七星影视

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I ignored the System messages popping up after the Dragon\'s defeat, as I ran towards Aquarina. Her transformation was amazing, but it tired too much. I quickly retrieved an Elixir, of the many I had made back then, and quickly made her drink it.

"Drink it! Quickly!"

"Ugh…!"

Aquarina quickly began drinking the Elixir, the lifeforce that had been sucked out of her through that transformation slowly began to recover, as she looked more healthy, and not as pale as before.

"Are you feeling better? Need another one?" I asked her. "Also eat these leaves, and this fruit."

I gave her leaves and fruits from Naturia to recover her Mana and Vitality even more, but Aquarina smiled back and gave me a kiss in my forehead.

"I am fine! Don\'t worry." She said, quickly getting up and beginning to stretch. "I am already used to this exhaustion. I usually just rest it off."

"Oh? It wasn\'t lethal?!" Asked Mist, who was readying a healing spell. "Phew! I was so worried too…" Her magic circle quickly dissipated.

"You\'re feeling good then? Are you sure? I\'ve never seen you transform like that before…" Zack said.

"Yeah, are you really alright?" Celeste wondered.

"I am okay, don\'t worry, ugh, don\'t be so corny now…" Aquarina was getting slightly flustered by everyone\'s concern.

"Hehehe, you\'re getting all flustered, look how red you are now." I teased her.

"I-I wasn\'t trying to make everyone worried like this… S-Sorry." Aquarina sighed. "Father told me to keep this form a secret and only reveal it when it was truly, truly necessary. I got a bit worried when I saw everyone struggling, and Sylphy… So I just went and did it, ugh."

"Well you owe us a few explanations now." I said while crossing my arms. "But before that, how about we first pick up the monster corpses? Also that big Sea Snake dragon is quite valuable! We\'ll surely use his materials to make something nice."

GRUMBLE!

However, before I could do anything else, I heard Aquarina\'s stomach grumbling furiously.

"Ah, using this transformation drains me of all my energy, my stomach\'s empty." She sighed. "My father always says I have to eat a ton when I transform…"

"Alright, let\'s prepare something to eat before going to the last floor then." I nodded.

"Yaay, more seafood!" Mist celebrated, she was quite the glutton as well, eating more than everyone together. Her race was quite known for that, known as "Jaw Demons" or something, they boast large jaws that can expand into a massive size, kind of like snakes, and their stomachs are usually larger too. They use this to accumulate energy for winter, like bears.

"Then let\'s gather everything. Should we try out the Sea Snake meat then?" I wondered.

"Yes!" Celica said. "I am hungry too… Utilizing Mister Teddy\'s secret power drains my energy… Not only mana."

It seemed that Celica\'s special "Puppetry Magic" uses her own Life Force, which transforms into Vitality, so to refill it, she just has to eat a lot much like with Aquarina\'s case. Food made using rich, high-quality ingredients and cooked using Cooking Magic bring the best Vitality-restoring effects, and could even heal wounds, so we\'ll be making a lot for everyone.

I used my special Dimensional Bag, an SSS Rank Item which is probably one of the most precious things out there in this world, capable of being able to hold an almost endless amount of items inside, to store all the Giant Eels and the Sea Snake, while we decided to forage around the Floor 2 to make sure there weren\'t any more treats left behind.

Like father taught us, usually it is safer to take a rest near the stairs leading to the next dungeon floor. Dungeons are quite safe in the stairs, as there are special magical barriers that stop monsters from moving between floors, which perhaps not as intended, turn into a safe place for adventurers to rest or even sleep.

That\'s not to say a wild monster from the outside of the dungeon could get in easily and just ignore the barrier, which happens a lot of times, but it is still way safer.

"This place\'s beautiful, it is not called the Coral Forest for nothing." Celica said in surprise. "So many colorful corals growing everywhere! How can they survive without water though?"

"They\'re special corals that grow in wet areas, they don\'t need water covering them all the time, and grow and develop a lot like trees do. Some even have fruits which are actually the eggs of their larvae stages." I said, reading the information given to me thanks to my Appraisal Ability within the Heavenly Eyes Divine Protection Ability. Using this, I\'ve been discerning which ones are useful for alchemy, and I\'ve extracted quite a lot of colorful corals.

Also, the Alchemy Subclass helps spotting them easily, and even enhance their quality once I pick them up and save them inside of my Dimensional Bag as an extra effect.

"Like that one over there?" Aquarina wondered.

She glanced at a very tall Coral Tree which had several fruits hanging on its branches, some were purple, others blue, some were red and others green. They seemed like normal fruits, but this was merely mimicry, a rather cruel mimicry at that.

"Yeah, but we cannot eat them just as they are, if we grab them and munch them, the larvae enter our stomachs like parasites. This is a method the corals use to spread around by letting predators eat their eggs and then poop them later, elsewhere. Like this, they spread their offspring far away. But its worse than just with normal seeds of fruits because these do damage to our stomach and can make us really, really, sick." I sighed.

"Ugh, never mind, I am not eating that…" Aquarina quickly felt disgusted.

"Well, they\'re still very good alchemy materials, rich in life force and mana!" I quickly grabbed dozens of these fruits, storing them inside the bag.

Like that, we reached the end of the Floor.

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