"Ugh!"
However, being annoyed wasn't the issue right now.
'Holy crap!'
The small scale turned red. It resembled a red ruby. The pressure became stronger.
Honestly speaking, Cale couldn't really figure out how to express this pressure.
It was different from Dragon Fear.
However, it was similar to it.
It felt as if an existence that was not human was trying to push Cale down.
'Fuck!'
Yes, based on that story, the presence could be intense because it was the only thing left behind by that amazing imugi.
It seemed like a stubborn imugi so it might not want to be consumed by Cale.
However-
'Why is it not coming off?!'
The scale showed no signs of getting away from Cale's hand.
The scale was stuck to him even when he flailed his hand to get it off.
'That's odd.'
This scale was really weird.
"Cale-nim, should I call the Fist King over?"
Cale nodded his head at Choi Han's urgent question.
"Yeah, call him here!"
'Motherfucking Emperor and the motherfucking Fist King!
They should have told me if they knew this would act like this!
That way, I would have been cautious when absorbing it!'
Ooooooooong-
"Ah, seriously?!"
Cale turned his head.
The white crown in his other hand… That bastard was shaking and going crazy.
It still had that disgusting black vortex in the white jewel and was desperately shaking.
"Come on!"
Clang!
Cale slammed the crown on the floor.
– C, Cale.
The middle-aged voice of the Dominating Aura was anxious but Cale didn't care.
Cale had already thrown this crown to the ground and stomped on it in the past in the Gorge of Death when this crown consumed the Dragon half-blood's blood and tried to direct its mouth toward Raon next.
Its durability was reliable since it was fine at that time.
Clang, clang! Clang!
He slammed it into the stone floor three more times.
Oo… oooooong...
But rather than the shaking stopping…
Oong, oong oong!
The shaking grew stronger as if it was resisting.
"…This little punk?"
Cale's face turned odd.
This crown had not wanted something this badly in the past.
It was said to consume Dragon's blood, but it had never released its presence and desired it like this.
In fact, it was a bit interesting that it wanted a small scale that didn't even belong to a Dragon this much.
"Mm. Ah, seriously?!"
Cale was about to contemplate something but he could not do so.
The pressure had gotten stronger despite the fact that he was using the Dominating Aura. His gaze headed toward the hand holding the scale.
"Huh?"
'…This looks serious?'
The red light coming out of the scale became even stronger.
It felt as if he was holding a large torch in his hand.
Tatatap, tap!
He heard some urgent footsteps at that moment.
"How is that possible?!"
Cale looked toward the Fist King after hearing his anxious voice.
"Gasp."
The Fist King could not breathe properly.
"Mm."
Even Choi Han flinched and looked at Raon. Raon nodded his head and cast a shield around the Fist King, Choi Han, and himself.
"Haaaaa."
The Fist King could finally breathe properly. But he quickly became shocked and started speaking with a look of urgency on his face.
"This makes no sense!"
'What is that old man saying?'
The moment that Cale, who was watching this and slowly raising the strength of his Dominating Aura, was slowly getting more annoyed…
"I've never seen that scale being red! The scale is black!"
He seemed completely flabbergasted.
"What we know about this scale through the books says that it may disappear once it leaves the area around the volcano so make sure to create a formation before it is used! That is why the formation around it had the power of fire in it as well! The reason I didn't explain this in detail was because young master Kim has the aura of fire! But for it to release a power like this-"
Cale realized something after seeing the Fist King unable to speak.
'This scale…
It disappears once it leaves fire...?'
Cale stared at the scale that was releasing such a strong pressure but refusing to get away from him.
He then used one of his powers against it.
Crackle.
The moment the rose gold aura rose from Cale's body…
– Huh?
The Fire of Destruction flinched.
Smile.
Cale smiled.
'It decreased.'
The pressure had decreased a bit.
It was like a hungry predator releasing its aura in front of a prey before becoming peaceful after it was a bit satiated.
Crackle, craaackle.
Cale channeled his Fire of Destruction some more.
Clang!
Of course, he slammed the shaking crown on the ground one more time.
"That crown is a bit pitiful!"
He ignored Raon's comment.
As the rose gold current flowed out of Cale's hand and attacked the torch-like scale…
Crackle. Crack!
As Cale watched…
"!"
His eyes opened wide.
The torch-like red light spread out in all directions as if it was exploding.
Cale's view instantly turned red.
'Ugh!'
Cale subconsciously squinted when he heard a quiet voice in his ear.
"Imugis suddenly realize that they are born, that they are alive."
It was a young voice.
It was the voice of a girl who seemed to be around On's age.
Cale opened his closed eyes.
'Ha.'
He saw a small village.
The moment he saw a small snake weakly being carried in a girl's arms… Cale realized that this was an illusion, an afterimage left within the scale.
"It then naturally learns that becoming a Dragon is the only way to prove its existence."
He also realized that the imugi was the owner of this voice.
"It could not be helped. It is because imugis do not have anything else."
"They live in nature for a long time without family, friends, or anything. It lives by itself with nature being the only thing by its side."
"It lives dreaming of other Dragons it will meet as it looks out into nature and continues to gather its aura within its cintamani."
