Dart and Pouncer exchanged a worried look as the light fury trotted towards the exit. Laura then realised that Ruffrunner hadn't followed right behind like a devoted puppy, and looked back, somewhat annoyed. "Come on, it will be fun!"

Ruffrunner, who had been woken up against his will for two mornings in a row, wasn't looking forward to… whatever this was. In fact he wasn't looking forward to anything other than going back to sleep. But no, this Laura, who he by the way had never met before, just had to threaten telling Toothless what he had done. She just had to have witnessed him scaring that fledgling yesterday, and had to use that to control him. "Becoming a better person doesn't sound like fun. It sounds like lecturing," complained the nightlight.

Laura thought about it. The black nightlight would probably enjoy what she had planned, but he was right. The way she had put it forwards didn't sound like a blast. "Let me put this another way: do you have a choice?"

This day just kept getting better and better, thought Ruffrunner sarcastically. He started following her, and soon leapt out of their home cavern, heading down.

Dart and Pouncer observed as the two dove away with mixed feelings. The mixture was composed of curiosity and wariness (by Dart) and admiration (by Pouncer).

Maybe the white nightlight should have been worried. After all, he knew that this newcomer was the same female he had been so interested in the day before. She had with all likelihood been looking for him, and only gone after Ruffrunner by chance. This probably meant that the black nightlight had a secret, something he didn't want their father to know. Maybe he should have been worrying about what would happen after the misunderstanding got figured out.

But Pouncer's head was far too busy thinking about the light fury's various curves to worry about that. He sighed happily. "Laura, such a perfect name. Is there anything about her that isn't perfect?"

"She just storms in without announcement and takes Ruffrunner. I don't get it," replied Dart. "There's something fishy about her."

He looked at her annoyingly. "That was a rhetorical question, my dear Dart. Thank you so much for ruining the mood."

To be honest, Dart wasn't in a particularly good mood even before Laura's appearance. Having just been grounded for at least one week might have been the reason. But removing her brother's newfound joy did the trick. "You're welcome," she replied with a warm smile.

Ruffrunner had never been this far down. And it just kept getting lower.

He fell rapidly, his wings slashing through the air. He had been diving behind Laura for the better part of two minutes, and was starting to seriously worry about falling out of the earth.

The hidden world's entrance was straight above them, but it was so far away that he could barely see the sky. The main hole had split into several smaller ones, and kept branching up more and more.

Finally, the light fury flared and made a graceful landing on a rocky ledge, in the beginning on one of the many tunnels they had passed. Ruffrunner did the same and took in the new place.

The first thing he noticed, now that he wasn't blasting through the air and could actually feel it, was the heat. Down here, It was warm and humid. Now, the rest of the cavern was neither cold nor dry, but the nightlight would have compared it to a rainforest, had he known what it was. Every breath felt heavy. He then noticed the light.

On the surface, the light was dominated by numerous bright crystals, who bathed the cavern in light pink and orange light. And the skylight was always present, its strong white rays, reaching several kilometres around the place and promptly shutting down when night came.

There were much fewer crystals here, and their light was different. Green, blue and violet rays dominated the place, making both the shadows and Ruffrunner's headache stick out more. He started fantasising about somewhere dark, quiet…

"Where are we?" asked the nightilight as he closed his eyes to get some peace. He would probably get used to the light soon, but for now it was annoying. "What possible reason do you have to bring me here?"

"I've already told you. I want to make you a better person."

"Mmm," answered Ruffrunner, not convinced in the least. "What do you get out of this?"

Laura, noticing the nightliight's attitude, understood that his patience was finite. "You are a brute and completely incapable of communicating with potential mating candidates," she stated matter-of-factly.

The nightlight looked at her in shock. Him? A brute? What had he ever done? "Wrong," said Ruffrunner as he thought of all the females he spent his time with on a regular basis. There were…

"Mostly," he added quietly after a few moments.

"And I don't want the alpha's son to poison females' lives like that. Especially if you end up becoming the alpha, and have nothing to stop you from doing so." She met his eyes levelly. "That's why I'm doing it."

"Aww, you're adorable," stated Ruffrunner flatly. "And how exactly will you avoid that?"

The light fury put forward her proposal. "I will teach you how to make females like you," she explained. "And with my advice you will be happy, the females will be happy and everybody will be a winner."

Ruffrunner blinked. Laura blinked. Some time passed, after which Ruffrunner blinked again. "You brought me all the way down here to give me… dating advice?" asked Ruffrunner incredulously.

