Warlock Apprentice

Chapter 3205: Chapter 3206: Pink Red Stork Dragon

”I hate people who only say half of what they’re going to say.” The head on Baba Ragon’s left let out a disdainful female voice.

”I don’t like them either.” A milky, childish voice came from Baba Ragon’s main head.

”Actually, I also...” The buzz only got halfway before suddenly stopping. ”Wait, the Mist seems a bit thinner. Huh?! Look ahead, is that the statue Shi Zhong mentioned?”

Baba Ragon’s main head and left head both looked straight ahead.

The Mist was indeed, as the right head said, much thinner now; because of that, they could see a Exotic Beast statue standing not far in front of them.

According to Shi Zhong, the first statue Baba Ragon would run into was a statue of a Draconic Beast hatchling.

But this statue looked neither like a Draconic Beast, nor like a hatchling.

The statue was about five meters tall, pink in color. Overall it looked on the lean side, with its long, slender legs taking up nearly three-fifths of its height, so visually it didn’t seem that huge.

It had an ostrich-like body, thick and fluffy, its pink feathers gleaming like jade. One of its wings was spread, the other folded; the spread wing was extremely wide, every pink feather vivid and lifelike.

Its neck was swan-like, slender and covered in fine down.

Its head, however, was a downwards-pointing triangular snake head, and in its brown eyes you could clearly see a vertical slit pupil.

In Baba Ragon’s view, this was just a somewhat neither-here-nor-there Beast statue, very far from the ”dragon” image in its mind.

But from Angel’s perspective outside the Miniature Garden, this Beast Species was actually very well-known. At least in the Southern Domain, it was quite famous.

—The Pink Stork Dragon.

This was a Abyss Magical Beast carrying a faint trace of Dragon Blood. Though the dragon blood was thin, its own Bloodline was actually very powerful.

The dominant Bloodline in its body was that of the pink stork, also called... flamingo.

Flamingos are born able to control flames; they are extremely ferocious and highly aggressive, and what’s more, before they die they can burn their own blood to obtain a Talent etched at the edge of life and death: Deathflame Ignition.

Once Deathflame Ignition is triggered, a flamingo’s burning power increases dramatically, and it can combine with any kind of gaseous flame, causing a terrifying explosion.

In other words, at the final moment of a flamingo’s life, it turns into a ”walking powder keg”—whoever lights the fuse goes down with it.

The ferocity of their nature is obvious.

Moreover, flamingos are gregarious Magical Creatures. Just imagine, a single powder keg can already blow the sky apart; a whole flock of powder kegs bombarding you... that’s basically a death sentence.

In the Abyss, even Demons rarely dare provoke flamingos.

This, in turn, shows that flamingos are far from weak.

The Pink Stork Dragon perfectly inherited the unyielding temper of flamingos and the innate powers of the Abyssal Dragon. Though it’s ”just” a Draconic Beast, once it grows up, it won’t be much worse than a true dragon.

The Pink Stork Dragon is famous in the Wizards’ Realm because once, two Pink Stork Dragons charged into the Stronghold City opened by the Blood Origin Alliance—Aisha Underground City.

In that ”Underground City Defense War,” the two Pink Stork Dragons were eventually driven off, but nearly one-third of Aisha Underground City’s territory was destroyed.

Most importantly, at the time, a Second Level True Knowledge Wizard stepped in and killed one of the Pink Stork Dragons. As a result, that Pink Stork Dragon entered Deathflame Ignition, blew up a huge swath of buildings, and then actually underwent Resurrection. Though it became very frail, it was still rescued by the other Pink Stork Dragon...

This stunned all the Wizards present.

The flamingo’s Deathflame Ignition is a mutual-destruction ability; once they use it, flamingos are doomed to die. But after that Pink Stork Dragon used Deathflame Ignition, it actually rose from the ashes and came back to life!

In that one battle it earned the title of ”Undying”!

This Resurrection ability naturally stirred the Wizards’ greed, so plenty of Wizards who thought themselves strong set their sights on hunting Pink Stork Dragons. Whether they succeeded or not is another story, but the feud between Pink Stork Dragons and Southern Domain Wizards was set in stone. Whenever they meet a Pink Stork Dragon in the Abyss, things basically never end peacefully.

Before Angel went to the Abyss, Madeline had warned him: if he ran into a Pink Stork Dragon, he must avoid it.

Even True Knowledge Wizards are unwilling to face a Pink Stork Dragon whose temper is explosive, whose first reaction is to go straight into Deathflame, and who can still come back through Resurrection afterwards.

