Dragonheart Core

Seros swam into the Underlake.

I swarmed him like a living collection of bees, points of awareness spilling over iridescent scales and the silver twist of his frills—he churred, low and excited, bubbles spilling through his fangs. Mayalle's whirlpool tugged him through, tail lashing as he called upon the water to guide him home—and with an elegance I hadn't actually seen from him before. He called the water and oh, still with the gravitas of a dragon, with the sea-drake budding in his bones, but now with an understanding. Not yet refined, still fumbling, but he spoke instead of shouted, and something reflected back.

Made easier by the passenger he was carrying.

My mana sharpened to claws.

Seros' tail flicked as he pushed into my dungeon proper, his claws spread wide and something thrumming in his mind. Still excited to see me, thoughts rampaging about with all he wanted to show me, but he could sense my wariness. The fangs I was greeting the mind alongside his with.

And, to my remarkable dismay, the mind spoke back.

Hello, dragon-core.

I coiled up like a threatened serpent. Trespasser.

The voice was a deep and powerful thing, one that echoed with the faintest memory of the Song in the recesses that my caged core couldn't fully comprehend. Old, in a way teeth were, and with a flavour of—not deference, because it was too powerful for that, but some kind of respect.

Hells above hells, Seros had brought back a god.

He didn't think in words or sentences, but he did push a feeling of quiet acceptance to me—whoever this god was, it had helped him. I caught a flash of tangled kelp chains, of stone cages, of merrow with deep teal skin—before I heard, faintly, the reflection of the Song. Something in the corners of his mind.

Brief elation that he had perhaps come closer to be a sea-drake, before the moderately more concerning element returned to me.

My mana reached out, drifting into the quiet murmurs of his mind and the deity tucked in the corners. Why are you here?

Now that there had been a connection, I felt the deity unravel, stretching out into an impression of cold shadows and jagged fangs. Black eyes, tucked beneath the star-burn. I am Abarossa, it said, soft and sibilant. Thirteenth of the Thirteen, defender of Arroyo. I am here to parlay.

Ah. Hm.

Of all the many things in the world, I wouldn't deny that this wasn't exactly what I was expecting. If it was here to parlay, what did it—she—have that I wanted? Or what did she want from me?

A faint lingering breath of frustration—not quite hated, softened by divinity, but certainly disconcertment. You took my voice.

Hm.

There was a schema, floating back in the marbled red-black of my core—of a staff, long and twisting, with a diamond on the top. I'd been particularly delighted to devour that, considering the sheer arcane potential woven throughout diamonds and all the mana they could hold.

And they were remarkably auspicious. The perfect thing to build my glittering hoard.

So I had, with minimal regret or even thoughts, dissolved it down to mana and ate it.

Then, of course, a handful of merrow had gotten pissy about that and fought me, and died, repeatedly, and generally spent the last moments of their pitiful lives supplying me with mana. I plucked knowledge of their thirteen gods and all the madness of their cove city from their souls as I devoured them, and essentially considered that was that.

So perhaps, if you were being generous about this all, I had taken her voice from the merrow, and from Arroyo.

Her fault, for having them try to steal my core.

Seros landed at the bottom of the Underlake, sand billowing up around his claws. He was in an odd predicament, and he didn't seem all that pleased about it—the voice, latching onto his mind like she belonged there, and him as the hapless carrier.

Parlay, I thought, loud and stained through with curiosity. What do you bring?

Abarossa's mana coiled around mine, the sinuous strength of a predator. Through me, recreate my staff, she hummed. Give my merrow back my voice.

Would that mean they attacked me more, or less?

And in return, I will bestow a boon upon your sixth floor.

Huh.

My mana settled back like hungering cats, ears pricked. That was certainly an offer, and one that had a surprising amount of thought put into it—and also none at all. What kind of boon should she offer that was so incredible that it was worth giving power back into the hands of the merrow? A fraction of them, supposedly, but I had little doubt that having all thirteen gods back at Arroyo would make them stronger.

A goddess didn't particularly have to worry about whether I was thinking directly to her—she heard my thoughts regardless. I will keep them from you, she murmured. And– hesitation, for a moment, before she pushed through. They are not strong. The thing has harmed them too much to come after you.

