Chapter 57 – Dragon (4)

Dragon. 

A hard shell that seemed like nothing could penetrate it and enormous size. Wings that, even when folded over its body, clearly showed their immense magnitude. 

It was a gigantic creature with a body length that seemed to exceed 100 meters, something that couldn’t exist in reality. 

The underground plaza, which was so vast, didn’t seem very spacious due to the single sleeping dragon occupying it. 

While Daniel and Sun-woo were staring at the sleeping dragon in a daze, Isabel was glaring at somewhere other than the dragon. 

A little distance from the sleeping dragon’s head. There stood a man looking at her. He was a handsome man with brown hair and tall stature, but he had an somehow ambiguous impression. 

“So you’ve finally come here. Since you don’t know the shortcuts anyway, if we can’t stop you outside, there’s no way to stop you.” 

Though he seemed to be speaking casually, his voice reached the ears of the three people standing on the high wall ledge of the plaza clearly. 

“I was curious why her guardians were targeting me, but it was because of you.” 

Isabel also answered calmly, but he immediately understood her words despite being several hundred meters away. 

“Well, even if they’re called guardians, without me they would just rampage according to instinct like other monsters.” 

The man gave a smirk at Isabel’s words. 

Sun-woo frowned while looking at the man. The man was having a normal conversation with Isabel, but to Sun-woo’s eyes, his entire body appeared dark and murky. No matter how he looked at it, he was definitely contaminated. 

‘From the color change, he doesn’t seem to be from the summoned either, so how is he fine?’ 

But his doubt was dispelled by Isabel’s words. 

“Your behavior has become quite strange. Are you in the same situation as the monsters and guardians here?” 

Contrary to Sun-woo’s thoughts, it seemed he wasn’t fine after all. 

“I suppose so. Well, unlike before, I’m not bound by constraints, so it’s right that I’ve changed.” 

The man gestured to Isabel. 

“Don’t just talk from there, come down. You came to check on Zigmund anyway.” 

From Sun-woo and Daniel’s perspective, there seemed no need to go down. The sleeping dragon was already stained with murky colors. 

The dragon was already contaminated. 

But Isabel couldn’t recognize the dragon’s change. 

Isabel began descending the stairs along the wall. Daniel immediately followed behind her, but Sun-woo didn’t follow and remained in place. 

When Daniel looked back at Sun-woo with a puzzled expression, Sun-woo opened his mouth with a stiff expression. 

“Honestly, it doesn’t seem like we two need to go down…” 

While speaking, he checked Daniel’s expression, but as Sun-woo expected, Daniel didn’t seem inclined to let her go down alone. 

Sun-woo turned his head to look at Isabel. 

When Sun-woo looked at her, Isabel opened her mouth. 

“That’s right. As you thought, the passage we came down is the escape route I mentioned before.” 

Her intuition was almost like mind reading. 

“Thank you for coming this far with me. I’ll create a path for you now.” 

Incantations flowed from Isabel’s mouth again, and Sun-woo felt the passage they had come from being modified. 

It seemed Isabel thought Sun-woo would leave immediately. 

But this time she was wrong. 

“I’ll guard the retreat route from here. Please return quickly.” 

At Sun-woo’s words, Daniel’s rigidly stiff expression relaxed, and a smile spread across Isabel’s face. 

“Understood. We’ll return soon.” 

With Daniel’s words, the two began descending the stairs attached to the wall. 

Sun-woo stood in front of the closed passage door and watched Isabel and Daniel approaching the dragon. 

Though he had just said Isabel was wrong, she wasn’t very far off. 

Sun-woo intended to guard the retreat route from here. 

Until he truly became dangerous… 

Shortly after, Isabel and Daniel were able to reach the dragon’s front. 

While the two crossed the plaza, the man in front of the dragon didn’t interfere with them at all, and no guardians protecting the dragon showed themselves inside here. 

Isabel, standing in front of the dragon’s head, placed her hand on the dragon’s head, which was larger than a bus. Blue light flowed from her hand and seeped into the sleeping dragon’s mind, and after a moment Isabel sighed and lowered her hand. 

“Too late?” 

At her appearance, the man snickered and teased her. 

The man seemed to pay no attention to Sun-woo watching from afar or Daniel protecting her beside Isabel. 

“I see. I don’t know how it happened, but even if I return, it would be impossible for her to return to normal.” 

“Of course it’s impossible. Do you know how much was poured into this place?” 

As he spoke, he pointed around the dragon with his hand, and following his gesture, a huge magic circle appeared on the floor where the dragon was sleeping. 

Seeing the magic circle, Isabel tilted her head. 

“Resistance weakening and absorption enhancement? What use would such magic have for a dragon?” 

“Well, ordinary things like poison would be meaningless, but there are interesting substances that even work on dragons.” 

At his words, surprised Isabel reached toward the magic circle and chanted a spell. 

“Reveal yourself. Your true form!” 

When her spell ended, bright light particles appeared above the magic circle. Floating particles smaller than dust were revealed by her magic. 

