Chapter 63: Those Who Wander in Search of God and Paradise (4)
Among the two hundred World Items said to exist in Yggdrasil, Tarnhelm had always been regarded as junk.
Yes, it carried the dignity of being a World Item, but its sole function was to change appearance and race. Beyond that, it had no practical value—barely one percent of what other World Items could do. It had some defense, true, but anyone serious about combat would prefer a piece with better bonuses. No one would waste a slot just for that.
But when Tiamat bought it for the staggering price of one billion gold—trading even divine-class equipment—the situation changed.
For all his overwhelming stats, skills, and classes, his massive dragon body came shackled with countless penalties.
Even after joining the Zodiac, he rarely went on hunts with them, reduced to little more than a mascot.
Sometimes his gigantic form and devastating [Dragon Breath] earned him use as a siege weapon against guild fortresses, but beyond that, he was seen as inefficient.
Once Tiamat acquired Tarnhelm, however, everything shifted. The World Item's effect allowed him to shed his colossal dragon form and assume the size of a human.
Just as I hoped. Perfect—now I can really enjoy myself.
His stats and classes remained unchanged, but now he was freed from the restrictions of his dragon body. He could wear proper equipment. He could move with freedom.
And so, a broken player was born.
A dragon's natural stats were already many times greater than a human's. Transplanted into a human-sized frame, those same stats and skills became a nightmare. Yggdrasil's playerbase soon learned what happened when "the strongest race" (mockingly) met "a useless World Item" (mockingly) and turned into "the strongest race, period."
Some compared him to the old Fighter Mode exploits in retro games. Others flooded forums with complaints:
Is the admin team insane? They're just letting this exist?
Even in a broken game, this is too much.
Exploiting a trash race with a bugged item… this is ridiculous.
The devs, of course, did nothing. World Items were officially sanctioned cheats. If they nerfed Tarnhelm, they would have to rebalance every other World Item, and no one wanted that nightmare. With Yggdrasil already in decline, they hand-waved it as a "hidden piece" discovered by players.
By then, most of the legendary pioneers had left. The top-ranked warrior, the Lion King of the Zodiac, was gone. The great festivals and world events drew fewer and fewer eyes. Even if Tiamat called himself "the strongest," it was an empty boast in a dwindling world.
But here, in this other world—he now understood why World Items were World Items.
"...Huh?"
A stunned groan escaped him.
Before him stretched not a hole, but an entire tunnel wide enough for his dragon-sized self to stride through with room to spare. A passageway bored in a single straight line, dozens—no, hundreds—of meters long, opening to a distant patch of deep-blue night sky.
The tunnel walls gleamed like glass, smoothed to perfection. There had been no quake, no noise, no resistance. Soil, rock, ores—everything had been vaporized, melted into nothing under the overwhelming heat of his Breath.
"What... is this..."
He touched the wall in disbelief. Ssshh! Steam hissed where his hand met the glassy surface, and he yanked it back with a gasp. The molten residue trickled off his fingers—at first like lava, then crumbling into harmless powder.
Then it struck him. His draconic lineage was a hybrid—black and red. Shadow and fire. His Breath was not pure flame but black fire: heat laced with curse.
The heat alone had bored through the cavern.
No—thinking back, even in Yggdrasil, the laser-type Dragon Breath had never displayed this much power.
In massive guild wars where thousands clashed, the piercing force of such a Breath was rivaled only by siege golems.
But there was one difference—this time it had been unleashed in his human form.
"Wait… in Yggdrasil, did I never… or could I never…?"
Tiamat frowned, lost in thought. In the game, he had never once used Dragon Breath while transformed into a human.
The charging motion, the unleashing of power—it was always locked to the dragon's form. He had even joked about it during roleplay: "Behold, my ultimate technique! The Breath, usable only in my true draconic form!" It was a performance more than anything, since most enemies had already been crushed in his human form.
He had assumed it was impossible.
But Tarnhelm only altered his appearance and race—stats, skills, techniques all carried over unchanged. Which meant… if he had ever tried, he could have breathed fire as a human all along.
"…Huh."
It felt like stumbling onto a hidden mechanic. For a moment, satisfaction flickered across his face. But it vanished quickly.
The tunnel he'd blown straight to the surface was a risk. He had no idea how long he had wandered, but that shaft could very well become an entrance for outsiders to infiltrate Shinsi. Worse, someone might have seen his Breath erupting.
In Yggdrasil, Dragon Breath had a set range, dissipating after a distance. But this world wasn't bound by game mechanics. The tunnel stretched for hundreds of meters in a clean, molten line—and who knew how far the blaze had reached into the sky.
