Lying dead silent in the small corner a short distance from the ground that she had found for the next hour, Scaly made sure to keep an eye out for any monsters that might try to take the opportunity to ambush her while she was weak.
Luckily, none of the monsters native to the underground world seemed to notice her, as she silently recovered her strength without moving a single muscle in the process. Allowing her to recover the mana and strength used crossing the underground ocean without any problems.
At the same time, she also got the opportunity to observe the heavenly lake serpents hunting down the fatty yellow cave fish and see where they would go after they had finished hunting and went back onto land again.
Well... She didn’t exactly see where they were going, but more so managed to pick up on the general location that seemed to lead somewhere further away from the edge of the water.
Considering her earlier encounter with the massive tentacle monster not too long ago, she fully understood why even a group of powerful monsters like the heavenly lake serpents would not place their home somewhere close to the water, as it could ultimately run the risk of them suddenly being dragged into the water by a massive tentacle in the middle of them sleeping.
If not for the fact that she had been spooked off by the massive titan spider that could still be seen wandering around not too far away, she would have already attempted to follow behind the heavenly lake serpents.
Unfortunately, even if she had now managed to recover her strength and mana, she didn’t feel confident in taking on the massive titan spider that seemed to be guarding the path that the heavenly lake serpents were moving when leaving the water to move back with satisfied expressions and full stomachs.
From a single glance, it was obvious to her that the titan spider and the heavenly lake serpents seemed to have some sort of agreement in place, as it didn’t attack any of the heavenly lake serpents even when they slithered right past it without any reaction.
Dealing with the heavenly lake serpents would already be something difficult to accomplish given how they always seemed to be working together, but now a titan spider had been included in the mix. Making what she considered a simple task of killing a few lone heavenly lake serpents and devouring their hearts to improve her dragon blood purity far more complicated than it should be.
Her goal of possibly attempting to kill off the last heavenly lake serpent to leave the water after feeding was also ruined, as the titan spider seemed to have almost read her mind by moving forward and stationing itself closer to the edge of the water to better protect the last heavenly lake serpent when it emerged from the water.
At this point in time, it wasn’t even some kind of mutually beneficial relationship- It was no different from the damnable titan spider deliberately acting against her to prevent her from ever getting a chance at one of the heavenly lake serpents!
Feeling herself staring daggers at the titan spider slowly extending one of its massive legs to help the heavenly lake serpent struggling to get out of the water due to its bloated stomach from eating who knew how many fatty yellow cave fish, Scaly had to do her best to stop herself from jumping out of her cover to confront the titan spider.
The main thing that kept her from doing this now was the fact that she knew the rest of the heavenly lake serpents weren’t too far away and her launching an attack would undoubtedly draw their attention. Possibly resulting in her being surrounded by enemies in a short time.
No matter how confident she might be in her current strength, she also understood that she wouldn’t do well faced with over a dozen heavenly lake serpents and a titan spider at the same time...
Rustle~
For this reason, Scaly decided to go with the more silent approach for now. Following the heavenly lake serpent and titan spider from a distance without getting too close to them.
Now that she was a young tempest dragon, her size was a bit larger than her time as a small lizard. Resulting in this kind of sneaky approach was made a bit more difficult compared to back when she had been smaller.
At least there was one benefit to her current size and that was the fact that the weaker monsters didn’t try to attack her when they spotted her. Instead, just ignoring her after a quick glance before continuing while keeping a safe distance.
Of course, it didn’t mean that all the monsters she encountered along the way decided to just ignore her, as some of the stronger ones still decided to try and attack her-
Ptsh-!
[Gained 686 Exp]
However, the end of most of these monsters were a swift death, as scaly mainly relied on using her sharp claws and water magic to avoid making too much noise or draw any unwanted attention to herself from not just the titan spider, but also the rest of the surrounding monsters.
In the end, as she continued to move further and further away from the underground ocean, Scaly found herself fighting stronger and stronger monsters. Making it more and more difficult for her to keep up with the titan spider and heavenly lake serpent that didn’t encounter any such problems, likely due to the titan spider’s rather intimidating appearance compared to her own.
Then again, it was also because she didn’t dare to use too much of her strength in fear that it might make the titan spider view her as a threat, thus she kept her strength limited to a degree that wouldn’t exceed the surrounding monsters whenever she felt the titan spider observing its surroundings.
How could she tell when she was being observed by the titan spider one might ask?
Simple... She couldn’t, she just guessed that it might be observing its surroundings whenever it came to a stop or moved its head around a bit. Resulting in Scaly advancing slower and slower as the head of the titan spider seemed to be moving around more often the further away from the water they got.