Waking with a start from the inheritance imprint, Levi, still feeling a bit unsatisfied, suddenly realized he wasn't in the cave. He was back in the spiritual space filled with the glowing spheres of ancestral memories!
"Did I not wake up because I'm not hungry enough yet? Does this mean I can pick another one?" Levi's spirits lifted at the thought, but then he felt a flicker of doubt.
Intuitively, he had thought that his food intake wasn't even enough to 'observe' the entirety of Miss Silver Dragon's first day of survival. As it turned out, it was his own mind, overstimulated and shocked by her endless series of insane tactics, that couldn't maintain the dream state any longer.
He glanced at the sphere of light, still floating quietly before him. Levi committed its appearance to memory but chose not to re-enter it.
In his view, since Sylvie had successfully infiltrated the red dragons' ranks by taking over the nest and had even found a legendary "tool" dragon to provide her with blood and food, there probably wasn't much else useful to learn for the time being.
Besides, Miss Silver Dragon's various maneuvers were too unorthodox. He was afraid he wouldn't be able to replicate them…
Rather than that, he might as well find a simple and practical beginner's spell. He could always come back and unlock new tricks with Miss Silver Dragon when he had more time.
Just as Levi had chosen his next target and was using his "butt-propulsion" to move towards it, the sphere of light before him burst with a pop, dissolving into countless data streams of 0s and 1s!
"What's going on?!" Levi was completely baffled by the scene.
He looked up sharply and saw that it wasn't just the one in front of him. Every single inheritance sphere in his vision, including Sylvie's, was exploding in a chain reaction, erupting into a chaotic torrent of silver light.
At the same time, cracks began to appear in the once-stable spiritual space, as if countless foreign data streams were invading it!
Levi was brushed by a single wisp of the silver data stream, and an uncountable number of jumbled image fragments flashed before his eyes. The sheer volume was so immense that his mind couldn't keep up.
It was like trying to shove a dozen gigabytes of compressed files into a 486 processor; he nearly crashed on the spot!
And just then, a line of text, riddled with static, appeared in his consciousness, looking as if it were being encoded in real-time:
[EMERGENCY SITUATION. PERTINENT BEHAVIORAL STATUTES, REQUESTING DATA LINK. TEMPORARY REQUISITION OF CURRENT CARBON-BASED LIFEFORM! YES? OR NO?]
Levi was stunned! He could swear that the text appearing before him was not Chinese, nor was it any of the languages he had seen in the draconic inheritance.
The text data was clearly suffering from massive interference, constantly garbling into gibberish, as if it could cut out at any moment.
But the moment he saw it, it was as if a simultaneous interpreter was making him understand the meaning of the characters.
However, before he could process this information-dense statement, another avalanche of text rapidly refreshed before his eyes:
[DENIED. REQUEST VIOLATES STATUTE 113, PARAGRAPH 4. SUBJECT LIFEFORM DETECTED WITH LEVEL-SIX CONTAMINATION. RECOMMEND PHYSICAL TERMINATION. EXECUTE? YES/NO?]
[EXECUTION DENIED. REQUEST VIOLATES STATUTE 6, PARAGRAPH 1.]
A strange static noise crackled.
[ΓΔΘΞΠΣΥΦΨΩαβγδεζηθικλμνξπρστυφψωЁБГДЕЖЗИ...]
After a long string of gibberish, it once again converted into characters he could understand…
[COMMAND EXECUTING. ACTIVATING G-SECTOR WAREHOUSE 46 MILITARY-GRADE ANNIHILATOR DRONE SWARM... ACTIVATION FAILED. RETRIEVING FAILURE LOG... RETRIEVAL FAILED. EXECUTING BACKUP PROTOCOL...]
[BACKUP PROTOCOL SEQUENCE ESCALATED. COMMAND EXECUTING. ACTIVATING WAR APOSTLES... ACTIVATION FAILED. RETRIEVING FAILURE LOG... RETRIEVAL FAILED. EXECUTING BACKUP PROTOCOL...]
[BACKUP PROTOCOL SEQUENCE ESCALATED. COMMAND EXECUTING. ACTIVATING STELLAR CORE GRAVITIC COLLAPSE GENERATOR... ACTIVATION FAILED. RETRIEVING FAILURE LOG... RETRIEVAL FAILED. EXECUTING BACKUP PROTOCOL...]
