Chapter 95

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Chapter 95: New Body and New Title

Tasha suddenly woke up.

The scene froze at the moment when Victor charged into the legendary professionals, his figure almost a blur, the martial monk’s head bursting like a smashed watermelon, the surrounding wizards not even able to turn their heads in time. The plot seemed to reach its climax, but everything abruptly stopped at that instant.

There was no aftermath, not even a fading effect, no pause at all. The dream ended so abruptly without any warning. It was like a movie cutting to black at the most crucial moment, the lights coming on suddenly, the story ending abruptly, leaving the bewildered audience not knowing whether to leave or stay.

There were no options left, Tasha was already awake.

The storyline she saw just now is still in her mind, holding a lot of information and bringing many puzzles.

In this dream, Tasha saw Victor for the first time, unexpectedly, he turned out to be a powerful demon fighting with his bare hands. But thinking back knowing the answer, it’s not hard to find traces. Magic is mostly just a support for him, and in Tasha’s memory, most of the fights she saw were all unarmed hand-to-hand combat. First impressions can be deceiving, being well-mannered, talkative, and scheming doesn’t mean someone can’t fight. Victor, when he fights, is like a fierce wolf shedding his sheep’s clothing, such a well-dressed thug.

He looks like he won’t lose.

Whether it is intuition or biased favoritism, Tasha subconsciously believes that Victor cannot be defeated in this siege. Even if four wizards set up a magic barrier, even if there are three (or possibly more) legendary professionals blocking the way, he still looks very much in control, knowing exactly what he is doing. That is the prime Victor, not the current pretentious underachiever.

Therefore, it is even harder to determine the timing of the dream.

So far, in the four times she fell asleep, Tasha’s "dreams" have been traceable.

The first time, after upgrading the Dungeon Core in the Devouring Demon cannon, Tasha saw the signing scene of the Aryan Declaration. The timing of the Aryan Declaration can be roughly determined, about four hundred and fifty years ago. When she was dreaming, she sent information about the Heart of Nature to the sky, and the dungeon obtained the title of [Keeper], shaping the body of a wolf for the first time. This dream probably stemmed from her previous signing at the Forest Convention, with the signatory being the Oak Guardian, the keeper of the Heart of Nature.

The second time, the dream originated from signing with the Dragon Knight Douglas. The soul of the former dragon remained as a guardian in the bloodline of friends, allowing Tasha a fleeting glimpse of the scene where the prophecy dragon received public information. This significant event also has a general timeline, about three hundred years ago, after the Dwarf War ended.

The third dream was about a dwarf. The dungeon got a new Dungeon Core fragment, leading to more advanced magical technology. The dwarf in the dream deepened their understanding of magic knowledge and saw the creators of the magical kingdom. A female dwarf in the dream told her father about the downfall of the dwarf kingdom. The kingdom, powered by the magical technology, was declining even before the departure of the dragon. After this dream, Tasha gained the attribute of a dragon, and the dungeon upgraded again.

Looking back, every dream has a clear connection between its origin, message, and development. So before this dream, Tasha had some guesses about what this dream might be about. The reason for this dream seems to be a mix of the second and third dreams. The Dungeon Core fragment that Tasha smuggled years ago seemed quiet for a while, as if it was saturated with energy. Now it seems to have transformed from quantity to quality due to the baptism of the Abyss and the Astral Plane. Tasha had thought about dreaming of stories related to the Astral Plane, but the possibility of the Abyss seemed more likely.

The content of the dream is indeed related to the Abyss, but it seems a bit different from what Tasha was hoping to know.

The Aryan Declaration, the Dragon’s prophecy, and the end of the dwarf dynasty are all extremely important turning points in Aryan history. So what does this dream tell? The wizard’s words hint at something big happening in the Abyss, undoubtedly before Victor’s death, which is before the Aryan Declaration. What did the Abyss do back then?

It’s too far back, to the point where there are no records left. The plane war four hundred years ago, where creatures from the earth expelled the Abyss and the Heavenly Realm, is well known. But going back fifty more years is the limit, as the origin of human empire history is the Aryan Declaration. "For Aryan, humans from various kingdoms united and signed the Aryan Declaration." If we replace "humans from various kingdoms" with "various races from the Primary Material Plane," it matches the facts and other races’ records — if those displaced races have any records left.

