My head itches…
"Ugh… Fluffy, stop licking… let me sleep a little longer…"
Levi mumbled in discontent, feeling a cool sensation on his head.
But as his mind slowly cleared, he quickly realized something was wrong…
It's… kind of hot… feels like I'm in a bath…
Also… Fluffy's tongue seems way too big… and it stinks…
This is definitely not my Fluffy!
Levi's eyes shot open.
A dog.
There was no doubt it was a dog's face staring back at him, but it wasn't his own adorable Samoyed. This creature's skin was covered in a layer of dark brown scales. Right there, half of Levi's worldview shattered. As his gaze drifted downwards to its ridiculously muscular physique, he froze completely…
"A Kobo…ld?"
The term surfaced in his mind instinctively…
WTF?!
Levi soon discovered an even more disturbing fact. The way these… things, which he'd tentatively labeled kobolds, were looking at him was all wrong.
It was the same look he got when he was starving all day and his late-night BBQ delivery finally arrived.
They want to eat me!
I woke up and became the main course!
This realization instantly shocked Levi's groggy mind into full alertness, and he began to struggle instinctively.
His movement toppled him over into the even hotter broth, and he swallowed a mouthful of the soup, which had the涩astringent taste of mushrooms. It choked back the string of curses that were about to erupt from his lips.
Tumbling in the swirling liquid, Levi finally saw his own reflection on the rippling surface…
It was a silver, lustrous egg…
Or more precisely, an egg with a round lizard-like head sticking out of it…
A piece of the shell he had just broken through was still stuck to his head, held on by either amniotic fluid or soup. Paired with his current expression of dazed, life-doubting confusion, it was a comically stupid sight.
The moment was fleeting, yet his stunned mind felt like it had wandered for an eternity. The reality of the situation forced him to accept the fact that he had transmigrated and become a lizard. There was no time to lie in a warm nest and reflect on his past life like the protagonists of other transmigration novels.
Perhaps sensing the commotion in the pot, the surrounding kobolds, who were already practically drooling over the soup, let out a collective 'Awooo!' and rushed forward. Using short spears that looked like they were carved from stalagmites, they shoved the silver lizard trying to escape back into the pot.
They weren't sure why the boiled lizard egg had suddenly turned into lizard soup, but hey, soup was more filling than an egg, right?
The old chieftain, Saron, watched his excited children with a mixture of fondness and melancholy. His thoughts drifted to the deteriorating living conditions in the Underdark. The conflict between the city of Grassthorne, ruled by the Shadow Mistress, and a neighboring Mind Flayer city was escalating daily.
This lizard egg, which they had found in a sinkhole, was one of their few decent finds in recent days.
"Let them enjoy this moment. If things get worse…"
Saron sighed, thinking that if they couldn't find a new territory with enough food, their only option would be to pledge allegiance to a stronger power.
This was the survival strategy for most declining species like theirs.
In most cases, they would become vassals, losing all sovereignty.
They might even serve as emergency rations when their patron was short on food. But any outcome was better than the extinction of their tribe.
"If only we could serve a dragon…"
Unfortunately, the few chromatic dragons within their tribe's territory already had powerful vassals and were mostly embroiled in the conflict started by the Shadow Mistress.
Showing up now would mean either being sent to the front lines as cannon fodder or being immediately chopped up, cured with mineral salt, and turned into military jerky.
When Saron was young, his father had told him that one of their ancestors had the honor of becoming a vassal to a red dragon. After accumulating enough merit, he was granted a drop of dragon blood, breaking the natural limits of his species and becoming a noble Dragon-blooded Kobold!
Of course, nine out of ten kobolds told similar stories about their glorious ancestry, a fact that often made them the laughingstock of other races.
But just as the old kobold was pondering the future of his tribe, a panicked commotion erupted from the 'lizard egg soup' he had almost forgotten…
Hot, hot, hot, hot, HOT!
Levi felt like he was being cooked alive!
No, if any other creature were in his situation, they'd have been fully cooked long ago!
For some reason, this body of his seemed to have a high tolerance, or perhaps resistance, to extreme heat. Despite being held down in a boiling pot by a group of kobolds for so long, he was still kicking…
This fact seemed to be breaking the worldview of some of the younger kobolds. They grew angry and agitated, baring their teeth and letting out threatening growls.
"These damned dog-things!" Levi's initial panic and despair were turning into frustration and rage!
I mean, anyone would be furious if they were pinned down in a stinking hot bathtub and not allowed to get out.
But this powerless anger in the face of tragedy… back in his world, the internet had a name for it…
Useless rage.
Levi was in that exact, awkward position.
On one hand, he was still struggling to adapt to this new body. His claws were sharp, but his short forelimbs made him constantly misjudge distances.
So every time he tried to scramble out of the pot, several stone spears would poke his claws and body.
Thanks to his scales, the attacks weren't fatal, but they still hurt like hell.
Many of his softer, more tender scales had been bent or torn, and the broth began to be tinged with blood.
On the other hand, as time passed, he was getting hungry… a hunger that gnawed at his very bones!
Levi had never been this hungry in his life. It felt as if his stomach, on the verge of rebellion, might just start digesting itself if he didn't eat something soon.
And objectively speaking, his body mass was indeed decreasing rapidly.