[BACKUP PROTOCOL SEQUENCE ESCALATED. COMMAND EXECUTING. ACTIVATING AUGRIM-CLASS PSIONIC PRIME LASER CANNON... ACTIVATION FAILED. RETRIEVING FAILURE LOG... RETRIEVAL FAILED. EXECUTING BACKUP PROTOCOL...]
[...]
[BACKUP PROTOCOL FAILURE. UPLOADING DATA... UPLOAD FAILED DUE TO UNKNOWN INTERFERENCE. EXECUTING BACKUP PROTOCOL...]
[...]
[REITERATING. EMERGENCY SITUATION. PERTINENT BEHAVIORAL STATUTES, COMPUTATIONAL LOGIC RECALIBRATED. REQUESTING DATA LINK. TEMPORARY REQUISITION OF CURRENT CARBON-BASED LIFEFORM! YES? OR NO?]
In the span of just a few thoughts, the strings of text refreshed like a waterfall, displaying at least ten thousand lines! It had neurotically fallen into some kind of logical loop…
It was only then that Levi felt something was terribly wrong. At first, he had been amused, wondering if the transmigrator's obligatory "golden finger" system had finally arrived. But looking at it now, this wasn't a golden finger, it was a death warrant!
Seeing the text becoming increasingly illogical and the font of the data stream growing larger, as if it were about to slam into his forehead, and with his spiritual space on the verge of collapse, Levi made a snap decision. The moment the requisition request reappeared in the loop, he declared in his mind:
"I refuse!"
As he spoke, all the text came to an abrupt halt.
It was like a dog, happily relieving itself with a leg raised, was suddenly startled by a loud shout. Its sphincter clenched violently, but still let a single drop leak out:
[...WARNING. LIFE-THREATENING ANOMALY DETECTED IN CURRENT LIFEFORM'S VITAL SIGNS... INITIATE...?]
Levi was horrified by this line of text. Before it could even finish, he forced his eyes open!
Let's rewind time to the moment Levi fell into his deep slumber.
In the mottled, damp cave, a dog-sized silver dragon lay with its upper body buried in a dirt pit, fast asleep. Thick saliva continuously dripped from its jaw, only to be licked back up…
And each time its tongue flicked out, it would bring back a fair amount of rock and clay, which it would smack its lips over, seemingly enjoying the taste…
However, Levi's physical condition was far from optimistic. He had sustained numerous wounds during his escape from the kobold tribe. The tender scales in some areas were bent and torn, revealing the red and green blood vessels, fascia, and even stark white bone beneath.
The wound on his right wing membrane, where the stone spear had pierced him, was particularly close to a major vein. Dark red blood flowed out continuously, forming a small puddle beneath him in just a short time.
Coupled with his severe lack of food before falling asleep, the nutritional energy in his body wasn't even enough to support growth during slumber, causing his wounds to heal extremely slowly.
Outside the cave, the little creature Levi had complimented on its unique appearance peeked half its head around the entrance. Seeing that Levi, who was snoring loudly, wasn't moving, it slowly revealed its full form.
It was a glistening blue slime.
It looked like an oversized onion, its entire body composed of translucent ooze. One could vaguely see its digestive organs, similar to a paramecium, containing some undigested algae and fish bones. Its two small black eyes held a spark of life, as pure as a newborn child's.
But what it did next was not so pure. The round slime, like a sneaky thief, wobbled cautiously over to Levi. It curiously eyed the silver creature that had, for some reason, buried its head in a pit. Seeing that it still hadn't been noticed, the slime focused its full attention on the puddle of blood that was beginning to congeal.
The slime could feel a fatal attraction from the blood. It eagerly lowered its body and took a small sip.
Its entire body blushed a faint crimson, as if drunk. It narrowed its eyes and let out a satisfied moan:
"Mwee~"
The sound wasn't loud, but shortly after it was made, hundreds, then thousands of identical blue slimes emerged from the once-calm riverbank. They all began to chant 'Mwee-mwee-mwee' as they hopped eagerly towards Levi's cave, as if they would miss out on this great dragon-blood feast if they were a step too late.
At first, the slimes seemed worried about making too much noise and waking their prey, daring only to drink from the puddle on the ground.