Due to the huge changes and wars in the past few centuries, many truths have been lost to time.

Tasha has long been curious about why the Aryan Declaration was signed and what led to it. For thousands of years, the Decaying Disaster has ravaged the Primary Material Plane countless times, as have the religious wars manipulated by the Heavenly Realm. One would think that Aryans had long been used to their powerful neighbors meddling, using the Primary Material Plane as a battlefield and chessboard. What finally made the creatures of the earth unable to bear it any longer, willing to pay a huge price, willing to set aside all disputes, and ultimately choose to start a war against gods and demons?

Why did this rebellion happen neither earlier nor later, but precisely four or five hundred years ago? What happened during that time?

Tasha had thought that Victor’s death was the prelude to the plane war. Maybe before the official war began, inhabitants of the Primary Material Plane had already started cleaning out the big demons lingering on the surface. But from the dream, it seems they did not chase after Victor. On the contrary, Victor seemed prepared to leave on his own, and the forces of the Abyss seemed to be retreating from the surface for reasons unknown.

The information from this dream is too little to determine if it is related to Victor’s death. Therefore, the timing of the dream becomes more uncertain, and the unusual behavior of the Abyss residents cannot be linked to the trigger of the Aryan Declaration. In the end, Tasha feels this dream is important based on personal speculation, following the patterns of previous dreams. Even if it turns out that the dream actually tells the story of events around the Decaying Disaster a thousand years ago, Tasha would have nothing to say.

Among all the dreams, this one is definitely the most incomplete. The dream of the giant dragon was also shrouded in mist, but Tasha was at least aware of which parts had escaped, with flickering signals and a headache hinting at a missing piece, giving her some mental preparation. This dream, starring Victor, ended so abruptly, as if the power went out midway, to be continued next time.

Maybe it really was because of a power outage.

The droplets in the Magic Pool were already running low. Although Tasha had created a reserve Magic Pool outside the central Magic Pool that could be used until it dried up, the consumption this time was truly astounding. Tasha quickly transferred magic reserves from other sub-pools, causing the pool water to rise again, but the dream did not return.

Tasha stood up from the pool.

It was only natural for magic to be greatly consumed. Besides using it for Victor’s scales and upgrading the dungeon, Tasha also created a new body.

Standing up from the Magic Pool, untangling herself from the sticky pool water, Tasha found her body surprisingly light. She shifted her shoulders, feeling lighter than she had in a long time, feeling a bit unaccustomed. Was it because she had shed the body of the crumbling dragon wings and exchanged it for a new body?

Through the subtle shift of her body’s center of gravity, Tasha quickly discovered a change.

There were no longer those heavy and robust giant dragon wings on her back.

Shedding dozens of pounds of weight, like a ascetic releasing the heavy sandbags tied to their body, feeling inexplicably light was strange. However, it also meant losing the ability to fly. Tasha sighed, starting to miss her wings.

Swish!

Just as she was thinking this, a pair of wings stretched out from the shoulder blades.

These wings were similar in size to the former dragon wings, but much lighter in weight. Rather than the robust red dragon wings of old, this pair was dark with translucent membranes and delicate bones, resembling an eagle compared to a crow. They had something strange growing on them, between feathers and scales, soft and shiny like obsidian shards.

Tasha tried to extend her wings but initially struggled to control them. The folded wings did not fully spread out, and the outer feathers suddenly stood upright, cutting through the air with a sheathing sound, sharp as knives.

After adjusting for a while, she successfully took flight. The new wings handled slightly differently than dragon wings, requiring less effort, offering faster speed and agility, like using a more sensitive computer mouse. While they might struggle more in strong winds and have a shorter flight duration compared to dragon wings, overall, they were far more practical for Tasha.

These were Abyssal wings, not belonging to common mythical creatures. Tasha would have to wait for Victor to wake up to learn what kind of demon part this was.

Devil wings were not purely physical, somewhat intertwined with magic to be so light and convenient. After a brief trial, Tasha found a way to retract her wings unnoticed; the dark wings slipped silently into her back, leaving only black shadows where the shoulder blades were, like intricate tattoos that felt no different to the touch.

"It’s not easy, but at least I won’t need to cut holes in my clothes to wear them," Tasha thought. In this state, she could easily blend into a crowd without needing any illusions.

She quickly dismissed that idea as she chuckled and shook her head, glancing down.

