I Have to Get Him to Adulthood Fast!

Chaos: ...

Damn, my head's spinning. Putting out intermediate-level magic power as a hatchling really was pushing it.

How did this red dragon recover so quickly? She can already get up again?!

Why did she drop back down? Did I scare her?

Good, good, good, she's pinned down!

Time ticked by, until the stiffness in his body eased a little.

He seemed able to move now.

Out of the corner of his eye, he glanced at Hera on the ground, her gaze filled with both humiliation and anger.

The Red Hatchling seemed to have a grudge against him now.

Honestly, that humiliated, furious look in Hera's eyes was pretty entertaining.

A hint of enjoyment appeared in his emerald slit pupils.

As for Hera's grudge? Whatever. She couldn't beat him now, and she never would.

He moved his claws, turning toward White Chubby.

Agatha came up to Chaos.

"When are we going to start hunting those Kashi?"

"Let me get some sleep first. I'm out of magic power."

After brushing off the big little girl, he continued toward the crab shell.

He had just finished a fight, and using his bloodline talent had wrung his magic power dry. Not a drop remained. How was he supposed to have any magic power left to summon Perceptive Vines?

Even squeezing him dry required him to have something left to squeeze.

"All right, get some good sleep first."

Chaos glanced at the big little girl following him and suddenly remembered that dream.

The dream in which he died on the riverbank.

Come to think of it, they hadn't properly explored their surroundings since coming out.

"Agatha."

"What?"

"Are you going into dormancy?"

"No, it's not time for my dormancy yet. Is it time for yours?"

Agatha looked at Chaos walking beside her, a little surprised. They had only just finished a period of dormancy. By rights, the next one shouldn't have come so soon.

"No."

"But it'll probably take a few hours for my magic power to recover completely. Why don't you take some hatchlings out to explore the surrounding terrain in the meantime?"

Ever since leaving the cavern, they had stayed in front of this pit.

Naturally, that was because there was food here, and it was safe.

The hatchlings were all quite happy to stay here, and Chaos wholeheartedly agreed with all four claws raised.

But the dream the hourglass had brought him kept lingering in his mind, refusing to let him rest easy.

"Sure. I'll take a few hatchlings exploring in a bit. Learning the terrain ahead of time would be good."

"Thanks for the effort."

Just a big little girl. Successfully put to work.

Feeling a little pleased with himself, Chaos remembered the thing underwater.

"Oh, Agatha, if you find the end of the underground current and see a circular body of water, don't go near it, and don't land. Turn around and fly straight back."

Agatha fell silent, fixing her gaze on Chaos.

She felt as though Chaos knew something she didn't.

Under Agatha's stare, Chaos grew restless, shifting the claws he had planted on the ground.

"All right, stop staring at me without saying anything. I'll talk. I'll tell you everything."

Chaos gave in first. For some reason, he always felt that Agatha had an indescribable, peculiar air of authority.

It wasn't fear or dread. Rather, that peculiar authority made him feel that this big little girl could be trusted, and subconsciously inclined him to listen to her within reason.

"It was a dream. I dreamed there was danger at the end of this underground river. The location looked exactly like I just described."

Agatha's slit pupils narrowed, her expression turning serious.

Dragons generally didn't dream. If they did, it was certainly connected to some kind of revelation.

"Can you describe the surroundings you saw in your dream more clearly?"

"Sure."

Chaos began describing them.

He described every part of the surroundings he had seen in the dream, leaving nothing out.

"That's everything."

"All right, get some rest. I'll take some dragons exploring."

As always, the big little girl was a woman of action.

Watching her enter the Dragon Group, pick out a few dragons, and fly off, Chaos lay down where he was.

Rustle~

He glanced to the side.

White Chubby, who was wriggling toward him along the ground, immediately stopped moving.

He looked away.

Rustle~

The sound came again.

The instant White Chubby's big, round head wriggled into reach, Chaos raised his own head.

Squish~!

Yep, one White Chubby-brand pillow acquired. Time to sleep.

Chaos closed his eyes.

Pinned beneath him, White Chubby rolled those round, slit-pupiled eyes a few times before closing them too.

Clearly, thinking had been abandoned.

Whoosh~!

Agatha took to the air with four hatchlings and hovered above the riverbank.

She looked down at the rushing underground river.

There were only two directions: upstream and downstream.

If Chaos's dream truly involved a vision of the future, that place should be downstream.

"We'll fly downstream first."

Agatha's tone was an outright command.

With that, she spread her wings and flew downstream along the underground river.

The four hatchlings followed without objection. Agatha's strength was absolute. Among Chromatic Dragons, the weak had to obey the strong.

Gurgle~

They continued downstream, flying for a little over an hour.

Agatha still led the way.

She glanced at the underground river below.

The water was growing calmer. It wasn't her imagination.

Whoosh~

Seeing Agatha pick up speed yet again ahead of them, the four little hatchlings exchanged deeply helpless looks.

They were all approaching their limits by now, but Agatha didn't seem to be.

She had even sped up again.

"Rest here for a while. I'll turn back soon."

Hearing the voice from ahead, the four hatchlings' eyes lit up with joy.

They had long since become too tired to want to fly.

There was no river beach nearby to rest on, but that posed no difficulty.

Finding a rock wall, they dug a hollow into it with their claws, and all four dragons squeezed inside.

Dragons pressed against dragons, dragons piled atop dragons.

After flying alone for a while, Agatha leveled her wings and hovered over a body of water.

It was just as Chaos had described: a huge, circular body of water, with a beach at its entrance and rock walls all around.

She lowered her head.

The clear water beneath her was like an abyss, bottomless and pitch-black.

Her scarlet slit pupils narrowed slightly.

Something had its eye on her. There was something underwater!

*~!*

An enormous pitch-black tentacle burst from the water. It was so fast that it barely made a sound as it broke the surface.

With a beat of her wings, she thrust herself backward, opened her jaws, and bit down on the tentacle, which was nearly as large as her body.

She jerked her head and tore, instantly snapping off the tentacle caught in her jaws.

Without pausing, she beat her wings, swiftly turned around, and flew back.

Splat!

A dense mass of tentacles burst from the water, trying to impale the red figure flying above it.

That figure displayed extraordinary agility, narrowly avoiding the black tentacles stabbing up from below every time.

After flying some distance with the black tentacle in her jaws, Agatha slowed down.

Looking back at the black tentacles slowly sinking beneath the surface, scorching flames rose in her scarlet slit pupils.

Her dragon heart was still pounding. It wasn't fear, nor was it relief at escaping death.

Her jaws parted, revealing dragon teeth covered in dark green fluid, adding another touch of ferocity.

Chaos's prophetic dream was real.

Exactly the same, without even the slightest difference.

And prophetic dreams like that generally only came to dragons whose bloodlines carried the power of time.

From today on, I should pay more attention to Chaos. I have to get him to adulthood fast!