Red Dragon Monster Hunter Template.

【Thousand Blade Scales】 has been retained.

[Sixth Attribute Energy Enhancement] has been retained.

[Unlimited Growth] has been retained.

…………

Thor glanced at the previous abilities, which he was already familiar with from his previous life's game, and his gaze fell on the last, simple one: [Infinite Growth].

It looks ordinary, but in the real world, crocodiles, pythons, lobsters, hermit crabs, and many fish all have similar characteristics.

Their bodies do not stop developing after adulthood; they continue to grow slowly over the years. However, after passing through the juvenile development period, the growth rate slows down significantly. In addition, various limitations such as lifespan, illness, and environment prevent them from growing into an excessively exaggerated appearance.

But the Serpent King Dragon is different; it can maintain rapid growth during its developmental period throughout its life, and its lifespan... is unparalleled throughout the ages.

Chapter 439 Devouring All Things

If we disregard logic, the pinnacle of biological evolution in Earth's history would undoubtedly be the Late Cretaceous period.

That was the time when the largest land carnivore in history was born, a creature with a body that seemed like a piece of advanced technology—the Tyrannosaurus Rex.

And the Triceratops, a creature with the strongest overall physical attributes, combining strength and mobility, resembling a human tank.

These two are also predator and prey. In order to improve the survival rate, an arms race lasting tens of millions of years took place in North America during the Late Cretaceous. The final conclusion was that bigger is better and bigger is stronger!

Once a creature reaches a certain size, it can become immune to many dangers and diseases. What is a deadly cancer for an ordinary creature is nothing more than a pimple on a blue whale.

This also applies to true dragons. Furthermore, as magical creatures, dragons can also avoid the biggest weakness of giant creatures—finding enough food—by absorbing magical elements and external energy.

For them, the increase in size is equivalent to greater strength, thicker scales, a wider range of breath attacks, and more magic reserves—it's all beneficial.

Therefore, the simplest way to measure the strength of a true dragon is to look at its size. Although it is not absolute, it will not be wrong in 90% of cases.

…………

Thor felt a surge of vitality welling up within him, every cell in his body eager to try, constantly craving energy and nutrients.

The boundless geothermal heat from the magma was rapidly absorbed, and large amounts of metallic minerals and inorganic matter flowed into his massive maw like a stream.

Cell differentiation, bone bud growth, and muscle stretching are all underway; his body is undergoing a transformation at a visible pace.

His rapid growth caused the reserves he had stored in his stomach to be consumed at an alarming rate. The amount of matter he digested every minute was almost enough to sustain an adult white dragon for a whole year.

Magma surges up from the depths of the earth, providing Thor with ample metals, minerals, and energy, but the growth of a true dragon still depends on the supply of organic matter.

He could indeed slowly synthesize organic matter using magic, but the process was too slow. It was enough for normal times, but it was far from meeting the needs of his rapidly growing body.

The massive red dragon swung its increasingly long tail, rising rapidly upwards like a deep-sea torpedo.

In the blink of an eye, he transformed into a streak of crimson light, leaping into the sky from the crater, carrying with him the gushing lava. The lava fell to the ground, cooled and solidified, forming grains of pure gold that shimmered with golden light.

Unable to bear the hunger in his stomach, Thor had no patience to wait for his men to prepare food. Trailing his long, fiery tail, he sped straight toward the distant ocean.

…………

Between the southern shore of the Thurte rainforest and the Carinsan Islands lies a sea area surrounded by warm ocean currents. Its unique hydrological environment has nurtured a vast array of plankton and countless fish.

Legend has it that at noon every year, when the sun shines on the sea, countless fish scales reflect a dazzling golden light, making the entire sea shine, hence it is also known as the Shining Sea.

Such a rich natural fishing ground naturally attracted the covetous eyes of many forces. Aquatic groups such as the Shahua fishmen, sea elves, mermaids, and Naga fought and competed for this place year after year, resulting in a situation of division among various factions.

On this day, all the tribes mobilized their armies to vie for control of a group of silverfish that had just migrated there.

Amidst the chaos, a figure emerged from the water, riding the waves.

She has a human-like upper body and a deep blue fish tail trailing behind her. Her body lines are soft, her eyes shimmer with a watery light, and she has translucent gills on both sides of her cheeks, which are hard to notice without careful observation.

He held a white trident in his hand. Limited by the rudimentary metal forging techniques in the sea, this weapon was made from the bones of a giant beast. He manipulated the water flow to condense it into rotating water blades, and struggled to resist the swarming Shahua fishmen.

Mermaids have lifespans similar to, or even slightly longer than, humans, but their reproductive capacity is comparable. Naturally, they are far inferior to the Shahua fish-men, who are known as sea gnomes. In the long struggle spanning millions of years, they have always been at a disadvantage.

