Yano's Investigation Log

But that didn't mean ordinary monsters were powerless against Tempered monsters.

Small monsters could be kicked to death by larger ones. Xingyan had, for example, killed a Claw Dragon with a single kick. But when the two sides were similar in size—or when one wasn't an entire size category larger—fights generally couldn't be ended quickly.

The enormous bodies and vitality of large monsters gave them that advantage.

Clawing, charging, biting, grappling and rolling—ordinary monsters fought Tempered monsters this way. Whether they could win or not, they would fight first.

Even if they ended up rolling around on the ground before escaping, they still had to put up a fight. Dragons with a strong desire to fight and kill, like Glavenus and Brute Dragon, would pursue their enemies and try to kill them. Those less inclined to kill would stop chasing once their enemies retreated, conserving their strength and reducing the risk of injury.

That was territorial conflict. No dragon would readily give up its hunting grounds. A lack of food meant death, and if driven into another dragon's hunting grounds, it would have to fight yet another rival to determine who owned that territory.

It was like how, in the game, Kushala Daora's arrival drove Raging Brachydios down from the mountains. Once it came down, Raging Brachydios clashed with the local monsters. After a fight, any locals that couldn't match it were driven away, and the process repeated until it claimed enough territory to feed itself.

Xingyan wanted to find out where he stood in the food chain. After all, if he really wanted to get technical, could he still be considered a Glavenus?

Was he about on par with Deviljho or Gold Rathian? Or had he become a dragon that wasn't an Elder Dragon but possessed power to rival one?

Only a fight could answer that question.

He wiped out an entire family of Horned Dragons. Freshly evolved, Xingyan had an appetite unlike any he'd ever had before. He was famished.

After eating his fill, the sensation of every cell in his body screaming for food finally faded. Xingyan narrowed his eyes. He didn't want to wait another second. He was going to find Old Steel Dragon.

He followed the path he'd carved out and returned to Miasma Valley. It still looked like a vision of hell, with yellow-green miasma hanging everywhere, impossible to disperse.

After the historic question of where Seregios was, a new question arose: where was Old Steel Dragon?

Xingyan was so dizzy he could barely think. Damn, why was Miasma Valley so huge?!

What puzzled Xingyan most was that he'd found the remains of Horned Dragons, Rathalos and other dragons that didn't live in this kind of environment. He had no idea how they'd gotten here—or had the conditions in Miasma Valley once been less hostile, back when these creatures roamed here?

After winding this way and that, Xingyan even found a path leading to the upper reaches of Miasma Valley. There, he saw in real life the remains of the Serpent King Dragon he'd seen countless times in the game.

The enormous skull of a serpentine dragon. All the flesh on its body had long since rotted away, leaving only brownish-yellow bones, yet the gigantic skeleton still filled Xingyan with longing.

Awe.

Like a mountain, it loomed over him. Xingyan figured he might be no bigger than one of the Serpent King Dragon's eye sockets—and might not even fill it.

How enviable. I wish I could be as big as a mountain, too.

The real Miasma Valley was every bit as maze-like as it looked. Not only was it vast, it was full of winding passages, with caves nested inside caves. By elevation, it could be divided into three levels. The upper level was mostly made up of fossils formed from the Serpent King Dragon's remains. The route was lined with all sorts of ring-shaped terrain, and this was the area closest to Coral Highlands.

The middle level was submerged in miasma. It was the densest miasma in the entire valley and consisted of caves of all sizes, riddled with a confusing network of passages. This was where Xingyan had gotten lost.

As for the bottom level... Xingyan hadn't gone down there. He had no intention of meeting Vaal Hazak in such an enclosed space, and the remains of the Horned Dragons and Rathalos he'd found earlier had left him uneasy.

He was a little afraid that those foreign dragons' remains had been carried here by the Skeletal Dragon. Like Vaal Hazak, the Skeletal Dragon liked to lurk in caves, and it piled the bones of its prey together.

