On the way down to the docks Kaden couldn’t resist a pass by the bay where their ships moored. Workers already unloaded heavy crates, one at a time, from the Child, while guards stood on the second, spears ready.
“We came here on that one,” Kaden said. “And I came on a schooner. It’s the dry dock over—” He forgot what to say next. His schooner, his beautiful schooner, stood ten feet off the ground, the keel blocked up and with pillars holding it upright. And the ship was a seleton, ribs and keel and cross members but almost no hull except for random strips.
Not random, those were the repair pieces Kaden had hammered on.
“You won’t be sailing on that for a bit,” The [Harvester] said. “You got a [Taming] skill? We can use that. Everyone on this will have [Taming] but it’s not for the drakons. It’s for the eggs.”
Eggs did not—and could not—be tamed, in Kaden’s experience, but his fingers tingled and Kaden couldn’t wait to see the beasts. And tame them. And probably feed them. And maybe ride one.
They boarded a low, skinny ship with a no mast or crew quarters. A Cultivator stood at the back, bracing himself. Kaden arrived almost last, and workers loaded trays of eggs onto the ship.
Not just chicken eggs, but racks of quail eggs, leathery eggs that might have been croccodile and what Kaden deeply feared would be [Terror Bird] eggs. Would his binding skill work on these creatures? Kaden had no idea but looked forward to trying it.
The [Harvester] who’d come to get Kaden stood up at the front of the boat. “Thank you all for volunteering. Your pay bonuses will be based on how many of the eggs we retrieve. If you know any of the survivors from the last expedition, ignore everything they said, it’s all lies.”
A man at the front raised his hand. “My brother says they were swarmed by Drakons on arrival. That the ship never made it into the underground tunnels. And that men were left behind.”
“I’m sure that’s an exaggeration. I don’t know your brother, you probably don’t know him as well as you think,” the [Harvester] replied. “Regardless, the plan is the same. Underground caves. The network of caves connects to each nest site. The racks keep the eggs so close to the bottom of the nest they get enveloped by the chi of the drakons.”
A woman beside him pointed to a tray. “You work in teams. Carry a new tray in, pull the existing tray, load the new ones. Retreat and repeat. If you have to choose, you take the smallest eggs. Do not, under any circumstances, take a Drakon egg. If the parents don’t kill you, I will.”
The [Harvester] pointed to Kaden. “He’s a guest, but word is he killed ten Fiery Dawn assassins last night. So if you think you can handle me or Cho, ask yourself if you can survive him.”
The boat lurched as the Cultivator used a technique that blasted water from the ocean, striking his outstretched palm. At first, it moved slowly, then picked up speed as it crossed the smooth bay.
Wide metal gates swung back just enough for their ship to pass—then snapped shut with a spray of saltwater as the ship turned and picked up speed, skirting the line of the coast. Kaden smiled and watched the water, drinking in everything.
Including the converations [Multispeak] translated. These men reminded him of the Pest Patrol he’d worked with. They were taking on dangerous work for pay, and for them, this was no adventure.
He stretched and walked to the front of the ship, matching the rise and fall of waves. The spray of seafoam as the cultivator drove them at inhuman speeds. In the distance, the remains of a statue several hundred feet tall stood The head had split in half, leaving only one eye, and one arm was sheared at the shoulde, the other at the elbow. The ship gave it a wide bearth.
Kaden’s heart skipped a beat as the statue turned, watching them go. The island stretched on, but now, in the distance, cloudy shaped betrayed even larger ones. The ship groaned and leaned, as it turned away, heading out further into the ocean.
The sun rose higher and higher before Kaden squinted. Yes, a storm boiled on the horizon, but beneath it lay an island, barren and rocky. And above it flew drakons. Wyverns, he noted. Professor Treadle had been quite clear, dragons had four or six legs, drakes two, with stubby claw hands and short necks with wide heads. Wyverns stood on two legs with only a single claw at the far edge of their wings, and long, supple necks that moved like Trinity’s serpentine head.
