Chapter 34: To Get What We're Looking For

As Kathia went on her way to the bookstore, she noticed by the local diner stood three men who looked grumpy about something. She heard one of them say, "What the hell was that last night? I can't believe they put that disgusting hippy firework out there."

The girl raised an eyebrow curiously and wondered, 'Disgusting hippy firework?' She wondered what sort of display had been shown last night during the festival's fireworks.

The second man, who was fat, mustached, and wore a gray fedora, said,"Yeah, talk about an insult to all those who died in the massacre. They think we can simply forget what happened and start being friends with those damned scalies? Hell no; they're barking up the wrong tree!"

The third man, who was scrawny with a thick red bear and in dirty overalls, said, "Dang right, you are. Them Aquarian scalies are tryin' ta brainwash us. But we ain't fallin' fer that."

Kathia smiled with enthusiasm and feeling joyful that she found potential citizens, who thought the same way she did. Going up to the men, the girl said, "Hello, don't mind if I cut in. I heard you guys are feeling upset with those dragons as much as I am."

The scrawny man shook his fist and said, "Dang right, we are! Those scalies are messing up our lives here."

"Yes, I know how you feel," said the girl as she nodded in agreement. "But I got some good news I would like to share with you." She looked around in both the air and on the ground to see if any Aquarians or those loyal to them were nearby before she could speak more. When no dragon was in sight, Kathia gestured for the men to come closer to hear. They brought their heads down to her face and she whispered, "There's a city being built far from Windfall and it's going to for humans only. So none of that civil rights for dragons crap." She grinned and continued, "We're also teaching people how to shoot arrows and cast magic, so we can defend ourselves for these scalies."

The men were all excited as the mustached man said, "That sounds wonderful! Where is it at?"

The redneck man said, "I could sure bring mah stuff and family and move on over there."

Kathia didn't want them to make any rash decisions before they get their hopes dashed, so she warned them, "Well that's great and all, guys. But we don't have any houses yet; the place is just a bunch of tents right now." Then she assured them, "But rest assured, the Rittevon Construction Company will be building houses over there and I'll be teaching them magic spells so that we can get the process done faster."

The short-haired man looked a bit skeptical and asked her, "But wait a minute, didn't the Rittevon Construction Company close down a few days ago?"

"It did," the girl said with a slight nod. She smiled and continued, "But I brought them back together! My father's company must go on, no matter how many jobs those dragons steal from us."

"That sounds wonderful," said the mustached man. "Hope this city out there gets built, because I can't stand living in this messed-up hellhole any longer."

The short-haired man and the redneck both nodded as he said, "Yeah, me too!"

Kathia got out her cell phone and told them, "And I'll be the one to let you know we have houses for you. Just give me your phone numbers and I'll call you when it happens." After the men told her their phone numbers and their names, the girl typed them down in her contacts list. "Okay, thanks guys! I hope you all have a good day."

"You, too!" the men said. The girl left and continued on her way to the bookstore. She reached the place and entered the store to search for important spellbooks. Kathia went over to the same section in the store where she found the beginner's magic guide book. Since Mrs. Merryweather was using it to learn spells for housework, Kathia decided to buy another one so that she can learn whatever spells she haven't learned yet. She also thought to buy a variety of different spell books, each with a different subject, for more magical knowledge. After picking up the beginner's guide, Kathia picked up a book on alchemy, healing magic, a book on runes, shapeshifting, folk magic, and ceremonial magic. These books sounded useful to her cause, but to make sure, the girl flipped through each page in the book to see if they had really good spells. They were all great, so she decided to get them. The girl went to the cash register and used her father's credit card to pay for the books. After getting her receipt and bag, the girl left the bookstore with her purchases. Her next stop would be the weapons and equipment for the camp.

The chase took the horde dragons to a pool of water where Juna did a blind jump and landed right in it. The group stopped at the edge and wondered what their next course of action would be. 'Great, now what?' Aeolus heard Gneiss asked.

Bam had an idea and suggested, 'Hey cous, why you sap her the water with your electric breath?'

