Chapter 16 - My Rivals?
It has been a week since I have left my family to get stronger in order to fight the Shadow Eaters. Each day was filled with walking and walking which I found out was not my forte on part of not having 4 legs but I was able to moderately keep up with an alternating gallop sort of like how 3 legged racers would run. After a week of idle banter between me and Master Lucan who told me that he would not answer the questions I had until he united all of the candidates together.
"Master if I may who are these candidates that you speak of is there a reason you need more than me?"
"Well Vexsus I will not sugar coat this for you. What we are about to embark on or rather I should say that you young ones will embark on is very dangerous and I will only take the survivors under my tutelage to train to protect this world."
That was definitely a shock to me as I was expecting more along the lines of he has a legacy to pass down and that the other 'candidates' were my rivals in receiving it. But to think that he is just taking some talent and then weeding out the chaff from that said talent meant that the fight we are going to be training for is definitely more world ending than I first thought.
With those words and the thoughts of what we would be facing circling through my head we walked in silence until we stopped on a cliff over looking a series of huts and other similar buildings but what I noticed was that there were what looked like lizardmen with wings, I say lizardmen because they were bi-pedal and were using tools, I could see some dragons at the bottom of the cliff disappearing into the cliff under us. They were all different colors aswell some were green while others were red and a few I seen were even black.
"Ok little runt this is our next stop welcome to the village where your grandpa and your uncle live along with his wife and children who as fate would have it is one of the other candidates there are actually 3 candidates in this village 1 is your cousin while the other 2 are said to be hybrids from a passing adventurer and his brother turned demon, That is still a mystery but again I have only heard rumors not anything with substance."
We walk down the cliff and come upon a lizardman and a dragon guarding the entrance into the village. They are both red scaled the dragon had a glowing red throat as he looked at us approach while the lizardman stepped forward with a bone spear shaft attached to a very sharp unknown metal.
"Halt, State your business in the village of Pride."
"I am Master Lucan please go tell your chief I am here to take 3 of your most talented children with me to train for the upcoming Shadow Eater invasion."
At the mention of his name both the dragon and lizardman have a wave of fear wash over them. The dragon instantly takes off in the direction of the village center and after a few minutes the dragon appears again this time with a humungous black lizardman along with a Green scaled lizard woman dressed in shamanic dress.
"Hello I am the chieftain of this village L'Shin Pride, and this is my wife the shaman of our tribe L'mine Pride. Welcome to our humble village my men have told me that you plan on taking a few of your children? is that correct sir?"
"Yes it is L'shin as I am sure you have noticed that it is nearing the time that the Shadow Eaters will emerge and wreck havoc upon the world I with the blessings of the other masters of the protection pact will take the most talented younglings in the dragon tribe and perhaps a few other species and will train them to become a Shadow Eater counter team."
"I see well if that is the case than I am sure you can provide proof, I see that you already roped my grandson into your group but that was the choice of his father. However I am the chieftain of this village and before I allow that to happen here I need to see evidence that says the other masters are ok with this potentially dangerous tactic."
Master Lucan tensed up a bit. I assume either he falsely tricked my father or he is not used to being questioned. My answer either way came at the form of Lucan gaining size and a overpowering aura slammed me into the ground along with all the other weaker willed lizards and dragons surrounding the area. The chief and the shaman however only stood there with calm looks on their faces almost like they were looking at a child throwing a tantrum. Lucan than growled lowly and after a second finally spoke while the aura dissipated and his form became normal again.
"Please forgive my outburst this form is prone to aggression. Yes here is the proof."
He waves his hand and a emblem appears in his hand which he hands over to the chief and with another wave an image of 3 different species appear almost like a hologram as they were sitting around a table of some kind. The chief then immediately kneels and drops the emblem onto the ground which surprisingly shows no damage but instead enlarges the mystical hologram.
"Fellow Masters please forgive this abrupt and unexpected calling but I am here with the Chief of the dragon village Pride and he needed to be assured that what we are planning is legitimate."
One of the Masters that looked like a Black lizardman but who was almost shimmering kind of like a shadow spoke up.
"It is fine Master Lucan I understood that this kind of thing could happen so we are not disturbed. Chief L'shin It is me Master Drago. Rest assured that what Lucan is doing is acknowledged by us, please give him your full support."
