The sapphire sea rolled gently, lapping at the Laughing Lion's oak hull.
Briny wind swept the deck, stirring the sweat-damp hair on Leon's forehead.
He hunched forward, knuckles white as he clutched the fishing net.
This was the ninth day since his transmigration.
He was no longer the college kid who'd sit in front of a screen playing dragon-girl jungle and roaming Summoner's Rift.
Now he was "Leon," a thirteen-year-old blacksmith's son from a Yi Ti town on the Jade Sea.
Three months ago, Dothraki Horsemen had swarmed like locusts, trampling his home and turning him into merchandise passed through slave markets until a Westerosi adventurer named Gillian Lannister bought him, making him the lowliest creature aboard the Laughing Lion as it sailed toward an unknown fate.
Gillian Lannister.
Just the name was enough to send Leon's heart plunging into icy water.
Having read A Song of Ice and Fire, he knew the man was Tywin Lannister's younger brother.
Yi Ti, Dothraki Horsemen, Volantis, Westeros… other transmigrators became lords, princes, or knights' squires, yet he'd become a slave—an Yi Ti blacksmith's boy who didn't even know where tomorrow would find him.
A voice from the bow, thick with the Volantis accent, cut through Leon's gloom.
"Gillian, how much longer to Valyria? We've been on this damned sea half a month. Is your chart wrong? Bring it out and let us see—else who knows what game you're playing!"
The speaker was a gaunt man in his middle years; beneath brown curls a hideous rose-red scar crawled from his brow to the corner of his left eye like an ugly centipede.
Those sharp eyes were fixed on Gillian at the prow.
Gillian Lannister didn't answer at once.
He stood tall at the bow, peering through a copper Myrish lens-tube at the far horizon, as though he could pierce the blue expanse itself.
Only after a moment did he lower the tube and turn calm blue eyes toward Scarface—Lenned.
"Lenned, the chart's fine. I paid for it with years of my life; I won't hand it over lightly. Want the treasure? Quit testing me, obey my orders, or…"
He paused, gaze sweeping Lenned's darkening face: "This ship can sail on without you."
With that, Gillian walked away toward the captain's cabin, leaving Lenned alone at the prow.
The sea breeze fluttered the hem of his open leather coat but could not disperse the sullen resentment clinging to him.
He stared after Gillian; the scar on his face twisted even uglier in the sunlight.
Leon kept his eyes down, mechanically hauling the net as if deaf to it all.
This was already the seventeenth such confrontation.
Lenned, Gillian's "partner," burned to pry open Gillian's mouth and steal the secret of the chart to the Valyrian Ruins.
Gillian, Tywin Lannister's youngest brother, had sailed to find the lost valyrian steel sword lightbringer and the ruins' treasure, and every time he stayed on guard.
Sifting his memories, Leon recalled that Gillian's final fate was to vanish into the cursed Sea of Smoke off Valyria… Leon's heart lurched.
He hadn't even cleared the starter zone and was already being dragged into a hell-level instance like Valyria?
He instinctively looked around for an escape, but the boundless blue held him fast.
At that instant a pure, icy light exploded without warning in the depths of his mind.
System?!
The massive jolt made Leon stiffen, breath stopping.
The sailors nearby kept shouting; none noticed the slave boy's sudden stillness.