[Beast Knowledge] offered no insight, but Kaden recognize the similarities between Lashkivores and Wyverns. Wyverns had no razor-whip tail, but the body shape, the head, the wings and claws, all brought back memories of the Lashes. When perched on the rocks, they wrapped their wings around themselves, a perfect shield from ocean wind or spray.
Hundreds upon hundreds filled the skies, and their clacking, rattling calls filled the air.
“Hold on, we’re heading for the caves!” the [Harvester] called. The ship gurgled and water cascaded over the sides as it sank lower and lower. Now Kaden understood why there wasn’t a mast on the ship. It would never have survived. The waves receded, the water itself lowered, and the ship slipped into a hidden cave in the island. The world went dark, and the ship stopped, rising higher as the Cultivator willed the water out.
Lanterns lit at the edges of the boat, and the Harvester lead the way. “Ramp’s here. Get out, get a lantern stick for each of you. Stay with your partner.”
He settled them all, then came up the ramp to Kaden. “The pathways are lit. You can get so close you can touch a Draken. Do not take their eggs.”
“I wouldn’t. Wyvern eggs need an alternating cycle of heat and cold to develop, which they get out here. You can’t just sit on one and hope it hatches.” Kaden raised and lowered alternate hands to show the cycle. “You said I could help with my taming abilities. What did you want tamed?”
“If any hatch when we leave, taming keeps them aboard the ship,” the Harvester said. “The caves were tunneled over hundreds of years to let us get as close as possible to the Draken nests. It’s truly a wonderful system that lets us create mana infused beasts.”
Kaden headed off into the caverns, filled with excitement. Waves shook the island and thunder echoed from outside. The first branch led him through a lower tunnel to a round room flooded with weak daylight.
Rain dripped down through metal bars that covered a hole in the rock. Above the bars sat a cluster of eighteen dark green eggs. A draken perched on the grate, spreading its wings over the eggs and radiating green light that bathed its eggs. The waves of green continued down to racks of eggs sealed in crystal boxes.
It would be something to try and replicate.
Kaden stood on tip-toes and reached out to brush the edge of a wing.
You have bound a beast (Life Wyvern).
Name Life Wyvern? (Y/N).
Kaden declined. This one had eggs to care for and he wouldn’t risk upsetting that. Instead, he moved on, pausing to wait for workers to pass carrying racks of eggs that gave off a yellow glow.
Fire wyverns rained down ash, while the ice wyverns had frozen their grate solid, and the yellow was solar. Kaden drank it in, the warm yellow reacting with the scale on his hand Suridev had granted him.
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The dragon had said he was proud of what the scale did, and yet Kaden hadn’t figured it out. The mana clearly resonated with the scale, but it didn’t do anything that Kaden could identify.
He moved on, spending hours to move cave to cave without disrupting the workers, and taming wyvern after wyvern and releasing them. He continued to follow the pattern on the floor lights—until he reached a branch that wasn’t lit. The floor lamps bypassed it entirely, but Kaden stepped past them, walking past rivers of rain that sloshed over his boots as he climbed up. Wind whistled past rocks and the daylight—what daylight there was—was dim. The iron grate was corroded and bent, but it still supported a clutch of eggs under a violet wyvern with specks of black in its scales.
Kaden crept up, careful not to disturb the nest.
You have entered a field of destruction. You will take continuous damage.
Before he took one more step, Kaden pulled Burny into his soul. Destruction was definitely not a mana type. Probably. This seemed to be a skill or aura, and that knowledge lead Kaden to the next terrible discovery. Beneath the grate, a field of egg shards rested, built up over years.
Not just shells, bones and teeth revealed the terrible truth. Any egg that survived the mother’s aura would be crippled by it during hatching. The skeletons below were malformed. Some blind, some wingless.
Kaden reached up, ignoring the way his heath began to drain, and bound the wyvern.
Then focused on [Beast Soul], sending a feeling of calm to go with the words. *Your hatchlings are dying.*
The mother shrieked—an entirely reasonable reaction to a stranger crawling into a hidden cave under your nest—and shifted so she could peer down through the grate.
