Ep 95. It''s Not Too Late. (2)
“Lord Serenis! Are you alright?!”
“Aldrid.”
It wasn’t long until the deity of life came rushing back to her lord’s side, son in tow. It also wasn’t long until she noticed the four armored men, all on their knees before the dragonlord who was now holding a strange, bronze-like sword.
“What happened? We saw a tree falling down and came as fast as we could…who are these men?”
“Men from the empire. Empire of…”
When the name escaped Serenis, she looked towards the kneeling lead officer. He quickly turned towards the blonde woman who’d just arrived, stammering to finish the dragonlord’s sentence for her.
“Akeia. The Akeian Empire.”
The officer’s answer was met by two distinct replies.
“Akeia?!”
“Hm. Nothing unusual, I suppose.”
The staggering difference between the two deities’ reactions left everyone puzzled. Rozerre soon looked towards his mother, nonetheless confused by his mother’s surprise.
“You sound surprised, mother.”
“Of course I am! Did the empire not fall in the last century? How are they still…?”
“…? Is that how it’s known in Wayla? The empire’s resettled to Astellion during its verge of collapse and has regrown to power over the last century. In fact, they now control most of Astellion’s land.”
Aldrid was still frowning after hearing her son’s explanation. The casualness in his tone was almost unnerving.
“…Rozerre, the empire’s soaked Wayla’s history in blood throughout their reign. Their appearance had always followed with bloodshed.”
“..Weren’t we to remain impartial to such acts? Mankind will always find a reason to despise each other. You were in favor of their nature, mother.”
“When did I ever…?”
“If you weren’t in favor of their bloodthirsty nature, you should’ve made them better. Failing that, you should’ve intervened during the era’s beginning. Is that not what a creator ought to do?”
“…”
‘That was only…because…’
Aldrid opened her mouth several times to defend herself, only to find herself absolutely speechless. When no words came from the deity of life, her son pursed his lips, shrugging at the sight.
“Whatever your reasons were, you cannot deny that you left things as they were for an entire millennium. And besides, you-“
“Enough.”
Rozerre choked on his words from the collar of his clothes suddenly tightening around his neck, being pulled off to the side. He turned to see Serenis dragging him closer to their side, staring down at him with a cold, unforgiving gaze.
“…Dragonlord? What is it?”
“I require your assistance. I must hear about the make of this blade from these men.”
“? Now, that’s no way to ask for help, is it?”
“…”
After a brief silence, the dragonlord gave in with an exhausted sigh.
“…I suppose you’re right.”
It wasn’t long until Serenis dropped to her knees before Rozerre. Her gaze fell to the floor, just like others have before her in the past.
“Please. I must know of this weapon’s origin.”
Rozerre stared down at the kneeling dragonlord with widened eyes; he hadn’t expected her to react so quickly. A sheepish laughter escaped the boy as he relished in his newfound superiority.
…Which didn’t exactly last very long as he soon felt a cold, iron hand tightening around his shoulder from behind.
“…”
“…”
Neither Rozerre nor Raizel said a word to each other. The boy merely stared at the steel dragon’s deathly stare from the corner of his eyes, gulping down a chunk of fear.
Death threats don’t work against individuals of outstanding loyalty. But they sure do against an old, little, immature kid.
? ? ?
It wasn’t long until one of the village’s unused sheds was turned into a pseudo-prison. It also wasn’t long until two dragons walked out of it with a small, frazzled deity of emotions following behind them.Stolen content warning: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.
“…Wouldn’t mother be the better choice? Even I could keep watch over a few men.”
“Aldrid does not know about this continent as well as you do.”
“Ok fine, but can that metal dragon at least not be around while we talk? Or perhaps she could do the watching instead?”
Unfortunately, making Raizel watch over the empire’s soldiers was out of the question. If that were to happen, Serenis had no doubt that she’d later return to find the soldiers killed in all sorts of horrendous ways.
Following suit, Raizel immediately shot back another glare at the little deity pointing at her.
“What’s your problem?”
“Do you realize how unnerving it is to walk side by side with impending doom?”
“Keep yapping and that impending doom’s gonna fall right on top of your head.”
“…”
Serenis disregarded the bickering while she made her way over to a secluded clearing, outside of the villagers’ earshot. She doubted that Hilia’s inhabitants would care about what they talked about, but it would’ve been problematic for those empire soldiers to hear them.
“…This should be far enough. First…”
The dragonlord then tossed the officer’s sword over to Raizel. The steel dragon caught it in her hand, quizzically looking back at her lord.
“Huh? What’s this for?”
“Break it apart, if you will.”
“…Break it apart? Wasn’t this your friend’s shell or something?”
“…It’s merely a small fragment. And I only seek to prevent it from being misused by others.”
In fact, Serenis would’ve done it herself had she been whole and hail. But it would be rather problematic if even a small piece were to enter her system, which was quite possible with how fragile her current skin was. And the weapon was practically indestructible through magic.
Raizel glanced down at the gleaming blade, shrugging in response.
“Meh, alright then. Don’t regret it.”
“Do break it into very small fragments. They otherwise retain their magic-voiding quality.”
While the steel dragon began crushing the thin blade into dust in her palms, Rozerre gave a curious glance towards the dragonlord.