The horde leader replied, 'That's what I'm about to do, Bam. But thanks for the idea.' But that wasn't the only part of his plan. He needed back up as well, so that his attack don't fail. He told the whole group, 'Everyone, I need you all to get close to her and attack her from the air. But don't touch the water as I'll breath lightning into it. Also, one of you needs to block her sight of me so that she doesn't see what I'm about to do.'

'With pleasure,' Yopple calmly stated, then faced the water as the rest of the group responded as well.

The disaster dragon gave the order, 'Now attack!' The group, save for the flightless Selenite, flew at Juna with the rock-breathers blowing out rocks and the fire breathers holding their flames and resorting using only their bodies as weapons. Aeolus put himself behind Yopple as his large size would be able to provide coverage. The cassare superheated the water with his magic to the temperature of fire. As the group got closer to Juna in a circle with Concetto right above her, Aeolus blew down his breath at the water. He held some of his voltage back, so that he doesn't electrocute her to death on accident. The water got electrified, but Aeolus heard no scream from the halfling. The splash he heard before his attack must have meant the heated water had hurt her, but would that count as a hit? Juna rolled her dark eyes as she change to her full dragon size. The horde halted before she dived back into the now steaming water, sending water up in the air as she seemed to be deep in the water. The horde got wet by the big splash, which also doused the flames in mouths of the firebreathers. Bam and Concetto spat out the water and renewed their flames. The horde looked down at the water; it was evident that the silver dragoness was not going to come up anytime soon. Aeolus felt confident about his victory; he managed to get the silver dragoness in the right place to get her for good. He prepared his lightning breath and brought the voltage up to where it would be enough to knock her out.

Baltia shifted to aim herself at the water and cried, "Ooh, I'll get her!"

Bam saw what the dark myst was about to do and shouted, "Baltia, no!" But it was too late, she dived at the water. Fortunately, Concetto was quick to grab her before Aeolus blew out lightning on the water. The bright light of electricity flashed across the water before the horde leader stopped and let it fall back in the darkness. The horde waited for Juna to float up; it seemed like a few minutes have passed and she still did not surface up from the water.

A few more seconds passed before bubbles raised on the far side of the water as now steam started to rise up from the water. The horde knew that it was Juna coming up, but some of them knew there was something wrong. Aeolus gritted his teeth and thought, 'No, she's still active.' The dragoness suddenly shot out of the water right up to Bam, almost looking like the lightning did nothing to her, as she went to extinguish his flame. Then she swiped her paw with the talons extended lighting quick and dropping back in the water. The horde leader saw his cousin cried, "Bam!" Concetto and Gneiss grabbed the navy blue dragon by the wings and tail before he would fall into the water.

Then Aeolus heard Juna taunting him with an explanation as to why his attack didn't work. 'Aeolus, you may be smart, but you must realize that water is not truly conductive without certain minerals and how deep it is and how large it is. Your lighting trick barely managed to get half way deep, so please try again,' she said. The horde leader let out a quiet growl in response.

Bam rubbed the wound that the dragoness had left him with. Gneiss looked at the disaster dragon and asked, "Aeolus, what do we do? We don't have much time left."

The horde leader looked down at the water and planned out his next attack. Immediately, he told his horde, 'Stand back, all of you.' The group flew away their leader and watched his next action. Aeolus used his magic to create a tornado and send it into the water to create a whirlpool. Hopefully this would draw out Juna. After the vortex appeared, he told the cassare, "Yopple, follow me." Then they flew down into the vortex. The horde leader told the others, 'Concetto, Gneiss, leave Bam and Baltia with Selenite. These three will watch the coast for when Juna comes out and attack her there. Meanwhile, the both of you will stay over the waters and strike when you see her.'

'Got it,' said Gneiss.

'Understood,' replied Concetto.

Bam said eagerly, 'I'll get her back, cous!' Aeolus held lightning in mouth, getting ready to strike when needed.

