Whether You Call Me a Guardian Dragon or Not, I’m Going to Sleep

Chapter 12: Age of Dragons (7)

There was a problem.

Not a minor problem... but rather a serious one.

"Doesn't it seem like there have been more dragons around lately?"

"Not just a few."

I add a word to Ifrit's grumbling.

It was fine when it started with just me alone, and then there were seven children born from self-aware nature, and from their scales, dozens of dragons were born...

But now, hundreds of years later, dragons have been pairing up and laying eggs, and before we knew it, their numbers had nearly reached the thousands.

"I never imagined that the extinction crisis of dinosaurs would come not from a meteorite but from dragons."

The dragons born after me and the seven children were originally transformed from dinosaurs, so they couldn't escape the limits of being a creature.

Dragons, needing to consume a large amount of food to maintain their huge bodies. Thousands of such dragons were spreading their wings over this land.

Naturally, their prey was the large dinosaurs that were most common on this land.

It's probably a relief that they don't touch the smaller dinosaurs, lizardmen, or the few small mammals.

Well, with the size of dragons, eating such things wouldn't even make a dent in their hunger.

"I'm worried about the decreasing number of dinosaurs. But I can't tell the children to starve."

"I've heard that there are dragons starving due to being pushed out of the food competition. They came to me asking for help, so I used magic to turn a large rock into meat..."

It was the first time I used transformation magic to turn a stone into meat.

I used it because I felt sorry for the children clutching their hungry bellies... Honestly, the meat wasn't very tasty. It was lean and tough.

But the hungry children devoured it anyway.

"We have to do something, right? At this rate, all the children might starve to death..."

I understand that something needs to be done, but how?

Should I scatter new creatures here? No, the ecosystem that's finally stabilizing would become chaotic again.

Well, it's already chaotic with dragons rampaging... Hmm... Maybe it doesn't matter?

No, there could be other problems. Let's leave that as a last resort. If it's not a simple creature like a slime, there will definitely be problems.

Then... would it be better to transform the dragons? But transforming a creature that's already been created is a very tricky task. It's not impossible... but honestly, I don't want to.

If only these children could photosynthesize like trees, it would be so much easier.

Wait, photosynthesis?

"Did you come up with a good idea?"

"I'm not sure if it's a good idea, but... a small idea has come to mind."

I'm not sure if it will work, but it's an idea worth trying.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

Dragons are creatures.

But at the same time, they are beings that received scales from self-aware natural phenomena.

From such a birth background, I thought of one solution.

To put it simply.

[If there's no meat, why not eat magical power?]

That's the conclusion.

Dragons are physical beings.

And at the same time, they are children of natural phenomena.

Therefore, they can be seen as half natural phenomena.

What if we utilize the magical power that has become quite abundant in this world?

If we can maintain the body through magical power and minimize eating?

If we can use magical power as a nutrient to maintain the body?

"Therefore, I would like you to teach your children the magic of transforming their physical forms."

I gathered the seven children and broached the topic.

I explained that the situation was so dire that dinosaurs might become extinct, and if dinosaurs go extinct, most dragons wouldn't be okay either.

"Was the situation that serious?"

"Yes. There's a limit to how much meat I can distribute. It would be better to teach magic to substitute the body with magical power, given the current situation."

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"I had no idea the situation had deteriorated to that extent..."

I nodded slightly at Thetis's words. After all, the sea, where Thetis and the blue dragons resided, was teeming with countless numbers of fish.

The story was different from the land, where dinosaurs were facing extinction.

Well, some dragons driven by hunger did go to the sea to catch fish and ended up clashing with the blue dragons... But that was just a cute quarrel.

"But for the children to maintain their bodies with magical power... Is that even possible, Mother?"

"There's no reason it couldn't be."

I replied briefly to Erebus's words.

After all, Erebus was largely responsible for how things had turned out.

Thanks to him creating dragons until almost all the scales on his neck had fallen off, the number of dragons had increased the most among the black dragons.

If Erebus had restrained himself a bit, the situation might not have been so serious.

"Ahem. Then let me start the explanation."

I began to explain the magic I wanted to convey to the children.

Magic is a power of infinite possibilities that changes according to will. If you can handle that power well, nothing is impossible.

Well, what you can do with magic varies depending on your own amount of magical power. But let's skip that for now.

"The magic I'm going to teach now is to minimize the biological elements that dragons possess and increase the proportion of natural phenomena. It also involves transforming the heart to collect magical power through breathing."

"Transforming the heart, is that really okay?"

"In theory, there should be no problem."

In fact, this magic was inspired a bit by the concept of a dragon heart I saw in a fantasy novel.

With the massive amount of magical power that dragons naturally possess, plus the magical power that accumulates in the heart over time, the body will be maintained automatically. Unless it's a newly hatched hatchling, it should be fine to eat the bare minimum.

Newly hatched hatchlings, well, there's no helping it! They have to be fed meat!

"If we don't act now, it'll be too late, so we need to hurry. Understand?"

"Yes. Well, if the children can live without eating like trees, they'll be happy to become more like me."

At Yggdrasil's words, the other children and I burst into laughter. After all, Yggdrasil was the World Tree itself.

"Now, you've all memorized the magic I taught you, right? Then use it on your children without missing a single one. Just by using this magic, your children will no longer have to go hungry."

With that, my children set off to use the magic I taught them on their offspring.

With this... I hope we can delay the extinction of dinosaurs a bit.

I wish dinosaurs could survive far into the future.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

After some time had passed.

The effects of the magic I taught were exceptionally great.

For the dragons who no longer needed to swallow food, eating became not something they had to do to survive, but a leisure activity to enjoy the taste.

The incidents of two dragons fighting bloodily over a piece of meat also decreased.

The lizardmen also reduced their need to hide from dragons hunting dinosaurs.

Especially the lizardman... no, the Lizardman Chieftain, who inherited the spear I enchanted. Anyway, that lizardman was quite pleased.

The meat of a large dinosaur was a special treat that could feed the entire tribe with just one hunt, but they couldn't dare to hunt because the dragons were slaughtering and devouring the dinosaurs.

Thanks to this, the lizardmen were thriving more and more, and they began to evolve from a hunting-based tribal life.

They started to create a primitive language, and not just hunting, they also showed signs of entering a sort of agricultural society.

And the most surprising thing was that they began to build structures that looked like temples.

The deity worshiped in that temple was... well, naturally. It was me.

Specifically, they were worshiping the name Creator Dragon God.

It was a name that felt very much like something out of a teenager's fantasy... But what could I do? It had become an inseparable name.

Now, I had entered an enjoyer mode.

Ah, right. That's true. The magic that transformed the dragons worked almost perfectly... but there was one unexpected side effect.

Now that the dragons had become half biological and half natural phenomenon, with about 1-2 parts biological and 8-9 parts natural phenomenon... for some reason...

The dragons were laying eggs very rarely.

Was it because their natural phenomenon increased? Or was it because their lifespan increased, leading them not to have offspring?

The annual birth rate among dragons dropped sharply, and soon there were situations where not even 10 dragons were born in a year.

This is scary...