“You tail-fetish pervert!!”
Fiya didn’t quite understand what “pervert” or “fetish” meant, but even with her tail, she could guess it wasn’t anything good. Those two words clearly conveyed deep condemnation of her earlier behavior.
“I’m sorry, okay~? But I really like your tail~~ Just let me touch it a little more…”
Even while apologizing, Fiya crept forward step by step.
“No! Stay right there! Don’t come any closer!”
Maybe it was the influence of Fiya’s soft tone, but Lu Qiuchen didn’t even notice her own wording and voice had started to become more and more feminine.
“Then… you can touch mine instead. That’s okay, right?”
Seeing that luring her didn’t work, Fiya switched tactics—flipping her ice-blue tail in front of her, offering it to Lu Qiuchen in an attempt to tempt her into becoming a tail-fetishist too.
Unlike her original form’s massive tail adorned with savage barbs, the smaller, scaled-down version of her blue dragon tail had only tiny nubs—nothing fierce about it.
In fact, it was… weirdly cute in contrast.
Lu Qiuchen felt her heart skip a beat.
Wait… could I actually be a secret tail-lover?
No! Absolutely not!
If she really did become a tail-fetishist, an image flashed into her mind:
A dimly lit room.
Two dragon girls sitting across from each other, their pale skin intertwined.
Their eyes filled with affection.
Their hands trembling as they gently caressed each other’s tails.
Heavy, low panting echoing through the room…
Brain! Shut up!! Stop thinking!! Aaaah!!
Lu Qiuchen forced herself to change the subject and break the mental loop.
“You came all the way here just to touch tails?”
To maintain authority, she didn’t revert to human form, her voice still gruff as she tried to steer the conversation.
“Of course it was for… Actually no! There is something I need to tell you!”
Trying to prove she truly had a reason, Fiya added quickly, “It’s about you! I came looking for you as soon as I heard this morning!”
Caught red-handed!
You asked me out days ago. Now you’re saying you heard something this morning? Even if it’s true, you clearly forgot all about it until now!
Lu Qiuchen narrowed her eyes at her, silently expressing: I see through your lies.
“I was playing hide-and-seek near the Great Waterfall this morning,” Fiya began.
“Two dragons flew overhead and were talking about something. They said they’ve come up with a great new idea—for this round of the coming-of-age trials, they’re changing things up.”
“I peeked up real quick and saw them! Both of them are the kind of dragons who always make the tests super hard!”
“They were talking really quietly, but I still managed to hear!”
Fiya puffed out her chest, hands on her hips, proudly beaming at Lu Qiuchen—her face practically begging to be praised.
Lu Qiuchen was speechless.
Fiya may look almost of age, but she still acted like a little kid—immature, but kind of charming in an innocent, goofy way.
Come to think of it, she was barely 400 years old.
For dragons, that really was just a kid.
“Thanks, Fiya. But how did you know I’m taking the coming-of-age trial?” Lu Qiuchen asked. She was genuinely curious.
Aside from herself, Impart, and Alduin, no one else on Dragon Island was supposed to know she was being tested next month.
“Oh, I found out from Andora-jie!”
Fiya sold her teammate out without hesitation.
Lu Qiuchen wanted to smack her forehead, but then remembered she was currently in her dragon form—dragons couldn’t do that kind of gesture. All she could do was sigh.
The day before Andola left for the human world, Lu Qiuchen had told him that she would be taking the coming-of-age trial at the end of next month.
She had brought up her training progress to spark a sense of urgency in Andola—according to Impart, barring any accidents, Lu Qiuchen was guaranteed to pass the trial.
She’d soon catch up with this “big sister” of hers.
Lu Qiuchen had hoped that Andola would realize that, as a newly-adult fledgling dragon, she shouldn’t just be running amok in the Tara Kingdom. What she didn’t expect was that this dragon had such a loose mouth!
On the path to becoming a full-grown dragon, a hatchling had to pass through two major thresholds.
The first was age. Other than cases like Lu Qiuchen, who had transformed into a dragon, hatchlings under normal growth conditions needed to be at least 800 years old to qualify for the trial.
This was to protect the hatchlings—those too young were more hot-tempered, mischievous, and prone to excessive sleep. If they encountered someone with ill intent, they could easily put themselves in danger.
The coming-of-age trial was the second hurdle to becoming a true dragon.
The usual method was simple: throw the hatchling into a designated location, tell them their target or mission, and leave the rest to them.
Targets were typically fierce beasts or magical creatures. Blue and green dragons, who were skilled in aquatic environments, might even face sea monsters.
There was no need to worry about truly invincible enemies—such threats would be silently taken out by guardian dragons lurking nearby before they even laid a hand on the hatchlings.
If a hatchling was too weak to handle a standard-level challenge, their future wouldn’t look too bright. Fortunately, such idiots were few and far between in the history of dragonkind.
This trial emphasized strength, but intelligence mattered too. The dragon race built everything on the foundation of absolute power.
Solving a problem through brute force wouldn’t cost you points, but solving it with both strength and cunning was even better.
More than a month later, around noon, Lu Qiuchen stood before a teleportation circle, ready to head to her trial grounds.
Over the past month, her combat skills had advanced by leaps and bounds. Compared to an average adult dragon, she was more than holding her own.
Focusing just on magic: if she were compared to the rare epic-tier spellcasters, she might not have mastered any ultimate spells from her main element, but in areas like mana reserves and casting speed, she had an overwhelming edge.
