Ryder's eyes widened when he saw a familiar face as he and his dragons walked down the street of Oki. He hid his face and strode away as fast as he could, to the confusion of his companions.
“Hey, you! The one with dragons! Stop!”
"Fuck." He gritted his teeth and closed his eyes.
Green was the first to turn around. The one who shouted was a teenager, much like Ryder. However, unlike Ryder, who wore a casual apparel and the jacket he had arrived in this world with, the other teenager was clad in high-quality armor with a halberd strapped on his back. Around him stood three of his party members, though their equipment appeared to be of lower quality compared to his. One of the members, a red-skinned man, glared at Green, making the dragon look away like his rider did.
“Hmm, what’s this? An enemy of yours, Ryder?” Purple casually glanced back at the rapidly approaching blonde with a ponytail and scoffed at his stiff human companion.
“Ryder? Is it really you?” The knight was weirded out by Purple, but he still pushed forward and placed his hand on the dragon rider’s shoulder.
“N-no…? I ha-ave no idea w-who that is….!” Ryder deepened his voice and tried to play dumb. This made Brown, in human form, snorted and the knight laughed out loud.
“I almost didn't notice you because of your changed hair color, but your awkwardness is as recognizable as ever, Ryder. I can’t believe I missed seeing you.” The knight turned him around and hugged as tightly as he could. Ryder tried and failed to squirm his way out. “I’m soooo glad I stumble upon a familiar face, even if it’s you.” The knight then left the hug with a bright smile.
Purple grinned with amusement while Green hid behind his rider, still avoiding the scary red-skinned man.
Ryder sighed and greeted back, “It’s good to see you too, Elizabeth--”
“Ah, about my name. Don’t call me Elizabeth anymore. I’m Andrew now, remember that~”
The dragon rider froze. His shock gradually turned to confusion, which then transformed into animosity as he pulled Andrew's hand from his shoulder.
“I see. If there’s nothing else, Andrew, I will take my leave.” Ryder turned around and attempted to leave.
“Come on, Ryder~ Let’s hang out for a bit! I wanna know how have you been! And I’m curious--” He grabbed on to Ryder’s shoulder again, but his hand was violently pushed off.
“I said,” The dragon rider temporarily manifested his draconic eye and glared back. “I will take my leave now.”
The knight recoiled slightly. Despite Ryder's rudeness, he still spoke in a friendly tone. “Then, at the very least, let’s exchange address cards. You have one, right?” He removed a seemingly ordinary white card from his pocket and handed it to his friend.
The rider glanced at the card for a couple of seconds, sighed, and pulled one out from his waist bag, exchanging it with the blonde.
“See you soon, Ryder. Or whenever you want to meet.” He turned on his heel and returned to his companions, leaving a bitter dragon rider behind.
X
"Care to share your story with princess charming back there?" Purple asked mockingly, while the flapping of his wings lifted him and kept him hovering in the air.
Ryder shot him a dirty look and readjusted his sitting posture on the top of a tree. “First, why do you care? Second, not ‘princess’. Andrew is a man, and as much as I hate him, I refuse to stoop to his level.”
“‘Care’? My, you think too highly of me, Ryder. Nothing amuses me more than petty mortal quarrels. It’s my favorite pastime.”
The human broke off a branch and threw it at Purple, who easily dodged it. “However, I do find it intriguing that you insist on calling that mortal reeked with female scent a ‘man’. Was 'he' cursed to be a woman? Your ‘refusal’ to stoop to her level is curious as well.” The purple dragon stopped flapping and lay down in the air, showing off his mastery over gravity and wind magic.
“Just leave me alone. I don't want to talk right now.” The teenager turned to stare at the city’s massive walls in the distance again.
Purple tilted his head back, contemplating for a few seconds, before floating downward and landed on their camp. The rider was slightly surprised that he wasn't pushed further for a comprehensive answer.
Ryder remained quiet, growing a small bush from the tree to block the setting sunlight. Deep within his heart, the seething fire didn't stop raging since the encounter in the afternoon. The past, as he ruminated on, only served as fuel to the flame. He thought about letting it go, but the idea was instantly charred. "How could he?" kept repeating like a broken record in his mind. Then, at the end of the record, the thought of forgiving the knight surfaced. Maybe he should be the bigger person and let it go. Maybe. Maybe. May-be. Maybeeee. Maybe….