I need to collapse it. Seal it off before anyone finds it.
With that decision, Tiamat sprinted toward the surface.
....
Meanwhile, three members of the Dragon's Dream party were making their way up the slopes of the Azerlisia Mountains. They moved carefully, slipping past monster territory, masking their presence until they reached the foothills.
The mountains stretched endlessly like the spine of a titan, but if you set your sights on a single ridge, the way forward wasn't impossible.
"How much further?"
"About half a day's climb."
"Ugh, climbing at my age… my bones are groaning."
"..."
Just minutes ago he had claimed to feel spry, and now he was whining again. Rohaim gave Dean a sideways look—madman. He quickly looked away before Dean noticed and smacked him.
"What about the dwarves? What exactly were you doing in their kingdom?"
"Well, that's…"
Before Rohaim could answer, Colton cut in—
And then the world went silent.
The chirping of insects, the cries of birds, even the distant howls of beasts vanished. An oppressive hush swallowed the night.
Rohaim and Colton froze mid-thought, their minds grinding to a halt. Dean collapsed to his knees, crushed by a primal dread that seized every nerve in his body.
Then, from beyond the ridges, it came.
A pillar of black fire erupted, punching through the twilight sky. It devoured the light around it as it rose higher, higher, until it seemed it would consume the heavens themselves.
The three adventurers caught only a glimpse, for it was gone in an instant. Yet even without seeing its full ascent, the sheer, annihilating pressure carved into their souls.
The pillar vanished. Silence fell again. One second, two, three…
And then the world screamed.
Every beast, every monster, every living creature across the mountains erupted into frantic cries, a cacophony like the world itself convulsing under terror.
Chirp-chirp-chirp! Grrrr! Gyaaah! Kyaaak!
Birds, beasts, predators, and monsters alike—without distinction of species—all shrieked and bolted in madness.
It was sheer luck the party had taken a detour around monster territory; had they gone straight, they would have been trampled by a stampede gone berserk.
But would those creatures even have noticed them? Looking at deer and orcs, yaks and basilisks fleeing shoulder to shoulder in blind terror—it was doubtful they'd spare so much as a glance. Even ogres and gigant basilisks, apex predators of the land, were swept up in panic, scattering in every direction.
The only reason Dean hadn't obeyed his instincts and fled as well was because his companions, Rohaim and Colton, had collapsed, their minds frozen.
Clamping down on his terror with superhuman discipline born of years of experience, Dean forced his legs to remain planted on the earth.
For several minutes that felt like eternity, death and despair pressed over them. Over and over, Dean's thoughts shattered and reformed: We're dead. We're dead. We're dead.
The fear was overwhelming, a force that threatened to break his mind. Only his hardened will kept him from going mad.
When at last that dreadful aura receded, Dean staggered back to his senses.
"Wh-what… what the hell was that just now?"
He gasped for breath. Already he was exhausted, every shred of stamina and mental strength burned away in mere minutes—where hours of battle against killer apes hadn't drained him. That alone placed him beyond the realm of ordinary heroes.
At his side, Colton and Rohaim lay half-conscious, their minds having fled rather than face the terror head-on. It was their own form of mental defense—proof they too had reached the threshold of heroism.
"Hey! Get up, both of you! Wake up!"
"Ughhhhuuuaaaahhh…"
"Grrrgghhhrrraaahhh…"
The two muttered incoherently, swaying like drunks before collapsing again. Dean knew it would take time before they recovered. So he laid them gently on the ground. At least they were safe—the beasts had all fled. It would be a long while before any dared return. Perhaps never.
With a groan, Dean sank down beside them. His body ached, his mind trembled. He couldn't bear to recall the image that had seared itself into his instincts, the memory that screamed annihilation.
Something unspeakable had occurred. Something that had driven every living thing in the mountains into a frenzy of flight. Compared to the raw instincts of beasts and monsters, could humans truly claim to be wiser?
"…Hhhhuuuuuhhh…"
Dean let out a long, ragged sigh. Nothing made sense.
And then—rustling in the brush.
His body tensed. He reached for his spear, but his legs gave out. He leaned against the shaft like a feeble old man, trembling.
If even a threat-level 50 monster appeared now, he was finished. Not only him—Rohaim and Colton too.
Cold sweat soaked his gloves as he gripped the weapon tighter.
The undergrowth parted.
What stepped out was—
"…A person? Hmmm. Uh, hello there?"
A boy. Draped only in a sheet of black cloth, appearing in a place no human should.
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