Chương 19: Reborn as the Dragon: — Chapter 19 - The Gale Bandit Group

"Good. Whether it's the Black Beast Mercenary Group or not doesn't matter — do you know the actual strength of these bandits and mercenaries?" The words were barely out of his mouth before Su Nian realized he'd asked a dog a graduate-level question. He hadn't really expected useful intelligence from Bolikri anyway. Sure enough, Bolikri hemmed and hawed for a long stretch, came up with absolutely nothing, and ended up staring at him with the most pitifully hopeless dog eyes he'd ever seen.

Su Nian ignored the pleading expression and switched to something simpler.

"Then you at least know their locations, right? You're a chieftain. Don't you make it your business to know what enemies are sitting on your doorstep? What if someone raided your home and you didn't even see it coming?"

"Master, what is 'raid one's home'?" Bolikri's dog face went utterly blank.

"That's not important!"

"Answer the question!" Su Nian's roar came out irritable and sharp. His claw hit the ground with an impatient crack, ringing out like steel on stone. Anna, nestled against him, immediately wrapped both arms around his neck and pressed her little face gently into his scales, soothing him without a word. Since becoming a Black Dragon, his temper had been getting worse. The only exception was Anna. Bolikri pressed himself flat against the ground, convinced the Black Dragon was about to swallow him whole.

He'd grown up on elders' stories about dragon clans keeping Kobolds as emergency rations, and right now those stories felt very immediate. He reported in a full-body trembling:"Report, Master! I only know the locations of two bandit groups. Mercenary groups move around constantly — they travel to towns to complete contracts, so they never camp in the wilderness for long."

"Good enough. Gather your soldiers. We're going to pay the nearest bandit group a visit."

"Lead the way." Su Nian spread his wings and swept a claw through the air. It was like throwing a switch. Bolikri let out a string of sharp barks, and the entire cave exploded into noise. Kobolds scrambled in every direction. They dug out their shabby knives, clubs, and trap-setting tools from wherever they slept, wrapped themselves in animal hides and the garish scraps of human clothing they'd scavenged over the years. Not one of them could manage a coherent outfit. They looked completely ridiculous.

But the fierce edge underneath wasn't ridiculous at all. None of them asked why they were going to fight human bandits. None of them seemed afraid. Having a true dragon at their backs was all the courage they needed. While the Kobolds prepared, Su Nian got to work. He had Bolikri bring him the cleanest, thickest pieces of clothing the cave had to offer.

Then he spent his remaining system points modifying the area between his shoulder blades, raising a few ridges of horn that doubled as railings without breaking the lines of his silhouette. He padded the space flat with layered cloth until the surface was genuinely soft. Then he nestled Anna into it and wrapped her securely, bundling her in strips of torn fabric that he knotted around the horn structures, forming a snug cradle that would hold even if he rolled mid-flight.

Anna lay obediently on the Black Dragon's back, both small hands hooked gently around his neck. Her fair little cheek was pressed flat against the padding, the slight baby fat squishing into an absurdly cute shape. She noticed it immediately. The dragon's back, which had been hard and awkward before, had somehow become perfectly comfortable. Mr. Dragon is scared I'll fall off. He went through all this trouble just to take care of me. Made his own back into a proper nest. That's so nice... hehe...

She watched him fussing and felt something warm and melty settle in her chest. A sweet little smile tugged at the corner of her mouth. Stolen content alert: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences. She had no idea how he'd done it. It didn't matter. Her admiration for him only grew. [Anna Hathaway favorability +5. Current favorability: 40 (Friendly)] Su Nian dismissed the notification. He had Anna shift around in every direction until he was certain she was comfortable no matter what he did.

Then he gave a satisfied nod. Ever since the transformation, he'd had this persistent instinct, keep his most precious things close, or hide them somewhere safe. Leaving Anna alone in the cave felt wrong. Too many ways it could go badly. Besides, he'd scout the area first. If the bandits looked like actual trouble, he'd tuck her somewhere nearby and post Bolikri as a guard. She'd be safe, and she'd still be within his sight. That was the plan.

Once everything was ready, a column of Kobolds marched out of the cave with the swaggering confidence of soldiers who'd fight their own grandmothers, and behind them followed a Black Dragon with an elf girl bundled on his back, looking entirely too pleased with himself.... Joseph was the leader of the Gale Bandit Group, a level 12, second-tier warrior commanding a little over a hundred men. They specialized in robbing adventurers who wandered into the outskirts of Silvermoon Forest. Men got killed. Women got kept.