"A crucial skill for the alpha's offspring to have," said Laura with a grin.

While his brother would have jumped at such an opportunity, Ruffrunner wanted to sleep. However, as this female had so charmingly explained, he didn't have much of a choice. Laura knew that he had threatened a fledgling, and was using this to force him to do as she pleased. As much as it hurt to admit, listening was with all likelihood the shortest path back to the sleeping slab. He'd simply try to get the lesson over quickly. 'Making females like you,' how hard could it possibly be?

The nightlight was curious about one thing though. "But… Why here? I don't see… " Ruffrunner pointed at their surroundings. "Anything."

Laura had seemed pretty excited up until now. But that was nothing in comparison to her face after those words. The light fury's dark blue eyes glimmered in anticipation as she darted into the tunnel. Ruffrunner ran after her, struggling to keep up. He started hearing some noise in front of him, and tried to reconnect what it was. Roars, coming from several different dragons…

In that moment, the light fury pressed her claws into the ground and came to a swift and efficient stop. In the next moment, Ruffrunned pressed his snout into the light fury and came to a swift and painful stop. "Sorry!" pledged the nightlight as he pawed his now considerably flatter nose.

Laura hadn't exactly appreciated the event either, but at least it wasn't her snout which had taken the brunt of the force. "Dating advice number one: don't run straight into females," she stated with only minimal whining due to pain.

"I had no idea about that, thank you," whined the nightlight as his senses and nose slowly grew back sharper. He looked at their destination, and awed.

A large, very deep underground ravine stretched in front of them, its sides littered with tunnels. In the middle of the ravine ran a stream, and all of it was illuminated by colourful crystals dotting the high walls. But what surprised Ruffrunner the most was the dragons. Hundreds, if not more of them, stretching as far as the eye could see, of all shapes and sizes, making their ways among the crowd. "Welcome to my home cavern," said Laura. "May its smells, sounds and many, many inhabitants welcome you into the world of being charming!"

Smells: fish, dragons, smoke, rotten fish, some things he didn't know and some things he didn't want to know.

Sounds: the river flowed slowly, making nothing but small splatters. Occasionally a small fish would jump out of the water and make a small splash once landing back into the liquid.

But with the sounds of hundreds of dragons of all shapes and sizes going about the cavern's chaotic life, the former were hard to notice.

"I haven't seen you in these parts, are you new here?"

"I just thought the alpha's son would be… bigger."

"You're the alpha's son, can you tell him to order Cendy to fall in love with me? I know we're meant for each other, but she doesn't want to admit it!"

"Hello there, friend. Welcome to my reign. Make yourself at home, but remember that if you ever see a saumon, it is mine!"

Ruffrunner had now been approached by four dragons in a grand total of thirty seconds, and wasn't feeling comfortable at all. He kept himself close to Laura who was, despite only having known her for fifteen minutes, the most familiar thing he had here.

After a few moments of wandering by the stream, Laura stopped them. Her paw pointed to a white dragon trying to fish from the stream, and she gave the nightlight a wink. "I'll give you dating advice number two: first impressions. And that will be your test subject." Ruffrunner stared at her flatly in response.

"It's simple. Go to that stream. Catch a nice fish in front of that female. And then you will give her the fish out of pure courtesy, as your gentleman brother did," she explained calmly.

"And she will magically fall in love with me?" asked Ruffrunner dubiously. "That doesn't really seem worth it," he added.

"She won't fall in love with you," said Laura. "But she will think of you as 'not a douchebag', which is certainly progress."

Resigned, Ruffrunner made his way to the stream, ending right in front of the light fury, on the opposite bank of the water. He scanned the surface for tasty fish. And… "There is nothing here! How exactly am I supposed to find something worth giving?" he said after finding nothing better than small herrings below the surface.

When he looked at the light fury, she was giving him a downward gaze. "I know. That's how it is here," she stated. "But that's why that female will be extra happy when you give her the fish."

"If fish are so rare, I'll think better than give it away just for her!"

Suddenly, the light fury raised her head, her eyes deliberately meeting his and Laura's, her expression seeming amused. "That female is fully aware of your discussion," said that female. "And she already has a mate."

Laura displayed an awkward smile as the black nightlight turned two very angry toxic green eyes in her direction. "I… didn't know that…'' she harkled. "I guess we should just find someone else then."

