Dragon Scale

"What's that?" Asha approached Kai, curious as to why he was staring so hard at a black rock.

Kai glanced back with a growing smile. "I believe it's a scale of that dragon."

"Dragon?" Asha tilted her head.

"Oh, I mean that giant, black creature that flew out of the mountain."

"That terrifying monster? It's called a 'dragon'?" Asha crouched down to take a closer look at the scale.

"Yeah. I never expected to see one in real life. I've only heard of it in stories. There are many legends about them and they are considered to be the strongest creatures in the world."

Asha's eyes widened in amazement and trepidation. She couldn't believe there was something like a dragon that was so much stronger than any creature she had ever faced.

Not only that, but they encountered such a fire-breathing creature yet they somehow survived. She couldn't believe their luck.

As she was immersed in her thoughts, she watched as Kai busied himself with examining the dragon scale.

On close inspection, the black scale had a natural pattern of stacked layers of paper-thin plates similar to how a tree trunk contained rings that marked the extent of its growth. 

However, it was basically impossible to count the layers like counting tree rings due to each layer covering the previous. One would have to cut the scale down the middle to count the layers.

Kai spent little time on observing the layers as he focused on the mangled edge that likely had been attached to the dragon before tearing off.

He wiped away the dirt to find that the torn section still had yet to dry. There might be an opportunity!

Kai cleaned that area as carefully as he could, wiping away any grime on his fur coat.

He had an idea.

From all the novels he read and shows he watched, he recalled how dragons are a wellspring of natural treasures.

Every part of a dragon was useful and could be used in all sorts of ways.

They could be crafted into fearsome weapons or durable armors, used in powerful magical rituals, or even cooked into luxurious meals with beneficial properties.

However, all Kai had was a single scale, so his options were limited.

Despite that, he was still thankful that he found anything at all. Not only did they both survived, but the dragon also even left a little souvenir for him.

Kai's eyes shined and a grin spread across his face when he discovered what he was looking for.

Within the meager flesh on the edge of the scale, he could see the dark red of blood.

It wasn't a lot, probably only a couple drops, but the fact that he even found blood made him rejoice.

Dragon blood!

He had dragon blood!

He recalled how dragon blood was used in many stories as a source of power for the protagonist.

Some drank the blood. Some bathed in it. Some used it as an ingredient in some alchemical process.

But all of them used it to strengthen themselves somehow.

Kai was betting on this assumption.

Just the fact that he was in a new world with all these magical creatures and even a dragon to boot, he would be stupid if he didn't at least try.

However, he didn't have any profound knowledge or skills to do anything with the blood, so he could only rely on the most primitive method.

Without thinking too much, he dug his finger into the remaining flesh and smeared a little blood on his fingertip.

He stared at his finger for a moment before sticking it in his mouth and closing his eyes.

Asha watched curiously as her son was behaving strangely.

Is that blood?

Why is he putting it in his mouth?

Did it taste that bad that he's grimacing?

After a long pause, Kai opened his eyes only to meet his Asha's curious gaze.

He tried to sense if anything changed inside him.

Then he looked at his finger and saw that the blood was no longer there.

Yup, he definitely licked it off, no mistake.

He even still has the ashy aftertaste in his mouth.

But nothing happened.

Furrowing his brows, Kai was disappointed.

Looks like real life isn't like in the stories he read.

He couldn't get an upgrade by consuming dragon blood.

Yet, he didn't want to give up. He still had more blood after all.

Maybe he didn't try enough?

That thought flashed through his mind and after not being able to come up with anything else, he decided to try more blood.

He only licked a little off his fingertip after all. That was barely anything.

Didn't the heroes in those stories swallow several mouthfuls?

The difference was staggering.

Unfortunately, he didn't have anywhere close to even one mouthful.

When he realized his reality, the only option left was to use it all up in one go.

Since he didn't have close to enough in the first place, there was no point in rationing it.

Kai had Asha hold the scale for him so that he could use one hand to dig through the remaining flesh to squeeze out the last of the blood into his other hand that's in the shape of a bowl.