Upon going down further into the whirlpool, Aeolus was taken by surprise from Juna's sudden rush out of the water. He blew out his lightning breath without thinking as he needed to attack quickly. Then he quickly got tackled by the silver dragon and pushed into the water. The vortex pulled him back and swung him around. As that happened, his little lightning trick tagged Juna not once, but four times because of the vortex's rotation, causing the lighting to bounce off the walls of the water. She felt the pain of the lighting as it hit her each time, causing a painful look on her face.

The disaster dragon spat out the water he accidentally swallowed and cried, "Yopple, get me out of here!" The cassare sighed before he concentrated on the water and worked on slowing down the vortex. As the vortex got weaker, Aeolus rose above the surface and flew to where he could see Yopple. The disaster dragon thanked him, "Thanks Yopple!" He then looked around for Juna to see where she was at and if she had taken a hit from his lightning. She did from the few scorch marks he saw on her. Then he saw the water rising quickly. The horde leader sought to fly up before he gets caught in it, but the water had beaten him. The disaster dragon held little breath he had as his eyes got stung by the liquid around him. Now not only did he have to reach the surface quickly, but he had to deal with the darkness preventing him from seeing most of his surroundings. Luckily, the light from Concentto's fire showed where he needed to go.

Aeolus swam towards the light until he reached the surface, where he just floated there. Gneiss and Concetto looked down at him as the former asked, "Aeolus, what happened down there? Did you get Juna?"

The disaster dragon answered, "I did; a few times."

The green dragon smiled excitedly and said, "Alright! Now a lot more of us will be trained." Then he started looking around for a bit. He turned back to his cousin and asked, "So where is Juna?"

Aeolus looked around for the dragoness. Earlier, he had seen her get thrown by the water into the wall. But where was she now? He had no idea. He looked to the soldier dragon and asked, "Concetto, can you find her?" The soldier dragon looked around for the dragoness until he gave up and shook his head in response. The horde leader figured out, "So she must be underwater then." He got out of the water and hovered. Then he flew away from his subordinates and cast another tornado into the water. If his vortex drew out Juna before, it can do it again. He waited for the dragoness to be seen. The vortex opened up the center of the water again, revealing a silver dragoness near the center as she laid against her side. She appeared to be unconscious. Now that she was spotted, Aeolus needed help getting her out, since she was a lot bigger than he was. Pulling her out would be too much for the horde leader to bear. Turning towards the cassare, he told him, "Yopple, warp Juna out of the water now."

The cassare nodded and said, "Yessir." Then he concentrated his spell and warped Juna out.

The dragoness was now on the ground beside Bam, Selenite, and Baltia. The three dragons looked at her, thinking that they have finally defeated the dragoness. But to make sure that all hits had gotten to her, Bam bit on her tail for a bit and then let go. "I think that's all seven hits now!" he said. Aeolus and the others regrouped and looked down at Juna, waiting for her to wake up. Baltia scooped up some wet dirt out of the water and smeared it on Juna's face in shapes of a mustache, eyeglass, and buck teeth. Bam snickered at the dark myst's work and commented, "Heh heh, nice!"

Juna still seemed unresponsive. It seemed she was dead, however her chest was still rising and falling as her breathing was stable. She was just out cold. Seeing as how the dragoness won't wake up, Aeolus said, "I guess this concludes our test. Vulture Horde, we have won! All seven hits have been done to her."

Baltia piped up in amusement, "And her face got messed up!"

The disaster dragon ignored her and said, "Whatever, the whole horde can now be trained. I will announce this to the others when we get outside." Looking to the cassare, he said, "Yopple, teleport us outside."

Yopple nodded his head and grunted, "Not too much of a distance, should not take much energy. Yessir." Then he focused on the group and started his teleportation spell.

Gneiss, Selenite, and Concetto all felt like being thrown up into a weird space. "Whoa!" the mates cried, while Concetto let out a silent roar.

The group was now outside the cave at the heart of the village. But now the sunny sky that used to heat up the desert was replaced by dark gray clouds above. But thankfully it wasn't raining or anything. Apparently, the horde got tired of the heat and had the gray dragons bring up the clouds to use as shade. Aeolus looked at Gneiss and Selenite and told them, "Take Juna over to the cave behind you. Let me know when she wakes up." The two dragons nodded and took the silver dragoness over to the chieftain's cave to rest.

