I am a wicked dragon, and you want me to fall into goodness?

Chapter 86 Will the Blue Dragon Eat People? (3k)

Pu Se glanced at his nearly fifteen-meter-tall frame, then looked with his lantern-sized dragon eyes at the slightly thin girl holding Amy; his meaning couldn't be clearer—

Are you rejecting me?

Linor's voice grew softer and softer until it was almost a sigh of despair.

She knew she had no choice but to turn around resignedly and walk heavily toward the direction she remembered.

"Come with me."

Her voice betrayed no emotion, only deep weariness: "The place I live—maybe it's not even enough for you to rest for a while."

The wind and snow continued to rage. Linor carried Amy, walking with uneven steps to the end of the most remote alley in Starfall City.

This place is far from the bustling main street, and even the knights' patrols rarely pay attention to it.

In a cluster of low-lying earthen houses half-hidden by wind and snow, rows of mud houses sculpted using earth magic stand there.

The walls were peeling and mottled; from a distance, it looked more like a makeshift shack than a home.

Linor gently pushed open the simple door made of rough wood, and a surge of heat mixed with snow water and body temperature rushed out instantly.

She seemed a little embarrassed, her voice slightly awkward, as if afraid of disturbing the people inside: "This is where I'm staying temporarily."

Pusser lowered his head, his eyes scanning the narrow space through the small doorway.

In the center of the room, a small campfire was burning, and a dozen or so long-eared tribesmen and twenty or so humans were huddled together.

In winter, temperatures of tens of degrees below zero can easily cause frostbite, making firewood for heating extremely precious.

To save wood, people often gather together for warmth.

Some of them were missing arms, some had broken legs, and they were all emaciated with tattered clothes.

Only those pairs of eyes showed a faint glimmer of light when they saw Linor.

"Linore—you're back." An elderly long-eared woman spoke tremulously, her voice filled with deep worry.

Her gaze fell on Amy in Linor's arms, then quickly shifted away, and when she looked towards the door, her eyes instantly filled with fear.

"Ahhhh! A dragon!?"

Puse let out a low hum, and his massive body suddenly emitted a layer of icy blue light.

Amidst the soft rustling of scales rubbing together, the fifteen-meter-long dragon body visibly contracted, shrinking into a slender form of about two meters in just a few breaths.

He turned slightly to the side, pushed aside Linor who was blocking the door, and easily slipped through the narrow wooden door.

"It's so noisy."

"Starfall City is a kingdom of dragons. What's so strange about it having dragons?"

The long-eared tribe members inside the house had been huddled together, barely daring to breathe.

But when Pu shrank to about two meters tall, the suffocating fear stemming from his absolute size actually dissipated by more than half.

The fifteen-meter-tall dragon was a calamity that blotted out the sky, a being that could flatten an entire shack with a mere flick of its claws. They couldn't even muster the thought of resistance; they could only let fear devour them.

But before them stood a two-meter-long blue dragon—

Although still covered in hard, icy blue scales, and the arrogance in his vertical pupils remained undiminished, he at least no longer appeared to be an untouchable taboo.

There's a misconception that if you grab a weapon, rush in, and fight, you might actually win.

Although they knew it was impossible, it certainly didn't seem that terrifying visually.

Linor was pushed so hard by Puse that she stumbled.

She took a deep breath and glanced at her tribesmen who were still tense inside the room: "Don't be afraid, everyone. This is—Lord Blue Dragon Puse."

She paused, momentarily at a loss for words as to how to define this giant dragon that had suddenly intruded into their sanctuary.

A benefactor? Or a nuisance?

Is it still an "unshakeable tail"?

In the end, she could only choose the most conservative and helpless explanation: "He—he just came back with me to rest for a while, he won't hurt us."

These words were said both to his clansmen and to comfort himself.

She dared not look at Pusser, but carefully moved her feet to the campfire, gently placed Amy on the straw mat, and wrapped the child tightly in an old blanket.

The people inside looked at each other, their hands still gripping the wooden sticks and stone slabs, but no one dared to actually rush forward.

The fire crackled and burned, dividing the shadows inside the room into two distinct halves.

No one dared to approach Puse and Linor, not even for the warmth of the campfire.

As the crowd backed away, they gradually leaned towards the opposite corner.

The long-eared tribe and humans, who were originally huddled together, seemed to be split apart by an invisible blade, and automatically shrank to the other end of the mud-brick house.

Hey, because of the existence of the Blue Dragon, these humans and the Long-Eared Clan are no longer clearly separated, but have instead merged together.

Linor sat on the haystack, wrapped Amy in a blanket and nestled between her legs, her body instinctively curling up slightly, trying not to touch Puse.

She could feel the gaze directed at her from the other side—a gaze filled with worry, fear, and an indescribable sense of alienation.