He then saw the imugi dangling on the young girl's shoulder, observing the smithy.
The imugi roamed around the blacksmith, who sighed while asking the girl if she picked up a snake but patted her head as if it could not be helped.
It then consumed the fire.
"The first emotion I felt was warmth."
"At first, I thought it was because of the fire."
"That was why I ate the fire and continued to eat fire."
The blacksmith looked amazed but seemed to have figured out the imugi's true identity while the young girl was just excited and happy.
The imugi ate the fire then spit out fire, as if to entertain the two of them.
"I thought that fire was what I needed to store in my cintamani."
"Of the many things in nature, I thought that fire alone would turn me into a Dragon."
The imugi continued to grow larger as it consumed fire.
It continued to become friendlier with the young girl and the blacksmith as well, sleeping next to the girl every night and waking up to spend all day with her.
It even played with the young girl's friends from time to time.
The children had been scared of the imugi at first and the adults seemed leery of it, but they all approached it after seeing it spit out fire in the shape of a flower and chasing away the ferocious beasts that tried to come to the village.
"I thought that I needed to consume even more fire."
Then came time for them to say goodbye.
The imugi left to look for more fires.
Cale realized that this illusion was slightly different from the story that the Fist King had told him.
'It's almost as tall as me?'
The imugi was almost as long as Cale when it left. It seemed to have stayed in that village for at least a couple of years.
"I ate fires after fires. To be more accurate, I ate the lava from the volcano over and over."
"I still stealthily went down to that village every so often to see how things were."
"Everybody was living well."
The young girl who had picked up the imugi had followed her father's footsteps to become a blacksmith and was also the Village Chief.
Furthermore, the day that the imugi first entered the village was now a festival day to celebrate the departed imugi.
The large flame that they started at the center of the village during the festival each year…
The imugi came down and consumed it on the last night of the festival when everybody purposely returned home early.
"This fire was the most delicious to me."
"That is how I filled my cintamani."
"I was able to fill my cintamani faster than I had expected."
But one day, the imugi had a realization while it observed nature.
"I felt the need to gain a bigger fire if I was to become a Dragon. I had to leave the village for a bit to find a bigger fire."
The imugi stealthily left a message for the Chief and temporarily left the area around the village.
"At that time, the rear mountain of the village, the volcano, was not in a state to erupt for a while because I had consumed a lot of fire."
However, the situation changed.
"My cintamani did not fill completely no matter how big of a fire I consumed."
"I felt a deep sense of loss at that fact."
"I wanted to quickly become a Dragon to meet others like me."
"It made me go farther away in search of larger fires, making me return to the village later than I had expected."
The imugi's voice was calm.
"Of course, I returned without being able to fill my cintamani."
"I realized that I would need to spend a longer period of time to become a Dragon."
When I returned to the village, the volcano was just about to erupt.
"In that situation, I was unable to prevent the volcano from erupting."
"This was already following the laws of nature. The wheels were already turning."
The imugi immediately went to see the Chief.
Was it because it was not a Dragon?
The imugi's human form was half human half Dragon. It looked human, but its body was covered in Dragon scales and it had both a tail and a horn. The moment a little girl around On's age told the Chief to leave…
The volcano exploded.
"My friend said this to me at that time."
The imugi considered the Chief to be a friend.
Although the Chief was now in her sixties and the imugi still seemed to be in the early teens…
"She told me to leave while I still could."
"However, I could not do that."
The situation after that was similar to what the Fist King had told him.
The imugi returned to its original form and blocked the lava heading toward the village with its body.
It also used its fire to burn the volcanic ashes to disappear without a trace.
'Wow.'
Cale couldn't help but gasp while looking at the fire that the imugi released.
The imugi had a tiny horn and its scales were dark and dull compared to those of Dragons.
Nonetheless, the imugi that wrapped its whole body with the fire released from its mouth was extraordinarily beautiful.
Its appearance was more sparkling than any Dragon Cale had seen until now.
The imugi started dying as it blocked the volcano.
"If I was a Dragon, I would have been able to protect the village and survive. However, I was not skilled enough to do that."
The Chief was by the dying imugi's side.
Cale heard the Chief's voice for the first time.
"Hey Eternal. Let's be together."
The Chief, who had named the imugi Eternal with hopes of it living a long time, did not leave its side.
The imugi happily received its close friend's feelings but pushed the Chief away from danger.
"Something amazing happened at that moment."
The imugi's voice was still calm.
"My body was dying but my cintamani was filling with power more than ever before."
"I thought that it was because I consumed a lot of fire while blocking the volcano and the lava."
"However, that was not it."
The moment the Chief, who moved closer despite the imugi pushing her away, placed her hand on the imugi's fire-covered scale…
The moment the Chief patted the imugi's back despite her hand burning…
"I figured out the identity of the warmth that I first felt."
"And I realized the identity of the fire, no, the warmth that filled my cintamani."
The imugi pushed the Chief far away.
"I had gathered the warmth of humans into my cintamani."
Maybe it was because this was an illusion, but Cale saw the imugi's childhood appearance once again.
"That was why my fire had no choice but to be warm."
