Outcast

Waking up the next day, Valoris immediately felt that his body was much stronger. Now 3 ft long with thicker scales and 4-inch horns on his head, much more muscular, the biggest change was the 5-inch black serrated blade coming out of the end of his tail.

Moving around to get adjusted to the changes to his body. Valoris went to go take another bite from the arm when he heard

"I wouldn't do that if I were you"

Turning around he saw it was Gorm standing outside his den

"That's from a beast much higher on the food chain than you. If you eat that you are gonna pass out again as your body absorbs it. Plus if you wait until after you are done training for the day you will see that it's much more effective"

"Thank you, Lord Gorm. How am I going to train?" asked Valoris.

"Well, that depends on you. Instead of just choosing for you, I'm going to lay out a couple of options and tell you the benefits you can get from it. Since this decides your future I think you should be the one to choose. Sound good to you?" asked Gorm

"Yes, thank you what are my options?"

"Well 1, you can spend your time fighting against animals similar to you to gain fighting and hunting experience and gain medium-tier meat to eat. 2, focus on refining your body's defense and vitality. This will be very painful and the gains will be slower than the others but will make you much harder to kill. 3, We find a natural treasure of wind or lightning and you cultivate in gaining understanding in aspects in one of those elements. This will give you a jumpstart on controlling elements compared to others."

As he listened to Gorms explanation Valoris was torn between body refining, and fighting as these were the two he was the most interested in.

"Can I do a mixture of 2? I'm really interested in Body Refining and Fighting."

"Normally I would say yes, however in 6 months the Blood Matches are starting, and if you focus on 2 areas you won't be able to gain significant progress in either."

"What's the Blood Matches?"

" It's where various clans and tribes compete for various resources and property. We didn't have any strong combatants in our tribe at the entry-level and, we were afraid that we would have to forfeit that event before you showed up."

As he listens to Gorms explanation, Valoris decides to choose Body Refining as his choice. He liked the idea of forging his body into a near-indestructible weapon. In his mind that was the way of true strength, he could shrug off powerful blows as if they were nothing at all.

Also, Storm dragons were known for their powerful attacks. But their natural defense was middling at best. By choosing to refine his body he was hopefully taking care of a potential problem for him in the future.

"I choose body refining "

Says Valoris, explaining his reasons for choosing it. Gorm agrees this is a good choice especially since as he is going to be forcing the potential of his body out every day, if he eats from the severed arm at the end of each day he will see that it will be much more effective.

"Follow me, I will take you to the body refining training area. And show you what to do"

Walking down a worn path to a large cavern that had several tunnels Gorm takes him down one on the far right.

"There are several ways to refine your body, each with their own strengths and weaknesses. You could focus on just defense and refine your scales and horns to be near-mythic armor by itself.

Or focus on strengthening your vitality so that your healing abilities make you nearly unkillable. Finally, you can choose one that does both. Be warned there are tiers to each type of training. The higher the tier of Refining method you choose, the more painful and harder it is to train.

Methods that train in both defense and vitality are extremely difficult and most choose to be masters of one aspect then to try and possibly fail in two. I will leave the choice to you"

Valoris knew this could be a turning point for him. He knew the obvious choice was to choose the method that focused on both. But, it would be extremely painful, he would have to work much harder than others to get to the same level, and he was already at a disadvantage compared to others his own age. They all started much stronger then he did and he was already scrambling to catch up.

"NO! hard work and determination are all I have. If I choose the easy path now I will always keep choosing the easy path. It doesn't matter if I don't catch up to them right now. Every day, I will give my all because I have too!

Eventually, I will become a dragon king because even though I could have chosen the easy way, I took the hard way to grow stronger." Thinks Valaris before telling Gorm his choice.

".. Are you sure this is what you want? If you want to make any sort of progress you will have to go through some hellish training?" asked Gorm a little concerned.

"This is my path to strength. True strength can only be taken or earned, not given. Doing this now means my potential in the future is unlimited" answered Valoris feeling more confident. Valoris knew he didn't have a rare talent for cultivation, he wasn't born as the young master of a clan.

The only thing he could claim to have a talent for was his endurance and determination. So if he wanted any chance of catching up, he couldn't go the traditional route. No, instead he would have to make his own path.

"Very well let's begin then" rumbled Gorm before pushing open the door.