While Aki was recovering from the injuries she had sustained during the battle, Logan was, at that very moment, inside a lava cavern, facing off against a Teostra.
In this lava cave, the ground's basalt had not fully solidified; under the intense heat, it glowed red, showing signs of melting back into magma, while small eruptions continuously burst around the area.
A silver-white figure was wrapped in bluish-purple flames, while across from it stood a crimson figure wreathed in bright golden-red fire.
For now, however, both sides harbored their own concerns—neither intended to strike first.
As the atmosphere grew increasingly tense and frenzied, the Teostra impatiently crushed the viscous magma flowing beneath its feet.
Then, from the lava tunnel behind the Teostra, glowing with a crimson radiance, emerged a familiar figure—the Lunastra.
Her fierce eyes glared at Logan with loathing, yet for some reason, she forcibly restrained herself.
She had recognized this creature—the one who had inexplicably scolded her back on the Coral Highlands. If possible, she truly wished to join forces with the Teostra and give Logan a harsh lesson.
However, she ultimately dismissed the thought. After letting out a low growl toward the Teostra, she flapped her wings wreathed in blue fire and flew back into the lava tunnel once more.
The Teostra's rising battle intent calmed in response to the Lunastra's low growl. Halting its advance, it let out a threatening rumble toward Logan, then fixed its gaze on him while slowly retreating step by step.
But Logan's purpose was not to fight the Teostra. He had merely sensed its aura from the sky earlier—it had been far too close to Aki's position, and he had come only to block its path, fearing it might attack her.
Now that the Teostra had shown signs of retreat, and Aki seemed to have already left, he naturally had no intention of clashing with an Elder Dragon.
All the more so because this was not just a single Elder Dragon, but a pair—a perfectly coordinated Elder Dragon couple.
Having achieved his purpose, Logan withdrew his aura and swiftly turned to fly out of the lava cave.
Although he did not know why the Flame Dragon couple had chosen to yield, Logan was no fool.
To face such a pair alone in a mixed assault was something even a muscle-bound brute like the Nergigante would never choose to do.
Not long after Logan left, inside the lava cave, Teostra once again stepped out, pacing like a noble male lion, the flames coiling at its side turning into combustible dust that drifted all around.
After carefully checking and finding no trace of other powerful monsters, it finally turned back and let out a muffled roar toward the lava cave.
Very soon, Lunastra, forelegs holding two dragon eggs covered in red-and-blue patterns whose surface temperature was extraordinarily high, carefully flew out.
Led by Teostra, they flew toward another lava cave at a junction area of magma and bioenergy crystals.
These two eggs had only just been laid by Lunastra and were exceedingly fragile; they had to be placed for a long time beside steady magma, relying on the magma's stable high temperature to absorb life energy.
The recent battle between Aki and the Brute Tigrex triggered a small magma eruption, and the magma flow there was the same flow as the magma in the Flame Dragon couple's nest; this caused the magma in the lava cave to seethe restlessly, with faint signs of eruption.
This greatly angered the Flame Dragon couple, who were carefully tending the eggs.
In order to better guard the eggs, the pair had even stopped going out to hunt, subsisting on the combustible minerals in the nest—fuelstone coal—yet monsters actually started fighting at their doorstep, making such a commotion.
During the incubation period, Teostra, already made irritable by the restraint, immediately went out to check; if possible, it could also incidentally improve its diet.
And then it ran into Logan blocking the entrance.
Having their nest location sensed by an Elder Dragon, for the sake of the still-fragile eggs, the Flame Dragon pair forcibly held back their temper, choosing intimidation and voluntary retreat to prevent a fight; and after Logan left, they secretly chose to move house, changing the incubation site.
This is also the temporary compromise most monsters with higher intelligence make when facing a strong enemy at their doorstep.
Logan, already far from the lava cave, naturally knew none of this; beating his wings on the way back to the nest, he thought to have Aki pick a new battleground, staying as far as possible from that lava cave.
On the way, after finding some fuelstone ore to gulp down and hunting a Dodogama, Logan flew back to the nest.
The sound of wingbeats made Aki raise her head warily; seeing it was Logan, she then lay back down in the nest, closed her eyes, and waited for her wounds to heal.
As for the Dodogama carcass that Logan had brought back, Aki had no intention of eating together.