He sighed, took out his phone, and checked if there was anything new to see in futility. Even though the internet connection was strong, the flow of time between the two worlds was vastly different. Barely a day had passed on Earth since he arrived here. He could message his friends and family, sure, but the reply often only came after a couple of weeks in this other world, if he was lucky. Thankfully, access to YouTube and manga websites were not limited by the time dilation. His phone was the only thing that kept his sanity in check whenever a visceral sense of loneliness prowled into his heart and ravaged it. It was why he couldn't help but feel a sense of relief wash over him once his fiery emotions died down. He knew he wasn’t the only Earthling wandering around, but meeting one that he recognized laid his fear to rest. Despite his hatred for the person now known as Andrew, he was still glad they met.
Green growled for him from below. He shook his head, trying to ignore the conflicting emotions battling within him, and descended from the tree. The phone was tucked into his pocket as protective vines wrapped it tightly before he washed his hand to start preparing dinner. The green dragon sensed his partner’s feelings and tried to lift his spirit up while the other two waited for their meal.
X
Brown finished washing the dishes and pots before reverting back to her dragon form and rest. As for Purple, he burped loudly without a care in the world, deactivated his gravity magic, and fell backward, making a Purple-shaped hole in the ground before sleeping. Green accompanied Ryder to an elevated ground, both sitting against each other and gazing at the heavily fortified entrance of the city. The road leading to the entrance was occupied by a long line of people, illuminated by large fire torches on both sides. There were guards stationed at the gates, and a few were lackadaisically checking the visitors’ papers and their carriages.
“What about that one, Green? I think it’s...a male….halfling? Definitely an adventurer, even if his armor looks shabby.” Ryder rubbed his draconic eyes after putting out his jury.
A small, undistinguishable bulb popped back up onto the ground at the side of the road before returning to the underground. Green nodded proudly, leading to his rider pumping his fist.
“Okay, last one in the line. Uhmmm, kobold? From the horns, I’d say it’s female…? Hmmm, could be a mage or a merchant with her robe. I'll go with... mage.” The human blinked rapidly before his eyes turned back to normal due to exhaustion.
The bulb popped out from the ground again. This time, however, before it could retract back to the ground, someone jumped toward it, grabbed it, and tore it off from its stem. This made Green growled in pain and retracted his vines from the ground.
“What happened Green? Are you alright?” Ryder comforted him while examining his torn vine.
Green smiled and waved his paw to show that he was fine, which was then followed by a snarl to let his rider know what happened.
“Someone noticed your bulb? How? It’s so dark outside.” The human reactivated his draconic eyes, causing him to wince slightly, and tried to spot the bastard who hurt his companion. He was able to make out a pair of feline ears and tail on a humanoid. Their slim physique suggested that they're a woman. The kobold nearby stared at her as she resumed digging the hole the bulb was previously been at.
“Wait a minute, I think I've seen her before. Isn't she--”
Andrew showed up right on time with the rest of his party and promptly questioned the catgirl.
"What the hell are he and his clowns doing here?" Ryder pondered as the party then returned to the way they came, which was the city gate, and stopped by a caravan with a bunch of hooded people. Unease was slipping into the human's mind as Andrew’s party initiated a conversation with them. Just as he thought nothing was going to happen and was about to return to the camp with Green, the carriage exploded. There were even more hooded figures hiding inside, and some swiftly escaped in different directions. This caused the entire line of people to panic as they scrambled to avoid the battle that had commenced between Andrew's party and the hooded figures.
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Initially, he didn't want to join the fight because, regardless of his distaste for his former classmate, Andrew and his party were handling the situation well. None of the hooded figures were attacking the civilians too, so it was just a contained scuffle. However, he swiftly changed his mind when he noticed a hooded figure, who had been hiding in the carriage, flee with a pink, glowing vase in their hands when the knight and his comrades were distracted. After mounting on Green, the dragon, also aware of the situation, raced down the hill.
“Does no one in his stupid group noticed someone is carrying a Lure?!” He clamored as the hooded figure with the vase was on the verge of escaping amidst the chaos.
One of Andrew’s companions, the red-skinned man, spotted the hooded figure and chased after them. The Lure was large and heavy, thus it impeded the hooded figure’s departure and lead to their capture. However, things took a turn for the worse when the red-skinned man pushed the hooded figure down, causing the vase to break into pieces as it fell to the ground. The sound of the smashed lure attracted all the hooded figures' attention. A moment later, all of them immediately abandoned the fight and sprinted away as fast as they could. The only exception was the one holding the Lure because they had been knocked out and detained by the red-skinned man.
“What the bloody hell are you doing, Andrew?!” Ryder exclaimed as Green skidded and planted his feet in front of the knight. The rider pointed at the broken Lure. “Why is your priority not preventing the Lure from breaking?!”
“What are you talking about, Ryder? What are you even doing here?” Andrew replied with furrowed eyebrows.
“Argh, forget it! Does anyone in your party know how to use holy magic? We don’t have much time left!”
