Chapter 101: Starvation

Edward looked at the platform and asked: “Why would I be in danger?”

[… because Jörmungandr was always against Ragnarök, even after everything Odin did to him. If he lays here and not in Midgard, it must relate to one of Yggdrasil’s schemes.]

Edward was reluctant to ask more about it after hearing the sorrow in Fenrir’s voice, even if he suspected there was something more to the story.

“I understand. I will avoid him and the second floor, if possible.”

With his investigation leading to mostly nothing new, Edward started walking back towards the dragon city, flipping the coin he had received up and down in his hand.

When the outline of the city appeared over the horizon, Edward’s stamina also recovered. Letting the coin fall into the palm of his hand, he asked: “How do I use this thing?”

He had already seen two different sets of runes on the sides of the coin, but he didn’t understand what any of them meant.

[Insert your mana into one side and activate the runes there. The same way you did with the teleportation talisman.]

Edward chose a random side, and the runes started shining in bright blue light after coming in contact with his mana. The coin turned completely liquid the next moment and covered his body with a shell of water.

He felt no pain or discomfort, but ended up losing his focus for a moment. The next thing he knew, the world all around turned a lot smaller. The tree that was at least twice his size barely reached his knees anymore.

Afraid the dragons will spot him if he stayed too much time in his giant form, he tried to summon the coin again. The moment he did that, he noticed his body turning into water and escaping his form until he was back to his normal size and a small coin was lying on the ground in front of him.

“So it uses my new elemental body spell. It uses mana to make up for the volume difference before materializing it in a fleshly body with increased size.”

Figuring out the process for the increase in size, Edward used his mana on the other side of the coin. His body turned into water completely before a large part of that water started getting absorbed inside the coin. When the process was done, the coin disappeared, and he was standing on a blade of grass the same size as his body.

“Can you hear me, Fenrir?”

[Yes.]

“Alright, just testing. Shouldn’t I be able to do this myself, without the use of this coin?”

[Azure says that form manipulation shouldn’t be available at your class level. Changing your form on your own would only hurt your body after materialization and the damage could be quite serious.]

Happy with the coin’s ability, he returned to his normal size after testing his ability to change form and approached the city. There was no way he was going to walk all the way there in his tiny form.

He got as close as possible without getting spotted in his wolf form before changing his size again. He forced his mana to stop getting absorbed into the coin when he reached the size of a normal rat before rushing inside.

Just to be careful, he still kept close to walls and buildings. He didn’t want to be spotted, but also the possibility of someone intentionally or by mistake stepping on him was terrifying.

Since he was in an unknown place, he had to get as much information as possible, so he rushed towards one of the larger buildings he had noticed from the outside.

Circling around it, he found the door and waited nearby for someone to pass through so that he could get in.

It didn’t take long, and the door opened, allowing Edward to rush inside, passing by the exiting dragon’s foot.

There, he found a vantage point and turned back into a miniature human before carefully studying the place. A few people were walking about, browsing different stalls with live beasts locked into cages.

It took him a few minutes of listening to their conversations to know the place was a food store. They would choose what beast they want to be cooked and the ones working there would take care of the cooking for them.

Using the same method, he walked from place to place, checking everything out. He found a marketplace, some sort of registration building, a promotion building, a spirit-summoning building, and so on.

There were many facilities, not that different from the ones in a normal city, as well as residences for different dragons. The bigger the building, the better the dragon’s status in society.

A few hours of research later, he found a building that piqued his interest. Not even mentioning the fact that it was one of the largest buildings he found until then, he could see even a few guards at the entrance. It was the first place he found that had actual guards.

He used the same route, standing on one side of the building before passing by the guards at the entrance and stepping inside.

He just passed through its doors and understood the purpose of the building immediately. There were two dragons in their true forms, lying down on their enlarged bellies with their eyes closed.

‘So this is a maternity.’

Noticing the dragons were talking to each other, he focused on listening in on their conversation, but he found nothing interesting about their conversation.

Giving up on the maternity, he sneaked back outside and kept exploring. Three days later, just as he was about to enter a building close to the center of the city, he felt his mark burning and stopped in his tracks.

Walking towards a relatively remote corner instead, he canceled his wolf form and asked quietly: “What happened?”

[There is someone extremely strong inside that place. I don’t know if your little coin trick would work. I felt it trying to infiltrate your soul the moment you approached the door.]

“So it found me?”

[I don’t think so, but don’t forget dragons are beings very sensible to soul fluctuations. Since I had to consume his probe, he might figure something was wrong.]

“Yes, but it also means that is probably the best place I could find some information. I’ve been only running into all kinds of different shops and maternities for the last few days.”

Fenrir remained silent for a moment before saying: [I can consume his probe without a problem, but you will probably not have a lot of time before he figures something is wrong. The moment I signal you to leave, you must do so. Also, be ready for anything. This is as risky as it can get.]

