Red Dragon Monster Hunter Template.

The number after the mental energy essence balance has now reached 1076.9, and it will occasionally jump up.

The undead creature that wanted to possess him had already given him over 500 points of mental essence, and it was still alive, like a peanut cake being squeezed out of a giant hydraulic press.

It is unknown what kind of creature it is, but judging from the power it displayed and the amount of essence it provided, it is probably not an unknown being.

Unfortunately, he died before he could even begin, his only misfortune being bad luck.

Chapter Sixty-Eight: The Exit

With so many treasures, how should they be arranged? Thor found himself in a blissful predicament.

The most direct and significant way to improve strength is undoubtedly to immediately draw a medium-level monster template.

However, Thor's physical instincts reminded him that the energy he had accumulated was nearing the limit that his age could withstand.

If a medium-sized monster template is loaded, the enormous energy may trigger a stress response in the body, causing the slumber that is the transition from the hatchling stage to the young dragon stage to arrive prematurely.

It should be understood that this is a crucial event in the life of a true dragon. Each time it sleeps across different age groups, it is almost equivalent to a complete transformation.

Therefore, before falling asleep, they must eat as much as possible to store up sufficient nutrients, and it is best to accumulate some magical gems around their bodies. Only in this way can the effect of falling asleep be maximized.

Thor naturally did not intend to enter a second slumber now, not to mention that the current environment did not allow it, and that he had not yet prepared all the necessary supplies.

Before that, he planned to extract enough fire and earth elemental ores and dragon crystals to achieve another leap in his strength.

"Then let's leave 1000 essences untouched and use the rest for extraction."

The moment the thought arose, 10 points of essence transformed into starlight and were cast onto the outermost turntable.

Ten tiny points of light then began to flash like neon lights, and after they stopped, a pale blue notification message appeared.

Congratulations on obtaining [Large Iron Ore], [Butterbeer], [Merlu Cat's Paw Staff], [Golden Rhinoceros Beetle Shell], [Ancient Tree Leaf]...

Thor glanced at it and found it was all useless; he no longer even had the desire to extract it.

Fortunately, after 10 consecutive draws, he got a chance to narrow down the range of draws. Without much thought, he immediately locked onto the ore category.

But the next moment, a blue pattern that looked like an ice crystal popped up, and the message displayed "Ice Crystal Stone" made his face darken instantly.

In the game, this thing is a special crystal that constantly emits cold energy.

However, its effect is very weak, almost the same as the cooling effect of a refrigerator, making it a super weaker version of Zhenbing.

Putting aside the fact that it completely clashes with its own attributes, what use is such a small effect? ​​Is it supposed to be used as a portable mini-cold storage unit?

Fortunately, he still has a sufficient amount of essence, so he doesn't care about wasting it. Besides, once he draws it, it's equivalent to unlocking the exchange rights for the corresponding items, which will come in handy someday, so it's not a complete loss.

Soon, he had invested all 80-plus points of essence into the outermost roulette wheel. A few points of light appeared on the top of the wheel, but most of them were not the items he wanted.

Only three of them were useful to him: [Earth Crystal], [Radiant Dragon Stone], and [Paladin's Secret Roasted Meat].

Earth Crystal is a yellowish-brown crystal containing a small amount of pure earth elemental energy; while Dragon Stone is orange-red with flame patterns, containing a mixture of fire and earth elemental energies.

What surprised Thor the most was the Palico's secret roasted meat, which he immediately extracted.

A whole herbivorous dragon thigh, weighing nearly 20 kilograms, was coated with honey and spices and roasted, emitting a rich and tempting aroma. Thor, who was already starving, devoured it, skin and bones alike.

After finishing his meal, he licked his lips with lingering satisfaction, checked the exchange price, and discovered that it actually required 5 points of essence. His face darkened even further.

It seems that this thing can only be used as a regular food when we become truly wealthy. Compared to dragon crystals, it is simply not cost-effective at all.

…………

There is no day-night cycle in the underground cavern, and the boring wait makes time seem to stretch out endlessly.

After the burning coals in the mine were completely extinguished, Thor summoned two white dragon whelps and had them dig out the connection between the outer shell of the True Ice and the ground, pushing the entire True Ice into the mine.

Although it's a bit hard to part with the spiritual essence provided by those undead creatures, it's best to seal off this unstable passage as soon as possible.