You could say that although the Pink Stork Dragon is a Draconic Beast, dealing with it is far more troublesome than dealing with many Abyssal Dragons.

The Pink Stork Dragon statue Baba Ragon was facing now was indeed a ”hatchling,” because an adult Pink Stork Dragon is at least twenty or thirty meters tall. On this point, Shi Zhong hadn’t lied.

Still, Shi Zhong had told Baba Ragon to accept the statue’s trial—so what exactly would this trial be?

Surely it couldn’t be having Baba Ragon fight the statue, right?

If that really was the case, Angel might as well light a candle for Baba Ragon... Even as a hatchling, a Pink Stork Dragon is not to be underestimated; Deathflame Ignition doesn’t distinguish between young and adult.

With strong curiosity, Angel waited for the ”trial” to begin.

Finally, when Baba Ragon approached the statue, the Pink Stork Dragon began to glow with a bright light; the Fairyland Information unique to the Immortal Realm also drifted out from the Pink Stork Dragon, its target pointing straight at Baba Ragon.

The moment Angel sensed the Fairyland prompt, he immediately activated the Fairyland Authority to analyze it.

The conclusion he got was:

”The Pink Stork Dragon’s trial will begin when the ten-second countdown ends.”

”The Challenger must stand within the area covered by the Light to further confirm whether to begin.”

”Current countdown: 10 seconds.”

”Current countdown: 9 seconds.”

”Current countdown: 8 seconds.”

”...”

The implication of this Fairyland prompt was to tell Baba Ragon that the statue wouldn’t force the trial. It would give a ten-second countdown. If he left the area illuminated by the Light within ten seconds, the trial would be aborted.

But the Fairyland prompt still didn’t clearly state what exactly the trial was.

Angel could only keep waiting.

Baba Ragon also saw the Fairyland prompt in his mind. Not only did he not step out of the Light’s range, he even moved closer to the Pink Stork Dragon, war intent flickering in his eyes.

Clearly, Baba Ragon and Angel had the same guess; he also thought the trial would be a battle with the Pink Stork Dragon.

He didn’t know what the Pink Stork Dragon’s abilities were, nor did he know how strong it was, but he wasn’t afraid; this was both confidence and arrogance... However, Baba Ragon clearly forgot that in reality he might still have some right to be arrogant, but in the Crystal Origin of Dreams, he wasn’t much stronger than an ordinary Indigenous People.

Soon, the ten-second countdown reached its final moments.

When the countdown hit zero, Baba Ragon felt the environment around him change in a flash. Not only was there no Mist in the sky, he was no longer on the rubble-strewn ground, but inside a huge cave.

The cave was very spacious, and very quiet.

So quiet that he could hear the clack-clack-clack of footsteps!

Baba Ragon raised his head warily, looking toward the source of the footsteps. In the darkness, a pink silhouette was slowly walking toward him...

...

”What just happened?” Angel stared blankly at the scene inside the Miniature Garden.

The ten–second countdown had already ended, so where was the trial?

From Angel’s point of view, Baba Ragon was standing stock–still, and apart from the glow, there was nothing unusual about the statue.

Neither the statue nor Baba Ragon showed any fluctuations of Fairyland prompts.

Which meant that even if Angel wanted to forcibly stop things, there was nothing he could do.

What on earth was going on?

Just as Angel was puzzled, he suddenly noticed Baba Ragon slowly closing its eyes, peaceful as if slipping into a sweet, beautiful dream.

Seeing this, Angel thought of a possibility: could this so–called statue trial actually be taking place in a deeper layer of dream, or in a Consciousness Space?

Angel didn’t know whether his guess was correct; he could only keep staring at Baba Ragon.

Time ticked by, second by second.

A quarter of an hour later, Angel finally noticed something ”discordant” on Baba Ragon’s body—a very subtle strand of Fairyland Information emerged and stayed hovering near the brow of the main head.

Without any hesitation, he immediately invoked the Authority to observe this newly appeared information.

Before long, the information resolved.

A single, very simple line: ”Completion: 1%.”

Just as he finished parsing this strand of information, new Fairyland Information appeared: ”Completion: 7%.”

Seeing this changing number, Angel was finally sure his guess was right: Baba Ragon was indeed undergoing a trial in some plane of Consciousness Space.

Otherwise, how could a completion–percentage prompt appear out of nowhere?

Only if Baba Ragon were in the middle of a trial, with the trial still ongoing, would the completion percentage keep changing.

