-Oh blessed descendants, you shall read our testimonies as fairy tales without enduring this horrific grief.-
⦁First Demon War (Empire Year 1064-1099), 12 million casualties.
⦁Great Erosion (Empire Year 1098-1123), 45 million casualties.
⦁Second Demon War (Empire Year 1118-1128), 3 million casualties.
*
The girl awoke in a secluded monastery in a tranquil village.
“CoughCough!”
Her throat was dry and her heart felt like it was being pricked by needles, and she clutched the blanket, writhing in pain.
At that moment, a nun passing by entered the room, sensing the commotion.
“Are you awake? I thought you were going to die if you kept lying still, kid.”
“…?”
“What’s your name?”
“Luri.”
“Okay, Luri. The children found you floating in the river after they went to do the laundry. Didn’t your parents teach you that it’s dangerous to swim in the valley on a rainy day? Where’s your home?”
The nun’s words sent Luri’s eyes darting around aimlessly.
[You should die right there, too.]
The final command from her heavenly parents.
‘Did I fail to die?’
The nun had a faint suspicion that she might be an orphan based on her reaction.
Just then, Luri sharpened her nails and began to choke herself.
“Hrrgh!”
“What are you doing! Stop that right now!”
Her nails left shallow scratches in her neck, but that was all.
“Phew… Ha…”
The strong nun rushed from behind to stop Luri from harming herself.
‘How could I, a dragon… end up like this? This can’t be happening… I can’t do this… Aah…’
The shock of losing a fight against such a lowly creature was too much for her to bear.
Luri ended up hospitalized in the monastery for a month due to a mysterious high fever.
*
‘I’ve lost almost all of my power.’
Shattered pieces of her Aura Heart lay scattered on the floor like a broken glass bottle.
This was Luri’s conclusion after a month of carefully observing her body.
She recalled the moment she shattered both her heart and Aura Heart.
Was it because she lacked the strength to destroy her Aura Heart during the last battle?
Moreover, she had mistakenly stabbed the wrong place, tricked by her own polymorph magic.
But even she admitted that these were nothing more than flimsy excuses.
The fact remained that she had betrayed her mother out of her attachment to life.
Once more, Luri felt an overwhelming sense of guilt.
‘Right, I will go see mother.’
It wouldn’t be too late to ask her why.
If she were to give the same command again, Luri vowed she would gladly take her own life.
“O great Hiasen de Kaizen! Conqueror of the Eastern Continent, protector of the Empire! The Emperor’s light shines upon us. Goddess, preserve the Emperor, and safeguard our Kaizen!”
The little ones in the monastery burst into song and barged into the bedroom.
Luri scrunched up her face in displeasure.
They were children who were far too mischievous to be dismissed lightly.
“Sister! I heard you’re hiding jewels in your mouth! I heard everything the priest said!”
Greed gleamed in the children’s eyes.
Luri felt nauseated but brushed it off.
‘I must conserve the little strength I have left.’
Clack clack—
One of them rushed over at her beckoning.
“Gah!”
Thump—
Luri seized the neck of the unsuspecting child and knocked them out in one swift motion.
“Get lost if you don’t want to die.”
“Isn’t all of it a lie? You won’t have to face a monster!”
Just as the children were about to leave, Luri called them back.
“What is Emperor Hiasen doing these days?”
A meddler intent on obstructing her mother’s great undertaking.
Not wanting to return empty-handed, she raised the question intending to provoke a commotion.
The little monastery kids blinked with wide-eyed innocence.
“Well, how would you know what we know.”
“The Emperor has passed away, you know?”
“What did you say?”
The world had moved on for much longer than she had anticipated.
A full twenty years.
*
Empire Year 1143.
Emperor Hiasen had achieved victory in the decade-long Demon War and fortified the nation for another seven years.
He died at the age of 39 from heart disease.
The entire empire praised his accomplishments, and statues were erected in cities all over.
One girl sat weeping in front of the Emperor’s statue.
“What a rare young man in these times. Just how magnificent must the Emperor have been for her to mourn like that?”
“Isn’t it a pity? He suffered all his life, and just when he established a beautiful era, he left us.”
Passersby chimed in, praising the girl’s loyalty.
“No…”
Luri’s nails, scraping against the stone, split painfully.
“This isn’t your achievement…”
Inside Luri, a fiery rage bubbled to the surface, and she felt as if her whole body was ablaze.
All surrounding sounds faded away, leaving only the echo of her heartbeat in her ears.
Unable to contain her anger surging through her veins,
Bam—
“Huh.”
“Just a crazy lady, huh?”
“By her clothes, I thought she was the daughter of a noble or a merchant.”
She slammed her head against the statue, drawing blood from her forehead.
[The Alpenheim Senate and the populace erect this statue to honor Hiasen Luminos de Kaizen, son of King Airogen, the great leader who conquered the demons and the Eastern Continent, ending the Great Erosion and overthrowing the Witch Estasha in the name of the Goddess.]
*
Facts that were hard even for a dragon’s mind to accept kept piling up.
