City of Sin

A Legend’s Dream

Dragon. The last dregs of Sharon’s sleepiness melted away the moment she heard this word, her eyes glowing with excitement, “How many? Where? Did you find a nest? Has anyone robbed them yet?”

“Not a nest,” Richard’s smile spread wider, “It’s an entire plane.”

“A PLANE?!” the legendary mage started to emit golden light, looking like a young girl who had been given a toy, “Where, where?! I only went to a dragon plane once, that place was basically heaven! You can’t even imagine it, there were dragons everywhere in the sky and nests all over! It was so sad, I couldn’t keep track of the coordinates. I swore that I would find it once I was stronger, and catch any dragon I want!”

Hearing of Sharon’s dream, Richard didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. She was jumping around like a little girl given candy, but that candy was a plane of powerful beings. It gave him new perspective on his own strength.

“This place is powerful too, I can’t conquer it just yet. There’s hundreds just on the other side of the passage, and the Five-Coloured Dragon rules it.”

Sharon frowned, “Really? Then things might be a little difficult, I can’t say for sure I’ll win.”

“That’s alright. I have a good idea, so you can just watch while I handle it. But you can go take a tour first, see if there’s anything you can get.”

“Alright, I’ll pack immediately. We’ll leave in half an hour!”

“Huh? No, let’s go when my rune convention is—”

“Who cares about a dumb convention?! It’s just a grade 5 rune, I’m not interested in that. Give me the coordinates and I’ll go myself. Right. This. Instance!”

“Uhh...” Richard was dumbstruck for a moment. Having become a saint runemaster, he was amongst the most important people in all of Norland. He dearly wanted Sharon to see his growth and be proud of it, but clearly the dragons were much more appealing. However, this was strangely relieving as well. The legendary mage had the grade 6 Deepblue Aria, why would she bother with mere grade 5 runes?

The patterns of the Deepblue Aria were still carved deeply into his mind. While incomplete, it was still far more powerful than any grade 5 rune, perhaps even a set. The single rune occupied all of Sharon’s rune slots, providing offence, defence, and any other utility as well. Most other legends could only afford a number of runes that served each of their individual requirements; some couldn’t even get grade 5 runes at all. That was why his convention was so important to them.

She ended up taking much longer than half an hour to prepare, but by the time she returned she had seven rings on her fingers and four bangles up her arms. Five entire necklaces shone brightly as well, and from one look it was obvious that everything was enchanted for storage. This was enough space to plunder a dozen nests.

While Sharon left, Richard still had to meet with Blackgold to discuss the operations of the Deepblue. The mages and researchers here were the source of his superiority, but they still needed some direction in terms of funding so they developed what was most important to him. Any single improvement coming out of the laboratories was minuscule, but it stacked up quickly to make his army one of the best in all of Norland.

With his entire network of planes now on the right path, every one of them starting to add a constant stream of resources to the family warehouses, he finally had the means to focus on technology he didn’t need immediately. At this point, even all the mages in the Deepblue weren’t enough for this purpose, and many projects faced a shortage in manpower. Planning things out with Blackgold, he was going to raise the benefits of everyone actively working on a project to entice more mages to join.

While Sharon left before all of that, thankfully she at least waited long enough to listen to his suggestion not to charge straight into the Dragon Plane’s crystal sphere. Instead, she used the portal to Faelor at Blackrose to head into the plane that way. The passage to Faelor itself wasn’t built for legends to use— a fact that annoyed her greatly because she would have to spend some effort to maintain it when she passed through— but Richard managed to convince her that it was better than being blocked off by the Five-Coloured Dragon or a being that was even more powerful.

......

Faelor and the Dragon Plane didn’t remain calm in Richard’s absence. The Thinker had been stationed beside the portal at all times, and recently it had found the fluctuations of a powerful being passing through. An enormous shadow was currently zooming across the empire as the broodmother flew towards Dragon Valley at full speed.

A full kilometre up in the sky, she looked to be worming her way through the sky. Her limbs moving rhythmically, her body constantly contracted and expanded, each burst moving her dozens of metres forward. On her body, all sorts of winged serpents were preparing their abilities for battle; while fast, these creatures couldn’t cover as much distance. Between the winged serpents were irregular projections that looked like black rocks, beings that looked like masses of writhing flesh crawling out on occasion. These were the nests of her legion of bastard demigods; even legendary beings would meet their demise if they were all activated. In many ways, the broodmother herself was serving the purpose of an enormous astral chrysalis.

The Iron Triangle Empire was completely still, not reacting to the broodmother’s presence at all. The country had few powerhouses left, and all of them had been warned of their imminent demise if they dared annoy her. A couple of them had still flown up with interest when she first started making her way across, but volleys of attacks from the winged serpents didn’t even leave corpses behind.

Next to a quiet lake fed by a river valley, a middle-aged man was cutting down trees to build a wooden cabin for himself. He looked up as the broodmother flew across, his expression changing instantly as a huge book appeared in the depths of his eyes. The pages turned on their own to display the picture of the broodmother, the entry marked with red. His breathing started to grow harried and the hands holding the axe started to tremble, only calming down once the broodmother disappeared from the horizon.

“The news was accurate...” he mumbled to himself, taking a flat piece of wood and starting to write something down with his finger. However, after only a few letters, his expression changed, “This might be a chance...”

The man went quiet, paralysed for hours until he made up his mind and tossed his axe aside. Instead of following the broodmother, he rushed towards the Land of Turmoil that she had flown from.

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