Chapter 650: You are an entity I believe is worth protecting.
"What made you think I would come even if I was watching?"
The Steel Dragon asked.
"I thought you would not want to see your people fall."
Kael answered honestly as he looked at Morvain and the others. The Steel Dragon followed his gaze, his eyes landed on Morvain, then on the other Velmourns.
The Matriarch straightened her back even more when she noticed the Dragon’s gaze, almost as if she did not wish to appear disorganised in front of him, no matter what.
But the Steel Dragon didn’t seem to care, he did not even bother looking at her, or any of the Velmourn Soldiers for more than a second, instead, he turned back to Kael and shook his head.
"I did not come here for them."
Those words made Kael blink in surprise, even Lavinia was a little shocked, after all, from what she had read in the records, the Steel Dragons were quite protective of Velmourns.
As for Morvain and the other Velmourns, they had it the worst, the Steel Dragon’s words hurt them.
But...
He was only beginning.
Without caring about their reaction or how his words would make them feel, the Dragon continued—
"The Velmourns we Steel Dragons protected ruled the entirety of Nerathis."
He spoke before he looked at the Velmourns below and with a slightly colder look on his face—
"These could not even survive on this little island."
The Velmourns below felt their chests tighten, to them, it felt like they were being judged and... the judgement clearly was not in their favour.
The Dragon continued—
"They were having trouble with the little tribes here. I am more ashamed at the fact that they still use the Velmourn name than feeling the need to come here and protect them."
The Velmourns lowered their heads and gritted their teeth.
They wanted to counter.
They wanted to glare at the Dragon and say that he had no right to comment on their name but...
They didn’t.
They kept their heads down and remained silent.
And perhaps...
That disappointed the Steel Dragon even further.
Then he turned back towards Kael and—
"If it were just them, even if they were hunted down one by one, even if they were annihilated, I would not have come."
The Dragon spoke and an absolute, heavy silence fell all over the place.
The Velmourns kept their heads down and gritted their teeth in humiliation, the tribesmen didn’t understand what the Dragon said but the heaviness in the air alone was enough for them to understand that they needed to remain silent.
Kael, on the other hand, stared at the Steel Dragon with a frown.
"Then why did you come...?"
He questioned with a frown.
"I came because of you."
The Dragon answered directly.
Kael narrowed his eyes at those words and the Steel Dragon continued.
"I came because I saw what you did."
The Dragon then looked at the surroundings, the broken wall, the battlefield, the tribes that had been enemies for generations now standing together and—
"I saw how you united this place.
And you did it without using much blood."
"I did use blood."
Kael lowered his head and clenched his fists as his eyes fell on all the bodies under him. There was nothing he could do about the enemies’ bodies, with the state they were in, killing them was the only option.
What hurt him more was the bodies of people who had followed him, the Alliance Troops who didn’t survive the battle.
The numbers were higher than what he had imagined in the worst-case scenario.
The Steel Dragon looked at him for a moment, then he shook his head.
"Only when you had no choice."
Kael looked at the Dragon and the Dragon—
"You are not bloodthirsty, Human."
He spoke in a deep voice.
"Do not mistake willingness to kill with thirst for blood. There is a difference between a beast that kills because it enjoys the feeling of cutting through flesh and a leader who stains his hands because the people behind him will die if he does not."
The Dragon then took a small pause, as if he wanted those words to etch themselves into Kael—
"You understand that difference.
That is why I came."
The battlefield remained silent and the Velmourns...
The Velmourns who didn’t dare raise their heads when they were humiliated before, now looked up, staring at the Steel Dragon praising Kael and...
They couldn’t help but feel a strange sense of... pride in that.
Even someone like Kayden was no different. Heck, he didn’t even know why he was feeling proud, he just was.
"Perhaps..."
And that was when the Steel Dragon said something that surprised the Velmourns and Kael even more—
"If the Velmourns of old had someone like you leading them..."
He looked at the Velmourns on the ground, then back at Kael—
"They would not have fallen."
He spoke directly and even Lavinia reacted to those words.
Velmourns of old...
To think the Steel Dragon wished that Kael had led the Velmourns of old...
She couldn’t help but imagine how truly terrifying that would be.
How was one even supposed to defeat a Kael who had grown to his fullest potential? The combined might of Dragonborn and other Kingdoms, that won the War twelve hundred years ago, wouldn’t have stood a chance then.
But...
The more she thought about it...
The more she wondered how a Kingdom led by Kael would look like, perhaps... the Dragonborns and others wouldn’t have revolted in the first place.
That thought put a light smile on Lavinia’s face.
She had already started imagining how she would have then proposed a political marriage between her and Kael.
And while she thought about everything, Kael, still a little overwhelmed by the praise, looked at the Steel Dragon and—
"So you..."
Before he could complete his words, the Dragon nodded.
"I came to protect you.
You are an entity I believe is worth protecting.
An entity that might bring a change to this world that even the old Velmourns could not."
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