That wasn't good news. The Skeletal Dragon was utterly different from Vaal Hazak, the lord of Miasma Valley. Vaal Hazak had a mild temperament and saw itself as nature's cleaner. Unless something happened, it rarely left its lair.

The Skeletal Dragon was different. Cunning and cautious, it liked to carry large prey back to its lair before devouring them. Its appetite was much like Deviljho's, and it might even eat every monster in an entire region.

It was extremely dangerous.

After spending so long in this underground world, so far removed from the sun, even his sense of time had grown hazy. Xingyan had no idea how long he'd been here. All he knew was that Velkhana tasted pretty good.

These flying creatures fell through gaps in Coral Highlands and down to the bottom of Great Sand Sea. Xingyan ate them clean, and also ate several Claw Dragons and Tobi-Kadachi that had come to forage.

He was starting to live like a local of Miasma Valley, but Xingyan still hadn't found any trace of Old Steel Dragon. He wondered whether the old fellow had burrowed into Miasma Valley, found a random cave to hide in, and never taken another step outside.

By now, Xingyan had even found a hunter, but he still couldn't figure out where Old Steel Dragon was hiding.

Not a patch of skin showed anywhere on her body. She was wrapped up tightly, and she even wore a gas mask. He could see her eyes only through two glass lenses. Xingyan had actually guessed who she was.

Master Yano.

A hunter who would eventually put down roots in Miasma Valley and spend decades studying it. She was very persistent and worthy of admiration.

After reaching Miasma Valley, Yano had found a stone cave that was only accessible to a human-sized body and made it her safe place to rest. She hadn't expected that a dragon like Xingyan, who did things the unconventional way, existed in the world.

Sick of Miasma Valley's winding, miserable paths, Xingyan had simply opened his mouth and started eating. He was going to carve a straight road through the blasted place if it killed him—and he wound up eating his way straight to Yano's safe zone, punching an entrance into what had been a perfectly secure cave.

It wasn't safe anymore.

Their encounter had been completely unexpected. Xingyan had been eating when he suddenly noticed a hollow space ahead. He poked his head inside and found a hunter wrapped up like a dumpling, staring at him nervously with a weapon in hand. Beside her were a burning campfire and a small tent.

Running into a hunter in a place like this left Xingyan stunned for a moment. He'd lost track of time and had no idea how long it had been since he set out. Even Yano had already begun exploring deep into Miasma Valley.

He didn't deliberately frighten the extremely nervous Yano. He pulled his head back and continued carving out a new path, just as he'd planned.

But from that day on, whenever he had nothing to do, he started watching Yano.

[Investigation Log · 1]

After the disaster caused by the two Kushala Daora had temporarily subsided, I left the base and followed the route we had taken before, heading for the gorge filled with miasma.

Although I had no evidence to prove my theory, I still believed that one of those two Kushala Daora had led the Research Commission from the Old World to the New World. It must have been an old Kushala Daora.

I was curious why it had entered the miasma-filled gorge in the first place. The Guild had never found Kushala Daora in any area with miasma. Or could the secret of the Elder Dragon Crossing be hidden in that gorge?

I hoped to find some answers.

[Investigation Log · 7]

Revere Elder Dragons. Revere the power of Elder Dragons.

I couldn't believe that, after more than two months on the road, I was still finding traces of the storm the two Kushala Daora had stirred up during their fight.

The storm had carried a huge amount of moisture deep into Great Sand Sea. For the life that normally lived here, such rainfall had to be extremely rare. I couldn't imagine Kushala Daora fighting each other every year.

They had received far more rain than usual.

I wasn't exaggerating when I said "far more." The Leader and the others could never imagine the beautiful sight I'd seen: flowers of life blooming in a desert where life should have been extinct.

Unlike the low, brownish-yellow shrubs we'd grown used to seeing in Great Sand Sea, countless green plants were growing rapidly under the rain. They were making the most of this rare opportunity, absorbing and storing as much water as possible.

