Aurora had done it. She has successfully pulled off one of the biggest thefts in human history.
She had successfully stolen from the tower and walked away alive to tell the tale.
Aurora eyes the warm egg on her bed. The aura of contentment it gave off was getting stronger by the second.
“I just need to wait for Astoria to come back now. And then we can leave this place. But what should I do about Karan?”
Aurora was not sure how to proceed with the situation now.
It was true that she had attained their initial objective. They had successfully managed to snatch the egg.
But there was so much left to unpack as well.
Aurora did not get much further in her thoughts before the knock on the door stole her attention.
“System, scan the identity of the person outside the door.”
The sealing spell caused on the door made it impossible to tell who was visiting her right now.
(Scanning identity…..
The person identified as goddess Astoria…..)
Those words caused a wave of relief to wash over Aurora. Her hand loosened her grip on this handle and yanked it open.
“Hurry up and come inside.”
Aurora did not give Astoria a chance to brace herself before she yanked the elder inside.
The goddess looked a little disoriented at the suddenness of Aurora’s action but she adjusted pretty quickly.
“So, did you manage to get it? Where did you put it?”
Astoria did not need to specify what she was talking about. There was only one thing she could be referring to.
“It’s on the table. The tower really went through the grinder to keep it hidden. It was even under a powerful illusion.”
Seeing as how powerful the dragons were as a specie, it was no wonder that the tower went through hell to keep it a secret from the world.
If this egg ever happened to hatch, then a new dominant force would be born. And the proud gods could not allow that to happen.
Astoria moved closer to the egg and reached out to it using her magic. Aurora felt the careful balance of magic shift inside the room.
Everything seemed to be going extremely well. And that meant that something bad had to happen.
Two kinds of magic clashed and sparks flew all over the room. Aurora had to hold herself strong or she would have been blown away by the shockwave as well.
“What happened?”
Aurora’s question came out in a low and rasped voice. Her knees shook when she tried to stand straight and she was sure she had hurt something in her back.
It was a good thing her magic decided to accelerate her healing by quite a lot. Or the wounds on her face would have been difficult to explain in the morning.
And she was also sure that a lot of people would have taken this as an excuse and pin wrong accusations on her character.
“It rejected my magic. Dragons are quite territorial beasts so this is not a shock to see.”
Astoria made it sound like an everyday occurrence.
Had it not been for magic-canceling wards, the whole tower would have known who was behind this magical explosion.
“I should try again. Maybe I should even submit to it so that the baby inside the egg doesn’t see me as an enemy dragon.”
Astoria’s words made sense.
Sensing it again, Aurora could see why Astoria had reached that conclusion.
The stagnant magic in the air that belonged to Astoria felt similar to the unborn egg’s. Both lacked the divine attribute of the gods but possessed the chaos factor of the abyss.
“Maybe you should not. The egg was not hostile to my magic so maybe I should be the one to take care of it”
Aurora’s offer was genuine. She could feel the egg’s annoyance every time Astoria neared it. But the same did not happen to her when she tried to approach it.
“Maybe that will be for the best. I can see that the egg is sensitive to your magic. It’s very reminiscent of a high-level abyss beast. Maybe it recognizes you as a mother figure.”
Aurora wanted Astoria’s words to be a joke. She could not see herself as a mother figure to anyone, much less a recently hatched beast.
But it did make sense in a twisted way. Aurora had been the first magic the egg had felt outside of the tower’s own.
“Let’s not jump to conclusions. We have more important things to focus on.”
Aurora diverted the attention from the current awkward talk to the main focus of her call.
“I agree. This egg feels like it is about to hatch any day. We should take precautions against that.”
Astoria’s words were true enough. Aurora could feel how close the egg was to hatching. Her instincts told her that it could hatch any moment now.
But her memory was what held her back. As far as she remembered, no dragon had been deployed under the abyss banner.
No dragon had been killed by them either. (And she would have known if the tower had killed such a mighty beast. It would have been a bragging ground for them.)
So it was only logical to think that someone had swiped this incident under the rug in her last life.
Someone high enough to know where the egg was being kept and powerful enough to shut everyone’s mouth.
Someone like a god or a goddess. Or even the tower master.
“Should we leave the tower now? We have what we came here for.”
Aurora made that offer.
“Not now. I cannot ditch the conference tomorrow or it would raise a lot of questions. But we are free to leave after that. So all we have to do is to keep this egg a secret for one day.”
Aurora heard what Astoria was not telling.
The security was too tight for them to act right now. Guards were posted everywhere and it was impossible to even leave the room.
The explosion in the secret chamber must have caused a chain reaction. The tower would be desperate to look for traitors in their midst.
“I understand the reason. But will we be able to leave with the egg? It doesn’t like to stay in pocket dimensions. We will have to carry it out.”
Aurora offered the crucial information before it became too late to be of any use.
“You don’t need to worry about it. I will take care of things once the time comes. For now, just focus on getting past tomorrow.”
Aurora had no choice but to go with the flow. Since Astoria assured her that things would be taken care of, Aurora chose to believe her.
It was still early enough in the evening for people to be moving around. Astoria could not stay in the room any longer as well.
As a member of the cabinet, she had duties she had to see to. Aurora felt glad to not be part of such a busy world. She hated this kind of responsibility.
Astoria opened the door to leave the room but a smiling face greeted her back.
“Good evening Lady Astoria. I was not aware that you were friends with my esteemed friend here. Ah, but your relationship is something deeper right?”
Karan’s grinning face stood on the other side of the door. He tried to look past Astoria’s shoulder but the goddess stopped him cold.
“You need not concern yourself with my relationships, Lord Karan. Though I did happen to hear a nasty rumor about you and my dear escort. Tell me, were you bullying him?”
Lady Astoria’s decent mood seemed to be going down the drain by the second.
Tension was rising in the air faster than a bird could fly. And this was the moment Aurora decided to take action.
“Excuse me.”
She took Astoria’s hand in one hand and yanked on Karan’s hand with the other. And within seconds, the trio had disappeared from the hallway.
The guards stationed in the hallway surely got a few topics to gossip about that day.
“Hey, what’s the big deal? You could have been gentler with me.”
Karan complained as he rubbed his wrist in a mock of injury.
There was no way Aurora’s lack of strength had left a mark on his skin.
“I would like to know what is going on here as well. Do you happen to know this person Aura?”
Lady Astoria was still trying to keep up the charade of Aurora being a guy. She was performing admirably as well.
But it was time to bring the truth to light.
“Actually, there is one thing I would like to tell you Astoria. And it concerns Lord Karan here. You don’t mind if I tell her about it, right?”
Aurora asked, just to make sure that they were all on the same page. She would not want to make an enemy of a god so early.
“Yeah, sure. Go ahead. I don’t care about my secret.”
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