endless path, infinite cosmos

chapter 87

Now that Vahn had obtained a new [Innate] skill, his strength once again had a large increase. Though the cooldown was a bit long, Vahn believed that, as his proficiency and understanding of the skill increased, it would take less and less time. With a large smile on his face, Vahn looked towards Fafnir who had just completed its transformation.

Fafnir was now 6m long and instead of pink scales and azure blue eyes, it now had onyx black scales with purple undertones. Its eyes were a pale green, almost ghostly color, and there was a strange magic seal on its chest. Instead of being slouched over like its previous form, it now stood proudly with a pair of forelimbs as well as wings. (A/N: That means it has arms, legs, and wings~! The Wyvern only had legs and wings.)

The most notable features though were the black horns that framed its face. It had a total of four horns, two angling towards the sky while the others wrapped around and seemed to be protecting the eyes somewhat. They were incredibly fierce looking, almost as though Fafnir was wearing a helmet. Its entire body was much more angular, and some of its scales now protruded out at deadly angles. Vahn felt like it looked cool, but at the same time, he couldn't see it as anything other than an 'Evil' Dragon.

He originally had a thought to try and let it clear parts of the floor on its own when he rested at night, but there was no way a group of adventurers would be able to avoid attacking Fafnir if they saw its current form. They would think it some kind of variant and attack it ruthlessly and, since Vahn wouldn't prevent Fafnir from protecting itself, they would probably die for their efforts. There was also a chance that, if a powerful Familia showed up, Vahn would lose his first 'named' familiar and companion.

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Vahn inspected Fafnir's new body, and it seemed to gleam with confidence as it proudly displayed its form to its master. Vahn found the scales on Fafnir's body to be far harder than the bedrock of the dungeon, which meant he was not only immune to magic but incredibly resilient to physical attacks. Af for offensive power, right now Fafnir 'communicated' to Vahn that it didn't possess any skills, not even its flame breath. However, it now had incredible physical strength and speed that caused craters wherever is struck. It also had the power of flight and didn't seem to rely on flapping its wings to do so. Using his domain, Vahn could sense there was a formless energy generating the lifting force behind the wings.

During this period, Vahn also tried using his [Prometheus] on Fafnir, but he was prevented from doing so as Fafnir was of a higher level and potential than he was. As a 'dragon', even while it was Soul Tier 1, it had insanely high parameters and natural capabilities. When Vahn had it fight against a Battle Boar, a creature even he enjoyed fighting due to its relative difficulty, Fafnir smashed the entire boar into the ground with a single powerful strike.

Vahn noticed that, even though the Battle Boar was quite strong among monsters on this floor, he only obtained 2OP when Fafnir defeated it. Due to this, Vahn was able to infer that he obtained less exilia and OP if the fight was one-sided or the monsters were much weaker. It was almost similar to how adventurers got almost no exilia from hunting weaker monsters. If Vahn wanted to make the best use of Fafnir's awesome power, he would have to venture deeper into the dungeon...

The reason Vahn wasn't willing to do so was that of the matter with the Osiris Familia, as well as the fact that he was actually weaker than Fafnir presently. If he became over-reliant on its abilities, it would stunt his future growth. It wasn't all bad though, because Vahn got to experience flying for the first time as he rode on Fafnir's back. Even though the angle was a bit odd, it seemed as if Fafnir could change the structure of its scales and created an area where Vahn could easily mount it.

If any spectators had been in the area, they would have seen a 'demonic' white tiger boy laughing loudly while riding on the back of a humongous 'evil' dragon.