Of course, before leaving, Long Ming still took a burning piece of pinewood from the fire. Its reddish glow illuminated the way ahead and made him feel considerably calmer.
He walked through the passage, where the soil was soft enough for every step to leave a tiny claw print. Firelight cast his shadow against the tunnel walls, making it sway with the flame. The deeper he went, the stronger the raw earthy smell became. Long Ming simply followed the passage forward.
After roughly half an hour, he finally reached the dark-gray rock and soil he had visited the day before yesterday. The once-intact wall now contained a huge hole. Gelu had removed the ant nest, leaving a hollowed-out cavity in the middle. Long Ming planted his torch in the soft earth, hooked his claws into the broken rock, and finally climbed up.
The opening left by the nest was barely wide enough for his body. Standing inside, Long Ming did not even have room to turn around. He felt the wall and, after confirming that it could be dug through, immediately put his claws to work.
Snow-white claw tips emerged from beneath his scales. Right now, Long Ming could only be grateful that he was a dragon. Even if he was still only a baby dragon, his claws were at least strong enough to dig through this rocky earth.
Long Ming worked seriously with his head lowered. Before long, he had excavated enough room to turn around. His tail swished in excitement, and he bent down to continue digging.
He had no idea how much time passed before his claws finally encountered soil with a different texture again. Long Ming raised his head and stared at the reddish earth, then dropped onto his bottom and panted. The little tail behind him wagged rapidly, creating a faint breeze.
Looking back, Long Ming realized he had dug quite a long tunnel through the rock. The tiny glow from the torch at the far end was already barely visible. He turned around and scraped a claw over the red earth. It was even harder than the gray rock and soil. More importantly, there were actually glittering particles embedded inside it. Tiny red sparks shimmered everywhere, dazzling Long Ming’s eyes.
Could there be rubies inside?
Long Ming immediately regained his energy and continued digging. After a while, however, he discovered that the red earth was becoming even harder—and warmer. It felt like a heated brick bed beneath his claws. The farther he went, the more red glitter appeared in the soil.
Long Ming sat on the ground, uncertain whether he should continue. He had already been hungry before he started, and after using so much physical strength, he was even hungrier. He had not found a single termite either. It felt like all that effort had been wasted.
Should he keep digging?
Long Ming stared conflictedly at the red wall before him and could not resist touching it. Sparkling red powder clung all over his claw.
Forget it. He would dig through this last section, then go back. There might really be rubies behind it.
Long Ming stood and resumed digging. This red wall was much harder than the earlier rock. Toward the end, Long Ming even began worrying that his claws might wear down. He checked them several times and only relaxed after seeing that the tips remained white and razor sharp.
Through sheer persistence, Long Ming eventually reduced the red wall to a paper-thin layer. He pricked up his ears and pressed them to the surface. With his keen hearing, he caught a sound that resembled flowing water.
“…Splash…”
The sound of something heavy falling into liquid made Long Ming’s eyes brighten. Could there be an underground river on the other side? There might even be fish in it!
The thought instantly excited him. He dug faster and finally broke through the red wall.
Red light flooded his vision, pouring across a vast ravine below.
From some unknown place overhead, glowing red magma cascaded downward like a waterfall. The surrounding red rock walls had been scorched by the boiling flow until they shone like colored glass, magnificent and dazzling. Streams of molten light moved slowly across them like an ancient oil painting brought to life.
At the very bottom lay an enormous pool of magma. Sheer, jagged glasslike walls filled the entire ravine. The lowest reaches glowed most intensely, where the thick, heavy molten rock occasionally sprayed up in fiery bursts before falling back into the pool. Tiny ripples appeared, only to be swallowed and smoothed away by the dark-red magma pouring from above until the surface became calm again.
Long Ming had never expected a volcanic ravine to exist behind the red earthen wall. His eyes widened.
He lowered his head and stared at the strange, magnificent fantasy landscape, genuinely stunned. It took him a long while to recover. There was actually a volcano right beside their home. Long Ming looked toward the sheer cliffs high above, then cautiously backed one small step away.
Falling down there would be no joke. One slip and he would become roasted dragon.
Feeling the excessive heat in the ravine, Long Ming reluctantly gave the glasslike magma walls one last look and prepared to return to the cave.
