After almost two weeks of trekking, as I began to scale the correct mountain properly, I noticed that the environment wasn’t becoming colder. It was getting warmer.

My eyes, which had been frozen in a permanent half-blink for several days, suddenly became warm enough to open again fully. I can see! Well, I could still understand the world around me even without sight, but finding the area in front of me to be not only snowless, but actually green was a stunning sight. Grass. There’s grass!

Breath caught in my throat, I run, something I didn’t know my legs were capable of doing anymore. Falling to my knees in front of a patch of green, I clutch at the little blades of grass, feeling something soft and harmless for the first time in half a month. It’s almost unreal. Painful, cold tears trickle from my thawed eyes. Ah, it’s wonderful. It’s…

I sniff.

It’s close.

My knees creak as I push myself to my feet again. I stagger into a stiff, dead man’s walk. Yes, now that I can actually look at the area around me, it isn’t barren anymore. The grass surrounds a flattened, walked path. However, the road is weirdly broad, as though it was mainly walked by elephants, or maybe quadrupedal whales. But it started in the middle of nowhere, so I can’t see why that would be the case.

Well, it seems to lead exactly to the top, so there’s no reason not to follow it.

Walking on a real road after so long feels strangely rejuvenating. No steep cliff faces to climb, no crevices to lose fingers and toes in, no jutting rocks to stumble on—and, best of all, no freezing cold to make me consider the pros and cons of cordless bungee jumping. It’s kind of nice, honestly, and makes me forget that I’m heading into what I can only assume to be some sort of lair. What shall I find at the top? A snake? A sea-serpent? Something else? Who knows. Either way, the summit approaches, and I feel about as ready as I can be.

As I pass a bend in the road, I begin to hear voices. Two of them. With a quick sniff, I can tell that the owners are also the only people there. They smell weird, though. Sure, they clearly smell like goblins, but then they also smell like fresh, warm rice. Feathery. Kind of like drakes do. Not to mention that the area close to them is positively warm, like a hot day in August.

Sitting down behind a rock, I let myself replicate Coda and listen in.

“I hope they send someone strong,” a young, adolescent voice chirps. “That would be so scaly.”

“I hope They send no one,” an older, mature voice replies, sighing. “Or perhaps a flapping fiend. Would that satiate you, Goss?”

“No way! Didn’t I tell you? I’m a type seven, so the only way this’ll work is if they send a human, and preferably a super-strong one so they’ll sob like little goblings when I rip it apart and wear its hide as a glove!” The younger one, Goss, squawks a laugh. “Oh, I can’t wait! Do you think it’ll be here soon?”

“Going by the sun, I’d say we’ve been here close to three hours now. If They wanted to send someone to ‘save’ me, They would have done so by now. Not that I’d see the point in such an exercise, save for them losing another champion.”

As I’m devoting myself to the art of eavesdropping, a status window helpfully assists me in explaining my position.

Hell Difficulty Twenty-fifth Floor

Boss Stage>

<[Clear Condition]

Defeat the despicable dragon

and rescue the pious priest.>

A dragon and a priest? Now that’s an odd combo. A dragon… like I saw in the tapestries at the Empire? Then again, it could just be an overgrown drake rather than an actual beast of fire and fury capable of burning the world to ash with a single burst of its hell flame breath. I suppress the urge to cough into my hand.

Well, I suppose I’ve heard enough. Before heading out, I briefly make a check for limbs and appendages. Hands, check; fingers, check; legs, check; feet, check… Yeah, good enough. I stand up, cross the final part, and emerge onto an unusually flat platform that’s apparently supposed to be the summit. It’s covered in healthy flora, with grass and flowers and even fruitful bushes covering it. I’d call the view unsuited for the title Apathy Summit if I hadn’t been more focused on what’s actually up here.

“I—it’s here! Scales and feathers, it’s really—” The one that’s apparently Goss puffs himself up, wings spreading in a display of size and power. “Greetings, human champion of the pathetic gods!”

It’s a dragon. It’s actually and literally a dragon.

I grab my own hand to prevent myself from trembling too hard.

