They did not, alas, want to fluff my new tail, so I followed them back to the little cluster of stone structures, feeling my tail swish behind
as I walked. None of my armour was going to fit now, but that was a small price to pay.
"So, not just the power of a dragon, but immortality, and, apparently, evolution?" asked Ortho, looking up at
as I entered. "I hope it wasn't our own forces that killed you that ti?"
"No, the red dragon."
Everyone in the room gasped, from lowly guard to Ortho himself.
"I gave as good as I got, though," I added. "He's not going to be flying again anyti soon. Even more so, if he got hit with the divine curse for killing . Would have killed him if he didn't hold Ancora hostage..."
Ortho looked on in disbelief for a few seconds, before bursting into laughter. "Right. The divine curse. For killing a hero. And this one cos back to life! Even if you lost to the demon lord, you would cripple him. A rematch would go very differently."
I just stared. Laughter really didn't suit him. Perhaps I was too used to his emotionless pragmatism, but his face seed completely wrong for it.
"Well, if you'll excuse , I need to go back and pick up where I left off," I said. If the red dragon was still outside the city resting, perhaps I could shower him in acid as I went past.
"Wait," said Ortho, getting himself back under control and his face imdiately taking on a far better suited expression of seriousness. "Muigal Pass has fallen. It's sooner than expected, but soone knocked out the commander, crippled the strongest defending mages, damaged the equipnt that kept the barrier powered, and stole the communications orb so they couldn't call for reinforcents. The grand barrier is holding for now, but we can't defend it. You have a day until they breach it, and then tens of thousands of civilians will die for every additional day you take."
Ah, so that's what the black orb I stole was. I did wonder.
There was no way they were putting all of their trust in , though. I hadn't seen Kevin since that first eting, and I had no doubt he was busily setting up a new ritual chamber sowhere, ready to summon a new batch of heroes.
"I visited one of their towns while I was there," I admitted. "Very nice place. Helpful and polite citizens, kids playing in the streets, so really nice looking cafes that I alas couldn't visit on account of having no money. Weird shops that would have forced
to do more maths than I was comfortable with, if I actually tried to shop in them. A big morial for those killed in the war, and a refugee program to make sure anyone displaced had their necessities provided for."
"Your point?" asked Ortho, frowning.
"I'm just saying, it doesn't really match up with your description of mindless slaves."
"I have never described them all as mindless. Certain demons, certainly, but not all. So are highly intelligent. They simply can't go against their orders. In a war, one does not send their entire population to the front. That would simply result in the population starving to death even if the war was won. I dare say that you would have noticed the population of adults in the town was skewed heavily towards won."
Yes, I had noticed that.
I rembered Ancora again, and how she hadn't resisted in the slightest, looking completely peaceful as she was held in mid-air, pinned between a pair of claws that had been sharp enough to tear through my scales and resistance skills without difficulty. And Sru'taklin, who had obviously carried her out from the town at high speed to et the dragon, not reacting as she was taken from him. That was very obviously not normal behaviour, and was the reason I wanted to finish off the red dragon. With him dead, would they be freed?
"But didn't you say the demon lord didn't like freedom? The town looked fine to
until the dragon turned up."
Ortho stared at
in a mix of incredulity and anger. "Then you must have been walking through it with your eyes closed. You ntioned the weird shops. Do you really think a store full of valuable goods left open and unattended like that would survive two seconds here, or back in your own world?"
Okay, so they did seem a bit strange, but I'd thought they were just naturally nice people. Then how co the copies I'd t back in the dungeon weren't?
How much of that dungeon was deliberate? Did the Goddess expect
to join the fight like this? Did she show
what I needed to see to make decisions here? Not just the fox-kin, but the many-limbed blobs. I'd seen them being mind controlled, and felt how happy they were with their situation. I'd called it fake, and the very concept disgusted . They were 'happy' because their brains were pickled in the appropriate hormones. If Ortho was being truthful here, then wasn't the tree nothing but a more extre version of the demon lord?
Would the polite Si'janrii at the gate turn back into the hate-filled wannabe rapist if I killed the dragon?
As ever, I couldn't help but complain how nothing was ever simple. Why couldn't the demon lord be so monster that ruled his unwilling slaves through fear? Having a bunch of mind-slaves that were happy with their situation and would likely be upset at being 'freed' was just all sorts of fucked up. I'd thought I'd had it bad back in the dungeon, with getting brutally murdered and eaten repeatedly, but I was starting to feel I had the most luck out of anyone in this damn world.
His copy had claid that any human king would prefer his subjects to be mindless sheep. Apparently I'd killed the king without ever eting him, so I couldn't check, but I suppose Ortho was the next best thing.
"So the demon lord is mind controlling everyone to live fulfilling, cri-free lives? I can imagine nobles wanting to do that to their subjects; it would make ruling so much easier. Did you ever consider trying to broker a deal?"
"Are you siding with the demons?" asked Ortho, but not before I saw his face flicker. He was good, but the others in the room were not. I didn't even need the aid of proficient empath to know that Craig would love to do that to everyone who wasn't him.
"Just trying to understand both sides of the conflict before I do sothing that could change the fate of the continent," I said. "For example, you said the demon lord started the war, but you never ntioned that he was provoked."