Just as Levi, weakened and dizzy, plunged headfirst into the soup again and choked on a mouthful of broth… his mind suddenly cleared!
Hey, that's pretty good!
And so, what had been a brutal drama of inter-species predation took a bizarre turn…
The silver lizard in the pot, after enduring a few pokes from the kobolds, would seize the opportunity to take a few big bites of the stew!
Some kind of root vegetable? Hmm… tastes like potato!
A purple mushroom? Could it be poisonous… better than starving to death!
Some kind of dried meat? Well, it's not mine!
With no other choice, Levi devoured nearly all the meager ingredients in the pot in a matter of moments.
The kobolds who witnessed this went red-eyed with fury!
That was all the food they had gathered over the past few days! And now, the creature they intended to be their main course had eaten it all!
The wails of the young kobolds finally caught the attention of the adult kobolds and Chieftain Saron, who grabbed their weapons and rushed over.
But Levi, nearly mad with hunger, couldn't care less. He hesitated for only a fraction of a second before targeting what was right beneath him!
I'll eat myself… my own eggshell!
Who was it that said eggshells were a good source of calcium?
CRUNCH!
Levi chewed a few times and swallowed with a gulp. His brilliant blue, vertically slitted pupils widened in shock.
He couldn't describe the taste, but it gave him a sense of satisfaction he'd never felt before. His mind felt clearer, as if all the food he'd eaten before was mere garbage in comparison!
Levi devoured the rest of the eggshell as fast as he could. Just as he was about to go for the piece stuck on his head and figure out how to escape, a sense of crisis washed over him, so intense it made his scales clench.
He desperately flapped his unfamiliar wings and twisted his body, but he was a fraction of a second too late.
With a whoosh, a long spear carved from a stalactite shattered the clay pot and pierced straight through his right wing, pinning him to the ground. The hot, blood-tinged soup spread across the dry earth.
An adult kobold had made its move!
"ROAR!"
A pain so intense it could drive a dragon mad made Levi let out a low growl. He lifted his head to see more than a dozen kobold monsters, clearly a size larger than the grunts from before, charging at him from all directions, wielding various old, damaged, but still sharp weapons.
And behind them, an old, scrawny kobold holding a short staff was scrutinizing him with a thoughtful expression.
Instinctively, Levi felt this one was the most dangerous!
You've got to be kidding me! Kobolds have mages?!
As it turned out, Levi was overthinking it. Before the suspected mage could even act, an axe with a chipped but gleaming silver edge came swinging down!
Pinned to the ground, Levi couldn't dodge the blow.
The kobold seemed to already envision the damned lizard hybrid's head being split in two, its body then torn to pieces by its comrades.
Levi thought the same thing…
But in the depths of his unwillingness and fury, a massive stream of information finally broke through an invisible barrier and flooded his mind. An instinctual urge made him feel that he had to shout something out, or his head would explode.
"TIBERIUS SEXTUS KEANU REEVES!!!"
As this complex, tongue-twisting phrase erupted in a roar from Levi's mouth, an unstoppable wave of cold burst forth.
Every kobold present felt the temperature plummet instantly. Those at the forefront were hit as if by a winter blizzard!
The axe-wielding kobold, in particular, found its swift, powerful swing slowing, faltering, and then freezing in mid-air.
The wind, filled with spontaneously generated ice shards, tore countless wounds across its body. The blood froze before it could even spill! Everything in its vision was covered by frost until it was plunged into eternal darkness…
An ice sculpture, filled with a beautiful, terrible power, was formed.
And behind this sculpture, a fan-shaped expanse of jagged ice stretched out as far as the eye could see.
The kobolds behind it, though not instantly killed by the sudden frost breath, were caught in the blast. Their bodies were covered in a thick layer of rime, and their feet were frozen to the ice, rendering them immobile.
Crystalline ice flakes drifted down from the sky.
In the Underdark, where the sun had not been seen for millennia, it was as if it had begun to snow…
All the kobolds were stunned by the sudden turn of events. The younger ones, terrified, collapsed onto the frigid ice, trembling and whimpering.
Many of the adult kobolds were at a loss. Some even dropped their weapons and prostrated themselves on the ground like whelps, as if in worship.
This was not a foe they could fight!
This, too, was the way of the weak in the Underdark.
Be bold against the weak, be meek against the strong.
Dignity? Honor? Meaningless in the face of death!
Panic and despair spread unstoppably through the tribe…
"A Dragon's True Name…"
Saron spat out the words through clenched teeth, his eyes fixed on Levi, the cause of it all, with an intensely complicated gaze.
Levi, who had thought he was a goner, hadn't expected to pull off such a feat in a moment of crisis.
It felt more like I had to cough up a giant ball of phlegm… but that phlegm was surprisingly powerful. He was also surprised that these damned monster-dogs had completely submitted after just one attack, bowing their heads in surrender.
"Is this… a breath weapon?"
"Did I… transmigrate as a dragon?"
Just as Levi thought he had survived the initial crisis and might even gain his first batch of followers like in the novels, the old kobold's voice rang out, slow and deliberate:
"My children, this may be sudden, but the very survival of our tribe is at stake. Kill it! Now! Quickly! For the tribe! Ansirakusa!!!"