Her mother, who seemed like she wouldn’t get a scratch, was gone.
Furthermore, all the people of the world mistook her mother as the source of the erosion.
And Emperor Hiasen seized all her mother’s accomplishments for himself and was praised by the masses.
Finally, even the demons, whom she had trusted most, branded her mother a traitor siding with humans.
On a winter’s day when the snowstorm raged fiercely.
Luri, caught in the swamp of despair, visited the Alpenheim Kingdom for one last time.
However, the Alpenheim people would have nothing but disdain for Estasha, who had raided their granaries.
[Death of the Great Erosion (1123) – Targon Belmoris]
Emperor Hiasen’s merciless blade pierced Estasha’s heart.
The moment she faced the massive portrait hanging in the cathedral.
“Aah…”
Luri’s legs crumbled beneath her in despair.
“This is all because I… I didn’t die back then… Aah… Hrrgh…”
Every word she spoke, all learned from her mother.
“All of this is my fault… No, I tried to die… Hrrgh, I tried to die…”
The air felt scorching and bitter against her skin.
Simply breathing infuriated Luri.
Her throat slowly tightening.
“I’m sorry, I was wrong Huh… I was probably scared because I’m not like mother… Ugh…”
Luri knew she didn’t even need to tighten her neck to feel her life flickering away.
The desire to annihilate the filthy humans.
The hopelessness of unable to realize that desire.
That gap began to gnaw at Luri’s vitality.
And at that moment.
Shuuuuu-
Hundreds of runes disassembled.
Colorful mana spread like smoke.
‘Ah, I see. I’m already dead.’
It was only before her life ended that she came to this realization.
[8th Circle Release: Polymorph]
Luri became aware that she had been forcibly bound by polymorph magic all along.
If this were the case, then could she consider this as having completed her mission?
With her heart finally at ease, Luri wished for nothing more than that to be true.
[If I meet mother, I want to ask her why she gave me such a command… No, I just want to see her.]
She barely grasped the dispersing runes with her hand to form an incantation.
[I won’t say anything.]
Empire Year 1144.
An incident where a dragon who could not ascend took her own life.
Nothing remained at the site where the magic circle disbanded, so it could not be recorded.
*
“Chilly, suffocating… Why is it so cold?”
Luri found herself trapped in a space where she couldn’t move.
The physically confined space restricted even her normal reasoning.
She felt like a creature lesser than a human.
The more Luri attempted to move her body, the greater the external pressure pressed in on her.
Something sticky clung to her skin.
[§Hara Yetrei Ka§]
[§Highprit§]
[§Woe is me for I am but a mere animal§]
She trembled in the cold, spending a long time there.
‘I don’t want to live.’
As her hair grew a bit longer, memories of the past began to resurface.
Her mother, her one and only.
Who took in Luri, the weakest of all dragons, and taught her the meaning of life.
Luri was unable to find a reason to live in a world without her mother.
Extreme headaches, heat, and explosions.
The dizzying world gradually stabilized.
Thud—!
“Ouch, that hurts.”
The pack targeting Luri was sure to show up once more.
[Leave me alone. I’m just a fake made of magic.]
To think that the polymorph magic had continued to operate on her body for decades after death!
Just recalling that incident made Luri laugh in disbelief.
[Just leave me be. In this life, I want to be nothing but a rock.]
She recalled her mother’s habitual words about wanting to be a rock if she were reborn.
Then the humans promptly led her to a cozy shelter.
Despite the instinctual urge for dragons to break out and ascend, Luri, with memories of her past life, didn’t wish to escape to a cozy world.
Humans were loathsome creatures at just a glance.
[I wish they’d all be buried in the snow.]
In the suddenly quiet space, she finally had a moment to rest.
“They’re here!”
“Wait. How do we get this thing out?”
“What if the sister doesn’t know either?”
“At the very least, we need to check if this is indeed a dragon’s egg.”
“Can’t we just use diagnosis magic?”
“No, it has to be handled delicately! It’s like a newborn baby!”
She was trapped.
The moment Luri realized she was caught by the lowly humans, fury surged through her, and she resisted with all her might.
Humans were stupid and endlessly weak.
They would tremble just from a few incantations she uttered.
“And if I play some of the melodies humans hate the most that I learned from my mother…”
She took satisfaction in hearing the agonized cries of the humans.
Then suddenly.
“This little brat.”
The world flipped over and her insides twisted.
Every touch cracked the wall separating her from the world.
As the voices of humans grew clearer, Luri’s head began to spin.
“Cruel humans! Isn’t it about time to stop! I am a dragon!”
“You said we had to handle it delicately!”
“It’ll be fine because it’s a dragon.”
In a twist of fate, Luri lost all words against the argument that it would be okay because it’s a dragon.
The instigator was a child.
A very young one at that.
[You should let me out. The moment I emerge from this egg, I’ll tear you and your family to pieces!]
“Strange, it seems like she remembers everything. Why has she become so ill-tempered while we weren’t looking?”
Thud thud thud thud thud thud—!
The second round of the Dragoon drop started without warning.