Kaden wasn’t afraid. He sensed the concern, but it was as much for her offspring as it was for him. Wyverns were strangers to fearing anything. *Your eggs disintegrate, don’t they? Or they hatch deformed?*
The Wyvern gave a rising shriek, and passed memories the way Trinity once did. Almost all of its hatchlings had neither legs nor wings, resembling more than anything leggless alligators. Those who survived died within days as they couldn’t grow faster than the mother’s aura damaged them.
The problem was, this wasn’t a simple fix. The destruction aura did only what it was supposed to, and he was fairly sure that if the mother could have turned it off, she would have. Moving these eggs to another nest would only kill the other hatchlings and eventually the surrogate parents. And of course, he’d learned from Cloud how he wasn’t a substitute.
*Can you lessen the aura?* Kaden asked.
The wyvern growled. The aura surged to painful levels. It was supressing, this was actually weaker.
“I’m sorry.” Kaden spoke the words, letting [Beast Soul] translate. “There’s nothing I can do. If I save your eggs from you, I doom another. If you come find me, I might be able to hire a Vivomancer to figure something out, but your hatchings will have the same problem.”
The [Destruction Wyvern] as he’d called it, lowered its head. Then screamed in rage. With one blow, it smashed its own eggs, then took flight. Others begain to shriek and scream.
Kaden kneeled in the dirt, cradling the hatchlings that had slipped through the bars, slick with egg-water. They’d been so close to hatching, so very close. He activated [Soul Binding].
This is not a living beast.
It wasn’t, failing to draw a breath. Kaden went through them, one by one. Only the last responded to his warmth, pressing up against his side. Kaden sheltered it from the rain and triggered [Soul Binding].
You have bound a beast (Destruction Wyvern).
Name Destruction Wyvern? [Y/N]
Kaden pulled the beast into his soul, imaging a warm craggy rock where it would be safe. The corpses went into Inventory, along with all the eggshells and bones. He stood and returned to the center cavern. Workers ran everywhere, panicked.
“It got Jai!” One of them screamed.
“Quickly, move the eggs to the boat,” The Harvester shouted. “All eggs on the boat, stay on the boat with your eggs. Where’s the [Beast Master?]”
Kaden shouted down the hallway, “What’s going on? Why are people running?”
Before the Harvester could answer, another worker grabbed him. “The Fire Drakens have a place for Monitor Lizard eggs to be placed with the actual Wyvern eggs. My brother in law was placing them when the Draken swooped down and grabbed him.”
“Where?” Kaden followed as the man rushed to another cave, one Kaden hadn’t reached yet, and wouldn’t have spent time at, since it only had another [Fire Wyvern] nest. Sure enough, a molded stone staircase led up to a tight turn, keeping Wyverns out but letting skinny workers (and Kaden holding his breath) squeeze out.
A [Fire Wyvern] as tall as Kaden stood with a worker pinned under one foot. It opened slavering jaw to swallow.
“Stop!” Kaden shouted, focusing on [Beast Soul] and projecting the determination that this would not happen.
An axe split his skull as pain shot down his spine. The world turned gray and Kaden’s vision dimmed as he almost fell over.
The [Fire Wyvern]’s head swung around as it focused on Kaden. Evaluating if maybe it had found a better dinner. Kaden lunged forward at the same time it did, brushing his fingers against razer sharp teeth—and applied [Soul Binding].
Everything stopped.
The [Fire Wyvern] looked from Kaden to the worker. *Steal. Egg.*
Along with it came a memory. Kaden had underestimated these wyvern’s intelligence. This one was enlightened, and it knew. Knew that the weak men-things brought not-eggs to the nest. Knew that they took them.
Accepted that the not-eggs were the outermost, and if an egg-eater snuck in, the not-eggs would die first, protecting the real-eggs. In red-tinted vision, Kaden watched the happless man deposit a Monitor Lizard egg. Then, as he turned, one disappeared into Inventory.
“Eat him. Eat him slowly,” Kaden said.
