Chapter 199: Sorcery: Dragonification Combat Body

"Huh!?"

Richard looked at Ulysses in surprise. 

"Ha, but this method requires some faith power. Do you want to see?" Ulysses asked.

Richard's expression turned serious. His faith power was limited, and it was a crucial resource that he hadn't yet figured out a stable way to gather. Using even a little would be costly.

"How much is required?"

"Ha, not much, just a little bit," Ulysses said, sensing Richard's hesitation. "Those little ones are already producing faith power. It'll be back in a few years."

Richard relaxed slightly and nodded at Ulysses.

A faint energy fluctuation emanated from Ulysses, and then with a sweep of his wings, a complex rune appeared in the air.

Richard was shocked—Ulysses had learned to use wizard runes! But as he looked closely, his worries eased—this wasn't a wizard rune.

"Ha, this is a simplified version of the Thousand-Faced God King Rune. It's not like your wizard runes. These are rule-based symbols, and even gods can't see their mysteries unless they touch the rules. Even the simplified version can only be learned by demigods who have encountered the rules."

With that, Ulysses flung the rune into the dragonblood serum, and it merged into the liquid.

"Ha, let's see if this meets your needs," Ulysses said casually. "I haven't used this in a while, so it's a bit rusty."

"This dragon species, with its bloodline's corrosiveness, is similar to those Abyssal creatures. This simplified rune can suppress the bloodline's corrosion from Abyssal creatures, so it might work here."

"Abyssal demons?" Richard asked, his interest piqued. "Do Abyssal demons have a similar bloodline corrosiveness?"

"Ha, although I have a bias against those monsters, the Abyssal creatures are definitely more powerful than this thing."

When Ulysses mentioned Abyssal demons, his tone was filled with deep resentment.

"Their flesh has an extremely strong corrosiveness. Even a single drop of blood can cause Abyssal corruption. If not treated, those infected will turn into new Abyssal demons."

"The worst part is, their corpses and flesh will also corrupt the environment. If the environment is not cleaned in time, it will become an Abyssal one."

"And once the Abyssal environment reaches half of a world's environment, the affected world will turn into part of the Endless Abyss. At that point, the native creatures of the world will be expelled, and the Abyssal demons will feel as comfortable as if they've returned home."

Listening to Ulysses' description, Richard could almost visualize the tragic fate of the native creatures in Abyss-corrupted worlds. Their companions were consumed, their environment twisted, and ultimately, even the world rejected them, treating them as invaders.

Richard shuddered.

"Such a civilization deserves to be destroyed, leaving not even a single cell."

Ulysses' gaze seemed distant, as though he were staring through time and space to his homeland. He shook his head and muttered, "Ha, stop with the grand talk. Let's see if your thing actually works."

Richard took the serum and began another experiment with a lab mouse.

It was the same half milliliter of serum, but this time, there was no visible change in the mouse.

After dissecting the mouse and confirming there were no signs of dragonification, Richard smiled slightly.

"Ha, looks like it worked."

Richard nodded. He had some ideas forming in his mind.

"Go ahead and return. As for the faith power, I'll leave that to you."

Ulysses opened a rift to the secret realm, waving his wings. "Ha, don't worry. I'm your sub-god. Isn't it the sub-god's job to handle the trivial matters?"

---

With the inhibition of dragonblood's corrosiveness confirmed, Richard immediately set about designing his experiment.

Dragons possessed many excellent qualities: they were strong, defensively resilient, and their various internal systems were highly efficient. Dragonblood granted them an incredibly strong adaptability. Among wizards, it had long been argued that dragons were the perfect biological species.

Richard's plan was simple: he intended to use bloodline alchemy to transplant some dragonified organs into his body, thus acquiring some of the dragonblood species' traits.

However, dragonification was a highly variable process. The same dragonblood from the same species could result in drastically different transformations.

Targeted dragonification had long been a subject of research in alchemical wizardry, with many third-ring wizards and even grand wizards studying it.

But Richard didn't plan on delving deeply into this issue. As long as he had enough Magic Essence and sufficient attempts, he would eventually find what he was looking for.

---

Ten years later, the Clarka Merchant Guild delivered the young dragonblood serum Richard had ordered.

Richard settled the final payment and stored the 500 milliliters of serum.

In the lab, glass jars filled with dragonified creatures were scattered all over the place. Over the past decade, Richard had not directly focused on organ cultivation experiments. Instead, he had been systematically studying the fundamental knowledge of dragonification, a subject that had stood the test of time.

