Chapter 96: Did you hear that?

Hearing Zephyr’s words, the dragon’s eye twitched.

But it didn’t even have the energy to get angry at him anymore.

Fine.

It would simply treat this guy as invisible.

Out of sight, out of mind.

Just as the dragon was beginning to doze off, its tiny body already exhausted from talking so much, it suddenly heard Zephyr speak again, his voice carrying a faint hint of dry amusement.

"And I can’t see you either. I’m blind. Can’t you tell?"

The dragon’s eyes snapped open. It stared at Zephyr for several moments. Only then did it notice the emptiness in his eyes.

"You’re blind?"

Zephyr didn’t answer. He simply released the mana restraining the dragon’s body.

The dragon immediately dropped several inches before barely managing to steady itself, a faint curse slipping from its mouth.

Without another word, Zephyr turned and walked toward Lucien, intending to reinforce the dome around him.

The dragon quickly followed, its voice tinged with surprise.

"I really didn’t notice! Now I understand why you weren’t scared earlier when I threatened you with a blood warning and attacked you. Wait... then how are you moving around? And how can you tell where I am?"

As if suddenly realizing something, it muttered.

"Ah, is it because of that skill you used to restrain me earlier? Amazing. That skill is incredibly powerful. I’ve encountered similar abilities before, but never one of this level."

It landed on Zephyr’s shoulder.

Zephyr ignored it completely.

He simply approached the sleeping figure inside the faintly glowing dome and gently touched Lucien’s cheek before retreating.

The dragon watched the scene. It noticed the shirt beneath Lucien and finally let its gaze settle on Zephyr’s bare upper body.

With a chuckle, it clicked its tongue.

"You really care about this person, huh? Your upper body is naked, yet you didn’t hesitate to give him your shirt to sleep on."

Then it noticed the bite mark on Zephyr’s neck and the finger-shaped marks on his shoulder. It tilted its head in confusion.

"By the way, what happened to your neck and shoulder? Did some bug bite you?"

Clearly, the dragon had absolutely no experience with intimate relationships. It had spent its entire life as a single dragon—and had died single, too.

Zephyr took a deep breath.

His voice darkened.

"Can you stay quiet? Otherwise, I don’t mind helping you disappear a little earlier."

The dragon immediately shut its mouth.

It silently watched as Zephyr left the underground chamber through the burrow they had apparently used to enter earlier.

Sitting on Zephyr’s shoulder, it watched as he placed another powerful dome-like barrier around the entrance to the underground chamber.

The dragon couldn’t help but wonder how someone who gave off such a weak aura could possess such powerful skills.

Had he stolen them from someone else? Or was he simply lucky, just as he had been lucky enough to stumble upon the place where it had died and left behind its legacy? Or perhaps this human was using some kind of ability to conceal his true strength.

Zephyr had no idea what was going on inside the dragon’s head. Even if he did, he wouldn’t have cared.

He dusted his hands after covering the burrow with the surrounding grass, tangled vines, and branches from the nearby trees, concealing the entrance completely.

Once again, he checked the dome he had created. Only after making sure he would be immediately alerted if anyone touched it in his absence did he turn around and scan the surrounding forest with his senses. He planned to go find Erick and the others. He wanted to check whether Erick had any spare clothes in his storage space, though he had little hope of actually finding any.

Before doing that, however, Zephyr decided to test his newly acquired skill.

He moved through the forest, killing every monster in the surrounding area near the underground chamber. He alternated between his new skill and his other abilities, effortlessly killing monsters of every rank.

The dragon sat on his shoulder, completely dumbfounded.

It watched Zephyr slaughter even S-Rank monsters as easily as if they were ants.

Only then did the dragon finally understand why Zephyr had called the skill he inherited from it merely ’good.’

Zephyr’s own skills were simply too terrifying.

Naturally, anything weaker would seem merely ’good’ to someone like him.

If the dragon had possessed such overwhelming skills when it had fought the Demon Generals, perhaps it could have defeated them and saved its race.

But what had happened could never be changed. The dragon’s eyes lowered, a trace of sadness appearing in them.

As time passed, the dragon gradually became numb to the spectacle.

Monster after monster appeared, only to disappear moments later after Zephyr sensed them. Eventually, the dragon even began to feel bored, wondering what the world had become in its absence.

The human race, in particular, seemed to have grown far too powerful after its death. Once considered the weakest of all races, humans could now kill S-Rank monsters as easily as flicking a hand to swat a fly.

With nothing better to do, it started chatting.

"What’s your name, human? I didn’t ask earlier. My name is Onicus. I’m a dragon."

Zephyr only gave a single-word response.

"Zephyr."

They hadn’t gone much farther when Zephyr suddenly stopped.

His expression became solemn.

Onicus immediately perked up.

"What happened? Another S-Rank monster? Go kill it!"

The dragon didn’t even realize how ridiculous those words sounded. It had just spent a little over an hour watching Zephyr, and the change in its perspective was already earth-shattering.

If its former self could hear it now, it would probably think it had gone crazy.

Tell someone to kill an S-Rank monster, and the monster simply died.

Heh.

How funny.

But it was the truth. It had witnessed it with its own eyes.

Zephyr’s ears twitched.

He suddenly lifted his head toward the sky.

His voice carried a trace of uncertainty.

"Did you hear that? I think someone is talking somewhere above us."