5.

The rich bastards did have the best larders. Erak was chewing on some overripe fruit as they walked through the Emperor’s pleasure estate. The wide doors had been broken open, exotic wood laying in splinters on top of luxury rugs imported from the Easter Reaches. Marble statues involved in lewd acts decorated the halls, tapestries of deviancy decorated the walls, and the chandeliers had red lights glowing from them.

A stench remained under the incense braziers burning in the corners. Erak tried not to look at all the stained sheets and manacles that dangled around from hooks on the walls. The fact that Victoria was supposed to marry the man who not only built this monstrosity but frequented it was distressing.

“Erak, where are you?” Sammus called out, his voice bouncing off the vaulted ceilings. Erak hit a wood paneled wall hard, the sound of cracking wood giving his position away. He finished off the fist sized fruit, tossing the core off to the side as he continued to walk the halls.

Erak paused to look at a statue of a pair of coiled figures wrapped around each other, of the draconic tail that one of them sported. That the dragons had long been rumored to have attached to the Imperial House was no secret, but seeing how it was flaunted here in the privacy of a pleasure villa where only the Emperor and his closest confidantes and concubines would see was distressing.

Dragons were the messengers of the gods. Partly divine and not to be so disgraced like this. Erak thought back to what he had seen in the sewers and now here in the Imperial house. He hit the statue and shattered it into pieces, the little bits of marble scattering around him.

Sammus came up the hall, he had a pair of bulging bags strapped to his back along with a jewel encrusted sword on his waist to complement his other blade. He was eating a thick bar of chocolate, as he swaggered toward Erak. Pomp came behind him, a crown somehow finding its way to the dragon’s skull.

“Dislike the artwork that much?” he asked. Erak just shook his head and the prince shrugged and changed the subject.

“Did you find something to eat?’ Sammus asked around his bar of chocolate.

“Yes, did you find any clues to the disappearance of the Emperor?” Erak signed to them. Sammus and Pomp both froze there, the two having guilty looks on their faces.

“Nothing sure fire,” Sammus said. Pomp scaled up Erak’s leg and rested on his shoulder as he looked over at the prince.

“The prince was occupied with looting the Emperor’s personal vault,” Pomp said. Erak looked at him and then at the crown he had on his skull. Pomp pretended not to notice his gaze.

“There was his journal here,” Sammus said, reaching with his free hand into a pocket and pulling out a small leather journal.

“In it, the Emperor wrote repeatedly about leaving his guards as frequently as possible and going to a small villa he had some miles away. He did not say what they did there, but referenced it repeatedly. Villa Draconis.”

“The Dragon House?” Erak signed, questioningly.

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“Yes. Which, from what you told me about what you discovered in the underground, makes me think that the experiments you found weren’t isolated events,” Sammus said, pocketing the journal.

“Where is it?”

“A day's walk from here. Maybe less now that we are stronger than we used to be,” Sammus said with a shrug.

“You’ll have to leave your pillage here, you won’t be able to keep up with me with all of that,” Erak said.

“I can keep up with my loot, worry not about me,” Sammus smiled as he spoke, his teeth dark with chocolate.

“The sword?”

“A family heirloom. My mother’s family, not my father’s. When the first of the accords was reached, the King of the Green Boughs had this blade forged and encrusted the Royal Jewels. And then handed it over along with his daughters to the Conqueror. It only seems right that as the Imperial throne no longer can protect what it served, that the jewels and the blade return home,” Sammus said, his clean hand straying to touch the hilt of the sword.

Erak took the moment to look at the blade and inspect what it said. He would never take it from his friend, but he couldn't help but be interested in what it was.

Ceremonial Blade of the Green Boughs

Legendary

Those in possession of this blade have the ability to seal pacts with Essence, regardless of skills or titles. Improve all base stats by five.

“There’s a hidden perk to the blade,” Pomp whispered to Erak.

“You’d have to increase your mental stats and Essence cultivation to pierce it though. Or strengthen me to the point I can break through the obscuring veil over it. Likely it’s possible that Sammus sees what it is, since he is of the correct bloodline,” Sammus’s words were so silent that even the prince’s delicate hearing didn’t alert him to their conversation.

Or at least Sammus didn’t give any indication that he had heard them speaking.

“Were there any other weapons?” Erak asked.

“None that I could see. At least not that aren’t purely ceremonial. Nothing above common.”

“Too bad,” Erak said as he began to backtrack towards the front entrance. He had a bag of fruit on his belt and his pockets were bulging with roasted nuts he had found in the pantry.

Sammus followed after and Erak left the abandoned estate, stepping out into the late afternoon light. Shadows were stretching out, the tall woods around them deeply obscured as sun set.

“Do you really want to go out into the woods as it gets dark? It would be better to wait inside of the estate until the sun rises and we can better see,” Sammus said.

“It would be safer in the sun,” Pomp said for Erak.

“Yes, that’s what I said,” Sammus said, confusedly.

“The beasts will be prowling in the night.”

“I believe this conversation is going around in circles,” Sammus said, sighing as he wiped at his face.

“We can’t level without the beasts. So we will be hunting the hunters at night. When they are out.” Pomp finished translation then looked at Erak and sighed, his breath cold and refreshing as it billowed into Erak’s helm.

“I somehow forgot you were insane. So be it, let us go and hunt the hunters in the dark.” Sammus dropped his two bags of loot, letting them land with a heavy jangle of metal and jewels as he tightened his sword belt.

He reached into a bag and searched around before pulling out a cloak with the Imperial sigil on it, donning it in one smooth motion. He struck a pose for Erak, smiling as sun finished setting and the purple dusk consumed the world.

“How do I look?”

Erak shook his head and barked a strangled laugh as he walked down the last steps and into the woods.