The dragon’s neck was sticking out of the black tunnel full of smoke, looking toward the opposite peak. The dragon opened his mouth, and magical symbols formed up and arranged into a square-shaped diagram. Flames erupted from the dragon’s throat.
The moment they passed through the magical square in the dragon’s mouth, all of the flames immediately concentrated into a beam of flames, like light passing through a lens. The beam launched from the dragon’s mouth, reaching an opposite hill in just a matter of seconds. However, there was no epic explosion. Only a small spot of melted stone appeared on the spot where the beam hit the mountain.
‘I can see how useful this is, but honestly, I was hoping for at least some small explosion.’
A massive amount of smoke was coming out of the tunnel in the mountain, causing Vesuvius to frown, ‘Luckily, it is high above a layer of clouds, so hopefully, clouds should obstruct that smoke. Otherwise, everyone will be able to spot this cave.’
The dragon jumped from the cliff and spread his wings, ready to go hunting. He quickly glided down from the mountain approaching the woods under it.
Smoke was coming from multiple places in the forest, catching up his attention. He knew that the most likely source of smoke and flames were fireplaces made by humans. And that most likely reason for their sudden appearance was the nobleman he killed. He quickly turned back in a panic, flying back to his lair while thinking about how he could get out of the trouble.
From generally low levels of monsters in the surroundings, players he met and his memories from his human life, he was sure that there would be no high-level players present in the area as it was one of the beginner zones. However, there were still too many players, and if he massacred them in great numbers, that would catch the attention of some high-level players.
Also, he couldn’t just flee from the region as he would have to fly over plenty of inhabited areas.
‘Maybe if I fly only during the night while hiding in the forest during days, I could get away…’
His dragon’s pride immediately flared up, ‘How could I just run away without even fighting.’ and then his rationality further cemented his dragon pride, ‘Where would I even go. This is the only mountain range in a large radius. On top of that, it is the beginner area, which is the safest one. There shouldn’t be any insanely strong monster nor high-level players.’
The entrance to his lair finally appeared in front of him as he landed, causing nearby snow to disperse.
He immediately entered his lair and returned to his planning. In the end, he spent a few hours thinking about all of the possible scenarios and came to a few ways that should be viable, ‘As a first option, I could attack the players, killing as much as possible. That should help me to get at least a few levels before fleeing. The second option is good old acting. Why not pretend to be just your old friendly neighbourly wyrm living in the mountains. With a little bit of trickery, I should be able to trick them into letting me be… or at least getting me some extra time. I should be alright if I could survive until the next update.’
Every time a new version of LOMM came out, time in the game world moved on. It varied from a few months to even decades.
Vesuvius still wasn’t sure about a few aspects of his acting plan, ‘My success would still depend on how the would system respond to my acting. If I acted as a wyrm and status showed me up as a dragon, I would be fucked up. However, I don’t think that would happen.’
When he was a player, he often got quests to investigate something. During one of them, he met a bandit dressed up as a beggar. He used analysis on him, and the system showed up in his status that he was a beggar. That only changed after his cover was blown away. Giving a Vesuvius inkling that there is a high chance that the game system would play alongside him.
‘There is a chance that it worked that way only because it was a scripted situation, but now that I know that NPCs are real beings, I am more inclined to believe that system is creating quests as a response to NPC’s actions and not in reverse.’
He also knew that even if he successfully tricked players with the system playing alongside him to create a more interesting plot, it wouldn’t work for long.
‘Eventually, the system would leave some clues and distribute quests to investigate further to uncover my lies. Otherwise, there won’t be even a point of the system playing alongside me as it won’t end in a deeper quest plot. Still, every day that it can buy me is more time for me to come up with a better solution and get stronger.’
In the end, Vesuvius decides to go with his plan, ‘Even if it fails, I still can go the escape plan. However, there is still the problem that wyrms should have weak and fragile bodies… Well, I am still small for dragons, so there is a chance that no one will notice.’
Then he grinned, ‘Maybe I can use these players from before to add some credibility to my story. They were killed by my wind attribute attacks and saw red drake. Maybe I can convince players to hunt an unexisting beast.’
He was mostly scared of players’ greed, wanting him to kill for wyrm materials, even though they were not even near as valuable as a dragon’s materials. Still, he knew players’ nature, ‘They won’t kill an NPC in the active quest… well, probably.’
Vesuvius knew that there was a large chance that his plan would fail, but at the same time, it was his best option as he knew that players wouldn’t give up, searching whole mountains, and they would eventually find his lair anyway.
He jumped out from his lair again, spreading his wings and confidently flying toward the forest swarming with players.