Ignoring the fight that was erupting below her, Scaly climbed up the last bit of the rocky wall before flopping on to the ground with an exhausted expression plastered all over her face. The injuries she had received from the rocks thrown by the troll had already pushed her to the limit and at this point, causing her to slowly close her eyes for a brief moment to catch her breath after she had made sure that there weren’t any monsters around to attack her.
Roooar!
GRooowl!
As she was peacefully laying on the ground and catching her breath, the sounds of the ferocious battle that was taking place between the troll and the mountain gnolls below reached her.
Roll~
Unable to contain her curiosity about who was winning, Scaly casually rolled a bit closer to the edge of the rocky wall that she had just climbed up. Getting close enough to peek over the edge and see the battle taking place below, while at the same time still recovering her strength.
Bang! Bang! Bang!
Looking down at the battle that was taking place below, Scaly was shocked to discover that the mountain gnolls that she had expected to be on the winning side weren’t winning. Instead, the mountain dwelling troll managed to singlehandedly hold off the mountain gnolls by itself. Even having brutally killed one of the mountain gnolls by crushing its head during the time she hadn’t been watching.
Even if both sides were around level 50, it was obvious that there was a clear difference between the two races, with the mountain dwelling troll clearly being superior to the mountain gnolls at the same level.
Grooowl~!
Grrrr-!
However, even though they were at a clear disadvantage when it came to facing the troll, the mountain gnolls were far more numerous compared to the troll, as they had already switched to a far more defensive tactic to try and slowly exhaust the troll with a continuous attack.
ROOOAR!
Of course, the troll knew just what the mountain gnolls were up to, as it let out a loud roar before charging towards the mountain gnolls blocking its path. Intending to leave the dead end that it had found itself in after chasing after a certain little dragon-
Bang!
Unfortunately, even though the troll far outmatched the mountain gnolls, it couldn’t break through them and leave. Only finding itself in an injured state after trying to force its way past the mountain gnolls.
In the end, there was nothing the troll could do about its current situation other than continuing its fight with the mountain gnolls. Not daring to relax itself, as a mountain gnoll would be ready to strike whenever it did so, thus resulting in the battle entering a stalemate, as the two parties fought ferociously against each other.
Looks like the battle won’t be ending any time soon...
Thinking this to herself as she watched how everything played out before inevitably ending up in some kind of stalemate, Scaly could not help feeling a bit disappointed that the troll didn’t kill any more of the mountain gnolls.
After all, even though she was currently in a weakened state, Scaly still saw hope of entering the battle between the mountain gnolls and the trolls after she recovered a bit of her strength and the strength of the two parties battling below weakened...
[Mountain Gnoll, Barbarian, lvl 50]
[Description: A mountain gnoll that has evolved into a barbarian, a rare and powerful class of mountain gnolls. Known for their terrifying strength and aggressive behavior. Avoid at any cost, inside or outside a dungeon.]
Not knowing what else to do as the battle below had no end in sight and she was busy recovering her strength, Scaly decided to inspect one of the mountain gnolls currently locked in battle with the mountain dwelling troll.
Of course, her intention was not to look through the description of this mountain gnoll, but instead try and focus her attention on the mountain gnoll part of the description that she had felt herself capable of inspecting in more detail back during her escape from the war shaman mountain gnoll.
[Race: Gnoll]
[Subspecies: Mountain Gnoll]
[Description: A subspecies of gnolls that often lives in the mountains or rocky terrain. Known to trade with other sentient races but are most often known to trade with beastkin sharing similar traits with them. Generally, follow a single powerful leader or a circle of shamans, though a circle of shamans leading a tribe among gnolls is extremely rare in general and can only be found in powerful tribes that have existed for a long time.]
[Average Lifespan: 30 – 150 years. Normal gnolls live around thirty years, with gnoll shamans capable of living for over a hundred years, some powerful shamans even living beyond two hundred years.]
[Ruler Ranks: The rank of all gnolls follow the same principle, with the lowest level ruler of a functioning tribe being at least a chieftain. Followed by Lords in more powerful tribes and kings in the strongest tribes. Beyond that, there is the fabled title of emperor, but... No gnoll above the level of king has emerged for the past thousands of years, with the legendary Gnoll Emperor remaining mostly a fairy tale in the eyes of most short-lived species.]
Reading through the wall of text that appeared in front of her after she focused on the mountain gnoll part of the description, Scaly was shocked to discover that it was actually a description of the gnoll race or to be more specific a subspecies of the gnoll race, the mountain gnolls.
Although the information contained inside this description wasn’t really that useful when it came to fighting the mountain gnolls, it at least helped give her a better understanding of the mountain gnolls or other gnolls in case she encountered them after she left the dungeon at some point in the future.
The only useful information at the moment so to speak, was the part about ruler ranks, it allowed her to confirm her suspensions about the fact that the lord and king rank were indeed a thing for the mountain gnolls... And the rest of the gnolls.
Not just them but given that a forest rabbit also had the lord title in its name, she guessed that other monsters should also follow a similar ranking scheme. At least when it came to those who ruled over parts of their race in a similar way to the mountain gnolls and the forest rabbits...
[Mountain Dwelling Troll, lvl 57]
[Description: A troll that dwells in the mountains...]
Having nothing better to do, Scaly soon decided to turn her attention towards the mountain dwelling troll that was currently busy fighting with the mountain gnolls, as she inspected it and focused on the troll part of its description. Hoping that she would be able to find out more about the trolls by inspecting the mountain dwelling troll below.
[Race: Mountain Dwelling Troll]
[Description: A unique lifeform created by dungeons, can only be found inside dungeons. Final evolution, unable to continue evolving without help from the dungeon.]
[Average Lifespan: indefinite, can live as long as its inside the dungeon it was created.]
[Level Limit: 60]
However, when she inspected the troll part of the description, Scaly was shocked to discover that the mountain dwelling troll currently fighting below wasn’t a troll, but instead some kind of unique lifeform that had been created by the dungeon itself.
Although she had no idea how that had come to be, she guessed that she should have been something similar to the mountain dwelling troll back when she had first opened her eyes at the first floor of the dungeon.
The only difference between herself and the mountain dwelling troll below was that she had taken a different than normal evolutionary path, while it had followed its original path to its final evolution.
Though it could to some extend be considered stronger than her at the moment, she was far from reaching her limit and could still continue evolving, while the mountain dwelling troll had already reached its final evolution and couldn’t continue growing stronger after reaching level 60 without some kind of special help from the dungeon.
Just thinking about the fact that this kind of thing might have been her fate if she couldn’t follow the path of becoming a dragon due to her dragon bloodline, caused a shiver to run down her spine.
No matter what, Scaly also confirmed something important with the status of the mountain dwelling race... And that was the fact that she could indeed end up running into a wall at some point in time where it would be impossible for her to continue evolving and increasing her strength.
Even though this would still be far off in the future given that she could essentially be considered a baby dragon at this point in time, Scaly still steeled herself to make sure that she did everything in her power to take the best possible evolutionary path as a dragon in the future!
For that to be possible, she also realized that it would be important for her to increase the purity of her dragon blood.
After all, with her current "inferior" dragon blood, the quality of her next evolution would definitely be affected to some degree...