CH 17

Ning Chu entered the game the next day, but didn’t meet Fourth Cub. He left a mark on the island, proving that he left on his own and didn’t encounter any danger, which made Ning Chu less worried. But what did those two marks mean?

Could Fourth Cub be coming to him? But he didn’t know where Ning Chu was.

Ning Chu told Third Cub and Cubbie about this, but they weren’t sure why this happened. Fifth Cub crouched down to eat the oat grass, while listening to Ning Chu talk about Fourth Cub. She hadn’t seen Fourth Cub for a long time, and the other two dragons, especially Second Cub… 

Fifth Cub ate all the oat grass, jumped on Ning Chu’s knee and laid down, rubbing the back of his hand.

“Let’s wait a few more days, in case he comes back on his own…” Ning Chu looked down, touched Fifth Cub, and suddenly said, “Has Fifth Cub’s wings grown a bit?”

In the past, the dragon wings on Fifth Cub’s back were very short, and they weren’t even the width of her neck when she opened them completely, and they clung to her scales. Now, the pair of dragon wings were obviously larger didn’t curl up like before.

Fifth Cub turned her head and looked at them herself, and her dark green round eyes looked at Ning Chu, “Wu?”

Ning Chu took a closer look, and confirmed that they were indeed different than before. To him, there wasn’t much time between the accident and the crossing, so he had a distinct impression of it, which Fifth Cub herself might not remember. But this time he had bought dragon crystals which were expensive.

After Fifth Cub’s shell was broken, Ning Chu thought about it and went to the mall to buy a new one, wrapped it in a soft cloth and put it next to Fifth Cub, “Sleep with it later.”

Fifth Cub pushed it with her paws, thinking it wasn’t as fun as the rattan ball, but she obediently pulled it back and put it under her paws.

Ning Chu also planned to go out today, but before he left, he went to Crow Market. When he arrived at the beast farm, Donald was holding a set of keys, “You want to set him free now?”

Ning Chu had already paid for the Cloud-Winged Dragon, so Donald wouldn’t interfere with his handling of it, he just couldn’t help but ask.

“Don’t worry, I will take it to the right place,” Ning Chu turned his head to look at Donald, “This time it won’t get in trouble.”

If he were to take away such a large dragon, it would be too eye-catching, so he bought a storage bag from Donald that could hold live animals.

Although the storage bag space wasn’t large, the Cloud-Winged Dragon could stay in it for about an hour, and that time should be enough. The Cloud-Winged Dragon smelled the breath of Third Cub on Ning Chu, so it didn’t dare act rashly, but was unprecedentedly docile, not even attempting to escape the cage when it was opened.

Ning Chu opened the storage bag, and along with a white light, the Cloud-Winged Dragon was collected into the storage bag. After Ning Chu hurriedly left Crow Market, he saw Wuuth at the entrance of the school.

Wuuth was leaning alone on the stone pillar outside the gate, with his usual unapproachable aura. If Ning Chu was not mistaken, this man was stalking him. When he appeared, Wuuth immediately approached him, sweeping his eyes to the Crow Market behind him, as if to say, ‘So you just went there’.

Ning Chu pretended he didn’t see him, and walked forward by himself.

Wuuth frowned and called out to him, “Hugh.”

Ning Chu now had to turn around, with a feigned surprised expression, “It’s you! What are you doing here?”

Wuuth pursed his lips for a moment and then said, “I’m coming with you.”

“To the Beast Cleanup?” Ning Chu replied in a polite tone, “I have other things to do today, so I can’t join you.”

He wasn’t repulsed by Wuuth, and although the man was strange, Ning Chu didn’t feel any malice. Maybe… he just wasn’t very good at communicating with people? Ning Chu still had to find a suitable place to release the Cloud-Winged Dragon and he didn’t want outsiders to know about this, so he definitely couldn’t let Wuuth join him today.

There were two or three students entering and leaving the school, recognizing Wuuth’s figure and looking at him, so Ning Chu slightly covered his face and smiled apologetically at Wuuth, “If there’s nothing else, I’ll leave first.” He just took two steps, then stopped and turned around to approach, “By the way…”

Wuuth’s eyes lit up but then he saw Ning Chu lowering his head and taking out a school jacket, “I almost forgot about your clothes.”

He reached out and took the clothes, and Ning Chu left decisively without looking back.

Wuuth stood silently watching his back, when Fifth Cub quietly peeked out, “Awo?”

Ning Chu chose the same direction as yesterday, since there was more scattered vegetation on that side of the road, and further away he could find bigger woods. The Cloud-Winged Dragon was good at flying for a long time, as long as he was careful not to get caught again on the way, he would be able to find a new habitat safely. He deliberately picked a remote path and tried to use magic to speed himself up, and after half an hour, Ning Chu stopped at a small stream.

