32 A Hatchling Surprise!

John felt as the heat atop his heat intensified and focused into a sharp jolt of pain that felt like a migraine fused with someone trying to stab a cleaver into his skull. It was pretty bad pain, but he had a massive pain tolerance, even as a human, and it lasted only half a second.

A flash of light shone from his head and as it died down, John saw a floating squid in front of him, around the size of a basketball. The squid had a large, round head with a single big golden eye. Its smooth, shiny skin was a bright ivory white, and its six tentacles were short and stubby.

With its round, infantile features, the squid looked pretty darn cute.

"Squee!" The squid floated forwards, latching its tentacles onto one of the reverted vampire's tumor heads. Almost immediately, the reverted vampire began to slow down in its movements, the ferocity of its struggling becoming sluggish as pulses of golden energy began to travel through it from the squid.

"What is that?" wondered John.

[A Neuralizer] said Mel. [One you have incubated to this point. I did not know when it would hatch, merely that it would take some time, but it seems that the Ray of Light has provided a boost of nourishment for it to hatch early]

"Take it down, kid!" roared John like a dad cheering for his kid at a baseball game. Or wait, did this squid thing even count as his child? Would it even consider him as a parent?

"Squee!" The Neuralizer's big golden eye narrowed in concentration as it doubled up its output of tranquilizing magic.

Well whatever, he would sweat the details alter, once he had destroyed this vampire fully.

John flapped his wings and dove right under the reverted vampire, crashing into its tail of exposed muscle fibers and exploding blood vessels. He felt several jet sprays of blood pierce through his scales and into his skin, but he just shoved the pain away, because if there was one thing he was good at, really damn good at, it was ignoring pain.

Right underneath the vampire, the [Ray of Light] would hit he absolute hardest. There was going to be no regenerating or escaping from this one, John would make sure of that, regardless of how many blood jets he had to feel cutting into his flesh.

The skies rumbled and grew golden bright for an instant, and in that moment, the [Ray of Light] arrived, smashing into John in a blinding, burning pillar. The immediate sound of flesh scorching raged in the air as the light started to burn down the reverted vampire.

The vampire loosed one last shrill roar as it raised a deformed, clawed hand into the air, towards the light. Its arm shook with exertion, and each vibration broke apart chunks of calcified flesh.

"W-warm…," said the vampire one last time before the light engulfed it, completely turning it first into a stone-like substance before that broke apart into ashen dust, fading away into nothingness.

>>>

*Essence obtained! (+30,000)*

Essence Level: 2650/10,000 > 32,650/10,000

Current Evolutionary Stage: Wyrmling

Next Evolutionary Stage: Greater Wyrmling

*Origin obtained ! (Vampire Young)*

Stored Origins:

-Mudclaw Crab (Medial Earthen Grade)

-Quill Fern (Low Earthen Grade)

-Plumed Rabbit (Low Earthen Grade)

-Verdant Panther (Low Mystic Grade)

-Firebat (Low Mystic Grade)

-Firebat Matriarch (Medial Mystic Grade)

-Nueralizer (Phantasmal Grade)

-Vampire (Medial Unbound Grade) *NEW*

>>>

John slumped down to the smoking, blackened forest floor in complete exhaustion.

Finally, it was over, and he was completely exhausted, drained entirely of his mana. Even one [Drokynthis] was difficult to manage, but two was his absolute limit, no, even more than that.

It would take some time before John could move again, but –

He looked around him. The forest was blazing, set on fire from countless superheated blood spurts, and there was going to be no putting out this forest fire at this point. A ring of flame roared all around John, closing in on him, but they would not affect John.

It was Hemet that John was worried for. He weakly stood on his four legs and trotted over to Hemet's limp body. The imp lay face up with his gauntleted hand over his heart, his blue eyes blank and dead.

The Neuralizer floated towards John and perched atop his head like a hat and looked down at Hemet with John."

"Squee….," said the squid, and John could get a grasp of its emotions from a kind of telepathic link, though not much more than that because the squid was not developed enough to have any complex thoughts.

