A Curse of Competence

20

^^ Gresham's Scale Armor ^^

By the time I was 14, Mother and Father trusted me enough to travel in my Ship all over the Continent, even without them; I'd made Father a replacement for his own ship that I'd used as materials to make The Lady's Flight, a ship around half the size of his original ship with the added perk of... well, Flight, as well as all the other systems for my Ships. He and Mother spent most of their time aboard that ship, traveling between the various Aphasian Vassal Kingdoms, (spread around the southern end of the continent like a crescent moon,) as merchants, while I traveled the Forest looking for different kinds of Magical Beasts with interesting Abilities that were becoming overpopulated; aka, ones I wouldn't feel bad for killing, due to the restorative effect on the ecosystem.

Gresham, though, was special: his Ecosystem was dominated by a predator that was literally uncontested, an Ancient Sky Dragon, and the lightning storm that raged as part of his uncontrollable lair effect had destroyed all plant life and wildlife in a hundred-kilometer radius, and often sparked wild-fires that spread to other portions of the forest. He was a menace, even unintentionally, and if it was possible to kill him, then there would be a one-hundred kilometer radius circle of land that was literally begging for plants to grow upon it. So, I'd approached him, spoken with him, and killed him with a delayed-cast fireball inside his ear right next to his brain. The storm ceased instantly, and his body became materials for me to use, but the volume was unimaginable; his length from shoulder to hips was bigger than my ship, while his tail was the same length again, and his head was around two thirds that length, at the end of a long and thick neck. His wings were weak and frail, but if they were stretched out again, their span would be beyond my imagination for a living creature; beyond anything. No Dinosaur or Megafauna had ever achieved a size of 400 meters in length from hip to shoulder, simply because their dietary needs would be astronomical, and no ecosystem could sustain them. But here, the Mana which helped keep people healthy prevented Starvation, and the more Mana you had, the Healthier you could stay... but of course there was a limit. Still, he was an Apex Predator, that much was true, and killing him without introducing a replacement would cause complications such as, 1: the monsters in the Forest overtaking the new nutrient-rich farmland that I'd cleared, and 2: an imbalance in the ecosystem that he had previously fed off of.

My solution? Use his body as the new Frame for my Ship. In that way, he still 'existed', and the monsters that wanted to challenge him would be fuel for my growth. Covering the Borders of his Lair with lightning rods enchanted with his Aura would keep the monsters away from the Lair, and the lightning they attracted would not only charge the enchantments, it would also remind the monsters with any amount of intelligence that the Lightning Dragon was still alive and his Lair was still a place that was best avoided. The mountain he used for his Lair was mostly hollow, so it would be a good place for a fortress city, as well; only six hundred kilometers from the Capital, with access to the coast if a river was made, massive amounts of farmland... perfect.

Of course, the Dragon's Body wasn't exactly suited to be a ship right away, and some major modifications had to happen; firstly, the Bones had to be replaced with Zeres Wood to alleviate the weight without sacrificing durability, and in fact the Zeres Wood actually increased the flexibility and regeneration ability of the Dragon Bones, which was better for a ship. Next, each Organ, removed and placed into preservative tanks in the warehouse, was replaced with a Shipboard Function. Kidneys filtered fluids, so they became the Water Filtration and Treatment Plants. A Liver filtered nutrients before they entered the bloodstream, and so it would deal with the nutrients placed into the drinking and farming water after it was purified in the kidneys. The stomach would be used as the waste disposal and also the Capturing Point for Soul Gems, according to its original purpose combined with the massive Philosopher's Stone that was controlled by Gresham's subconscious mind mixed with my own chemical knowledge. It would be the same as the previous garbage disposal, feeding the Farmland that were spread in several layers throughout the intestines region. The bladder was the end point for all the black water from the entire City/Ship, where it would be transported to the stomach and kidneys to be disposed of and recycled. The heart would of course pump all the water and Mana throughout the ship, and for this I used the actual Heart of Gresham. I knew Demos was going to want to study it, so I simply decided to reuse the capillaries, arteries, and veins that already existed as water pipes, which would also help keep the interior warm or cold depending on the need. The heart itself was a massive thing, befitting a creature that'd been nearly a kilometer long from his nose to the tip of his tail, and it could handle pumping blood and Mana naturally, so changing blood for water was simple, considering blood naturally came from the bones which were now replaced with Zeres Wood; instead of creating blood, they created water, so the system worked perfectly as it should. The lungs, which would send air into the 'blood' to oxygenate the entire ship, were also left whole, though they would be maximized and enhanced by way of Magic to gather all the oxygen they encountered and keeping it, instead of exhaling 97% of it. One day there would be thousands of people within this ship, and they would need proper air filtration and circulation, so it was best to do that now.