Fantasy, Greed

"Are you really going to let that human go?"

Samantha asked.

Garos put away the map, looked in the direction the Rogue had fled, then withdrew his gaze and said, "Do I look like a dragon who breaks his word? Since I said I would allow her to leave my territory, I'll give her the chance."

Since Garos had said so,

Samantha did not ask further. She went to clean up the battlefield, picking through everything and leaving no corner untouched as she gathered the adventurers' equipment—whether intact, damaged, or completely destroyed.

"My dear brother, can I have these Alchemy items?"

She hugged the equipment against herself with her foreclaws and asked eagerly.

The adventurers' equipment and Alchemy tools all seemed rather low-grade to Garos, not worth mentioning compared to the items on him.

But instead of agreeing at once, he asked, "What do you want them for?"

Samantha said excitedly, "To dismantle them, melt them down. I want to try using them as materials to forge Alchemy tools suitable for dragons."

At her current level of Alchemy, the chance of failure was high.

But regardless of the outcome, she could benefit greatly from the process.

Garos flicked his tail and said, "Repair your Alchemy Workshop. These items are yours. You can use them to make tools, but you must continue extracting Black Oil as well. Don't neglect that task."

Samantha's eyes lit up.

"Ah, my dear brother, I'll definitely succeed in making Alchemy tools."

"Just wait and be proud of me!"

Her tone at the end did not sound like the way dragons of the same age spoke to one another. Instead, it resembled the way one spoke to an elder.

In truth, Garos had appeared once again when she was helpless, turning the tide and giving Samantha a sense of security that even the Iron Dragon Mother had never provided—because there was simply no danger to encounter in the Iron Dragon Mother's territory.

Her feelings had changed from reluctant submission at the beginning

to dependence on Garos now.

At the end of the day, Samantha was only a six-year-old Hatchling Dragon. Though she possessed Dragon Inheritance, her mind was still immature, and she was nowhere near as mature as Garos.

She regarded Garos as someone she could rely on, as well as a goal worth learning from and catching up to.

Whoosh!

Garos beat his wings, and a wild gust swept up dust, dead branches, and fallen leaves.

"Where are you going?"

Samantha asked as she bent over rebuilding her Alchemy Workshop—the crude shelter made of stone slabs.

"To deal with the Rogue."

Garos said.

"Huh? Didn't you say you were letting her go?"

Samantha was somewhat confused.

"Wrong. I said I would let her leave my territory."

Garos corrected her.

Let her go? What a joke.

If creatures like adventurers were not wiped out in one go, then unless he abandoned his territory afterward, they would keep coming to hunt him. There were also quite a few powerful adventurers among them. Letting the Rogue leave alive would put himself in danger, and Garos would not allow such a thing.

From the very beginning, he had never intended to spare the Rogue.

As for why he had let her run for a while first, it was not to toy with her or amuse himself. He mainly wanted to see whether any other adventurers were lying in wait outside to receive her.

The possibility was small.

After all, when hunting dragons, they should have all attacked together to ensure nothing went wrong.

But what if?

There was nothing wrong with being careful.

Before he possessed sufficient strength, Garos was extremely cautious to ensure his own survival. Reckless Hatchling Dragons were nine times out of ten buried in the Wilderness.

He spread his wings and shot into the sky, blending into the night.

"As expected of Samantha's brother. He's evil to the core. I'm still too immature—I need to learn from Garos."

Samantha sighed inwardly, then continued repairing her tiny Alchemy Workshop.

Elsewhere.

Bright moonlight poured down from the heavens, coating the Wilderness in silver.

The Rogue was breathing heavily. Having removed her leather armor and all her Alchemy tools, she was almost completely naked. Her body was covered in tiny cuts from sharp leaves and jagged stones, and she had already reached the outskirts of the Iron Fir Hills.

Given her current state,

without companions or equipment, injured and weakened, even if she left the Iron Fir Hills, safely escaping the Wilderness afterward would still be incredibly difficult. It could even be called Nine Deaths, One Life.

