Chapter 82 - CH.81

Johanna quickly picked up the pace, starting to slowly jog away from the boy since those eyes were still staring at her with their murderous intensity, and frankly speaking, they were very intimidating even for Johanna, but luckily for her, it didn't seem like the origin of the eyes was following her; it seemed like the person behind them was interested in something completely else. And Johanna had an idea what and who it could be; the eyes looked very similar to those from the dragon boy, and once he was turned angry by her little surprise, it would seem logical to think that this was his younger sister that he had talked about before. Once Johanna got a few feet away from this area, she finally felt safe again, so she began to slow down and began to walk again, but as she was walking, Johanna realized that her stomach was looking awfully round, which she only somewhat understood. Sure, her pregnancy only lasted a fraction of a normal one, but this time it was even an exception to that, which scared her, not only because it was so quick but also since she is nowhere near anybody that she knows. As a matter of fact, she is in the middle of the forest, which is only inhabited by dragon children and monsters, so it is not a very good location to give birth to her child.

But without another option to consider, she decided to look for a relatively small space that could protect her and her baby while she was giving birth and the hours after. Since it doesn't matter how strong you are while experiencing those kinds of pains, it is impossible to defend oneself. Johanna knew that she didn't have much time to find this place since the bulge in her stomach was growing by the second now, so she had to decide quickly, and after considering for a few seconds, she decided that she would just go into a small ditch, which she found while looking for locations, and give birth to her dragon child there while keeping as quiet as possible. After laying down and preparing some last breaths, it all started, way too fast for her taste. The pain was unlike anything she had experienced; yes, the process of giving birth was already painful, but the pain was "reduced" by the whole procedure lasting for hours, but not this time. The kid didn't take hours; it was more like a few minutes, but those minutes made her faint multiple times, keeping in her screams as to not attract dangerous beings in this forest. After enduring this excruciating pain for a while, it suddenly resided as she heard a little pop sound, which surprised her, thinking that she might have just launched out her baby, but unlike she had expected, it just lay there—not a baby, but instead an egg—a dark red and scaly egg. Johanna swiftly used her shapeshifting ability to heal up her wound, which healed her body but not her mental state, which had to suffer harshly. But that wasn't the focus for her, so she picked up the egg to inspect it.

The egg was as big as an American football, not as pointy and maybe a little bit bigger, which surprised Johanna on how she was even able to pop out that thing, but after wondering for a while, she focused back on the egg, and since she was curious about it, she felt its warmth and tried to listen to see if it made any sounds, which it did—small little heartbeats, which she only was able to pick up after changing her ears to those of a wolf so that she could hear better. Johanna was simply astonished by all of this—how fast a life could be created—but she also hoped that the egg wouldn't hatch that soon, since she didn't want to raise another child right now, now that she had only started her journey. But leaving it behind with the other two dragons in this forest would be way too heartless for Johanna too, so she decided to just hope for the best, and if it were to be born, she would bring it back to the goblin village and let the shapeshifter raise it there. But that was a problem for her future self, since her top priority right now would be to get back to fulfilling her objective in this world and to eat something first, since giving birth and creating an egg drained all her remaining energy, which was already exhausted from the dragon ride. So the first best thing she did was to walk in the direction where the river was, hoping she would find some tasty fish there, like she did together with the boy. Johanna also hoped that he would take better care of himself, hygiene-wise, and that the food source she had shown him today would make it easier for him to feed him and his little sister, so she turned around one last time, thanked him mentally and moved on to get something to eat.