Fortunately, the one that appeared last time was just a dead soul trying to possess him. If it had been a headless knight or a skeleton lord, the trouble would have been much greater.

…………

The biological clock rooted in the minds of dragons allows Thor to clearly perceive the passage of time.

Three days passed in the blink of an eye, and as evening approached on the fourth day, a commotion suddenly arose in the distance.

"found it!"

"This is it, there's no mistake!"

"We can finally get out!"

Upon faintly hearing these sounds, Solton immediately perked up and rushed towards the direction from which the sounds came.

Upon closer inspection, one could see a spot on a towering stone wall in the underground cavern that was exceptionally crystalline, seemingly containing some ice shards.

"Get out of my way! Let me see!"

Thor forcefully pushed aside the young dragons surrounding him, raised his thick forelimbs, and fiercely clawed at the stone wall in front of him.

The dragon claws, like naturally magical weapons, collided with the hard stone wall, producing a screeching sound. The stone on the surface of the wall crumbled away, revealing a thick layer of ice underneath.

This isn't a stone at all; it's just a disguise created by freezing a layer of stone chips on the surface of an ice block.

Upon realizing this, Thor immediately took a deep breath, his chest and abdomen bulging high, and he transformed the magic power within him into blazing flames that he suddenly unleashed.

The rolling flames scorched the entire stone wall in front of them, and a large amount of water vapor rose up instantly. A layer of stone chips mixed with water droplets dripped off the surface like mud, revealing a mine shaft about three meters in diameter that was frozen.

"There really is another exit! All of you, get out and break through the ice! I want to see where this leads!"

The impatient young dragons around them immediately swarmed forward, unleashing a barrage of breaths of various colors onto the ice surface. Before long, they blasted the ice layer open, revealing the deep, seemingly endless passage behind it.

Just as Thor was about to step into the passage, he suddenly remembered something, pointed his paw at a nearby orc, and said.

"You go in first, then the rest of you, I'll cover the rear."

The orc pointed at trembled instantly. He knew all too well what it meant to be the first one in this unfamiliar cave.

But he dared not disobey Thor's orders, for obeying might offer a glimmer of hope, while resistance would likely result in his immediate death. So he could only walk in with a grim expression.

The other orcs followed closely behind, then the dragonborn and the young dragons, while Thor, as he had said, lagged far behind.

In this way, even if there is any danger ahead, it will not threaten him immediately, and he can turn around and run away as soon as things go wrong.

Given the strength of those orcs and young dragons, even if a team of high-level professionals appeared, they could probably hold out for quite some time.

Chapter Sixty-Nine Volcano

The pitch-black tunnel was deep and long, so quiet you could hear a pin drop, with only the clear sound of footsteps echoing within, making one feel a little uneasy.

Despite the dragons' innate dark vision, which allowed Thor to see his surroundings clearly, he still felt uneasy.

His lips parted slightly, his chest vibrated, and high-frequency sound waves spread outwards intermittently.

Echolocation systems derived from scaly bat biotemplates are far more reliable than vision in such complex underground environments.

Moreover, this ability is the nemesis of most assassins and stealth creatures. After all, even if they can hide their bodies and move silently, their physical form still exists and will naturally reflect sound waves.

While surveying his surroundings, Thor would occasionally pull out a piece of silver-gray ore from under his wing and toss it into his mouth.

These were the mithril mines they had found earlier. After the undead surge caused chaos, no one had time to collect them, so they naturally benefited Thor, who was the first to return.

As a being inhabited by a human soul, he did not have the obsessive hoarding desire for treasure that ordinary dragons possessed. Rather than carrying these burdens around, he preferred to simply eat them.

Although most of the five-colored dragons do not like to eat metal ores, the red dragons prefer fresh flesh and blood.

However, the Rock Thief Dragon template that Thor loaded was a monster that fed purely on ores, which to some extent changed his appetite.

Metals like mithril, which are extremely lightweight yet exceptionally tough and possess remarkable magical affinity, might make his scales and bones even lighter and stronger, while also providing better magical conductivity.

However, if we're talking about truly nourishing food, the corpse of that blue dragon hatchling is the real best choice.

Even among the five-colored dragons, cannibalism is an extremely heinous act. Usually, only certain elderly and dying individuals will hunt their own offspring to reclaim bloodline energy in order to make a breakthrough.

Or some individuals with an extreme thirst for power might use some bizarre ritual to consume the hearts and brains of their own kind in order to acquire one of their abilities.

