Teepo had never seen the sea before, at least as far as he could remember. Which made the bridge to the Rhapala region seem even more daunting, impressively long as it was regardless. He quickly shook himself out of it though, refusing to let himself be impressed that much by a bridge of all things, and carried on. The bridge soon ended, on white rocky land, unlike the mostly green plains and forests of Wyndia. The vast open terrain, with the horizon meeting the ground in every direction, felt slightly too vulnerable for Teepo's liking, being used to living in the thick of a forest, but there wasn't anything that he could do about the terrain, so he reluctantly accepted it.
"Why do I always forget I can transform if need be? What does being exposed matter if I can burn any threat to a crisp anyway. If they deserve it." He thought to himself.
"Still don't wanna get seen as a dragon I guess." Teepo mused a bit more. "Heck, the less everyone knows about me the better no matter what, not like there's anyone I trust that is still alive. Ok, I trust myself still, but not as much as before, well everything happened." Teepo managed to quickly stop himself before he slipped into getting stuck thinking about the past. Teepo wasn't particularly wise, bu still knew that nothing good would come from that.
"Just wish I would know why I felt this anxious, but whatever, hope I'll be in a better mood tomorrow." Teepo shrugged and went to sleep, surprisingly successfully.
After a few more days, Teepo reached Rhapala. The road had been mostly unremarkable, except for Teepo finding it curious that the flower rings on the ground which were rather common around Wyndia still were common here.
Rhapala itself was a rather small town, contrary to Teepo's expectations. There was a scattering of various buildings, built around a central plaza, some large crates, and a pub a bit off to the side, but not much else. The docks were large though, as large if not larger than the rest of the town. Neither were particularly interesting to Teepo though, and nothing particular was happening at either, save for what looked like some love drama that Teepo didn't want to poke his nose in over his dead body. As such, he found himself wanting to move on rather quickly after he had stocked up on provisions and bought maps for the regions in the vicinity. Looking over where he could go next, he had two options, he first wanted to go to Parch, wanting to wait with moving on to another region, but getting there seemed to be a hassle, so on towards the Urkan region it was, passing along Mt. Zublo on the way.
That was what he had planned at least, but a trip back and forth to Mt. Zublo later, and he was back in Rhapala, now with the knowledge that the road around the volcano was blocked due to an eruption earlier. Which left him feeling frustrated, and standing on one of the docks and blankly gazing out at the sea.
"Whatcha looking for kid? Haven't seen the inner sea before or what?" One of the dock workers, an iron ogre, somehow had snuck up behind Teepo, despite the iron ogre's size.
"Nothing really, just looking around the place. What do you mean with inner sea?" Teepo answered in a neutral tone, shifting into curiosity.
"Well, you do you." He responded after a few moments. "The inner sea is the sea between here up to Steel Beach over in Urkan. Where are you heading after you're done looking around?" He continued aftter a fe more moments.
"Um…" Teepo quickly thought it over and didn't see any harm in telling the truth.
"The Urkan region, maybe?" Teepo shrugged. "But I learnt the road was blocked by the volcano eruption, so I don't know about going there right now." Teepo shrugged again for emphasis. "Hey, how do you travel to Parch by the way? Didn't see any way to get there looking at my map."
"Parch is a backwater fishing village, what business would you have there? As for Urkan, hmm, well, why don't you take a ride on one of them guild boats?"
"They take passengers? Looked like they were only shipping machines on them."
"Shipping machines is their main business, but they do take passengers. You'll have to pay to a bit o' zenny of course, but it really doesn't cost that much."
"Good to know. Thanks." Teepo nodded and walked off.
Finding the guild's business building took a bit of time, especially as Teepo had assumed that the building with a logo of a cat's face would not be the place to look for a guild which specialized in freight. A short lesson in being careful about making assumptions later, and Teepo entered the building, which really just had a desk with a man sitting behind it. Buying his ticket went well, so then it was simply a matter of walking down to the dock and waiting until the boat came in.
The boat ride took two days, with Teepo first feeling a bit anxious over whether the boat was safe or not as he had never ridden a seafaring boat. Teepo was greatly enjoying not having to put in any physical effort himself, and be able to just sit back and relax, and gaze out at the sea. For the first day at least, Teepo got bored the second day, but there was nothing to be done about that, so he decided to get some extra sleep, which wasn't something he desperately needed, but he knew Rei would chew him out for not getting enough sleep if he was still around, and Teepo had been sleeping less he usually would.
Teepo was woken up as the boat moored at the pier in Junktown. As Teepo was leaving the boat, it suddenly shook violently, accompanied by a loud noise.
"Did the fricking engine blow again?!" Someone roared louder than the noise had been.