"My body was dying. But the cintamani filled more than ever in my life."
"The affection that my close friend and the villagers showed me and the affection I showed back."
A young girl's calm voice continued.
"I finally realized why I wanted to become a Dragon."
"Humans die too quickly."
The Chief, who was older than sixty, took the villagers and quickly moved to the evacuation location at the imugi's urging.
The imugi looked at the evacuation center before using its whole body to block the lava pouring down.
"I would be alone once my close friend leaves."
"The villagers are there but they were neither my close friends nor my family."
"That was the reason I wanted to quickly become a Dragon, to leave this village, leave this land and be somewhere others like me exist."
"However, I realized that I could not leave this land, could not leave these people."
"My roots were here."
The imugi released fire for the last time.
It released its fire toward everything trying to harm the village.
"The cintamani. My roots were full of things I had gained in this village."
Flash flash.
The illusion slowly became faint and flashed.
Almost as if it was announcing the death of the imugi.
"My body was dying."
"Imugis were existences that came from nature."
"In the end, I will return to nature."
"However, I was a bit different from other imugis."
"Unlike other imugis that lived in nature and filled their cintamani with things they had felt in nature, I had learned of the human world and filled my cintamani with the warmth of the human world."
The volcano stopped erupting and the lava stopped flowing.
As for the imugi, it was completely burnt.
"I could not become a Dragon even if I filled my cintamani all the way."
"What was inside me was not nature."
The moment the Chief rushed out and placed her hand on the imugi's burnt body, it turned into ashes and flew away.
It must have been returning to nature.
Although it was just an imugi and not a Dragon…
Its body became nature.
"That was why I was able to leave behind my cintamani."
Only one thing remained.
It was a small rock.
It was black, uneven and looked extremely grotesque.
Nobody would think this was a cintamani.
"Since it did not gather what it was supposed to gather, the shape of my cintamani was quite unsightly."
"My friend turned it into a scale to make it beautiful."
"I don't know why she thought such a grotesque and ugly scale was so pretty."
The illusion started disappearing.
"I can feel warmth coming from you."
The imugi that died a long time ago spoke.
"The fire you have is warm."
"I can feel your desire to burn anything and everything in order to save something."
Cale could see a red fog surrounding him now that the illusion disappeared.
The fog started disappearing.
"This is what my close friend said."
"No matter how unsightly the iron, forging it in fire and changing its appearance will turn it into something necessary for the world."
"She said that although I looked so weak and feeble before I met fire, I would be extremely beautiful when I became a Dragon."
"But the moment I heard that, I wanted to become fire instead."
"Yes, I wanted to become that kind of fire."
Cale lowered his head.
The scale was gone and a small flame was on his palm.
It was an extremely small fire like the flame on a candle, but…
It was warm.
And he was certain that this fire would never go out.
He heard a young girl's voice.
"I can change anything."
"Because I am a fire."
The imugi did not say anything else.
However, Cale felt as if he understood what the imugi was trying to say.
– Cale. I think it's possible.
– Cale, that's it!
He heard the Fire of Destruction and then the Dominating Aura's voice.
Cale looked down at the white crown.
It was calm.
He slowly moved the crown toward the flame on his palm.
Shake shake shake.
The crown started shaking as if it was scared.
Cale tried moving the crown away from the flame.
It calmed down.
Moving it back made it start shaking again.
The black vortex that was causing issues earlier was gone as well.
Only the white jewel was visible.
The corners of Cale's lips twisted up.
"There's no need to release the seal of the Fire of Destruction any more in the Central Plains."
No, he could just release the seal later using other fire attribute elixirs if necessary.
That was why it would not be bad to prepare for the next world, Aipotu.
"An imugi that could not become a Dragon despite filling its cintamani."
A Dragon that became a Hunter and a fire left behind by an imugi that turned into ashes and disappeared.
'I'm curious.'
What results that would create…
Cale pulled out the crown that Maxillienne left behind.
The two crowns were shaking.
Existences that killed Dragons or wanted Dragon blood…
However, Cale saw Dragons as friends.
Crackle.
The moment the small flame revealed its existence…
Cale grabbed both crowns with the hand holding the flame.
* * *
"Human!"
Raon rushed out of the shield and approached Cale once the red fog disappeared.
Choi Jung Soo, who came down because something seemed weird, and Choi Han, both quickly started following behind Raon before stopping.
This was especially true for Choi Jung Soo, who stopped almost as if he was ratting, before starting to speak with an odd look on his face.
"Uhh…mm… That suits you well?"
Cale, who had an extremely dazzling red crown on his head, looked at Choi Jung Soo with an extremely unsettled look on his face.
That made Choi Jung Soo a bit relieved.
It was because he felt an odd aura coming from the crown wearing Cale.
Cale suddenly smiled brightly.
"Hahaha, hahaha-!"
Choi Jung Soo turned pale.
"H, human! Why are you laughing like that? Are you going somewhere to throw money again?"
Raon asked in an anxious voice while Choi Han calmly asked.
"Did you gain what you wanted, Cale-nim?"
Cale gave a simple response.
"Yeah."
—
Translator's Comments
Choi Han knows Cale best.