of the abnormal disappearance of the Earth Spiders, Garos keenly smelled the scent of danger.

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(End of this chapter)