I couldn't describe how moved I'd felt. These plants couldn't speak, yet they seemed almost intelligent. For them, this was certainly no natural disaster.

[Investigation Log · 34]

I was wrong. Even for those plants, the rain had been a natural disaster.

As I continued onward, I gradually noticed numerous desert locusts among the plants that had been growing so quickly. They were eating the plants' stems and leaves. Many plants had been stripped down to their trunks, and the locusts were breeding in huge numbers.

Only then did I realize that the scarcity of rain in the past had meant a scarcity of plants, and the few plants could sustain only a small number of desert locusts, forcing them to live scattered apart.

But after the storm brought by Kushala Daora, the plants began growing in abundance all at once. The desert locusts that fed on them multiplied in turn.

I was a little worried. I hoped these locusts wouldn't damage the ecosystem of Great Sand Sea. The plants were already scarce here. If the ecosystem at the lowest level collapsed, it would eventually affect the large monsters above it as well.

[Investigation Log · 77]

I've ventured deep into the miasma gorge, and I feel fine so far.

The Technical Class Captain's work is as reliable as ever. After filtering the miasma, it can't do any harm to my body. As long as I don't expose my skin, I can explore the gorge without worry.

This is exciting. I wonder what kind of monsters such an unusual environment produces. I hope I can handle them.

I found traces left by Kushala Daora, but there were two kinds. The first was decayed dragon scales that had retained a fairly intact shape. The other was rust. If I hadn't carefully studied the Guild's research on Kushala Daora before setting out, I never would have recognized that the rust had also come from one.

The decayed scales were older than the rust. But strangely, some tracks led outward while others led inward, and they were at roughly the same height on the cave walls.

Did that mean my theory was right? The Kushala Daora the Research Commission had tracked was one of the dragons responsible for that disaster. After entering the miasma gorge, it had come back out, fought the other Kushala Daora, and then returned here.

I could picture the Rusty Steel Dragon striking a protruding rock as it entered the gorge. The hard rock had scraped some rust from its body.

There were traces of only one Kushala Daora entering and leaving. I was certain that the last time the Research Commission saw it, its scales were still silver-gray. So had it changed into a Rusty Steel Dragon inside the miasma gorge?

In such a short time? Did that fit the normal growth pattern of Kushala Daora?

I couldn't answer. Was it natural rust, or had the miasma corroded it?

Rusty Steel Dragons were more temperamental and aggressive than normal Kushala Daora. If the miasma gorge had corroded its body, why would that Kushala Daora come to a place that caused it pain?

I need to find it.

I have a feeling the secret of the Elder Dragon Crossing may be hidden in this.

[Investigation Log · 159]

The investigation is progressing unusually slowly. This place is more dangerous than Great Sand Sea, but I've discovered many new plants and insects here. It's fascinating that even in an environment filled with miasma, a unique ecosystem has developed.

But what I've found most of are the remains of all kinds of monsters. Their rotting bodies are what keep the poisonous miasma hanging over this place. The creatures that live here are all scavengers.

A monster graveyard—that was my first impression when I saw the piles of rotting remains.

Had that Kushala Daora chosen this place as its graveyard?

Some welcome news: after tracking and observing the skinless-looking monsters of Miasma Valley day after day, I've finally found more rust from the Rusty Steel Dragon.

I found it.

[Investigation Log · 193]

I've been found! By a monster!!

Strangely, the monster didn't attack me. It seemed to eat rocks, and it happened to eat its way into my hiding place. When it noticed me, it didn't react at all. It just backed out and kept eating rocks. Why? It seemed familiar with me.

After living in Miasma Valley for so long, this was the first time I'd seen this kind of monster. It had a head like a Glavenus and a tail like one, but it lacked the Glavenus's signature flame-shaped shell on its back.

Its body was extremely smooth. Apart from the evenly distributed, mesh-like bumps on its armor, every scale was like a mirror. Even in the dim light of Miasma Valley, I could see my reflection in its body.

This probably wasn't a Glavenus. It was a little too friendly.