Leon sank his mind inward, where a panel glowing softly yet insistently appeared clearly:
Host: Leon
Age: 13 (Lifespan limit: 81)
dragon spirit: 0 (Chance to obtain from slain magical units)
Mana: 0/500 (Absorbs ambient mana passively or from magical items actively)
Passive Skills:
① Dragon Bloodline (Purity: 0.05%. Chance to obtain dragon spirit from slain magical units. 100 dragon spirit = 0.01% purity. Higher purity raises mana limit, lifespan, size, Dragonflame power, Flame Knight count, Dragon Spirit Guards count)
② True Dragon Physique (Purity raises physical strength in true dragon form)
③ Fire Controller (Purity raises fire affinity and immunity)
Active Skills:
① Dragon Flame Breath (Human: 1-m fireball / 5-m range / 1 mana/sec; Dragon: 5-m fireball / 25-m range / 5 mana/sec)
② Prairie Fire (Human: 1-m Dragonflame armor / 2 mana/sec; Dragon: 5-m flame field / 10 mana/sec)
③ Dragon Blood Pact (Forms a Dragon Blood Pact with a human, turning him into an absolutely loyal Flame Knight, granting dragon blood and reshaping the body; purity level increases the number of70
Section 3: True Dragon Descent: transform into a 1-meter long true dragon; purity level increases size. Cost: 73
Section 72
Section 4: Dragon! Power!
Section 5:
These two words thundered like an ancient horn deep within his soul, instantly scattering the dark humiliation of slavery.
'But the cold numbers were like a bucket of seawater: Mana: 0/500.
'He couldn't even spark a flame, let alone cast a skill.
'That tempting 'True Dragon Descent' needed a full 1000 points just to activate.
'Leon sensed the thin magic in the air and the unmoving mana pool on the system panel, shaking his head in despair.
'If he waited for passive absorption, it would take forever.
'As for using magic items to absorb, it was a joke—a slave with nothing, not even a decent stick!
'And the dragon spirits needed to raise bloodline purity had to come from dead magical units. Could he even kill one? He'd still be a slave.
'Bitterness surged again.
'He had a golden finger, but the startup conditions were cruelly harsh.
'Right at that moment!
'The heavy fishing net in his hands lurched violently, a savage, almost frantic jerk.
'The force was far beyond any ordinary school of fish, yanking the unprepared Leon forward so hard that his knee slammed onto the wet deck.
'Yi Ti brat, haven't you eaten? Put your back into it!'
'A bearded, liquor-breathing sailor cursed beside him, adding his own effort while others gathered to help.
'The net was hauled out of the water with a splash and a stronger stench.
'In the net, a huge writhing silhouette was visible.
'When it was dragged onto the deck into the glaring sun, the sailors let out a collective hiss of awe and fear.
'It was a monster-fish.
'Nearly a meter long, covered in dark green thick scales whose edges gleamed like metal.
'Its head was grotesque, packed with needle teeth, and its two cloudy yellow eyes bulged like cheap glass.
'Seven Hells! What the hell is that thing?' a young Westerosi sailor paled and stepped back.
'A mongrel crawled out of the Valyrian sea, uglier than the cheapest whore in Lys!' the bearded sailor snarled.","Another old hand drew his skinning knife, hunched, and inched toward the dying creature.
'Leon's heart hammered.
'His eyes locked onto the fish's cloudy gaze, and in that murk he glimpsed a flicker of strange light.
'Could this thing be a magic unit?
'The idea hit him; the cold "dragon spirit: 0" on the panel suddenly felt like fire.
'The monster spasmed as the sailor's knife finished it, and a pale glow rose from its corpse.
'He glanced around, but none of the sailors reacted, as if they couldn't see it.
'The light floated, shimmered a moment, then shot into Leon.
'dragon spirit +1... Only one point, nowhere near enough to raise purity, but it sent waves through him.
'This thing can give dragon spirits?'
'So that was it!
'The system said "killing a magical unit has a chance to grant dragon spirit," but it didn't say he had to land the kill.
'The discovery felt like a door opening in the dark, but reality slammed it shut again.
'Only magical beasts carry mana. Where could he find more?
*He looked at the corpse, then at the distant blue line of the horizon, muscles tense.*
'There lay the Valyrian Ruins.
'If this thing from the cursed waters counts as a magical unit, then the Ruins should hold plenty more to raise his bloodline.","Better to go there than to escape and drown in the open sea.","On the deck the crew still argued whether to cook the catch or toss it back.","No one noticed the Yi Ti slave in the corner—his eyes, once dulled by despair, now kindling their first flame of hope.