The powder-like tiny particles rising from the magic circle were being absorbed into the dragon’s nose following the magic circle’s patterns. 

“Well, as you know, the work is already finished and there’s no use stopping it now.” 

Isabel, who had been staring blankly at the particles, shook her head at the man’s words. 

“But I can’t just leave it be.” 

Her hands glowed red and the particles floating in the air and the magic circle began burning simultaneously. 

Sun-woo could also hear the two’s conversation as if they were talking right next to him. 

Since other sounds weren’t coming through loudly and only their conversation was audible, it seemed Isabel was using magic to let him hear their conversation. 

Looking at the man’s words and the burning particles, Sun-woo was reminded of the powder that had been the raw material for medicine he’d seen recently. 

The raw material for contamination spreading agents. That powder that was being made in the New Continent of Caroline’s world. 

“Don’t tell me pills weren’t the final purpose.” 

It seemed his decision to stay was the right choice. 

The flames burned all the magic circle on the floor and the powder floating in the air before disappearing. 

“Why did you run around everywhere making things complicated? If you had stayed quietly by the dragon, I wouldn’t have had to be tied up here waiting for you.” 

“Did you really make her and all the guardians and monsters in this mountain range strange?” 

“That would be impossible for me alone. Several people joined forces to do it. We did all sorts of things with magic circles and strange medicines to sanctify this entire mountain range. Of course, the core is Zigmund here.” 

The man clicked his tongue while looking at Isabel. 

“The problem was that when the work was finished, you weren’t there. Thanks to that, even after everyone else returned, I was waiting for you here. I told the guardians not to kill you but to capture you, but in the end you came here on your own.” 

“You’ve definitely changed from before.” 

“Right? I wondered why humans acted so pretentious and talked so much, but now I can understand.” 

Isabel looked around the dragon’s lair with a slightly sad expression. 

“While adventuring with others, I saw many things. Friendship, love, sadness, joy, human conflicts and disappearing minority races.” 

She looked back at Daniel. 

“After parting with you, I continued traveling searching for disappearing minority races – elves, dwarves, etc. And among them, I saw monsters and various races that had lost their reason and were rampaging.” 

Isabel’s gaze now turned to the man. 

“Their appearance isn’t different from the monsters and guardians I’ve seen here.” 

“Ah, that’s a bit of a misunderstanding. Most cases occurred naturally. Hmm. Is it strange to say naturally? Well anyway, artificially creating them only started recently.” 

Having said that much, the man grinned. 

“Hmm, I should wrap this up now. I need to return to my home too.” 

“Are you planning to kill me?” 

At her words, the man opened his eyes wide. 

“No way. The trash beside you is natural, but would I kill you? How would I handle the aftermath?” 

“If you’re not going to kill me…” 

At his words, Isabel made a puzzled expression. 

“If I carelessly killed you and Zigmund woke up, that would be a disaster. We still don’t know how a changed dragon would react. Who knows what would happen if a transcendently superior being takes another step forward? I have no intention of self-destructing.” 

The man continued speaking. 

“First we’ll only change the sleeping dragons, and when safety measures are prepared, we’ll change the awake dragons too. I want to live long too.” 

As the man’s words continued, Daniel’s face looked very confused. 

And seeing Daniel’s confused face, the man made a mischievous smile. 

“Hmm, it seems he doesn’t know after all. Seeing that you brought him all the way here, you must be quite close. It would be very interesting to tell him the truth, wouldn’t it?” 

At his words, Isabel’s expression darkened. 

“Are you going to break even taboos?” 

“I told you all controls have disappeared. Now it’s all up to me.” 

While the two were talking, small sparks were crackling in the air between them. It was a collision of mana. Even while talking, the two were expanding their mana and looking for openings to attack. 

“First, bringing him in here means you told him you’re Zigmund’s guardian.” 

The man grinned wickedly while looking at Daniel. 

“Moreover, there’s another true secret she’s hidden. The Isabel you like isn’t a half-elf. No, she’s not even the race called human or elf. She’s just a kind of materialized spirit.” 

Daniel unconsciously looked at Isabel. 

“Isabel is just a dream that Green Dragon Zigmund is having.” 

After his words ended, the underground plaza became quiet for a moment. 

Isabel staring intently at Daniel, the man’s triumphant expression. 

After a moment, Daniel’s voice was heard. 

“I have no idea what you’re talking about.” 

At Daniel’s words, Isabel burst out laughing. 

“It’s as he said. I am an incarnation of Zigmund’s dream. A being born from the powerful force of magic while the dragon sleeps. I eat, drink, and bleed, but fundamentally I’m a being that belongs to the dragon’s dream.” 

Dragons are beings that sleep for hundreds of years at a time. To protect themselves through guardians and learn about the changing world while sleeping, dragons create a kind of avatar. 

And when the dragon awakens, that avatar disappears and becomes the dragon’s memory. 

Even after Isabel’s explanation, Daniel’s expression didn’t change. 

“I understand, but what does that matter? You’re Isabel anyway.” 

Isabel smiled at Daniel’s words. 

“Yes, I am Isabel.”