Chapter 44: The School is Built

Kathia followed the hiker's spirit, she glanced to the left and right sides to make sure that neither Spinx nor his dragons and snake were seen. The coast had been clear every time. As they continued through the woods, they were getting closer and closer to the mountain. But the closer they were to Trident Mountain, the more anxious she was in thinking she encounter the necromancer. The girl tried to regain composure by telling herself silently, 'Come on Kathia, get a hold of yourself. You're a destined slayer of dragons and savior of humanity; you can't be scared of one guy. You got spells, too. It'll be like a gunfight; strike him first before he does. Abra-kadabra and he's dead! You can do this, girl.' She hoped these words would make her best prepared for that one encounter. After a while of going through the woods, the girl noticed a trail of blood on the group. An uneasy feeling nagged at the girl, thinking what kind of harm could have come to Azera. "Oh my god," she said in disturbance.

The hiker's spirit noticed the tracks too and said, "That probably must be the lad. We should go and see."

While watching the telepathic scene of what was going on in the battle, Pendra saw Eitri using his water magic to douse out the black flames had been taken controlled by a human in red armor. Then the villagers were taken by surprise when the black flames rekindled themselves. The ground beneath the flames cracked and became dark like it was being charred. The cracks went past the water barrier, cast by Eitri to protect the dragons from the human's control of the guard's fire, and beneath the villagers. The dragons looked down below themselves as if they were expecting something bad to happen. Then more black fires rose from the cracks and torched the villagers. Pendra was frightened by seeing his father in flames as he shouted, "Dad!"

The autumn dragoness and the hatchlings abruptly turned to him, wondering what he just saw. Danielle asked him, "Pendwa, what happened?"

The dragoness was mad at the imperial fleshcrowne for his disobedience and scolded, "Pendra, did you ask someone to show you the fight?!"

The male hatchling flinched under her harsh tone. Not wanting to get himself into trouble, he tried to save his skin by lying, "Uh, no?"

The autumn didn't believe him and questioned, "Then why did you shout for your father?"

Pendra's brown eyes shifted to the side for a bit before looking as he answered,"Um... because I... uh... forgot to give him a present?"

The dragoness was skeptical of his story and growled,"I don't believe you, I can see that you're lying. Pendra, you are getting a time out. And you will stay there until your parents get back!" Throwing her head in the direction of the cave's corner, she told him, "Now get in the corner!" The male hatchling grumbled under his breath as he walked over to the corner and sat there with a pout.

The magi Aquarian returned with a couple of stone dragons and said, "I'm back now and I found these two willing volunteers to help out."

Minerva looked at the stone dragons, observing their rock-like bulky bodies. They appeared to be strong. Being the earth-affinity dragons that they were, the woman had to wonder... "You're stone dragons, aren't you? Can you do earth magic?" she asked. The stone dragons both nodded in response. Then Minerva took out the blueprint and showed it to them. "This is how we want our school built. Can you make it that way?" she asked. The stone dragons studied the blueprint for a little while before they went past the two humans and got to work. They used their magic to quickly build floors, walls, rooms, and even the roof.

Pendra continued to see his father's vision of the fight. The battle looked to be tough on the villagers as the human warriors seemed to be dodging their attacks with ease and as a result, the dragons would sometimes accidentally hit each other. Not once did the humans ever suffer a casualty whereas they killed some of the villagers. The hatchling was feeling discouraged with the way the situation was turning out to be. It seems like the dragons probably won't win this fight after all. Then he saw a royal blue dragoness shouting sometime before his father's vision fell upon a blue-armored human who made a dash for the deeper part of the caves. Thus began the pursuit of the blue-armored human to try and stop him from going any further. But then, two black-armored humans stabbed two of the chasers before Pendra's father dropped to the ground all of a sudden. The hatchling gasped in shock, knowing his father had been hurt. The vision started blurry before the eyelids closed into everlasting darkness and then the noise of battle softened into dead silence. The hatchling thought his father must have gone to sleep in the middle of the fight, so he tried to wake him up. 'Come on dad, this is no time to be napping! The humans are going to get us, wake up!' There was no response, much to Pendra's disappointment. The hatchling tried again with more urgency in his tone, 'Dad, wake up! Now!' But still, nothing had changed. The more he tried to wake up his father, the closer he got to the grim conclusion that his father was dead. Pendra didn't want to believe it; his father couldn't be dead, he shouldn't be dead. He was supposed to come back to him alive and be there to tell his friends about how he killed the humans. But unfortunately, no amount of denial was going to change this harsh truth. Pendra's eyes started to water up with tears and a whisper escaped his breath, "Dad."

