Atlan Continent, Serel Wilderness.
A black-feathered, red-beaked hawk-bird flapped its wings across the sky, passing through lush mountain forests, clear green lake surfaces, and the endless wilderness, gently slowing down before finally landing on a jagged cliff, preening its feathers while looking down.
This place was a massive circular sinkhole, appearing as if struck by a meteorite.
The central area had woods and rivers, surrounded on all sides by steep, protruding cliffs.
The Black-feathered Hawk tilted its head, its gaze puzzled, its vision reflecting a creature at the bottom of the sinkhole that was repeatedly using all its strength to ram its flesh-and-blood body against the mountain rocks.
It was about six meters long from head to tail, with scales and horns, possessing both wings and a long tail; it was clearly a young dragon, though its appearance was somewhat unusual, unlike common species.
Its head resembled a Red Dragon's, complete with the back-swept horns of a Red Dragon, but the difference was that the base of the horns was encased in spade-shaped metallic bone, forming an angular structure similar to a knight's helmet.
The dragon scales on its body were layered, with a base of black shimmering with silver light; the surface bore faint patterns, presenting a dark red luster similar to molten lava flowing over an iron plate. The edges of the scales were as sharp as blades, reflecting a cold obsidian-like light as they rose and fell with its breath, giving it an overall highly metallic texture.
Though it was a young dragon, it already possessed a sense of ferocity and power far beyond that of ordinary beasts, with limbs, tail, and wings that were exceptionally strong.
Bang!
Garros's wings, much broader and thicker than those of an ordinary young dragon, flapped to accelerate as he slammed headfirst into the base of the cliff before him. Shattered stones flew everywhere, and dust filled the air.
Shaking his head, he pulled his head and forebody out of the rock.
Garros shook his dragon scales, shaking off small stones stuck in the gaps and dust on the surface, then stopped his mountain-ramming behavior that had puzzled the Black-feathered Hawk, resting beside the large hole he had smashed.
"I've been a Dragonkin for six years now, without even realizing it."
Garros sighed silently in his heart, looking down at his dragon claws, opening and clenching them repeatedly.
It—or rather, he—was not a normal Dragonkin.
First of all, he was a hybrid of a Red Dragon and an Iron Dragon, which was evident from his peculiar appearance.
However, while a Red Iron Dragon hybrid was rare, it was still within the realm of normalcy.
Both Red Dragons and Iron Dragons are paragons among Evil Dragons, both worshipping power and strength.
One was the head of the Chromatic Dragons, and the other was the head of the Ferrous Dragons.
While under normal circumstances, there is fierce competition between these two types of Dragonkin and they often find each other distasteful, leading to battles upon encounter, it wasn't impossible for these power-revering Evil Dragons to suddenly take a liking to each other mid-fight, turning combat into flirting and then an uncontrollable passion.
The reason he was considered abnormal was more importantly that within this Red-Iron Young Dragon's body resided a human Soul that had arrived via Transmigration from another world.
That's right, Garros was a transmigrator.
He couldn't figure out why he had transmigrated and didn't bother to think much about it since it was meaningless; besides, a Dragonkin's body was far more powerful than a human's, and Garros, having gained a new life, had long since accepted the reality of becoming a Dragonkin.
Influenced by the dragon heritage and six years of life as a Dragonkin.
His human Soul and dragon nature had now undergone Fusion, becoming inseparable to form a personality dominated by dragon nature—loving the pursuit of power and strength—while also possessing human logic and wisdom. He had the resilience and strength of a Dragonkin without the excessive arrogance, conceit, or the pathological obsession with treasure that were the downsides of their nature.
In short.
Take the essence and discard the dregs.
Raising a dragon claw, Garros carefully felt his head, which had been ramming the mountain for a long time.
The fine scales on his faceplate and the horns on his head felt even sturdier to the touch.
"Though it's not very obvious, my body has definitely become a bit stronger again."
The young dragon nodded in satisfaction, his tail—covered in blade-like scales—swishing back and forth, sweeping dense scratches onto the ground.
Over the six years, Garros had constantly studied his Dragonkin body.
Aside from the various wonders inherent to a Dragonkin body, he was pleasantly surprised to find that perhaps because of the Red-Iron hybrid nature combined with his human Soul, some unknown marvelous reaction had occurred, giving him an innate talent that other Dragonkin didn't have.
—Adaptive Evolution.
This talent wasn't obvious; at first, the effect was so minuscule it was imperceptible, and Garros hadn't even realized he had such a talent before he was two years old.
It was actually still limited now, requiring day after day of accumulated training, tempering, and adaptation to earn a single effective evolution. Moreover, the scale of evolution wasn't large and required corresponding food to replenish energy.
In a few years, it had only made Garros's physique much stronger and harder than a normal young dragon's, giving his scales a metallic texture even now.
But.
As Garros used it and grew older, the talent itself was also growing and evolving, with its effect being better each year than the last; its upper limit was currently unknown.
As everyone knows, any evolution-type talent is extremely broken; Garros was full of anticipation for his future.
"With the long lifespan of a Dragonkin and the characteristic of growing stronger with age, combined with my Adaptive Evolution talent, one day I will be able to evolve and strengthen to an inconceivable degree."
Garros thought happily.
Turning his head to glance at the massive mountain, the strong young dragon strode away to create some distance and then rammed into it again and again, dust flying and stones scattering.
A bright future was currently just a vision.
As for now... better keep ramming the mountain.
This was one of Garros's daily training methods.
Other methods included, but were not limited to, flying into the sky and then free-falling, jumping into fires to burn himself, letting the Iron Dragon Mother lash him with her tail, and holding his breath underwater to try and suffocate himself.
Time passed slowly.
The sun gradually slanted westward, finally sinking into the embrace of the distant mountains.
A night sky hung with countless stars descended, and two moons—one full and one crescent—simultaneously emitted clear moonlight, making the world in the dark not seem dim.
After the mountain-ramming training ended.
Garros left the front of the cave entrance that had clearly collapsed and recessed.
There were many, many such openings around, all Garros's masterpieces.
By the mirror-clear lake water, Garros's arrival startled away a large number of birds and beasts.
He didn't mind, taking large, hearty gulps of water before looking up at the twin moons.
Of these two moons, one had phases that changed with the time, while the other was a "Fake Moon" that always looked like a perfectly round jade plate and never changed.
The Fake Moon was actually an extraterrestrial magic fortress built by the Elven Empire [Nausir].
Besides this Fake Moon.
There were also many twinkling stars that looked no different from other stars but were actually various "satellites" created by the various Empires through magical means.