𝓞𝑣xt.𝐜𝒪𝐌

POV Alesia:

Alesia opened her eyes, her body shooting upright from the altar that she was sprawled on.

She felt immense energy flow and move through her body that put her former strength as dragonkin to shame.

Alesia just stood there, letting energy flow and surge through her whole body. She could feel the connection to the elements.

She raised her slender hand, and mana pulsed all the way from her veins into her fingertips.

Immediately bright yellowy flames flared up around her hand, brightly glowing, its heat causing the surrounding air to twist and shiver.

Her eyes went wide, her eyes slightly glowing as she watched the flames burning in her hand.

There was no heat, only a weak, itchy and tingly feeling in her fingers.

‘This is like legendary elemental elves or elementals.’ she felt it. There was no magic with her mana directly transforming into flames as it left her body.

‘Could it be that elemental elves have their origin with dragons?’

Suddenly a rough kobold voice came from behind her, “Your Majesty, your new minions has woken up. We know a location where the king will meet with the foreign emissaries. There is still a time!”

Alesia clenched her small fists, her blood pressure rising together with jealousy and anger, ‘No, this was supposed to be my time, my time with my master.’

Later the same day:

POV Ambasador von Neuman:

The sky was clear, with small glowing stars sewn all over its black background. An immensely large battleship drifted across it as if it was a sheer ocean.

The whole ship was huge, and its hull was easly longer than multiple football fields put next to each other.

It shone in the silver moonlight, its hull battered in shiny metallic plates with massive white glowing runes engraved in them.

A large section of its board was empty, with only two chairs facing each other.

Guards in sleek ornamental armour that looked like those worn by heavy Arabian knights stood in straight posture along the board.

Long purple capes fell down their backs and sides, reaching all the way to their knees, forming a triangular shape that partially covered the guards even from the front.

Their faces were obscured by the masked helmets with purple glowing eye sockets.

They stood unmovingly, holding their short doubled-edged polearms with blades made of purple light.

Two men sat in their chairs facing each other in a staring contest.

One looked like an old man with white hair and wrinkles. While the second one was a young man in his prime, his trimmed hair reaching to his shoulders and a short black beard covering his face.

‘A monster masquerading as a human, such a disgusting thing.’ The old emissary kept his smile on his face, not showing his internal disgust, ‘Just wait, a time when we will no longer need you is coming.’

The old emissary was disgusted dealing with a vampire, but he knew that it was the cheap option, ‘Better to let our own monster guard the wilderness than spend on extra legions.’

It was the scary part of the world hidden in a shroud from the common people. It was a world where a single monster could replace a whole army for a fraction of the cost.

Loud rumbles were constantly thundering from a distance, each time getting closer and closer to the ship. Bright blue bolts of lightning were striking far on the horizon.

“Your Majesty, you see, it isn’t easy for us to join a war against a dragon. It would cost us lots of resources with a questionable return.” The old emissary straightened in his chair and looked straight at the monster before him without any fear, knowing that the vampire wouldn’t dare to attack him and risk retaliation.

“Emissary, I don’t believe that you have a choice. We have been paying tribute at the time and protected the borders with the undead wasteland. It is time to fulfil your obligation.”

“Absurd. We have still not even decided if it is an external war that would oblige us to help or just internal strife for power, which is not our problem.”

Suddenly the rumbling got even closer, the king and emissary freezing, their eyes turning towards a quickly growing silhouette on the horizon.

A massive beast covered in rumbling black clouds showed out of nowhere, its golden eyes looking at the ship like a shark at a fish.

“Go and prepare weapons!” The king shouted, his eyes slightly flashing in a red light.

A soldier in purple without a mask and with extra golden engravings on his armour saluted and turned on his heels, only to freeze when the old man raised his hand.

“No, I don’t think that it is necessary.”

“Sire, it is a dragon…” the officer turned at him with a questioning look and doubt.

“Exactly, yet they still didn’t unleash their attack. I think that it is obvious that they want to speak. Let them say what they want. This is a diplomatic mission anyway, and don’t be an idiot. I think it is obvious that our single ship isn’t enough to win.” the old man chuckled and turned his gaze back towards the king, “Our friend here might survive, but we can’t be as careless.”

POV Vesuvius:

The dragon watched the ship in the clouds, still unsure of how to proceed, ‘If they attack me, that means that they are hostile anyways, so I will attack too, but if they don’t attack, there is no need to make any more enemies.’

The dragon’s two eyes zoomed towards the ship’s board, stopping at an inconspicuous human-looking figure in black sitting in a richly decorated chair made of polished dark wood.

The man looked ordinary, but there was an immense amount of dark, shadowy and blood attributed mana radiating out of him as if he was a bloody black sun.

His heart immediately flared up in a rage as he realised that the person behind all of the complications was right in front of him.

He clenched his clawed hands, a loud screeching and grinding noise resounding through the sky.

But in the end, he suppressed his anger, his rationality winning, ‘No, I can’t let my emotions cause useless trouble again. Attacking a foreign ship with a dignitary would be like declaring war on them. As they didn’t attack me, that means that there is a chance for them to stay out of this.’

His goal was simple, he wanted to prevent any larger escalation that would lead the kingdom’s backers to join the war on the enemy side, ‘There would be only war after war.’