Dragon Tongue – 4

“If it’s another method, what kind of…?”

“As I said last time, the simplest way to handle the Dragon Tongue is to try using it yourself. That’s why I told you to put your lips together and repeat exactly what I say, but I was rejected because you said you couldn’t…”

Pareunari trailed off, glancing at Minerva-nim. A dragon observing a human’s mood – it was quite a rare sight.

“You said the Dragon Tongue reacted on its own to the word you spoke, right?”

“That’s right.”

“Do you remember what word it was? It doesn’t matter if you don’t, because I can just follow the traces, but it would be more convenient if you told me now.”

What word did the Dragon Tongue react to back then? The dragon’s corpse-

“It was ‘process’.”

Hearing my words, Pareunari, who had been lost in thought for a moment, approached me with an expressionless face, then circled around me, observing me. Pareunari circled several times in that state before returning to their original spot.

“How fascinating.”

“What do you mean?”

“How is it that the first word you learned was destruction? Usually, one would start with simple concepts of creation and then gradually move on to concepts of destruction.”

I thought it was easier to destroy something than to create it, but since Dragon Tongue was a concept I didn’t understand, I decided to just accept it. Pareunari would know much more about that than I would.

“Is it that fascinating?”

“To put it in human terms… hmm… yes. It’s like a child who just started standing learning to run before learning to walk. You can understand it that way.”

It was a very simple and clear explanation. Even I would have been extremely surprised if something like that had happened.

“Anyway, what I’m going to teach you is this: making your body fully understand the Dragon Tongue.”

“My body understands? How?”

“You just have to experience it directly.”

Pareunari’s eyes began to glow faintly. Their lips parted, and a shockwave erupted.

ㅡShatter!

With that simple word, my surroundings literally exploded. The floor cracked like a parched rice paddy. The walls were the same. Stone fragments poured down from the ceiling like rain.

With just one word, Minerva-nim’s experimental workshop had been reduced to ruins.

The shattered walls, floor, and ceiling were immediately restored when Minerva-nim lightly waved her staff, but Minerva-nim herself seemed quite surprised that the space she had created herself had been destroyed so easily.

“This is the Dragon Tongue.”

Pareunari’s face suggested that such things were natural. From their perspective, they had merely uttered a single word.

“…You seem quite useful, Pareunari.”

Curiosity filled the silvery-white pupils. As if reading the emotions in those eyes, Pareunari shook their head.

“You can’t use it. You haven’t absorbed a dragon’s soul, so no matter how much you practice, you won’t be able to use it. Even if you were to absorb a dragon’s soul, your body would collapse because the compatibility wouldn’t be right.”

“Are you saying that child can withstand it?”

“That’s right. They absorbed Kekus’s soul, and Helthra’s soul too. I’ve never heard of a human absorbing two dragon souls and remaining perfectly fine. They’re special.”

“I knew that. They were an extraordinary child from the first time I met them. It’s just…”

Minerva-nim’s eyes, fixed on me, gleamed with an emotion close to greed.

“They were simply far more so than I had anticipated.”

My body trembled. I deliberately avoided their gaze.

“Just now, do you understand why you were unharmed?”

Pareunari threw out a question at just the right time. I quickly answered.

“Isn’t it because Pareunari used it to bypass me?”

“It’s similar, but different.”

They shook their head from side to side.

“It’s partly because I didn’t aim directly at you, but also because the dragon souls within your body reacted to the Dragon Tongue. If you didn’t have those souls, you would have shattered just the same, even if I hadn’t aimed directly at you.”

“But I didn’t feel anything, even though you say the souls reacted?”

“That’s because it’s the realm of instinct. Do you consciously breathe, or consciously blink your eyes? No, you don’t. I had to make an effort to breathe like a human and blink like a human. Dragons don’t do that. It’s the same thing. For dragons, reacting to the Dragon Tongue is a matter of instinct.”

It was a statement that I both felt I understood and didn’t understand. Seeing my expression that I didn’t grasp it at all, Pareunari prepared the Dragon Tongue again.

“Don’t worry. We’ll just keep doing it until you understand.”

ㅡShatter!

Kwajijijik! With that word, the shockwave that erupted completely shattered the floor, ceiling, and walls that had just regained their original forms. This time, too, I was perfectly fine.

While Minerva-nim calmly restored the shattered areas, Pareunari, who had been deep in thought in front of me, approached.

“Hmm… I think that’s enough. You should be able to use the Dragon Tongue now. Alright, try it on that wall over there.”

