Jack coughed as he felt the liquid enter him.
"What… What did you do?" Jack asked in alarm, but then he heard a notification, "Receive legendary-grade draconic blood essence. Fusing with current bloodline. Bloodline has been upgraded."
"Bloodline upgraded?" Jack muttered. He hurriedly opened his status window and searched for his bloodline description.
*
Divine Gold Dragon Bloodline, level 3/10 (Legendary bloodline)
- Passive skill: +28% to attribute, HP, Stamina, MP
- Active skill 1: Gold scale armor: Cover user's skin with gold scale, reducing all damage received by 70%, immune to all negative status effects and knockback effect during activation, all healing and recovery on user are increased by 100%. Duration: 3 minutes. Cooldown: 2 hours.
- Active skill 2: Gold Dragon Sight: Trigger slowdown vision, all object movements are slowed by 1000%, sees invisible objects, can zoom in on distance object. Duration: 10 seconds, Cooldown: 2 hours.
Draconic Essence: 2820/3000
*
"Divine…? Legendary…?" Jack muttered after seeing the description.
"Syndrillis' bloodline inside you is incomplete," Broidrireg said. "I gave a little bit of mine to complete it. Now the bloodline is a proper divine dragon's one."
The increase of the grade to legendary had doubled the skill's passive boost, it was +14% before. Additionally, he had gotten another active skill even though his bloodline level was still the same. Previously, Peniel explained to him that his Unique-grade bloodline should give him a total of 4 active skills, with an additional skill received every three-levels increase.
"I suppose this legendary-grade bloodline will give me a new active skill every two-levels increase?" Jack asked Peniel.
"Yes," Peniel answered.
"So I will have a total of five active skills once my bloodline level reached level 9," Jack concluded.
"You get another skill when your bloodline is fully-leveled to level 10," Peniel said. "A legendary bloodline gives a total of six active skills."
"What? Yes…!! That is f*cking-A…!" Jack exclaimed.
"Now, who is the best dragon?" Broidrireg asked.
"It's you! Oh, mighty Broidrireg! You are the best dragon there is!" Jack proclaimed. Snot was still dangling around his body, but he didn't give it any mind.
"Hmph! You damn right I am!" Broidrireg uttered. "Now hurry up and go clean yourself. It was funny at first, but now it is just disgusting looking at you."
'Urgh… Whose fault is that?' Jack complained in his mind. Before leaving, he didn't forget to express his gratitude, "Thank you, mighty Broidrireg. Thank you for everything. You are the best!"
"Hmph," Broidrireg waved him off. The dragon just laid there on the ground as he watched Jack run to Darmos' hut.
Luckily, they landed near Darmos' hut, so Jack didn't have to run far. The excitement from getting a legendary bloodline had dulled his senses, but now the stench of the snot covering his body had returned. He ran as fast as he could. Once he arrived, he immediately unequipped everything and jumped into the lake. He also took out his armor one by one to clean it.
When he came out of the lake, Darmos was standing beside the lake. "How was it? You get the trial?" He asked.
"Not only I get it. I aced it!" Jack exclaimed while giving a thumb up.
"Good. I have fished a lot of fish today. Let's celebrate," Darmos said.
"I also have some meat. Well, not draconic ones," Jack said. "I will cook twice as many as the usual. We will have an all-you-can-eat buffet tonight! Oh, I also have some wine in my inventory."
"You have wine? Why didn't you take them out before? Take all of them out now. I won't forgive you if you keep some from me."
"Hold your horses. Let me re-equip everything first," Jack said.
The two of them had a celebration feast that night. Peniel couldn't eat their food, but she joined in the chatterings. Darmos again pull a prank on Jack. When Jack was not looking, he added a lot of chili powder into Jack's food, causing Jack to run for water after having a taste. Darmos was rolling on the ground laughing.
Jack got him back by emptying all the wine jugs. Darmos kept on taking one jug after another but found no wine. Only after Jack had enough laughing that Jack gave the wine back to Darmos.
The two enjoyed their time until late at night.
"Tell me, Darmos. When we first met, if I fought the monsters with you on my back and I passed as you intended. Will you send me to Broidrireg's lair right away?"
"Yes, that was the plan," Darmos answered.
Jack chuckled, "Then I'm glad I didn't do as you intended. Otherwise, we wouldn't have enjoyed so much time together."
"Hmph, who enjoys the time with you?" Darmos turned away.