The female hatchlings tossed a ballooned Kylie to each other in a game of Kylie ball. The balloon hatchling laughed in fun as the others bumped her around with their paws and noses. But then the game stopped when they heard sobs from the corner. Kylie deflated back to normal and the hatchlings and their dragoness babysitter turned their attention to Pendra, who was crying to himself. They were all concerned for him as Danielle asked, "Pendwa, what's wrong?"

The imperial fleshcrowne sniffed and was about to answer, but the dragoness beat him to it first. She imagined that he must have seen his father get killed and decided not to be too hard on him as he was already in emotional pain. She said in a soft tone,"You saw something horrible happen. Didn't you?" Pendra nodded his head in confirmation of what he witnessed. The dragoness sighed in pity and told him, "This is exactly why I didn't want any of you to see the fight. It isn't all fun and games as you think it is, people get hurt in these sorts of things. Not a pretty sight to see." She went to join him in the corner as she told the other hatchlings, "You four keep playing. I will try to cheer him up." The female hatchlings just stood and looked at each other, feeling unable to play with their mood for it diminished by their concern for their friend. The dragoness softly stroked Pendra's back with her talon and murmured, "You poor thing, I feel your loss."

After a while of waiting for Axle's return, Atlas smelled his scent and anticipated his return from the hunt. She soon saw his form approaching the group. The magi greeted him with these words, "Hey Axle, how did the hunt go?"

As she waited for his answer, Violet started whispering to her, "Atlas. Axle has something on his mind and not for the good, it seems. Maybe you should talk with him and see what is going on, just for a little while." The vampire looked over her shoulder at Axle, who still looked like he was in deep thought.

The magi looked to Axle again, more specifically his facial expression. He definitely looked uncertain about something, but what could it be? Then she looked back at the vampire before replying, "Alright, I'll see what his problem is." Atlas went towards the dragon as her eyes briefly shifted to the side Violet was at and thought, 'You better not do anything fishy while I'm gone.' The magi knew she wouldn't need to worry much as there as Ohimia and Garin were with her; the former could let her through telepathy if Violet ever did something suspicious. After she reached Axle, who seemed more distance from everyone than normal, Atlas asked, "Hey Axle, something up you want to talk about privately?"

Axle snapped out of his trance and paid attention to her. "I..." he stuttered a bit. He turned as he said, "I think a private talk will be fine." They started walking from the group. The white dragon walked slowly enough though for the magi to come up beside him.

Once they were away from the others, Atlas asked, "So Axle, Violet's told me that you seem to be in bad thoughts. Want to talk about it?" She was concerned about him and wondered if there was anything she could do to help him out with his problems.

Axle kind of lowered his head a bit. "I was thinking about my actions and if I was on this journey for a good reason. Not just because I was told by my father to do it,"he said as they continued to walk.

The magi simply replied, indicating him to go on with his talk, "Uh-huh."

"I also was thinking about my own desires. If really needing to reclaim Shadow Wind was the best way to go. It does trouble me that Dracul did kill my father, but..." He went quite, almost if he wasn't sure of himself.

Atlas was dumbfounded by his reluctance to do the obvious solution. Was he actually hesitant to rescue his own people? She told him, "What are you talking about? Of course you got take back Shadow Wind. That place is in hell with Dracul in charge. And as long as he's there, then everybody's going to suffer. You got to knock him off the throne and avenge everyone he's killed."

Axle shook his head and replied, "Vengeance only get more people killed. As for knocking Dracul off the throne, that's a bit more of a challenge in itself. First of all, Shadow Wind is run by more than one lord, but they take orders from the elder lords first. Simply put it, on a chess board, Dracul could be just a pawn in another person game and I am forced to play that game." The dragon seemed a bit lost for a minute before he sighed.

