Chapter 1229 – Hunting Profile: True Dragon

“Oh, I have, and let me tell you, she’s quite something,” Villy said, seeming almost too excited as he prepared himself to tell Jake all about the dragon he’d found for his Chosen to hunt. This thought was only further amplified as the snake god cleared his throat and stood up while looking at Jake with a serious gaze.

“Are you ready?”

“Yes?” Jake exclaimed, very confused.

“Then let the briefing begin,” the Viper grinned as he teleported back behind the sofa and closer to a wall. At the same time, an image appeared on the white wall reading:

Dragon Hunting 101: Choosing the Right Prey

Jake could only stare as the Viper began. He snapped his fingers as the title disappeared and was replaced with bullet points, a picture, and…

“Are you seriously doing a slideshow?” Jake couldn’t resist asking.

“That’s exactly what I’m doing,” the Primordial said, clearly proud of himself. “Now let’s begin.”

“Do we really need a slideshow?” Jake still tried to butt in.

“Yes, now be quiet and let’s get started already,” Villy waved him off and cleared his throat once more, as he even went as far as to shoot a beam of green light out of his finger to mimic a laser pointer.

“Let’s start at the beginning. Dragons are monsters with scales that- “

“Villy,” Jake cut him off, throwing the god a glare.

“Ugh, fine,” the snake god sighed as he started skipping slides. About three dozen slides later, he finally reached the point where this representation would become relevant.

“Here we go, your target. After a lot of research and looking about, I decided on this one as I truly believe she’s someone you’d both find decently challenging and deserving of being hunted down,” the Viper began as he showed a picture of a draconic woman.

“Her name is Yrelstromoz, a former member of the Lumenflight. She’s a few hundred years old and reached full maturity, and became a True Dragon about three decades ago. However, ever since becoming a True Dragon, she’s done nothing more than be a menace to everything and everyone she came across.”

Skipping to the next slide, Villy continued.

“As the daughter of two peak A-grade dragons, she grew up in relative wealth, even by Dragonflight standards. She found herself wanting for nothing, and seeing as both her parents were rather protective, she didn’t get many real-life experiences either, but led a mostly isolated existence.”

Jake instinctively held up his hand, making the Viper nod towards him, allowing the question.

“If she was raised like that, doesn’t it mean she lacks actual combat experience?” Jake asked. He didn’t doubt that dragons were still unbelievably powerful, but if she never learned to fight, he feared the experience wouldn’t be very satisfying.

“Alright, let me just quickly cover that,” the Viper said, skipping forward a few slides more before clearing his throat. “As a member of the Lumenflight who was born a True Dragon, she was put through their rigorous education from a very early age, covering the mastery of magic, combat, and many other important skills. So while it’s true she doesn’t have many life-and-death battles under her belt, she’s still more than capable. From what I gathered, she was even considered relatively gifted growing up, with her parents providing her with extra tutoring. In summary, she knows how to make use of her innate power. At least on paper.”

Jake nodded, finding that knowledge a little relieving. Seeing Jake had gotten his answer, the Viper continued.

“Now let me get to the part that allows you to justify killing her,” Villy said quite bluntly. “First, the sob story. Less than a decade before she became a fully fledged B-grade True Dragon, her parents were both killed in a dungeon. They were trying to break through their wall and reach S-grade, but failed and died for it. This left Yrelstromoz feeling less than happy, especially when she learned why her parents had tried so hard to evolve.”

After rapidly going through a few more slides, the Viper showed a picture of two dragons, one of them looking sad and the other posing proudly.

“While the Lumenflight provides brilliant education to dragons before they are fully grown, after they reach B-grade, it’s mostly up to them to keep progressing. However, if the parents are powerful enough, they can still leverage their influence to assist their whelp. In an attempt to evolve and thus become more influential, her parents desperately tried to push past their limits even if they weren’t capable enough.”

Jake slowly nodded along, still having a very hard time seeing why he would want to hunt down the grieving daughter of two dragons who’d tried to do everything they could for her.

“Some questions for the students! If this happened to you, and your parents died in an attempt to give you a better future, what would your response be?” the Viper asked.

The room got silent for a few moments as Jake genuinely believed the question was rhetorical, but the Viper was just staring at Jake until he raised his hand with a sigh.

“Yes, you, how would you react?” the snake god said, pointing his green laser at Jake.

“I would obviously be sad and then probably want to prove my parents’ efforts weren’t in vain by proving to everyone just how powerful I could become, all with the hope of one day surpassing them?” Jake said, not sure if that was the answer Villy was looking for.

“Interesting,” the Viper nodded. “Yeah, would it surprise you that this wasn’t Yrelstromoz’ reaction? In fact, I would argue her reaction was quite the opposite. After her parents died, the first thing she did was make a fuss about her inheritance. The second thing she did was waste most of this inheritance on useless things. As for trying to get stronger… yeah, fat chance.”

Okay, Jake was beginning to understand she perhaps wasn’t the best of people, but so far, Jake had heard nothing outrageous.

“After evolving to B-grade – something she did merely by being alive – she stopped trying to grow entirely. The power boost from becoming a True Dragon truly went to her head, and she evidently had no desire to progress further from there. In fairness to her, even a newly evolved True Dragon is still a True Dragon, and in the grand scheme of the multiverse, she is indeed powerful and could live a comfortable life if she so desired. I’m not even going to ask if you think she decided to live a quiet life.”

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