That smile told a lot about his thoughts.
*The problem was understanding how to make that power his and use it to save his mother. *
Thinking about his future plans, while hunting as an adventurer to earn money for his rent and pay for his future research, something strange happened.
He was hunting a mega slime, a monster around level 300 which, though, couldn't do anything against him if not become his experience and future livelihood.
Then he felt something strange. He felt a stream of mana particles moving from the core of the deceased mega slime to his hand.
Even though he used polymorphic magic to easily blend in the human society, his powers were always working as usual: so he was curious about what was happening.
After some time, that movement stopped, and the usual core used as proof of subjugation of the mega slime in the adventurer's guild slowly cracked and then decomposed into grains as little as sand.
At that moment, his emotions were battling inside himself: his brow was furrowed because he wasted his time and couldn't get enough money to expand his research; on the other side though, he had a manic smile on his face because he felt that he acquired partly the ability to morph his body consistency, shape, and density.
He absorbed part of the powers of the mega slime.
These two expressions alternated a pair of times on his face before the crazy smile won and kept staying there.
He had found a way to save his mother.
Couldn't he just ask for help from a phoenix and not kill them to get their powers?
That may seem more rational, but there were two problems: first, the phoenix power is involved only in self-regeneration, so he had to absorb it himself to make it his and start any curing process; second, after so much time denying the pride of his race, their thirst for power, their internal contempt for every other social group, he changed.
For the first time in his life, he felt the thirst for power. If he had to save his mother from this unknown disease, he might as well give a sense to his title of Dragon Hero, then become the stronger dragon ever existed, just before destroying his race.
Yes, Cain's rage was suppressed during his childhood, just thanks to the love of his mother.
He felt betrayed and alone.
His village always treated him as an annoyance, and even the rest of his family abandoned him when it was the moment to choose where to go and how to save Eve.
All the pain he felt. He wanted to give it back after saving his mother. In order to gift her a world where she would be the only dragon.
His mind was becoming ever so convoluted that he reached a conclusion in complete antithesis to what his mother hoped for him.
The sad part was his mind didn't have the necessary calm to realize even his mother wouldn't be happy being left alone in a world without him and her family.
That evening returned to his inn, and he built something similar to a giant food basket. The difference was that he wouldn't put food in it, but his mother, surrounded by ice. She would stay there during his flight towards a forest where he heard were present two phoenixes.
Once he arrived there, he fought with the Phoenix newlywed couple and gained a spot in the place that, from that moment on, would be called Cinder Forest.
He didn't have to wait long after that fight: in fact, a lich probably had an idea similar to his and tried attacking them.
At that moment, he decided.
*Let them kill themselves with their own hands! *
A slight grin on his face.
The time he waited was stressing him to no end, but during the fight, every wound they inflicted on each other was a reason for joy in his heart.
Finally, the moment came: the lich was defeated, mainly because of inferiority in numbers, but the other two were at their limit too.
Suddenly, with a movement of mana, an icy flame surrounded them as if stopping them in time. In the next second, their bodies slowly decreased in size until they were absorbed into their golden cores.
He had done it: he betrayed those that, after years of peaceful coexistence, could, no doubt, call the best friends of his life.
Strangely no tears were shed by him. His face told another story.
The same smile of years before appeared again on his face.
He felt like a kid the morning of Christmas: after years of hard work, he received three wonderful presents.
Then he proceeded to absorb the lich's core similarly to how it happened to the mega slime, but something unexpected happened when he tried doing the same thing for the other two.
He didn't feel any mana influx from them!
The world turned around under his feet. After an angered scream, he slowly regained his calm and tried other assimilation methods.
After some time, he managed to englobe the two Phoenix cores into his.
The result was lacking, but he didn't have the knowledge to solve this problem now.
Still hoping this to be sufficient to accomplish his goal, he quickly returned to his palace.
A house inspired by the Royal palace of Panpolis, he himself carved inside a mountain in the forest.
Walking at a fast pace in the long grand corridors inside the mountain, he arrived in front of the room where his mother was waiting for him.
Hours and hours passed from the start of his treatment, and he felt a decisive improvement in the strength of his healing. He felt close but far at the same time.
