Tale of the Red Dragon Without Dragon’s Might
Chapter 109: Revisiting Old Places

Chapter 109: Chapter 109: Revisiting Old Places

Tassera left, she needed to go back and retreat into solitude to study and digest the abundant gains from her journey to Crossroads City.

Despite being a teenage dragon, it will be decades before she matures into a young dragon. This period is even longer than the time it took for her to grow from hatching to her current stage. An impulsive response is understandable but limited to impulsiveness. Leon quickly calmed down and even dared to claim that women would only hinder the speed of his sword drawing.

If it weren’t for the necessity of a partner in the practice of the Inner Core Dual Cultivation Method, Leon would dare to belittle Tassera... Well, if there were such a beautiful Blue Dragon, especially a Storage Dragon offering herself willingly, he would have no reason to refuse; one should not deceive oneself.

Anyway, Leon returned to the Molten Lava Lake, submerged in the molten lava, preparing to continue his cultivation, striving to complete his Foundation Establishment soon so he could do as he pleased.

It must be mentioned, the cultivation difficulty of the Inner Core Dual Cultivation Method and the Breathing and Exhaling Skill is comparable, yet their methods are fundamentally different.

The Breathing and Exhaling Skill merely requires constant absorption of nature’s spiritual energy, and at the beginning of each month, drawing in the Sun and Moon Essence, primarily challenging one’s perseverance. On the other hand, even if one masters the techniques of the Inner Core Dual Cultivation Method, failing to enter the right state nullifies the effort.

To enter this state, one must banish all worldly distractions and maintain the purity of one’s six senses - sight, hearing, smell, taste, body, and mind, ignoring sights, sounds, and thoughts. All should let the Primordial Spirit decline and consciousness take control.

Leon could never achieve such a state, except perhaps when extremely tired and unable to move, or soaking comfortably in the Lava Lake and similar special circumstances; he even finds it hard to sit quietly for ten minutes.

In fact, it was easier now. Before crossing over, he could not even walk without looking at his phone, luckily never running into a pole, and except when absolutely exhausted and needing to sleep, his mind was never quiet, always lost in wild thoughts.

After being transformed into a Red Dragon in this world, with no phones to entertain and even finding an interesting book to read wasn’t easy, yet there was still never a quiet moment. When utterly bored, he would simply sleep until he woke naturally, eat something, and then sleep some more.

Leon loved how as a dragon, he could sleep however much he wanted, sleeping up to twenty hours a day without issue, and additionally, sleeping encouraged his growth, indeed an excellent way to pass the time.

"Why isn’t it working?"

"Let’s try again."

"I can’t believe it."

Again and again, Leon’s repeated attempts to enter the right state left him truly angry, and the more upset he became, the less he could enter the state, just like the more one wants to sleep, the harder it is; eventually, he gave up trying and yawningly went to sleep.

After waking up, Leon ate something quickly and eagerly began cultivating.

"Why isn’t it working?"

Unable to enter the state, Leon couldn’t help but start doubting this and that, even though he wasn’t fixated on Tassera, just occasionally thinking about how much time cultivation might take each session.

A yet another fruitless day.

He remembered that he had recently plundered many crystals from Rocas’ Crystal Mountain and took them out and laid them where he, in his Dragon Form, slept.

By the third day, Leon inevitably started thinking about Tassera; they hadn’t seen each other since that day. Though they often didn’t meet for ten days, half a month, or even one or two months, wasn’t the relationship different now? Didn’t they need to be close for a few days?

Thus, another day passed without gains.

At most three days. If he couldn’t enter the state in three days, he must leave the desert, otherwise, there would always be distractions. Once out of the desert, there would be no need to think about these confusing issues. With that thought, Leon strongly made up his mind.

In fact, Leon thought about leaving before the third day came but was delayed by the sudden arrival of the Evil Wolf.

In the tavern of Oasis City, Leon watched with interest as the Evil Wolf wolfed down his food, finishing a large chunk of camel meat in less than a minute and downing a large beer in one gulp, and said: "I thought you weren’t coming."

"My lord, you flew off, and in half a day, you could go from Crossroads City to the desert. I only have two legs to walk on," the Evil Wolf said with a pained expression.

Leon chuckled, remembering when he and Tassera left Oasis City, passing through deserts, wild deserts, forests, and swamps to reach Crossroads City, taking nearly ten days.

The Evil Wolf was far from their strength, couldn’t fly, and so he couldn’t complain about the difficult road and just fly over it, skipping stages. Encountering monsters meant he had to think carefully whether to fight or detour, lacking the ability to fight through all the monsters along the way, so his timing was not too late.

Is this Oasis City yours? asked the Evil Wolf.

"No," Leon looked around, thinking that the Oasis City they were in was the largest nearby and had several strong figures. He considered the possibility of taking it over in the future, but for now, it was better to be cautious.