Among the Shahua fish-men, there have even evolved special mimicry individuals whose appearance is indistinguishable from that of mermaids. They often disguise themselves and infiltrate mermaid groups to steal information, poison and assassinate, and commit despicable acts.

In this battle for the fish, the mermaids were once again at a disadvantage. The Shahua fishmen had even formed an alliance with the Naga at some point, intending to take this opportunity to completely drive the mermaids out of this sea area.

While desperately fending off attacks from all sides, the blue-tailed mermaid searched for a chance to break through and retreat. She had to bring the message back to her tribe to avoid the impending annihilation.

After creating a giant wave that knocked away a predatory shark that pounced on her, she caught a glimpse of a crimson shooting star streaking across the distant sky out of the corner of her eye. The next instant, a torrent of lightning crashed down from the heavens.

…………

The place with the highest population density in the world is neither the wildebeest herds migrating on the African savanna nor the train stations during the Spring Festival travel rush, but the surging tide of fish in the vast ocean.

People often use the analogy of sardines in a can to describe a crowded scene, but the sheer density of sardine schools in the deep sea is no less impressive than that of sardines sealed in a can.

Thor desperately needs a massive amount of organic matter, something that the terrestrial environment cannot provide. Only the super fish tides in the ocean, which can easily reach tens of millions or even hundreds of millions of tons, can satisfy his needs.

His extraordinary dynamic vision and mental energy field allowed him to see the dense, silvery scales below, even across the distant sea.

This triggered the power of the storm, stirring up the surrounding air currents. As they rubbed against each other, lightning-attribute magical elements continuously gathered, transforming into countless tiny lightning bolts that rained down.

While a single bolt of lightning wasn't particularly powerful, its coverage was enormous, causing the shimmering sea stretching for over ten kilometers to tremble slightly.

Large schools of fish floated to the surface, their white bellies turned up, among them were many blue and black alien creatures.

The enormous red dragon slowly descended from the sky, opened its ferocious maw, and began to devour the sea.

The power of the ocean tides was also mobilized, constructing a massive whirlpool with seawater, generating a powerful pulling force that gathered all the aquatic creatures stunned by lightning, transforming them into a giant silver pillar that shot into the sky.

Countless silver fish, carrying seawater, safari fishmen, and nagas, poured into Thor's mouth. The moment they entered his body, they were rapidly decomposed, digested, compressed, and condensed into a super-high-energy polymer.

After a gluttonous feast, he was still not satisfied. He spread his wings and continued to search for the next massive swarm of fish.

The once bustling sea was now desolate, and for years or even decades to come, the people living in these waters would suffer from prolonged famine.

After a long while, a mermaid draped in seaweed and shells, with long, azure hair, cautiously emerged from the water, gazing in the direction the red dragon had gone, her hands trembling uncontrollably.

Chapter 440 Igniting the Fire of the Sun

"Who! How dare they offend His Highness Ambori's divine power..."

"Dragon! A huge red dragon! Run!!"

"Help me! I don't want to die! Someone please save me!"

…………

As his strength grew, Thor rarely ate excessively anymore. What appeared to outsiders as gluttony was, for him, merely a matter of taking a small bite.

But the hunger surging through his body at this moment made him, after many years, once again indulge his desires.

He followed the ocean currents of the shimmering sea forward, wantonly plundering one natural fishing ground after another, swallowing countless creatures and their flesh and blood into his belly.

Such actions naturally clashed with the indigenous people of the area, and the protests and panic that followed turned into scattered discordant noises.

But how could the mighty red dragon care about such things? Just like when humans harvest wheat, they never ask for the wheat's consent.

All living beings are the dragon's pasture; this is the most prominent principle imprinted deep within the dragon's heritage.

After a period of unbridled gluttony that inadvertently destroyed more than a dozen intelligent races, Thor finally felt a sense of fullness in his stomach.

He looked down at his body. In the short time since he had been plundering and growing, his body had undergone visible changes. His length from head to tail had increased to about 140 meters.

The organic matter has been replenished; it's time to return to our nest.

He still has the Teostra monster template that hasn't been loaded yet, and deep inside the volcano, there is an endless supply of high-temperature magma, which is exactly the environment needed for transformation.

And so the enormous red dragon spread its wings and flew away, leaving behind only a legend in this sea that would be recorded in history and passed down for thousands of years—the famine beast, the Red Plague.

…………

Thor sank once again into the depths of the scalding lava, the warmth enveloping him from all sides allowing him to comfortably stretch out his massive body.

He gathered his consciousness, sank into his mind, and found the square that still glowed faintly, representing the Teostra template. With a thought, he chose to extract it.

A familiar warmth rose from within, slowly spreading to every part of the body.