Yopple grinned and then looked at the ground. He asked, "So, shall we start training once Juna wakes?"

Aeolus replied, "If she allows us to be trained, then yes."

The others went to rejoin and the horde outside the village. They saw that half of the horde were still sparring, while the other half were taking a break. The disaster dragon was pleased to see them being persistent in their training, but didn't show it on his face. He thought, 'They're still going at it. Good!' But of course, they must train against the same sparring partner all the time. Plus, they needed a break after being in that dark cave for nearly an hour. So Aeolus announced to them through telepathy, 'Vulture Horde, I have returned! Now I need your attention on me.' The horde stopped sparring and the leader waited until all eyes were on him. Then the leader said to them, "Vulture Horde, we have completed our test with Juna and have landed all hits on her, so that all of us will receive training." Roars of cheer sounded among the crowd; they were all glad that their leader had accomplished this. After the roars died down, Aeolus continued, "But of course, we have yet to hear her decision as she is currently unconscious and will need rest until she wakes up. Speaking of resting, I believe this horde needs a thirty minute break before we resume training again with different partners. So without further ado, everyone take a rest now and review your training. Think about whatever tricks you learned and figure out what you could have done in your fights."

The horde happily started resting and went to mingle with their friends. Fakoo and Omdomiel went over to their leader. The former of the two said to him, "Aeolus, we found a survivor of the Eternal Wind clan."

The disaster dragon asked them, "Is it Rina?"

Omdomiel answered, "I'm not sure; he never gave us his name."

So it's not Rina then; which means another member of the clan had survived. Aeolus asked him, "So what did he look like?"

Fakoo described, "He was a black dragon with a cut in each of his wings. He wanted to ask you if you've see anybody from his clan."

The horde leader replied, "Well what a coincidence, because another survivor had been looking for her kind, too."

The charcoal dragon's eyes grew a bit wide with interest and asked, "You saw another one?" Then he smiled and continued, "Well in that case, he'll be glad to know you saw her."

Aeolus then asked, "That he will be. Now where is he?"

The albino answered, "He left; I think I saw him go into the village. But I'll contact him and let him know you're here." Then she used telepathy to contact the black dragon, 'Our leader's back. He's with us now.' Then remembering how he was unaware of telepathy, she instructed,'And also, to use telepathy, you must picture someone in your mind and use your thoughts to communicate with them.'

The dragons waited for the Eternal Wind clan member to meet them. During their wait, the dragons sat and talked amongst themselves, sharing stories about their past days and what the new Gallion clan was like. It took a while until they saw a lone black dragon approaching them; it was most likely the Eternal Wind clan member. He announced his presence, "Alright, I'm here." Then he looked around the crowd and asked, "So you said that the leader is here now. Where is he?"

Before Fakoo could say anything, Aeolus answered for her, "That would be me." He rose up off the desert ground and went to the black dragon, who was almost half his size. The horde leader noticed the cuts in the wings, which looked similar in fashion to the way Rina had them. He said, "You must be other the survivor from the Eternal Wind clan I've heard about."

"That I am," the black dragon said and nodded. "Seeing as others didn't hear my name yet, I guess now is the time. The name's Raven, the frontal warrior and subsequently the head of the watch duty. Not that my job in the clan matters anyway, seeing as the village is almost gone now, along with the others," he added with a harrumph.

Aeolus responded with a simple "Mm-hmm."

After hearing the response from the leader, Raven said,: "Now, I heard that you've met a surviving clanmate of mine. Who is he? Or she?"

The horde leader answered, "Her name is Rina; we last met in this village a few days ago."

"Rina?... Oh, her," replied the black dragon, without much enthusiasm. "Dark-blue, almost never smiles, very brutal in combat, has a weird obsession over that multi-colored cube humans call 'Rubik's Cube?'" Aeolus had seen a small cube with multiple colors on it a long time ago, but he never got to hear its name. Perhaps that was the Rubik's Cube that Raven mentioned.