Goss, the dragon one of the two, is about the size of a double-decker bus. And that isn’t even counting the tail. Is that feathers? He’s all covered in feathers? No, not completely. The face, a pale yellow, like cartoon lightning bolts, is uncovered and scaly. And the horns. A bit stubby, but he has horns. His eyes are bright yellow. His body is almost fluffy in parts, kind of like the dune of a baby bird, and especially his tail, which, right there at the end, has long fluffy parts that look awesome. And the wings? They have a little tiny-chicken fluff to them, but otherwise?

If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it.

I clench my jaw. Damn, that’s cool. He’s way too cool.

The dragon stares at me. I stare at the dragon. I’m trembling. If I look closely, his cheeks are a little deeper in color than the rest of his body, almost as if he’s blushing. His wings are trembling almost as badly as my hands are. “—Human!” He points at me using his trembling wing. “You have come to rescue this idolater, have you not?” his magnanimous wing moves to point at a robed goblin sitting casually in a small wooden cage off to the side. As I’m looking at him, the goblin in question waves using one of his wings. Carried by the atmosphere, I wave back at him.

…Hang on, wings?

Yeah, now that I’m looking at it, the supposed priest in there has a pair of large, parrot-RED wings on his back, covered with patterns of BLACK, yellow, green and blue. Very tropical, and very out of place on an otherwise modestly dressed priest.

The dragon stares at me. I stare back at him.

…Oh, he’s expecting a response, isn’t he?

I go to tug at my collar but find that, as always, I’m wearing nothing. Exactly nothing. Not even a—

I look down at my nethers and then back up at the dragon. He’s also in the nude, technically speaking.

“E—excuse me,” I mutter, turning around and pulling out the first-best hide from my inventory, which happens to be goblin. I can feel the priest’s gaze on my back. D—damn it…!

Sticking it back in, I pull out my rat coat, tying it around my midsection almost as a kilt. Good enough. I turn back to the dragon and the priest, coughing in my hand, clearing my throat to speak properly. “Uh, I…” I cough again. “—Yeah! I’m here to rescue that priest, and to…” I bite my tongue. “To, to…” I swallow. Man, I must look so pathetic right now. This is not how I’d imagine my first time fighting a dragon to go. Now that I’m thinking about it, I never expected myself to fight a dragon either, per se. More so ride it across the skies. Man, that would be so awesome…

“To…?” the dragon asks gently, more confused than anything.

I point a big finger at him, hoping that clenching my hand might suppress the trembling. “—To slay you, you despicable dragon, you!”

The dragon’s eyes go wide with unadulterated glee, his wings flapping with excitement as he grins childishly and turns from me to the priest then back to me again. “You—you’re really—” The dragon swallows, stepping back and forth like an excited dog, the tip of his tail wagging. “Champion of the gods! Tell me your name, so that I may announce your death to the gods, your perishing giving me the final push needed to loosen my final ties to the ground and emerge into the skies as a fully-fledged four-winged dragon!”

“I am…” My real name? My username? My jaw clenches. “Lo Fennrick. But you can call me Kitty.” I try to make a show of bravado. “And what name should I announce to the heavens when I slay you, oh great dragon?”

The dragon’s chest puffs out with pride and excitement, feathers ruffling and unruffling. “Goss!” he announces. “It’s Goss Fletchling, but you may call me Goss!”

“Goss,” I say, if only to sound it out. Damn. That’s a cool name.

Across the summit, I can hear Goss mutter breathily, “Lo Fennrick… What a name…” Which I hope isn’t in the ‘what a dumb name’ sense, because if it is, my heart might just break. He looks at me again, face split in a toothy grin. “Very well, human Kitty! We shall battle. My claw shall face your… What weapon do you use, anyway?”

I see a chance and I take it. Holding up my hand, I use the summon rat skill, instantly transforming it into a plump rat, grabbing it before it can fall. I hold it up like it’s a grenade of some sort. “I use the rat.”

“The rat?”

He isn’t laughing. I cough a little. “The… rat. Yes.”

He stares at me. I stare at him. I’m just about to throw the rat in my maw to eat the feelings away when he gives a full-body shudder, uttering with the greatest awe, “What an ability, what power…!” Before his eyes can fully transform into glimmering stars, he catches himself, coughing into his wings. “I—I mean, no matter how amazing your powers of rat are, my powers as a dragon will be more than a match. I’ll turn that rat of yours into roast meat with a single breath!”

