As Kevin approached the village, the guards that had started towards him earlier never actually completely closed the distance. They followed from a distance. Some more guards had formed a small group ahead of him outside the town.

He was impressed; soldiers and guards were uncommon for small villages like this, not least because of the resources necessary to maintain a full time guard’s training, body, and gear. But then he realized that out in the wilderness, especially within the range of powerful monsters, maybe soldiers were a necessity. Still, he wondered how the villagers could survive in this area, guard or not guards.

The weirdos living in the village right by the dragon mountains were protected by some of the dragons that took pity on them. This village had no such protections.

He got his answer about this group’s survival a moment later when, behind the soldiers, approached six people that included a figure in a pointed hat—one of several traditional outfits for those skilled in the arcane. A mage. Without even asking any questions, Kevin was able to reason that the guards were more of an early warning system and maybe support for the magic users, who were the real defensive power of this settlement. It was strange that a village this small would have a mage, much less any more. And for the village to be protected around the clock, they'd have to have at least two, or at least he figured so.

So at least two mages? Wow.

"Greetings, traveler," said an older woman with a smile. The other villagers around her seemed to defer to her, even the mage, and she carried an aura of responsibility and command.

"Are you the mayor?" asked Kevin.

"You can think of me as such," said the woman. "My name is Frida. Welcome to our village. This is a free village built in a free territory. The laws in our village are simple: no murder, no stealing, nothing that you would not want done to you. Simple, huh?"

"That does sound simple," said Kevin. He waved at the number of guards and other village folk who were watching. "Does every visitor get a welcome like this?"

"Well, no," said Frida. "But, to be honest, you are the first person by themselves who has ever approached us from the direction of the Dragon Mountains. We do get occasional visitors, but they are usually envoys passing through to see the dragons, or peddlers passing by on their way to somewhere else, and …the Merovingians."

One of the other villagers spoke up, a middle-aged man with a bushy beard. "Calling those nutters by the name they want to be known as is far too much respect for them," he spat.

"Bartholomew, peace," said Frida. "We have a guest." The man glowered at nothing in particular and crossed his arms.

"Nutters?" said Kevin. "I think I know what village you might be talking about, but I only saw it from a distance. The dragon worshippers, right?" He thought it was weird enough that some lizard people worshiped dragons. But for a clan of humans to do so, and even offer sacrifices…The dragons that actually paid attention or cared thought it was bizarre.

A few of the guards began to mutter, and Frida blinked. "You were that deep into the dragon forest by yourself?"

"Well, yes," said Kevin.

The older woman eyed him up and down. "I don’t see any guild identifications on you, or anything to show your affiliations. When you approached, you did not announce yourself. Forgive me if I am wrong, but I do not think you are famous or have any impressive credentials. You are well built, but what you are saying is something I have never heard of anyone claim before, at least nobody who was not a famous adventurer or well known mage or warrior. After all, there are many powerful monsters in the dragon forest, and the sheer number of monsters is dangerous as well on its own. Some say that the same source of mana that caused the dragons to build their nests in those mountains also called to or sustained the high monster population."

Kevin didn't know anything about that, but it did sound somewhat plausible. He thought it was still unlikely, though, because there were other places in the world that had a far higher concentration of monsters and far more powerful monsters to boot. He kept his mouth shut, though. Maybe he’d ask his parents about it when he saw them again.

Frida eyed him speculatively. "I don't suppose you..." Her voice trailed off, and she continued again, sounding slightly nervous. "You wouldn't mind taking part in a polymorph test, would you?"

Kevin was shocked at the question, but he quickly understood the situation. He answered, "Not at all," and then smiled to show that he wasn't offended. The villagers around him visibly relaxed.

Internally, he was a little amused. The polymorph test was almost never suggested because, in order to suggest it in the first place, one would usually suspect that a person might actually be a dragon or some other powerful supernatural being. Among beings that could polymorph, almost all of them were far larger than a human, even the Rakshasa.