The [Fire Wyvern] shrieked with delight.
“Unless.” Kaden stalked over to pin down the worker. “Give it back. Give it back now, and maybe I can convince her to let you go. Maybe she eats you anyway and I take it out of your corpse inventory.”
The worker’s teeth chattered and he wept. “I need it. I need the money. Lord Sato barely pays, even for dangerous work.”
He couldn’t believe anyone would be so greedy, but he could imagine desperation. “I’m trying to save you. A little help saving you would go a long way.”
“Let me stand up. You saw what she did to my hand?”
Kaden sent an image. An idea to the [Fire Wyvern]. The egg was gone right now, but it didn’t have to be. A maybe-egg was better than a no-egg. If she killed him, it was a no-egg, but Kaden might be able to help. The wyvern shifted, letting the worker stand and retreat. “I’ll be right back.”
Squeezing back through the gap took way longer, and by the time Kaden descended the stairs, the worker was nowhere in sight. But this was an island, and he knew where the boat was. He stalked down to the underground bay. “Give it back.”
“Too late for that.” The Harvester stood over a lifeless body, a firey red egg in hand. “I told him if he stole I’d kill him. And once you take them, the mothers won’t accept—hey!”
Kaden activated [Moment of Speed], snatching the egg. “Stay here. If I’m forced to swim back, I will and I will arrive in a really bad mood. Then, I’ll find you.”
He returned to the griffin nest and lead with the egg, holding it out before him as he returned. It took nothing to remove the binding once the egg was returned. “He’s dead.”
Gratitude would have been great.
Instead, the Wyvern screamed and snapped jaws at Kaden, pushing him away from the eggs. This was no display. [Split Second] activated on every lunge, and Kaden moved only back, only away, until he could step sideways into the rock, ignoring the flames that wreathed the wyvern.
Such amazing creatures. Not as powerful as a drake, only a ‘dragon’ in the sense they weren’t [Match Lizards,] but intelligent, enlightened, emotional. Kaden returned to the bay expecting the boat to be gone, but the workers still huddled there. The ache in his skull was steady, and would be for days, probably.
Back in the central cavern, workers had stripped the dead man of his clothes and posessions, but left the corpse in a puddle of water. Kaden shoveled it into Inventory and went to find the harvester back at the ship. “You.” Kaden said to the Harvester. “Did you get them all collected? Did you get them all exchanged?”
“No?” He spoke as a man afraid.
This was simply unacceptable, and no amoung of Skill Shock would stop him.. Kaden boarded the ship and picked up the entire stack of eggs. “Come with me.”
Cave by cave, they worked through the network, binding the wyverns and then working to remove the eggs. Some grates allowed wyverns to spit fire or acid or poisonous gas. Kaden handled those. Others just required the monstrous lizards to back away so workers didn’t panic. “Where’s the eggs for the [Destruction Wyvern? I wouldn’t bother if you have some, because anything you subject to that is going to die. Also she smashed her nest and left.”
“You can’t go in there. The aura will kill you. That’s thirty points of damage a minute,” one of the workers said.
Commoners. Kaden remember when thirty points was a serious wound. He couldn’t blame them for not wanting to die. “Is that everything?”
He’d made serious progress on unlocking another binding slot, found a different kind of wyvern, acquired a new problem, and generally speaking, enjoyed the day. Totally worth getting stabbed by an assassin.
“Let’s get the hell out of here,” the Harvester called.
Their cultivator moved carefully, approaching the mouth of the cavern. The sea water rushed out, taking with it the ship, which surged forward as the waves crashed back to the rocks.
Shouts of fear accompanied the frenzied rush of workers to the back of the ship. Because on the bow perched the [Destruction Wyvern]. It threw back its head and issued a scream, loosely translated by [Beast Soul] as *All right, you trash talking piece of shit, let’s see you say that without a rusted iron grate between us. Also, did you take all the corpses of my corroded unborn? Because that’s kind of weird.*
It was a loose translation.
What wasn’t a loose translation was the way she stalked forward across the deck. Straight at Kaden.