The thunders echoed between the tall cavern walls and the huge stalactites as the dragon blasted through the dark, vast spaces, with lightning brightly flashing around his armor of black and gold.
Suddenly on the terraces carved into the walls and even on the ground flashed bright, white lights, and hundreds of small crystals launched from everywhere.
The small crystals grew eight legs as if they were spiders, even though they were large as a cat as they swarmed in the darkness, forming rivers and lakes of stars.
More and more crystals launched from their small crystalline mandibles.
The crystals blasted through the air, loudly shrieking as they closed towards the dragon, driving lines of light on black background.
The lightning crackled in the dark clouds emitted from his body, and forking arcs of electricity filled the dragon’s surroundings.
The electricity surged and jumped between the incoming crystal projectiles and shattered them into dust before they could even reach the dragon, the bright electrical light lighting up the cavernous space briefly.𝒪𝚟xt.𝐜𝚘𝑚
The dust rained down, reflecting the lights in its millions of grains, creating a beautiful light show in the sky.
‘It would be a shame to destroy all these structures just for some small critters. What if they are some artifacts waiting for me to gain them?’
The dragon flapped his wings even stronger, his body accelerating as he flew forwards, leaving the small crystallings far behind him. The unimaginably large caverns branched and intervened, forming a vast labyrinth-like complex as he flew through them.
‘This can’t be natural. The scale of this is too large for that.’
Vesuvius’s eyes fell upon an enormous transparent crystal growing from the black cave floor. It was tall and wide easy as an apartment building, brightly shining with the dragon’s smoke-enshrouded body reflecting within it.
A terrifying silhouette of a monster was frozen within it. He couldn’t see its details, only its black, bug-like exoskeleton, large blue, glowing claws, and eyes that still had life within them.
The dragon braced his wings as he decelerated and stopped above the frozen monster. Curious, his eyes swept over it as he had already checked the crystal multiple times.
‘It is not ice… or more accurately, it feels like nothing. It is as if the crystal isn’t even here though I can see it. I can’t pass through it, yet I can’t feel it with my domain. It is physical, but it isn’t a matter…’
Ding!
//
Analyze result:
Material: Crystalised !#?*
Level: 150
//
‘I would bet it is only a matter of time before some player tries to snort it.’
The dragon’s body slowly glided down, moving closer and closer to the crystal, his long-clawed finger already stretching forward, wanting to poke it.
Without warning, the crystal shattered and exploded into millions of small shards. At the same time, sounds of crystals shattering resounded from around, the star-like crystals on the ceiling, pillars, and ground exploding and breaking down.
“Hahaha!” distant laughter came out of nowhere, and the giant bipedal monster in a black carapace that used to be trapped in the crystal jumped straight at the incoming dragon. It used its two muscular, raptor-like legs and its long coal-like tail ending in a sharp needle growing from its back to shot upwards like a bullet fired from a gun.
Its head was shaped like the head of a mantis with two small dots that were its eyes shining in the extremely bright blue lights.
The dragon’s front leg moved forwards with such a speed that it made a sonic boom while his head retracted backward, away from the beast.
‘Oh my…, this was so unexpected. Such an original and shocking trap…’
With an earthshaking impact, the crystal neon-red claws collided with the two sets of the monster’s pitch-black, blue-glowing claws.
The dragon’s much larger hand pushed upon the monster.
However, it just stood there with its legs sinking into the stone and its exposed muscles pulsing with abnormal strength in the gaps of its exoskeleton as it held back the claw larger than its entire body, like an ant carrying a pebble.
The golden and blue eyes locked with each other, both burning with fury and anger.
Dozens of blue points lit up in the distant darkness, all of them quickly moving towards the fight, the sound of claws scratching against stone and clacking of mandibles quickly getting closer and closer.
‘Such a power within such a small body… but it isn’t enough!’ Mana surged through the dragon’s veins, flowing straight into his claws and muscles. His strength grew in an instant.
The giant crystal claws pressed down, and the black claws snapped like thin twigs. The dragon’s blades descended at the monster like a guillotine, and in a blink of an eye, blue blood splashed everywhere as the claw splattered the monster as if it was just a bug.
[+1000 XP]
The dozens of blue eyes quickly closed to the dragon, the black silhouettes of the monsters swarming in the shadows, some larger while others smaller.
Vesuvius didn’t even feel bothered, his only concern being the weird crystals.
The dragon opened his mouth, and a bright white light leaked out.
The stars, squares, and circles all formed within his gaping mouth as he sucked in the air, creating a massive vortex, while veins in his neck flared up into life, glowing in blue and gold even through the thick layer of the armor and scales.
POV ???:
The group of players stared with wide eyes at the impossibly vast cave. Its sheer size made them feel like ants standing in a human house.
The air was cold and humid, the only light source being the everpresent glowing crystals and the rivers of light.
The players and the kobolds stood in lines, clad in their black runic armors, the tall winged knight standing opposite them.
The knight waved his sword, and his loud voice resonated through the cave, “Go, search all the stone structures! Do not leave even a single stone unturned. Bring all the stuff you find here, where it will be inspected!”