"Y-y-yes." A frightened voice responded.
"I told you we shouldn't have skimped on the repair last time! Stupid little…."
Teepo quickly left, not feeling like listening to people yelling or the need to get involved.
Junktown was interesting to Teepo, relative to Rhapala at least, feeling like pretty much the polar opposite to the forest where he had lived. No plant life was to be seen unless you actively looked for it, instead there was just piles and piles of ...junk. All there for the taking too, no one would know or care if you made off with whatever hunk of metal caught your fancy, which was very unlike the slight stinginess which was always faintly present everywhere Teepo had went.
"Impossible to be a thief in a place where you can't steal anything, huh." The thought struck Teepo as he dug up a piece of metal and put in his pocket, just because he could.
"Welp, can always steal food and money and whatnot. So much for that thought." Teepo thought slightly dejectedly as he walked away.
"Suppose all of this is called junk for a reason though. Don't know jack and can't do jack with that junk. Maybe melt it down and sell the scrap metal?"
"Well, whatever. I don't have a good way of hauling this junk around anyway. Leave it to the pros I guess." Teepo shook his head and sighed.
"That's a thought actually. Maybe I could join the guild, if I can't come up with anything better to do once I'm done travelling."
"Scrap that actually. I don't ever want old man Bunyan finding out about that, he would never get off my case if he did. Working like that is for losers anyway." Teepo got up and started walking away.
Teepo suddenly stumbled as he walked into a round, purple robot of some sort.
"vuuvuuuvuuuvu?" The machine whirred at Teepo.
"Um, sorry?" Teepo was incredibly confused, how and why was this machine reacting to him.
"vuuvvvvuu?" The machine whirred and spun it's head. After which it promptly left.
Teepo shook his head, and got back to thinking.
"Man, I really don't know what to think about this place. Let's wander around a bit more I guess. Can always come back here later when I leave, not like I have anywhere I should be."
After looking around Junktown for a bit more, Teepo had firmly concluded that there really wasn't much to see other than the junk, which Teepo wasn't really interested in. So he stocked up and prepared to hit the road again, also noting that his zenny coffers were running low once again. They weren't empty quite yet though, so he left that as a problem to solve for the next time he got into a town.
"Let's see… I could go to Steel beach, or wait, never mind, they only allow guild members there. I could go east but there's only mountains there, who cares about those. So south to Urkan Tapa and Angel Tower I go." Teepo reasoned once he got out of town.
The road between Junktown and Urkan Tapa was wholly unremarkable, except for how surprisingly few travelers there were on the road that connected two, at least in Teepo's mind, major cities. Other than that the occasional monsters were different from the one on the other side of the inner sea, unsurprisingly enough, but they still were pretty easily dealt with.
Urkan Tapa had a certain air about it, which Teepo couldn't quite place. What he was sure about though after buying some food to replenish his stocks was that he needed some money, and quick. Which led to Teepo attempting another break-in. The construction of the place reminded him of Junktown, with the blocks containing a single room each stacked on top of each other in irregular layers, with the side effect of making it harder to plan a robbery, at least in Teepo's opinion. After scouting around for a good target for a bit, he settled on the largest block, as it didn't seem to be guarded in any way, and a larger block meant more money in Teepo's thought process.
The initial break-in went as easily as can be expected from a place with not even a door. The problem arose when he tried to find any valuables. He found absolutely nothing of value, except for the fairly elaborate carpet on the floor.
"What do I do?" Teepo mumbled to noone in particular.
"This thing should turn a decent sum if I am able to sell it, but I can't really sell it here, so I would need to lug it some other town and sell it there." Teepo glanced at the carpet.
"Yeah, no, stealing a carpet larger than my tent and lugging it over to another town to try and sell it is just too stupid." Teepo ascertained after a little bit of thought.
"Actually, that tapestry on the wall looks like it could sell for a decent profit as well. And I can actually carry it around kinda easily unlike that fricking large carpet."
Teepo started removing the tapestry from the wall. Then someone tapped him on the shoulder.
"Excuse me young man, but why are you removing that tapestry?" The voice said sounding mildly flabbergasted.
Teepo tried to run away, but got firmly grabbed.
"I hold no ill will towards you, so it would be the easiest for you to simply answer my question." The voice hardened a bit, and then got gentler again.
Teepo clearly didn't have any other options, so he started telling the truth.
"Um… well I have no money, so I thought I would grab this thing and try to sell it."
"The plight of the poor? Fear not. Money is nothing to god, and as such means little to us as well. If you need charity we can offer." The man took on a voice which Teepo would describe as smarmy.
"Really? Those shopkeepers next door seemed as cheap as anywhere else." Teepo snarked in response.
