Demon's Virtue

Chapter 330 - Walking On Eggshells

"I welcome thee. Please, act like you're at home. Meaning, respect this space and don't break anything, you hear?" Lognir told everyone as Eiro just lightly smirked. The Demon turned his head toward Armodeus, who seemed rather keen on observing this legendary being in front of him a little bit more.

"Sorry about him, he's a Craftsman. He seems rather interested in your scales." Eiro explained, and the elder Dwarf turned his head with shock in his eyes, "E-Eiro, don't tell him that!"

"What? It's true, he would have figured it out sooner or later anyway. It's not like you're doing much to try and hide it." Eiro pointed out, and Lognir started to chuckle softly.

Although that 'soft chuckle' was still loud enough to slightly hurt Eiro's sensitive ears, "I figured it was something like that already. But do not worry, there's no need to be scared. As long as you do not harm us or reveal our secrets to those outside of this cave, I do not mind giving you a few 'materials' to work with."

The Craftsman next to Eiro opened his eyes wide in surprise and excitement, "Really?!"

"Of course. The scales that I shed are useless to me, but I know they are wondrous items to you folk. I just never had the chance to see anything made with them before, so as long as you agree to let me watch you work, I will give you whatever you desire that I can offer." Lognir told Armodeus, who honestly didn't expect this sort of answer. Even Eiro didn't think that something like this would happen.

He heard from Solomon that Lognir was a kind-natured being, but this went even beyond that. It made Eiro wonder if Lognir was trying to hide some sort of grand objective.

Please, come deeper within the cave, I wish to introduce you to my companion. She can be rather fiesty sometimes, so I don't want her to get surprised by our visitors." The Dragon slowly turned around and stepped deeper into the cave toward where the other dragons seemed to be.

Now that they were inside of the cave, Eiro was able to sense them perfectly, although there was something that made Eiro think that something rather awkward might be about to happen.

They stepped through a grand archway as they entered an area that looked to be some sort of ancient ruin, which would explain why this place was chosen by Dragons to breed. And on the other side of the room, Eiro could see half a dozen of differently colored dragons. They were already similar in size to a large dog, although they only seemed to be a few weeks old at most.

And amongst them sat a beautiful woman with long black hair. She was wearing a black and purple dress, but it was hard to explain her any further than that. It was as if every time Eiro blinked, small details about her were changing. Her hair was laying on her shoulder slightly differently, some details on the dress changed, and even the vibe she gave off slightly shifted.

Eiro knew that this was happening as he looked at her, but when he tried to remember what she looked like before, but whenever he thought about it, it was always different. Even if he kept thinking about the same instance again and again.

The Demon read a few different books about monsters before, obviously, and there was one sort of being that seemed to fit this sort of pattern.

This sometimes happened to Monsters in the domain of Chaos. The Dragon of Truth, an aspect that laid in the overall domain of 'Order', had a 'Dragon of Chaos' as a mate. This... was rather interesting.

But then, Lognir reacted in the way that Eiro figured he would, "K-Krista!" The Dragon exclaimed, "Why are you in your human form? I thought I told you we were expecting visitors!"

The woman in black raised her head to look at Lognir, before just softly smiling, rubbing her hand over one of the young dragons that were gathered around her, "Oh, I didn't realize that it was this important~..." She replied bluntly,before Lognir let out a deep sigh. Quickly, his body was covered in particles of light again that soon gathered in front of him as Lognir turned back into his humanoid form, scratching the back of his head.

"So, yeah... I was not going to show you this side of me, but I figured it's too late now. My mate is a slight bit..." Lognir started, trying to find the right word to describe Krista, and Eiro quickly found one without needing to think for too long, "Unpredictable?" The Demon asked.

Without hesitation, the Dragon of Truth turned toward Eiro and nodded his head, "Yes, that's the exact right word! You feel it too, then?"

"Of course I do... I can usually think up at least a couple plausible scenarios of what might happen, but when I look at her... It's that I can both see completely unrealistic, illogical things, as well as nothing at all." Since that was a rather good explanation, Lognir crossed his arms with satisfaction, "Then your perceptive abilities must be extraordinary as well."

