I Gave Up Being Stronger

Chapter 453

“Can you do it or not?”

“I can’t...” Min-Ji mumbled at first. However, seeing the disappointment flash across Jin-Sol’s face, she quickly changed her answer. “...say that I can’t.”

The Succubus Lilia set down her iced tea. “You’ve probably already tracked them all down, haven’t you?”

“W-What are you talking about, Lilia? I would never do such illegal things.”

“But you told me to use the Succubus network to detain the worst offenders...” Lilia smiled with her eyes. ‘It seems I’m quicker at understanding people’s hearts, Miss Mad God of Favoritism.’

Jin-Sol grabbed Min-Ji’s hand. “Let me know if you identify these haters online.”

“Are you going to kill them?” Min-Ji asked.

“No, that’s going too far.”

Min-Ji clicked her tongue in apparent disappointment, but felt relieved. The warmth from Jin-Sol’s hand was comforting. She felt she could be honest without hiding anything.

“Then why?” Min-Ji asked.

“I want to create a blacklist.”

“A blacklist?”

“Yes. From now on, those on the blacklist will never be able to purchase the Chul-Soo Potion.”

“Oh, that sounds like a good idea! But couldn’t they still buy them indirectly?”

“I’m thinking of adding poison to future Chul-Soo Potions that will affect only these individuals.”

Chul-Soo Potions were incredibly effective, so even with a bit of poison inside them, they wouldn’t harm regular users. However, with this idea, they could cause severe side effects for those on the blacklist.

“The Carvington Family offered to help. I think it’s quite possible,” Jin-Sol added.

“How potent are you planning to make the poison? Is it going to be around the Snake King level?”

“Unfortunately, that might be too difficult.”

Lilia, who had been eavesdropping on them, nodded. ‘Well, that would be excessively toxic.’

“It would be too expensive. I mean, no matter what, killing them is going too far.” Jin-Sol laughed awkwardly.

Lilia thought that if Snake King-level poison had been cheap, there could have been a large-scale bloodbath.

“Then how strong will the poison be?” Min-Ji asked.

“Maybe something that causes lifelong diarrhea or induces overeating to make them morbidly obese?”

“Jin-Sol Unnie, you’re too kind!”

***

Tamer Nick, who had escaped the Dragon’s Nest alive twice, sought out his reclusive master. “Master, Chul-Soo might be able to tame the Fire Dragon.”

His master’s name was Pupu Baung. A legendary Tamer known for taming and riding Dragons, Pupu was a panda Beastkin with an incredibly cute appearance.

“Chul-Soo..., Chul-Soo, you say...,” Pupu Baung, who had grown plump while living in seclusion in a bamboo forest, chewed on a bamboo leaf. “The name sounds familiar.”

“He’s said to have tamed the Thunder Dragon...”

“He tamed a Thunder Dragon?” Pupu Baung jumped up but, unable to control his recently increased weight, rolled forward twice.

“A-Are you alright, Master?”

“Ah, I’m fine. I’m a panda Beastkin after all.” Bear-type Beastkin were known for their study bodies. “It must be a false rumor. Thunder Dragons are difficult to tame.”

“But didn’t you do it, Master?”

“I had an incredible amount of luck on my side. Honestly, I can’t even summon it often. The lightning and thunder are so powerful when I try to summon the Dragon that even a bear Beastkin’s body can barely withstand it.”

“Is that so? But Chul-Soo has an incredibly powerful defensive barrier. I think that’s how he was able to tame the Thunder Dragon. However, Master, what I wanted to tell you about isn’t the Thunder Dragon. This time, it seems he’s trying to tame a Fire Dragon.”

Pupu Baung burst into laughter. “Puhahaha! Your jokes have improved! Your sense of humor has grown while we were apart!”

“I’m not joking, Master. I think he’s going to tame a Fire Dragon.”

In fact, he could have already succeeded.

“My disciple, listen. A Tamer cannot tame a subject beyond their capacity. Even if he somehow got lucky and succeeded in taming a Thunder Dragon, he can’t tame another Dragon. You said he was human, right? Pure human?”

“Yes, he’s a pure human.”

“Then one Thunder Dragon is his limit. That’s the limit of his race. No human can surpass that. If there was such a person, they wouldn’t be human.”

“But Chul-Soo...”

Pupu Baung couldn’t stand by and watch his disciple get caught up in vain delusions.

“Alright. Let’s assume, for argument’s sake, that there is a human who can tame two Dragons. Even if such a thing were to happen, the Tamer would soon be found burnt to death,” Pupu Baung said.

“Really?”

“Didn’t I tell you that Thunder Dragons and Fire Dragons do not get along?”

“Uh... I had no idea. Are Thunder Dragons and Fire Dragons on bad terms?”

“You might not know. It’s not widely known.” Pupu Baung would have also been unaware of this if he had not succeeded in taming a Thunder Dragon. “A very long time ago, so long that it’s hard to measure by human lifespan, a Fire Dragon named Julius severely beat up a young Thunder Dragon who came to his nest, mistaking her for an intruder. I think its name was Atanna. You can imagine how intense the Fire Dragon’s attack had been considering that the attack left Atanna on the brink of death, right?”

“Such a thing happened. I had no idea.”