"Provoked? His demands were completely unreasonable. To completely stamp out all slaver bands and bandits that were either operating in demon territory or profiting from the activity of others there. How much manpower did he think we had?"
"How many nobles around the border were profiting from those activities?" I asked, and felt the anger radiating from three people in the room.
"They were slaves already!" exclaid one, managing to ignore one of Ortho's pointed glares. "What does it matter if we took a few for our own use?"
"I see..." I said, not elaborating any further. "Well, I'm off to fight so dragons. See you."
"You are? From the way you're talking, I have to suspect you're planning on betraying us," said Ortho.
"Maybe I would be, had I not t the red dragon on my last trip. Like I said, he used a hostage against . One of his own fox-kin. A young girl I'd befriended on my visit. For that alone, he doesn't deserve to live. Now, anything else before I leave?"
"No," said Ortho with a shake of his head. "I've circulated your description as far as I could, but given the communications issues caused by our mystery assailant, I can't guarantee you'll make it over the wall without being attacked."
"That won't be a problem," I answered, before leaving the building and flying back to the shrine, invoking fast travel for the first ti in this world.
The fox-kin temple was empty, which was a relief. A soul-mage priestess under the control of a dragon who wanted to kill
wasn't ideal. When I stepped outside, I found the streets were equally empty, which was stranger. Did I finally enter a fox-kin settlent when people were actually sleeping? But they had a sun here, and it was still up in the sky. Besides, perceive presence was picking up nothing whatsoever.
I took to the skies and flew towards the last location of the dragon. He was still there, but so were the missing fox-kin. I looked down at the display in utter horror. A ring of priestesses surrounded him, Dru'niryeal among them, feeding a constant stream of healing magic into his wounds. That much was fine. What wasn't fine was the queue of adult won in front of him.
I watched as he grabbed a pair of them in one hand, flinging them into his mouth. The line took a step forward. The town's n and children stood at a greater distance, watching, but doing nothing. The words of Dru'niryeal replayed in my head. 'Should he demand our deaths, our deaths he would willingly get.'
No-one had noticed , but what could I do? I had nothing that could kill him with one hit. If I tried to ice him again, he had any number of potential hostages. While I couldn't say I cared enough about most of them to let that stop , all he would have to do was target the children, and I would break.
No, there was a move I could make... It was ti to be a hero.
I dived, picking up as much speed as I could, but carefully timing my approach as he grasped the next bite of his al. He opened his mouth wide, tossing in his willing victims. He saw , but failed to react in ti. My reappearance must have surprised him, and now I was flying too fast. He was immobile and had his mouth wide open.
I flew in.
Now, where would cause the most damage? Sha he wasn't just a little bigger, or I could have climbed up the back of his throat and into his nasal cavity, and tried to get at his brain that way. As it was, the back of his throat would need to do. I flew into it and glued myself there with my webs.
I blasted his throat with ice, freezing it shut, and he started writhing. He shook his head from side to side, but I was stuck, and was too far back for his tongue to reach. He could neither roar nor breathe fla, or even speak, which would hopefully prevent him threatening . I took another breath, trying not to vomit at the stench, and aid a second blast down his throat.
The mouth opened again, exposing
to daylight, and he shoved a claw into it, trying to remove , but thanks to his extended muzzle, he still couldn't reach. I laughed madly between attacks. "What's wrong? Ate sothing that didn't agree with you?" I shouted, before adding another layer of ice.
The dragon's head dropped, slamming into the ground. As before, my webs held, but this ti dislodging
hadn't been the intent, and his mouth opened once more. Perceive presence hadn't been doing much during my suicide mission, given that I was inside the biggest presence in the area, but even with the dragon blinding
I still felt the gathering outside. Sru'taklin rushed into the mouth, sword drawn, eyes fixed on . Mru'walyn was behind him, flas building up around him as he cast a spell, presumably more to aid the choking dragon than to harm .
I aid a burst of acid in front of them, coating the dragon's tongue. As I'd hoped, he failed to hold it still, and the pair of fox-kin who had been standing on it were catapulted back outside as it jerked upward. That would buy
a few more seconds, but how long would it take a dragon to suffocate? I flooded the mouth with more acid, and the dragon's pained writhing prevented any more fox-kin from entering.
The next attempt involved angling his head upward, and I looked out of the open mouth into a massive floating ball of water. Would he try to flood
out next? I aid an ice breath outwards, freezing the surface of the water as it fell into the dragon's mouth. The result was that he smacked himself in the head with an oversized hailstone. It didn't do any damage, but neither did it achieve anything to help him.
I aid more ice around , freezing whatever was in range. My mana was starting to run dry, but his movents were starting to slow. I continued with my ice anyway, not caring if it consud my entire supply. As long as I had enough remaining for an ergency trigger respawn, I was fine, and it was doubtful that I even could get myself that low; I'd regenerate the required amount of mana in a fraction of a second.
The head crashed to the ground for a second ti, but this ti there was no further movent. The presence faded and vanished.
That left
with two problems. Firstly, how to get out of here now that his mouth was closed and he was no longer alive to open it for . Secondly, with him no longer blinding my perceive presence skill, I could pick up an even larger presence hovering up in the air outside.
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