Oh right, the magi had forgotten about the fact that Shadow Wind needs many lords to rule it. But vengeance gets more people killed? She didn't quite understand the logic behind that. Wouldn't getting rid of a bad apple keep the whole bunch from getting spoiled? If one avenged their loved one's deaths, how did it get more people killed? Back to Axle's topic, Atlas spoke in dismay, "Great, so even if we get rid of Dracul, some other snake who's just as bad or worse will still keep Shadow Wind in hell." There was Arch and he was a dragon lord. The end of Dracul doesn't mean the end of him. Just how many other lords were there who were behind the mess that was going on now? Did they need to take down each one before there was peace?

"I'm afraid so. Each lord and elder that is on Dracul's side would have to be taken care of, permanently," Axle said soon followed by an unwilling sigh. "And that is why I question if I should attempt to reclaim Shadow Wind back or if I should just remove Dracul, and all the other corrupted lords from power and leave Shadow Wind."

Atlas knew that he didn't like to kill others, but she also knew that Dracul and his cronies would try to come back and take over if they weren't finished off. After all, Dracul did kill Axle's parents and became a lord again. But wait, did he just say "leave Shadow Wind?" The magi asked curiously, "Leave Shadow Wind, why?" She wondered what made him thought about that. Sure Shadow Wind would be well off under Mekarth and Juna, but why did Axle want to leave a city he held a high position in?

Before she could get an answer from him, a somewhat familiar voice spoke telepathically in her mind, 'Atlas, are you there? It's me, Rina. The dark blue dragoness who helped you with that squirrel. Listen, I need to tell you something and you might not like what you hear, or probably even believe it. Still...'

It sounded like Rina was about to tell Atlas some bad news. The magi's lips almost turned itself into a frown and her eyes gave off a hint of seriousness. She was expecting to hear some kind of foreboding things from the Eternal Wind clan member. Atlas quickly said to Axle, "Hang on, Axle. Someone's talking to me with telepathy." Then she looked away from him and turned her head to the space between trees, almost as if she was now facing Rina in person. She asked, 'So what do you want to tell me?'

The dragoness answered, 'It's about the Vulture Horde. I'm sure you've heard about it at some point. The thing is, they have a plan they are going to set in action once they are finished with something.'

Atlas wondered if Aeolus probably had met the clansdragoness like she had. When Rina paused, the magi goaded her to speak some more, 'Yes, go on.' She wanted to hear what this dragoness had to say about the horde to know what was so important.

Rina told her, 'The plan is to wipe out every single human on this world. No prisoners, no slavery, no banishing. Only mass genocide. I have heard the news from my close friend and I know he is not the type to lie about information like this. Now, in case you believe me, I would like to ask you a question.' Her tone suddenly darkened as she said the following, 'Do you agree with Vulture Horde?'

It sounded like Rina and her friend must have heard the horde's old agenda, something they reformed on. Confident in her knowledge and trust of her old friend, the magi smiled and answered, 'The mass genocide thing? Oh don't worry. The Vulture Horde's not going to do that anymore. Aeolus said that he's only going to kill the bad humans from now on. And I'm glad he's differentiating the good from them. Don't need any innocent blood getting spilled on their claws.'

'He said that?' was the confused response that came from the dragoness.

'Yes, he did,' Atlas confirmed.

Before the magi could say anymore, Rina decided to put the conversation on hold, 'One moment.' The magi waited for a few moments before the clansdragoness asked her, 'Atlas, let me fill you in on details. I learned about this plan just a couple of hours ago. My friend learned about it yesterday, not long before he was teleported to me. When exactly did Aeolus say that he is no longer hunting down innocents?' And added after a short pause, 'Not only that, but I contacted him immediately after I've learned about this, just to confirm what my friend has said. And I'm afraid what he said is different from what you were told.'

The magi stopped smiling and became confused as she asked, 'What? What did he say? Aeolus told me that these two nights ago.'

'I asked him if he was planning to wipe out every single human in the entire world. He said yes, however they have other things to attend to before they will decide to start. Then I asked him why he wants to do that. In response...'

Rina trailed off for a bit before continuing. 'He listed everything bad that humans have done to him.'

Atlas curled her mouth into an open frown, being shocked at what she just heard. Aeolus lied? That can't be right. Then the dark blue dragoness said mentioned that Aeolus wanted to kill because of all the things the humans did to him. Atlas replied, 'What? You got to be kidding me. Aeolus would never lie; he's always been honest with me. Always!' The bad things that happened to him were definitely true though. The disaster dragon had suffered far worse than she and probably Flarina ever did. Not to mention, no human in the world had ever shown him any real kindness like a few did to the first Firestar sisters. Another pause in the conversation started and Atlas waited to hear the clansdragoness's response to her denial.