With those last words the image of the masters fades away and Lucan waves his hand and the emblem disappears like it never existed. After seeing that I knew that he had something I thought was always a cool item in games and novels. It had to be a spatial Item or even better he had the magical talent to use spatial magic. Wait if I have the skill Spatial bullet does that mean I can learn skills related to an inventory? That thought sent my mind reeling with questions but at the same time an overwhelming excitement started to overtake me as I began thinking up possible trainings to get those skills.
My racing mind was snapped to reality by the Chief standing back up and leading the way to a house that was way bigger than the surrounding buildings.
"This is our towns inn I will go ahead and have a room fixed up for you both and a hot meal prepared, go ahead and rest for today and tomorrow I will bring you the 3 talented children I am assuming you are wanting. I need atleast tonight to speak with their parents to make them see that this is something they cannot control."
The chief and shaman leave after a short nod at Lucan, We enter the inn and at once the atmosphere is filled with silence as every head turns towards us I seen dragons at a large opening towards the back like an outdoor patio area where they were being served drinks and freshly cooked meats and other foods. I turned to Lucan before finally speaking.
"So now that we have a place to sleep that isn't just hard ground, along with a free hot meal I would like to sit down and discuss some things."
"Aslong as it does not include how I know of your Sin and what I will be having you and the other candidates doing I will answer to the best of my ability."
With that in mind we were directed to a table by a very cute Lizard woman with shiny dark grey scales which shot me glances of pity after seeing that I was handicapped in a way especially since even though I was a dragon I could easily fit inside of the main building and was not having to be forced out into the patio serving area with the other dragons.
"So I noticed that you can have things appear and disappear with a wave of your hand, do you perhaps have a magic item?"
With a nonchalant wave Lucan grabbed and dropped onto the table a small bag that was hidden on his waist. "This is what is called a Spatial bag, it allows me to hold alot of different objects in a different space aslong as the object is nonliving and inanimate. Before you ask no I do not have an extra nor do I plan on giving a dragon who has the natural element of space such an item if you want this you will have to learn on your own to control your magic."
"Well that is a shame, and another thing how do you know what element I can use? Is there a skill that grants you insight into my abilities?"
"That is something you have to find out for yourself, until you pass the upcoming trials I will not help you nor provide anything I deem as such."
"Well fine I guess that will be the end of my questions, for now anyway. I will just eat and I plan on going to rest in the room. I am going to take full advantage of being this small since for now is has given me the chance of laying in an actual bed again."
Lucan and I finished eating and went up to the room and upon entry I was very surprised by the amount of luxury that was given to us. There were actual beds covered with all manners of leather coverings that gave enough of a layer to provide a decent amount of comfort, there were also a separate and private bathroom. Ofcourse since this world is I am assuming still within the medieval ages it was only a hole cut into the wooden flooring while a huge hole was dug into the ground. It was atleast a step in the right direction but still lacking from the comforts of my old life which I miss alot.
However after laying down on the bed the stress of being on the road for a week and all the stress of being on the look out for monsters seemed to crash down on me all at once as I drift off to a very deep sleep. Next I am in front of Gluttony but this time the gaseous cloud was a bit thinner than usual and seemed to have shrunken in size.
"Great Elder what happened why do I get the sense that you are not as powerful as you were before?"
"Descendant, You must be careful my brother Pride and sister Envy have learned that I granted my sin onto a sibling of their chosen. I was cornered and beaten for days on end until they grew tired. What you see is as much power as I can muster for now until I can recover. They are now on the lookout for you they have a truce for now and are sharing the control of this plane with the other sins but I was forbidden from establishing in this world. They wanted to limit my power and eventually share in devouring my power and gaining it for themselves but I found out about their plot and around that time I found you. Like I said you have to be careful young one. I have to go now, I am currently in hiding and must limit how much energy I use."
Their was a flash of light and I was left in a void of darkness before I felt a strong shake of my physical body and my subconscious faded out and my consciousness took over. I jerk awake to see a blue scaled lizardman with 2 black horns emerging from his forehead who was standing just over me with his hands still on my shoulders. I also noticed that a smaller human was standing slightly to the side but after blinking away the grogginess I could see that it was a female and that she had black scales covering portions of her body and she also had wings and a blue scaled tail slowly waving from left to right.
"Hey your the new dragon around here my name is Desmaros, and this is my cousin Lizaria."