“Oh yeah?” I say, grinning back at him. “Not if I can do it first!”

“What are you—”

<[Touch of Reversed Heat Protection (Lv.1)]>

A single poke and the rat erupts into flames, turning halfway to ash before I regain my senses enough to stick it in my mouth, extinguishing the flames and regaining enough flesh to recover my hand again, if only partially. Using the three fingers I was able to recreate, I do a pose, including jazz hands. Ta-dah!

He hasn’t moved a single inch from the spot where he’s standing, nor has his expression shifted by a single muscle.

Twirling around, I do the pose again, including jazz hands. Ta-dah!

His jaw falls open. “Are… Are you...?” I pause my jazz-handing. He takes a trembling breath. “A half-dragon…?” I stand before him, mid-pose, unable to find the proper way to respond to that. Frankly, I want to say yes, but that would be like a mouse declaring itself half-cat just because its ears were a bit pointy. Before I have to express that fact in gentle words, the dragon continues, saying, “But that shouldn’t be possible, you can’t get half-corrupted, that makes no sense, so maybe…” Its heavy brows sink down across its eyes. “Do humans not become dragons, physically?”

“Um,” I say sheepishly, “I don’t think humans can turn into dragons at all.”

His wings fall a little. “Oh, um…” He tilts his head cautiously. “I’m sorry for your loss?”

“All the better,” the priest suddenly chimes in. “Becoming a dragon is nothing but cruelty. And not only for the ones around you.”

I take personal offense. “No, it isn’t! It’s—”

“It’s awesome!” Goss says, finishing my sentence. We turn to each other, our jaws slacked open. I shoot him a thumbs-up. He gives me a thumbs-up in turn. Since he’s obviously the expert on this, he continues, saying, “Being a dragon is totally scaly. You can fly, shoot fire, become immune to almost all kinds of dumb magic… And you don’t have any stupid parents to get you down anymore!”

The look the priest gives him is one of deep, bottomless pity.

Before he has time to say anything else to get the mood down, I add my own piece, saying, “And you get to live for thousands of years to become an ultra-mega strong super-dragon, totally unkillable be it by mortals or gods alike.”

The dragon and priest both stare at me like I just declared the world was a ball of fire.

“Wherever did you hear that?” the priest asks.

“Yeah, um,” Goss says, “that’s only… Like, yeah, I guess if you go and become a mumbler you could live for a while longer, but that’s not really…” He hums hesitantly. “Sure, four-winged dragons can live to be over a hundred years old, but most get defeated before that, so it still isn’t exactly thousands of years…”

I blink at them. “Wait. You’re telling me that you aren’t super long-lived?” I can feel myself squint in suspicion. “...How old are you, anyways?”

Goss, forgetting all about the previous topic, puffs up again, grinning proudly as he says, “Three!”

I sway a little where I stand. “Three… hundred…?”

“No, I’m three.”

I cross my arms. “There’s no way in hell that you’re three years old.”

The dragon flaps his wings indignantly. “Am so!” After a second’s pause, he soon adds, “Well, if you count my years as a skinny goblin, then I’m thirteen. But I’ve been a dragon for three years!”

I turn to look at the priest in the hopes of perspective. He looks solemn where he sits in the cage. Once his eyes meet mine, he gives a defeated shrug.

I turn back to the dragon. He’s younger than me by almost seven years. He’s… just a kid.

“Well?” Goss asks across the peak. “Aren’t we gonna fight?”

Goss doesn’t seem to understand why I care. In all honesty… Why do I care? The clear condition is simple. He’s all aboard and doesn’t seem to mind killing or dying. The priest doesn’t care either. Yeah, sure, he’s just a kid, but he’s still a dragon.

I crack my knuckles. “Yeah, yeah. Fight. Let’s do it.”

The dragon nods. “Yup. We’re gonna do it.”

“Yeah. Exactly. Fight.”

The air thickens with tension. He stares at me. I stare at him.

…Neither of us makes the first move.