A Dragon's Curiosity

While Nisha rested after fighting off the boundary, the golden drops of blood returned to her heart and lost the sheen after passing through the space hidden inside the crystalline sphere.

Their volume did not get consumed while mending her broken flesh, actually the total amount had increased compared to the wisps that left the sphere in the first place.

Strand after strand returned to the hidden space and fused together, taking a solid form in the process.

At the start, the outline was still blurry and hazy, yet after the storm from the advancement to the fourth rank settled, the eventual result was fairly discernible.

Floating within the crystalline sphere, a drop of blood levitated.

Compared to a normal one, the bead did not take on the crimson colour of blood, and it remained rather hazy at the moment.

Subconsciously unsatisfied with the slow progress, Nisha turned in her sleep and pulled on the surrounding energy with a violent tug.

Mana and energy from the Dharnas estate surged and converged on the elf’s room, not unlike a whale swallowing up a sea of krill.

Not only the single lot, energy from all over the noble district, then the entire capital and beyond the city walls surged into the emptied area to replace the depleted stores.

Before the occurrence could develop into another extraordinary phenomena that aroused the attention of the bigshots all over Ator, the dragon sighed in contentment at being satiated from a good meal.

Without the boundary restricting the girl’s body, plentiful energy returned after being drawn into Nisha’s [Inner World].

Giving as much as was taken from the outside, neither side suffered a loss and the elf even benefitted from the exchange.

A tiny hint of dragon aura was added to the released energy, although it was next to impossible to discern the addition without having extensive knowledge and personal contact with a dragon.

On the other hand, Nisha’s [Inner World] enjoyed a large infusion of energy, leading to flowers blooming and new landscapes forming before the energy finished circulating and left the space.

Nevertheless, the benefits stayed and a steady circulation formed, where anyone would scarcely believe the volume of energy hidden within the slender frame of the elf.

Furthermore, the constant baptism of elements also affected the drop of blood inside Nisha’s crystalline heart.

Despite being a beast, the dragon did not form a core before, perhaps a side effect of the boundary that was maliciously inflicted on the dragon siblings.

With the restriction shattered, the handicap vanished instantly and she ended up forming a Dragon Heart, a rarer variant of a regular beast core.

Perhaps, the boundary ended up being a blessing disguised as a disaster, since the pressure derived from the clash between the [Dragon Force] and the restriction necessitated Nisha to obtain such a rare core to weather through the tribulation.

If either was missing, the girl would perhaps have ended up with a much inferior core.

Regulating all the energy flowing inside and out again, the hidden space within the Dragon Heart accumulated a drop of essence blood, a perfectly round sphere hovering within.

With every heartbeat, a new wave of blood passed through the core and carried more energy with it, drowning the essence with different elements sourced from the environment.

Similar to the golden strands of blood streaming into Nisha’s body earlier, red streaks of fire essence separated from the aura and mana and coagulated within the blood drop before the remaining energy journeyed towards the [Inner World].

Stimulated by the influx of power, the pale sphere turned fire red and emanated a fiery heat within the hidden space inside the Dragon Heart.

The girl sleeping on top of the ruined bed was blissfully unaware of the changes happening within herself and failed to wake up from the commotion inside her [Inner World].

Normally, her inner self remained condensed and roamed the landscapes of her mindscape while her body rested throughout the night - this time, the girl was really knocked out from the effort of breaking the restriction.

At the same pace of the fire strands suffusing the drop of essence blood, the mind of the elf roamed an achromatic dream, until she started moving towards a sea of red.

Anyone else would have been scared silly by the intense heat and the tongues of flames growing in intensity, yet Nisha welcomed the familiar prickle of warmth on her skin.

Would a fire dragon ever be afraid of basking in flames?

Taking a dip in a volcano full of molten metal counted as a pastime for her, so Nisha was just curious to find the source of the red world.

Moving through the empty space was not a conscious choice, an unknown target attracted the dragon’s mind.

As Nisha got closer, the flames parted and allowed her a closer look at the target of her journey.

Floating within the void, a giant red sphere emitted countless gouts of fire.

Red, orange and dark black spots intermingled as a giant ball of fire emitted infinite amounts of heat and energy.

Instinctively, the elf understood that she was looking at a sun.

Ator had two of them, a large one and a smaller one, as well as three moons.

Although it was considered common knowledge that they were celestial bodies, which often represented the pinnacle of fire and water respectively, the girl had never considered them more than a part of daily life.

Seeing a sun from close up made her really appreciate how massive the heavenly body really was, she was no more than a speck of dust.

The countless swirls of the sun drew patterns she was not even aware of before seeing them with her own eyes, forming its own system and circulation.

Just from witnessing them for a moment, the dragon felt that a faint idea formed in her head, allowing her to take control of flames just by looking at them.

I never knew that it was possible to feel this small. Nature is amazing!

Despite being dragged towards the veritable wonder of the cosmos, the situation escaped Nisha’s notice.

Her mind was captured entirely by the patterns and workings of the fire swirls, with nothing left to spare for her surroundings.

A larger law was at work here, a primitive and fundamental force of nature magnified countless times until it formed a giant sphere sustaining countless lives.

The dragon was sure that this celestial body did not belong to Ator, it was bigger and differently coloured from those of her homeworld.

A gout of flame burst from a black spot, the extreme temperature warping the void around it.

Fascinated by the occurrence, Nisha used all of her willpower to shift her mind to the particular markings formed by nature next to the dark area, wishing to take a deeper look at the phenomena.

The sheer forces involved with such an eruption would likely wipe out a corner of the continent the elf lived on, leaving nothing but vaporized ash and dust behind.

