TEB Ch 5

“What were you doing while this was happening!?” 

As the Count shouted at the woman, whose name was either Lady Priscilla or Lady Praslin or something similar, she responded by glaring at Liev with great anger. 

“I apologize. I should have continued to monitor his side.” 

The child was undoubtedly obedient and sincere enough not to do anything foolish. Or should I say, he was not like a child? I thought I had figured out his strengths well, as he did whatever he was told to do, like a smart adult. It was absurd to think that he was too busy dozing off to notice that the egg was hatching. 

“What do we do now? We can’t just dispose of him without anyone noticing, now that he’s been imprinted. 

The child didn’t know what he was taking care of or what he was doing. The Count’s group firmly believed in that. It was unlikely that an ordinary commoner child would have heard about dragons or had information related to them. 

So, there was no way he would have done this on purpose. Just like he said a moment ago, it was natural to think that was a mistake. Because he was so sleepy, he didn’t even know that the egg was hatching, like a child would at that age. 

“What… what is imprinting?” 

His face looked fearful and confused, as if he was afraid of what might happen next. Lady Priscilla shook her head and waited for the Count to speak. 

“You don’t need to know anything about it.” 

The Count uttered those blunt words and left the room, holding his head as if he had a headache. What could be done in this situation? Liev sneakily observed Lady Priscilla’s reaction. She, too, couldn’t act independently without the Count’s orders. 

“…” 

A sharp gaze brushed against his cheeks for a moment, and with a long sigh, the lady left the room, showing contempt for Liev. 

“You wait here. I will come back after speaking with the Count.” 

Thud, the door closed again. Liev let out a sigh of relief, realizing that his assumption had come true. If it were possible to cancel the imprint or if killing the imprinter had no effect on the hatchling, he would have been killed on the spot. Based on the current situation, it was clear that there was no immediate solution. Liev slightly lifted the corners of his mouth, and at that moment, a chubby little dragon that looked like a large lizard titled its head in Liev’s arms. 

“Oh, it’s nothing. You don’t have to worry.” 

Of course, Liev wasn’t in a situation to say such words. Anyway, the fact that he prevented the baby dragon from imprinting on the Count. The first step was successfully taken. Liev carefully examined the baby dragon in his arms. The baby dragon, which had a pair of small horns on its head and a body covered in glossy jet-black scales, was incredibly beautiful and majestic. 

It looked like a dragon in a fantasy game but was slightly smaller than an ostrich egg and had a chubby belly like a baby. It was so adorable that Liev felt like smashing down a wall with his fist. Not only Liev, who was captivated by reptiles, but also anyone with a universal sense of aesthetics, would admire its appearance. 

“You haven’t done anything wrong.” 

As Liev gently stroked the small dragon’s forehead, the dragon blinked its long vertical pupil’s characteristic of reptiles, closing and opening its eyes. 

“kkiing?” 

Then, gently, like a cat scratching its head against someone it likes, it pressed his forehead against Liev’s fingertips. Then he remembered the first time he fed formula to a cat that had lost its mother. Helpless, unable to do anything by itself, it would later become a predator driven by hunting instincts, but for now, the innocent cuteness of small and vulnerable animals made his heart pound. 

I will rescue you from the fate of becoming a monster. You can rest assured.

Of course, he didn’t know how things would turn out in the future, but as he assured the baby dragon, a thought occurred to him. Although it had been called Kevades all along, it was just a name the Count gave to the dragon later. The dragon still didn’t have an official(?) name yet. Perhaps the Count would name it soon, but in his own way, Liev wanted to give it a new name as a means of not letting it follow the fate of the original work. 

“Hmm, what would be good?” 

Liev started stroking the baby dragon’s forehead again with his small hand. And as he heard the happy growling sound from the dragon, he recalled the name he had always imagined—a name he would give to his own baby dragon in his dreams. 

“Yeah, Renard. Renard sounds good.”

It didn’t have any special meaning. It was just a name that sounded pleasing to him—a fantasy-like name. Despite having thought about raising a black snake for over ten years, he couldn’t think of any other name than Renard. 

“From today, your name is Renard.” 

As if understanding Liev’s murmured words, the baby dragon made a purring sound, lightly exhaling through its nostrils like a puppy. It then once again snuggled against Liev’s body. I think I’m going crazy. Really, how could it be so cute? Just like Liev secretly did whenever he received adorable animal patients, he lifted Renard’s body, planted a short kiss on his warm forehead, and hugged him with his whole body. 

At the time, he had no idea how those loving and affectionate actions would come back to him later. 

*** 

It hadn’t even been less than a month since Liev realized that the baby dragon was different from ordinary reptiles. The baby dragon was growing rapidly, day by day. Not only did it grow to the size of an adult’s forearm in just one month, but its appetite to eat was several kilograms of meat in one sitting. It was an absurd ecology that couldn’t be described as ordinary for an animal. 

And there was one more unbelievable thing… 

“Liev! Don’t go!” 

Even though he only picked up from what the Count, Liev, and Lady Priscilla were talking about beside him, the baby dragon was accurately learning the meanings of words and sentences, though his pronunciation was sloppy. When Liev reported to the Count that the dragon had started speaking, the Count clutched his head as if it were hurting. 

The imprint, which had been considered only speculation among magicians, had turned out to be true. Thanks to this, the six-year-old kid unexpectedly became important in this current situation. Since they couldn’t casually handle this situation, they had no choice but to involve the child as a full accomplice. Originally, the plan was to dispose of the child until the dragon hatched, then hire a researcher who knew well about dragons and conduct experiments to strengthen it. However, due to the unexpected turn of events, they felt a bone-piercing regret for the plan that suddenly went wrong.

‘Kkiyung, kki-ing…!’ 

Whenever Liev tried to get a little away from that damn baby dragon, the dragon would cry, shoot small flames through its nose, and cause a commotion, making it impossible to touch it. Moreover, that little guy didn’t respond to him unless it was the name he had given, “Renard”. The only fortunate thing was that the dragon didn’t yet understand how significant it was for him to follow him. 

The Count and his group saw Liev caressing and stroking the baby dragon as if he were handling a puppy, assuming that he must’ve thought of it as some kind of unusual pet. 

Anyway, since Liev was the only one who could handle the dragon at this point, The Count had to completely change his plan. Now that things were like this, they had no choice but to teach the child enough to be a useful researcher and have him perform experiments and collect data. The Count ordered Priscilla to teach Liev how to read and write. 

It was what Liev had hoped for. It would have been nice if language skills were automatically installed here, like in the usual isekai stories, but the owner of this body that Suhyuk had possessed was the youngest son of a desperately poor rural family who didn’t even have enough food or livestock. 

His parents couldn’t teach him to read or write, only the eldest son in the family could read and write. There’s no way the child, who was only a six-year-old child without even a name, knew how to read. In any case, to escape with Renard later and live smoothly, it would be good for him to know how to read and write. In places with a high illiteracy rate, just knowing how to read and write could make a living. 

Since Liev was already good at studying, he quickly learned what Lady Priscilla taught at an extraordinary speed, and his vocabulary grew as he learned how to raise young dragons. Liev now spends time with Renard in the slightly larger attic. During the day, he took care of Renard, recording his weight and height day by day, and at night, he returned to the attic to share his knowledge about dragons with Renard.