But the only one to break the silence was Axle who asked her, "Atlas, what's going on?"

Atlas told the clansdragoness, 'Hang on, one moment.' The magi spoke to the dragon, "I just heard someone say something about Aeolus. She said Aeolus was going to kill all humans. But he told me that he was going to spare the humans and this was two nights ago. But she heard him say it today." She faced the ground, shaking her head and continued, "But I'm not sure so about this."She put her eyes back on Axle and continued, "Aeolus has been honest with me for so long and he has never lied before. I don't know what the heck is going on. Their stories say the opposite and I don't know who's telling the truth." She had a great deal of thrust in Aeolus and doubted that he would deliberately lie to her, but she also couldn't deny the times when Aeolus's stories took place either. There was clearly something wrong.

Axle looked at Atlas and told her, "I'm sure Aeolus is a good guy. But if it bothers you that much, we might want to check in on him personally after we are done with the mountain. I need to check in with Juna and Mekarth about a few things as well." Then he looked towards the mountain than the sky and said, "We might want to get a move on here soon, it's starting to come close to mid-dawn."

The magi looked up at the sky as well to see the sun's position. He was right; they still had a long way to go and they mustn't waste any more time. She agreed, "You're right, we should get going." Then turned around and started to head back to the group. The magi said to Rina, 'I'll talk to Aeolus later and see what's going on. Right now I got business to take care of.' After making it back to everyone else, Atlas said to everyone, "Guys, we're ready to go! We need to get to Trident Mountain now."

Ohimia, Garin and Violet ended their conversation and the lumina replied, "Alright, we're coming." Violet came down from the tree she was in and rushed over to Axle. After the girl got on his back, Axle took to the air, just slow enough for Atlas and the rest of the group to catch up as they headed to the mountain.

"Well, here we go!" Garin said. He launched his lithe human figure into the air and did a couple flips before falling in line beside Atlas and Axle.

After 10 minutes of getting the school built, Ronan whistled as he was impressed with their quick work. "Impressive! Most impressive! That was really quick. Never before have I seen a building get set up so quickly. Well, I thank you for the facility construction." He bowed to the dragons and commented, "It looks great."

The dragons bowed back to the man. They were pleased with his polite gratefulness and felt they need to show the same amount of respect back at him. The stone dragon on the left said, "You're very welcome, my good man."

The other stone commented,"You're quite polite for a human. Say, are you a dragon sympathizer?"

Just then Drake flew over and landed next to Ronan and Minerva. "Not just a sympathizer," said the man who patted his dragon friend's side. "This is my partner, Drake." Drake bowed his head to the magi and stone dragons. "I also have this,"Ronan said as he drew his sword. There were markings, engravings. "This was given to me by my master before his death. He said it was crafted by dragons. One of very few swords to possess enchantment by the wisest of dragons. It is only verifiable by a dragon of great wisdom, though I can vouch it has saved me on number of times and some of those times, it felt as if it had some kind of protective power." The dragons examined it before he sheathed it away.

Minerva looked at the sword with interest, seeing how beautifully engraved the markings were. The dragons looked back at the man as the Aquarian said, "So you really are a friend of dragons and a warrior by the looks of it, too."

Ronan nodded to the magi, "I am. I was trained to kill and I've yet to meet a foe who could best me. I have no doubt that such a person exists though."

The magi nodded in agreement and said, "You might be right, young man. Well anyway, our work here is done. If you need anything else created, just let us know and we'll find dragons right for the job."

Minerva replied gratefully, "Thanks again, mister!"

"Our pleasure, miss. You all take care now," the Aquarian said before he and the stone dragons left.

Minerva turned to her boyfriend and said, "So now I guess we go get some business loans for the equipment and stuff, right?"

Ronan looked to her and said, "Uh, yes. Frankly I'm amazed it was built so quickly. I figured it'd take over a month to get everything established, but at this rate we might be ready by the end of the week." He was obviously beyond impressed."Let's just hope war doesn't break out, otherwise I'll be teaching soldiers who can barely hold a sword right, much less use one," he said with his eyes rolled.

