Chapter 409 - 0406: Can’t Hit the Fire Dragon Bones (Second Update)
Burial Ground, in the afternoon.
Liszt walked among the five huge Fire Dragon Bones, constantly using the Eye of Magic to observe the magical feedback of the bones.
He saw no sign of magic.
The so-called resurrection of dragon bones by the Smoke Mission showed no signs; these five decayed dragon bones still looked the same as ever.
He dismissed the Eye of Magic and observed the dragon bones with his naked eye. Geographically, from Black Horse Island, the Burial Ground was located between Ice Grass Hill and Needle Grass Hill, roughly to the due east of the island.
"If I take this number one dragon bone beside me as the starting point (0,0) of the coordinate system, with the eastward extension as the x-axis and the northward extension as the y-axis, with twenty meters to a scale. Then, the number two dragon bone is located at (-2,3); the number three dragon bone at (4,5), the number four dragon bone at (8,3), and the number five dragon bone at (11,4), with the closest distance between numbers one and two being seventy-two meters."
As Liszt examined, he plotted the coordinate system on thick parchment.
The five dragon bones, positioned on the coordinate system, could roughly be connected to form a pentagon shaped like a sword blade: "Is there some special reason for this shape or for this distribution of bones? Or is it just because the volcano erupted at random, scattering the bones to these five points?"
It seemed to be a random scatter without a special reason.
He packed up the parchment and climbed to the top of the number one dragon bone, which had been weathered into a flat horizontal surface at the break. The bone was originally covered with soil and weeds, but now the weeds had been cleared away to reveal the fine patterns of the dragon bone itself. According to normal skeletal structures, bones are hollow, but the Fire Dragon’s bones were not.
"Or rather, the location of the bone marrow inside its bones has been filled with some substance," Liszt squatted on the broken surface and looked closely; one could see a division line between the bone and the marrow.
Like the growth rings in a book.
"The Fire Dragon Bones haven’t turned into fossils and are still bony in nature, including the large fragments previously transported to Fresh Flower Town, which are real bones. Those bone fragments didn’t contain the substance that marrow transforms into... What exactly has the marrow in these five dragon bones turned into?"
He wanted to chip off a piece for research.
But the Dragon Bone was too tough to be chipped open, and strangely, the echo seemed a bit too loud. He stopped, and the echo disappeared instantly. When he struck the bone hard, the echo surged again.
"Something’s not right!"
He immediately used the Eye of Magic again, looking around in a circle; no magical traces were found.
He struck the bone again, and at that moment, along with the surging echo, a magical pattern, like lightning, appeared beneath his feet on the dragon bone—red magic power, intertwining like blood vessels within the dragon bone, flashing by in an instant.
"There’s a situation!"
He struck once more, seeing even more clearly the fire-red magic power within the dragon bone emerge, thick and thin, convoluted like roots. He turned his head to look at dragon bone number two nearby; when struck again, the second dragon bone also displayed a mass of densely intertwined fire-red filaments that flashed over the bone.
Looking towards the distant bones three, four, and five, every time he struck bone number one, they too would flash red magic filaments.
The echo expanded accordingly.
And as Liszt continued to strike, the twinkling of these fire-red threads became brighter and brighter, as if they would ignite at any moment.
He inexplicably thought of the sensation of turning the crank on a tractor from his childhood.
With the acceleration of the crank’s rotation, the ignition of the cylinder increased, eventually accompanied by billowing black smoke, and the tractor ignited successfully.
So, his chisel danced on the Fire Dragon Bone like the needle of a sewing machine.
In his view through the Eye of Magic, the fire-red magic filaments grew brighter with each pass until at last they almost blazed into a large fire.
The temperature in the surrounding air was also rising progressively.
"Just a bit more effort, and I would have ignited these five dragon bones!" His heart surged with excitement as he increased the pace of his work. However, just as the flames were about to catch, the fine steel chisel snapped with a crack.
The fiery red threads on the fire dragon bones also extinguished instantly.
All his efforts were in vain.
Suppressing his frustration, Liszt took out a bone hammer made from fire dragon bone fragments from the Gemstone Space and continued to hammer away at the bones.
But after he had also broken the bone hammer, the fire dragon bones still failed to ignite.
"There must be something missing, perhaps fire dragon magic power?" he stopped hammering and sat on the fire dragon bones to think, his wrist already numb and sore, requiring a rest.
After he had rested, he took out his stock of fire dragon jars—aside from the supply used for the Fire Dragon Brick Factory, there was still quite a lot of fire dragon magic power that had not been put to use.
He released a small amount of fire dragon magic power onto the fire dragon bones.
He quickly discovered…
As the fire dragon magic power touched the fire dragon bones, it instantly turned into numerous fiery red magic threads and was devoured by the bones. After the fiery threads vanished, no Magic Little Fire Dragons flew out.
After watching for a while, Liszt was certain of one thing: "Has my precious fire dragon magic power just gone to waste like that?"
Unwilling to accept this, he took out another bone knife and continued to strike the fire dragon bones.
However, the result was the same as before—the fiery red threads grew brighter and brighter until the bone knife broke, and still, the fire dragon magic power did not ignite: "Could it be that I need to keep feeding it fire dragon magic power?" It seemed the fire dragon bones were lacking a kind of "fuel," much like a tractor without oil.
No matter how much you try to crank a tractor with no oil, it won’t start up.
But still…
For Liszt to use fire dragon magic power as fuel, adding it to these five seemingly useless fire dragon bones, felt somewhat reluctant. After all, the uses of fire dragon magic power were so immense—currently, the Fire Dragon Brick Factory relied entirely on fire dragon magic power to operate, and the raw material ratios for slabs, conduits, and pottery had already been figured out.
They could be fired into finished products.
The conduits and slabs from the Fire Dragon Brick Factory directly accelerated the construction speed of Black Horse Island. The streets of the port town were already paved with slabs, and the drains were covered with conduits—neat and smooth, showing none of the backwardness and primitiveness typical of a small town.
Once you step away from the Fire Dragon Brick Factory, the feeling of backwardness hits you in the face.
"The Fire Dragon Brick Factory is one of the few industrial lights on my territory, and I must ensure its smooth operation... The current stock of fire dragon magic power could barely be used as ’fuel’ for the addition... Besides, we could continue to mine the underground volcanic glass and extract new fire dragon magic power."
He made a decision right then: while Black Horse Island was still undeveloped, he would first clear the land and mine all the volcanic glass and fire dragon magic power.
The entire underground of the island was made of basalt columns, with gaps filled with lots of volcanic glass—it should be possible to mine plenty of fire dragon magic power.
"Igniting the five dragon bones should be nearly enough, right?" He looked at the dragon bones in front of him and released all the remaining fire dragon magic power.
As the bones rapidly absorbed the magic power, he struck for the last time.
Unfortunately, the result was still the same—all his efforts had been in vain, unable to ignite the magic power.
"Regardless, the five fire dragon bones have clearly revived. The next step is to keep mining fire dragon magic power and add it as fuel! When it finally ignites, what will it breed... could it really be a Fire Dragon Cub?" Liszt swallowed his saliva, feeling his heartbeat quicken.
He quickly dismissed this unreliable fantasy.