The surrounding area was very quiet, a few low-ranking magical beasts sniffed Ning Chu from afar and ran away, but he didn’t sense anything unusual. Ning Chu opened his storage bag and released the Cloud-Winged Dragon from inside.

The Cloud-Winged Dragon suddenly teleported from the closed space to the outside world, and it was a little frightened, while roaring and backing up in panic, its eyes alert.

Third Cub appeared with an “awo”, and the Cloud-Winged Dragon immediately became obedient. It gradually calmed down, its snorting no longer hot, and its head hanging down.

Ning Chu didn’t go to the beast farm yesterday, so he didn’t know if it had eaten anything, so he bought some raw meat from the mall to feed it. The Cloud-Winged Dragon was really hungry, biting into the meat and devouring it.

With Third Cub around, Ning Chu wasn’t afraid that the Cloud-Winged Dragon would hurt itself. He watched the Cloud-Winged Dragon finish eating the meat up close and tried to reach out to touch it. The Cloud-Winged Dragon cowered for a moment, but finally didn’t move away, lying meekly in place. After it was almost healed, the feathers on the dragon’s wings also grew back somewhat, but looked pitted, there were still many large and small scars on its body.

Ning Chu frowned more and more as he watched, and sighed.

This was just one of the ordinary dragons he had run into, and there were countless others that were hunted and injured in places he hadn’t seen. He knew every type of dragon well in this world and had personally fed them in the game, and now they were all becoming real, as if… It’s because of him that the dragons were here.

To be honest, he did prefer the five rare dragons and Cubbie before, but now that he was faced with these real, living beings, Ning Chu felt that they needed care as well. He had a selfish heart, he didn’t want the dragons to stay in such a dangerous place, especially since there were still people coveting magic dragons and Dragon Island.

But there was only so much he could do to help… Ning Chu suddenly remembered that the game store had an option to create a new Dragon Island, but because it cost a crazy amount of credits, he almost forgot about it.

Ning Chu opened the game store and silently counted the number of zeros.

1,000,000… That was a million gold coins or 100,000 purple gold coins.

Where could he earn so much money? But the new Dragon Island meant a new residence. Dragon Islands were fully developed, and could accommodate thousands of dragons.

Ning Chu made a silent note of this and touched the sparse feathers on the Cloud-Winged Dragon’s wings. He sighed again and stood up.

Third Cub returned to Ning Chu’s arms and “aowuu”d to the Cloud-Winged Dragon, which was ordered to open its wings and fly away. Ning Chu was about to leave when a rustling sound came from the nearby grass. A few dragons showed themselves and approached slowly, both curiously and cautiously.

The Cloud-Winged Dragon had roared a few times when it was released, then Ning Chu fed it raw meat, and these dragons could smell the area and came over. When they saw Third Cub in Ning Chu’s arms, they backed away in fear, not daring to come any closer, but not leaving either.

Several of the dragons weren’t fully grown, but were thin and small, and hadn’t eaten in days. Now that they had run into each other, Ning Chu bought enough meat in one breath and threw it over promptly to feed them.

Third Cub didn’t let out his aura to suppress them, and several dragons didn’t leave after eating the meat, but stayed by the creek to drink water and sunbathe. They weren’t as wary as adult dragons at all times, and since Ning Chu and a magic dragon were together, they treated Ning Chu as one of their own kind.

One of them was a greenish-white long-necked dragon, which looked so lively and cute that Ning Chu bought a rattan ball and threw it at it. The long-necked dragon was startled by the rattan ball at first and touched it with its claws, making it roll down the grass to the stream.

It was getting late, so Ning Chu decided to look elsewhere to see if there were any more dragons left alone and in need of feeding. Leaving the creek, Ning Chu put on his mask and walked alone in the forest, but he suddenly stopped in the middle of the walk and glanced behind him.

There were only trees and dirt before him with nothing unusual in sight, and Third Cub was lying quietly in his arms. He felt as if… someone was following him, he had felt it already when he was feeding the dragons by the stream. Ning Chu turned around and took a few steps, then stopped again.

He hid Third Cub and called out tentatively, “Wuuth?”

Sure enough, a familiar figure appeared from behind a tree trunk in the distance.

Ning Chu, “…”

It was enough that this person was sneakily following him, but why did he come out when he called out his name? Wuuth didn’t have the slightest self-awareness about being discovered, he wasn’t followed by the Dwarf Dragon as he approached Ning Chu.

Ning Chu didn’t speak, but he was wearing a mask so Wuuth couldn’t see his expression.

Wuuth heard him call out to him so he didn’t think too much, but now that he noticed that Ning Chu remained silent, he couldn’t figure out what he was thinking. He simply reached out and took the mask off Ning Chu’s face.

Ning Chu was caught off guard, his forehead hair sticking up in a strand, his teal pupils staring at Wuuth, as he reproached a little angrily and a little confused, “…You really are unnoticeable.”