The polymorph test was a very simple spell. Almost any magic user could cast the polymorph test but it required the consent of the person it was being cast upon. As soon as it took hold, it made that person hungrier than they had ever been before in their life. They couldn't control it, and it would completely empty their stomach, even if they had eaten before. For a dragon or other similarly large being, this would result in them losing consciousness, being single-mindedly driven to find food, driven to eat far too much food for any normal human to ever consume. Even people that could enter into eating contests would still not come anywhere close to, for instance, a Rakshasa's appetite.

This story is posted elsewhere by the author. Help them out by reading the authentic version.

And if the polymorphed individual lost consciousness, or grew ravenously hungry and didn’t get new energy quickly, their polymorph would start to break.

Some of the villagers brought out some soup and mutton, which Kevin was happy to see. The soup, in particular, smelled delicious. It was about what a normal person would eat. These people were nervous, but at least they were not cruel. Sure enough, after that, the hat-wearing magic user politely asked, "Are you ready?"

"Go ahead," said Kevin.

She lowered a wand at him, and a spark jumped from the tip before hitting him in the chest. A few seconds later, he was absolutely starving and tucked into the food that had been laid before him with equal parts gusto and enjoyment. He knew that many people, not just supernatural beings but people in general, might be offended at a test like this, but he didn't mind. After all, his natural stomach was even smaller than a human's. And this was an opportunity for a free meal.

He figured the free food was only right. On this world, demanding this test from a stranger really could be considered rude.

Once he polished off all of the soup and the mutton, continuing to eat after he was full, he burped and rubbed his belly. "That was very good," he said.

"Thank you," said one of the guards. "My mother has been in charge of the never-ending soup this week."

Kevin nodded and then watched the townspeople all watch him. If he'd truly been a dragon, then he would have been struggling to control himself but eventually break under the pressure of the magically induced hunger. Kevin was very calm, though, so he took the opportunity to observe the people around him more closely. When he found some oddness, he wasn't exactly surprised.

For one thing, the guards' weapons were far too high quality to belong to low-level warriors out in the middle of nowhere like this. The ladies he could see, in particular, were wearing clothing that was far too nice for a random band of adventurous settlers. Plus, more importantly, they all looked nervous, but not…fearful for their lives. They didn’t seem at all like they were prepared for imminent death. If Kevin had been a dragon and he had transformed into his original form here, perhaps been so offended he’d gone on some sort of rampage, for anybody to feel confident enough to stop or delay such a thing would require a very large amount of magic, or a genius, or some sort of pre-planned defensive measures, or maybe all three.

These villagers were confident.

What he was gleaning from the attitudes of the people around him was that they were worried he might be a dragon, but not in mortal fear of it. It was still extremely interesting information.

Of course, they had no way to know that this test wouldn’t necessarily work on the most powerful dragons, or their progeny. It was a secret that dragons kept very well.

After a few minutes passed in somewhat uncomfortable silence, Frida sighed and said, "Thank you for enduring our rudeness, Kevin. You are free to enter our town. However, I will ask you politely to not spread word to the outside world of what you see inside."

"Oh, don't worry," said Kevin. "I can tell you all already have a lot of secrets. And I promise that if I venture farther into the world and find out that a noble house suddenly disappeared, I won't put two and two together, and I definitely won't tell anybody if I do." He winked at Frida, but the older woman stood stock still. She stared at him and did not seem even slightly amused.

"I applaud you for your cleverness," she said, "and if you had come from a different direction than deeper in the forest, this conversation might be different by now."

"Whoa, whoa, whoa," said Kevin. He held his hands up and noticed a few slight shifts in the weapons of the guards around him. Now that he had puzzled out what kind of people these townsfolk likely were, he wasn't surprised now to see the muscles underneath the clothing of the guards. After all, they probably weren't simple guards and were more likely either magical men-at-arms or full-blown knights, maybe even paladins.