Edward nodded and turned back into his wolf form before walking inside the building. He felt nothing different, but also didn’t doubt Fenrir for even a second.

You are reading story Curse of the Mad Wolf at novel35.com

He noticed the inside was full of cages with many beings locked inside, each of them having a guard placed at its door. There were humans, dragons, elves, demi-humans, and even a few viera. What worried him the most were the clear signs of torture present on all of their bodies.

Realizing it was a prison quickly, Edward started rushing along its walls, searching for Circe. After not being able to find Circe anywhere, he didn’t get discouraged because he found a set of stairs going up to another floor.

Worrying he had little time left, he rushed straight for the stairs and reached the second floor. Since he didn’t receive any sign of retreat from Fenrir, he started exploring the second floor as well.

After going through a handful of cages, his body shook briefly, and he froze in front of a small cage to the side.

Circe was tied to the bars of her cage, her head hanging lifelessly and her face covered by her long black hair. Her entire body was exposed, with her clothes all gone and there were wounds all over it, covered by small spots of ice.

‘Master…’

Feeling the space all around her trembling and noticing the curse seep out of her spiritual body, Fenrir panicked and tried to warn Edward, but no matter what she did, it proved useless. He wasn’t reacting at all.

“This idiot. Azure, I’m taking over.”

“I understand. I’ll try to protect him as much as I can.” Replied Azure instantly.

Fenrir nodded and closed her eyes. Her spiritual body blurred for a brief second before returning to normal. A muffled groan sounded throughout the space and her front legs buckled under her massive body.

Azure didn’t expect this and floated in front of Fenrir’s head before asking: “What happened?”

Fenrir opened her eyes again and looked at the chaos energy seeping out of her body: “I don’t know… he pushed me out of his body before I could take over.”

“This has never happened before.”

“Something changed, Azure. The curse has changed.”, muttered Fenrir in a worried tone as she observed the events outside.

While Fenrir and Azure were speaking inside Edward’s soul space, back inside the dragon prison, chaos energy was seeping out of Edward’s body and slowly covering his miniature wolf form. His eyes were completely black, and there was a trace of unconstrained madness inside them.

Edward didn’t move at all, but the entire prison started shaking, with the dragons and the prisoners on the second floor turning towards the gray mass of energy that appeared in the room.

The energy was slowly growing, and so did the number of dragons. Not long after all the guards were on the second floor, they parted ways and let an old-looking man pass by.

The old man approached the mass of chaos energy with a frown on his face as he asked the closest guard to him: “What happened?”

The guard shook his head and said: “We don’t know, ancestor. That thing appeared out of nowhere.”

The one called ancestor continued watching the mass of energy with the same frown and asked: “Who are you?” He could feel a soul inside, but no matter how much he tried to probe that soul, it was like his probe would enter a bottomless pool.

The mass of energy started taking form not long after the ancestor’s words. The first thing to materialize was a pair of complete black eyes. Looking at those black eyes, the ancestor took a step back and fire mana started circling his body.

Looking at the wolf form the energy took and the prisoner behind it, the dragon ancestor had a good idea who the intruder was.

The wolf blinked once after its body took form. A slow and confused voice sounded throughout the second floor next: “Who - am - I?”

Hearing no answer, the wolf tilted its head to the side and stared at the ancestor before asking again: “Who - am - I?”

The ancestor was terrified by the wolf’s eyes and voice and threw a fireball at it in panic. The fireball passed through the wolf’s head, obliterating it along with the wall behind, before disappearing far off into the distance.

Tendrils of grey energy left the still-standing body and a new head appeared, replacing the old one. The wolf didn’t seem to even notice the previous attack as he looked around at all the dragons in the room.

They were all creeping back, terrified expressions on their faces. The ancestor was the only one who stood his ground.

Once the wolf’s eyes landed on the cage Circe was in, it stopped. It paused for a long time, in which not even the ancestor dared to make a move, and his voice resounded again.

“I - remember.”

Chaos energy enveloped the wolf’s body, changing its form until Edward’s human body appeared in the prison hall.

He lifted his head up and took a deep breath of air before lowering it again. There was a smile on his lips and his eyes were just as black as the wolf’s.

“The old is back anew.”

“The souls had changed.”

“The times had changed.”

“The worlds had changed.”

“But I remained.”

Licking his lips slowly, he fixed his eyes back on the ancestor in front of him and his smile grew even larger.

“And I am always hungry.”

You can find story with these keywords: Curse of the Mad Wolf, Read Curse of the Mad Wolf, Curse of the Mad Wolf novel, Curse of the Mad Wolf book, Curse of the Mad Wolf story, Curse of the Mad Wolf full, Curse of the Mad Wolf Latest Chapter