The woman let out a chuckle in response. "Well as long as there's peace, there's still hope," she said."Besides, I'm sure the Aquarians here will do a great job preventing war from happening here. So shall we go find a loaner now or do you want to take a break from working?" she asked.

The man hummed, sounding uncertain. "I suppose it would be best to get it done now rather than later. Let's do it," he nodded.

The woman nodded and replied, "Sure. But first, I need to find out where the closest business loan office is. We can't go around getting lost trying to find it." She thought about where to start, since she couldn't use a computer to search for such a place anymore. The alternatives to find one were a directory or simply asking someone where one is. The first option was easier, since some people would probably have no clue. "Let's go to a bookstore and look in the yellow pages," she suggested.

Ronan smirked, "Sure. I think there's a book shop a few blocks towards the inner section of the city."

"Then let's go there," she said before they along with Drake walked to the bookstore, so they could continue with their task of the school set up.

After 10 minutes of following the trail, Kathia and the ghost saw a body lying on the ground in a pool of blood. A sword was lying next to him. Recognizing who it was, the girl cried, "Oh my gosh, it's Azera!"

The hiker shook his head in pity and said, "Poor lad, it looks like his wounds caught up to him."

Not ready to accept that he was dead, the girl ran towards the mercenary and knelt down to check his pulse. The beat was really slow, perhaps he can still be saved. Kathia was resolved on her promise to not let the little girl down. She cried, "Hang on, Azera. I'm going to try and save you!" She searched his body for the wounds and began to use healing magic on them. After Azera was healed up, Kathia looked to the hiker's spirit and said, "I'm going to take him back to his friend. Can you be on the lookout for anybody who's in sight as we go?" She was going to need someone to watch her back in case Spinx attacks.

The hiker was happy to help, "Sure thing, lassie!" The girl struggled to lift up Azera's body and carry him on her back. The man was pretty heavy, due to his muscles adding weight to his body. With his weight going to slow her down, it would take a long time for her to return to the little girl. After putting Azera's arms over her shoulders, Kathia started to walk back to where the little girl was. Hiker floated by her, keeping a vigilant eye out on her surroundings.

The couple entered the bookstore while Drake stayed outside. The couple went to the nonfiction section, where Minerva looked in the shelves with the directories. She found the yellow pages book on the bottom-most shelf and picked it up. The one at home was outdated, now that some of the stores had been rearranged in Windfall. At first, the woman thought about paying and leaving, until she got an idea that there might be books about fighting techniques for Ronan here. Even though he had a master that thought him a lot, he probably didn't teach him all the techniques in the world. Thinking that learning more would be beneficial for the school, Minerva asked, "Hey Ronan, before we make our purchases, do you want to see if we can find books that teach you how to fight?"

Ronan shook his head. "A book has limits to what can be taught. You can learn everything about fighting from books, but they can never teach you to adapt, to change tactics and to outsmart your opponent. We'll do fine without books."

Minerva thought he would miss out the new techniques they would find in books, but then again, what would she know about fighting anyway? She decided to support his decision and said, "Well if that's how you feel, then I guess we're done here. Come on, let's go to the cashier now. Maybe we'll pick up a chocolate bar there." There was this milk chocolate hazelnut bar she wanted to try. If it was still being sold, then she would happily take her chance to buy one now and break a piece to share with Ronan. They went up to the cashier area, where the woman picked up the chocolate bar she was hoping to get. They paid for the book and the chocolate. The items were put in a bag and then the couple went out the first set of the double doors to sit at the bench that was in the entrance area. Minerva took out the yellow pages and looked through the book for the address of a business loan. After she found one, she pointed to the address and said, "There, I found one! We should try over there first and see what they can do for us."

Her boyfriend grinned eagerly and said, "Well then let's go, no time to waste."

"Alright then," replied Minerva. Then they left the store and went onto Drake's back. The woman told him where to go and how to get there. The dragon followed her directions and flew towards their destination.

They finally got to the business loan place. The humans hopped off of Drake and went inside the building. There, they went up the desk where the receptionist was done organizing some papers. The man asked, "Hello? Are you here to get some loans?"

Minerva answered with a nod,"We are. We need some funds to get some things for our school."