It was as if even she was no longer safe because of the existence of this blue dragon.

Suddenly, the silence was abruptly shattered by a sharp cry of a newborn baby.

The cry was thin and weak, yet it was like a needle piercing the stagnant air in the room.

It was a human baby huddled at the very back of the crowd. A one- or two-year-old child doesn't understand the dangers around them; they only know that they are hungry and need to cry.

The baby girl's mother was a human woman who was so thin she was just skin and bones.

She hurriedly hugged the child to her arms, gently patted the child's back with her rough hands, and made soft, soothing noises.

But the crying didn't stop; instead, it became even more heart-wrenching due to hunger.

The woman's gaze was fixed intently on the earthenware pot resting on the campfire.

A thin, powdery porridge was cooking in the jar. It was their only food for the day, made from ground grass roots and a little bit of collected wheat. It was so bland that it was almost tasteless, but it was enough to keep them alive.

She bit her chapped lips, glanced at the child crying uncontrollably in her arms, and then looked at the dark blue dragon.

Fear surged in her eyes, but her maternal instincts ultimately prevailed.

She took a deep breath, her legs trembling like leaves, but she still slowly, very slowly, stood up.

She dared not look up at Pu Se, but kept her head extremely low, moving step by step with difficulty toward the campfire.

With each step she took, she could feel the tense gazes of the crowd behind her.

Her palms were sweaty and her teeth were chattering, but she gritted her teeth and continued forward.

Her goal was simply that jar of scalding hot powdery paste on the fire that would stop the child from crying.

The woman finally stopped by the campfire. She didn't even dare to touch the handle of the earthenware pot, but carefully used a sharpened piece of wood to lift the lid.

A slightly warm aroma, a mixture of grass roots and wheat flour, instantly filled the air.

She shakily filled a wooden bowl with a small amount of the paste, ignoring the heat, dipped her fingertip in it, blew on it repeatedly, and then slowly brought it to the baby girl's mouth.

The child seemed extremely hungry, and began to suck on the fingertip with great force, his crying gradually subsiding.

The atmosphere inside the room subsided somewhat as the crying quieted down.

The people huddled together opposite them stared at the steaming bowl of porridge and at the child in the woman's arms, who was gradually calming down.

The stiff lines on those sallow, emaciated faces gradually softened.

Even the old woman who screamed first showed a barely perceptible hint of relief in her cloudy eyes.

Pu Se's blue vertical pupils shifted from the crowd huddled together opposite him to the bowl of thin porridge in the woman's hand.

The dragon's nose twitched slightly, as if trying to discern the aroma mixed with grass roots and wheat flour.

His deep voice rang out, tinged with a barely perceptible hint of doubt, but devoid of any pity: "You—this is all you eat?"

These words were like a pebble thrown into the air that had just calmed down.

No one answered Pusser. After a while, Linor, fearing she might anger the blue dragon, had no choice but to explain.

The girl's voice, tinged with maternal warmth and tinged with a bittersweet calm, said, "For us, this is already very good."

Linor raised her head, her gaze sweeping over the nearly empty earthenware jar, and then looking at the emaciated people opposite her.

She paused, then gently stroked Amy's sleeping cheek with her fingers, her tone carrying a hint of helpless acceptance.

"Starfall City doesn't have much food left. Better food, such as clean wheat flour, a little bit of dried meat, or even black bread that can fill their stomachs, should be given priority to the knights who go out hunting."

"They need to find supplies for the city to get through the winter and fight against monsters and beasts outside the city."

"Only by ensuring they are well-fed can we, the elderly, women, and children who remain in the city, have a better chance of survival."

Linor's voice was not loud, but it carried clearly throughout the entire mud-brick house.

The people opposite all lowered their heads, and no one spoke. Only the crackling of the campfire echoed quietly inside the house.

In the midst of this deathly silence, a clear "gurgling" sound suddenly rang out from Puse's abdomen.

The sound wasn't loud, but it seemed particularly jarring in the mud-brick house where only the crackling of the campfire could be heard.

The air inside the room froze instantly, a hundred times more tense than when the woman walked towards the campfire.

The people huddled together opposite suddenly raised their heads, their eyes, which had softened slightly, instantly filled with extreme fear as the dragon's belly roared.

Will he steal their last remaining wheat porridge, which is barely enough to keep them alive?

Could he possibly prey on the defenseless elderly, women, and children because of food shortages?

Could he... eat people?

One terrifying thought after another began to frantically grow in their minds.

Some people even began to slowly shrink back, trying to hide in the corner of the mud wall, as if that would allow them to escape the blue dragon's sight.

Linor's heart leaped into her throat, and she instinctively pulled Amy closer to her, her body tense with nervousness.

She looked at the icy blue scales of the puser, her lips moved, but she didn't dare to utter a single word.

She had no idea what this capricious dragon would do next.

>