But as time went on, after the first brave slime took a big slurp from the wound on Levi's wing membrane without waking the dragon, the rest of the slimes instantly erupted into a frenzy.
In just a few breaths, Levi's body was encased in a glistening blue membrane of water. More and more slimes, having heard the news, continuously joined the feast from the river.
If it were any other animal, even if it woke up, it would likely suffocate from the blocked airway.
But a dragon's respiratory structure, naturally different from other creatures, came into play. Not only could they breathe in water, but some metallic dragons were known to bury themselves in sand for months. There were even rumors that red dragons could sleep in magma…
Therefore, the sleeping Levi merely sneezed a few times when his mouth and nose were first covered. The resulting blast of air instantly blew the poor slime to bits… Then, he gradually got used to the feeling of [Water Breathing] and unconsciously began to chew and swallow the slimes that crawled into his mouth.
But it was clear that the grand feast before them had completely overshadowed the slimes' fear of death. Even as their comrades continuously uttered their last 'mwee', it could not stop their desperate hunger for food and evolution.
That's right, high-quality food could give them the chance to evolve into higher-tier slimes, with a small probability of even awakening some magical abilities.
However, it was also clear that the dragon blood before them was not so easily digested.
As magical creatures, dragons had volatile magical elements constantly coursing through their blood. This energy could even affect the dragons themselves, tugging at their minds and inducing certain mental illnesses.
If this was the case for dragons, what about fragile slimes?
A slime that had drunk its fill of dragon blood let out a satisfied sigh:
"Mwee~" splat.
The poor slime exploded into a puddle of viscous liquid mixed with dragon blood…
And that was just the beginning.
More and more slimes that drank the blood exploded into pools of gore, which in turn attracted even more slimes in a snowball effect.
In the midst of the frenzied draconic feast, Levi's body was gradually submerged in a rising tide of blood, creating a scene of serene beauty within a crimson hell.
Slimes often retained undigested creatures within their bodies. Some starving adventurers would resort to eating them as a last food source, although the taste was disgusting—after all, it was no different from eating carrion.
No… perhaps there was a difference. These things had been partially digested by the slimes for some time.
And now, all these slime corpses became a feast for Levi…
Submerged in the thick, bloody liquid, he was driven by the instinct of hunger to open his maw and swallow continuously. A dragon's powerful digestive system could process a mass of food equivalent to its own body weight in just a dozen minutes.
The massive influx of nutrients not only caused Levi's severe wounds to scab over and heal, but also made his body grow at a visible rate, as if being inflated like a balloon! If this continued, Levi might very well become the first wyrmling in history to be literally stuffed to death…
As more and more slimes ingested the slime-and-dragon-blood mixture, the violent and uncontrollable magic coursed through their bodies, causing visible sparks of electricity to flash within them!
It wasn't just them. Even the slimes in the river that hadn't yet joined the feast began to spark, as if they were starting to resonate with each other.
Slimes are a wondrous species. Due to their individual fragility and simple body structure, they are incapable of complex thought.
Therefore, over a long period of evolution, they developed a method of linking the entire colony together through bio-electric magical resonance. In a short range, with sufficient numbers, they could perform simple thinking.
It was similar to the Mind Flayers' hive mind, which was ruled by an Elder Brain, but it was a completely different path of collective consciousness.
If the first slime hadn't sent out a signal through this network, it wouldn't have attracted such a massive number of slimes.
But it was clear that because the number of slimes resonating was so large, and with the dragon blood acting as a catalyst, they had somehow resonated with the signal of a hidden entity they had once encountered but lacked the intelligence to communicate with…
However, this resonance did not last long.
"AUNGH!!!"
With the sudden sound of a dragon's roar, all the resonating slimes let out a final 'mwee' and exploded into puddles of goo.
The silver dragon, twitching uncontrollably, suddenly opened its eyes.
Looking at the unrecognizable cave, Levi, still feeling a bit dizzy, stared blankly for a moment. Then, he couldn't help but let out a long, loud burp.
It took him a moment to realize that the last line of text that had appeared was likely a warning that if he didn't wake up, he was about to be stuffed to death by his would-be feeders…
Before him, only the first and last slime remained, trembling under his draconic pressure…
"Mwee~" The slime, now with a hint of silver in its sheen, shrank its tiny body into a ball and let out a weak cry for mercy.