"What!?" She said it twice right to his face. She was heartbroken, she had put her trust in him for five seconds and he was already going to eat all the townsfolk! 'Bonk' "Ow! What was that for?"
"Don't jump to conclusions little miss." He scolded. "I said I was going to help and that is what I'm going to do. Now from the bit I saw of your memories I can tell that this country is rotting. You've never met a good official, gaurd, or noble for your entire life. They killed your family and chased you for their greed and pleasure. But they also run wholeheartily towards their deaths, no country can sustain that behaviour for long before it collapses.
Moca thought about it for a minute and couldn't help but agree. With the exception of family members, everyone was out for themselves, she had never seen any kind of orphanage, schools, or even gaurd posts. They only usually stopped people from getting in or out of a city. After that it was a free for all. Crime and poverty was rampant and disease was common. Only nobles got to go to private schools to learn math, fighting, or magic. It was a perpetual cycle that got worse as time and generations went on.
"But what are you going to do? As soon as you step into the city you'll cause a panic and people will die before they submit to you. It'll cause chaos far worse then the city lord could" She scrunched her nose at the large dragon, obviously doubting his means, but he just smiled and said.
"How do you think I've lived for so long without any tricks up my sleeve?" He then reared up on his haunches and outstretched one of his forelegs his scales glowed that familiar purple glow, signifying his magic, and in one quick motion he made a gash in his foreleg and let purple blood flow from the wound. It landed on the ground and started to conjeal in a strange lump. Needless to say, Moca panicked flailing her arms wildly and screaming. She eventually calmed down once the glow came back and sealed the wound, healing the scale. Then the Lump of blood started to glow a brighter purple and grew in size. gaining height until it was about 6,5 a full foot taller than her. As it slowly took shape she recognized a human Figure forming. It started to change color to a tan skin tone. Eventually it turned into a fully formed man with purple eyes, shoulder length purple hair and black fingernails, along with a chiseled jawline. The man really was ‘fully formed’ and once she looked down she yelped and turned around with a blush.
“Do you think the hair is too much? It might stand out after all.” He said as he combed back his hair with a hand.
“Put on some clothes, you idiot!” She yelled at him and turned around, accidentally getting another face full as she turned back, her head steaming.
“Oh, sorry. I forgot about those.” He said as he snapped his fingers and a black shirt and pants formed under a black hooded cape made from the same purple blood that made up his body. Curiously he had lost a half inch from the new clothes.
“Amazing…” She finally remembered how cool it was that a man formed from a dragon’s blood after the embarrassment had passed.
“Hmmm, you know your clothes are pretty torn as well would you mind if I made you some as well.” He said while he looked at her pants, cape and shirt. She had ran through the forest while trying to evade the slavers so she had made cuts, scrapes and scratches all over her body with massive rips in some places of her clothes and her hood that kept her pretty face hidden.
“No, no, no. I am not putting on blood clothes!” She shivered and held herself, moving away from Talavernax.
“Oh stop whining and just take a hood. I’ll get you a good pair of clothes once we get inside the town.” He said as he pulled her arm and forcefully put a materialized cloak on her shoulders. She screeched and shivered, trying to get it off but to no avail. It was clinging to her with force and she couldn’t budge it.
“What is this magic?” She asked, still pulling on the stubborn cloth.
“It’s simple blood manipulation. A branch of water magic that I’m guessing has been lost since you’re so shocked by all of it. Anyway you should know that this body is just a kind of golem with a connection to my mind. It’s easiest to make a golem with a part of myself rather than out of earth or ice or something else.” The golem was talking while showing his body moving around in strange ways, showing that it was just a puppet. “Anyway I’ll hide myself underground and let my body sleep until we need it and keep talking through this.” The ground started to rumble as Talavernax’s body began to sink into it using earth magic leaving only the end of his snout above ground, making it look like a rocky outcropping.
“You’re full of surprises aren’t you.” she said as she began to walk towards the town.