He had only just turned around when he heard another “splash,” as though a pebble had fallen into the magma pool. Then came several more in succession.
“Splash.” “Splash.”
Long Ming stopped.
He turned toward the seemingly empty ravine and slowly returned to the edge. Looking down carefully, he saw a glowing red stone drop into the magma pool, splashing up a tiny spray.
Where had that stone come from?
Long Ming hooked himself forward and peered down. All he could see was the steep, smooth cliff face, as though coated in glass. He looked around again but could not find any cracks at all, much less a place from which small stones might roll downward.
A cool draft rushed from the tunnel behind him, swept over Long Ming’s back and tail, then spiraled into the scorching ravine. Long Ming retreated another small step and softly went, “Awoo.”
His babyish voice echoed throughout the deathly silent ravine.
He must have been overthinking it. Nothing could possibly survive here.
Long Ming blinked and was about to leave when an icy hand suddenly curled gently around his left ankle, damp against his scales.
Long Ming: ……..
He stared straight ahead. His claws, however, abruptly clenched against the red rock beside him, snow-white tips sinking deep into it. The scales along his tail lifted involuntarily, and his whole body went rigid.
The hand gripping his foot was very weak. It rested loosely around his ankle, as if he could break free at any moment.
Long Ming tightened his claws, mentally prepared himself, and finally looked down.
He saw a large, pale hand—clearly an adult’s. The knuckles were distinct, the skin almost bloodless, blue veins faintly visible across the bony back. The only thing separating it from an ordinary human hand was the thin, pale membrane connecting the five fingers. The fingertips were an eerie dark blue-green, as though poisoned.
Long Ming moved his foot and slipped it from the hand’s loose grip. The pale hand immediately collapsed weakly against the ground. Following the wrist with his gaze, Long Ming saw an equally pale arm reaching upward from a slanted ledge below.
No wonder he had not seen anyone.
The person was beneath him.
The hand slowly began sliding away as though it were about to fall into the magma pool below. Long Ming hurriedly grabbed it. The instant he touched it, bone-deep cold seeped into his claws.
Was this person really alive? He could not already be dead… could he?
As Long Ming felt around, he suddenly realized something about the hand was strange.
Why did it seem to have scales too?
He held the hand and examined it carefully. Fine silver scales appeared faintly across the back, and if he looked closely, the wrist and arm were covered in them too.
After finishing his inspection, Long Ming glanced at his own healthy, smooth, rounded black scales and suddenly felt a peculiar surge of fondness for them.
The pale fingertips suddenly twitched, startling him.
So the person really was alive.
What should he do? How was he supposed to save him?
Long Ming stood and thought for a moment, then decided he should at least see who—or what—was hiding below.
He carefully flattened himself against the ground. His tail curled around a protruding rock behind him, while his claws dug tightly into the surface. Only then did he dare lower his head and peer into the deepest part of the ledge.
To his surprise, he saw an injured mermaid.
The mermaid was gravely wounded. Long pale-gray hair lay tangled across the dirty ground. His face was hidden from view. The clothing covering his upper body was soaked in blue blood. His enormous tail disappeared into the darkness. One arm bent near his head, while the other stretched diagonally upward to grip the ground above—the same surface where Long Ming was standing.
It was obvious he had an incredibly strong will to live. Such extreme heat alone would have been agony for a mermaid, much less one who was badly injured. Judging by the dried blue blood, he had probably been trapped inside this volcano for quite some time, alone in this inferno and waiting for death.
But then Long Ming found him.
Long Ming backed up and sat properly. The pale hand still clung stubbornly to the edge, dark blue-green nails scraping desperately against the ground, even the finger bones trembling.
Wind whimpered through the tunnel and echoed softly around the volcanic ravine.
Long Ming reached out and touched the icy hand with one claw.
“Awoo,” he said softly.
Then he went back.
He moved quickly on the return trip. Once home, he found the wheel, picked several wooden boards from the grass pile, and fitted them together into a crude wooden platform. After finishing everything, Long Ming shook Gelu awake.
He could not possibly rescue that mermaid by himself.
The instant Gelu opened his eyes, he saw the chubby cub who slept all day and refused to sleep at night. Exhausted, Gelu yawned. “Cub, why are you still awake?”