The horde leader continued,"I have no idea where she is now, but I can have one of the magi dragons take you over to her if you wish."

Raven replied,"I still have some unfinished business here, it won't take too long. I'll come back here after I'm done with it."

Aeolus patiently replied, "You may take your time." Raven nodded, turned around and headed back to the village as the group watched him go.

After a while, the black dragon sprinted back towards them. He slowed down as he got near and calmly walked toward the leader. "I am done," he huffed, once he stood before the disaster dragon. "Whenever you are ready."

Aeolus telepathically contacted one of the magi dragons, 'Kekul, come to me. I need you to teleport an Eternal Wind clan member over to one of his clanmates.'

The magma magi dragon immediately appeared via teleportation and spotted the stranger. "That's him, right?" he asked while looking at Raven.

Aeolus nodded and answered, "It is. Now let me show you who to take him to." The horde leader sent Kekul an image of Rina, whom the magi used his tracking spell on.

After memorizing the dragoness's appearance, Kekul said, "I got it." Then he looked at Raven and concentrated on the mental image of the dragoness. After he channeled enough magic energy, he teleported the black dragon over to his clanmate. "There, it is done," said the magma magi.

Kathia walked down the side and looked around for a horse carriage past walking people and the hulking masses of dragons. Since the dragons' bodies blocked the view, the girl had to look underneath them for any signs of the carriages like wheels and hooves. It took her 20 minutes to finally find one in front of a fast food restaurant where a couple was dropped off to. Kathia ran over to the carriage quickly before someone would get to it first. She took out her coins and held them to the coachman as she shouted, "Sir, I need a ride!" The coachman took the cash and let the girl onto the carriage. She told him to take her to the northern gate of the city and the coachman made the horse take them there. During the ride, Kathia took out the book on folk magic to see what her people can learn for their well-being. The carriage finally reached the gate and dropped Kathia off there. The guards opened the gate to let her out and the girl went back to the car.

As Kathia got in beside the driver, the woman greeted her, "Hi, welcome back! Did you buy everything you need?"

"I sure did!" the girl replied with a grin. "I bought a bunch of spell books so that we can all learn all the magic we can. And I even bought the weapons and equipment Jason needs."

The driver sounded happy, "Oh that's great! I'm sure the others would be amazed when you show them."

"They sure will be!" Kathia guaranteed, picturing the people's amazement. The car drove off on its way to Sundown.

The woman went on watching video after video, while skipping those that weren't important to Ronan's cause such as one about women's business for example. After a while of watching all these surprisingly short videos, she went on to read the next steps. Step 3 was about choosing a business location, which was already done. Step 4 was about the business loan programs. Minerva read the sub-articles there to see how the process was done. Everything looked complicated and she was probably going to get bored trying to read it all in step 4. But no matter how tiring it was, the woman needed to force herself to read through all of these. Maybe if the boredom was too strong, then she could take a quick break of either walking around for a few seconds or looking at web images she searched for a bit. While going through these sub-articles, Minerva found a "Fine a Lender" link that would tell where the nearest lender would be in Windfall. She clicked on the link and put in the location data in the search engine to find the results. She received a list of banks and financial groups. She wrote the names down on paper, so that she could look up their addresses later. Once, she was done with Step 4, she went on to Step 6 which was registering a business name. Come to think of it, Ronan hadn't thought of a business name yet. She wondered what kind of name he would call his fighting school. She decided, she would discuss this later after she was done with her research.

Step 7 was how to get a tax identification number. Minerva read up about the EIN and the requirements for it. There weren't going to be any employees, the school wasn't going to be a corporation, they weren't going to file tax returns, she wasn't sure if they were going to need a Keogh Plan, and they weren't going to be involved with any organizations. So she figured they didn't need an EIN. She skipped Step 7 and went on to Step 8, which was registering for local taxes. Soon, Ronan entered the room and approached the woman from behind. He asked curiously, "How's it looking so far?"

"I'm over halfway done with how to start a business," Minerva answered him. "I only got step 8 left and then two others." The woman looked up the taxes for Windfall to see how these things worked. After she clicked on the first link in the article, it took her to another website with several links. She turned to Ronan and said, "This is going to take a while."

