A Dragon against the Whole World

Chapter 291: Chapter 262: Adaptive Niche

The wind and snow scattered, falling quietly.

A massive white beast landed among the small dragons, adopting a superior posture, looking down at the surroundings with a condescending gaze.

The young Blue Dragon remained calm.

”White...”

The Green Young Dragon and Black Young Dragon instinctively wanted to express their discontent.

However, when they raised their heads and saw Trish’s massive body over sixteen meters tall, and felt the biting winter breath, all words got stuck in their throats.

Both small dragons simultaneously stepped back half a step and turned their gaze to the Red Dragon Kahill.

This companion, who had always been the most unruly.

”White scales?!”

Kahill, as expected, bristled with scales.

The prejudice rooted in her bloodline made her speak impulsively: ”Just a white scale, worthy of being our Nurturer?”

She deliberately emphasized the two words ”white scale.”

The Dragon’s Kiss parted, revealing sharp white fangs, and sparks sputtered from her nostrils, instantly vaporizing the snowflakes that fell on her scales.

Discontent, disdain.

Such emotions were apparent, undisguised.

Hiss... Kahill is still as brave as ever...

The eyes of the Green Dragon slightly narrowed, its Dragon Claw quietly scraping the ground as it moved backward, shielding the Red Dragon Kahill, while subtly nudging the Black Dragon with its tail.

As the most adept at assessing situations among the Five-Colored Dragons, he had already foreseen the impending tragedy.

The nudging of the Black Dragon was due to the Green Dragon’s natural inclination to influence and control other creatures.

The Black Dragon reacted slightly slower, but under the Green Dragon’s reminder, it also realized what was happening, retreating quietly and joining the Green Dragon to protect the Red Dragon in front.

At this moment, the White Dragon Trish did not immediately rage.

She first turned to the quietly standing Red Iron Dragon Galos, completing a series of subtle posture adjustments in the process: tucked wings fitting neatly against her sides, raised head lowered at a fifteen-degree angle, and even the tip of her tail curling obediently.

Like snow melting under the scorching sun, naturally and smoothly lowering her ecological niche.

Smooth, seamless.

Thought the White Dragon.

When facing a high-niche strong being.

It’s better to lower your ecological niche proactively than to be humiliated and forced to do so later.

[Dynamic Niche Theory]

[Point Two: Proactively lowering your niche in the face of an absolute superior gives a survival advantage over being forced to submit.]

This was a line of thought Trish derived based on dynamic niche theory.

She was prepared to gradually perfect this theory and then compile it, either placing it in her legacy in the future or using the surrounding small dragons as her initial teaching subjects, letting them comprehend the essence of niche.

Under the White Dragon Trish’s gaze, Galos did not say much, maintaining a tacit attitude.

Back then, when his younger sister Samantha had recklessly provoked the big dragon in her weakness and was harshly defeated by the White Dragon Trish, he did not intervene.

Now, with the Red Dragon Kahill provocatively acting, he would even less likely stop the White Dragon’s upcoming actions.

If Trish wanted to manage these small dragons well, she first needed to establish her authority.

Moreover, a young dragon speaking disrespectfully without understanding the power disparity indeed needed to be taught a lesson.

Galos’s tacit consent was as if a silent decree.

The White Dragon turned back, gazing at Kahill again.

As she turned, she straightened her head and chest, her entire dragon aura climbing like a thawing glacier.

”Youngling, repeat what you just called me.”

The White Dragon, with an aloof and dangerous demeanor, did not get angry but coldly laughed as she spoke to Kahill.

”White scale! White-skinned monster! White Dragon beast!”

With every insulting word Kahill uttered, the muscles under her scales tensed further.

The pride belonging to the Red Dragon made her incapable of understanding what assessing the situation meant.

The disdain for the White Dragon in her inherited memory translated entirely into a fighting spirit at this moment.

”A most inferior kind of dragon dares to...”

Whoosh! Bang!

A blast of cold wind came, followed by the White Dragon’s massive claw striking down hard on Kahill.

Kahill didn’t even have time to raise her forelimb for defense before her entire dragon body was struck like a ragdoll, being flung out, plowing a trench over thirty meters long into the snow.

The previously barely-scabbed wounds on the young Red Dragon all burst open, the hot Dragon Blood scalding the snow, releasing sizzling white vapor.

”Vile White Dragon!”

The young Red Dragon roared, climbing to her feet.

Ignoring her injuries, she smashed the ground with her claws, spreading her Dragon Wings as her body shot toward the white dragon like a cannonball, but the White Dragon just sneered, standing silently where she was.

At the moment Kahill neared.

She reached with her massive claw and, with a swift movement, pressed it against the young red dragon’s neck, interrupting her charge and suppressing her onto the ground.

The Red Dragon was indeed renowned for her strength.

However, one side was merely a young dragon, while the other neared two hundred years, a half-step middle-aged dragon, the age difference was enormous, to begin with, the strength of the Red Dragon was insufficient to bridge this age gap, and even more so, she was in a severely injured state now.

”Vile White Dragon, let me go!”

Pressed down tightly, almost unable to move, Kahill cursed angrily: ”If we were the same age, you would definitely not be my match.”

Upon hearing this, the White Dragon merely sneered.

”Heh... the same age? I will always be two hundred years older than you.”

She looked down at the struggling Kahill, speaking coldly: ”Listen well, little red skin, this world will never give you a chance for a fair duel.”

”When you are trampled by a true enemy in the future, have your wings broken, your skin peeled, your body dismantled, and face ultimate humiliation—”

The White Dragon Trish slightly tightened her claw, frost seeping into Kahill’s wounds through her scale crevices, bringing piercing pain, as she bent her head down, her Dragon Breath condensing into fine ice crystals by the red dragon’s ear, colder than the wind of the Icefield in sound.

”—you will understand, the first lesson in a dragon’s life is always to ’recognize your niche’!”

Seemingly suppressed for too long.

Now finally having the chance to stand at a high niche to educate the young dragons, the White Dragon couldn’t hold back her speech, saying in a deep voice:

”Red Dragon? Blue Dragon? White Dragon? In the moments of broken wings and fractured horns, colors are nothing but the cheapest epitaphs! The bloodline inheritance you pride yourself on, can it shield you from the Ice Axe of a Frost Giant? Can it let you take half a breath when you are at death’s door?!”

”Learn to measure the gap between claws and fangs!”

The White Dragon released the now no longer struggling Kahill, saying to her: ”You can continue shouting ’white scales are vile,’ but next time you say it, you’d better ensure you’re stronger than me.”

Broken bones are the best education.

Facing the White Dragon’s condescending scolding, Kahill finally recognized reality, without continuing to show her fangs defiantly.

At this moment, the White Dragon’s gaze swept across all the small dragons present.

”When the enemy is stronger than you, lowering your posture is wisdom; when you are stronger than the enemy, crushing their skulls is an obligation, the truth of survival is to adapt between ’curling up’ and ’tearing apart’—not to foolishly spit ridiculous sparks at a mountain like a silly red scale!”

She said seriously.

Silence, deathly silence, not a sound.

Not only the little dragons.

Galos, Solrog, Samantha.

The Ignas trio, and also the Red Silver Dragon watching the gathering of the Evil Dragon from the Burning Steel Castle, and the Elf Dragon watching the spectacle among the flowers... were all stunned by the White Dragon’s words.

It seemed... did she truly comprehend some kind of truth of life?

”Foolish red scale?”

Samantha’s low growl broke the silence, staring at the White Dragon Trish, she said unpleasantly: ”White-skin, you seem a bit too smug.”