I flared out my awareness, core thrumming with energy. The thing? Entirely undescriptive, and without giving me anything to go off. The concept of something so strong it harmed merrow wasn't particularly hard to imagine—hells, I was plenty strong by myself—but there was a wary hatred in Abarossa's voice.

She didn't try to respond with words. There wasn't a need.

Instead, she set her fangs into my core, and poured vitriol through the gaps.

Stars—gleaming, white-silver-grey stars, endless in hue and density, swarming overhead—one went out. A second. A third, flickering in and out, ate in one and excess mana pushed out the second. Eaten. Eaten.

Black skin– black eyes– ivory fangs–

My mana swarmed around me, stinging and snapping at the air—and deep within my core, something– twitched. Moved.

Raised its twin-mawed head, before the drowning serenity of my core pulled it back under.

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The pitch-shark.

Well, if I had wanted any more indication the one that had attacked me had been but an infant, the idea of an entire merrow city being broken down to the foundations was plenty.

They will not harm you, Abarossa said, and her voice was softer now, weakened, the visions she had given me enough to clip the wings of her ability. Why was she so weakly tethered to Aiqith? Not when I can speak to them. They are focused on their own regrowth.

For some surprising reason, I wasn't particularly interested in the merrow growing more powerful—but Abarossa was a goddess, and they did have multitudes of laws about lying. So.

With her staff remade, maybe she really would keep them from attacking me, or at least distract them away. It wasn't as if I wasn't powerful enough to slay them if they thought to take my core, as I'd proven in the past—still they'd never made it past the Jungle Labyrinth.

And she had said parlay.

Maybe this was an attempt by myself to distract from the pitch-shark, from the schema that snapped and hungered in my core in a way it was not supposed to, but I would take it for the moment. Perhaps later I would capture some elder merrow and interrogate them about how their city had been destroyed. Even from the bare flecks of Seros' mind I wasn't taking the time to dive fully in while we had an audience, I could see the shattered stone and ghosts left behind.

You wish to become patron of my floor, I said, cautiously. There was a potential in the offer stretching both ways I wasn't much a fan of.

Abarossa's presence stretched out like a shark's shadow. Yes.

The Hungering Reefs were, admittedly, rather perfect—I didn't know exactly what she was the goddess of, but it was drenched in the sea and the jagged points of fangs. Something hungry, powerful. Fitting, then, that it had been her priestess so hungry she had been the one to try and claim my core.

But the floor wasn't done yet. Oh, it was getting closer, considering I was still enjoying myself thoroughly touching up the broken shipwreck and giving the sea serpent a home he could be truly proud of, but it wasn't done. Only the third room had anything truly large and dangerous, and the second, while crowded, only had roughwater sharks as true terrifying predators. The silver kraits, yes, and the vampiric dryad whenever she floundered through the water to drag out prey by its shorthairs, but not yet complete. I had larger dreams for it, for the paradise that was most similar to what I knew and remembered of my past life.

I'd wanted Seros to bring me back schemas, but instead he'd brought me a goddess. But maybe he could bring both.

Was this a good idea? Most assuredly not.

But I had invited Nuvja into my hall, and from her earned a promise for future deals. And I had spoken to Nenaigch, wrapped her power through my walls until the Haven was made for her, until my newest entrance would be opened as soon as Nicau had pulled his head out his ass and guided me.

Abarossa had come to me. In all worlds, that meant she wanted this deal—that it was her bringing it to me, hitching a ride in Seros' mana like she belonged there, like she needed it.

That gave me power, in a way.

That gave me the ability to request.

My floor is not yet complete, I said. Unless you would offer to provide creatures to complete it.

Abarossa was a goddess, one of the many-fanged stars high above. There was no face I could ascribe her to, no mortal trappings I could imagine an expression on—but I still got the sense that she was, ah, hm, displeased.

Her teeth wrapped around me, closed and cold. Creatures.

Not necessarily with her bopping around like a goddess off to fetch corpses, but she knew the Song, and with her staff she could command her merrow to bring me whatever I wanted. Not forever, since that was too dangerous an ask for even me, but certainly some brilliance. Yes. A pause. And allowing me to complete the floor after you become its patron.