"Sigh, you are still so shy," Jack teased.
"You will be leaving tomorrow, I suppose?" Darmos asked.
"Yes. I still have lots of matters to deal with," Jack answered. "Will you miss me?"
"Hmph! I miss my peace. You are too noisy."
"Haha, I will try to visit if I happen to pass near here. Or, if you decided to ditch this hermit life, you are welcome to come to my guild headquarters in Themisphere. It has a nice mountain there."
"Nah, I want nothing to do with the outside life. Well, I'm tired. I will go to bed. Don't forget to clean up before you sleep."
"Bloody heck. This mess is your doing as well. Why do I have to clean them all up by myself?"
"Because you are a guest. You should be grateful I didn't charge you anything for staying so long here," Darmos uttered as he went into his hut.
"Shouldn't a host takes care of the guest?" Jack muttered.
*
The next morning, Jack prepared to leave as Darmos sat beside his hut.
"I'm leaving," Jack said.
Darmos just nodded.
"Not gonna miss me?" Jack asked.
"Hmph," Darmos snorted.
"Not even my cooking?"
"… Perhaps the cooking."
Jack laughed as he took out his guild return scroll. "Okay, hope we meet again, mighty one. Don't give the next trial-taker too much trouble, eh?"
"Hm?" Darmos watched Jack disappear after activating the scroll. "Heh, interesting punk," he mumbled.
*
Jack appeared inside Heavenly Citadel's teleportation chamber.
"Why did you call him mighty one?" Peniel asked.
"Oh? You aren't aware? That old draconian is Broidrireg," Jack said.
"Hah? What makes you say that?" Peniel asked.
"It is pretty obvious. Both of them harrumphed a lot and also ridiculously enjoy pranks. The dragon tried to act intimidatingly when we first met him, but once he started having fun, it is pretty easy seeing Darmos in him."
"Hm… now that you mention it."
"Also, after getting close with Darmos, my Influence skill levels up. It is at basic expert now. You said before that this skill's proficiency is gained by increasing the affinity with influential natives, right? I doubt a level 10 old draconian who lived in the middle of nowhere can be considered influential. However, if he is a level 95 eternal-grade divine dragon, now that is a different thing entirely."
"I see. Well, I guess for a dragon of his caliber, disguising into a weak draconian should be a piece of cake," Peniel said. "You are pretty crafty trying to invite him here. You think you can trick him like that to stay here and become a guardian of this place?"
"Hehe, can't blame me for trying."
"So, what are you going to do? Are you going to continue the chain kingdom faction's quest?" Peniel asked.
"Not yet. I still want to strengthen myself first. Or more correctly, my pet, Therras," Jack replied. "Fierce Flame had agreed to take me to the place where she said has the person who can make pet's armor. She is still occupied with a quest, but she said she will return in a few days. So, I will just stay here and farm the legacy dungeon and training caves to increase my level."
Jack went to the Guild Hall. He found Pointy Tip there.
"I was expecting the group of girls here again," Jack said to him. "Or is the lava dragonet matured already so early?"
"The lava dragonet is not yet matured," Tip informed. "But Jeanny and John had worked out an agreement. The girls would only have this platform in the morning and during the dragonet's feeding time. Any other time, it should be handed back to management. Otherwise, how are we supposed to develop this headquarters?"
Jack nodded. "Where is Jeanny?"
"She and a large portion of guild members are currently accompanying Prince Alonzo traveling all around Themisphere."
"Oh… What about that annoying dude?"
"He is with Olddemon, Sturdy Serpent, and a few other members. They are working on an important guild quest. They said the quest reward is a hero token."
"A hero token?"
"Yeah, it's for preparation when our guild levels up. So we don't need to go through the hassle of capturing and challenging a hideout or outpost boss. This quest might take them a few days to complete. Do you need them for anything?"
"Never mind," Jack said. "I'm going to do the legacy dungeon. Do you want any members tagging along? Otherwise, I will just go in alone, no problem."
"Wait, I'll check who is available here first," Tip said.
After a while, he said, "I have sent them messages, eight players will head to the legacy hall. They will meet you there."
"Eight?" Jack asked.
"You need one spot for Arlcard, right?" Tip asked back.
"Oh, right…," Jack said. But he actually didn't plan to do that. He wanted to see how powerful his newly acquired beast form was. But still, it's better to be prudent. He should still leave one spot for Arlcard just in case.
