Chapter 8: Swarm

Garos circled at an altitude of a thousand meters, his dragon eyes locking onto the Rock-Shattering Worms below.

Through the Life-Level Detection Art, Garos had already confirmed that the Rock-Shattering Worms were Level 7 lifeforms, the same level as him currently.

Life-Level Detection Art—this was a spell-like skill he had awakened a year ago.

Dragons are top-tier magical beasts and also natural sorcerers; as they age, they naturally master many spells originating from their bloodline.

Such spells differ from regular magic; their power and effects are weaker, but they can be cast instantly, and are thus called spell-like skills.

Life-Level Detection Art is one of them.

Under normal circumstances, a young dragon has not yet reached the age to awaken and master spell-like skills.

For Garos, it was not just his physique that grew rapidly due to adaptive evolution; he also mastered some spell-like skills ahead of schedule.

"Same level as me; I should be able to secure a safe victory."

Life level is merely a reference; many creatures can fight above their level, and dragons are the foremost among them. Garos, by nature cautious and steady, did not consider hunting above his level for now, but instead set his sights on the same-level Rock-Shattering Worms.

Garos suppressed his dragon aura, flapped his wings with minimal amplitude, and gradually approached the target from above.

The Rock-Shattering Worms perceive the location of creatures through vibrations.

A breeze swept past; the Rock-Shattering Worm, which had been basking in the sun, suddenly raised its head in alertness, its two nearly invisible eyes, like green beans, blinking.

Powerful ferocious beasts and demons were everywhere on the wilderness, along with hunting teams formed by intelligent beast clans.

Hunting and being hunted was the eternal, unchanging main theme here.

The Rock-Shattering Worm was a powerful hunter, but that did not mean it could not become prey.

A hundred meters in the air.

Seeing the moment the Rock-Shattering Worm showed an anomaly, Garos, who had been slowly flapping his wings, narrowed his eyes; a pair of wingspans exceeding twelve meters suddenly unfurled, whipping up a violent gale.

The young dragon became a black-and-red mixed meteor; as it dove, the edges of its wing membranes tore through the air, almost sparking fire.

By the time the Rock-Shattering Worm reacted, the dragon's shadow had already obscured its body.

With no intention of slowing down even slightly, Garos, carrying immense force, dove and crashed to the ground, using his own body as a weapon to smash onto the Rock-Shattering Worm.

The iron-hard insect armor, at the moment it contacted Garos's body.

Under the massive impact, the black carapace shattered like an eggshell, and the flesh beneath was directly crushed into meat paste.

Bang! With a thunderous, earthquake-like roar, the rock plates shattered into countless stones, mixed with dust rising and swirling upward.

The Rock-Shattering Worm, a ferocious beast that was relatively dominant even among Level 7 lifeforms.

Struck by the young dragon's impact from the sky, its body split directly into two halves from the middle.

And Garos, with some of the buffer scales on his body shedding, suffered almost no fall damage.

Woooo!

In extreme pain, the Rock-Shattering Worm let out a roar like a strong wind blowing through a canyon.

Insects possess tenacious vitality; it did not die, but instead erupted with powerful strength like a final burst of life, its upper body thrashing in rage and flinging the young dragon toward sharp rock spikes.

The rock spikes failed to pierce the dragon scales; instead, they were crushed and shattered.

The buffer scales on its back absorbed the impact force upon colliding with the rock in an instant and generated a rebound force.

Garos shot toward the Rock-Shattering Worm again at an even faster speed.

By now, the Rock-Shattering Worm wanted to flee; its mouthparts' sharp teeth rotated, gnawing at the ground, and more than half of its body had already burrowed underground.

Even with only its upper half.

With the Rock-Shattering Worm's regeneration ability, it could gradually recover to completeness.

Sensing the vibration of the dragon body rubbing against the air, the carapace on the part of the Rock-Shattering Worm's body still exposed above ground suddenly swelled, and high-temperature, high-pressure steam sprayed out from the gaps.

A sulfurous smell shot straight into the nostrils.