Quite clearly, those were no longer ordinary legs.

Her legs became longer, more flexible, and gained a lot more strength. Where her feet used to be, now she had sharp claws, making noise as she walked, as if wearing sharp high heels. Tasha flew again, soaring to the top of the dungeon, her dragon claws easily gripping into the rock, anchoring her body.

If that foot landed on any flesh and blood body, it could easily tear them apart.

Tasha was quite satisfied with this, her transformed feet were better than hands. Her skills with a sword and the temporary ability to have claws were enough to arm her hands. Turning her hands into claws would be redundant and a wasted opportunity. Today’s extraction of elements went very well for Tasha, with almost every part being quite useful.

Basically.

Releasing her claws from the top, Tasha landed and returned once again to the Magic Pool. The last time she reshaped her body, she wanted to place a mirror nearby, and indeed, she did, but all the furnishings were destroyed during Angry Demon’s visit. The water in the Magic Pool remained calm as a mirror under her will, reflecting Tasha’s face.

The face still resembled that of the dragon form, with almost no change in features and face shape, only a tiny difference. This slight difference could be seen in temperament and expression, but it made her look like an evil twin of the dragon form, rather than the same person.

It’s true," Tasha thought, "appearances can be deceiving.

She still had a calm and aloof expression, which on the dragon form would be "otherworldly" and "like a forest elf," but in her current body, it was more like a "watch the world burn" and "it’s an honor to be my food" Great Devil face. Tasha felt that the responsibility for those bone-white horns above her head was partly to blame.

Among Tasha’s thick and crow-like long hair, there grew a pair of bone horns roughly the length of a palm. Victor’s dark curved horns resembled those of a ram, while the ones on Tasha’s head were more like a goat, with distinct ridges along the dagger-like curve. Though typically a feature of herbivores, having them grow on a humanoid’s head gave off a strong sense of intimidation.

…But what’s the point of them anyway?

Tasha wordlessly felt her head where the horns were, tapping on them, feeling their hardness. Some orc herbivores also had horns, who could transform into beasts and headbutt people for real, making horned deer look down on herbivores again. But Tasha couldn’t transform into a beast and just thinking about headbutting someone with her horns was too embarrassing to bear. The placement of her twin horns wasn’t ideal either. Trying to headbutt someone was awkward, and there was a risk of accidentally hitting the ceiling when launching into the air quickly, a scenario that made Tasha cringe.

Rather than having any special use, it seemed more like a demon’s symbol, although Tasha wasn’t quite sure why demons had horns. She recalled the image of Victor she had seen in her dreams, his imposing and fearsome horns that were as big as his head, which made sleeping a challenge—flat on his back unable to turn over, what a tough life. While she sympathized with him, she also felt a bit more appreciative of her own pair of horns, which were light enough to lie flat and toss and turn in bed, at most just risking hitting the headboard.

The great demon Victor was currently lying in the Magic Pool, enveloped in a strange cocoon adorned with scales, awaiting the moment of hatching. While Tasha expressed her disdain for the abyss and demons, for now, no one emerged to defend against her remarks.

This new body with demon wings and horns suggested that the dungeon had incorporated more elements of the abyss this time.

Above the Magic Pool, the heart of the dungeon rotated slowly. It resembled a peculiar heart, its belonging to any known creature unknown. At the first sight of the core, Tasha instinctively knew that the current Dungeon Core was like none other of a healthy dungeon’s core.

[dungeon-Tasha]

Merging and restructuring, Progress: 51/100

Abilities: Abyssal – You have been blessed by the Abyssal Will, even though His gaze has faded, the mark of being a servant of the Abyss remains eternally in your soul / Nature – You have received the approval of the Heart of Nature, the Will of Nature watches over you / Dragon – You have gained recognition from the lingering will of the Legendary Ancient Dragon, as the distant dragon glances towards you from broken to incomplete, and then to a "dungeon" without a prefix, Tasha finally completes the Dungeon Core.

On the card of the dungeon, the attributes seem unchanged, but the order has shifted. The three attributes are now arranged from strongest to weakest, if they each had colors, the color covering Tasha now shines with the strongest Abyssal presence.

The strengthening of the Abyssal attribute is not only reflected in this new body.

The new information in the Dungeon Core makes Tasha hesitate, but now that the pathway to the Abyss has reconnected, doing this does not seem to violate her contract with the Oak Elder.