“Regardless of their element, Dragons are supposed to protect young Dragons. So, what do you think happened when he attacked a young Dragon? Some Thunder Dragons went to confront Julius. But instead of apologizing, Julius started a big fight, saying they dared to come to his nest and make a ruckus. It was the height of hypocrisy.”

Since Pupu Baung had heard this from the Thunder Dragon, his story was inevitably biased. “From then on, Julius earned the name the ferocious Fire Dragon. He was truly a vicious Dragon. Julius had received incredibly strong power in exchange for being bound to his nest. I think he must have been throwing hysterical fits due to extreme stress.”

“I see...”

The Fire Dragon that Nick had met recently seemed very gentle and kind. He wondered if time had changed his personality.

“Yes. He even provoked the Thunder Dragons, telling them to kill him if they could. He was undoubtedly a mad Dragon.”

Since Tamers inevitably formed deep mental bonds with their tamed creatures, Pupu Baung chewed on bamboo irritably, as if he was the one who had been wronged by Julius. He didn’t even mention that taming such a mad Dragon would drive the Tamer insane as well. There was a much bigger problem.

“Anyway, as a result, Thunder Dragons and Fire Dragons have been mortal enemies ever since. And as you know, Tamers have a deep mental bond with their tamed creatures.”

“Then...!”

“Yes. Even without that, when two opposing elements clash, it can only lead to destruction. An explosion that a mere human’s universe couldn’t handle would occur. So, taming two Dragons is tantamount to suicide.”

“But isn’t there still a possibility? Chul-Soo is a man who has turned every impossibility into possibility so far, Master.”

After contemplating for a while, Pupu Baung said, “If that man succeeds in taming a Fire Dragon after the Thunder Dragon, I will release the Thunder Dragon I tamed.”

It was essentially as good as a declaration that it would fail.

***

“This is something we cannot overlook, Park Terse!” Nick said seriously.

“Well...”

“I’m telling this as your senior. We need to stop Chul-Soo right now.”

“He wouldn’t listen to me even if I tried to stop him, and to get to the third checkpoint of the Dungeon now, we would need help from someone like Lessefim or Mole Woman... I don’t think we can go in right now.”

They were still a long way away from the boss room of the Dungeon.

“We must convey this message! Chul-Soo is surely being overconfident!” Nick yelled.

Chul-Soo had even managed to tame the Singing Bamboos with kind conversation. His taming ability was truly beyond imagination. However, withstanding the shock of two Dragons clashing after taming them was a different matter entirely.

“But, well, he will be fine with his Absolute Barrier, right?” Terse asked.

“Absolute Barrier is for blocking external attacks!”

Terse found this senior Tamer a bit annoying. Terse believed that if the barrier could block external attacks extremely well, it also could block internal explosions.

“He might be fine since he has high poison resistance...,” Terse said.

“What does poison resistance have to do with the explosion within one’s microcosm?!”

“Why wouldn’t they be related?”

Terse believed high poison resistance could block explosions in one’s microcosm. Despite being his senior, Nick seemed to lack a lot of experience. It was surprising that Nick did not know such common sense.

Still, since Nick was making such a fuss, Terse sought out Wang Yu-Mi. She was the only person who could communicate with Chul-Soo outside the Dungeon through her messages.

“Ah, I’ll pass on the message. However, I’m not sure if it will be used for creating a sense of crisis.”

“It’s not about creating a sense of crisis,” Terse said.

Yu-Mi adjusted her round glasses. “But he said he’s already tamed the Fire Dragon...!”

***

One of the main ways to clear a Dungeon was to deal with the Dungeon boss. Killing the Dungeon boss was one way of dealing with it, but taming it also fell under the concept of dealing with the boss.

“Julius, come closer,” Jin-Hyeok said.

Julius awkwardly approached Jin-Hyeok, unable to act confidently in front of Chul-Soo. He was starting to understand why Min-Ji kept hiding in the lava. As time passed, even making eye contact became harder.

“I’m going to tame you. Tamers become stronger when taming a powerful being, right?”

Julius’s heart pounded. ‘He’s going to tame me? We are going to be mentally connected! H-How ecstatic!’

Jin-Hyeok placed his hand on Julius’s head. “Don’t resist. I don’t want to hurt you.”

“Y-Yes, of course!”

[You have activated the Skill ⌜Taming (Physical)⌟.]

Just because it was a physical type of taming, it didn’t mean violence was necessary. Even patting the head was an exertion of physical force. However, Julius himself had some doubts.

‘I believe in Chul-Soo’s abilities, but...’

Chul-Soo was still a mere human and had not lived that long. Even Julius couldn’t be sure if the depth and capacity of Chul-Soo’s soul had grown large enough to tame him.

‘Will this work...?’

[You have successfully tamed the Fire Dragon ⌜Julius⌟.]

Julius dove into the lava. He didn’t know how to express this joy and ecstasy. A profound sense of satisfaction was swelling up from deep within him, ready to burst. The dragon felt as if he had become one with Chul-Soo, living in the same world. He didn’t know how to express this happiness. It was as if he had become the true Chul-Soo Land No.1, no, No.0.

‘Huh?’

Suddenly, Julius felt a chock strike his head.

‘How dare you! Do you know where this is?’

Julius heard a voice. It wasn’t a voice from the outside, but one resonating inside his head.