Shifter - Infinite Transformation-Chapter 49: Dragon Slayer

Coating the lock with my mass, I inserted myself inside it. While I couldn’t form any appendages with a slime this weak, I knew it was possible. I’d heard enough about the Slime Queen from the monster kingdom to know how frightening they could be. That said, compressing my body mass to give some weight to my liquid body was quite difficult.

I struggled for several minutes, which led to a lot of cursing from the Gnome’s side, but I eventually managed to turn part of my body into a key. If pushing as much of my liquid body into the keyhole counted as that.

Anyway, it was enough. Compressing my body, the liquid stiffened temporarily. That was enough to turn the ’key’ and snap the first cage open.

The first Fairy shot out of the cage, leaving only a few more cages to tend to. And that I did, opening each of the cages.

"Good boy. I don’t know why a human would help us, but I shall thank your mate for taming you well." The Gnome said with a punchable smile, patting my leg.

"I can bring us out now that I am no longer restrained." The Gnome flexed his little arms, and erupted with power I didn’t know the tiny fae possessed. He flashed a toothy smile, creating a golden vortex out of thin air. "Or do you want to stay here?"

It would have been best to leave. To abandon this place now that the fae had been rescued. The battle drew closer to the cages. Staying would only make matters worse.

But...

"I will stay," I responded, "but it would be great if you could go to the Eserian Grove to warn them. Say that there is a dungeon entrance and that the Zetrian Empire’s soldiers found it."

They would have to flee. No matter how long they had successfully protected the Eserian and the Forea Alliance from the Zetrian Empire, the dungeon entrance changed everything.

The Zetrian Empire would use everything in their power to claim it. The Eserian Grove’s residents were certain to die if they stayed.

"I can do that." The Gnome said, looking a touch more serious than before. "They call me Sheraq."

Gnome Sheraq was about to leave when my response reached him.

"I am Xavier."

Sheraq didn’t even acknowledge my words. He popped out of existence.

And just like that, he was gone. The Fairies were no more as well. It was like they had never been there.

"That was quick." I mused, still uncertain if I did the right thing. Maybe it would have been better to go with them. But as I turned to the beasts, I knew I did the right thing. They looked pitiful. Like they’d been beaten ever since their capture. As for how long they had been in that cage? The smell that shot into my nostrils told me a lot more than I wanted to know. It filled me with anger.

So I opened the locks to their cages as well. They rushed out in fury, the power of monstrosities erupting from their frail frames, yet they did not attack me. Instead, they regarded me, their eyes glimmering with intelligence – sentience. Something monsters were not supposed to possess.

They were wild creatures that strove for nothing more than chaos. Yet, here I was, staring into the eyes of the monsters I’d freed as they rushed past me and toward their captors, stirring all the more trouble.

That left me alone with dozens of cages, a few corpses, and one beast that didn’t step out of its cage. It might have been strong at some point, but that time had long since passed. Now, it was only a husk of its former self. Tubes had been inserted into its appendages, its lower body, and even the back of its head. Blood flowed through the tubes and into a small container, each droplet seemingly weakening the beast further.

It was dying, yet it somehow prevailed for years.

Years? How did I know that it had been this long in this cage? No, not this cage. Captured. Tortured.

It didn’t want my help either. The monster wanted to be killed.

Intelligence gleamed in its eyes as they met mine. Orbs of pitch-black darkness bored deep into me. They resonated with me.

’Kill me.’ They seemed to scream, and I stepped closer before realizing what was happening.

The beast was not humanoid, yet I was certain it was far more intelligent than most humans. It had the frame of a feline monster, yet it was covered in scales. Its head was a mixture of a feline and a canine. No, it resembled a fox, if covered in scales. There were spots, broken and shattered, where horns must have been.

’Kill me.’

"Do you want to die?" I stepped even closer, one hand to my sword’s handle. Even though the monster was weak, it could have snapped forward to kill me. I was at its mercy, yet I didn’t feel afraid.

If anything, I felt sorry. Apologetic about all the pain such a beautiful creature had gone through.

’Kill me.’

"Is that really what you wish for?" I couldn’t help but hesitate. What if the monster could be salvaged? It felt wrong to take that opportunity away from a sentient beast.

I knew I was being a hypocrite for thinking like that after all the harm I had caused myself, but something within me resonated as I stared at that beast. It snapped forward, pulling the tubes forcefully out of its body. Blood gushed everywhere as the beast towered before me.

Then it collapsed to the ground, alarm bells ringing.

It forced me to act. To flee and abandon it while the alarm bells informed the soldiers that something was happening, or to end its suffering and flee before anyone would find me.

Unsheathing my sword, I couldn’t help but feel that it weighed more heavily in my hands. Be that as it may, I no longer hesitated. The monster had been clear enough about its wishes.

Pressing the sword tip against the open wound in the back of its head, where one of the tubes had been, I fulfilled its wishes. I rammed the blade deep into its head.

The monster stirred, but its eyes never left mine.

’Thank you. Please, protect the young.’

"I am sorry." I muttered as the shimmer of life in the orbs of eternal darkness faded, "And thank you."

Juvenile Nature Dragon (Juvenile) has been defeated. Shift has been updated.

The message struck like thunder, while the Essence influx that followed ravaged through my body like the storm of centuries.