"What did you call me over for?" Evil Wolf asked.

"We have a business..." Leon briefly explained the partnership business between him, Tassera, and Brass Dragon, of course omitting a lot of information, like the fact that Brass Dragon was actually part of their group wasn’t as glorious as it seemed, and Evil Wolf did not have the clearance to know so much.

The job Leon arranged for Evil Wolf was to liaise with the sand bandits, handle matters related to the Plunder Certificate, take over the tasks originally belonging to Tassera, and stay in the Oasis City to report any disturbances in real-time because neither he, Tassera, Brass Dragon, nor Efreeti, all being significant figures, could afford to stay in the Oasis City for long.

Evil Wolf was mostly satisfied with the heavy responsibility promised by Leon, mainly because he had traveled all the way from Crossroads City, and since he was here already.

After settling Evil Wolf down, Leon found Tassera and Brass Dragon, told them he would leave for a while, packed up quickly, and left the desert planning to find a secluded place for solitary cultivation. Like those stories where cultivators always venture to remote mountains and forests.

Leon hadn’t actually been to any remote mountains or forests; the first thing that came to his mind was the forest where he had lived for a long time. He hadn’t returned to see how it had changed after being away for so long.

Because when he left, he hadn’t mastered the Sleeve of the Universe, although he had the Dimension Bag, it wasn’t convenient to carry around, and many treasures were left there, which he now needed to retrieve—even a single Gold Coin was worth retrieving, let alone far more than one.

Leon easily flew back, circled around once before landing in the nest he had lived in on the mid-mountain, finding everything just as it was before.

Leon remembered he had asked the Hobgoblins Warlord to set up a camp below the short mountain, which now remained only an empty shell, not a single messy goblin was to be seen, and he wondered what had happened.

Leon didn’t pay much attention to it, and busily scoured the mountain, digging out all the things he had previously hidden and threw them into the small space of Sleeve of the Universe. Then he went to check the abandoned fortress, not spotting a single Orc.

Leon turned and flew to the Hobgoblins camp, which from afar seemed quite populated and even larger than before. Diving into the middle of the camp, he immediately caused numerous disturbances.

The Hobgoblins Warlord seeing the commotion, hurried out from the command center, seeing Red Dragon he immediately kneeled on one knee and said, "My lord, you’ve finally returned... You’ve grown bigger and more powerful, everyone will prostrate before you."

Having traveled to many places by now, to deserts, seen Blue Dragon, Brass Dragon, encountered Efreeti, Male-faced Sphinx, unfortunately unable to enter the tomb of the Ancient Fallen Empire, also visited Crossroads City, met with Vampires, fought the Magma Land Shark...

His standards had become higher, Hobgoblins just didn’t catch his interest anymore, Leon said, "I’m just back to check things out, I’ll leave soon and might never return. You take care of yourselves."

"Where is my lord going?" the voice of Hobgoblins Warlord clearly anxious, generous Red Dragons were not common.

"Why? Do you want to follow me to leave?" Leon teased, "My new territory is in a faraway desert from here, are you sure you want to go there?"

The Hobgoblins Warlord fell silent immediately.

While it was true that Hobgoblins could also survive in the desert, but going from the forest was way too far, and it was impossible for his people to travel such long distances, as barely one in ten would survive.

"I just made a trip to the abandoned fortress and saw no Orcs, where are those Orcs?" Leon was certain those unorganized Orcs were no match for Hobgoblins, "You didn’t kill them all, did you? I told you no infighting."

"Not daring." Hobgoblins Warlord quickly denied knowing Red Dragon was usually amiable but ruthless when provoked, "They were unproductive, at best raising a few pigs, liking to venture out to plunder without restraint, they were bound to encounter unbeatable foes eventually."

"Are they all dead?" Leon asked.

"Dead ones died, remaining ones left." Hobgoblins Warlord said, "We don’t have the leisure to care about them."

Leon still remembered the Orc Priest named Lorug, and the Orc Leader called Dekka, now all gone, mysteriously feeling everything had changed.

But Leon merely sighed for a moment, not yet to the point of feeling sentimental, gently shook his head, and left.

Of course, he would not stay in this small forest, now that he could face off against an adult Blue Dragon in an arena, as long as he didn’t court death, he could survive, and had many places to choose from.

After considerable thought, Leon still went back to Black Ridge Mountains to look, faintly remembering the ruins of a temple that once served as Dragon Nest, but Mother Dragon and Dragon Sister were nowhere to be found.

He found the nest he previously dug, discovering it occupied by some unknown creature, too lazy to declare sovereignty or demand compensations, no money then pay by meat, a pound of meat is also a pound.

Where to go?

Leon didn’t know where to go, just flew around randomly; it still took a bit of time, and he found a lush Primitive Forest brimming with Magic power, planning to stay there for a while to try to get into the zone.