Long Ming pointed at the wheeled wooden platform he had made.
Gelu saw it, covered his forehead, and groaned in pain. “Earth Goddess above, don’t tell me you want to play some kind of sled game? I knew it. Cubs are all energetic, unreasonable little creatures.”
Long Ming did not understand and became anxious. If they delayed any longer, the mermaid might really die. He began crying out insistently in his soft baby voice.
Gelu stared at the chubby cub apparently acting spoiled toward him. In the end, he got out of bed and resignedly grabbed the rope attached to the front of the platform, grumbling all the while. “Hurry up and get on. I swear by the Earth Goddess, you are only allowed to play for half an hour. Understand?”
“Not one second more. Not one minute more. I, Gelu, can be very strict.”
Long Ming’s eyes lit up. Delighted, he sat on the platform and pointed one claw toward the tunnel.
Gelu assumed he was merely indulging the cub. When they reached the destination, however, he saw the enormous hole in the rock and finally realized that the chubby cub had stayed awake in the middle of the night and accomplished something enormous.
“My heavens! You actually ran all the way over to the Hell Volcano!” Gelu’s chest hurt from anger at the naughty little creature.
Long Ming grabbed the wheeled platform and headed toward the end of the tunnel. Seeing the little cub’s tail swaying ahead, Gelu hurried after him. Along the way he widened several sections of the tunnel, because otherwise his own body could not fit through.
When they finally arrived, Long Ming saw the hand was still there. Gelu followed close behind and nearly jumped out of his skin at the sight.
Long Ming pointed at the hand, then at the wheeled platform.
“You want to save him?” Gelu crouched, gathered his courage, and looked over the edge. He saw the mermaid below as well.
“I need to think about this carefully.” Gelu stood and rapidly weighed the advantages and disadvantages.
A mermaid. An injured mermaid at that. What benefit would there be in saving him?
There was a river in the southern forest that was often occupied by the piranha folk. If this mermaid could command those piranhas, then perhaps they could enjoy a steaming pot of milky-white fish soup even in winter.
“Awoo~ Gelu.” Long Ming looked up at the beastman and called him in his babyish voice.
Gelu looked at the chubby cub he had found, suddenly thought of a solution, and smiled as he patted the cub’s head.
Long Ming’s tail whipped as he panted with effort. Gelu beside him was not doing much better. This injured mermaid was genuinely heavy. After the two worked together for a long time, they finally managed to pull him up.
Long Ming sat on the ground to rest. He noticed the mermaid’s tail was damaged—the left fin seemed to have been sliced halfway through by a sharp weapon. Long Ming instinctively hugged his own tail. That must hurt terribly. The thought made him wince in sympathy.
Gelu placed the mermaid on the wooden platform. Long Ming automatically joined him in pulling it, and at last they returned to the cave.
It was the middle of the night. Gelu examined the wounded mermaid and saw that his scales had dried and cracked badly enough to bleed. He brought over the large iron pot, painstakingly lowered the mermaid inside, then filled it with water so the injured creature could soak.
The mermaid remained unconscious. Gelu yawned and decided he would apply some medicinal herbs after the mermaid woke the next day.
Long Ming watched Gelu return to bed and fall asleep. He dragged over a small stool, stood on it beside the iron pot, and stared at the mermaid.
This was the first time he had ever seen one of these legendary creatures. He could not help being curious.
The mermaid’s face was filthy, making his features impossible to see clearly, but his tail was quite beautiful. It was silver.
Long Ming was studying him curiously when he suddenly heard an exceedingly weak yet elegant, clear voice, refined enough to make anyone pay attention.
“Greetings. I am the former Tyrant of the Deep Sea, Lord of Storms, surviving descendant of the Sea God’s divine race, Aoduoduo Liergete Aotelaisi. I am deeply grateful that you saved me.”
The enormous string of titles made Long Ming’s head spin. He had only learned simple words so far and had to struggle for quite a while before he understood a few of the sounds near the end. Looking at the injured mermaid, he filtered out everything he could not understand and simply repeated what he thought he had heard.
“Oreo?”
After saying it, Long Ming rubbed his soft belly and swallowed.
Right now, he really wanted to eat Oreo cookies.