Draconic Awakening

It was day five of going through the massive buried ship, and Ragnar had already cleared a few floors.

Fighting against a number of mighty lizard beasts like the first one, he had gained more Arcana for his core. Throughout the journey, he had come to learn more about his Drake sigil, his Arcana, and his current body.

While battling with a few lizard beasts in the ship, he realized that a slash by the Drake sigil created a special wound—not just a gash, but one where ice would quickly form, causing the enemy pain and discomfort.

Apart from that, he had also found out he could augment the blade with his cultivation, which was dragon fire.

Spreading the fire on the sword, he managed to make more lethal attacks against the lizard beasts he faced.

At first, he was puzzled—would the blade just leave a burn or a trail of ice? Would it melt the ice?

But Ragnar was wrong. The attack did not just freeze the wound; the ice from the gash began to burn into the lizard beast he had cut down, like a disease decaying its victim.

Very lethal indeed.

Still, with every lethal attack came a lethal backlash to represent it. The backlash from the Duskrime being augmented ended up not as his hand burning, but freezing—visible frostbite and ice over his skin could be seen.

If it was used for too long, his limbs would go numb, and he would probably lose grip in a long battle and end up being killed.

So, he avoided going too far when using the augmentation and, when he was alone and safe, tested how long he could hold it for.

He had also implemented a method: hunting and clearing the ship only at night, then testing out his abilities during the day. There was also a reason for this...

Ragnar sat on the broken flooring of one of the ship's levels, his back pressed to the wall. He cradled himself, dressed in dark armor from shoulder to toe—nothing too large, but enough to protect most of his vital organs.

This was his new Ember Mark, the armor he had crafted from slaying about eight lizards and gaining a few beatable cores.

'It took about seven cores to craft the armor, and one to maintain it from every fatal damage.' Ragnar's gaze fell to his chest plate, where there was a large tear through the armor and his skin. His pale flesh was clearly visible, oozing blood slowly.

It was a wound he had gotten from failing to block a club from one of the lizard beasts—a fatal injury he regretted, as it had cost him the entire day of hunting, forcing him to stay here and rest.

"I'm still amazed it hasn't even closed," he grunted, shifting his hand slightly to see if the pain had reduced. He was clearly wrong.

He reclined his back against the moist wooden wall and let out a sigh. "There's just one floor left before I clear this entire ship."

{Prisoner: So close? What do you think would be at the bottom? Gold?}

Ragnar furrowed his brows. 'Someone's more talkative than usual?'

Even Ragnar had thought about it—what would be at the bottom of the ship? If he could find out what truly was there, he might be able to deduce what was really off about the shipyard—that feeling gnawing at his gut.

As far as Fang Zhen had learned, in this new body, the gut feeling was more than just a feeling. It was a hunch—mostly.

Ragnar shook his head and stared at his three shadows. All of them seemed buried in their own behaviors.

'Three shadows of distrust, three aspects, three weaknesses, three Arcanas,' Ragnar pondered. Ever since he had gotten to the shipyard, the young lord had certainly had time to think.

And while he had tried to get the prisoner to react when he was in danger—all failed attempts—something had come to mind. A consideration he was almost sure of.

That the shadows of distrust were the fault of his weaknesses.

'The dancer is the cause of my blindness from overusing sight. If a singer takes his steps from sight and the lights are switched off, he loses his way, makes mistakes, maybe even falls or stops dancing.'

'The writer is the cause of burnout. Every writer, when they get overworked, goes into a state they call burnout. That's when they feel like they're in hell—unable to think, suffering headaches, unable to focus.'

'And finally, the prisoner—a ruthless criminal from the depths of who knows where, and the only thing he answers to is gold... My final and worst weakness.'

Ragnar did not know how true his thoughts were, but this was his best bet to explain his unreasonable weaknesses. Having three Arcanas was also a thing to be considered.

Who knows?

"But the thing that's bothering me," Ragnar sat upright and stared at the three shadows, "if the dancer can move around and scout freely, and the prisoner can interfere with the physical world only when it needs to... then—"

His gaze fell onto the writer, who was busy scribbling on its sheet. "What can you do?"

The writer gave no reply, basically ignoring him.

The more he thought of it, the more confused he became about who the true owner of the shadows of distrust was. 'I don't really know who created or had this Arcana. The shadows are really something... a mysterious entity that, if known to men or the Lords, would certainly stir up trouble for me.'

Ragnar grinned at the thought of harnessing both the shadows and his dragon abilities fully—how unstoppable that would make him.

But before he could think much about that fairytale, he needed to become awakened first. And that meant he needed to clear the cursed landscape of the First Realm.

--

Author's note:

Because of the performance of this group. I am supposed to go on a hiatus or so, but I'll keep releasing just because of the follow up