CHAPTER 124: RESONANCE

"Eh? Cough... didn’t I say I exchanged it with equal value?"

Lucien said, coughing a little awkwardly. To be honest, he was also a little surprised that he got such a rare thing just like that.

But he thought that it might be because of the increased favorability stat he gained through Debt Collection.

Although he couldn’t say that to his grandfather.

"Equal value? Are you nuts?"

Sure enough, hearing what Lucien said, Malcom rolled his eyes dramatically.

"You brat, you don’t know how much value this has outside. Do you believe that if the news spread that you hold this thing in your hand, how many people will try to kill you?"

Malcom said, clearly telling Lucien the worth of the dragon blood.

"Forget it. There is no point discussing this anyway. You managed to get it, that’s enough."

Seeing that Lucien was scrunching his nose in annoyance, Malcolm felt that he was a bit too much and dropped the issue.

"I heard you have a secret technique to strengthen your physique. Is that true?"

Instead, Malcom suddenly asked something that was conveyed to him by Velmara before.

He heard Lucien wanted the dragon blood to enhance his physique. He wanted to know whether it was a hoax or the truth.

"Hmm? Yeah, I think so."

There was nothing to hide as Lucien nodded immediately.

"But, it isn’t something that I can share. You can think of it like an exclusive skill of sorts."

Still, he immediately told his difficulty in case grandpa was trying to gain the technique from him.

It wasn’t that he didn’t want to share, but that he couldn’t.

The A rank technique, Dragon King’s Physique, was a passive skill he gained from Zeyvyr after all. He couldn’t just share.

"Okay, no need to explain. I don’t need your technique."

Malcolm was annoyed that his grandson had to explain like this. He wasn’t some stingy old man who would look at his juniors’ treasures covetously.

"Tell me this, is it true that you can refine dragon blood? Are you telling the truth?"

He asked again, as that was the main point here. So, after asking, he couldn’t help but look at his face closely as if trying to spot lies.

"Yeah, why would I lie about that? Just...refining the blood of a Weaver rank dragon might be hard."

Lucien said lightly.

He already noticed something odd about these questions, and from how high-ranking a dragon was in this world, he already understood why Malcolm was concerned about this thing.

"Oh? Then, why don’t you show me?"

Sure enough, just because he said so, Malcolm didn’t believe him. Instead, he suddenly signalled Lucien to sit down right at his place, intending to see live whether he was bluffing.

"Don’t worry, I will dilute the blood enough that it won’t do you any harm. Just sit down and calm your thoughts."

Malcolm saw Lucien’s confused look and reassured him before paying attention to the crimson tube in his hand.

Then, in Lucien’s surprised gaze, he suddenly exerted light force, directly shattering the glass tube in the process.

"Swoosh!"

As soon as he thought that, the situation inside the Dimensional Vault suddenly changed.

When the blood was inside the seemingly fragile glass tube, Lucien didn’t feel much.

But when those drops of blood exited the confined space they were in, getting exposed in the air, a heavy, suffocating pressure descended everywhere out of nowhere.

And unlike the pressure he felt from Zeyvyr, which was measured, this was a wild aura ready to destroy everything in its path.

Heck, it was so overwhelming that Lucien could even see the blood itself trying to writhe and spread of its own accord, as though it carried an instinctive desire to plunge everything into chaos.

Not to mention the blood inside his body boiling uncontrollably without his approval. In just a second, Lucien was already feeling dizzy and nauseous.

"Condense!"

Fortunately, Malcolm reacted in time, quickly confining the blood in his magic and calming its violent nature.

"Hmmnnn!"

But just when Lucien breathed a sigh of relief, another thing happened that not only managed to surprise Lucien, but even Malcolm and Velmara at his side.

That was because, just as the dragon blood lost its violent nature due to Malcolm, suddenly they felt a faint hum from the far corner of the Dimensional Vault.

And that far corner was the same place where Lucien saw that massive dragon before.

Just, now that he turned to look at it, he saw the faint mist around the dragon separating on its own, revealing its massive body pulsing gently with mana.

And along with it, the blood in the confines in front was also vibrating at the same frequency.

"Is it resonating with this blood?"

Lucien couldn’t help but say aloud, finding the situation weird. After all, the dragon in front was already dead for who knew how long, and it couldn’t possibly be able to sense the blood.