Yet there was still a sliver of hope.

"Damn it! Damn you, Evil Dragon!"

"Do you think I'm insignificant because you believe I'll die in the Wilderness?"

The Rogue clenched her fists so hard that her nails nearly dug into her flesh, fury rising in her heart.

"I will—I will escape the Wilderness, then return with stronger companions and make you pay dearly for your arrogance!"

Two Hatchling Dragons.

One was a Red Dragonet, while the other was an even more formidable mixed-blood Hatchling Dragon.

To adventurers, this was an irresistible temptation. So long as she escaped the Wilderness and passed on the news, adventurers willing to form parties and hunt dragons would come one after another.

Ignoring her body's exhaustion, the Rogue ran with her head down.

First, she needed to get far away from these Iron Fir Hills.

As time passed, the Rogue leaned against a slope to catch her breath. Looking back toward the Iron Fir Hills, she saw that the dragon had not pursued her or appeared. It truly seemed to have spared her.

Crack.

The sound of claws stepping on loose stones suddenly came from nearby.

The Rogue instantly tensed and craned her neck to look.

In her field of vision, a pack of Needle-Hair Wolves sniffed the scent of blood in the air as they slowly approached from different directions, their eyes fixed on the Rogue.

The smell of blood excited the Needle-Hair Wolves.

They smelled weakness on the Rogue, so without much probing, they lunged at her directly.

Already weakened and stripped of her equipment and tools,

the Rogue faced the wolf pack's attack. In less than a minute, she died with unwillingness and fury, becoming food for the wolves.

—Dying at a dragon's claws would have been better. At least it would have been more honorable, more swift.

That was her final thought before death.

At the same time, Garos circled high in the air, silently watching what unfolded below.

"There are no other adventurers."

He had secretly followed the Rogue for some time and found no one coming to meet her. He had been preparing to strike, but then noticed that a wolf pack had discovered her trail. So he held back and watched the Rogue die beneath the wolves' fangs.

Very quickly, not even a bone remained on the ground.

The wolf pack also vanished, heading elsewhere.

This was the normal state of the Wilderness, and the normal state of countless worlds—weaklings were devoured completely, their lives uncertain from one day to the next.

With no lingering worries, Garos returned to the Iron Fir Hills and took out the map again to study beneath the moonlight.

Following the route on the map, he found the marked location increasingly familiar. After thinking carefully for a few more minutes, he suddenly understood.

"The location marked here is the abandoned mine occupied by the Rock-Crushing Worm colony."

There were as many abandoned mines in the Ser Wilderness as stars in the sky. When he had first heard the Rogue say that the dungeon lay beneath an abandoned mine, he had not thought much of it. Now, he was somewhat surprised.

It really was quite a coincidence.

But after thinking it over, Garos felt it was only natural.

"The Worm King possesses an extraordinary mental ability. It can directly control the life and death of other Rock-Crushing Worms. That isn't an ability a normal Worm King should have."

Garos fell into thought.

"Could it have been influenced by a Legendary Realm Alchemy tool and evolved psychic abilities?"

At that thought, even someone with Garos's temperament found it difficult to suppress his greed. He wanted to cast all caution aside, investigate immediately, and obtain the Legendary Realm Alchemy tool.

Then,

he would no longer need to be cautious and could steadily climb to the pinnacle of dragonkind. With the Power of One Dragon, he would crush every creature that dared call him an Evil Dragon.

Rule the entire world!

Do whatever he wanted!

Live until the end of time!

"Stop, stop, stop!"

"Garos, stop indulging in unrealistic fantasies!"

Whoosh! Whoosh! Whoosh!

The Red Iron Dragonet violently shook his head, then drew several deep breaths and let them out, repeating the process to calm his turbulent emotions. Then he looked at Samantha, using an ordinary Hatchling Dragon like her as a negative example to remind himself that he absolutely could not fall into the common vice of Evil Dragons, or he would end up the same way.

Greed—second only to arrogance and conceit, it was a major factor that could easily lead dragons into danger.