“Already?”

“Time isn’t important for the Dragon Tongue. You can just think of it as the souls within you having assimilated well.”

Their finger pointed to the opposite wall.

“Just utter it naturally, like breathing. With the feeling of putting your thoughts into the words. You’re commanding that wall to shatter. It’s okay if you don’t know how. The souls will move according to your will on their own. Using it with your own conscious will comes later. For now, just pretend you are.”

Listening to Pareunari’s chatter, I took a breath. I tried my best to follow those words. Putting my thoughts into the words, as if commanding the wall.

“What word should I use?”

“That’s entirely up to you. It’s your power, so choose freely according to your thoughts. You can choose ‘process’ like last time, or you can follow me and say ‘Shatter!’ The Dragon Tongue is a concept, not a restriction.”

“Once I decide, I can’t change it or anything like that-“

“No. So don’t worry.”

I took a stance. What to choose was already decided. If I were to activate the Dragon Tongue with an everyday word, I would have to speak very carefully until I could perfectly control the power. That was out of the question.

With the feeling of commanding the wall, I carefully opened my mouth.

ㅡShatter!

Then, a sensation as if something was boiling deep within my body surged up. The sensation didn’t stop there. My entire body heated up as if it were being forged.

The heat filling my body surged up my throat and burst out of my mouth.

A peeeep- ringing sound filled my ears.

With a tremendous explosion, the floor not only shattered but turned into a handful of dust. The ceiling, similarly pulverized into dust, scattered its own debris like a hazy mist.

The destruction didn’t stop at the floor and ceiling. When the shockwave, which was turning every place it touched into ash, met the walls, the workshop walls shattered into pieces and burst outwards.

Once again, a massive explosion reverberated.

Outside, mages who had been sitting peacefully and were suddenly hit by a dust storm from a clear sky could be heard chattering loudly, their voices full of confusion, asking what was happening.

“…”

Minerva-nim and I, who had experienced such a situation before, remained calm even though one side of the workshop had completely blown open, but Pareunari could not.

They stammered, their lips parting several times, and after numerous attempts, they finally managed to form words.

“You… were you a dragon? Were you transformed into a human like me?”

Judging by the nonsense that came out first, it seemed the shock was considerable.

A presence was heard from outside. Kaikilia slowly opened her eyes. Golden eyes, shimmering as if pure gold had been melted and cast, gleamed between her eyelids.

The pleasure that had enveloped her entire body and refused to let go had just subsided. She raised her upper body. The blanket covering her slipped off, revealing her stark naked body.

Without even thinking of covering her exposed body, Kaikilia replayed the previous events in her mind.

It was such an intense experience that she wondered if any pleasure beyond it could possibly exist. Moreover, she had half-lost consciousness midway through, so her memories were even hazy.

At the point where she had felt climax, and felt it again, and again, until her head was completely burned out, her reason collapsed, and only instinct remained, what had she done? Had she been pinned underneath and humiliatingly obeyed everything she was told?

In the end, the object with her mouth-

“…Ugh.”

The sensation of a foreign object completely filling her throat, the sensation of constricting her throat to please that foreign object, the sensation of her inner throat being poked, and the sensation of something sticky and fishy pouring into her throat.

All those sensations seemed to return, and Kaikilia unconsciously fumbled at her throat. Whenever she swallowed, the events of that time automatically came to mind.

While Kaikilia struggled not to be swallowed by pleasure, someone opened the bedroom door and walked inside. She deliberately diverted her thoughts and snapped at the intruder.

“By what reason have you set foot in my bedchamber, Pope?”

The owners of the presence were Floreta and Luna.

The two troublesome Popes, who had been sitting demurely in front of the central hall, declaring they wouldn’t leave until the honored guest was brought to the Holy Nation, had now come to Kaikilia’s bedchamber.

Indeed, there were only four beings in the entire world who could so boldly enter Kaikilia’s bedchamber: the Eternal Mage, the Pope of the Sun, the Pope of the Moon. And finally…

“Did Your Majesty fully enjoy the pleasures of last night?”

“Shut your mouths. It’s none of your concern.”

In response to Luna’s voice, Kaikilia returned a very sharp retort.

The reason the Popes had come all this way was obvious. They must have come to ask to take that man to the Holy Nation. She had absolutely no intention of allowing that.

“If you have come again to make that strange proposal, my answer remains the same as before, so it would be best for you to return as you are.”

“No, Your Majesty the Emperor.”

Floreta smiled faintly.

“This time, we have come to offer a different proposal.”