Ugly ones got killed too. Adventurers died in Silvermoon Forest every day, and the King of Anlius wasn't about to march an army this far out to deal with a bandit problem. Out here, at the edge of the world where the king's reach didn't stretch, Joseph lived well. Very well. This kind of life had been unthinkable during Emperor Xivi's reign. Back then, the ruthless emperor had hunted bandit groups like his nearly to extinction. Fortunately, that magnificent bastard had long since ascended to the Celestial Realm.

Now only the Duchy of Winterhold in the north still clung to those suffocating old rules. Joseph's father had been a bard, and he'd told Joseph stories about the Winterhold Empire at its height, how it had stretched across almost the entire habitable northern continent. How the Winterhold Emperor's eagle banner had flown even on the southern continent. In those days, every race counted as equal under Winterhold's laws. Every good-aligned people had lived side by side in peace. Joseph thought that was laughable.

Humans were humans. Why should they share a world with other races? Xivi had just been a man with good luck and a strong arm, a traitor to his own kind. Give Joseph the same luck, and he'd have done better. He was still deep in that daydream when his men came hauling in a pair of adventurers.

"Boss! One second-tier warrior, one first-tier water mage apprentice. Came to Silvermoon to hunt magic cores." The bandit's grin split his face.

"Look at this girl — fresh as they come, heheheh..." He kicked the gagged mage girl onto the floor in front of Joseph. Joseph crouched down and grabbed a fistful of her water-blue hair, yanking her face up. A few loose strands fell across her cheek. Beneath them was a delicate, tear-streaked face, porcelain-soft, achingly pretty. She had on a white mage's robe, loose-cut, but it couldn't hide the shape beneath. One bare calf peeked out below the hem, lightly scraped, still enough to make Joseph's fingers twitch.

He'd caught a real prize this time. She stared up at him with naked fear, and beneath the fear, revulsion. Joseph smiled at that. He liked that combination. He pulled the cloth from her mouth. He loved the sounds prey made right before everything got worse.

"Let me go," she gasped.

"Let me go right now. I'm warning you — I'm a student of Saint Roland Magic Academy. My sister is a lecturer there. If anything happens to me, you're all dead."

"Saint Roland Academy," Joseph repeated, drawing out each word.

"The crown jewel of the Anlius capital. Big name. Real impressive." He turned toward his men with a grin.

"I'm terrified~" He held her up by the hair, exposing her neck and the open collar of her robe, turning her toward the room the way you'd display a catch to buyers. Every man in that room had hunger in their eyes. Not one of them flinched at the academy's name.

"You filthy bandits!" The warrior's gag came off next. He was shouting, but there was no steel behind it.

"Let her go! Come at me if you want someone to fight! Or are you afraid of what the empire's army will do to you?"

"Empire's army." Joseph walked toward him slowly, still smiling.

"If Emperor Xivi himself walked through that door right now, I'd still do exactly what I want." He tilted his head.

"You care about her, don't you? Don't bother hiding it. Your face already answered for you." He leaned close to the warrior's ear, his voice dropping to a venomous whisper.

"I'm going to enjoy her. Right in front of you." A beat.

"How does that feel?" He stepped back and raised his voice.

"Boys! Get her clothes off. Bring her right up front where our friend here can watch. Good things are meant to be shared. Heheh." The room erupted. The bandits had been holding themselves back long enough. They surged toward the girl where she'd crumpled on the floor, past caring, past hope, her eyes already empty. Then a black shape tore across the sky overhead. A crack of thunder followed, a dragon's roar, raw and enormous.

And then the acid breath came down like a curtain, vast and consuming, swallowing bandits and adventurers alike in a single blanketing wave. The Black Dragon had arrived.

PS, Lore Note: The Bard (gleeman), Originally, a term for Celtic poets who composed praise-songs and satire. More broadly, it describes the singers and poets of tribal societies who specialized in composing and performing verse about heroes and their deeds. As early as the 1st century AD, the Latin writer Lucanus described bards as the national poets and singers of Gaul and Britain. They were a product of the medieval world.

Bards came from every station in life, some from noble, wealthy households; others from poverty. What they shared was their wit, their craft, and the extraordinary stories they wove from nothing. They were invited into lords' keeps, where noblewomen, young ladies, and their knights would gather and seat themselves according to rank. Some would rest their chins on their hands. Some would quietly set aside their weapons.

And when the room fell into that particular stillness, when every mind drifted somewhere far away, they would listen, entirely absorbed, to the bard's song. ➤ Next: The Demise of the Gale Bandit Group