Standing at the volcano's crater, Kal squatted on the ground, staring blankly at the three dragon eggs placed before him. Two of them were his, were alive, were just produced by the mother dragon who had turned into human form beside him.
As for the last one, it was also his, the stone dragon egg he had brought from the Ice-Fire World.
These three dragon eggs looked very different.
The dragon egg he had brought in had a main exterior color like gold, its surface shining with a glaze-like metallic luster, and it was a football-sized egg with raised patterns like snake-scale reliefs.
But the two just laid by the mother dragon were completely different from the one he had brought.
Their exterior was smooth, their overall color mainly green, and they also did not reflect light; instead, they even appeared somewhat grayish, a kind of smooth matte texture.
And on them were spread irregular patterns, blocky and scale-like, of different sizes, as if they were painted on, and when touched, there was none of that hand-cutting feeling at all.
And then, the most important thing was that when touched, they were warm, one could clearly feel that there was the sense of a life fluctuation inside.
Not at all like his own stone dragon egg, which was just a good-looking stone.
But starting today, it would no longer be the same.
Because this dragon egg from the Ice-Fire World, which had never shown any movement since the moment he obtained it, unexpectedly also had gradually developed a slight bit of change.
"It has begun to have the breath of life—how strange."
While Kal was comparing the dragon eggs just produced by the mother dragon with his own dragon egg, the mother dragon was also at the side looking at this stone dragon egg he had brought, a strange expression on the human face with two dragon horns.
Hearing her words, Kal showed a look of contemplation, then his gaze shifted toward the iron pot he had casually thrown to the side.
"Has this dragon egg been soaked in magic water during this time?"
As if thinking of something, Kal asked a question.
Hearing Kal ask this, the mother dragon recalled this stone dragon egg that Kal had put into a pot and then soaked with magic water, and she nodded.
"Yes, I carried it over together with that pot you used to hold the magic water."
This thing was what Kal had brought in last time for her to incubate, and then when it did not work and he soaked it in magic water before leaving, she had simply tossed it into a corner and completely forgotten about it.
If not for the fact that the dragon eggs in her own belly had also reached the time to be born recently, she would not have remembered this stone dragon egg that Kal had brought.
After all, Kal treated this thing like she treated gold and gems, treasured to the extreme, so her impression of it truly had to be deep.
So, thinking that she was coming to the volcano crater to lay eggs anyway, she casually brought this pot over as well, and then casually tossed it into a corner again.
As for her own eggs, of course they were placed properly beside the lava of the volcanic fissures to incubate.
After all, these were her children.
As for that stone egg of a wyvern—never mind that it was a stone, even if it were an actual wyvern standing before her, it was just a beast only slightly smarter than a kobold.
So she simply did not consider this thing to be of her own kind.
Treating it as food was not bad; at least it was big, and since it breathed fire, when eaten it was warm.
Seeing her speak so casually, Kal instead furrowed his brows, feeling that things definitely could not be so simple.
Because right now he simply could not understand whether his own stone dragon egg had revived because it had been affected by the rule-rewriting caused by this world's update, or whether it had truly been revived by him accidentally soaking it in magic water.
After all, before this, he had already carried out such experiments countless times, whether it was burning it with fire in the forge, or soaking it in the temple's holy-water pool.
Kal had even secretly used the golden holy cup of the temple's High Priestess Witch, filling it with the Essence of Life and placing his dragon egg inside it upon the altar, and it had still been useless.
During the weekly rituals to please the deity, he never missed a single one; several women took turns participating, and every time the deity manifested and shone divine light.
But the dragon egg in the holy cup was still a stone, no different from the floorboards in the hall that could also be illuminated by the holy light.
He had tried many methods. After the temple proved useless, he brought the dragon egg to the Dreadfort.
Then, using one hundred bat-witches he had caught in the bat cave outside as offerings for the sacrificial ritual, he traded them with the dark elf witch Erelvi to obtain the attention of the evil deity.
But as mentioned before, this was just a stone, and because of this, even Kal—who was a deity-favored one of this game world—had taken a strike of lightning before the matter was eased.
After all, speaking from a higher perspective, his behavior could already be said to be teasing and desecrating the deity.
Next, Kal also tried giving this thing the Spider Queen's venom, and even letting the goblin witch directly infuse it with life force, but neither worked.
The Spider Queen said she did not eat stones, and if he wanted spider eggs, he could bring her a bear's corpse or the corpse of a crocodile beast.
As for the goblin witch—after he became the king of the goblin kingdom, she naturally would not disobey his orders.
But other than polishing this thing until it shone, it was completely useless.
It was as if this thing really was just a stone, and no matter what was said, it was still only a stone.
Thinking of all the sorrowful things he had gone through, tormenting himself countless times over this thing, Kal felt speechless with tears running down.