The priest seemed to willfully ignore that statement, and continued talking.
"Well, my child? Do you want assistance with your financial situation? Or if you just want some guidance in life, we can offer you that as well."
"No thank y- hm, wait actually, sure why not? You don't charge anything for the guidance right?" Teepo knew that he usually would mock anyone offering guidance, but some guidance did admittedly sound really nice right about now, and hey, he could always just hightail it if it got too preachy.
"Rest assured my child. What matters do you seek guidance in?
"I- ummm." Teepo realized that even if he really would like some advice, he wasn't even really sure where to start and what topics he would want advice on. Not to mention that sharing all the details around his circumstances might get him in trouble. Still, he had to answer something, so he quickly made up an excuse for being unsure.
"Well, explaining would take a really long time, so do you have any, I dunno, catch-all advice."
"Advice for all situations is not something that we, or anyone except maybe god for that matter, can offer. Still, if you would want to, we could grant you temporary entry to Angel Tower."
"Angel Tower?" Teepo answered skeptically.
"Our god is known to shown themselves occasionally at Angel Tower, if you truly are a lost child of god, then our god in all her mercy will maybe show herself to you someway, to guide you. Who better to offer advice than god herself?" The priest exclaimed with some extra gusto.
"I'm not going anywhere, so sure, why not?" Another spot to stop by while traveling sounded alright enough to Teepo.
"A good choice. Wait here for a bit then, and I'll go prepare your entry permission papers."
"Permission papers?"
"Angel Tower is our most sacred place, so there are guards who are only allowed to let a select few people onto the grounds. You'll need the permission."
"Ok. What's your name by the way?"
"Hondara."
Hondara did as promised, and returned a bit later with the papers. Teepo then spent another day looking around the town, finding a very lifelike statue of a creature that Teepo didn't know the name of to be interesting, but other than that the town was very sparse, and the people too zealous for Teepo's taste. Teepo also had a bitter realization that the Mcneil village wasn't honestly particularly much worse, or better for that matter, than most of the towns he had visited, much as he disliked it.
Arriving at Angel Tower Teepo wondered why it was called that, as the structure was as wide as it was tall, and there were no angels to be seen. Naming aside, there was a certain unnerving feeling that hit him as soon as he entered, with the closest comparison that he could think of was when the amalgam had appeared while he had been in Mcneil manor. Whatever ghosts there might have been wasn't Teepo's problem though, so he wasn't too concerned. Well, yet at least, but if they were like the Mcneil ghosts he figured he should be more worried about how to mock them properly rather than actually being scared of them.
"Stop." Teepo froze immediately, partially not by conscious choice.
"Who sent you here?" The guard rumbled.
"A priest named Hondara, here's my permission papers.
The guard took the paper and glanced it over.
"Hondara gave you permission then?"
"Yes." Teepo quietly let out a sarcastic comment about the guard's intelligence.
"Alright. Walk the stairs to the top and wait a bit. Should god decide to contact you, you will know it."
Teepo stood around for a few minutes. Then, all his surroundings turned to black, and a voice called out. As suddenly as the surroundings had initially changed, they then changed back to normal, with no indication that anything had happened.
Confused about what had just happened, Teepo decided to hang around a bit longer and see if anything else happened. He got bored of waiting pretty quickly though, so he decided to go, also feeling slightly worried that the guards would grow suspicious if he just stood around for a long while. Descending down the stairs, Teepo decided to just ignore what had happened, not having a clue what he would do the experience he had had even if he wanted to. He also briefly considered trying to sneakily loot Angel Tower, because if it was a holy site there had to be some valuable objects somewhere, right? On second thought it was just way too risky, and poorly planned out as his robberies often were, he still had the presence of mind to not attempt a break-in under broad daylight with literal guards around.
Having left Angel Tower the road continued on down south. Teepo was back to not having any particular destination, so he shrugged and started walking down the road yet again.
When Teepo went to sleep that night, a vivid dream begun. And in that dream, a voice called out.
"My… Teepo." The voice, unnaturally gentle, said.
The dream ended abruptly, leaving Teepo wondering why in the morning. As he travelled over the next few days, the dream recurred while he slept. If it even was a dream, the same dream appearing several days in a row creeped Teepo out too much for him to want to think that was the case. But what was it then? Then during another night the voice spoke again, but now the dream lasted just a bit longer.
"My… Teepo. Hopelessly lost in the world. I can show you the path which is best for you, and the world. Accept the wisdom and mercy that I can grant to you, unlike to the rest of the brood."