"Just one moment," the man said. Then he called the loaner to let her know that she has business to do. After a brief exchange of words, he hung up and said to them, "Okay, your loaner, Mrs. Bernstein will see you in her office. It'll be right at this door." He pointed to the office.

"Thank you, we'll see her now," said Minerva. Then she went over to the office where a plumb brunette woman was sitting at her desk.

Mrs. Berstein asked, "Greetings, I hear you need some funds for a school you want to improve."

The blonde nodded, confirming the loaner's assumption and explained, "Yes. You see? We need to buy some expensive training equipment for our fighting school and to have a graphic designer make advertisements. I don't know what the estimated cost for all the things we need is, but I can imagine that it would probably be around twenty thousand gold."She turned her head to the assassin, looking for a confirmation on her guess. "Would it, Ronan?" she asked. She never got to check the store first for the prices, which she should have done first. Gods, they must look silly coming here without knowing the exact amount they need.

Her boyfriend appeared to think for a moment before saying, "I'd estimate twenty minimal but at max... I'd have to say forty. Weaponry alone is not cheap and I'm not certain how much equipment will cost. The advertisements will most likely cost the most." He added, "Of course with time and how many students we get, we'll be able to pay off the loan quicker."

Minerva awaited the answer for a few seconds until the man told her his assumed price costs. Forty sounded too cheap, unless the equipment Ronan planned to get wasn't too cheap. Darn, she should have tried to research the costs and look for what equipment they need before coming here. The blonde really felt embarrassed for making this rash decision to come here first. Now what would she do to not embarrass herself any further? Perhaps she should just request a not too expensive loan for now and then go to the equipment store? That didn't seem like too bad an idea. She asked, "How about we get a thousand gold loan for now? We'll pay her back with the remaining gold we don't use and then pay off the rest with the profits we make?"

Ronan sighed, "Minerva, how about we tell her what we will need and she can get us an estimate of how much gold we will need for what we want to get?"

Minerva replied, "Okay, I guess that would work." Then she listed the things they thought they would need, "So we need wooden swords, dummies and... uh... what else?"

The man sat forward and said, "Wooden swords and steel swords. Something for punching and kicking... lumber to build wooden dummies, which I can do myself I just need to afford the wood... Perhaps uniforms and weights?"

Looking back to the loaner, Minerva asked her,"So you got all that?" The older woman nodded and said yes. "How much would it be if we had twenty of each?" the blonde asked.

Mrs. Berstein took up her pencil and notepad as she replied, "I'll have to calculate that first." After writing down the numbers of the estimated prices for the needed supplies as she mumbled out the numbers, the loaner told the couple, "And that will come up to a total of 5080 gold."

Ronan looked surprised at the amount and said, "If that's the case, then I think a simple 7000 gold will be more than enough." He looked to his girlfriend as if waiting to hear her confirmation.

Minerva agreed with his suggestion and nodded to the loaner, "Yes, let's go with that for now."

Mrs. Berstein took out a clipboard with a paper on. She told them, "Alright then, please fill out this form and I will give you your funds." After she gave them to the blonde, Minerva took a pen off the desk and filled out the form before returning it to the loaner. The fat woman said, "Alright then, I will send the money over to your bank account. It should be over to you by the end of the day. And we'll send you a letter by mail to let you know when the loan is due."

Minerva said with a smile, "Thank you, ma'am. I do hope our fighting school goes well so that we can pay you back."

"I hope so too," said the loaner who smiled back. "Well anyway, have a good day you two."

"We will," replied the blonde. Then the couple left the office and went out of the building.

Author's Note: So once again, I decided to give this series a new name and it's called "A Dragon's Rage". I'll be making a journal on my DeviantArt account with a link to the poll about what you guys think about this name change. Also, here's a few interesting things from Ronan and I omitted in this chapter, since I usually focus on my characters' POV:

- Ronan was feeling excitement but also nervous. He wondered if this was the right choice for him. If it was the right path. He knew he could train a lot of skilled warriors but at what cost? What would be the end result of his work as a teacher? Would a new war spring? If so, what would he do? There were so many possibilities and it frightened him a little. The uncertainty.

- Ronan thought to himself, "The price of steel weapons is very cheap here. In the desert you have to work two years to get the money for a true steel blade."

Anyway, I'm going to go finish up my New Years Eve fanart that should have been done two years ago.