It was not that Dodogama meat tasted too bad, nor that the amount of meat was insufficient.
Through years of living together day and night and under the influence of the Symbiosis state, Aki's intelligence had also made great strides. Although she still could not compare to certain high-intelligence Elder Dragons, she at least possessed thinking ability on par with humans.
Her self-control had already been thoroughly trained in those earlier years of waiting for Logan to come of age; she intended to use hunger as one of the motivations driving her to fight.
Therefore, after confirming the idea of using battle to raise her own strength, Aki also clearly informed Logan that they were to hunt separately, and even if she were to starve to death, Logan could not intervene.
Logan did not agree with such an extreme approach at first, but when Aki truly failed to catch prey for 2 days and still refused to eat the food Logan brought back no matter what, Logan understood that Aki was serious.
In the volcanic region, resources were anything but abundant.
Whether Barnos or Gastodon, in this place their numbers were also extremely scarce and simply could not serve as a routine food source. This was also the main reason why large monsters could only feed on other large monsters.
After hearing Logan say that the site where she had just fought the Brute Tigrex was unsuitable for continued use as a hunting ground because of the factor of a powerful enemy, Aki—although somewhat regretful—still chose to accept it.
She had always only sought to become stronger, to be able to eliminate sooner that sense of estrangement between herself and Logan, and not truly to seek death. It was just a pity, for that place was clearly an 'arena' that many nearby monsters would choose.
...
Ancient Forest.
The Wyverian girl, accompanied by the Third Fleet Master and Tonkotsu, moved among the nests of the various Fire Wyverns.
She held in her hands a large gemstone that emitted a strange radiance.
"No matter how many times I look at it, I still feel this gemstone is so beautiful. Not using it for research would really be too much of a waste."
Hearing the Third Fleet Master's words, the Wyverian girl's ears twitched.
When getting along with the Third Fleet Master, she always had the feeling of facing, as in her childhood in the tribe, that old Wyverian who had inherited ancient alchemy.
In the Third Fleet Master's eyes, the definition of beauty did not refer solely to appearance; whether it had research value was also one of the parameters she referenced.
The wish to study this gemstone—such words had already appeared many times in the ears of the Wyverian girl and Tonkotsu within just 3 hours.
At first, the Wyverian girl would solemnly explain that this gemstone was not hers and that she was merely an "escort."
But the Third Fleet Master still refused to give up, continuing in various roundabout ways to express her desire to conduct research on it.
One could only say that, at this time, the Third Fleet Master—who had only just come from the Old World—still had a few flaws in her character.
After hearing it many times, the Wyverian girl began to choose silence as her response.
[Clink~]
A ring of light suddenly shimmered from within the gemstone. The Wyverian girl stopped at the entrance of a hollow nest, ignored the several fierce-looking Grimalkynes at the entrance, excitedly wiped the gemstone, confirmed it once more, and then looked at Tonkotsu with joy.
"May I ask whose Fire Wyvern nest this is? Is its owner present?"
The gemstone's reaction gave the Wyverian girl a sense of relief.
Although there were other Wyverians living on the Ancient Tree, and along the way the ecosystem here had completely overturned her understanding of the Ancient Tree—with many new and wondrous things dazzling her eyes—
She was, after all, only a warrior—a warrior struggling to survive on this dangerous continent. She did not possess such a great desire for exploration; if not for that wise old Wyverian in the tribe saying this was her mission, she would never have gone to seek out this gemstone, much less deliver it to such a terrifying place.
Those ferocious Fire Wyverns flying about outside, and these Grimalkynes as well, had kept the Wyverian girl's heart taut with tension, afraid that one misstep might bring disaster.
In this unfamiliar place, where there was almost no possibility of escape, it was truly a kind of psychological torment for her.
She only wanted to hand over the gemstone as soon as possible and leave here quickly.
"This is the Fire Wyvern boss's nest, meow."
The Wyverian girl froze and looked toward the deep nest—it was indeed clearly different from the others.
As for the "Fire Wyvern boss," she had been able to understand its meaning from earlier conversations. Only now she no longer cared; finishing this quickly and leaving was what she desired most!
But in the next second, after hearing Tonkotsu's words, the joy that had just begun to rise in her heart instantly plummeted to freezing point.
"The Fire Wyvern boss went to a faraway place, meow. No one knows how long it'll take to return, meow!"
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