Chapter 453: Eating a Fire Dragon

Fast-paced narrative

Read on the go

The heavy rain arrived faster than expected.

The island's climate is unpredictable—clear skies in the morning can turn into a raging storm by the afternoon. The collapsed sinkhole had barely been filled with a layer of rocks and sea sand at its base when a sudden downpour began to pour relentlessly.

It was around three in the afternoon.

Meanwhile.

Liszt was in his room at the port town, devouring his meal with gusto. The roasted monster meat, seasoned to perfection, was delicious even without any accompanying drinks.

This was already his fourth meal today.

One in the morning, one in the late morning, one at noon, and one in the afternoon. He would have another in the evening, another at night, and even get up for a midnight snack.

Seven meals a day, each larger than before.

He also had to make two trips to the bathroom to get rid of the waste from his digested food.

"So, am I now sharing a mouth with a dragon to eat?" Liszt finished his roasted meat and downed a cup of dragon milk in one go.

A shadow of complex worry crossed his brow.

Despite eating seven meals a day, he showed no signs of obesity; on the contrary, he felt increasingly thin. "The magic seed's nutrient absorption forces me to eat more monster meat, dragon milk, and other rich foods. The amount I spend on food now probably matches what Hiddleston consumes."

Hiddleston and other blizzard beasts are mid-level monsters, devouring a colossal amount of food every day.

Liszt has caught up and shows signs of surpassing them. Judging by the value of the food, his consumption is higher—because he cannot do without dragon milk and monster meat. Skipping a meal of monster meat or a cup of dragon milk leaves him feeling physically weak.

"I don't know how long I'll have to nurture this magic seed. If this keeps up, it'll eat me out of house and home. The only silver lining is that the magic seed doesn't drain my magic power, or I wouldn't even be able to afford potions."

He's been gorging himself these past two days.

Yet, he feels no change in his heart's position. The magic seed occasionally gives off a warm sensation but otherwise stays dormant.

No matter how Liszt channels his mana, he can't draw it out or stimulate it.

He also can't tap into the magic seed's own power. He suspects that the magic seed is made of highly concentrated dragon magic; otherwise, it's hard to explain where all the Fire Dragon magic went after passing through the dragon bone magic array.

The territory continues to mine volcanic glass.

They can likely extract another dozen tons of volcanic glass from the surface, as the shallow layers are easy to mine due to the very soft soil. But mining the deeper layers is difficult. With a current shortage of serfs, they're only mining the shallow layers of volcanic glass.

Based on Black Horse Island's area, the total volcanic glass reserves likely exceed fifty tons.

He used about twenty tons of volcanic glass's Fire Dragon magic to condense the current tiny magic seed. "With such a high compression ratio, gas can turn into liquid, so why does the Fire Dragon magic only condense into a flame no bigger than a candle's?"

The transformation of magic is hard to predict.

Liszt isn't sure how much it costs to raise a dragon, but nurturing a magic seed has already tightened his finances.

"I need to speed up my practice of 'Breath Attenuation.' Currently, using this mana secret technique, I've only reduced the rate of mana loss by one-third. According to Stephenland Vulture's introduction to mana secret techniques, at the elite Earth Knights level, the rate of mana loss can be reduced by three-quarters."

Reducing the rate of mana loss means an increase in nutrient utilization, meaning less food intake.

When 'Breath Attenuation' is mastered, a three-quarters reduction in mana loss would at least save him two meals, making five meals a day probably sufficient.

Moreover.

After mastering "Aura Attenuation," the consumption when taking potions would also decrease, undoubtedly making it a highly efficient mana technique: "I need to master it ASAP."

Just after eating, he entered a state of cultivation, diligently practicing the mana method of "Aura Attenuation." With the pressure from the magic flame seed, he was fully immersed in his practice, focusing intently on every detail of the mana technique, hoping to master it soon to cut down on food expenses.

Suddenly.

His heart leapt, feeling a vague sense of restlessness from the rubber spirit bug connected to his mind.

Immediately raising an eyebrow, he understood and called out the smoke task: "Complete the task, reward: the restlessness of the rubber bug."

