Ch.4747. The Peculiar Fate of the Kingdom of Levia (4)

Right after devouring ten humans, the first change that occurred in the 14-year-old vampire Barca was in his eyes.

Even high-ranking vampires typically maintain round pupils like they had in life, but his pupils began to transform.

Similar to felines or reptiles like snakes, his pupils changed to resemble those of a predator, and this transformation was soon complete…

But this was merely the beginning.

By the time the vampire had consumed his twentieth corpse, his body began to grow.

His fingers became longer and thicker, his arms swelled, and his overall size increased to nearly five meters tall…

However, his waist and torso didn’t thicken proportionally to his height, resulting in a figure that appeared both slender and enormously imposing.

Naturally, these changes weren’t limited to his external appearance. His skeletal structure fundamentally differed from the human bones it was based on, and his muscular structure transformed as well.

And when he stuffed the thirtieth dismembered corpse into his enlarged mouth, his form began to visibly twist away from anything human.

The sharp claws that had grown from his fingertips and toes changed to resemble those of a lizard, and all his teeth transformed into fangs.

By the fortieth victim, he began to fundamentally distort.

Bat-like wing bones protruded from his back, his snout gradually extended while his mouth split wider, and most significantly, a thin tail with minimal muscle covering the bone grew between his legs.

And when he swallowed the fiftieth corpse—the body of the guard commander he had first killed with a spear—his appearance clearly revealed what form he was evolving into.

His legs bent backward into a reverse-joint structure, the bat wings on his back grew enormously thick, and his tail thickened to nearly the size of his torso.

Even his neck elongated, with two pairs of horns growing from just above it. By this point, anyone could see what his transformation was leading toward.

A dragon. The vampire was transforming into something resembling that monster, the symbol of power.

When he swallowed the sixtieth corpse in one gulp, his size increased further, reaching ten meters in length including his tail.

As he chewed through the seventieth corpse, his skin transformed into that of a dragon, with scales like hardened blood growing over his red skin.

After consuming the eightieth corpse, the vampire’s external changes were limited to about a 20% increase in size, but internally, dragon organs began to form, including a flame sac.

And after devouring the ninetieth corpse, he had grown to resemble a mature dragon of about fifteen meters in length, at least in appearance… but the most important change was yet to come.

For the hundredth and final victim, the completely maddened vampire wholly consumed the body of his pregnant wife, the fake aristocrat’s eldest daughter. This corpse was different from all the others.

The sacred number 10, which was the fundamental cause of this entire situation.

The corpse representing this sacred number multiplied by itself seeped into his body intact, moving to his heart and merging with it.

The most important organ of a dragon, which produces an endless amount of magical power (MP) that could be described as infinite without exaggeration.

As the Dragon’s Heart began to circulate blood filled with magical power instead of oxygen throughout his body—

The vampire who had been Barca the 14th was completely reborn as a new entity.

A dragon species that normally occurs when a pure-blooded dragon is infected by a high-ranking vampire or transforms through a ritual of their own will, though this case was an exception.

A Vampiric Dragon, which along with the Lich Dragon (the dragon version of a lich, created when an archmage transforms themselves into undead through a ritual), forms one of the two pinnacles of supreme undead dragons.

Also known as a vampirified dragon, the vampire who had been Barca the 14th ascended through the blessing of the vampire god.

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Pure-blooded dragons, as they are called or described within this world setting, are undoubtedly among the strongest races in Dungeon & Adventure, just as they are in other fantasy media.

They are classified separately as “Dragon” species, distinct from Magical Beasts, Undead, or Humanoids, so their status within the world setting needs no further explanation.

Of course, most dragon-type creatures classified as lesser dragons are merely monsters with somewhat impressive stats…

But pure-blooded dragons—true Dragons—possess strength on an entirely different level from these lesser dragons.

Apart from having four legs and wings, these creatures have quite different appearances depending on their type, and even without job modifiers, their basic stats exceed those of most other races with equivalent rank jobs.

A dragon that follows the magic tech tree possesses superior physical abilities compared to warriors of the same rank, while a dragon that follows the warrior tech tree, despite having fewer innate abilities, often has greater magical power than mages of other races.

They also possess boss monster-level health and naturally increase in rank over time to become mature dragons.

Even the weakest mature dragon is treated as at least a rank 3 advanced dragon species, equivalent to the realm of a Sword Master.

A hatchling dragon emerges from its egg as an ethereal being and rapidly grows to rank 7 within a month. From this state, it develops into an adolescent classified as an intermediate dragon species within 2-3 years.

After about 10 more years as an adolescent, it generally becomes a mature dragon.

And within this classification, the Vampiric Dragon that Barca the 14th became corresponds to a mature dragon, even if it might be considered weak by overall standards.

In terms of dragon ranking, it would be classified roughly as rank 3, but with the vampiric transformation raising it to approximately the lower end of rank 2.

The Vampiric Dragon, or rarely called the vampirified dragon, may have once been a Dragon species, but now it is merely an undead of the vampire lineage.

It retains most of the physical abilities and breath weapon from its time as a pure-blooded dragon while gaining various special vampire abilities such as regeneration and transformation, making it even stronger.

Some abilities have also fused, allowing it to summon vampire minions through a minion production skill, or to exhale a unique vampiric breath instead of the original elemental breath.

Although its vampire abilities are only at the level of a high vampire (rank 5), when combined with a dragon’s physical prowess, it is reborn as a monster of the highest danger level.

However, even a Vampiric Dragon has a critical weakness compared to normal dragons: it cannot utilize the dragon’s special growth system.

In Dungeon & Adventure, growth systems exist in each world setting, though they differ slightly.

This system, which applies to living creatures, causes overall ability scores to increase with age during youth, then plateau at a certain point, and eventually decline due to aging for most abilities.

This might seem quite inconvenient, but in reality, aging slows once one reaches a certain level, and there are many anti-aging items and traits, so ability score reduction due to aging rarely happens in the game.

This system applies differently to ageless races like dragons—they can grow infinitely without aging.

Even after reaching the highest rank (rank 0) known as ancient dragons, beyond the advanced level commonly called mature dragons, dragons have the characteristic of growing almost infinitely in power simply by aging.

In some world settings, a dragon species that has lived since the beginning of time can even be the creator of the world, so this growth greatly contributes to dragons’ strength…

But how could a Vampiric Dragon, an undead vampire, grow biologically?

Well, even so, a dragon is still a dragon. It’s certainly among the most powerful forces I’ve acquired—

‘Now, go and complete your final revenge.’

A certain wicked and malicious evil god, planning to gift the Vampiric Dragon to Lisa as her personal mount later, first demanded that it settle its grudges.