Dragonified creatures were highly diverse, and many times, the organs and glands within a dragonified creature could conflict, leading to premature death or short lifespans.

Richard spent the last ten years understanding the function of these organs and glands, ensuring that they wouldn't conflict with each other in a single body.

After ten years of research, Richard finally designed a transplantation plan for himself.

These organs and glands would enhance his bones, muscles, digestion, circulation, detoxification, and even grant him the signature ability of a dragon—dragon breath.

If the transplant succeeded, Richard's combat abilities would be greatly improved.

Richard named this transplantation plan the Dragonification Combat Body, which would be his first alchemical sorcery.

He divided the young dragonblood serum into ten portions and began extracting the serum.

Then, Richard went to the corner of the lab.

In this corner, there was a glass tank containing a clone that Richard had specifically cultivated for the combat body.

This clone shared the same constitution as Richard.

After spending a year training in the Mountain Secret Realm, Richard's physical constitution hadn't improved much, largely because he hadn't deliberately trained in the high-gravity environment.

But once Richard finished setting up the gravity training room, everything would be compensated.

Richard took the clone out and injected it with the young dragonblood serum.

Dragons grew through four stages: hatchling, adult, mature, and ancient dragon.

The hatchling stage needed no explanation, and the adult dragon represented a first-tier being. A mature dragon might be a second- or third-tier being, but if it didn't reach fourth-tier by age six thousand, it would enter the ancient dragon phase.

At the ancient dragon stage, the dragon's intelligence would greatly improve, and its arrogant and domineering nature would gradually fade.

Among these four stages, the blood of hatchlings was the most active, and dragonified creatures born from hatchling blood could show many variations, unlike the fixed dragonified forms of older dragons.

In fact, if Richard had a choice, he would have preferred using adult dragonblood for the experiment. However, the Wizarding Guild didn't track which dragon's blood produced which specific dragonified forms, and they didn't note the characteristics of each variant.

So, Richard was left with no choice but to use hatchling blood and "open a blind box."

Still, Richard had a plan. If the Dragonification Combat Body proved effective, he would collect dragonblood from various wizarding guilds to identify the bloodlines that produced the required organs for the combat body.

But if the experiment wasn't successful, Richard would reserve this sorcery for later and pass it down to his future apprentices to explore.

As the young dragonblood serum was injected, the clone showed no immediate reaction.

While the hatchling blood was active, its corrosive properties were the lowest among dragonblood types.

Richard's current body met the second-tier standard, so he wasn't sure if the hatchling blood could corrode it.

Half an hour after the serum was injected, the clone suddenly shuddered, and a small sign of dragonification appeared at the heart. Calcium scales began to grow from the front of the heart.

However, this trace didn't spread further.

An hour after the injection, the signs of dragonification retreated, and the clone's pores began to exude black, foul blood.

Once the bleeding stopped, the clone's vital signs stabilized, and the dragonification was deemed a failure.

"Ah, seems like even dragonblood's corrosiveness has its limits. The hatchling blood couldn't even corrode a second-tier being."

Richard sighed, then went to the next room to find a first-tier clone.

This time, dragonification reactions occurred quickly, and within twenty minutes, dragonification began to spread.

Richard placed the clone in a glass tank and filled it with nutrients.

Dragonification had begun. Now, it was only a matter of time and luck.

---

Twenty years later, Chacks, who had come to take over, looked at the bottles and jars in the lab with excitement.

"Junior brother, you've finally returned to the right path of flesh and blood! Teacher will be very pleased when he sees this."

Richard laughed and brushed Chacks' hand off. "What nonsense. Does Teacher not appreciate my research on alchemical machinery? Those black Magic Essences were all earned from alchemical machines."

Chacks' face stiffened, and he replied glumly, "Well, it's true that alchemical machinery earns money, but synthetic beasts can earn just as much."

Richard smiled and didn't say anything further. He began tidying up the lab.

Chacks helped clean up, but when he reached the corner, he exclaimed:

"Junior brother, what's this body doing here? Looks like... it's already dragonified."

Richard walked over, pulled the body from the glass tank, and said, "Experiment material. I've been researching dragonification recently."

Chacks turned to look at Richard, and only now did he notice that his junior brother's eyes... had turned into vertical slits.

(End of Chapter)