Then seemingly, a lamp lit up over his head, and he remembered the kid the two introduced to him during their peacemaking party after their initial fight.
*Hmm, Rubra, eh. Well, it seems right, one family to save a family! *
Any sense of morality even slightly resembling that of humans or even, that of his loving mother was now absent.
Cain became just a monster ready to do anything to save Eve, be damned himself or the rest of the world for all he cared!
These thoughts led his next two hundred years, he continued his research to unlock the powers of Rubra's parents, but after around one hundred years, he started thinking it was just the phoenix's racial trait, remembering how they were absorbed back in their cores.
After two hundred years after that fated day, he gave up on his research. He preferred to wait one more century to inglobate Rubra's core than to continue a fruitless process.
The problems started coming when that bug entered the forest: in the beginning, he built a stable, and for some reason, one day, he jumped from a rocky precipe.
Cain honestly didn't care much about him at that moment: it was like an adult watching ants walk on the ground as if to make time pass faster.
*Two months passed, and that ant returned from death twice!
I'll show him my true form as a parting gift before giving death to him. *
These were the thoughts of Cain after seeing Eric raise himself from the ground after taking(in his mind) the brunt of his Glowing Judgement of Armageddon.
Unknown to him, that parting gift caused Eric emotional damage, making him remember his dark dark past.
Those memories he preferred hidden under the flux of time, suddenly surrounded him, and seeing himself in that betraying, deranged Red Dragon, anger raised in Eric's mind.
*It should be time now, right?!
How long do I have to bear the trial of the 'Ghost of Christmas Past'? *
Cough, cough.
As if waiting for his question, the poison Rubra threw in his mouth started to have an effect.
''Wasn't this a cheap unchivalrous way to fight an enemy?''
Some might say. Eric liked it more because of this. Fighting to the death, moreover, with the man who caused his lover to suffer hundreds of years, these underhanded tricks were a given.
From the beginning, Eric always thought that once on the battlefield, everything was lawful.
In his mind, the fighting made every sentient being regress to their animalistic side. So, when fighting, he eliminated every sense of morality from himself.
To be completely honest, he felt like the pain of poison was too little to give retribution for the pain he caused Rubra, and he wanted to continue torturing him after being restrained.
Finally, he decided to leave the choice to Rubra.
At this point, the poison had hit his nervous system, meaning he couldn't send any more electrical signals to his muscles: he was paralyzed.
''You can do with him whatever you want for all I care.''
Eric said this way to Rubra. She, in the beginning, fixed her sight on his face to check if he was judging her.
Then she stopped caring, the rage that kept her going for all these years, the pain she felt when she knew about her parents.
She remembered all of that, and instinctively her wings, previously retracted, extended to their full size, and a bloody aura enveloped them and the rest of her body.
On her face was apparent calm, but in her mind, she was thinking about all the ways she could at least give Cain a hint of how much she suffered because of him.
Then, suddenly she remembered the smiling faces of her parents but tried not to lose herself in her memories, creating a fire arrow that pierced the left shoulder of the paralyzed victim.
At that moment, she didn't see the smiling faces of her parents but a puppet that didn't emit any sound.
Not to talk about having her parents back, he couldn't even satisfy her deviant desire for revenge and cries of pain.
Again, strangely, she thought about her parents, but this time their faces were dark and sad as if she had done something wrong.
Then, as if electricity ran through her body, she felt it and dropped instantly to the ground.
Eric ran immediately near her while shouting.
''Rubra, what happened? Are you alright? ''
She raised her head with clear difficulty, two streams formed under her eyes, but she wasn't sad.
The smile on her face was the same as if a load as heavy as the entire planet was lifted off her shoulders.
After regaining her ragged breath, she said Eric:''I-i can feel them, I feel their presence?!''
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A.N.: The final of the first volume is coming close.
Some side stories will start to answer some questions, I honestly enjoy this format and speed of narration, but the second volume will probably be longer, a bit slower in pace, and have more battle scenes.
I hope you'll enjoy the journey too.
P.S. I think I'll add A.N. to the other chapters since the Author's thoughts section isn't quite visible, and keep the last one standard for any chapter