“I do, Dragon Rider. I'm a priestess,” Andrew’s last companion, a fair-skinned woman with horns, replied.
“Okay, great, please go to the Lure and cast 'Halo' around it before purifying the damn thing! I know it sounds odd, but you have to trust me, okay? Now go!”
She nodded and was about to leave, but was stalled by Andrew as he stretched his arm. “What are you trying to do, Ryder? What is this about?”
“Are you-- Goddammit! This place is going to be swarmed with monsters any second now! I can answer your stupid questions after we’re safe! Now move it, priestess! I’ll head to the gate to protect the civilians and guards! You and your friends just need to make sure she isn't interrupted!”
The knight nodded reluctantly before trotting in the direction of the Lure with his party. As for Ryder, it took only a few seconds for his dragon to arrive at the commotion in front of the gate. All the visitors were shouting and demanding to be let in while the guards were panicking, not knowing how to handle the madness.
“H-halt!” A guard aimed his spear at Green, stopping the dragon dead in his tracks.
“You need to let them in right now! A horde of monsters is going to arrive soon!”
“W-what--”
Suddenly, a small creature howled before pouncing at that very guard with bared fangs. Green swiftly slapped the creature away. The crowd grew even more chaotic as they saw more monsters howling at the edge of the illuminated path.
“Let them in and close the gate NOW! You can investigate them afterwards!”
“W-we can’t! The captain said-”
“WHO GIVES A SHIT! JUST GO IN AND YOU CAN BITCH ABOUT IT IF YOU’RE STILL ALIVE!”
The guard bit his lips and relented. He ordered his colleagues to let everyone in and shut the gates afterward. However, the order came too late as a wave of monsters flooded the area.
“Green, once the gate closed, build a wall in front of it. I’ll call Brown.”
Green nodded and sprouted twirling trunks from the ground to form a wooden dome.
“Brown, someone broke a Lure. There’s a group of people protecting a priestess trying to purify it. Protect them.” Ryder telepathically ordered. Then he smashed his draconic arm into the ground and transformed a small portion of the grassy field next to the path into a pool of mud. Smaller monsters were successfully trapped, but the stronger ones simply ran around or leaped over it.
He removed his sword from the sheath hanging by his hips while draconic scales and plates rapidly enveloped his entire body, starting from both of his arms. For the monsters in the distance, he raised his left arm and fired green projectiles at them. Once the projectiles were successfully stuck to their bodies, it began sucking the water content of the monsters and grew at astonishing speed. Seconds later, the monsters were completely bound by vines and fell to the ground. As for the ones that assaulted Ryder head on, he coated his sword with paralyzing spore before slashing them lightly.
"Watch out!"
Upon hearing the shout from behind him, he turned back and saw a wolf-like creature sprung in his direction. Right as the rider cursed under his breath for not having enough time to dodge, an arrow was shot through its skull, hurling its body a few centimeters away. The guard from before approached him with a dozen of his comrades. "We'll take care of the left, Dragon Rider. You just focus on the right." Ryder nodded and called out to Green to join him.
Back at the Lure, exhaustion was catching up with Andrew's party as they struggled against the endless onslaught of monsters. Sure, most of them were easy to defeat, but there were just too many of them to deal with at once. When one of them managed to land a bite on the knight's arm, anxiety began creeping into his mind. The priestess, on the other hand, full of confidence that her companions would protect her, remained calm as the Lure’s content, a puddle of pink liquid, slowly but surely lost its brightness. A cloud of pink gas was released continuously throughout the process, but thanks to the ring of light around it, it couldn't escape as it diffused into nothingness.
“How much longer, Sera?!” Andrew activated his magic skill, that, upon thrusting his halberd forward, created an impaling shockwave, sending the assaulting monsters flying away.
“A few more minutes.” She informed as the color of the Lure had faded significantly.
Out of nowhere, a large brown dragon crashed into the monster horde and flooded them with sticky mud. The red-skinned man flared up when he saw the dragon and charged toward her with his sword. Brown noticed him in her peripheral and spitted out a ball of sticky mud on his legs. The man was instantly immobilized and fell flat on the ground, causing the others to become apprehensive. The earth-dragon shot them an uninterested look before engaging with the rampaging monsters. That was enough of a sign for the group to understand she was on their side. The red-skinned man, however, still screamed obscenities at her.
What felt like hours later, the Lure finally lost all its color. When the creatures snapped out of their trance, they promptly escaped back to where they came. Andrew tore off the sticky mud while the catgirl sat down with a sigh of relief. With the crisis averted, the brown dragon returned to the camp once she reported telepathically to Ryder that the purification was a success.