Because I wouldn't be stomaching that wrath gods wielded whenever I made changes to their precious floor.

Abarossa stared at me, wrapped in liquid fangs. Still the prickling ire. But I could make her staff, and she wanted it. And if she wasn't planning on claiming my core for her merrow, then me growing stronger wasn't a problem—was only a boon, truly, since she was the only goddess of Arroyo that would have any connection to me.

Very well.

Entirely intangible I was, but my mana quivered with glee.

No time for hesitation—I reached out to Seros and pulled him along, unsheathing his claws from the sand as he kicked off to swim down. Through the Underlake, plodding over the Jungle Labyrinth, walking on the creaking isles of the Skylands.

Then, plunging into the Hungering Reefs, and all the death that awaited there. The sea serpent, coiling on his broken shipwreck, the kobolds in their lagoon, the reefback growing a palace on her shell. All glorious elements of mine.

Not done. Not yet. But a goddess offered to provide, and I would allow her.

So I gathered my mana, great coiling wreaths of it, spinning around the floor like all stars made, and sunk it into the stone—into the pure white beaches, the towers of capturing coral, the crystalline water with quartz-lights overhead.

The Hungering Reefs, palace and paradise, land of predators.

Boom.

Congratulations! Your floor has attracted the attention of the gods.

Some wish to become Patron of the Hungering Reefs. Please choose from the boons they present.

My core shuffled and split—my consciousness, bobbing out like an untested hatchling, drifting up to the star-filled sky far above. The world beneath me, precious Aiqith, tossed aside in favour of this nameless land where power flowed like a current. Where stars hovered, thrumming with ancient energy, staring down at me with mana-filled eyes.

…very few of them, this time.

It seems they knew when a floor wasn't completed, and weren't willing to settle for what I was offering.

Pricks.

But they were here, and they were calling me, and up I went to see what lavish spread of mana they held in their grasp. Perhaps a dozen, or more, lingering blue-red-purple-green-violet-maroon-cerulean, star-burn deep in the midnight sky.

I reached up to them, at the power they proffered.

What would she do if I picked a different deity? Slipped my sixth floor into the hands of someone else who offered me power, like the goddess of fireflies, who was still floating high overhead even on a floor that even my own mana didn't think was complete. A few smaller ones were still here, willing for anything I would offer, and I sensed her watching me, the coiled hunger that threatened to cut out my core if I didn't fulfill our deal.

Very well.

I picked and wove my way through the other deities, lingering for but a moment to feel their offer as to not be insulting before going higher. Abarossa swam overhead, the gleaming light of her star sinking into my core, into my power. All that she was, all that she offered me.

Abarossa, the goddess of sharks.

Well, that was fitting. Star-burn was she, but teeth alongside, cold and ink-drawn. The shadows moving overhead, the black hunger of eyes. Worlds above my roughwater sharks, something bigger, something older.

And what she offered me was the power of the hunt.

My Hungering Reefs were here for destruction, for desolation—but they were in essence, the ocean. An unforgiving land, where death was consequence.

But I wanted my creatures to grow stronger, and to do that, they rather needed to avoid death.

So Abarossa would take my creatures, and make them sharks.

All those in the Hungering Reefs would feel no draw of hunger, no claws of tiredness, no world in which they would rather rest than continue their hunt. Their dens would go empty; their teeth, sharpened. Ever would they circle, hunting either for more prey or to avoid predators.

Invaders? They wouldn't receive the same honour. There would never be a moment of rest, of peace, as they were surrounded by monsters who never slept, never waited, not when there was something to hunt.

It wasn't exactly what I wanted for my floor. I had pictured something to do with the coral, with the lagoon, with the sea serpent's cove. Abarossa was powerful, but in relation to sharks; she couldn't offer me power that wasn't hers. What she had was the best she could do, although better than merely giving me sharks.

My paradise would become more of a danger. Would become dangerous, never-ending, constantly changing and moving. Would give me teeth to keep up the kobolds and menaces within.

And, I said, you will bring me creatures.

Abarossa's mana wrapped around me. Cold, iron-teeth. I will.

The deal was made.

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