“Mama, why doesn’t our hair melt?” Tilly’s curious eyes fixed on Xuefei as she silently waited for the moment Xuefei would open her eyes.
She lay quietly in Leia’s embrace, with Leia positioning her so that everything from mid-chest downward was just right in the magma, turning it into a comfortable hot spring soak.
“Because an Evil Dragon’s body isn’t like the frail ordinary Demon Race—it’s incredibly heat-resistant.”
Tilly always had so many questions.
Today, a bunch of strange ones swirling in her clever little head had finally been answered.
If Mama Leia was bullying Mama Xuefei just to ease Mama Xuefei’s past worries and help her through them, didn’t that mean…
“Leia (meow~) is doing it to protect Mama Xuefei!”
Leia gave an awkward laugh, but then she reconsidered—this explanation wasn’t entirely off-base.
“As expected of my daughter. That’s exactly right.”
“Mm, I thought it was to cure Mama Xuefei’s illness…” Chesia murmured softly.
“That works as an explanation too. Mama Xuefei’s condition is quite serious. She needs daily treatments to keep it under control~,” Leia said with a nod.
Chesia’s expression turned worried in an instant. Her small hands balled into fists, which she pressed fearfully to her lips.
“Then… will Mama’s illness get better?”
“If I drag her over every day for ‘treatment,’ it can be kept in check…,” Leia replied.
But it was probably impossible to cure completely~
~~~
In truth, Tilly and Chesia hadn’t spent their entire wait just splashing around in the water.
Otherwise, they never could have kept it up for a full four hours—they would have gotten hungry and gone looking for their mamas long before then.
Thanks to the combat prowess from her “previous life,” Chesia had no trouble at all dodging Tilly’s “fire sprays.” In fact, at her current level, virtually no physical attack could harm her. Bolstered by the ultimate combat techniques and the physical gifts of the strongest race, she was destined to cultivate into a being even more powerful than the War God someday.
As a result, their “battlefield” stretched far beyond the edges of the Magma Pool.
The two small dragons effortlessly leaped across thousands of meters of precarious, crumbling rock, fighting all the way from the southern end of the volcano cavern floor to the northern. Even the largest magma pool on this level couldn’t withstand the reckless antics of two Evil Dragons.
A careless crash into a stone wall might trigger a mere earthquake at best—or bring the whole mountain crashing down at worst.
Chesia was keenly aware that their noise would ruin her mamas’ precious time together. To prevent any unnecessary disruptions, she deliberately shifted their “battleground” to a much vaster expanse farther away.
This commotion just happened to reach the Flame Demon who dwelled thousands of meters underground.
She snapped her eyes open. Her fiery red hair blazed fiercely, her entire youthful body—cloaked in flames—brimming with the cataclysmic energy of a volcanic eruption. Sensing intruders in her territory, Miss Flame Demon let out a sound of deep dissatisfaction.
“Who’s disturbing my sleep? Damn adventurers—is Flame Chrysanthemum really worth that much?”
In all honesty, those Flame Chrysanthemums growing near the Magma Pool were incredibly valuable.
She roused herself swiftly from the pool, smoothing down her long hair. The flames coalesced into an elegant yet deadly long skirt, one that could reduce anyone who drew too close to a puff of flying ash. The horns crowning her head flowed like molten lava, their surface as scorching as a red-hot branding iron.
Uncounted millennia ago, a girl who had perished in this place had absorbed the resentment and magic power, transforming into the volcano’s mightiest creature.
She could traverse 140 kilometers through the magma in a single hour.
Which meant she quickly pinpointed the culprits wreaking havoc in her “bedroom.” Anyone else might have assumed a band of adventurers had chosen her doorstep for their team-building outing.
But then something strange happened.
Miss Flame Demon’s eyes widened.
Across the vast magma lake, figures shot through the waves like missiles, moving at speeds too blistering to track!
One was a touch slower, but still several times faster than she was!
Being woken up was an utterly infuriating experience. She had no interest in whether this was some novel adventuring scouting tactic or bizarre spellcraft. Brimming with sleep-fueled rage, she crossed her impressively developed arms and declared:
“Meow, this old lady’s gonna see just who you are!”
“Wula lala!”
The Flame Demon soared into the air and charged ahead, only for something soft to suddenly wrap around her body the next instant, carrying her all the way to a distant shore.
Her smooth little feet stomped furiously against the ground. Glaring down at the girl who was a good thirty centimeters shorter than her, she snapped:
“Hey! Why’re you disturbing my sleep? Can’t us monsters look out for each other? This is my turf! Go on home to your mama, quick!”
“Um… please don’t go any farther…”
The little girl sort of looked like a dragon.
But it couldn’t possibly be that lord’s child, could it? The distance was far too great, and word was that the Evil Dragon was quite the shut-in. She would never venture all the way to the Steranta Mountain Range.
So, it was probably just some creature of a similar race?
She’d heard there were fish that could live in magma. Could it be one of them?
Miss Flame Demon declared, “What fight? This road was opened by me, these flowers were planted by me—to pass through, you can’t just barge in like that! Don’t beg me to let you go, or else I’ll toss you up to the mountaintop to get battered by the terrifying blizzard!”
The little girl looked deeply worried.
For a moment, Miss Flame Demon thought her pressure had worked. She didn’t even realize that, in Chesia’s eyes, she was just as cute as Chesia’s own mother.
“If you keep going forward, Mama will eat you.”
“Huh?”
Whose mama was that?
So arrogant!
Miss Flame Demon’s own mother had long since vanished to who-knows-where, but that hardly seemed like something to brag about.
“I’ll throw you out, you little pest!” Miss Flame Demon huffed, her cheeks puffed out in anger.
A scorching hot whirlwind began to rise around her. The high-concentration plasma storm reached temperatures of several thousand degrees, but Miss Flame Demon had no intention of killing her. She just wanted to give this little magma-swimmer a proper scare.
An attack like that could effortlessly wipe out an entire human city.
But then the problem arose…
Chesia lightly hopped up and headbutted right on Miss Flame Demon’s forehead.
Bang~
“Ow, ow, ow! Why’d you hit me?!”
“I’m warning you, miss. Mama doesn’t want to be disturbed by outsiders.”
Just then, another figure stumbled out of the magma in a sorry state.
It was Tilly.
In order to “chase” Chesia, she had transformed into her dragon form. The instant Miss Flame Demon turned her head, she caught sight of the scales covering Tilly’s body.
“Chesia~~, wait for me! Don’t run so fast!”
“Mm, Sister…”
As Tilly shifted back into a girl who looked much like Chesia, Miss Flame Demon froze in shock.
She finally realized what those fearsome pupils signified.
Could it be… could it be…
That lord had actually shown up uninvited, right at the entrance to her own bedroom?!