“One more thing.” He said holding up his hand to stop her. He put his palm to the ground and closed his eyes. Spreading his mana out and deep into the ground, after a while of waiting Moca was about to interrupt him until the earth began to shake uncontrollable. Trying to right herself, she watched awestruck as he began to pull gold, silver, and bronze colored ores from the ground. He had spread his mana through a massive area underground searching for small signatures of the specific kind of rock and then pulled them together. He then pressed the gold ore and silver or into small coins.
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“Have you any money on you?” He asked expecting the answer to be no. Once she shook her head he nodded and held up the bronze ore. “We’ll sell this, saying we mined it from the mountains to gain some coins. Then I’ll just counterfeit some. Money problems solved." He smiled. probably expecting to be praised.
She just sighed and motioned for him to get a move on. Nothing he could do now could amaze her. She had become surprisingly easygoing around him. It was probably due to the bond that he had made.
“Off we go then.” He followed close behind her; whistling a merry tune.
Once they got onto the main road it was already obvious how dilapidated everything was. The crops along the sides of the road were withered and decaying. Not enough rain had come in the season and the closest source of water was miles away. You could see a few farmers who were beyond malnourished and looked like the undead, working under the blazing sun trying their best to stop the decay, without any signs of success. There were a few poultry vegetables and bits of wheat that were left untouched and would undoubtedly be sold to aristocrats for little to nothing under pain of death by hanging instead of starvation.
After another hour of walking taking in the scenery of the farmers, who seemed to be left for dead, the two of them made their way to the front gate of the town. It was a wooden gate with two watchtowers with bowmen sitting atop them, mostly drinking atop them but always with a hand on their bow ready to kill for sport if anything fun happens. The wooden stakes that made up the wall were surrounding the entire town. Most of them in decay or just plain destroyed. Offering an easy way in for any would be criminals, but Moca and Nax decided to take the frontal approach.
“Halt!” The man held his hand out stopping the duo and gripping his spear. “What business do you have in Nern?” He shouted obviously trying to intimidate them.
“We came from the mountains, we’re here to sell some Bronze ore. May we pass?” Nax spoke cordially, Maybe too much so, Moca thought as the guard started sizing them up. Not much was visible but he could obviously see the curves of the women by the way he licked his lips.
“What mines do you speak of? I know of no bronze mines around these parts.” He snorted. “Show me this ore you have.” At that Talavernax pulled a piece of bronze ore the size of his fist out of his cape and showed it to the man. He was surprised at its purity it look like a shiny piece of ore not laced with crystals or other debris. Probably smelted previously. He smiled. “That’ll be a 50% tax on all goods that come in and out of the city.” Moca twitched at that. It was an astronomical number nobody would make any profit coming in or out of the city. What was the city lord thinking?
After giving over a chunk of bronze and being patted down by the guard who took the opportunity to grope Moca’s every corner, causing her to nearly lose it, they were finally let in. They asked for directions to the nearest smith to sell the ore to they found a shop called ‘the boots hammer’ and went inside. The place looked grimy and unkempt but the heat of the forge still filled the shop and sitting there hammering an iron sword was a dwarf. Probably the only dwarf in the city left that hadn’t been kidnapped and sold into slavery due to his usefulness to the town. But even this one looked malnourished, probably overworked from some unreasonable order from the lord of the town or another noble.
“Hello?” Nax said. Unsure if he could hear him over the fire.
“Leave the work orders there and get out.” the dwarf said dismissively.
“No. I’m not here for you to make something. I’m here to sell some ore.” Nax said, putting the bronze on the counter.
“Hmm, oh let me see here. Not many ores coming in these days.” The dwarf picked it up and peered at it through a small lens. “Very high purity!” He said astonished. “where did you get it?”
“From the ground.” Nax said nonchalantly. Shrugging of the answer
“Ah guess we need are secrets eh. I’ll give you a silver for it.” He said
Again Moca scrunched up her nose. That was pure bronze made by magic it would be at least 2 gold anywhere else. But before she could step up and talk Nax stopped her shoulder and signaled to her that it wasn’t worth it.
“We’ll take it.” He said and pocketed the silver and they left. It didn’t really matter since he now had the ability to make at least 500 of those coins but it still irked her.