According to what Shi Zhong had said before, Baba Ragon had to push the trial’s completion to 80% for it to count as a clear.

Although Angel had confirmed his guess, what annoyed him was that he couldn’t see what Baba Ragon’s trial actually was... who knew when it would reach 80%, hey?!

Moreover, he had no idea whether there was any danger in the trial Baba Ragon was experiencing.

After all, trials in Consciousness Space were completely different from other kinds of trials.

The individual existences in the Crystal Origin of Dreams and the Wilderness of Dreams were all driven by memory and consciousness. If something went wrong, it could even affect reality.

Angel hesitated... should he try to contact Baba Ragon?

If he contacted it now, would Baba Ragon, in its current conscious state, even receive the message?

And should he keep waiting here? Or go to the Ability Tree and run a keyword search to confirm whether this trial was safe?

Just as Angel was wavering, Baba Ragon, standing before the statue, suddenly opened its eyes.

”What’s going on, did I fail? Completion only 20%?” the milky little voice yelped.

”I clearly tried very hard to comprehend it, how come the progress is so low?” the female voice from the left head finished, then looked to the right head: ”You were spacing out the whole time just now. Couldn’t you at least help with the comprehension?”

”I was trying to comprehend too... but I couldn’t grasp anything at all!” The right head let out a buzzing sound, rebutting while sighing helplessly: ”Why does the statue trial have to be about comprehension? My brain’s no good. I’d rather just fight it head–on.”

”Speak for yourself, don’t lump me in with your bad brain.” said the main head and the left head in unison.

The right head huffed, ”Then what do you want to do now? Go back in and keep taking the trial?”

The female voice from the left head said, ”Didn’t Shi Zhong say we only have three chances? We should be a bit cautious. How about we take a breather first?”

The main head said, ”Resting is fine, but if we don’t pass the trial, we can’t activate the title, and without the title we can’t leave this damned place... If we’re going to rest, it’ll have to be right here.”

The right head said, ”Actually, we can also choose to go Offline.”

The left head immediately shot that down: ”No, going Offline now would be chickening out.”

The main head chimed in with a milky voice, ”Exactly. Luigi gave us the Log–in Device, so he most likely wanted me to enter this Dragon Tomb. If I can’t even clear the first statue... I can already hear Luigi’s mocking laughter in my head.”

After a round of bickering between the three heads, they finally decided not to go Offline, but to take a break first.

They would digest what they’d just managed to comprehend, then take the next trial.

Once Baba Ragon had settled on its tactic, it stepped back slightly, out of the statue’s Light, then closed its eyes to rest...

Angel saw all of this.

As for Baba Ragon’s ”Luigi arranged for it to come explore the Dragon Tomb,” that was a complete misunderstanding. Even Luigi himself had no idea this bizarre Mist Isle Dragon Tomb instance would appear.

Putting that misunderstanding aside, just going by Baba Ragon’s three–headed dialogue, the trial it was going through seemed to be testing ”comprehension ability.”

If it was a comprehension–based trial, then it probably wouldn’t damage its consciousness.

But as for actually clearing it, that was another story.

After all, comprehension is a rather mysterious thing.

...

Angel gave Baba Ragon one last look, then withdrew his vision from the Miniature Garden.

Based on the information at hand, the Dragon Tomb did not currently seem to pose any major danger. But that was only a provisional judgment; he would still have to run an information search later before making a final call.

As for Baba Ragon’s side, there shouldn’t be any problems in the short term; it’s just that clearing the first statue might be a bit tough.

The first attempt had only yielded 20% completion, and it only had two trial chances left. Reaching 80% would not be easy.

If this were Tomorrow Town, Uriel’s Choice... that kind of instance, Angel could still ”cheat” from outside.

But now, with this sort of ”consciousness trial,” he didn’t even know what form the trial took, much less how to help.

Still, just because Angel couldn’t cheat from the outside didn’t mean he had no way to help Baba Ragon.

The simplest and most direct method was to have Kukurus or Luskania enter the Mist Isle Dragon Tomb.

Those two were Cave Dragons—dragon species—perfectly matching the conditions for entering the Dragon Tomb.

They’d definitely have no problem getting in. As long as they could rendezvous with Baba Ragon and then tackle the challenges together, discussing things as they went, they should be able to clear it.

It was just that, right now, two questions lay before him:

Was Kukurus willing to enter the Dragon Tomb?

And once Baba Ragon saw Kukurus, would it really be willing to join forces with him to tackle the trial?