I Have a Task Log

A complete relief carving adorned this wall.

It depicted a five-headed Giant Dragon, wings spread, flying over an erupting volcano as if it had just emerged from the crater.

Colin wasn’t surprised to see this relief.

In fact, the Dragon Worship Cult had never tried to hide its intentions.

According to their doctrine, the future of this world would be ruled by the Dragon Deity and the Giant Dragons under its command.

Therefore, the Church’s ultimate goal was to summon the Mother of Evil Dragons from her imprisonment in Hell to the Mortal World. They would then join her ranks and become the foremost servants of the Dragon Species.

And this plan wasn’t just baseless talk.

’The reason,’ Colin thought, ’is that since the Mother of Evil Dragons is imprisoned in Hell, many Dukes of the Devil cooperate closely with her. This has given her a way to use "Demon contracts."’

It was worth noting that the so-called Demon contracts weren’t just a Demon’s trick.

The contracts were backed by the laws of Hell and the authority of Asmodeus, the Lord of Nine Hells. Both parties signing the contract had to provide suitable stakes and penalties for breach. If either party violated the terms, the rules of the world would forcibly execute the contract’s contents.

This enforcement was like a law of Nature, akin to "water freezes at low temperatures."

Therefore, as long as a sufficient price was paid, a contract could be used to summon the Mother of Evil Dragons herself from Hell to the Mortal World.

This was why the Dragon Worship Cult frantically scoured the world for wealth.

Colin glanced at the mural, then his eyes fell on a treasure chest placed beneath it.

It was a sturdy, iron-banded chest, about the size of a small crate—something one person could carry.

’Is this the first treasure chest I’ve seen since transmigrating? Speaking of which, you see chests all the time in games. This one shouldn’t be a disappointment, right?’

Colin stared at the chest and, without turning his head, said to the others, "I have good news. It seems the Mage forgot to take the treasure they looted."

"Don’t forget to check for traps, kid," Dorn said.

Colin took a deep breath and spent another ten minutes performing a ritual to cast [Detect Magic] on himself.

When he opened his eyes, sure enough, he could see the dark green Spiritual Light of Evocation Magic shimmering from beneath the chest.

Seeing this, Colin felt a bit weary.

’The books were right.’

’Because of their own weakness, Kobolds without the protection of a Giant Dragon are extremely insecure creatures. They naturally take certain actions to compensate for this lack of security.’

’If goblins compensate for their insecurity by abusing weaker creatures, then Kobolds relieve their anxiety by tinkering with traps in their lairs.’

’But aren’t there just too many traps?!’

There had been traps at the entrance of almost every chamber along the way, and there were even poisonous mushrooms in the small plots where they cultivated fungi.

This more or less explained the necessity of Adventurers.

If a group of non-elite Recruits or Mercenaries had attacked this cave, the casualties would likely have been in the double digits. But for elite Adventurers, a few people could handle it.

Afterward, Colin went back out to look at the Cultists’ bodies.

The Leather Armor and weapons on these Cultists could all be sold and were worth a bit of money.

He lifted the hood of one of them, and a foul stench assaulted his senses.

Looking closer, Colin felt his stomach churn.

Half of the man’s face was covered in scales, and there were fine suture lines where the scales met the skin.

Colin proceeded to remove the Cultist’s Cloak and Leather Armor.

The rest of this person’s body, like his head, was covered in patches of scaly Dragon Species skin sewn on.

He looked back at the other Cultists.

They were all more or less the same; each had parts from a Dragon Species sewn onto their bodies.

Their suturing technique was subpar. Many areas were festering and inflamed, and he could even see maggots wriggling in the wounds.

Some Giant Dragon Fanatics would transplant the limbs of a Dragon Species onto themselves to achieve their goal of "draconification."

Colin had read about this in books, but he never expected to see the real thing today.

When the fight started, he’d thought his opponents were a few Dragon Descendants. He never imagined they were a dozen lunatics who treated themselves like Frankenstein’s monster.

He was halfway through looting, fighting back his nausea, when the others, their wounds now healed, came to help.

The group quickly finished looting everything of value, including the equipment and belongings from the Kobolds.

Of course, these belongings weren’t things like Gold Coins—they had probably already handed over all their Gold Coins—but rather the sculptures the Kobolds carried.

Most of the Kobolds had one or more dragon-shaped sculptures carved from bone or wood tucked into their bedding. The craftsmanship on many of them was quite good, so they were definitely worth some money.

After packing everything up, the group gathered around the treasure chest.

"Ale, in a moment, help me translate the Magic Runes on it..."

Colin was cut off mid-sentence by Dorn, who said, "I found a pressure plate underneath. It’s probably there to detect the chest’s position, which is likely how the trap is triggered. We can just drag the chest away."

"Will that work?" Colin gave him a skeptical look.

"Let’s give it a shot. If it works, we’ll—ahem... we’ll save a lot of time." Dorn crossed his arms. "There’s nothing left to pack up in there, right?"

Colin thought for a moment and took the [Climbing Rope] from his bag.

He maneuvered the rope toward the distant chest and slowly tied it around.

"Three, two, one, run!"

The group grabbed the rope, and on Colin’s command, they bolted toward the chamber’s exit.

The instant the chest was pulled, the pressure plate beneath it erupted in a silvery-gray light. Then, a thick fog, accompanied by a faint hissing sound, poured from the walls and spread toward the center of the room.

As the poisonous fog spread, the group was already out of the chamber and couldn’t see the specific consequences.

Once they were safe, they stuffed the treasure chest into the [Dimension Bag], carefully avoided the traps on their way back, and returned to the forest clearing where the cave entrance was located.

Colin didn’t plan on waiting around. He aimed a Signal Flare at the sky and fired it.

The red flare shot into the air, shining like a star in the sky.

A short while later, a Pegasus descended from above the treetops and landed gently before them.

The Wood Elf rider quickly said, "Get on, gentlemen and ladies. We don’t want to be spotted by a dragon."

Colin and the others didn’t say much, simply jumping onto the triangular net on the Pegasus’s back.

To the beat of the Pegasus’s wings, they slowly ascended, flying over the treetops toward the safety of the Silver Star Court.