Hearing my brother just be himself helped put me at ease, but I could still feel my heart racing from getting yelled at. My face didn’t feel right either, making an unfamiliar expression.
The commander turned back to me with a growl. “These are my men, and this is my castle, Don’t give orders here, you have no right.”
I raised my eyes again to check his stats again to make sure… They were more than befitting his status. He was better in every way. I had no doubts that even against Lu it would be a one-sided match. Although, out of the corner of my eye I realized my brother's stats had gone up significantly over the past few months. ‘I guess Lu beating him in that spar really bothered him quite a bit didn’t it.’ I chuckled, suddenly forgetting about everything else. ‘I guess any older brother must feel bad losing a fight to their younger sister.’
The commander growled and walked away. ‘I’m sure we’ll be hearing from him again…’
Airsidh flicked my forehead, forcing me to lift my head. “Eyes up. Let’s meet in the warm room, we can just follow him. I’m sure that’s where he’s going.”
I hesitantly listened, but found myself staying closer to him than usual as we walked past yet another host of strange faces, this time all unrelated to me… It was even more unsettling than before.
“If it bothers you that much I can carry you.”
“Still no teasing please…” I groaned. Even if my blood was calm it still seemed capable of flaring up… And I was already nervous, for all I knew that alone would trigger the dragon to start affecting my thoughts.
“Something to take your mind off it then? I’m curious, did you notice anything strange while we were fighting it?”
I thought back, relaxing more as my brain wandered elsewhere. “It didn’t bleed very much… Lu said it might just be normal for it though, but it seemed off. And… The smell… But, again I’m not sure if that’s normal or not.
He smirked. “Two for two. Remember that Kraken me and Zu killed?”
“Yeah.”
“It’s the same one.”
I stopped my feet in their tracks and felt another wave of chills run down my arms. “You don’t mean…”
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“Yup, zombie kraken, which means it’s not dead, and probably coming back tomorrow.”
I started walking again, catching up in pace. “And… We’ll be gone by then right?” ‘It’s not our problem…’
His grin grew wider. “I thought you wanted to kill it and see what it tasted like?”
“Please don’t make me eat a zombie…”
He laughed. “Of course not, but… We should help out while we're here. Speaking of which, we're here.” He walked in front holding the door for me and we entered the war room. From inside there, you couldn’t even tell only half the castle was left. Not only was everything still intact, but it remained in perfect condition, the tapestries were on uncracked walls and the furniture was positioned as you might expect, with a single large table in the middle not unlike our home town hall.
The commander took his seat at the head of the table behind a large thickened glass window and growled again, watching as I stepped into the room. “Well. I suppose the ignorant have to learn in order to improve…”
Several other men sat around the table as well, but I couldn’t help but notice the empty seats… ‘Casualties…’
Airsidh casually walked over and took a seat. “Come here. I’d like to hear what you come up with.”
I walked to the empty seat next to him but… “If I sit down I can’t actually see anything…” I muttered, standing on the wide chair instead and crossing my arms… Hoping it wasn’t too noticeable.
Of course, it was… But no one decided to comment on it at least and my brother quickly grabbed their attention. “Right then, shall we get to the point? That Kracken, how long has it been attacking, how many times, and what do we look like in terms of supplies.”
The commander sighed, pushing forward a map of the castle and rolling it out. “It’s attacked three times, the first was two days ago. Every time it comes back we suffer more casualties, so we're down to around 150 men. It attacks every 12 hours or so. We have whaling ships docked here, but they aren’t outfitted to take out a Kraken, they were designed to hunt smaller whales. Still, it can only lose so many limbs before it’s dead in the water… So we keep doing what we have been…” He stabbed a knife into the table, “and wait for it to bleed out...”
‘That’s not going to work though…’ I turned to Airsidh, waiting for him to explain, but he gestured for me to do it instead.
“Me? Do I have to…” ‘This guy hates me…’
He nodded.
‘You owe me for this…’ I took a deep breath, scratching my head as I started to feel my nerves build up again. ‘Come on…’ “That’s not going to work…” I muttered, clearing my throat. “The Kraken is undead, it’s not going to bleed out, and the only way to kill it is going to be the shatter its crystal, imobalising it isn’t a bad idea, leaving a rotting corpse in the river you fish out of doesn’t sound good either…”
The commander growled again. “It’s undead… And you’re sure…”
Airsidh nodded. “I’m the one that killed it the first time.”
A mix of shock, horror, and some kind of weird sense of honor covered their faces as they stared at him for a moment. “Ok, so how should we deal with this…”
I looked around the room, even with me and my brother taking up two of the chairs, three were left empty. No doubt whatever plan I came up with would only involve more casualties… “We could do the same thing… Wench it into the courtyard and fight it on the land, cut it up until we take its crystal or it can’t move anymore.” The surviving men looked around, knowing full well that a plan like that surely wouldn’t be the safest. “To minimize damage I could be down there with you, I can see manna crystals because of my eyes.” They all started staring at me again, still in complete silence.
“Nope.” My brother was leaning back in his chair with his eyes closed as if he was taking a nap. “Try again.”
‘What…’