"Could it be that this is 'each version makes a new god,' and the strongest weapon is a patch?"
"In the past it did not work simply because this world did not have the concept of dragon eggs at all?"
"And now it works, because the version updated, and the world's rules were perfected along with it?"
"In any case, you cannot tell me that this egg revived simply because it was soaked in magic water, and then placed in a pot and heated at the volcano crater, right?"
"But to be honest, I truly never tried this experiment before."
Looking at the iron pot he had scooped the dragon egg out of the moment he sensed the life fluctuation, and then casually tossed aside afterward, Kal was now very suspicious that this iron pot also had a share in the credit.
After all, this dragon egg he had obtained with great difficulty in the Ice-Fire World—after being tormented so many times in the game world—Kal had inwardly already acknowledged it as a stone as well.
So his thinking was normal, and he simply had no intention at all of trying to cook a stone to eat.
Even soaking it in magic water with a pot as if pickling it was merely a kind of psychological comfort, something he did casually.
After all, after he left this world, even time in this world would pause, so what he used to contain it or where he put it made no difference.
In any case, Kal was unwilling to believe that this thing had shown faint signs of life simply because it was soaked in magic water on one side and heated on the other.
So after receiving confirmation from the mother dragon, and after thinking for a moment, Kal stood up, turned around, and picked back up that iron pot he had thrown away like garbage.
He first placed the dragon egg inside it properly, and then once again poured bottle after bottle of magic water into it until it was full.
This iron pot, newly set up on the volcano, was heated in no time, and the magic water inside the pot began bubbling.
The dragon egg in the magic water was also being cooked to rise and fall within the mist of vaporized water, looking extremely beautiful.
"Alright, let's try it first. If it really can revive, this thing would have a world-shaking significance for me."
Looking at the dragon egg being cooked in the pot, Kal rubbed his hands with a face full of satisfaction, his heart filled with good thoughts.
And then, at this moment, the incompletely transformed dragon-claw hand of Visenna reached before him, stroking his sturdy chest muscles, and made her invitation.
"How about starting a round?"
"We will enjoy it. How would you like us to proceed?"
Thus, time was always insufficient; the version update of the game world had brought far too many things.
Kal even deliberately, after exploring both the front and rear areas of Visenna, made a save file at the current time point in order to fully experience all the newly added content of this version update again.
And next—
The farmer's pursuit, activate!!!
[You are the second son of a poor farmer. Your chance of inheriting the family farm is very small— therefore, you decide to gather up your childhood dreams and go elsewhere to seek fame and fortune—]
[Witch—]
[High Priestess—]
[The innkeeper's daughter]
[The once-hero's daughter, who now struggles to survive by running a horse stable alone in town and does not even dare to think about love—]
[The girl who lives in the forest with her grandmother, protected very well by her grandmother, yet deeply yearning for certain things]
[The halfling girl who ran a bakery in town, bitterly waiting for her beloved lover, but in the end could only despair as she faced bad news and hardship—]
[The young mayor's wife who married an old and powerless mayor, keeping the empty boudoir alone and suffering alone, who by chance met a poor farm boy who could not even afford rent and had just come to the big city to struggle—]
[The swamp elf girl whose entire tribe had been slaughtered by orcs, who after being saved by a brave hero could only serve bleakly as an acolyte in the temple, yet always willing to give repeated chances to the hero who could not even remember her name—]
[The female giant whose boyfriend died during a certain hunt, who raised two giant wolves she regarded as her life—]
[The vampire sisters, each with her own past story, who had lived for who knew how many years yet were restrained by a higher vampire, barely surviving and depending on each other—]
[The mistress of the silent witch tower, who by chance met a gifted young man who wandered in unintentionally—]
[The eldest daughter blessed by the deity, yet belonging to a demon race—]
[The gift bestowed by the deity to its favored one, a clingy petite succubus—]
[The elf who guarded the holy-water well alone yet was always troubled by the underground creature, and her mother, whose life was also full of stories, and who in the end mutually understood each other—]
It was the adventure story of a village boy, full of ups and downs, telling again and again the bitterness of the human world.
After once again encountering all the experiences he once had, carrying an experience indescribable in words, Kal, with trembling legs, came again to the dragon cave.
After paying the taxes that needed to be paid once more, he finally obtained permission to ride on the dragon's back and fly toward the distant volcano crater.
Taking out his dragon egg from the iron pot that had already boiled dry several batches of magic water, Kal's face was ruddy, but the fatigue lying deep within his eyes could not be concealed; at last, a faint smile appeared on his face.
"After waiting so long, today finally arrived; after dreaming for so long, someday the dream is realized— wait, wasn't I just riding a dragon over here?"
Thinking of this, Kal turned around and looked at Visenna, who was staring at him as if she had thought of something again.
"Good night, see you tomorrow!"
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