Chapter 103: Offering
Erani, the Dryad and I walked through the forest, looking for Drakes.
We knew that, in just a few hours, it was pretty unlikely we’d actually get enough Drake meat together to actually sate a Dragon’s appetite. Drakes were big, sure – head to tail, they were probably five, or even ten, paces long. But I’d just seen a Dragon up-close. And I could tell just how much it’d need to eat to actually be satisfied.
Still, I wasn’t too worried. Leaving out this offering wasn’t actually about giving something of significant value to the Dragon – it could easily kill a few Drakes. No, this was more about showing that we had friendly intentions. It’d at least be able to tell that for us, killing Drakes was difficult and dangerous, and if we were going out and doing that solely for its sake, we obviously respected it and wanted to help.
Thankfully, Index’s perfect memory of events helped us here, as well. It knew where and when we encountered Drakes in the past, so all we had to do was re-trace those same steps to find them again.
It could also tell us the general Levels of those Drakes, meaning we could ensure we never got into a fight we couldn’t win. And as long as we made sure we were prepared before each fight and didn’t fight them in bad circumstances like we did back on the cliff, we’d be fine.
We still didn’t tell the Dryad about Time Loop – we were under time pressure here, so it just wouldn’t make sense to stand around and explain this whole thing to her while I was trying to figure things out with Index, plan ahead for our encounter with the Dragon, or fight Drakes.
Instead, we just told her we’d changed our minds about the exact way we’d go about doing this. It wasn’t like we straight-up lied to her, though. I told her I found out some new information with one of my System abilities, and it didn’t seem like our old plan would work.
Honestly, she didn’t inquire much about how the System ability worked, so I didn’t even have to tell her anything untrue. Instead, she just asked what we’d be doing, and when she’d get to see the Dragon.
So that was how we spent our next three or so hours. Most of our time was just spent walking from place to place, with me making liberal use of Expedite to keep our pace up – I’d even started using two stacks of the Spell on myself and Erani while we were in flatter areas where we could afford to be a bit clumsy.
Because of my extreme rate of Mana regeneration, even if I started eating into my reserves from the usage of Expedite, it’d only take a bit of rest once we got to our destination before I was fully filled up and back in top shape, ready to fight.
First, we took on a Red Drake – those had access to fire magic. Some laymen got Red Drakes confused with Dragons; you’d often hear someone bragging about how they survived a Dragon attack, when in reality it was just that they’d gotten a bit too close to a Red Drake’s territory and it’d chased them off. But really, they were quite different.
Sure, they were both flying, scaled beasts that used fire, but that was where the similarities ended. Obviously, there was the difference in Level and Size, but Red Drakes also had completely different fire magic. They didn’t breathe fire by breathing out a massive, billowing cone that enveloped everything nearby in its intense inferno. Instead, they shot off concentrated balls that’d explode on impact. Really, it was quite similar to Erani’s Firebolt.
Red Drakes also had a few additional things that Dragons didn’t do. Their skin itself could heat up so much that it could melt steel – at least that was what I’d heard – and they could even start wildfires if they got too hot when in a dry area.
That heated skin ability really hurt my ability to take on the Drake we fought. While it at least didn’t inhibit Ray of Frost or Crippling Chill, it did completely destroy my ability to keep contact with Noxious Grasp. So I was demoted to long-range caster in that fight, taking potshots from afar, keeping curses active, and using Gravity Well to keep it grounded, while the Dryad took it on within melee range with her whip.
Still, despite my own troubles, Erani and the Dryad were just fine while taking it on. It had that Firebolt ability, but didn’t seem to be able to use it too often judging by our fight, so as long as Erani and I kept our distance, it couldn’t do much to hurt us.
In the end, I got 271 XP for my troubles, and we got a sizable corpse to offer the Dragon.
But we weren’t done. After killing the Red Drake, we left it where it was and went to find our next victim. I’d spoken with Index and asked it to look through its logs to specifically find a single area we passed through which held multiple close-by Drakes. So, once we killed the Red Drake, the next Drake was close enough for us to get to and kill relatively quickly.
This one was a White Drake, which used healing and buffs to keep itself strong. That meant it took longer to take down, but also had absolutely no way to attack at a long range. So for that fight, we took a more methodical approach. Sure, it had healing, but using that Healing cost Stamina – it was like my Regenerate Talent.
We kept it grounded with my debuffs, kept our distance from its powerful claw swipes and bites, and took our time to slowly exhaust it, killing it with relatively few complications. It took a few additional minutes, but taking a bit of extra time to kill it safely was much better than killing it recklessly, taking a bunch of damage, and requiring hours to regenerate that Health.
For the White Drake, I got another 289 XP.
After killing it, since it was close to where we killed the Red Drake, we grabbed it and began dragging the corpse back that way. My 17 in Strength helped a decent bit in this, and Expedite’s Dexterity boost helped us ensure we moved optimally, but really we wouldn’t have been able to move such a big creature without the Dryad.