This pure fire-attribute ancient dragon was perfectly suited to the red dragon's body, and all the modifications went smoothly, as if it was meant to be one with him from the start.

Just when Thor thought this was only a slight increase in his existing power, a transformation that had been building up for a long time suddenly erupted within him.

In the Monster Hunter universe, fire-attribute monsters are arguably the most numerous.

Thor has extracted the power of Rock Dragon, Rock Dragon, Fire Dragon, Slayer Dragon, Lava Dragon... as well as Lava Mountain Dragon and Serpent King Dragon. These beings all control the power of high temperature and fire to varying degrees.

In addition, the red dragon's innate talent for controlling fire, combined with the integration of the Flame King Dragon template, completed a qualitative leap from quantitative change, carrying its consciousness and continuously delving into the depths of the crimson element river, one of the four basic elements of heaven and earth.

A warm torrent of energy flowed through his body, and the already extremely high temperature inside his heavy core fission organ, which was formed using the Lava Dragon template, rose rapidly once again.

The temperature quickly rose to an alarming level, and the violently hot plasma instinctively spewed outwards, but was firmly imprisoned by a thick gravitational field, unable to break free even slightly.

The chain reaction that should have ignited the heavy metals could not occur under such extreme conditions. Before the reaction could even start, the nuclear material was broken up and disintegrated by the high heat, and the reaction chain was abruptly interrupted.

On the contrary, the light elements such as hydrogen, tritium, and helium, which were mixed with heavy metals and rushed into the cavity, had their atomic nuclei move violently under extremely high temperature and pressure, breaking through the barrier of electron repulsion and colliding violently.

A reaction akin to the creation of the world erupted within Thor's body, but the violent energy was completely gathered by the gravitational field, transforming into a stable, burning fireball.

A miniature solar celestial body took shape within his body.

The laws of heaven and earth trembled, and the primal feedback descended, allowing Thor to touch the laws of the sun amidst the power of fire and earth.

Then a bright golden light emanated from beneath his crimson-gold scales, flowing and spreading across his broad and majestic chest, like a slowly unfolding golden sun.

The surging, immense magical power, relying on the cage effect, slowly spread throughout the entire Doomsday Volcano, extending to the crimson-golden city built upon the volcano, and the vast surrounding land.

A deep, rumbling sound came from the depths of the earth, like an ancient behemoth that had been sleeping for hundreds of millions of years slowly awakening.

…………

In the city of crimson and golden radiance, all living beings stopped what they were doing and focused their attention on sensing the surging anomalies in the world.

Several powerful Darkin were the first to notice the anomaly, and suddenly flapped their wings and took to the air, issuing an urgent warning.

In an instant, the entire city was like a disturbed beehive, with all sorts of creatures—Darkin, dwarves, kobolds, humans—fleeing in panic.

A traveler from afar stared blankly at the chaotic scene before him, dodging a goblin that darted past his feet, and then witnessed a sight he would never forget.

In the distance, a majestic volcano roared, its sound echoing across the land, causing the entire mountain and the surrounding earth to tremble violently.

Endless crimson magma shot into the sky, transforming into towering pillars of fire, before collapsing into a rain of scorching flames that dyed the entire sky a fiery crimson.

The deafening roar drowned out all other sounds in the world. A red-hot pebble grazed his clothes and embedded itself heavily in the soil.

He looked down and saw that it was a piece of scorching red gold, but he had no intention of picking it up. Looking at the rain of fire falling from the sky, he felt only extreme fear.

And this was only the beginning of the anomaly.

After the first eruption of lava, massive amounts of lava poured down the crater, causing the surrounding rocks and soil to churn and roll, resembling hundreds of earthen dragons writhing wildly.

Under the combined influence of the laws of the world and the magic of fire and earth, the tectonic plates surrounding the Doomsday Volcano began to slowly squeeze and converge inward.

The rising rock layers pushed the mountain upwards continuously, and the surrounding low hills were also affected, colliding and shifting with each other. Some of them sank into the ground and disappeared, while others rose up and became new mountain peaks.

The already majestic and imposing Doomsday Volcano slowly climbs towards the clouds. Only this magical world could create such a magnificent spectacle.

If placed within the rules of real-world physics, the mountain's immense weight would have crushed its base long ago, causing the entire mountain to sink and be buried deep within the Earth's mantle.

…………

Deep within the magma, Thor was unaware that his transformation had brought about earth-shattering changes to his territory. At this moment, he was in a deep slumber.

A golden halo surrounded his massive body, and endless fire and earth elements converged from all directions, some even condensing into tangible elemental life forms that circled around him in celebration and worship of this dragon favored by the world.

Time flowed slowly, and his enormous body continued to grow.

Chapter 441 Divine Power and Believers

"Praise be to the great light of dawn!"

"Praise be to the eternal crimson sun!"