Chapter 82: Chapter 75 – Hatching (Stage 3)

Something woke Moira. She was comfortable, and didn’t want to get up. It was light out, but it’d been light out when she went to sleep. That wasn’t what had woken her.

Loneliness

It stabbed through her, and suddenly she was completely awake. Lancaster was still asleep next to her as she tried to figure out where the feeling came from.

All Alone

It had to be Serenity. She pulled on some clothes and grabbed her backpack. Her bedroll could stay right where it was; she’d wake Lancaster if she tried to move it, and she probably wouldn’t need it anyway.

The Great Dungeon entrance wasn’t far, so she hurried and selected the fifth floor.

The egg was right where she’d left it. It was undisturbed except that Rissa was asleep, curled up next to it, facing the egg. She didn’t even have her bedroll out; it looked like she’d just sat there next to the egg until she fell over from exhaustion.

Moira smiled. It was good to see that Rissa cared. Sometimes she wasn’t sure about her.

Not Alone?

Not alone.

Moira rummaged around in Rissa’s bag until she found her bedroll. She wasn’t sure how long this would take, but it was already chilly. She sat on the opposite side of the egg from Rissa and spread the bedroll over the three of them.

She was very tired. The ground was hard, but-

Moira fell back asleep.

---

Serenity woke up, alone in the darkness.

There was nothing around him and no one nearby. He was surrounded by blackness, and unlike all other darkness he’d been in recently, he couldn’t see through it. It was like the world just ended a bit beyond his reach.

Had he dreamed of going back in time? He didn’t like the life of the Final Reaper. Dreaming of a time when it wasn’t that way only made it worse.

No, it wasn’t a dream. It couldn’t be.

Just beyond the darkness, there was someone.

He wasn’t alone. It wasn’t a dream.

He could prove it to himself.

He started trying to find out what he was, other than “dragon”. He’d seen hundreds of variants of “dragons” in his vision of the Dragon Conclave, after all.

Two arms, two legs. His skin felt weird, hard and slightly segmented, sort of like scales. That seemed right. His head was different. Longer. To be expected of a dragon, he guessed. Different ears, he’d need to see them to be sure what they looked like. No horns, but he did seem to have a slight ridge on the top of his head.

Further back - OUCH. He’d snagged one of his wings with his claws. He froze for a moment, then reminded himself he was a dragon. Of course he had claws and wings. The wings did feel a bit odd. They didn’t feel like his skin - scales? They felt almost fuzzy?

Well, whatever.

Tail, of course, though it seemed a bit short. He was in an egg, so it must grow later.

So. Not a dream, unless it was still happening. He should go over his new Path in detail.

Current Path

Death-Eater

Not a Path the Final Reaper ever had, but it’s the one I remember choosing as Serenity. It’s not a dream.

Level 10 - Loot Core - teleports a monster core from touched monster body to the user. Usable on any dead monster with a core. Costs mana.

That’s both really basic and awesome at the same time. Even beyond the time savings and removing any chance of damaging the core trying to get it out, it doesn’t damage the monster at all. That means everything possible to salvage will still be salvageable. More useful on some things than others, but even the time savings is useful. Makes sense for this to show up in a racial package based on a monster, I guess.

Level 25 - Basic Draconic Shapeshift - An adult dragon is a force to behold, but there are many places they simply can’t go. Young dragons are commonly taught to take on another form, often humanoid, to fit in small places and interact with non-dragons. A skill normally gained much later in life, you get a basic version of it now since you don’t get Species abilities. Lucky you!

You can shift between your Draconic base form and your True Chimera form. Costs mana to shift.

I see the Voice is both descriptive and snarky. Well, I guess it’s my fault for asking for “additional information”. This looks insanely useful, and future variants of it should be even better, if I can get them. No maintenance cost, either. That means it’ll probably cost to shift both directions, but that’s completely worth it.

Level 50 - Deathstrike - Infuse your body or weapons with Death energy to deal additional damage. Costs Stamina.

A bread-and-butter skill for a melee warrior. Not much to see here, but it’s good to have. I wonder why it’s part of a racial package?

Level 75 - Resilience of the Dead - Slightly increased resistance to certain status alterations

If that’s what I think it is, that’s incredible. Temperature and many of the mental effects, probably. Unless it’s resistance to status alterations commonly imposed by undead? That would be useful, too.