"Would it help if I took an oath?" he said.

Frida blinked in surprise again. "You'd be willing to do so?"

"No problem," said Kevin. "I don't want any trouble, and I've been eating nothing but rations and monster meat around a fire for the last few days. That soup was really good, and I'd like more. And I can pay."

"Monster Meat," mused Frida. "Some of..."

Swearing on his mana had been good enough for Branch, but doing so here might give away information he didn’t want to. Better to use an oath to Haradrim. Kevin held his hand out at shoulder height, level with the ground. "God Haradrim, hear my words and judge over this oath." The air grew brighter around Kevin, and the surrounding people closed their fists and touched it to their heart in salute to the god's presence.

"I hold no malice towards these villagers, nor do I have any plans of telling others about their existence. This concludes my oath.” He dropped his hand.

"That's not good enough," said Frida. "I apologize, but intentions are not enough. Our village name is Great Hope, too."

"So be it," said Kevin. Luckily, divine contracts had been a robust area of his education growing up. There was no way that a layperson would have the knowledge to be proceeding as smoothly as he was, but he was dealing with nobles and they probably didn't even recognize this fact.

He raised his hand again and the light returned. Kevin said, "God Haradrim, I amend my previous contract to include that I will never knowingly betray these villagers of Great Hope, nor tell others of their presence for personal gain, and will only ever do so if I feel it is in their best interest. I wish for this addendum to be manifest if and when I conclude my plea."

"That's not good enough either," said Frida.

Kevin narrowed his eyes. He held his hand straight up to officially stall the contract process in the official way Haradrim accepted, and said, "Look, lady, I've been pretty nice about all of this now, not least of which because I appreciated the soup, but you're starting to cross the line. I have been accommodating and I think I've gone above and beyond to make you feel better. But if you press this any further, I'm not going to be happy. If I just walk away, with no oath, you’ll have to either kill me or deal with the fact that I know your secret and don’t have a leash."

He hadn't intended his voice to get too rough or to be too intimidating, but apparently, something about his posture or what he said made Frida and the people around her take him seriously. Then Kevin realized some of their reaction might be because the divine light remained. He was still under the God of Truth and Contracts' jurisdiction. That meant it was highly unlikely he could lie and get away with it. Of course, trying to use Haradrim’s light as a lie detector test was forbidden by the god. Good thing that hadn’t been Kevin’s intention.

"Then that is acceptable," said Frida.

"Good.” He held his hand at shoulder level again. “This concludes my addendum, and this concludes my oath." He dropped his hand. Just like that, the light disappeared. Kevin smiled. Contracts through Haradrim, only possible if made face to face with affected parties, and only possible if there was a witness, could be handy Most people didn’t use them, though. Breaking a contract through Haradrim could bring about swift and severe consequences. It usually cost a person something, too.

Luckily, in Kevin’s case, Haradrim already owed his parents so much, Kevin got free contracts for life.

"Welcome to our village, Kevin," Frida said in a more subdued voice than before. "I hope we can do some productive trading. Now please follow us to see the mayor."

“I thought you were the mayor.”

“No, I am the mayor’s aide. Again, please follow me.”

As he and a little delegation from the village walked towards the log walls, he overheard one of the guards whisper, "Who is he, do you think?"

The other guard said, "I don't know. I'm just glad he's being friendly again because my blood just went cold."

"Me too," said the other guard. "Frida should have known better than to keep pushing on somebody that walked out of the fucking dragon forest. Oh well, at least we know it's not a dragon."

"Even if he is, it doesn’t matter anymore. The oath honestly makes me feel better.”

Kevin felt offended by the guards' conversation but pretended he hadn't heard. He would demonstrate to everybody what a good neighbor he was once he started buying more provisions and eating delicious food. At least, he hoped the food was delicious. At least being better than what he had been eating wasn’t a high bar to clear.