Ronan gave a frustrated look and the woman knew that that even he thought it was taking too long. "Well, you have a better chance of understanding this than I do. Need any help with anything?" He asked, offering his aid.

Minerva knew it was now the right time to ask this certain question. Turning away from the laptop, she asked, "Yes, Ronan do you know what you're going to call this school of yours? We need a business name for this school."

The man shook his head and answered, "Hmm, no I've never thought of a name for it. Any ideas?" He sounded curious as to what her answer would be.

Minerva shook her head and answered, "No not yet." Then she suggested an idea, "Hey, why don't we think together?" With both minds at work, they'll have an easier time getting the perfect name. The woman started to think of names for his school. The first one to come mind was, "How about Ronan's Fighting School?" It may have sounded bland, but she felt she could try suggesting that name first before she thought of more creative ones.

Ronan shook his head and said, "Sounds too prideful." Then he got an idea and suggested, "Hey, what about, Dragon's Fist martial arts?"

Minerva smiled and replied,"That sounds better." Then she thought about rearranging the name a bit to see if it would sound better than it is. "But what if we called it 'The Fist Dragon's martial arts'? I mean we know martial arts involves using your fists, so there's no need to call it 'fist martial arts'." Another name immediately came up for her and it was called, "Southwest Martial Arts". She figured it would reference where Ronan came from. But before she could suggest it to him, she wanted to know what he thought about "The Fist Dragon's Martial Arts."

The man shook his head again and said, "To put Fist before Dragon doesn't sound right unless you make it 'Fist of the Dragon' or something like that."

"Oh okay," the woman replied. Then she raised a finger and was about to suggest 'Southwest Martial Arts' until a new name suddenly popped up. Then she said, "What about Blazing Tiger Fighting Academy? That sounds even better, right?" If not, she'll have to suggest the other name she was thinking of earlier.

Ronan thought it over for a bit before he suggested, "Hey, what about, 'Blazing Tiger, Soaring Dragon Academy'?" He smiled at the thought at of his idea. "Tigers are patient and ferocious. Dragons are wise and deadly. Good, no?" he chuckled.

Minerva giggled back and thought about how good the two names sounded. "Yes they are, but I think it would be better to keep the name of the school short instead of having two names in it. Soaring Dragon sounds like a pretty unique name," she complimented. "But I think Blazing Tiger sounds more attractive. It's got that energetic ring to it," she said.

The man nodded with a smile and said, "What the heck, why not. Blazing Tiger Martial Arts." He glanced at the clock as if he was checking the time before he looked back at her.

"Then let's call it that," Minerva said. She was proud they could get at least this much done today.

Ronan nodded and asked, "Alright so what's next? Got the name done, and I'm sure you've already covered a lot of research, what else is left?"

"Let's see..." said the woman as she turned back to her laptop to look. There were two more steps left: one about obtaining business license and the other about understanding employer responsibilities. "There's two more steps, but it'll be done soon," she assured as she clicked on the link to step 9.

The man thought about what else they'll need for his business. "Hmm, we'll need equipment. We'll need to find someone who can help us get the necessary training equipment. Wooden dummies, weapons, weights, etc.," he went on listing a few things.

To help him on where to get them, Minerva said, "We can get some of them at the sports store, a Hayanese shop, and order some online. I know a sports shop over at one of the shopping centers."

Ronan nodded and replied, "Alright, sounds good." With a smirk, he continued, "Again, thanks for this Minerva."

As he left her room, the woman returned the smile and said, "Anytime, Ronan!"

Author's Note: Wow, it's been a month since I last uploaded a Dragon Rage chapter. The reason for this delay is because Esko, Draco and UberCatsr (a.k.a. TheTron852) all had school and exams to study for and do. Now with Aeolus out of the way, now I can work on other chapters and get them done quickly. But first, I need to do an anniversary story for Jass on DeviantArt. It probably won't reach 9 pages as I've delayed too much on it, so I'll just work with what I can put on it.