The Crimson Dragon Chapter 62

Translated by: SaltyTank

Edited by: crimsonwolf8439

h.e.l.lo everyone, this will be the final chapter of TCD for me and crimson as we’re moving to a new site (GT) and will be starting a new project soon. I’m sorry but I and crimson had thought thoroughly about this already and have discussed with other members of the team as mentioned in the announcement 2 days ago. Anyone can pick this novel up as it is now officially dropped after clearing the queue of sponsored chapters. Thank you everyone for all the support, and I hope to see you guys in the future, SaltyTank out.
 

Chapter 62

 Dragons stood at the summit of magic beasts; not only did they have high rates of recovery, they also had a distinctively insatiable appet.i.te. It was rather common for them to eat minerals and gems, and they could even eat food heavier than their own body in a single meal. This was especially true before reaching adulthood.

 After devouring half of the Giant Octopus during their fight, Claudius used spells and his dragon aura to strand a school of chum salmon onto the beach. Just like that, he ate over ten tonnes of fish. Even Claudius did not understand how he could fit so much food in his stomach; logically speaking, his stomach would have been overloaded and might even burst.

 What followed next was even more dramatic. Like a balloon being inflated, the shrivelled muscles regained their former glory and began to fill up the gaps between his skin and bones. The dangling skin and scales were once again supported by layers of muscles. By the time the transformation was over and his stomach was grumbling once again, Claudius had already turned into a magnificent-looking Crimson Dragon. The powerful Crimson Dragon had returned from its slumber.

 Claudius walked back and forth as he adjusted himself to his new body. His body was over forty metres long, and he was slightly below twenty metres tall when standing on his hind legs. He could probably appear in Ultraman as a monster and fight on par with the heroes with this body. Claudius' head was now much larger than ordinary Crimson Dragons and his chin was now coated in a layer of unknown metal. Looking at his own reflection on the water surface, Claudius almost mistook himself as a Deathwing.

 He stroked his metallic chin which was quite smooth despite its rough look; "This makes me question my own bloodline&h.e.l.lip;&h.e.l.lip; Well, the two horns on my snout are quite different from the black dragon king though."
 

 Claudius suddenly craved for different food after devouring another school of fish — for some reason, he wanted to eat the metals near the volcano. As he cursed himself for having such weird desires, Claudius also understood that it was his instincts as a dragon. What were the robust bones and tough scales made of? Metals were obviously consumed during the formation of those body parts. By breaking down metals during digestion, dragons could grow solid and durable scales through regrouping the metals in a closely packed molecular structure.

 Claudius gave in to his desires. He gobbled everything in his sights — rocks, sulphur, metals, everything.

 "Never thought rocks were so tasty! Hmm, so this is the instinct of a dragon, huh? These things are tasty because my body needs more minerals and metals&h.e.l.lip;&h.e.l.lip; Then what about human women? It seems that dragons think that women are 'tasty treats', I wonder what's so tasty about them&h.e.l.lip;&h.e.l.lip;"

 The awakening of the Crimson Dragon was a huge threat for the creatures on and near the island — at least to those which are intelligent. The insects were unaffected as their tiny brains could not understand the concept of 'danger', but things were different for the sea monsters lurking nearby. With Claudius running around like a kid, the dragon aura he emitted was like a gravitational field, putting a large pressure on the sea monsters. The pressure creatures felt from a dragon aura was proportional to their intelligence — the smarter they were, the more frightened they would feel. The smartest creatures nearby were, of course, the four, no, three gigantic sea monsters residing in the four surrounding mountains. The most affected one of the three was the fishman — it was holding a trident while sitting on his undersea throne with a troubled look on its face. With its 30-metre-long body and high intelligence, the fishman dominated its counterparts and ruled over them as a king. Its underlings built a Roman-styled palace at the bottom of the sea, and in the middle of the palace was the throne. Due to corrosion, the palace looked like an ancient ruin past its days of glory, but it was still magnificent nonetheless. Even though the undercurrents were strong, sunlight could still reach the palace as if the crystal-clear seawater was non-existent. The territory of the fishman king was the most beautiful and silent region, with mountains blocking off most of the waves while rain clouds rarely formed in the area due to the volcano's activities. If not for the fishman king, the sandy beach and clear water was certainly a good place for humans to settle down and enjoy a peaceful life.

 The fishman king was troubled by his own intelligence — he had dreams, nightmares to be exact. The dragon aura brought nothing but fear and nightmares for the king. It was always vigilant and tense as it thought the Crimson Dragon would attack it out of the blue and eat it, which was a reasonable worry to be completely honest. Calling the fishman king 'it' was perhaps disrespectful — Freimer was his name. Despite being a sea monster, he had intelligence and emotions far above the level of typical monsters. Freimer's favourite activity was to appreciate the beauty of his territory from his throne, and the next on the list was chilling on the beach while enjoying the breeze and warm sun.

Now that the Crimson Dragon was awake, all was over. Freimer was a clever monster, thus he was now considering if he should continue his duty as commanded by Umberlee. From the start, Freimer never considered himself as a faithful servant to the G.o.ddess; he was more of a mercenary. There was no point in risking his life as he was not a devoted believer of Umberlee, not to mention that the G.o.ddess never paid him anything for his work. With that in mind, Freimer decided to take things into his own hands and protect his own interests.

His stay was not a complete waste of time though; with the abundant amount of sea monsters in the region, Freimer managed to create his own forces by turning monsters and other fishman into his slaves through magic. With his influence and manpower, Freimer was confident that he could create a whole new undersea kingdom somewhere else — a kingdom beyond reach of others, a peaceful kingdom solely for himself.

For this very reason, it would not be surprising for Freimer to suddenly vanish from his territory. What about the G.o.ddess' anger and rage? As if Umberlee had spare divine power to care about such trivial things. Freimer believed that the G.o.ddess' weak underlings could not stop him from leaving. Perhaps someday, he would create a kingdom so strong that the G.o.ddess would seek help from his citizens.

The Giant Toad was also preparing to escape. Although it was a beast and was nowhere near as smart as Freimer, it realized that staying any longer meant only death awaited it. Although the excavated mountain had rocky walls tens of metres thick, the toad still felt unsafe as it had to spend one third of the day in shallow regions or on land as an amphibian. There was no choice but to run away — it was clear that the Crimson Dragon would not be stopped by mere layers of rocks.