Tilly stood there dumbfounded for a moment as he tried to register what the Magnus had just said.
“So… what? That's it?”
Rulak looked away from the mists distractedly as if Tilly was interrupting something, “Oh, no. Not at all. I cannot pierce these magics, especially in the time frame you seem to be under, but you should be able to manage well enough on your own,” He said with a wink, before bending down and studying the exposed Scorch running under the dirt of the mountain.
Tilly straightened from his crouch, fighting not to show the frustration growing in his chest, “Wanna clue me in? I am kind of in a rush here.”
“Dear me, I am incorrigible aren't I?” The raptor muttered to himself with a chuckle, before looking up with a predatory smile, “That barrier is meant to keep out all those not aligned with dragonkind. I am not sure if it is here to make sure that this mountain is taken last of the six or if it serves some other purpose. Whatever the case, you should be able to gain entry through the first set of defenses by simply switching to the outfit I first met you in” he said, offhandedly tapping his staff against the exposed patch of dragon glass and beginning to mutter to himself.
As if eavesdropping on the conversation, his armor seamlessly shifted to its dragon skin suit and Tilly looked down before looking back up at the frustrating Magnus, “The first set of defenses? What about the second?”
“Ah, yes, I am afraid there is nothing anyone can do about those. They are temporal in nature and will result in the loss of some significant time from your perception outside of the barrier. If you destroy or deactivate the source, there should be an interesting balancing of the timelines. That is of course if you survive!” He added brightly, finally looking up from what he was doing on the ground, “I would love to witness something so novel.” He finished before turning back toward the Scorch and tapping the glass a few times with his staff, raising multi-colored sparks from the impact point as he watched on fascinated, almost immediately returning to muttering under his breath.
Tilly eyed the humanoid raptor for a long moment, taking his ease and general disinterest in Tilly's timeframe or well-being in stride. He felt like he wasn’t getting very much for bringing the Magnus through to what was apparently a very hard-to-reach location. Yet at the same time, the power before him more or less represented an almost mythical Faction, and he didn’t want to upset what seemed to be the beginnings of a working relationship.
“Look, I appreciate your time, but is there anything else you can offer me? I was hoping for a little more in exchange for access to this place…” Tilly said in a serious tone as he swept his arms open in a broad gesture, hoping to emphasize his contribution. Already some of the confidence from the armor set was leaking into his tone, and while he could feel the tear radiating discomfort deep in his center, outwardly, he felt noticeably better about his chances.
The First Magnus looked up again, answering with a tone that was absent any of the levity he had displayed earlier, “Your claim is your own, I will not sully it by tipping the balance one way or another. But I will say that this entire area has been set up as a confluence of Fate on a scale I have never before seen. If you survive your next encounter and lay claim to this place… I will offer further assistance in utilizing your new influence to its fullest. But make no mistake, I have offered you very valuable knowledge, and there remains no debt between us.”
Tilly held the Magnus’ reptilian gaze for a long moment, making sure not to back down from the shift in tone. Then in a polite voice, he replied, “That is very generous of you. I accept your offer of future assistance, and I will see you when I am done above.” He concluded with finality as if sealing a verbal contract. He made sure not to let any of his doubt show through his tone as he turned to face the mists again.
Either he was going to die, or he would meet the Magnus again from a place of strength.
With a final gesture of thanks to the wizard, who was already kneeling back down and pulling out a whirling metallic device from his robe, Tilly set off, back up the slope and into the mists, this time wearing his Draconic Emissary armor set.
Almost at the edge of his hearing, he caught the Magnus’s muttered reply, “See that you do, human. I much prefer you to the alternative.”
With those words behind him, and the mists parting before him in a way they hadn’t before, Tilly moved resolutely up the mountain.
‘Kindle, I don’t have much time to explain, but listen closely-’ He sent over the vast, but slowly shrinking distance of their stretched bond.
The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings.
…
Brokenridge Level ??? Heartsflame Dragon
The last hours had been the most humiliating of the dragon’s long life.
“Fight me you coward!” He roared again, straining against temporal bonds lashed around his soul. Everything but his voice had been sealed in a magic so thorough that it beggared belief.
“What need do I have to fight you when my superiority is so evident in this exchange?” His sire purred from his throne, an abomination formed of the bones of many of his brethren. Shining at the seat’s apex sat a gem of profound purity, seemingly made of crystalized air itself, and the source of his sire’s dishonorable advantage.
“It is our way!” Brokenridge roared, the light from another of his Mana Overcharges winking out as the stream of his strength flowed out from his body and into the complicated network of a Scorch working that radiated up from the ground unlike any he had ever seen.