The completion of the task indicated that the collapsed sinkhole had been filled up by the heavy rain, forming a lake and five openings. With water supporting the surface pressure, the rocks around the collapsed sinkhole should not easily collapse. However, fences would need to be set up around it in the future to prevent people from falling into the water.

It was a nearly thirty-meter-deep sinkhole lake.

He stood up, ready to take the rubber bug to plant new insect grass—needless to say, he had already sensed what the restless rubber bug wanted to do—just like the previous rubber bug, it wanted to spit out the new insect grass it had nurtured within.

Incidentally.

He noticed the new smoke task.

"Task: The new season's autumn harvest is about to begin. Flower Town and Black Horse Island have cultivated many farmlands, but the cultivated grains are still hard to meet the needs of the territory's population, and more people will need to be satisfied in the future. Please store enough food for ten thousand people to survive the winter. Reward: A spirit bug."

"Huh?"

Seeing the reward, Liszt was suddenly stunned: "Another spirit bug, really?"

The surprise was too sudden, and for a moment, he didn't know how to express his feelings, feeling his thoughts a bit sluggish, probably due to the recent troubles with the Fire Dragon, causing his brain to be somewhat cluttered.

After a while, his thoughts resumed: "Is it a wild spirit bug like Nami, or a domesticated spirit bug like Jie La evolving? If it's a domesticated spirit bug evolving, which one would it be, the corn grass spirit bug, or the rubber bug triplets? It's probably not the rubber bug triplets, as their evolution should yield three spirit bugs."

So.

His thoughts shifted to the corn grass insect, which he hadn't brought with him and was still in the castle of Flower Town. He wasn't sure whether it was quietly accumulating strength, nor could he be certain that it was the corn grass insect about to evolve into a spirit bug.

However, during this period, apart from the rubber bug triplets, the only other active spirit bug was the corn grass insect.

Shaking his head.

He suppressed the meaningless speculation.

He then turned his thoughts to the content of the task: "Storing enough food for ten thousand people to survive the winter, according to the traditional winter, is from November to February of the following year, but in Flower Town, the so-called 'winter' usually refers to the snowy season from mid-December to mid-February of the following year."

Flower Town is at the northeasternmost corner of Coral Island, and Black Horse Island is northeast of Flower Town.

From mid-December each year, it is covered by a long snowy season, during which the serfs usually stay at home as much as possible to reduce heat consumption and lower the number of meals.

"Food for more than ten thousand people for two months is no small amount, relying solely on grains is definitely not enough. Seafood and meat must be stored in large quantities, preferably a lot of salted meat and pickles... but the smoke task's requirement for food for ten thousand people to survive the winter is quite interesting."

The smoke task is closely related to his own thoughts.

Sometimes Liszt would think that many of the tasks are driven by his "imagination."

For example, the bizarre task of helping Meopo and Angela improve their marital relations was probably projected by the smoke task due to Liszt's frequent thoughts about Angela Sapphire's promiscuous behavior.

And recently, he has been preoccupied with how to purchase serfs during the expansion order and bring them back to the territory.

So.

The Smoke Mission has issued a task to provide winter food for ten thousand people.

"Perhaps I can try in future Smoke Missions to actively guide the Smoke Mission through continuous self-suggestion?"

"It seems a bit sketchy. At most, it might influence the content of the mission, but it probably won’t affect the rewards."

"But giving it a shot couldn’t hurt."

He has always relied on the rewards from Smoke Missions to achieve rapid advancement for his territory and himself. Yet, deep down, he also harbors a strong desire for control, hoping to firmly grasp the Smoke Missions in his hands rather than passively triggering them. Moreover, this might be related to a sacred dragon.

Smoke Dragon!

Thus, he has never ceased to ponder over the Smoke Missions.

...

Mentally preparing himself to guide the Smoke Missions, he took the Rubber Bug Triplets with him. Riding on the back of a chocobo that was reluctant to leave its shed, he ventured out into the heavy rain, heading toward the rubber plantation.