So, he thought, it was some kind of resonance of their same origin, which made sense.

"Resonance? It seems so."

Malcolm, who saw the whole situation, heard Lucien and faintly whispered. But his eyes, that were calm before, were clearly a little excited as if he had discovered something different.

In fact, even Velmara was clearly a little bit excited.

"Hey, wait a minute... grandpa, didn’t you say that this dragon was a juvenile dragon? What realm is it at?"

However, Lucien’s attention was elsewhere as he suddenly remembered something from their talk before.

Now that he thought carefully, Malcolm indeed said that the dragon in front was a juvenile one.

But Lucien could clearly feel now from its aura that it was far more powerful than Zeyvyr.

’Didn’t that mean Zeyvyr is a juvenile dragon too?’

He couldn’t help but have doubts. Due to the human standard of power here, he had automatically thought Zeyvyr an adult because of his high realm.

But now that he thought about it, if he was a juvenile dragon, it made sense for his childish behavior of hunting gems and sparkling things, didn’t it?

"He was in the realm of the Lord when he was hunted down. Why do you ask?"

Malcolm lightly replied and looked at him, finally realizing what he was thinking.

"Oh, did you think you met an adult dragon?"

Malcolm said, understanding Lucien completely.

After all, his grandson’s realm was too low, and he couldn’t discern high power without a proper comparison.

So, he just lightly explained while simultaneously letting the drop of blood in his hand hover, clearly ready to refine it for Lucien.

"Dragons and humans are inherently different. I hate to say this, but humans are the worst species in terms of their beginning."

He explained and lightly waved his hand, taking out a huge calabash filled to the brim with spiritual water of unknown origin.

Then, he spilled the spiritual water on the few drops of blood, causing them to absorb it voraciously, thereby creating a faint silhouette of a crimson river in front.

"An adult dragon starts at the minimum of the High Sovereign realm. I doubt they can come into this broken world now."

The more the blood absorbed the spiritual water, the more Malcolm poured out of the calabash, increasing a few drops of blood into a long crimson river shimmering with vitality.

But Lucien could clearly feel that in the process, the aura that had been so strong before became less and less, until even the faint resonance from the far corner disappeared.

It seemed Malcolm was clearly reducing the potency of the dragon blood to allow Lucien to absorb it safely.

"Dragons are darlings of nature after all. They are believed to be the progenitors of mana and spells. They cannot be fathomed with common sense."

As Malcolm prepared the blood, he faintly taught Lucien what he knew.

"Actually, it seems that even in the World of Origin, dragons have a very high status. In fact, this so-called Shadow Kingdom is being played around by a juvenile dragon named Ragnar. You can see how powerful they are."

He said, faintly suggesting how lucky Lucien was to meet one and even strike a deal. Not everyone had such luck, even when this world was intact before.

"Okay, this is enough. Let’s start the absorption now. If I dilute it further, the effect might be compromised."

Malcolm suddenly said while putting the calabash back into his ring.

He then lightly waved his hand, regulating his mana, gathering all the river of beautiful crimson liquid into a giant bottle.

Lucien could see that although the volume had increased countless times, the blood didn’t seem different from before.

Only the aura and violence it had shown before were totally gone now.

"Okay, I am ready."

Lucien was already sitting on the floor and regulating his breathing.

After all, the Dragon King’s Physique was a passive skill, and he didn’t need to do anything at all, at least as far as the information he received from the system.

"Hmm... then let’s start with a small portion. Try to absorb this."

Malcolm nodded, looked a little serious, and came close to Lucien, giving him a small flask filled with diluted blood.

To be honest, he was still doubtful that Lucien could absorb it. After all, he knew that without a special physique, it was nigh impossible to do this.

But he didn’t remember Lucien awakening anything like that before. That’s why he was so cautious.

"Okay."

But to his surprise, Lucien didn’t seem to care and grabbed the flask from his hand, then directly chugged down the whole blood into his mouth as if he were drinking booze.

"What..."

"What are you doing?"

The incident was so absurd that both Malcolm and Velmara looked terrified at Lucien’s reckless behaviour.

They thought Lucien was going to absorb the liquid bit by bit like a mana stone, but he directly gulped it down his stomach, drinking it like water.

Was this really how you were supposed to absorb things?

"Hmm? What do you mean? Isn’t this how you absorb the blood?"