Level 100 - Eat Death - absorb Death energy found within the Death Eater’s aura. Absorption based on Affinity. Intensity of absorption can be varied but the ability cannot be completely disabled. Absorbed Death energy may be consumed or used to restore mana or stamina.

You are reading story After the End: Serenity at novel35.com

Note: Until your Death Aspect is healed, it will draw from your absorption aura and will take precedence over all other uses. The intensity cannot be reduced.

That’s clearly the ability I need to heal my Death Aspect. Hm. Can I use it yet?

Serenity checked his Status.

Damaged. Ick. At least it says Healing. It also hurts a lot less than that strained Time Aspect. That’s odd.

I’m only fifty XP short of being able to use the capstone ability, so that should be fast. And then I can choose a Path I want.

I wonder how my Death Affinity increased so much. Maybe something to do with how I unlocked my Aspect? Or is it because of my new Species? Strange. Seems like a good thing.

I wonder what I look like.

Wait, why does it say unhatched?

Is that why I can’t see any farther? Am I inside an egg?

Serenity made himself stretch a little, and he hit a hard barrier.

Just a little more.

He stretched himself more, and found that he could reach the hard barrier in two directions. He braced himself against one and punched at the other.

He could see light coming in through cracks, but it didn’t come apart. It seemed very bright, compared to the complete darkness he’d been in. He rubbed at the crack, and felt a film which seemed to come apart as he scraped with his talons.

He felt heavier and realized his weight was now on his legs, instead of floating.

He punched the eggshell again. It cracked more and more, letting more fluid out. It was easier each time. He could smell the outside, a little. It smelled like … Rissa and Moira? How could he tell it was them?

Dragons must have better senses. Get out of this shell, worry about being a bloodhound later.

He finally punched a big enough hole to squeeze out the side, towards the light he could see. There was also a cooler breeze that way.

He took a step, then another, and fell over. He’d tripped over something soft, but he was too tired to look.

He was tired. Very tired.

---

Serenity woke up to the sound of laughter. Something - no, someone - was cuddling against him. It was warm and comfortable, but he was awake now. He felt a lot more aware than he had earlier.

There was light coming from the side, and he was pretty sure he was completely under a blanket or maybe one of the bedrolls. He worked his way to the top and looked out. It seemed to be an awfully long way to the exit. He wasn’t much shorter than one of the bedrolls, but he had to travel several feet to look out.

The person laughing was Echo, and the moment she saw him, she glanced at Lancaster and started laughing harder. Serenity wasn’t sure what was funny. There didn’t seem to be anything weird about Lancaster.

“Whrfr sti?” That definitely didn’t come out right. Serenity tried again. “Whhso kee?” That wasn’t any better.

Echo was sitting on the ground, laughing so hard there were tears coming from her eyes. Something had to be funny, but-

Maybe he wasn’t as awake as he’d thought. He’d forgotten he wasn’t human anymore. Which probably meant that he was very short. That would explain the bedroll. He hadn’t expected a dragon to be small - oh.

Hatchling. Argh.

That would change with time or maybe Tiers. For now, though - what did that ability say? There was a reason he’d been willing to accept this.

Level 25 - Basic Draconic Shapeshift - An adult dragon is a force to behold, but there are many places they simply can’t go. Young dragons are commonly taught to take on another form, often humanoid, to fit in small places and interact with non-dragons. A skill normally gained much later in life, you get a basic form of it now since you don’t get Species abilities. Lucky you!

You can shift between your Draconic base form and your True Chimera form. Costs mana.

He hoped his “True Chimera form” would be what he needed.

He ducked back under the covers to use the skill. It was fast, but it took about a quarter of his mana. That was fine. It wasn’t like he’d be shifting back into a baby dragon any time soon.

Serenity moved so that he could look out from under the covers again and looked around. This time, the bedroll wasn’t that much longer than he was tall, so at least he didn’t seem to be really short in his True Chimera form.

Rissa was still asleep next to him, and Moira was sitting up with her legs under the bedroll. She did seem to be fully dressed, at least. Which brought up the next issue.

“Does anyone know where my pants are?” At least he could talk now.

Echo wasn’t even laughing anymore, she was laying flat on her back, gasping for air. Whenever she got a good breath, it came out as a laugh.

“Echo? Breathe. It’s not that funny.”

“Y-Yes. Yes it is. Hahahahaaaa!”