Back at the gates, Green untangled the dome he worked hard to build, while Ryder unequipped his armor. The duo met up, gave each other an exhausted smile, and sat their backs against each other. The guards thanked them profusely before celebrating loudly with their comrades.
“Heyyyy! Ryder!”
Andrew waved at his former classmate once his party had gotten close enough. The red-skinned man glared at Green with contempt while carrying the unconscious hooded figure. Green could definitely tell he had some gripe with dragons, and he was desperately trying to ignore the man.
“How do you not know what a Lure is? Or is your mission not defeating Moros' forces?” Ryder asked when the blonde stood before him.
“Duh, of course my mission is to battle against Moros and his cronies. What does the Lure have to do with this?” He crossed his arms.
“Don't you know Moros' underlings use Lure to cause chaos? Why were you looking for the hooded figures, then?”
“Really?! I've never seen one before. We were told that there is an important cargo on the carriage, something that the bad guys were trying to use in order to do more bad stuff. We were supposed to escort the carriage peacefully back to the cas- I mean, the client's place. If they refuse to obey, we’re allowed to seize the carriage and capture one of them for interrogation. I guess it’s safe to say that the ‘Lure’ thing you mentioned is the cargo. At least it couldn’t be used to cause any more trouble!”
Ryder sighed and stood up. “Next time, when you see a Lure, make sure it doesn't break or have its lid opened. If this had happened in an area with dangerous monsters, many people would've died. Got it?” He then hitched himself up to Green’s back.
“Wait! There’s one more thing I want to say, Ryder.”
The dragon rider stared at the knight impatiently.
“No matter what happened before we came here, let’s forget about it, okay? You probably want to return home as well, and we stand a better chance defeating Moros' army by working together instead of being angry at each other.”
Ryder considered his proposal and was almost ready to accept it.
“Let’s just forget about the bad stuff you did to me before, and you forget the bad stuff I might have done in the past! Deal?” Andrew stretched his hands out with a smile.
His right eye twitched. “Might have? You have no clue why I was angry at you, didn’t you?”
“Not really? Come on, it’s not like you never did anything bad to me. Like that play. Let’s just forgive and forget, yeah?”
He gritted his teeth and scowled as his eyes widened. “Are you being serious right now? We would have failed our subject! You do realize that, even if I wasn’t the one asking you to replace your friend that day, someone else would! Plus! You were supposed to play that role before you asked your friend to take over!”
Andrew furrowed his eyebrows and started shouting back, “Hey! I already said that I’m willing to forgive you! Why do you have to bring it all back up? Can’t you just get over yourself?”
Ryder scoffed in spite. “I don’t want to hear that from someone who is incapable of remembering the wrong he did to others.”
“You’re really stubborn, you know that?! You’re so narcissistic!”
“Fuck you. You seem so happy to be your true self here, so why not just stay in this world forever?!” He then relayed a telepathic order to Green before the dragon leaped away.
“You’re a real big meanie head, you know that, Ryder?! A big fat meanie!!”
The duo ignored Andrew as the catgirl and red-skinned man consoled him. The priestess simply stared at Ryder until he fully disappeared into the night.
Once they made it back to the camp, Green growled gently and patted his partner's back with his vines to comfort him. He cursed himself in his mind for being unable to master the art of shape-shifting.
Ryder kicked the ground with bitter anger. He couldn’t tell which possibility infuriates him more: Andrew lying about not remembering or that he genuinely could not remember. There was a burning desire in his throat to scream at the top of his lungs and fling slurs at his former classmate. However, if he did that, he'd be no different from the hypocrite he was angry at.
“It appears that I have missed out on another one of your mortal bickering.” Purple raised from his earthly bed and grinned. Green growled with hostility, but the older dragon wasn't fazed by the younger dragon's attempt to stop him from stirring Ryder’s emotions further.
“Say another word, and you'll eat your meat raw for the entire week,” Ryder pointed at Purple with bulging veins at his temple.
“My, my, someone had their button pushed. This is uncharacteristically childish of you, Ryder, to be so obsessed with another mortal’s flaw. Are the mortals back in your world so ruled by irrationality? So strong that I could perceive it through our telepathic link?”
“I don't want to hear that from you! You don’t know anything!”
“Is that so? Then perhaps you should re-evaluate your capability as a dragon rider. After all, aren’t they supposed to understand and be understood by their dragons?” Purple mocked as he laid his body down and slept.
Ryder gritted his teeth, but found himself unable to rebut his sharp-tongued companion. Like a deflated balloon, he crashed down next to the campfire and pulled out his phone. Green shuffled to his rider's back, sat, and nuzzled. The human smiled dryly and patted the dragon. He then laid his back against his scaly friend and watched YouTube videos with his earphones.