Ruffrunner groaned and put his paw down. "Can't you just let me go back?" he asked. "I don't need to know how to court females. They're uninteresting."

Laura stared at him, her gaze flat and quite irritated. "Do you really believe I will fall for that after that disastrous courting attempt?" She pointed at the nightlight with her tail. "You started this, not me."

To the light fury's surprise, Ruffrunner stopped arguing, instead looking at her carefully. "What courting attempt?" For the light fury this was an increasingly strange situation. It seemed as if the nightlight in front of her really had no idea of what he had done. She pointed at herself with her tail.

"You think that I courted you?" repeated the nightlight, his mind starting to connect the pieces, and about to come to quite a fruitful conclusion. He just needed confirmation.

"Yeah, it was pretty obvious," answered Laura. "Your reaction was unmistakable."

Ruffrunner gave a grin, and for the first time that morning, felt as if he had the upper hand. He took off, heading home. Not even ten seconds later, Laura caught up to him, anger visible on her face. He had to admit that this female had a temper. "I will tell your dad everything you did!" threatened the light fury.

"You don't know what I did. You only know what Pouncer did. And if you make him embarrassed, I will be grateful," he explained, a grin on his face. This light fury did not know of him scaring the fledgling, and had nothing to hold him accountable for. He pumped his wings harder, soon finding himself back in the hidden world's main hole. The updraft of the rising water vapour immediately pushed from underneath his wings, giving him a large boost for the long flight back up.

And… guess what, the light fury was still besides him. "Then why did you get all scared when I said 'I know what you did'?!" she asked.

"I did something. That you don't know about," concluded Ruffrunner. She had nothing to threaten him with.

The white dragon shook her head. "You're bluffing."

Ruffrunner realised that if this dragon had gone all the way up to his home cavern, she could and would do it again for as long as it was necessary. He wouldn't get rid of her without proving his innocence. "Come with me. I will let you meet Pouncer. Let's see what you think of him afterwards."

The white nightlight raised his head as his brother entered the cavern. "I have a surprise for you. Close your eyes," said Ruffrurer.

Pouncer didn't seem convinced. "It's totally not that I don't trust you, but I think I will keep them open," said the dragon with a smug smile. Ruffrunner was in trouble. He wanted to fool his brother, but Pouncer wasn't an idiot.

Mostly. "It's for a female", he tried.

"Okay," said the target as he obediently closed his eyes.

Surprised by how smoothly this had gone, the black nightlight made his way to a nearby ledge, where Laura was waiting for him. "Now you go there and cuddle with him," he said. "Once you see how he acts around females, your doubts will be gone."

The light fury didn't seem too excited about this plan. "I'm not going to cuddle with him!" she declared.

"Yes…"

"No…"

"Come on. You said it yourself! Pouncer is such a gentleman!"

"Na-ah."

"Have fun living with the doubt of who tried to court you all your life."

Laura sighed. She would have much appreciated being able to go through this, but the idea was just too repugnant. "I'm not going to nuzzle with a dragon who can't see me. It's not something I want anyone else to go through, you see," she explained. There was also the fact she wasn't that comfortable about going so close to males, but that came second.

"Then how exactly do you want to discover who it is?" asked Ruffrunner.

Laura found herself chuckling at her own idea.

Dart looked curiously at the events in front of her.

Ruffrunner landed in the cavern's entrance. "Here she is. And you keep your eyes closed, okay?"

"My eyes are sealed!" declared Pouncer confidently, as he rose up to face the expected female.

Dart looked on as Laura landed besides Ruffrunner. The dragon then walked next to the white nightlight, while trying to keep its steps as light and feminine as possible. The dragon reached Pouncer's side, and let its wing gently brush over the white nighlight's back. The dragon's tail went to Pouncer's underside, gliding its way from one side to the other.

The dragon was Ruffrunner.

"Ooh..." whispered Pouncer at the treatment he was receiving. Dart suspected that her brother would have closed his eyes even without being asked to. Or maybe not. Not if he had known it was Ruffrunner who was giving him the care.

Dart watched ever more intriguely as Laura placed herself right in front of the white nightlight and carefully observed his every reaction. "Hello there, beautiful. What are you doing?" said Pouncer in a very husky and very masculine voice. "Because I'm completely onboard whatever you want to do," he added.

Dart watched on as Laura's eyes widened in recognition and warped from anger to fear to shame in roughly two and a half seconds. "You were right… I'm so sorry Ruffrunner..." she said embarrassedly.

