Rumble~!
At least she thought she would be able to escape from the dreamscape before the dream cloud whales had a chance to reach her, but the dream cloud whale who had emerged first seemed to have other ideas, as it opened its mouth wide before shooting out what looked like a colorful beam of light. Clearly knowing that she was in the process of leaving the dreamscape and fully intent on stopping her before she could succeed.
But even faced with the terrifyingly fast beam of light shooting towards her, Scaly wasn’t unable to react in time, as she flapped her wings desperately before throwing herself to the side just in time to avoid the colorful beam attack from the dream cloud whale. Allowing the gate of dreams to activate successfully, as countless small colorful clouds engulfed her once again. Taking her out of the dreamscape before the dream cloud whale had the chance to launch a second attack.
Problem was... While she had managed to successfully avoid the attack and was now in the process of leaving the dreamscape, Scaly didn’t feel the slightest bit happy about her situation, as she understood full well that she had moved away from the location that she had deemed safe and instead ended up returning to the material plane from somewhere completely unknown. All she could do was hope that she wouldn’t end in some deadly situation because of her avoiding the attack from the dream cloud whale at the last second.
Then again, even if she did end up in a deadly situation on the other side, she had a feeling that it would still be far better than staying in the dreamscape where she would have to face off against the dozens of dream cloud whales that had emerged in response to the collision between the two floating islands and had been eyeing her hungrily just before the colorful clouds had engulfed her...
Thump~
In the end, she once again found herself hitting the ground the second she arrived back in the material plane. Only this time around, there wasn’t someone to break her fall.
Rought landing aside, Scaly didn’t waste any time as she began observing her surroundings. Looking for any potential danger.
Only after making sure that there weren’t any powerful adventurers or monsters around her did she finally take the time to breathe a sigh of relief for the first time in what felt like months.
Even if the time since she had entered the giant ant nest and faced off against the gluttonous giant ant queen had been less than a day ago, the constant life and death situations that she had ended up finding herself in was nothing short of stressful. Making her flop onto the ground without a care in the world now that she finally had somewhere to rest without having to worry about any powerful monster or adventurer showing up to attack her.
As for how she could be so certain that her current location was safe... That had to do with the simple fact that it was still underground. Her current location being a small hole barely enough to fit her with a hidden entrance connected to a much larger underground cave. The hole in question had been created by another monster that should have long since passed away or gone somewhere different, as it was clear from a glance that the place had long since been abandoned.
The only worry she had was the inhabitants of the larger cave outside, but at least for now, it wasn’t something she had to worry about, as she was safe without anyone around to attack her for now.
Although... The question she had immediately after showing up in this underground space, was where the tree and mountain base she had seen earlier from the dreamscape had come from. A question that was soon enough answered as she poked her head outside and saw a bit more of the massive underground cave outside the small hiding place, she found herself in.
From the base of the mountain to the tree, she found them at first glance, as it turned out that the entire underground space seemed to be inside a massive mountain, with another mountain inside of it stretching up for thousands of meters inside what was undoubtedly a far larger mountain. The tree she saw being part of some sort of unique underground forest that covered the rest of this underground cave. The only source of light being several strange glowing crystals and what seemed to be an opening at the very top of the underground cave that wasn’t entirely below the surface considering it should be inside a towering mountain.
Still, with such a large opening at the top, Scaly felt like it should be relatively simple for her to leave and get back outside again and figure out where she had ended up. The main thing that kept her from just flying up immediately was the fact that she had exhausted most of her strength inside the dreamscape and had no idea what kind of monsters might be lurking inside the underground forest nor what kind of monster might have claimed the towering mountain peak for itself.
At least for now, she intended to first recover her strength inside the rather cramped hole in the wall that she had found herself in before attempting to leave and find a way to get to the floating continent she had seen in the dreamscape.
After all, outside of just recovering her strength, she had a feeling it might also be best to allow the situation inside the dreamscape to calm down a bit, as she would undoubtedly be sensed by the dream cloud whales if they were still swarming around the area near the floating continent.
Not to mention, this would also be a great opportunity for her to see gauge the strength of the monsters that roamed around this underground mountain shaped cave. Having already seen quite a few small monsters moving around out of the corner of her eye.
But before focusing on these small monsters, she decided to first check out her own status to see how much stronger she had become after the encounter with the gluttonous giant ant queen and her rather sizeable nest. Curious if any of her magic or skills had ended up leveling up during the deadly encounter.
Name: Scaly
Race: Dreamscale Dragon
Dragon blood: 31% (Uncommon)
Level: 38/40, 23%
Mana Heart: Second Circle
STR: 1037 |VIT: 2397 | DEX: 1339 | M: 4142
Magic: [Dragon Water Magic, lvl 8], [Ice Magic lvl 3], [Wind Magic, lvl 7], [Lightning Magic, lvl 4], [Dream Magic lvl 3]
Skills: [Dragon Bloodline, lvl 4], [Dragon Flight, lvl 8], [Poison/Venom Resistance, lvl 5], [Dragon Claw Strike, lvl 9], [Dragon Breath (Water), lvl 6], [Corrosion Resistance, lvl 4], [Pain Resistance, lvl 5], [Swimming, lvl 6], [Dragon Heart, lvl 1], [Endless Vitality, lvl 1], [Agility, lvl 1], [Brute Force, lvl 1]
However, as she looked through her status, she was disappointed to discover that none of her magic had increased in level nor had any of her skills so to speak. The only skill that had increased in level was her swimming skill, that had somehow increased from level 5 to level 6 during the encounter. Confusing her greatly considering that she hadn’t been swimming through water outside of the brief time in crystal-clear lake water of the first floating island she had ended up in, but... Back then, she had already noticed her level in swimming going from 4 to 5. Meaning that it had somehow increased by an entire level during that time between her first time swimming around the crystal-clear lake.
No matter how she thought about it, she didn’t think swimming through the crystal-clear lake of the dreamscape floating island was that effective when it came to increasing the level of her swimming skill. Meaning it was likely something different that allowed her to rapidly increase the level of her swimming skill.
Don’t tell me... Was it when I flew from the first floating island to the mountain floating island!?
In the end, the only thing she could think about was the brief time she had spent travelling through the sky of the dreamscape without the protection of a floating island, as thinking back on the experience, it had indeed somewhat felt like swimming through really thick water.
But if that was the case... Didn’t it mean that to more easily travel through the dreamscape in the future, she would have to increase her swimming skill!?
But... Thinking about it... Whales did normally swim through water, so maybe that was why their dreamscape equivalents were able to move through the sky of the dreamscape so easily?
Feeling her thoughts wander as she thought about this, Scaly decided not to think too much about it for now and instead wait to test out things once she returned to the dreamscape again...