As he caught the drops of blood, one of them splashed onto one of the scratches on his hand.

Kai winced from a burning sensation when the blood seeped into his cut.

However, he quickly ignored it as he started squeezing the remaining flesh into pulp which produced five drops in total.

It was more than he expected, and he hoped that it was enough to have an effect, no matter how small.

As he was lifting the blood to his mouth, he paused as he felt heat rising from within his body.

It wasn't a normal feeling.

He had never felt anything like this before.

It was unnoticeable at first, but it only grew warmer.

It spread evenly from within across every part of his body.

It felt like the spreading heat radiated out from his skeleton as it spread through his muscles and eventually reaching his skin.

However, the intensity of the heat started tapering off which irked Kai for unknown reasons.

He pondered on why the sudden change in his body when a burning sensation reminded him of something.

Nothing happened when he ingested a drop of dragon blood but after it came into contact with the cut on his palm, he started feeling an unnatural warmth spreading across his body.

Is this how it works in this world?

Eager to test out his hypothesis, he took out his stone knife and forced open an incision in his palm, drawing out some blood.

"Wha-! Kai!" Asha was startled by Kai's act of self-harm and was about to interrupt when he motioned her to stop.

"I'll be fine, it's just a scratch."

He turned his attention back to his palm as the dragon blood began mixing with his own blood before seeping into the incision.

A moment later, the burning sensation intensified to a much greater degree than before, now causing pain to sear through his body.

He started sweating despite how cold it was in the surrounding as his body heated up like a furnace.

Even Asha noticed something amiss when she felt Kai radiating heat like a campfire. Her brows wrinkled in worry as she had no idea what was going on.

Kai felt a bit worried too because the spreading warmth in his body has evolved into a searing pain tearing through his flesh.

It was a painful sensation completely foreign to him and it was incredibly uncomfortable. It was all-pervasive and he couldn't distract himself away from the pain in any way.

Now he became nervous that he did something foolish and he was going to burn up from within like a self-combusting idiot.

However, he forcefully calmed down his train of thought as he sat down in a lotus position like he remembered in the novels he read.

"Kai, are you alright? You're burning up." Asha tried her best to suppress her fear, but she couldn't avoid a tinge of panic lacing her tone.

With his eyes closed and teeth clenched to resist the searing pain, he could only grunt out a few words. "Fine. Just. Wait."

Clueless as to what was happening, Asha could only standby and wait as Kai attempted to overcome the pain radiating throughout his body.

It felt piercing hot beneath his skin like he had lava for blood. He has never been burned alive before, but he imagined this must be pretty close to what it should feel like.

Although the sensation was dreadfully painful, after everything he recently went through, it wasn't enough to make him give up.

It's hard to tell, but he vaguely sensed that something was changing in his body, but he didn't know what.

However, after he calmed down a bit, he was able to regain a little control over his mental faculties as he endured the burning pain.

One minute became five then ten.

Soon, half an hour passed as the burning pain did not subside one bit. Kai wanted to cry inside because this process was taking more time than he expected and he had to continually maintain his willpower so that he wouldn't pass out from the pain.

After all, wasn't it mentioned in those stories that the protagonist had to endure pain and not pass out in order to reap the benefits?

He followed that same logic since he didn't have anything else to go on.

Then, he noticed something new.

A strange sensation flitted through his consciousness. He felt some sort of new, ethereal sensation from within his body. It was like he somehow awakened the sense of the amalgam of touch, smell, and taste to perceive within his body.

It was a magical new sensation in which he never felt before and had nothing to compare it to.

However, the fleeting sensation left as soon as it came as the last dredges of his willpower was unable to maintain it for more than a few seconds.

After that, his burning body started to gradually cool down back to normal over the course of 10 minutes.

All the while, Kai maintained his concentration as he tried to will back that new inner sense he discovered but it was as difficult to grasp as trying to catch water with your bare hands.

However, this strange sensation is something he will never forget, and he was determined to explore it again in the future.

But first, his exhausted mind could finally relax as he passed out for the third time today.