I Guess I'm a Dragon Now (Part 1)

Escape, Day Four

Feeling as if the life in his body was slowly escaping though his claws and into the ground, Ergen struggled forward despite the sun's heat as he looked for a shelter to rest in. He'd found one previously, though the small cave he'd found turned out to be a giant wasp nest that had instantly come alive then he laid down. Soon, he found himself running for his life yet again as hundreds of the large insects had attempted to sting him. And even though he'd managed to escape, now he found himself in this new situation where he felt as if he would turn into Dragon jerky at any moment. Which wasn't a pleasant thought at all.

Not wanting to walk through the desert anymore, Ergen attempted several times to fly, flapping his underdeveloped wings to no avail as he just didn't have the muscle required to lift himself from the ground. He attempted this several times before folding his wings at his sides and allowing them to rest as continuing to walk, and with each passing hour, he could already feel that he was losing the small amount of water that he'd managed to gain from the oasis. The sun was unrelenting above him, and Ergen was felt as if his entire body were on fire with his normally blue scales turning into a slight purplish color as he knew now that they were somehow getting burned. He was completely out of his element, and as he finally spotted some kind of rock casting shade in the distance, Ergen rushed towards the stone eagerly before it started moving now that he'd grown close enough.

Seeing that what he'd thought was a rock at first was actually a gigantic armadillo almost five times his size, Ergen walked up to the creature, hoping that it wouldn't want to eat him before he discovered that it was ignoring him completely. Ergen couldn't be happier with the development as the stayed in the shade of the armadillo for what seemed like hours, keeping it's pace as it walked along the desert and towards what he hoped was another source of water. The sand beneath his claws was still burning him, but the rest of his body was thankfully out of harms way thanks to his new friend before Ergen finally saw what he'd been searching for.

In the distance, Ergen saw that the sand finally ended in what looked like a rocky area. And as he grew closer, he started smelling what seemed like salt in the air before he heard the unmistakable sound of roaring waves. As soon as he singled out the sound, Ergen ran forward with his claws scratching on the stone before he finally stopped in front of a seven-meter-high cliff and ended in a vast ocean that he couldn't see the end of. And while he'd been hopeful at first, now Ergen's survival instincts started to make him think as he grew cautious. He's already seen at least some of the horrors that laid beneath the desert sands, so who could tell what leviathans were waiting for him in this ocean? Was it worth the risk in travelling across it to see? What monsters could be in this expanse of water when there was a behemoth eel in just a large lake in the forest that he had come from?

Looking back across the desert to see nothing but heatwaves and sand dunes, Ergen sighed inwardly as he thought that he'd be better off dying in the water than drying up in the desert. And now that he was out of the sand, he looked down to see that all four of his feet were swollen from the burns that the heat had inflicted upon him. This was no place for a water dragon like him, and if he belonged anywhere... it was the ocean.

With reckless determination filling his mind, Ergen didn't look back at the desert before he dived off of the cliff and splashed into the water beneath him, immediately feeling relief as his scales and feet hit the cool water. Some areas stung badly as they must have had open wounds on them that were reacting to the salt water, though Ergen didn't mind it now as he quickly looked around him in all directions, hoping that he hadn't dived into the mouth of an enormous fish or something. Though thankfully, everything seemed peaceful as several schools of different kinds of fish swam around in circles, making the light reflect off of their scales as a forest of glowing coral and kelp illuminated the sea floor beneath him.

An army of crab-like monsters marched against the current, walking towards some unseen destination before several were blasted up from the sea floor by sudden geysers of air that burst out of random places in the sandy ground. The crabs all appeared to be unhurt, and the local ecosystem seemed to be completely used to the geysers  as the blasts kicked up small rocks and sand as they detonated, filling the water with low clouds of debris before the loose earth would sink back down the the seabed. The coral also seemed to be used to this as they had several holes that seemed to be specifically designed in order to release the air underneath them, and everything seemed almost alien to Ergen as he swam alongside a school of fish before circling  a long piece of kelp that seemed to attract his attention more than the others beside it. Seeing as he could breath underwater, he didn't need to go back up to the surface as he continued to circle the kelp, wondering why he was so fascinated by it before he eventually bit into the tip of it and tore off a chunk of the plant.

Surprisingly, the 'plant' turned out to actually be a creature as Ergen tasted meat from what he'd torn off, and in looking down he instinctively used his frost breath just in time before he froze the head of the kelp creature solid. It had several limbs that looked like spider legs around it's mouth, seeming to be designed to latch onto it's pry before the creature's large beak would eat them. Though thankfully Ergen had been spared that fate as he discovered that his frost breath worked well underwater. The substance that he could spit didn't seem to react to water at all and traveled just as far and fast as it did while he used it in the air. It seemed incredibly convenient to Ergen before he started eating the kelp monster, not wanting the meat to go to waste before he finally ate his fill and left the rest of the monster for the ocean's other inhabitants. The schools of fish, as well as the crabs, all swarmed over the monster as soon as Ergen left, completely stripping all of the meat from the bone in a matter of moments before dispersing. Both horrified and impressed at the same time, Ergen watched as they had left nothing but a skeleton and an empty bag of waving skin left before what was left of the carcass rested on the seabed.

Feeling the water around his scales, the satisfaction of a full stomach and a sense of accomplishment from having survived this long, Ergen swam in a back flip while showing off his excitement. He was glad to finally be rid of the accursed desert, and he couldn't help but be happy before he began to swim forward while moving along with the army of crabs. He didn't know where they were going, be he hoped that they knew the ocean better than he did as he attempted to follow him. Eventually, he thought that they might come close to another land mass, which would bring a new possibility for his potential home. And with that thought in mind, Ergen swam deeper and deeper into the depths of the ocean, ready to face the unknown with only the slim chance of life at the end of his dangerous journey.