Where Did Everyone Go?

"I'm taking this dragon." Without answering the Branch President, the little girl sat down on Zheng Yichen's head and gently stroked it with one hand, as though she enjoyed the sensation.

Her tone left no room for negotiation. She was stating a fact, and to the Branch President and the others, that was a blatant provocation. As for their subordinates, they had been specially selected. With their leader silent, they voiced no objections. Or rather... they had no chance to.

The Branch President and the others failed to notice the state of their own men. At a glance, they looked perfectly normal, but a closer look would have revealed their bodies trembling faintly and a trace of helpless terror in their eyes.

"Impossible!" A man glared coldly at the little girl. They had committed everything they had to capture this dragon. Their base was only a town in a remote region, so building up enough strength had never been easy.

They had managed to muster so much force this time only because the potential rewards were enormous.

After all that hard work, more than half the people present would never agree to give up a prize already in their hands!

The Branch President was reluctant too, but... what he wanted to say was, If you want it, take it. Reaching the position of Branch President, even of a branch in a remote town, meant he had some ability. At the very least, he wasn't blind to what stood before him.

His experience also far surpassed that of the local bigwigs. He knew just how powerful some forces in this world could be, and he knew what the right choice was now. But when that man spoke before he could, the Branch President's heart sank!

"Oh? Impossible? That's not for you to decide." The little girl tilted her head. "You don't look like the one in charge, but that's all right."

"I was only asking..."

The little girl lightly swung her feet. The Branch President's expression changed drastically, and he could no longer maintain his composure. "Please wait! You may take the dragon whenever you like, Your Excellency!"

"What gave you the courage to interrupt me?" The faint, sweet smile vanished from the little girl's face. As her expression changed, a thick smell of blood filled the air.

"I... I'm very sorry... Please spare us..." The Branch President stumbled back two steps. He opened his mouth to say more, but when he noticed a shadow falling over them, all that remained was terror and despair...

What was that?

As Zheng Yichen gradually regained consciousness, he felt a tickle at the tip of his nose. He instinctively reached up with a claw to brush it away, only to take a solid hit to the face. The point of impact was tiny, but it felt as though an adult had slapped a child. Any lingering sleepiness vanished!

Clutching his dragon face, he sat up abruptly and looked around in astonishment. The bolts embedded in his limbs and wings had been removed. He had no idea how whoever pulled them out had done it. Despite their barbed heads, they had left no torn wounds behind.

As for where he was, if he remembered correctly, this was the town he had secretly watched from a distance several times. His dragon eyes had plenty of advantages, the most basic being how far they could see.

A soft, sweet voice came from below. "#%￥..." Distracted by his confusion over his situation, Zheng Yichen looked down. A little girl stood on tiptoe, raising one hand as she tried to tell him something.

This little girl... She was the one from last night!

Zheng Yichen couldn't understand her. Judging by the changing sounds of her speech, though, she seemed to try several languages. One of them had an oddly resonant sound that felt both foreign and familiar to him. The familiarity came not from his own knowledge, but from some recognition in his body. Yet it was still foreign to him, and even without that strangeness, he wouldn't have been able to make sense of it.

Strange. This town used to be full of people. Where did everyone go? He looked down again at the little girl, who was still trying to communicate with him. Perhaps because he hadn't responded, her cheeks puffed up slightly. She looked so adorable that he couldn't help wanting to reach out and pat her head.

Then he looked at his claw and set the idea aside for now. He had decent control over his strength in this body—he could even carve small, neat characters into stone—but stone was an inanimate object.

Even if he didn't hurt this mysterious little girl, what if he frightened her?

"You don't even understand Dragon Language. Are you really a dragon?" Hands on her hips, the little girl lightly kicked at the ground and looked up at Zheng Yichen through narrowed eyes.

Zheng Yichen looked down at the little girl with a helpless expression as she kept trying to talk to him. No matter what she said, even if she was a child prodigy who knew far more languages than someone her age should, he still couldn't understand her. However many languages of this world she knew, could she somehow know Chinese too?

As for other languages, Zheng Yichen's grasp of foreign tongues was limited to phrases that sounded like "good morning," "good evening," and a few readily recognizable words from certain adult films...

"Hmm~ I don't think there are any dragons that can't understand Dragon Language." The little girl leaned against Zheng Yichen, propping her chin on one small hand. Dragon Language was unique to the Dragon Race. Unlike human languages, dragons didn't have to study it or hear it often to learn it.

Dragons inherited memories from their race at birth, and those memories included Dragon Language. Speaking it came as naturally to a dragon as eating and drinking—provided, of course, the dragon was past the hatchling stage, when all it could do was squall.

Zheng Yichen had spoken while he was being surrounded and attacked, but she hadn't understood the language he used. There were very few languages in this world she didn't understand.

A wild young dragon that apparently had no inherited memories, no mother dragon to raise him, and had been left entirely to fend for himself would have been lucky not to turn into a mere beast. Yet the one before her hadn't "regressed" at all. On the contrary, every sign suggested he possessed considerable intelligence and knowledge unfamiliar to her.

This dragon had another trait normal dragons lacked: he had no Dragon Aura.

Dragon Aura was more than an imposing presence. It exerted immense mental pressure on beings weaker than the dragon and could even affect those of equal strength. If Zheng Yichen had possessed Dragon Aura, he wouldn't have been in such a desperate position when they surrounded him.

At the very least, ordinary horses within a certain range wouldn't have dared move.

What interested her even more—and made her want to keep this dragon—was that he was unaffected by the dangerous nature of her body!