The white nightlight seemed surprised at these words."Laura? But you are in front of me? So who is this…" Pouncer halted himself. "Lovely lady?" he finished after a few seconds.

Dart had had enough. At this point it was just sad. "Open your eyes, Pouncer. They're playing you," she said, breaking the tension.

Slowly and carefully, Pouncer lifted an eyelid to discover who had been cuddling with him.

"Aah!" yelled Pouncer as his eyes sprang wide open. He bolted away from his brother, nearly crashing into the cavern's roof in the process. He panted hard, his eyes focusing on Ruffrunner as if he was some sort of demonic creature.

"I'm sorry to bother you all. I am now going to go back to my cavern, disappear among the crowd and live in shame for the rest of eternity. Goodbye," said Laura as she made her way outside.

As Pouncer saw Laura, who had been the dragon of his dreams for almost an hour, leaving, he understood that this was a time for action. "Wait!" he called out as he started running, catching up to her in a few seconds. He had to say something. Something deep, anything, just to make her not leave.

The light fury shook her head. "Please don't make a long confession about the true meaning of love," she said, not daring to meet the nighlights gaze.

Pouncer had nothing left to say.

Laura gave a sad, unimpressed look at the nightlight and dove away, quickly disappearing out of sight.

Pouncer didn't remove his eyes from the cavern for a long time. When he did, his eyes turned towards his brother. "Ruffrunner, I need to know how I can find her again."

Unfortunately for the white nightlight, his brother had reunited himself with his sleeping slab, his eyes closed beately. Pouncer would not manage to get an answer that day.

A week after these events, very different people were dealing with a very different problem. Maps of the trip that had reached the hidden world were in the captain's house, leading to a very real risk of ending up in the hands of someone with the intent of harming dragons. Two beings were determined to stop this from happening.

Eret and Helga knocked on the captain's door. The captain opened the door, saw the two vikings that had almost gotten him eaten, and growled. Noticing that his anger was mostly directed towards her husband, Helga stepped forwards and made her offer. "We want to buy all the maps that were used on the trip."

The captain gave her a suspicious look. "How much?"

At this point, Eret, son of Eret, rolled a large barrel in front of the door. "Would you like to exchange them for a barrel of mead?"

For a few tense moments, the two vikings could do nothing but wait as the captain looked down at them. Finally, in some kind of miracle, the captain gave a satisfied huff.

Stopping immediate harm was not the same as stopping harm from happening forever. Over the following days, voices started to spread over Berserker island. In particular among older vikings who had seen the dragons with their own eyes, and in particular in dark taverns after a few too many glasses of mead.

Ulf put the cup down on the table and shook his head. "Dragons are dead."

"Gone, not dead," retorted the other viking quietly as he took one sip out of the mead. "And not so gone at that."

The first viking was not convinced. "Sailors. They'll say anything to catch a girl's eye."

The third viking at the table, who had been slumbering up until this point, turned his head to look at an unfortunately female passerby. "Aye, you are looking at the new general of Berserker's armed forces, sweetheart. And there's a particular tactic that I wanna show ye." he asked souavely.

Ulf pointed at the events. "Case in point," he said flatly. "All those Thorsdamed weeks without a woman's touch…"

As their friend was rewarded with mead on his face and fell asleep, the second viking brought up the crucial point, the one that had convinced him. "Aye, fair, but… they say the captain found them."

Even with enough alcohol to down a boar, Ulf's eyes went wide open. "The captain?" he repeated. That fisherman had not as much as looked at a woman or set foot in a tavern for years. He was not one to talk, and he was not one to lie. Punch you to Valhalla if you were to annoy him, but such stories were not something he'd come up with. "Did the captain talk 'bout dragons?"

The second viking chuckled. "Of course no," he said. "Talking isn't his forte. But sailors who were on the trip with the captain. And saw dragons there."

For the umpenth time this night, Ulf shook his head. No. There were no more dragons, and he wouldn't have to deal with them anymore. Not after all this time. "That proves nothing," he denied.

"That disproves nothing either," answered the second viking. With a swift gesture, he emptied his cup and fell gently asleep on the table, leaving Ulf alone, thinking.

Unbeknownst to them, that tavern was the property of Eret, son of Eret, who had warily listened to their conversation. And while doing his best to appear occupied, the ex-dragon trapper had been made painfully aware that he would not succeed in keeping their secret forever.

However, later that night, he and Helga made a decision. They were going to do something about it.