Such a destructive power was deeply attractive to a dragon and she imagined herself wielding a similar prowess one day.

Natural markings created through the law of nature appeared familiar and foreign at the same time to the girl.

It was like an itch that Nisha was unable to scratch, overloading her mind with information yet eluding her attention.

Finally, her journey stopped in front of the sun’s surface, with flames raging left and right of the dragon from the dark spot.

If she just stretched out her hand, Nisha would be able to touch a heavenly object with her own hands.

So she did just that.

There was no cosmic incidence or an earth shattering change that happened afterwards.

Nisha only stared with fascination as the basic law of the universe operated in an orderly manner.

It was akin to water flowing downwards or a seed germinating after it was planted in fertile soil.

All these tiny yet unchangeable processes happened every day in every single aspect of life, yet no one was capable of thwarting them or explaining the reason why they happened.

Whether it reached a cosmic scale comparable to a wonder like the sun or the light of a small candle hidden behind a screen, they all operated on the same constant principles.

Floating so close to the sun obscured everything else in her point of view, allowing Nisha only to observe the single dark spot.

A great amount of fire elemental aura and mana boiled beneath the surface, preparing another outburst.

Just as the gout erupted, the natural markings around the blast point changed accordingly and the dragon had a sudden inspiration.

Before the fire burst out and obliterated her spiritual projection, the red drop of essence blood ran out of power and the fiery world collapsed, leaving behind only that single name:

[Solar Flare]

Before the elf had a chance to return her awareness to her body and ponder over the mysteries she observed and the principles behind it, the excess elements in the hidden space inside the crystalline Dragon Heart acted first and countless dark filaments formed the shadow of the next blood essence first.

Afterwards the golden threads completed the image and the dark essence surged inside the spiritual void, tinging the entire space black after it was left empty by the departure of the sun.

From the achromatic background, a vat of inky darkness flew down the canvas, turning the entire expanse of space into absolute twilight.

If the obscurity was not too bad, it was still possible for humans and elfs to observe some of the details of their surroundings.

Monsters and beasts generally had some degree of nightsight to survive in the Wilderness, giving them a greater allowance when it came to dark environments.

But when all light sources were cut off and not a single ray of light was left, the darkness opened up and created an infinite space of gloom.

No one could possibly observe a single object, not even with true sight.

Only some outliers such as Nisha’s [Spirit Sight] could circumvent the lack of light and rely on energy signatures to sketch out the background, yet the elf was at a loss this time.

The black void did not only lack light, her spiritual awareness floated inside a void yet again and journeyed towards another goal.

Not even dust existed in this place, making her unsure what awaited the dragon at the end of the expedition.

Without a point of reference, the passing of time was not quite obvious either, at least the sun gave her a framework to guess.

Eventually, the monotony of nothingness was broken by a brilliant spot on the horizon.

Nevertheless, Nisha felt that something was wrong with the light, as the darkness should have been broken with even the tiniest lightsource.

It only became clearer once the simple consciousness approached the structure.

Staring in awe, the elf beheld a tower connecting the ends of infinity, as it extended towards an unseen goal above and below.

In her subconsciousness, Nisha realized that the structure should be an actual tower existing somewhere and in reality the building did not have an infinite height, but it represented a part of the law, hence her perception adjusted her view to see it as an endless connection.

Her brain failed to merge the image of a tower with a base and a ceiling, hence the girl saw two images at once and beheld something ridiculous as an infinite tower.

Nevertheless, this was her second experience in this spiritual space and her focus quickly spotted something familiar.

On the body of the tower, natural markings meandered up and down the length of the black stones, recording the fundamental truth of the universe in the form of a law.

Despite not understanding the language in which the working was written down, just gazing at the living writing gave Nisha an inkling towards the nature of the truth.

Once an extreme reached the breaking point, it was easy for the process to reverse.

When a human went through extreme coldness, their body might feel warm instead - if extreme destruction fell onto a target, unintended creation might take place.

The tower represented the darkest shadows and the law created a twisted outcome.

Black light radiated from the dark stones building the tower, drowning the entire space in eternal gloom.

Starting from the base, Nisha’s attention was captured by the dark light and guided to the first section of the markings.

Once a shadow deepened enough, a connection spontaneously came into existence and led towards the tower, an infinite boundary between all darkness.

No matter which entity threw the shadow, as long as they were unaware of the truth of the world, they would never discover the gate leading here.

By observing the tower and its majesty, a faint understanding and connection grew in Nisha’s head and she learned another concept.

[Midnight]

Once darkness reached an extreme, light was born instead.

At the deepest point of the night, shadows turned into dark light and transformed the impermeable shadows into a passage towards the unknown.

While the underlying law was not as destructive as gout of fire from the sun, the principle was similarly derived from the truth of the world and exceeded Nisha’s capabilities at the present.

After the connection between the girl and the tower settled, the darkness receded and returned to the building stretching towards infinity.

Despite the encounter being quite briefer than her fascination towards the sun, the dragon longed to enter the tower and explore its mysteries.

Yearning to explore her curiosity, Nisha’s awareness returned to her sleeping body and prepared to rest and digest the harvests from her fourth rank advancement as well as the two encounters that taught her a principle each.

Once the second drop of blood essence formed, an image swam inside each blood sphere.

First was the [Solar Flare], while the second had the shadow of a tower, [Midnight].

As the images turned clearer, the third drop of blood essence came into being.

Whereas the first two drew golden wisps from all over her body, the third one only accepted contribution from the crystalline Dragon Heart itself.

There was no third spiritual journey or profound experience. The shadow within already had a name and it quietly turned solid even faster than its two predecessors.

With great clarity, the image of a dragon solidified.