The voice said in the same silky tone. A brief flash of a blonde woman clad in a pink dress, with a pair of wings detached upside-down behind her appeared. Teepo woke up confused and concerned. Having a person who the voice was attached to felt like a relief, but on the other hand Teepo had no idea who she was. Her being able to seemingly appear in his dreams at will, knowing that he was brood, and finding him interesting enough to do it repeatedly was also creeping Teepo out a lot. At least the voice itself was pleasantly calming, ignoring the potential implications behind the voice. Being able to respond somehow sure would be nice though, or knowing who she was.
After a few days, the last being spent travelling a narrow cliffside road overlooking the sea, Teepo arrived at the place named Tidal Caves on his map. A manillo stopped Teepo just as he was about to enter a cave mouth.
"Hey kiddo! Better watch the tides if you're headed in there."
"….Sure. What are you even doing out here? I don't see there being many customers here."
"Yeah, but if any of you landlubbers want to travel to Cliff you will have to pass this spot. And lemme tell you kid, those caves have some critters the likes of which you will never want to run into! So I sell gear and medicine and whatnot to travelers." The manillo grinned, very, very widely.
"I have no money, so screw you." Teepo grumbled matter-of-factly.
"A shame." The grin went away. Well, watch out for the tides still!" The grin returned in full force.
The inside of the Tidal caves were frankly kicking Teepo's ass, much to his surprise. All the travelling that he had done lately had been on well traveled roads, with very few monsters, so he was feeling slightly rusty. Still, even if he wasn't rusty, there were lots of monsters that he hadn't seen before. The frogs weren't that scary, but Teepo still received a good tongue lashing from one of them, the cyclops cacti were hard to approach safely, and the rest of the local fauna was even worse. The whelp didn't feel that strong anymore. Teepo had been able to rather swiftly incinerate every wild monster he ran into at first, but now it felt like he struggled to gain the upper hand at all. Combat issues aside, having to watch the tides was making it risky to delve deeper into any side tunnel, as drowning was a very real possibility.
Still, a surprise encounter with two spiky balloon-resembling fish left Teepo with an awkward wound on his sword arm, and surrounded in the narrow corridor he was in. His magic had proven to be rather ineffective in a previous battle, so that left transforming, although that hadn't been very effective either. Still, that was better than nothing, so transform he did.
Then, as Teepo transformed in desperation, despite knowing it wouldn't really get him out of the dire situation he was in, a sudden change happened. Teepo transformed, but unlike the whelp he had grown accustomed to, his form shifted and expanded into a large purple bipedal dragon, with wings, long fangs and claws, and a long tail. There was no time to ponder his new form though, as he still had a battle to fight.
Even with the new dragon form the battle was no cakewalk, but after getting a good grip on the creature with his teeth, he was able to finish it off. Transforming back, Teepo felt a bit dizzy, so he reluctantly took a break.
After having rested so he didn't feel dizzy anymore, luckily not getting attacked while resting, he tried to muster up his new form again. It didn't work however, much to Teepo's chagrin, as he transformed into the familiar whelp form.
"Drat. Welp, I'll figure out how to transform into that whenever I want at some point. Really don't need that extra power long as I am anywhere but this place. Or heck, maybe I am just too tired to turn into that." Teepo grumbled. "Is there even anyone alive who actually knows how all of that works? Well, whatever, maybe I'll meet someone like that one day. Or not." Teepo then felt a drop of water fall from the ceiling on his neck.
"Man, this place can just go screw itself. And those fricking flying spiky fish-things with a tail extra much so. What are they even fricking called?" Teepo spat on the ground.
"Whatever, should move my bum before the tides change. I do not want to spend the night in here." He grunted and got up, sighing as he saw another of the round frogs quickly moving towards him, and entered a fighting stance.
A few hours and a little incident with a raft inside the caves later, Teepo was outside without any major injuries, albeit sopping wet and in a grumpy mood. Getting out of the caves meant that travelling was back to normal, much to Teepo's relief. The woman in his dreams was back however, albeit not saying anything new, Teepo decided that if it wasn't anything that was harmful now, he would just figure out what the dream meant at some later point. The only solution Teepo could think of was that maybe returning to Angel Tower would shed some light on what it was, but he doubted it. A few days more walking down the cliffside road, and a village which could generously be described as run down laid before him. Teepo took a look at his map.
"Yep, this is Cliff all right." Teepo nodded to himself.
Author's note: Was unsure if I should also have Teepo collect genes to develop his dragon powers further, but decided against it as the form the dragon lord closest resembles is kaiser, and the infinity gene really isn't something there could be multiple copies of it scattered in the world, so with that considered I think Teepo developing his powers on his own seems the most logical, although probably not with the same amount of options as Ryu has. Hope it won't come off as plot armor too much.