“Interesting how you say ‘misuse,’ dragonlord. I thought you’d be all for someone dirtying their hand in your stead. Or perhaps you despise the prospect of having your prey stolen?”
“…”
There were several things that had become clear after questioning the empire’s soldiers.
First, they truly did not know what the peculiar sword had been made of – such information was only known among the highest of ranks. The four soldiers merely referred to the sword’s material as ‘celestial bronze,’ which was otherwise assumed to be just a peculiar type of metal in their eyes.
Second, said material was being procured from a set of rocky mountains to the north. Serenis could vaguely guess at what these ‘mountains’ actually were, but she hadn’t bothered to comment until confirming the inkling herself.
And finally, the empire had been busily equipping their soldiers with antimagic weapons and gathering their troops at a fortress located to the empire’s western edge. According to the lead officer, they had but one purpose: to invade the western lands of Asarda, and bring down the deity of stars.
…Except, none of that really made sense.
The Twelve were worshipped as keepers and protectors in various regions, but their existence was still largely within the realms of myth and faith. One did not live out their days thinking a deity would keep their homes safe from an invading empire; one did not invade others thinking a deity would stand in the way of their advance.
But for some strange reason, the Akeian Empire was so certain of Aymeia’s presence there that they were preparing an entire army to battle the deity. And they were so knowledgeable that they knew exactly how to combat their enemy, and where to go about finding the necessary materials.
None of which humans should’ve been knowledgeable about. But alas, somehow they were.
Rozerre wracked his head in annoyance. Although he was in favor of remaining impartial to whatever bloodfest humans facilitated, things were different when a deity was directly involved – as an enemy, no less.
“Well, this is quite worrying. After all the trouble we went through to hide it, it wouldn’t do for humans to learn of the shards again.”
“…Trouble, is it?”
When the dragonlord glanced at the boy with doubtful eyes, he retorted back with an equal amount of doubt and annoyance.
“What? It was a necessary measure, people would never have stopped killing each other for the divinity shards. Even if Felicir hadn’t killed the star, mankind was steadily heading towards the same doom anyhow. Our divinities may have gone to much worse individuals in the end.”
“…”
“That’s why the Twelve had all agreed on disallowing humans from learning our origins. But if they really do manage to kill Aymeia, then all that effort goes to waste…”
Serenis let out another sigh, and Raizel rolled her eyes from the side. It was pretty clear there wasn’t any talking around this little boy’s head, nor was he interested in learning where the empire may have acquired such information.
Instead, the dragonlord proposed a solution to his problems.
“If I were to destroy this deity’s shard, would that not solve the problem?”
“It’s not that simple, dragonlord. Do you even know where Aymeia is?”
“…No, but I was hoping that you would.”
“I do not. Nobody knows where that woman is. I bet she’s holed up somewhere and hasn’t seen the light of day in centuries.”
“You mean, nobody SHOULD know.”
Raizel abruptly interrupted the conversation, dusting off the final remains of the broken blade from her hands. She exchanged glanced with Serenis and Rozerre, simplifying their entire argument in her own way.
“You two make it sound hella complicated. If the empire’s heading somewhere to kill this deity, then they obviously know where they’re going, right? Those useless soldiers might not know, but their emperor has to.”
“…What are you saying, child?”
“I’m saying, just raze them to the ground and make the emperor spit out where this deity is. And then go destroy their shard or whatever.”
“…”
“You wanted to find out what happened to your friend anyways, didn’t you? Their emperor will probably know that too.”
Truth be told, Raizel was all in for anything that had to do with razing the empire to the ground. And Serenis didn’t see a much better option than the one being proposed, either.
The only one who was even remotely against the idea was the deity of emotions, staring at the two dragons in bewilderment.
“…Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. The empire isn’t some neighborhood house. You can’t just hope to burn them to the ground and get away with it, they have thousands upon thousands of troops at the ready!”
Neither dragon seemed bothered by the prospect. Though, Serenis was at least kind enough to answer the boy with a remotely logical answer.
“We need but meet this emperor of theirs, no? There’s no need to harm their soldiers.”
“The emperor is at the very heart of the empire! You’re not thinking of intruding the capital, are you?! Even if their troops are gathering west, he’s bound to have an entire army protecting him!”
“Interesting. Where is this capital you speak of?”
“…Zeria? It’s southwest from here, at the centre of Astellion...wait, that’s not important!”
Serenis shrugged back at the deity, then looked towards the steel dragon. Much like herself, the youngling didn’t seem worried in the slightest – in fact, Raizel looked more excited if anything.
“How about it, child? Do you see any problems with meeting this emperor?”
“No.”
“Good. We leave tonight.”
Rozerre gulped in fear at the prospect of these two invading the empire’s capital. Whether that was possible or not didn’t even concern him – what concerned him more was the fact that he, a deity, had just enabled two monstrosities to attack mankind. Which he was supposed to be protecting, at least in appearance.
And, as a last resort, the boy turned to the only argument he could think of that could deter the two dragons.
“…Wait. Even for the dragonkin, wouldn’t it be troublesome to turn the entire empire as your enemy? If your goal is finding Aymeia, perhaps you two could work with them instead?”
“They killed my parents.”
“And defiled my brethren’s remains. We are already enemies.”
“…”
You’re right. Have it your way.