Chapter Thirty One: The Vault of the Castle of Flowers

The king sat in front of the vault’s gold. He was in a room with his assistant and Redran. They were in a dungeon, deep under the Castle. He planned to spend it. He was drawing up a plan. Redran sat beside him, helping. His age had given him years of battle knowledge. They were planning to defend the castle from Batuuk.

Maps and charts were laid out.

“In one week, the assault will happen. We must have the men to defeat the orc.” The king said but half asked Redran.

“We will put up a very good fight. As long as we maintain our advantage. We have a castle built to sustain a siege. I was here when these bricks were carved and moved into place. The Castle of Flowers is a monument of death, and the flowers were planted over the graves of fallen enemies and fallen heroes. That’s the main reason they are here. Not for beauty. They are here to cover the bodies. We will survive any attack, as long as we maintain our advantage of high stone walls, with plenty of archers.” Redran said confidently.

“Please take this scroll to my captain.” The king asked his assistant.

The king and Redran were planning more defenses, steel wire traps and hidden archery nests, when the castle shook.

Redran and the king walked up the stairs slowly. The castle was rumbling above. They walked into the main hall, the throne room and stood by the throne. They watched as the dragon ripped open the throne room ceiling and stared at them.

It shook it’s head and started sniffing the ground. It sniffed more and more and broke the earth with it’s nose. It collapsed the floors beneath the castle and moved it’s snake-like neck further and further down. It reached the dungeon and smelled the gold.

Shiny. The dragon thought to himself. He reached down more and opened his jaw. He took a few bites of the ground, and continued to eat dirt and rock when the gold was all gone. Every single coin in the vault. The dragon’s neck retracted rapidly, and caused massive destruction. The dragon, a bit full from the dirt, felt a bit sleepy.

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Arrows pestered the dragon from all over the kingdom. The sky became dark with the amount of arrows. The dragon breathed fire for fifteen seconds over the kingdom, then became irritated.

“Home now,” The dragon said to himself. He was tired. He found a lot of shiny things. They tickled his throat. He felt happy. The dragon flew home. The King looked out over his destroyed throne room. The dungeon far below was open to the sky. He sat down. Redran started to run away, to speak to the guards and help those wounded in the fire.

The castle had been under attack for at least five minutes before it attacked the throne room. The walls were destroyed in sections. The city had been entirely flattened in some sections by the outer wall. Other parts were currently on fire. The castle was incredibly ruined.. The gate was bent, and opened halfway.

The flower fields were muddy with footprints the size of a house. The king went pale and sat on his throne. He pulled at his hair and punched the air in anger. He had a massive meltdown and threw his chair down into the void.

A few hours later, everyone had assembled. The fires had been extinguished by the water and fire magicians, and the city was quiet. The worst type of quiet.

The king emerged from the castle to find smouldering fires, and broken rubble in the streets.

The king noticed people had stopped talking and turned to see what he would say. He was their leader, after all.

“Does anyone have any ideas on how we can kill a dragon?” He asked meekly.

It was quiet for a long time.

“I will kill it,” One knight said, holding up his sword. “I will be the first man to kill a dragon.”

“Catapults.” One villager shouted.

“Burn it with whiskey!” A farmer shouted.

“Feed it and worship it like a god!” A drunk man shouted.

“Just get, like, fifty ice wizards and freeze its brain.” Nathaniel said quietly. The king heard it and his ears pricked up. He got goosebumps.

“My wife’s cooking.” Another villager said, which made everyone laugh.

“Fity Ice Wizards!” the king shouted. “And freeze the brain!” The king shouted, he ran back to the castle to plan a journey north, to the snowy mountains, where a large number of Ice Wizards lived.