Silence grew. No echoes, no invasive thoughts from dragons.
Not even the salt mine's ambient noises came through.
Konrad crawled around in a thick, toxic cloud without finding her.
"Come on, Maple," he coughed out. "Don't tell me I turned you into smoke."
He could've, that last spell was a new record. Glassing the entire cavern would have taken less effort. He burned over a thousand mana in one go, or rather, turned his essence into crystals.
They crackled under his hands and feet, and he picked up fragments wherever he went.
Purple shards, potent with mana. Most likely expensive as hell, too, and with the adamantite—he could've made a living from these alone. It seemed less of a hassle than becoming a noble.
If only he could've gotten used to his legs trembling.
Becoming an expert in transmuting or creating rare materials wasn't easy, either.
Finding dragons? Almost impossible.
He had no wind magic to clear the smoke, though he felt the air getting thicker. With the seal broken, ambient essence rushed in, helping him regenerate.
He only had to avoid that fissure he had left open.
Instead, he tripped over something else—small and soft, and not dragon-like at all.
"A goblin corpse?" he muttered, but that didn't feel right.
His hands wandered, and the body shuddered. Very much alive. Soft, fine, and—squishy?
A round object, with its center poking his palm.
It reminded him of something, so he gave it a gentle squeeze, and—
"Kyah, stop," a drowsy voice protested. "Still sensitive. Let's do it again later, please."
Konrad almost jumped right into that fissure.
"Maple?" he demanded, trying to fan the smoke away with both hands.
A girl appeared beyond it with a pretty, but tired face, crimson hair, horns, a lizard's tail, and—
Completely naked. He choked on the smoke and stopped fanning.
How and when—or why?—he was too flustered to ask.
"What?" Maple smirked, her eyelids still drooping. "If you're that eager to do it again, I'll be ready for you in five minutes—no, let's make it ten, daddy."
"Do what again?!" Konrad's voice pitched up, blood rushing into his face. "Stop calling me that."
And where did he get this much blood?
Even with his face burning—and his nose bled earlier—he had plenty enough left for a boner.
There was no hiding that from a dragon, and her chuckle made everything much worse.
"I'll take care of that, too, after a fifteen-minute nap," she offered, her smirk evident from her voice alone. Konrad didn't even dare to look at her. Not because she was scary—the opposite.
And was she adding five minutes to her counter every time she spoke?
"Did the spell work? Did I break your seal?" he asked, pretending everything was normal. He failed. "Why did you transform into a naked girl? Or was that a side-effect or something?"
The girl snorted, her chest heaving—but at least she closed her legs to sit up.
Not that Konrad was looking, of course. He would never.
He already had Lily and the rest of his harem that he never touched, but—
"Such a flustered savior," she laughed. He sucked in a sharp breath, realizing the things he was thinking in front of a mind reader again. "Sorry, sorry, I'll stop looking."
She said that, as if he were the naked one there.
Another chuckle, and she shifted with some faux-modesty. Stopped reading, like hell.
"Okay, I'll stop now," Maple claimed, patting his head. "And yes, the drain stopped. I don't know when was the last time I felt so free and happy, and it's all thanks to you, da—Konrad Halstadt."
She did that on purpose.
Even if he had little experience with women and couldn't read her mind like she did, he knew.
"Here, take this," he offered his cloak, a little charred, but better than having her naked. "And you still didn't tell me why you transformed from a giant dragon into an enormous lewd."
The dragoness laughed, taking the cloth, but she was in no hurry to put it on.
"Experiencing an orgasm in that huge body after so long would've torn me apart. You are quite something, Konrad Halstadt," she teased with his name this time, then laughed.
Lily was a saint in comparison, and she loved playing with him too.
"I didn't even touch you," Konrad protested.
He took a step back before she could accuse him of something.
"Didn't you fondle my breasts a moment ago?" she asked, raising an eyebrow. "And you put all your mana inside me—that was amazing. You had a lot of the stuff for a human your age."
"T-that was—"
Every word only made his embarrassment and arousal worse.
And he couldn't even think straight, or she would've read it from his mind.
"An accident?" Maple grinned, and he made the mistake of looking at her again.
She was sitting with her legs wide open again, not a morsel of modesty—or hair down there.
The cloak was on, but didn't cover anything.
Her wetness still glistened, and he needed to tear his gaze away from it, earning another laugh.
"Come on, daddy," she murmured, crawling closer. "Your friends had already left the mines, and you finally set me free. Let me pay you back by taking care of that—"
Her calling him that was both turning him on and ringing an alarm bell.
"R-right, we should go, too," he took another step back while he could still control his body. He needed a distraction as well. "The tribesmen—they prepared a feast; you must be hungry."
The groaning of a dragon's stomach, even in a human form, was a sound to remember.
Not exactly a turnoff, but at least she stopped advancing—for now.
"Ugh, starving," she nodded, closing her legs and pulling the cloak tighter. It didn't help with the grumbling noises, but at least it was safe to look at her now. More or less.
"Do you know the way out?" he asked, watching her tail swish behind her.
"Yes, and to be clear—I transformed because I could never leave through those tiny ass tunnels in my dragon form." Her explanation made a lot of sense, and the ability seemed convenient.
He didn't think of it until now, and it only made his embarrassment worse.
"And also—call it that," she added. "My majestic dragon form, not a beast, or a monster."
Her expression turned serious, as if she took offense at every instance he thought of her as that.
"I never said it out loud. And you keep promising not to read my mind," Konrad shot back, his brain starting to function again. His blood returned to normal, but he had to be careful.
No naughty thoughts, or she'd weaponize them.
Which reminded him.
"If you can transform at will, can you get rid of your tail and horns, or are they permanent?"
"You don't like them?" she blinked, seeming surprised for once. "But I saw how fond your memories are of your lover's cat ears and—oh, not that I was digging into those memories."
Konrad sighed. Was this his life now?
"I do, and they look—interesting?" He paused, recognizing a tunnel they've been through before. The surface was getting close. "But they scream dragon, and I want to keep you a secret."