"Of course. They're some of the best around." Eiro laughed quietly, before he turned his head to the side, seeing the even more perplexed Armodeus standing beside him. The eyes of the craftsman were not directly focused on Lognir, Krista, or the six newborn dragons, but rather on the nearly metallic shards that were gathered on a small pile in the corner of the room. With a glance, considering the shapes of some of these shards, it was easy to assume that these were the leftover shells of the eggs that these newborns hatched out of.

Eiro looked at them somewhat curiously as well, considering that Armodeus was concentrating on them so much that he was nearly forgetting what kind of situation he was in, "Are those really that great? Can you even make something with literal eggshells?"

The elder Dwarf turned his head toward Eiro with a broad grin on his face, "Oh lad, don't mistake these for the same sort of eggshells like those of a bird! They're far more special than that! Armor, Potions, even some types of weapons can be created with them! But since Dragons only breed once or twice in their lifetime, it is even rarer to come accross these than a Dragon's scales!"

Eiro raised his brows curiously. He hadn't heard of something like that before. Not like there was all too much information about such things available to the general public. That it could be used for potions made sense, since sometimes the eggs of other beasts or monsters were used in potions as well, but that you could make Armor and Weapons out of it seemed a bit surprising to Eiro.

He turned his head toward Lognir, who was staring back with a somewhat blank expression. The two locked eyes for a few moments, before the Dragon finally gave in, "Fine, he can have them. As long as he makes something out of them here in the cave."

"I think that should be fine. We have everything we need for that with us right now." Eiro pointed out, and meanwhile Armodeus already basically ran toward the shards of the eggshells that were laying in the corner of this large room.

"...Bavet, go play with the kids a bit." The Demon suggested, and the slime slithered over Eiro's hand confused, "Wait, why do I have to-"

"Just do it, please."

"...Fine." Bavet grumbled before jumping off Eiro's arm, quickly transforming into a wolf as he carefully walked over toward the Dragons. Meanwhile, Eiro and Lognir chose to start walking through the cave a bit as Eiro informed the Dragon of Truth of everything that he needed to know, including the specifics of the situation with Eiro's memories, of course.

The Dragon cupped his chin with his hand, deep in thought, "Yup, you should be able to remember it somehow. And I already have a pretty good idea for how you could achieve this."

"And what would that be?"

Lognir looked back at Eiro with a soft smile on his lips, "Simple. Meditation while I put you under an immense amount of mental stress. From the way you move, I can tell that you did a lot of physical training and practice to improve your raw abilities, but I doubt you do much beyond just reading for your mind. Am I right?"

Eiro frowned slightly as he started to think, "That's fair... I do spend a lot of my time doing mental exercises... but I guess it's not enough at the end of the day."

"Those abilities improve your ability to come to conclusions, correct? What about your memory? Did you do anything to practice for that?"

"...I never really had to, and I'm not sure if that would work. For nearly my whole life, I had the ability to remember every single aspect of my past."

"I understand the situation, I think." Lognir pointed out, "You're reliant on that ability of yours. So just block it out for a little while and we do some memory-based training for you."

Eiro looked back at Lognir, not really understanding what he meant, "...Block it out?"

The Dragon looked back at Eiro with a slight squint, "You don't know how to block your skills out? Wait, is that why you didn't block your aura-output? You just can't do it?" As if he was looking at a child, Lognir took a step back with a wry smile, while Eiro just glared back, "Whatever it is you're talking about, I don't think it's something normal. At least not as much as you think it is."

"...You really don't know how to block your aura? Are you a kid or something?"

"...My next Evolution will turn me into a Supreme Being."

"And you don't fucking know how to block your Aura, what kind of dumbass are you?!" Lognir yelled out loudly, "Fine, then let's do that first. We'll work on basic Aura blocking, then work on blocking your 'Card' abilities, since they are foreign anyway, and then we'll work on blocking your regular abilities."

Eiro was getting more confused the more Lognir was saying, until he finally understood what exactly he was talking about and what this would do for Eiro.

"...If I manage to reach a level similar to yours when it comes to this Aura-Blocking, I will be able to hide from regular people. It will be much easier to do my thing without worrying about being seen by random people."

"Ah, that too.. But mostly, I think the boosting-effect might be useful for you in the long-term."