The Stepstones. Throat-Cutting Isle.
Minutes earlier...
"Ugh... my head..."
Jon rose from the Weirwood throne, rubbing his temples as the System forcibly disconnected him from the vision. The jagged, bloody welts along his spine—remnants of the interface's connection—began to knit shut with unnatural speed. Every time he entered a quest instance, the sensation was unnervingly similar to the "neural-link" technology of ancient sci-fi; the Weirwood roots acted as biological fibers, plugging his consciousness into the world's hidden network.
SCREE!
As Jon regained his footing, the falcon perched in the high branches of the Heart Tree dove toward him like a homecoming swallow. Jon raised his braced forearm, and the bird banked sharply, settling its talons onto the leather.
The falcon he had acquired in White Harbor had grown significantly, now nearly fifty centimeters in length. With its piercing gold eyes and matching talons, it was a breed Jon couldn't quite identify, but its intelligence was undeniable—likely a byproduct of the System's influence.
SCREE!
"Easy, Golden Eagle," Jon murmured.
The bird let out a low, urgent hiss, glancing repeatedly toward the Dock Market. Despite their short time together, Jon knew the signs. It was a warning.
"Let's go."
At his command, the Golden Eagle launched like an arrow into the sky. Jon began to walk toward the harbor, his gait calm and rhythmic. As a Dragon Lord, his skinchanging abilities had reached a pinnacle. He could now operate on "dual-screens"—controlling a beast while his own body remained active and alert. He had attempted a "triple-screen" control recently, though it had failed; perhaps at Level 2, he would master it.
Through the Golden Eagle's telescopic vision, the entire Cutthroat Isle theater opened up before him. He saw Ghost's bloody stand against the land-raiders, and further out, his fleet beginning to buckle under the weight of the pirate swarm.
"If you are so eager to die," Jon whispered, his voice dark with a cold, rising fury, "then you shall be the first offerings to my stone."
He reached into the void and pulled out the newly synthesized Dragonstone. The prismatic red crystal shimmered in the sunlight, looking like a drop of congealed dragon's blood.
[Consume Dragon Soul Energy to activate Dragonstone? YES/NO]
Jon took a deep breath and pressed [YES].
A jolt of static electricity surged through his skull, a prickling sensation that raced down his central nervous system to his very fingertips. As the energy ramped up, the tingling was replaced by a localized, agonizing pressure. It felt as though someone were pumping pressurized steam into his veins.
"Aaagh... Hrrr...!"
The scream died in his throat, warping into a guttural, bestial hiss. Then came the heat. His silk tunic and leather jerkin began to smoke, then char, the fabric carbonizing against his skin as a corona of flame erupted from his pores. He felt his body lifting off the forest floor, caught in a sickening moment of weightlessness.
A vortex of energy began to howl around him, actings like a centrifugal cooling fan that stabilized the violent power surging through his bones.
ROAR—!
When consciousness returned, Jon felt... expanded. He was no longer a man; he was it.
He had manifested as a massive, two-winged dragon. His scales were a brilliant, shimmering gold that caught the sun like polished coin. With a single beat of his titanic wings, he sent a gale-force wind through the trees, snapping branches like dry tinder.
"Help! Gods, help!" "A dragon! A DRAGON!" "Drowned God save me! I want to go home!"
The pirates at the forest's edge broke. They scrambled over one another, their greed replaced by a primal, colon-loosening terror.
[Dragonstone activation successful.][Transformation Time: 07:55 remaining...]
Jon looked down at the fleeing men. They looked like scurrying ants. For a moment, he simply hovered, adjusting to the alien architecture of his own muscles. He felt the heave of his draconic diaphragm and the heat pooling in a specialized organ deep in his gullet.
BOOM!
A pillar of molten, white-gold flame erupted from his jaws. It wasn't just fire; it was liquid ruin. The Dragonfire chased the fleeing pirates down the slope, incinerating man and stone alike.
As the fire touched the earth, a ripple of magical energy radiated outward from the Stepstones, skip-jumping across the surface of the world like a stone thrown into a still pond. Deep beneath the earth and across the narrow sea, things that had been sleeping for centuries began to stir. The "湖面" (surface of the lake) was no longer still. Jon didn't care. He was too busy reveling in the sky.
"Is... is that a dragon?" Narsas stammered, his eyes bulging. His enhanced vision as a System Rogue left him in no doubt.
"It's him," Kapo shouted, his voice cracking with religious fervor. "The Lord is a King of Gold! I will fight for him until my body returns to the Drowned God's halls! Look at him!"
Kapo was no longer a mercenary; he was a zealot. To him, the Golden Dragon wasn't just a weapon—it was a god made flesh.
Jon soared. The thrill of flight was unlike anything he had ever experienced—the sheer tactile sensation of the wind against his scales and the absolute freedom of the sky.
He reached the harbor in seconds. The battle below was a slaughter. His merchant-converted galleons were swarmed by pirate longships, looking like whales being torn apart by a hundred sharks. Garo's men were fighting for their lives on the blood-slicked decks.
Jon's shadow fell over the fleet, a golden phantom of doom.
"What is that...?"
The fighting on the Sea Fox stopped. Pirates and Chainbreakers alike looked up as the sun was eclipsed by a glittering, winged god. The pirates who saw the beast through Myrish tubes dropped them in horror, realizing that the "Blackfox" had just led them into the lair of a legend.