Wild Dragon of Rome 24 (Patreon)

I had decided not to ask her ‘help’ again until we could reach the shore, but it was hard not to change my mind as I watched Lillian dress. The desire was dancing in my chest, begging me for another release.

Her shy, inviting glances didn’t make the decision any easier.

I refused the call, not just because I wanted to pay attention to our surroundings, but because I wanted to control my surprisingly intense instincts. I wasn’t completely inexperienced when it came to matters of flesh, but no one had awakened the same intensity of feelings I had felt toward Lillian.

A part of it was her incredible beauty. On that, there was no doubt. Another, even bigger part of it was our shared challenge. I didn’t remember the last time I had to face a threat or an enemy without the suffocating weight of the solitude.

Yet, even with those factors, I could feel that there was a wild, animalistic edge to my lust, begging me to disregard anything else and focus on my pleasure. Not the way I usually acted or thought.

I decided not to indulge that part of my instincts.

The rationale was simple. The timing of my new instincts left little doubt about their source, and it was not the best idea to indulge them until I got a better understanding of what had been going on.

My mental pondering had been interrupted by a movement I felt under the boat. I once again reached the oar and stabbed the fish with it before letting it drift away. I continued to row.

“It’s dangerous,” Lillian said, once again fully dressed as she looked at me. “They are far away. Maybe I should start scaring the beasts away.”

“No need,” I answered. “The biggest advantage of the first and second-order fish is their sneak attacks. Since I could sense their presence, there’s no benefit of scaring them.”

“And, if we were unlucky enough to come across a third-order beast?”

“We’ll think if and when that happens. There weren’t many such beasts in the channel in the first place, and it won’t be too late to intimidate them even if we stumble upon one. You can focus on your meditation. You have just received a lot of mana. You better start converting it to vitae.”

She chuckled. “You’re right. I should focus on practicing. With the threat we are facing, every bit counts.”

She closed her eyes, meditating. I continued rowing, but at the same time, I focused on my magic, giving myself a chance to observe the changes. While her ‘assistance’ helped to relieve the pressure, my body was still filled with mana, more than even an ordinary mage should be able to handle without burning up.

I focused on my heart, where it all began. The moment I focused inward, the crystal glowed brightly, right in the center of my heart, my blood spreading the mana across my body with every throb with no limit, once again proving that the reputation of dragon hearts as great treasures was not for nothing.

With nothing else to do, I started wondering about one thing. The name.

The origin of dragon hearts was shrouded, at least for someone like me. The rumors, like the fact that they came from actual dragons that had been slain by the gods, were common, but even after I had received one, I didn’t waste any time wondering about it. After all, anything mana-related had fancy names, often linked to pointless old stories.

At that time, I confidently declared that I didn’t care about anything but their ability to generate an infinite amount of mana, which would allow me to reach the rank of mage of four elements, maybe even achieve the impossible, and turn into a sorcerer of four elements.

What a horrible miscalculation.

Now that I had one lodged in my heart, I was starting to believe that the name might not be as much of a coincidence. But, only might, because I didn’t forget that, only after I had merged the four vitae right in my heart, the dragon heart reacted.

Maybe it was just a coincidence.

I hoped so.

There were many stories of dragons, and if there was one thing that was common about them, it was the death and destruction that was linked to them as they raged endlessly, even their names were rarely mentioned. I knew there had been stories of Jupiter fighting against one, and almost being defeated. The great beast Typhoon.

A story that had been told to me by my grandfather.

My grandfather, famously paid attention to nothing else but my training.

“Oh, please not,” I whispered before I remembered Lillian. Luckily, she was distracted by her meditation, and didn’t notice my silent crisis. I wasn’t ready to follow that track, not when it would have no benefit.

Instead, I focused on my magic again, feeling its flow. It radiated out of dragon heart, danced around my body, increased the intensity of mana in my body, filling me endlessly, like a water skin being filled endlessly, its seams about to burst…

Not a good image, I thought as I continued to watch the way mana moved in my body. I would have channeled it to my elemental damaged and shivered elemental cores, to see if I could repair them. Such damage should have been irreversible, but I doubted anyone bothered to repair them with near-infinite mana.

I would try. After all, it was the only way all that mana would be useful. Humans needed the elemental vitae as a channel, otherwise the mana couldn’t be manipulated. That was one of the fundamental rules of magic. Mana couldn’t be used directly. Like I was unable to absorb the mana, and needed vitae as a medium.

Even now, that didn’t change.

Still, watching my body being filled with mana was not good. It was uncharted territory, and I had no idea how to progress. I wanted to shout in frustration, but remembered one of my grandfather’s saying.

The weak cries and curses and the strong acts.

Smart words. Wise, even, though as usual, the situation when he uttered those words was hardly a casual situation. I still remembered it. I had just defended a farm against a small pack of hungry wolves. An ordinary pack, led by a mere first-order wolf that was wounded. My grandfather forced me to fight them alone while he watched.

I was eleven.

I had hated him then, when he stood over my bleeding body, yet delivered a lecture about my mistakes before helping me, ending it with that quote. Frankly, no matter how much I love him, I still hate him.

A complicated relationship to have with a dead man.

Still, his lack of mercy didn’t make those words any less true. There was no point in me to lament about my misfortune. I had taken a risk, and it backfired, ruining my breakthrough, either temporarily or permanently.

At least I came out with a new set of abilities instead of ending up being burned inside out.

I opened my eyes again, and focused on watching the horizon, ignoring the temptation to start repairing my elemental cores. I had no doubt it would be a painful experience, enough to rival the worst training exercises my crazy old man had been able to come up with, but it wasn’t pain that kept me back.

No, it was the fear of creating a commotion. The shore wasn’t too far away. Just a few minutes, and we would be safe. Once I arrived on the mainland, with my new capabilities, I was confident I could get away from anyone trying to chase me.

”I couldn’t believe that we actually got away. Incredible,” I muttered, but even as I said those words, I felt an elemental stirring somewhere at our West, a stirring that gave me a very bad feeling. Water.

Talk about tempting fate.

I thought about changing direction, but I decided against it. That flare was too subtle, too controlled to belong to a beast. Also, there were only two possibilities. Either they were slower than us, in which case I would arrive at the shore before them, or they were faster than us, and trying to maneuver was useless.

I chose to continue, acting like I hadn’t noticed anything, hoping that our followers would choose to stalk us rather than push themselves to the limit, unaware of the advantage I would have on the land.

Not to mention, I much rather be close to the shore once that inevitable fight happened. Lillian was a water mage, which gave her a significant advantage on the water, but that benefit was already neutralized by the fragility of our boat.

I continued rowing, searching the horizon, hoping that we weren’t being chased by what I had been fearing.

Then, at the horizon, I saw a subtle movement, behind a cloak of shimmering water, enough to keep any ship camouflaged from wandering eyes — as long as those eyes weren’t enhanced more than what was possible in a freak accident.

Even if that ship was coated with a bright, shiny black paint…