Her Strength score was obviously much larger than mine. She was a melee-focused monster, so it made sense, but it was still a bit jarring to see someone with arms smaller than mine so much more capable of pulling so much weight. I knew she’d done things before like pulling me up a cliff with her whip, but that gap in Stats hadn’t ever been made as obvious as it was now.
After killing the White Drake, we still had a bit more time, and went out to kill one more. Thankfully, I’d asked Index to try its best to find an area with as many lower-Level Drakes around as possible, so we actually had a couple choices.
The nearest-by Drake was a Green Drake, so that was the one we went for. The fight with it went similarly to our previous fight with the acid-spewing type, except this time much easier, since we were the ones that chose the terrain.
The Dryad and I took turns alternating who was the main melee attacker, making sure the Drake couldn’t ever overwhelm either person with its pools of acid. And, since I kept draining its Stamina over the course of the fight, it could use that acid-throwing ability less and less as time went on.
And eventually, like all the others, it fell, earning me a sizable 334 XP. Out of the 1600 total I’d need to Level up, I was now at 1416 – it wouldn’t take much to get me to Level 17. Part of me wanted to push things and try to get one more Drake before the Dragon came, but I knew we didn’t have that much time – especially since we needed to get the actual offering set up. So after killing the Green Drake, we grabbed and began dragging it back to where we’d piled the first two.
By the time we got it back, it was about thirty minutes until the time the Dragon had come before, so we’d need to be ready by then.
Now that we had everything in the right place, it was time to actually construct the offering. None of us really knew what an ‘offering’ would entail, other than a bunch of stuff to give to the Dragon, but we all did our best to try and at least make everything look presentable.
We found a high-up plateau visible from the air and put the Drake corpses up there, arranging the bodies to look nice and symmetrical next to each other. The Drakes took up one side of the flat area, while we stood on the other. And with that, everything was set up.
I watched as the massive beast soared down from its mountain, going to attack the wall like it’d done before. On its way back up, it’d most likely see us.
“When is Dragon arriving?” The Dryad said.
“Soon. Why are you so eager to meet it?”
“Strong monster.”
“Yeah, I guess it can definitely do a lot for us. Still, I’d have assumed you’d be more afraid and less eager. I sure as hells am more than a bit anxious about talking to the thing.”
I got the impression from her of a mental shrug. “It is just a wilderness creature.”
“Yeah, a wilderness creature that could kill you in an instant.” I knew it could, too. I’d just seen it, about four hours ago. Or, depending on how you counted, in about three minutes.
“How do Humans say… it is risk and reward. I am confident that risk is low because of plan. Am also confident that reward is high.”
I just shook my head. Seemed like she was confident in this Dragon’s ability to help us take down the wall. I supposed that was a good thing, so I didn’t need to go convincing her otherwise.
“So we’re just waiting for the Dragon to come?” Erani asked me. “When is it supposed to see us?”
“Well, we’re technically in a different spot, so I don’t have a perfect idea, but it should see us when it’s on its way back up the mountain. Really, it already saw us, but it just waited to come and actually confront us. So even if we’re in a different spot, it’s still looking around for us. So, since we’re in such a visible location, it’ll probably find us around the same time.
She took a deep breath. “Alright. So we’re just going to, I guess, talk to it.”
“Just a conversation.”
She shook her head. “Yeah, maybe to you. You can just go back if you die.”
“I’ll also go back if you die, you know.”
She pursed her lips. “Well, thanks. I guess that’s a bit reassuring.”
“Did you not think I’d do that? Go back and change things if you died?”
“I don’t know. Maybe. I guess I just felt like you’d try to prioritize your own survival. So if you felt like you needed me…”
“I do need you,” I put an arm around her, standing and gazing across the mountainous skyline. “Not just for survival, either. We’ve been through a lot together. I wouldn’t just let you die if I thought it’d help me a bit.”
She just nodded silently and leaned her head on my shoulder.
“I care about you. Seriously.”
“Thank you. I’d say I’ll do my best to keep you alive, too, but I don’t think it carries the same weight when I don’t have time travel powers,” she chuckled.
“Well I appreciate it either way,” I smiled back.
My positive mood was interrupted by movement in the distance. A figure flying through the air, toward us. The Dragon Astintash, clearly looking in our direction.
It neared us, flapping its wings to slowly descend toward the plateau our offering was set atop. The wings’ flaps blew air all across the area, stirring the leaves of the nearby plants and scattering the sticks we’d laid out to get its attention. My long hair was pushed back with each movement of the beast’s wings.
I subconsciously took a few steps back, intimidated by Astintash’s entrance despite already having seen it up close. I could tell where Dragons got the nickname ‘tyrants of the air.’
It landed with a loud thud, shaking the surrounding area.
“You have acquired my attention, Humans,” its deep voice rumbled my heart. “What do you want from me?”
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