A full-grown dragon responsible for overseeing the trial approached her and informed her of her trial’s objective. Just like Fiya had said, her trial was far from ordinary—but it was “unordinary” in a way she never expected.
Impart had once taught her: “Barring any accidents, Lu Qiuchen will pass the trial with no problem.” And of course, the moment someone says “barring any accidents,” an accident always comes knocking. That’s just life.
*****
Just two months ago, a few days after Andona and Andola left Dragon Island, envoys from the Tara Kingdom arrived.
They brought an urgent letter written by the king himself. In it, he revealed that just one hour before the envoys set foot on Dragon Island, Andola and Andona had both mysteriously vanished from the kingdom.
Got it—I’ll only provide a glossary if you ask for one.
Here is the English translation of your provided passage:
What puzzled the envoy was the Dragon Elders’ Council’s calm reaction to the matter. It was as if they had long anticipated this situation.
They showed no particular concern—after simply acknowledging the incident, they dismissed the envoy and told him to inform the king that there was no need to worry.
The dragons might not be in a hurry, but King of Tara certainly was.
In recent years, the Tara Kingdom’s national strength had steadily declined, becoming increasingly dependent on the dragons. And now, in this fragile situation, two adult dragons had gone missing in his territory.
This was far more serious than the issue of raising dragon hatchlings in captivity. Capturing a dragon hatchling was a provocation.
But the disappearance of two fully grown dragons? That was tantamount to declaring war on the dragon race!
Although the current king of Tara was a dim-witted fool, he knew one thing: as long as he could cling tightly to the dragons’ thigh, he could continue living his indulgent, decadent life.
And it was a life he was enjoying immensely—he wasn’t nearly ready to part with it by losing his head.
He mobilized the entire kingdom for a month-long search, turning the nation upside down. Not a single patch of land went unchecked; every citizen was subjected to strict investigations.
Despite public outcry and resentment, they still failed to find the two dragons who had vanished without a trace.
As for the accidental uncovering of numerous spies from other nations and the dismantling of many hidden cult organizations during that month—those were deemed trivial.
After a month had passed with no success, the King of Tara panicked. He spared no expense to open an ultra-long-distance teleportation array capable of spanning half the world and personally traveled to Dragon Island to beg for assistance.
Seeing this disgusting human—a mass of rolling fat, practically a ball—crying and wailing before them, even the dragon elders began to feel annoyed. They just wanted to send him away as quickly as possible.
Upon learning that the two dragons hadn’t returned for an entire month, the Elder Council grew a little suspicious. Those two wild kids had guts.
Running off for a month might be forgivable—many dragons treated visits to the Tara Kingdom as free vacations. This had already become something of an unspoken rule within the dragon race.
Still, they would at least notify the kingdom before departing.
But this time, the two had gone too far—allowing that pig-headed human king to come pollute their vision in person. Once those two got back, they were definitely going to get a lecture!
As for whether the sisters had encountered any danger, the dragons didn’t even entertain the thought.
Even Lu Qiuchen, who had only been in this world for a year, wasn’t concerned. She had absolute confidence in the strength of adult dragons.
After the gods and demons had returned to their respective worlds, adult dragons stood unchallenged.
Let alone two together—if they joined forces, even if a nation’s entire cadre of legendary-ranked experts attacked, they couldn’t stop the dragons from escaping.
This time, the dragons sent two well-seasoned adults as the investigation team—a blue dragon and a red dragon.
The blue dragon was over 2,000 years old, and the red dragon over 1,500. Compared to the newly matured sisters Andona and Andora, their combat experience and power were vastly superior.
With such a combination, even if they had truly clashed with every legendary-level powerhouse in the world outside the dragon race, at the very least one of the two dragons should have been able to escape back to Dragon Island and report the situation.
But, as expected, the unexpected happened again.
This very morning, the King of Tara came in person once more, bringing with him even worse news: the second pair of dragons sent out had also mysteriously disappeared earlier that day.
These two dragons were nothing like the Andona and Andora sisters who had left without notice. They were more mature and bore the responsibility of investigating the disappearance of the previous pair.
Over the past month, they had been diligently following leads throughout the kingdom, and even when they went out, they always notified others in advance.
Yet this morning, when the guards went to deliver their meals, they found the luxurious dragon nest already empty—there was no sign of the dragons at all.
The Elder Council was enraged, and the King of Tara feared he might be killed on the spot.
Four adult dragons—nearly a tenth of the entire adult dragon population—had vanished one after another over just two months. The dragon race had not suffered such humiliation in nearly ten thousand years.
Given that the southern continent was no longer safe, Lu Qiuchen’s original adult trial was also changed.
Her mission was modified—greatly increasing the difficulty. She was now to travel to the Kingdom of Tara and find clues regarding the mysterious disappearance of the dragons.
Naturally, the dragons would not send such a promising young talent to her death. Red Dragon King Andala and Blue Dragon King Kalmer would accompany her as both guardians and examiners, secretly protecting her throughout the mission.
With those two by her side, any potential danger was no longer a threat. Her only concern would be how to find clues more quickly.
If she could independently discover key information or assist the two Dragon Kings in rescuing the missing dragons, she would pass the trial.
Conversely, if she failed to make a meaningful contribution, she would fail the assessment.
This was merely a small trial for the one prophesied to change the world—the “Chosen Dragon.”
Compared to the fate of the entire world, what was this incident, really?
Taking a deep breath, Lu Qiuchen felt a surge of excitement and pressure she couldn’t suppress. After all, she was just a hatchling who had never left Dragon Island before.