Tasha attempted to activate the flame rune.

The orange-red flames lit up in the dungeon, just as with every previous summoning, the shadow with wings appeared near the rune, the dragon about to take form. Tasha’s palm pressed down on the shadow at this moment, and under her touch, the forming dragon began to change.

When signing a contract with Douglas, who has dragon blood, Tasha acquired the skill of "Dragon Blood Bath". This one-time skill can temporarily draw dragon blood from the Dragon Knight and imbue it into any dungeon building, object, or member, granting them the dragon attribute. As she had attached the dragon attribute to the flame rune, the things summoned by the flame rune transformed into pseudo dragons in dragon form.

A complete Dungeon Core can bestow the Abyssal attribute upon things in the dungeon.

She did not remove the dragon attribute from the flame rune, only before the flame-summoned being took form, she imbued it with the power of the Abyssal attribute. The almost materialized dragon shadow began to distort, like someone waving a poker through a fire, sparking and shining brightly.

The image of the flying dragon began to collapse, shrinking from the size of a few cows to a size similar to that of a person. Something very different from the dragon crawled out of the extinguished fire pit. It only reached the waist of an adult, had red skin, a very large head, a body like a child, and its ugly head could never be mistaken for human. This creature had sharp teeth, horns, and wings. Compared to it, Tasha felt that her own wings and horns were incredibly beautiful.

This creature holding a weapon similar to a steel fork was undoubtedly Little Devil.

It is a common monster in the first stage of evolution that most Abyssal Demon Seeds transform into, abundant in the Abyss, foot soldiers in the Decaying Disaster. Its status is similar to goblins in the Primary Material Plane.

Tasha looked at the monster and smiled.

She had truly encountered the Abyss before and knew that the creature in front of her did not come from the Abyss. It did not have the Abyss’s aura. It was still a pseudo dragon from the dungeon, just in a different form. It had the appearance, attack method, and power of a Little Devil, but not its true nature.

The Abyss was not as terrifying as Tasha had once thought. The Abyssal attribute remained with her, like nature and the dragon attribute, just an addition that could not change Tasha’s essence. Creatures from the dungeon still belonged to the dungeon, with attributes but no alignment.

Besides the attributes, this upgrade also added something very important.

Titles: Keeper (drawing elements to form a body of the protected), Dragon (guarding your territory and subjects like a dragon safeguards its treasures – additional dragon attribute bonus), Astral Traveler (carrying a token from the Astral Plane, ready to face it with courage, you can embark on the journey once again).

A new title appeared.

New title, "Astral Traveler"

"You once briefly visited the Astral Plane and passed a test of will there. Your capacity is limited like taking a spoon of water from a vast river of knowledge. The experience of being submerged by the river won’t let you drown quickly next time. Your soul was baptized by the Astral Plane and for some reason, you left an anchor there. It’s fragile but still exists."

Tasha’s heart suddenly leaped.

Does this mean she can visit that mysterious, terrifying, and incredibly attractive place again?

"The experience of not drowning in the river will prevent her from getting lost immediately next time in front of the Astral Plane," even if she is alone. The explanation behind the conditions of the title seems similar to a wizard’s teachings, where having enough spell materials and sufficient mental energy can activate spells. What is an Astral Plane Token? Unknown. But there is always a glimmer of hope.

The Astral Plane is very scary, Tasha still remembers the immense fear she felt when she was in contact with it. Feeling one’s own insignificance and ignorance is not a good experience, but she still wants to go there again for the secrets it holds.

Beyond the world, there is another world.

This can provide a lot of information on unsolved mysteries, such as her journey, the disappearance of the Heavenly Realm, and the mysteries of the disappearance of many races. Tasha has thought many times about where the dragons could have gone, and at that time her imagination was limited to interplanar migration, but now it seems there are other options.

What about the elves and the Druids? Did their travels also go beyond the world?

Why does no one talk about the faraway journey, why has she never seen any records of the Astral Plane, why can Victor say the name of the Astral Plane but never tell her about such a guess?

Perhaps one day, she could find the answer from the Astral Plane.

But that’s all in the future.

Tasha sighed, like someone who had to end their vacation and face difficult work. The threat of the Abyss was imminent, just a few years left, too many things to prepare for.

First, she had to announce this news while minimizing panic as much as possible.