Chapter 121: Dragon

"Mr. Ethan, you are too humble," Elara said.

"The Roland Adventure Group is the strongest adventure group in the elven race, and they have extensive connections throughout the kingdom, with them on your side, no one will dare to target you anymore."

"I see." Ethan gave a noncommittal response, he didn’t really care about things like that, to him, the most important thing was protecting the people he cared about.

"Let’s go, we should head out as well," Ethan said.

"Alright." Leon and Elara nodded, following Ethan as they walked toward the High Elf, Magnus.

"It seems you have forged a deep friendship with our hero," Magnus said with a smile.

"You flatter me, we are merely friends."

"Friends? Heh, earning the friendship of the Roland Adventure Group is no small feat," Magnus said meaningfully.

"By the way, Mr. Magnus — earlier I wanted to ask you about the World Tree."

"The World Tree? Why do you ask?"

"Because I possess a World Tree seed."

"What? You have a World Tree seed?" Magnus’s eyes widened.

"Yes."

"You wish to plant it?"

"I do."

"Then do you know what conditions are required?"

"I know, it requires World Fragments and Fragments of Chaos."

"You know quite a bit," Magnus remarked.

"Then do you know where the World Tree must be planted in order to grow?"

"That... I don’t." Ethan shook his head.

"The World Tree can only grow in soil tainted with dragon’s blood."

"...A dragon?"

"A dragon?" Leon and Elara exchanged startled glances.

World Fragments and Fragments of Chaos were already incredibly difficult to collect, now it required dragon’s blood too? A dragon was a legendary creature of immense power — almost no one could defeat one, was the World Tree truly just a myth?

Both Leon and Elara looked at Ethan with concern.

But Ethan smiled. "I have already gathered all the materials, except for the Fragments of Chaos."

"You don’t need to worry about the dragon’s blood."

Since the one who had given him the seed was a dragon, the blood naturally wouldn’t be a problem, Pearl didn’t bat an eye at this either, but the other elves were different — worry was written all over their faces.

"A dragon..."

"Dragons are incredibly rare, could it be a Wyrm or something similar?"

"It must be a pure-blooded dragon, not a fake like a Wyrm, but the blood of a true dragon possessing wisdom and immense magical power."

Magnus’s answer made Elara even more uneasy, she tugged at Ethan’s sleeve. "Don’t lose heart, even if we have to mobilize our family’s entire power, we will help you find—"

"Hmm? Mr. Ethan? You seem quite happy?" Leon noticed.

"Because I already have a way to resolve the dragon’s blood."

"R-really? You are truly amazing..."

"In that case, the only thing left is the Fragment of Chaos, meow." Ever since the last encounter, the Dark Elves hadn’t appeared, collecting enough shards wouldn’t be easy.

At that moment, Roland and his team — packed and ready — walked out of the village, hearing Pearl’s words, Roland spoke up.

"Um..." A peculiar light flickered in his eyes.

Ethan looked at him. "Ah, you should be heading to the dungeon now, be careful—"

"No, that’s not what I wanted to say." Roland opened his backpack and pulled out a leather bag.

’Is he trying to give me money?’ Ethan was about to decline when Roland opened the bag.

"This is—?!" Inside lay an enormous quantity of Chaos Fragment shards.

"These are all from our dungeon runs, we usually hand them over to the Temple of Harmony to exchange for rewards."

"The Temple of Harmony? Why would they collect Chaos Fragment shards?" Elara’s question made sense — Chaos and Harmony were as incompatible as fire and water.

Leon was equally curious, Roland shrugged. "We don’t know the specifics, we only know they purify the shards to enhance the power of Harmony."

He pressed the bag into Ethan’s hands. "These are all the shards we’ve collected recently."

"How could I accept this—"

"If it weren’t for your candied honey sweet potatoes, we would have died in that dungeon, compared to that, this is nothing." Roland smiled and pushed the bag firmly into Ethan’s grip.

"Combined with what you collected before, it should be enough to synthesize a complete Fragment of Chaos, meow," Pearl said.

"Since that’s the case, it would be rude to refuse." No one knew when the Dark Elves would return, these shards would save him a great deal of time.

"I will repay this favor, when will you visit the Great Forest?"

"The Great Forest? Why?"

"I live there, if you come, I can forge equipment for you." Weapons forged with Pure Iron and the Hammer of Gaia would be a tremendous asset for dungeon clearing.

Roland grinned. "I’m really looking forward to that, we will definitely visit."

"Then I wish you a safe journey."

"And we will enjoy the lunch you prepared."

After watching Roland’s group leave, Ethan handed the bag of shards to Pearl.

"Better to wait until we’re back in the Great Forest to synthesize it, meow~" Pearl glanced at the elves around them, they stared back in confusion, and Pearl patted the bag.

"Humans possess both Harmony and Chaos attributes, so it’s fine for Ethan, but elves are different — to them, Chaos is poison, meow."

"The energy will affect the elves?"

"And it attracts monsters, meow, a complete Fragment of Chaos makes them stronger."

"Then we’ll wait." No reason to stir up trouble, Ethan scratched behind Pearl’s ears, this little cat was getting sharper by the day.

Leon and Elara walked over. "So, is your business in the Elven Kingdom finished?"

"Yes, the only thing left is the seed vault."

To reach the vault, they had to return to the royal capital, no need to detour to Elara’s territory.

She sighed softly. "If you don’t mind, I would like to invite you to be a guest in my territory..."

She caught Ethan’s look and trailed off, anyone could tell he wanted to get back to the Great Forest.

"Next time. I’ll definitely come."

"Oh hahaha, it’s nothing, we still have plenty of trades ahead, oh hahaha." Elara laughed, and Ethan didn’t argue.

After returning to the royal capital, Ethan’s group went to pay their respects to Regracio.

He seemed to have been expecting them, he had prepared a banquet, the elves there were full of curiosity about Ethan, pointing and whispering.

"That human..."

"To think extinct humans have appeared again. Is this a good thing or a bad thing?"

"Doesn’t he live in the Great Forest or something? Is it true?"

"Shh, I heard he makes porcelain."

"What? That porcelain is made by a human?"

"The recent increase in honey sweet potato trade seems to be because of him too."

"This is delicious."

"Meow-meow, not bad, meow~"

Ethan was long used to being stared at, right now, all he wanted was to properly enjoy the food with Pearl.

Elara sipped her wine and sighed in admiration. "You are truly something else. If it were me, I would have snapped a long time ago."

"It’s nothing. By the way..." Ethan took a bite of a fruit pastry and glanced around the hall.