CHAPTER 89: DRAKE’S HUNGER

---

He nosed open a leaf sealed pouch hanging from the cart frame. Strips of salted wolf jerkies spilled in his mouth. He gulped them whole, barely tasting char, and waited for satisfaction.

Nothing.

The emptiness persisted—a cavernous hole widening behind ribs.

Another pouch. Shelled nuts roasted in charfruit glaze. Gone. A third: smoke-dried fish the catch frog the river, strong enough to make Zephyr gag on good days. But it vanished down the drake gullet. Still the ache writhed in his core like a coal left to burn without air.

Star’s pupils narrowed with rising worry. He pivoted toward the cracked skull of the dead Fire Leopard. Its body still lay splayed on the igneous slab, steam curling off blackened fur. Predators rarely ate other predators, but Star wasn’t any common predator.

His instinct whispered: fire feeds fire.

One testing nibble became a ravenous frenzy. He tore charred muscle, crunching rib bones, slurping marrow seasoned by ember core heat. His jaws worked methodically, using young drake serrations to slice through tendons, as copper wire. The fire leopard body was at least fifteen to twenty times bigger than him. But... Within minutes little remained: a smear of blood, scorched sinew threads, powdered bone dust.

Star paused, panting. His muzzle smeared ash black. The pang dulled only briefly... then flared worse. His stomach clenched as though it was still emptier. All that meat and bones vanished inside his stomach like it was nothing.

He turned toward the cart. Toward Zephyr’s heavy leather satchel, the one that smelled strongly of mana, minerals, and blood.

Zephyr snored lightly. His forearm draped across his chest. The satchel rested behind his head like a lumpy pillow. Star approached on stealth pads. He hesitated at first, gaze flicking from bag to master.

A low whine escaped. His hunger or need overshadowed all guilt. With one careful claw he tugged the strap until the pouch slipped free and flopped onto soil. Zephyr stirred but did not wake. All of them were in deep sleep. Why? It was simple... fatigue.

Star flicked his tail nervously, then pried the flap open.

Soft glow covered his eyes. There were three beating lights swirled within foil wraps. Two smaller—a warm candied orange each the size of a small orange. One larger—fierce ember sun half the size of Star’s own body.

Beast cores!!!

He froze, claws half-lifted. "Wrong," a small voice murmured inside his head. These orbs were trophies—currency, medicine. Star understood their worth. He’d watched Zephyr polish cores like jewels. He knew they were precious.

Yet the hunger clawed him from the inside, harsher than any shame. His fledgling body vibrated with emptiness, as if every Spark Dash had burned a tunnel straight through his sternum.

He turned his head toward Zephyr. His face was slack in dream-peace, soot smudged across cheekbones. Star’s ears flattened. He dipped his snout in the smallest of nods—a dragon’s bow—wordless apology.

"I am sorry, fire-bond. But I can’t control my hunger."

With delicate fangs he unlatched the flap and nudged aside layers of emberfoil. The first wolf core came free—warm citrus glow, the size of a small orange. Star hesitated only a heartbeat, then... Star’s jaws closed around the first E-Rank wolf core. Flavor hit like lightning, coppery sweetness, sparks leaping across tongue. He swallowed. Heat knifed into his belly, spreading through veins. The ache eased a fraction.

Second wolf core followed, sliding down the throat in molten syrup pulses. Another bloom of heat filled limbs. For a glorious heartbeat he felt half full.

But half wasn’t enough. He needs more energy.

Star’s eyes are fixed on the leopard core, Rank-D. It was swirling magma inside a crystalline shell. It radiated danger and promise. His maw watered with primal greed.

He hesitated ... looked at Zephyr again. Then... Star jaws wrapped around the core. It was larger than his bite radius; his teeth cracked the shell with a chime of glass meeting forge. Lava like hot liquid mana poured across his gums, hissing on enamel. The shock nearly dropped him, but he refused to release.

With a final gulp, the core slid into his belly like swallowing a live piece of lava.

A roar of power detonated behind Star’s eyes. He lurched, tail whipping. Mana veins flared under his scales, each luminous filament crawling like lightning caught beneath thin gemstone. Hunger evaporated quickly, now replaced by crushing heat, so intense his vision pixelated red and gold.

He staggered to the ash-nest, instincts driving him toward Aurora’s warmth. The chick snoozed, oblivious. Star curled near her tiny frame. Mist was coming out of his body, white at first, then tinted scarlet—escaped his mouth and pores, swirling into a cocoon.

Inside his chest, the dragon core compressed, fracturing into motes that embedded along his inner skeleton. Muscles twitched and thickened strand by strand. Wing bones stretched fractions of an inch. Talons sharpened. A second heart-beat thundered in nervous harmony with the first.

Mana overflow spilled into the air—steam and glittering ember specks. They drifted like fireflies over Aurora’s feathers. The phoenix chick shivered but remained asleep, comforted by instinctual trust in her drake brother.

Star’s eyelids drooped. Overload shifted toward heavy drowsiness, the price for early evolution.

A hour later...

The sun’s edge kissed granite peaks, the beams had filled the bowl. Dew cooled char-dust. A hush deeper than normal dawn hovered, as if the forest held its own breath waiting for the next page.

Zephyr stirred first. His hand reached for the dagger—habit. Not finding the satchel pillow behind his head, he blinked, sat up. Then find the bag near him. When he picked it up, he felt the lightness of the empty bag.

Fenna’s eyes opened, soon after, sensing tension before words formed. She reached for bowstring; Aurora chirped awake, blinking golden motes off her crest. Muse lifted nose, ears twitching as though hearing something sublime.

Across the ash-nest, Star lay curled—now easily two meters long, a radiant coil of scaled muscle and glimmering heat. His entire form shimmered with a fresh molting sheen, light playing across his body like liquid metal kissed by fire. Mana vapor clung to him in slow, swirling ribbons, drifting around his limbs and scales like ceremonial incense.

Where once he had been the size of a small cat, now he stretched longer than a full-grown hound, his wings pushing past a meter each, wide enough to cast real shadow. His chest had deepened, torso sturdy with new bone density, tail thicker and ridged, and at his crown, two sharp shiny black horns curved slightly inward—no longer nubs, but a young drake’s crown.

Zephyr’s mouth fell half-open.