This steam simultaneously carried fire and water attribute damage; it was the Rock-Shattering Worm's life-saving skill, with considerable power.

Garos closed his eyes and charged straight forward, using his formidable physique to cross the enveloping steam, tore open the insect armor once more with one claw, and embedded it into the flesh of the Rock-Shattering Worm.

Whoosh!

He flapped his powerful wings, lifted his body into the air, completely dragged the upper half of the Rock-Shattering Worm out of the ground, and then swung its body around, smashing it against the surrounding rocks again and again.

The crashing sounds of bang-bang-bang continued for several seconds.

With a sweep of his dragon wings, he scattered the surrounding dust.

Garos released his claws; the Rock-Shattering Worm had completely lost all signs of life, its carapace shattered in large quantities, its flesh crushed and mangled beyond recognition.

"I used too much force."

"The same-level Rock-Shattering Worm seems completely unable to resist my strength."

Garos clenched and then released his dragon claws, feeling the pain on his body rapidly fading, and thought silently in his heart.

The final high-temperature steam of the Rock-Shattering Worm; its fire damage was basically immune to Garos, and as for the water attribute damage, it should have caused Garos some trouble, but because he had specifically trained and adapted to it, the slight damage caused was negligible.

"My behavior of training in water to overcome my disgust has been effective."

"Although I cannot measure it specifically, my resistance to water attribute damage has definitely improved."

He turned his head to look at the insect corpse.

Garos stepped forward, used his claws to peel open the carapace, and revealed the flesh inside.

Unlike its fearsome appearance, the meat of the Rock-Shattering Worm was actually tender and white, looking very appetizing; moreover, the texture and taste were excellent, ice-cold, delicate, and sweet, simply like vanilla-flavored ice cream.

Shortly after, having finished enjoying the delicacy obtained from the hunt.

Garos simultaneously scanned the surroundings, his gaze sweeping over this abandoned mine pit.

The place was jagged with strange rocks; around the mine pit was a circle of steep and dangerous rock layers, while inside was a square area full of pits and hollows, covered with collapsed or abandoned mine tunnels.

Flapping his wings, the young dragon descended to the bottom of the mine pit.

Garos slightly closed his eyes, quietly sensing the ground beneath him, and soon felt a faint attractive force.

"There are still some residual ore veins beneath here."

He pondered silently.

There were many such abandoned mining sites in the Ser Wilderness, but few were mined so thoroughly that nothing remained; some ore veins usually survived.

Glancing again at the surrounding mine tunnels, Garos mused that this seemed like a suitable place to dwell.

Not far from this abandoned mine lay a forest containing a lake, inhabited by numerous creatures resembling gray hyenas.

Water, prey, mineral resources.

Possessing these elements made it a good place.

"After I leave the Iron Dragon Mother, I can first claim this spot as a dragon's nest, then make other plans."

Garos thought to himself.

Suddenly.

The ground trembled slightly.

Garos's gaze sharpened; he flapped his wings and shot straight into the sky with a swoosh, vanishing from the spot.

Boom!

The rocky ground where he had stood shattered like fragile glass in an instant; a huge black shadow burst from the earth, catapulting hundreds of meters into the air before falling back down.

His tense spirit relaxed slightly.

Garos exhaled and lowered his gaze to look below.

In his field of vision lay a colossal Rock-Shattering Worm, a hundred meters long, coiled at the bottom of the abandoned mine; its insect armor gleamed with a cold metallic sheen under the sun, radiating an overwhelming pressure.

Click-click-click!

Amidst a grating, teeth-aching sound, the ground continued to shatter as Rock-Shattering Worms burst from the earth one after another.

They were densely packed, countless in number; their bodies rubbing and twisting against each other sent shivers down the spine.

"There is a swarm of Rock-Shattering Worms, and even a Worm King present."

"This place is temporarily out of my reach."

"It seems finding a suitable territory to dwell in is no easy task."

The young dragon sighed in regret, dodging the acid rain vomited by the Rock-Shattering Worms toward him, flew higher and higher, and departed from this place.

(End of this chapter)