Thor has better ways to become stronger, so he naturally disdains using this method.

It's just a blue dragon hatchling. The benefits of eating it whole might not be as great as those of a low-level monster template. On the contrary, it might cause negative effects such as reduced charm or dragon poison backlash.

Only the black dragon, with its darkest and most cruel heart, and the white dragon, with its intelligence as low as that of a wild beast, are prone to doing such things.

Black dragons are the most common, mostly driven by the pursuit of greater power; white dragons, on the other hand, are driven by the harsh living environment and the scarcity of food.

'I remember that, apart from me, the black dragon named Worsog returned to the vicinity of Zhenbing on its own initiative!'

All the young dragons knew that the mine where the undead were emerging was dangerous, and they all kept their distance. But this guy came back on his own initiative, which didn't seem right at all.

Was he really attracted by the flames of the fight? When did this dark and cruel black dragon develop such a strong sense of curiosity? Could it be…?

Thor popped the last piece of mithril ore into his mouth. It was a rare commodity, and he finished it off in just a few bites.

His pale golden pupils shone brightly, but due to the obstruction of two nictitating membranes, they were completely invisible in the darkness as his gaze swept over the black dragon hatchling in front of him.

A creature that dares to eat its own kind in its youth is definitely a ruthless character. As it grows up, it may achieve great things and its strength may reach the level of an ordinary red dragon of the same age.

Why don't we take him down before he grows up?

But after only a brief moment of thought, Thor turned his gaze away without any interest. The reason was simple: the other party posed no threat to him whatsoever.

No matter how hard Vosorg tries, his bloodline concentration can only reach his current level at most in his entire life, not to mention the inherent power gap between black dragons and red dragons!

Killing a young dragon for no reason will only instill fear in other young dragons and their allies, making subsequent command difficult.

…………

Perhaps long, long ago, the glacier dwarves already lived in this endless glacier.

The passage ahead was exceptionally long, with obvious excavation marks on the stone walls on both sides, clearly not something that a generation of glacial dwarves could have built.

This bottomless passage was not only long, but also sloped slightly downwards. As Thor continued forward, he was pleasantly surprised to find that the temperature in the air was gradually rising.

About ten minutes later, a bright orange light suddenly appeared in the darkness, and a hot wind blew in from the passage, bringing a long-lost heat.

Having had enough of the endless glacier's cold, the kinship legion and the young dragons quickened their pace upon seeing this, and the orange-red light ahead grew larger and larger as a result.

The narrow field of vision suddenly opened up, and what appeared before Thor and his companions was a huge, towering cave.

The cave is circular, with a diameter of several thousand meters. Faint sunlight shines down from above, and not far ahead is a sheer cliff that plunges vertically downwards, with molten lava flowing silently at its bottom.

This place leads to the interior of a huge volcano. Even though the volcano is dormant, Thor can clearly sense the powerful fire and earth elemental forces beneath his feet.

The smell of sulfur in the air made him take a deep, pleasant breath, feeling warm and comfortable all over his body.

"Look there, those damn dwarfs are over there!"

A gasp caught Thor's attention. Following the direction a dragonborn was pointing, he saw a massive furnace and numerous makeshift structures standing on the lava flow near the shore below.

Glacier dwarves busied themselves around the furnace like ants, constantly feeding ore into it and using the heat of the magma to refine it into pure molten iron.

If you look further away, you can see that the rock walls inside this volcano are covered with a large number of holes, just like an ant nest that has been dug in all directions.

This is probably the stronghold of those glacial dwarves. Only such immense geothermal power could attract these dwarves who love digging and forging to gather here.

Unexpectedly, he had stumbled upon this place. Thor's lips curled into a cruel smile, and he growled in a low voice.

"Excellent! Let's make a scene and make these tiny insects pay for their past actions!"

Upon hearing this, the surrounding young dragons all showed excited expressions. They had been trapped in that underground cavern for a while and were now eager to vent their frustration.

Without Thor even needing to urge them on, the young dragons flapped their wings and took to the air, their roars—some high-pitched, some sharp, some hoarse—echoing throughout the volcano.

"Didn't expect that, did you! I'm out again!"

"You scumbags covered in ice shards, I'm going to turn you all to ashes!"

Chapter Seventy Legendary Equipment

The sudden turn of events left the glacier dwarves below, who were busy with their work, somewhat at a loss. They all raised their heads and looked at the various figures hovering in the air.