Chapter 102: Dragon chest

Jelo stood there for a moment, trying to remember what he had been asking the system before Mira’s interruption. He furrowed his brow, mentally retracing the conversation, but the details were fuzzy. Something about creating a family? About other dragons? The specifics escaped him, slipping away like water through his fingers. His exhausted brain wasn’t helping matters.

He sighed and decided to just ask a new question instead. There was plenty he needed to understand anyway, and dwelling on what he’d forgotten wouldn’t get him anywhere.

“System,” Jelo said aloud, then paused, feeling slightly self-conscious about talking to a voice in his head while Mira was standing right there watching him. “Tell me about one of my new skills. The Dragon Chest. What is it?”

The system’s female voice responded immediately, clear and professional as always. “Dragon Chest is exactly what it sounds like. It is a large, limitless chest that you can store things in. It functions as interdimensional storage, accessible only to you. Items placed inside exist outside of normal space and can be retrieved at will.”

Jelo’s eyes widened in surprise. Interdimensional storage? That sounded like something straight out of a fantasy game or novel. “Wait, can it really contain anything?” he asked, his voice rising slightly with excitement. “Like, literally anything?”

“Yes,” the system confirmed. “The Dragon Chest is limitless. It can never be full. There is no maximum capacity, no weight restriction, no size limitation. You can store as many items as you wish for as long as you wish.”

Jelo’s mind immediately began racing with possibilities. A limitless storage space? That would change everything. He wouldn’t have to worry about carrying supplies anymore, wouldn’t have to make difficult choices about what to bring and what to leave behind. He could stockpile resources, weapons, equipment—anything he might need for future fights or survival situations.

For example, the beast crystals he had hidden upstairs. With the Dragon Chest, he could easily store them all away, completely secure and invisible to anyone else. No more paranoia about searches or inspections.

Then another thought occurred to him, darker and more practical. If the chest could store anything… could he store people in it as well? Not permanently, obviously, but maybe temporarily? It could be useful for protecting someone, or even for capturing an enemy. The possibilities were—

“You can only store non-living things in the Dragon Chest,” the system interrupted, as if it had been reading Jelo’s mind. Which, given that it was literally inside his head, it probably could.

Jelo felt a slight pang of disappointment, though he understood the restriction made sense. Storing living things in an interdimensional space probably came with all sorts of complications—oxygen, temperature, the ethics of essentially trapping someone in a void. Still, it would have been useful.

He turned to Mira, who had been watching him with growing curiosity as he stood there apparently talking to himself. “The Dragon Chest is basically unlimited storage,” he explained. “I can put things in it and they’ll be stored in another dimension or something. I can pull them out whenever I need them.”

Mira’s eyes lit up immediately, her expression shifting to one of amazed realization. “Wait, seriously? That’s incredible!” She stepped closer, her hands gesturing excitedly as she spoke. “You don’t need to carry a backpack anymore. Or any bag at all. You could just… store everything you need and carry nothing. You’d look completely normal, completely unprepared, and then suddenly pull out weapons or supplies from thin air.”

“Exactly,” Jelo said, a small smile forming on his face despite his exhaustion. It was nice to see Mira excited about something, especially after everything they’d just been through.

Mira’s expression became more thoughtful. “And maybe you could even store things inside like Dabba hearts, right? So you wouldn’t have to eat them immediately. You could save them for later, build up a reserve.”

Jelo paused, considering that. Technically, a Dabba heart was a non-living thing, wasn’t it? It was just organ tissue from a dead creature. By the system’s own rules, it should be storable. The idea was appealing—he could hunt multiple Dabba and stockpile their hearts, consuming them when he needed a boost rather than being forced to eat them on the spot.

“Can I store Dabba hearts in it?” Jelo asked the system directly.

“No,” the system replied simply. “You cannot store Dabba hearts in the Dragon Chest.”

Jelo felt disappointment wash over him immediately. Dam it. That would have been so useful. He could have built up a massive reserve, never worried about running low on Draconic Essence. But apparently the system had limitations he hadn’t anticipated.

Before Jelo could fully process his disappointment, the system continued speaking. “However, you should not be too disappointed. If you unlock a certain level, there will be a feature that allows you to store Dabba hearts separately from the Dragon Chest. This specialized storage is designed specifically for organic materials that provide power or sustenance to dragons.”

Jelo’s interest immediately rekindled. A separate storage system just for Dabba hearts? That actually sounded even better than storing them in the general Dragon Chest. It suggested the system had specific functionality built around his need to consume hearts, which meant it was probably optimized for that purpose.

“What feature is this?” Jelo asked eagerly. “What level do I need to reach? How does it work?”

The system fell silent.

Jelo waited for several seconds, expecting a response, but none came. “System?” he prompted. “Are you going to answer?”

“That information is currently restricted,” the system finally replied, its tone maddeningly neutral. “You will be informed when you reach the appropriate level to unlock the feature.”

Jelo felt a surge of frustration. Of course. The system was dangling information in front of him like a carrot on a stick, telling him just enough to make him curious but not enough to actually be useful. It was the same pattern it had followed from the beginning—always keeping secrets, always holding back, always making him work for every scrap of knowledge.

“Why can’t you just tell me?” Jelo asked, unable to keep the irritation out of his voice. “It’s not like knowing about it ahead of time would break anything.”

“Information is released on a need-to-know basis to prevent overwhelming the user with excessive data,” the system explained patiently. “Revealing features before you are ready to utilize them serves no practical purpose and may lead to confusion or improper expectations.”

In other words, the system was treating him like a child who couldn’t handle too much information at once. Jelo clenched his jaw, biting back a more aggressive response. Arguing with the system wouldn’t accomplish anything. It wasn’t going to change its protocols just because he was annoyed.

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