“Our way?” The dragon king chuckled, “Am I not the apex of our kind? Whatever I choose becomes our way, not the other way around, whelp… Besides, who are you to sit in judgment over me? I am older than you can imagine. Do you think my nose cannot detect the changes your own Domain has undergone? Who are you to moan about un-draconic advantages, when you sit on that abomination of a Hoard!” He spat, purple flames leaking from between his ancient teeth as he shifted upon his seat of power in anger.
“You have placed your strength at the mercy of others, and at any moment, they could fail!” He roared, “No, it is far better that I take such things from the claws of those less worthy. It is my place to guard our strength, our pride… THAT is the Draconic way!”
Brokenridge flexed again, even more furious at himself than he was at his sire. He had plunged into the protections blind, wreathed in flame and fury, planning to test the sharpness of his claws and heat of his fire against the king of old.
But his sire had not been that king for a very long time. Not since he began taking tribute from the others instead of earning it by wing and fang. Not since he stopped leaving his throne to taste the glory of flight. Not since-
“Why?” He growled softly, his fury abating for the first time as the hopelessness of his predicament slowly settled into his awareness. The gem above his sire glowed brightly, and the Scorch enchantment running through the throne siphoned off some of its excess strength, empowering his sire’s transfigured Domain.
Brokenridge had trouble understanding much of what he saw crawling along the ground around him. It spoke of absolute domination, where time itself bowed to the whims of its master. The Scorch cracked and popped, radiating out an enchantment that was a cruel reflection of the once mighty king who sat at its center, grown fat in his power.
Now, Brokenridge bowed before that throne, an unwilling puppet of the powerful magics infused into this mountain, his strength slowly being leeched away by another’s modified Domain.
“Why, you ask?” His sire mocked gratingly, jowls pulling back to reveal rows of teeth the size of Brokenridge’s forearm, “Well it is a story that bears a remarkable resemblance to your own path-” as he answered, his voice grew furious, false levity falling away to revealing the ancient bitterness beneath, “I felt my people’s discontent, their weakness. They were ungrateful for what I had given up… You most of all! After your challenge, others followed, each one falling before my might. ‘Tyrant’ they called me…Ha! I was their protector! And this was how they wished to repay me?
“Well, you are not the only one who has drawn the eye of one of the First Watchers. Another came to me, one far superior to the little woman and her donkey. He told me of a way I could bind my people to me… forever. He read my fate as the keeper of our people’s strength and pride and I took his offered knowledge, achieving what no other dragon could.” He finished, his fury smoldering at the end of his speech as if the fuel his anger had given him was all but spent after the Epochs-long campaign against his own kind.
“And my broodmother?” Brokenridge asked quietly.
“I learned my lesson with you, whelp. Exile wasn’t enough. She is mine now… just like so many others.” He spat, his bitterness stoking his fury to flames once again as his whole body radiated with a dark purple light, reflecting ominously upon his throne of dragon bone in a sort of reverse shadow.
Brokenridge roared in renewed fury, the betrayal of all that he had known cutting him so deeply that something in him broke. The assurance that had marked him for so long, the confidence that he would be enough, that he could do what no other could and free his people… it shattered and his roar of outrage deepened into a bellow of loss at the price his people had paid for his sire’s folly.
“You have destroyed us… Much of the world has forgotten our strength, and the rest will pass away with you here, rotting away on this mountain.”
“So be it!” The huge dragon roared back through yellowed teeth, “You all made your choice, as did I. Those who have fled will return, as you did, and they will bow or be consumed!” He finished, his roar reaching up several octaves, revealing a desperation far surpassing Brokenridge’s own circumstance.
It was then that the younger dragon understood. His current captivity was a bondage far lighter than the one his sire had brought upon himself… He was more a prisoner than Brokenridge would ever be, and in his rejection of all others, he had sealed his fate more assuredly than any enchantment every would.
Brokenridge’s mournful roar broke off as he realized something… Something so terrible that it grated on him to even allow the thought to run through his mind.
‘I am utterly snared, if that human does not come to assist me… I am doomed.’ The thought was so audacious that he renewed his struggle against the invisible chains that bound him, desperately searching for a way out, one more time.
But, it was no use. There was no flex in his bonds, no weakness in his prison… and the more he struggled, the greater his sire’s drain on his strength became.
Brokenridge’s eyes narrowed at that realization and suddenly, he saw how the wily monarch before him had baited and drawn him into this long struggle, all to speed his demise.
“What is it, whelp? Finally showing me your belly?” The dragon king laughed, eyes alight with false cheer.
Brokenridge did not answer, relaxing his muscles for the first time since their confrontation and settling down into the snare, easing his struggle as he chose to do something that came so unnaturally to him: wait.
‘Fate has placed me in your hands, Billy. Do not dither in fulfilling your word to me…”