Still, John could sense the squid felt bad for Hemet because it recognized and knew the imp as someone who had accompanied and protected John, likely from having observed everything while it was incubated atop John's head.

"I'll try to save him," said John. "But I'm not so sure what I can do."

[Resurrection is a power that is rare beyond measure] came Mel's voice. [Not even dragons have managed to manifest it. Only the Angels can, but even then, their resurrection spells are of the twelfth tier, beyond your capacity to cast even if you had them committed to your being]

John steadied his breath and got serious, getting into his medic mindset.

"What about my light breath? It has healing properties, and from what I can tell, it's an all in one recovery package. It stems bleeding, promotes new tissue growth, and even gives a spurt of energy to jumpstart vital functions," said John.

[Wounds to the heart, to the core itself, are irreparable by any ordinary means] explained Mel. [Had the imp been wounded fatally anywhere else, your light would have sufficed]

"Damn it," said John. "But I'm still going to try. At the very least, I have to make sure he's dead and give him a proper burial afterwards. I don't know if such a thing is part of demonic or draconic culture, but it will give me some peace."

John with heavy heart went to check the imp's vitals to make sure he was dead. He reached down and took the imp's hand off his heart to see the injury, and then his eyes widened.

Hemet had inserted the cursed bone inside of the wound that had ruptured his heart, and the bone had taken root inside of it, forming a cluster of black tendrils that allowed for a small but detectable heartbeat.

"He's alive! Barely, but he's still there!" said John.

"Squee!" squeaked the squid in excitement.

John immediately fired a concentrated blast of his light breath into Hemet's heart, narrowing the area of application for the breath while intensifying its effectiveness to jumpstart his heart with as much healing energy as possible, almost like a defibrillator combined with an adrenaline shot topped with tissue recovery.

The thin beam of light penetrated Hemet's heart like a guided laser. Flesh patched over the hole in Hemet's chest, and soon enough, John heard the imp's heartbeat grow louder. Enough that he was confident the imp would survive.

Then, John took the imp's severed right arm on the ground and roughly held it in place at the point of separation at the shoulder socket and fired off another healing breath, almost like he welding the severed parts together.

There, good as new, thought John as he beheld Hemet's fully healed form.

Hemet's eyes flickered with life again, and he sucked in a deep breath.

"Easy, there. Easy, deep breaths," said John. "Don't try to get up. Just focus on breathing."

Hemet listened, spending his time breathing until his ragged breaths became more even and normal.

"Good," said John. "Now try to get up, but don't push yourself."

"I am fine, my young dragon friend," said Hemet as he rose up to his two feet, still a little shaky but overall seeming pretty fine. "All thanks to you and your wondrous Angelic magic."

"You know I use Angelic magic?" said John.

"That golden light is unmistakable, heh," said Hemet. "And one of the reasons I try so hard to fend for you, my friend. For that light is the key to saving this realm. And ah, it seems we have another friend, an even younger one."

The squid atop John's head floated down to Hemet, and Hemet gave it a few pats on its round head before the squid floated back to its perch on John.

"A dragon with angelic light and a Mind Reaver's Neuralizer. A sight never before seen in this realm, I am sure of that," said Hemet. He coughed violently into his hand as he clutched at his chest.

"Are you okay?" said John with concern.

"Fine. Fine, my young dragon friend," said Hemet. He looked down at his chest. Black veins bulged from his heart area.

"That doesn't look good," said John.

"Ah, my body will get used to it, do not worry, heh," said Hemet with a smile. "Demonic Arcana, or Curse Magic as it is called, gives and takes. This one gives me life, but at the cost of a bad cough, it seems, heh. Nothing I cannot handle.

But enough worrying about me!" Hemet regained his usual cheer and looked at the burning forest around him. His cheer faded almost as soon as it came up, though, and he became dead serious. "We should get going now. The forest burns, and enemies lurk in the dark. We must get to the treasure soon, for we have little time."