”It was far more powerful than our initial assessments. I believe it possesses a Nascent Dragon’s Heart, too, which is what ultimately led to our defeat,” the middle-aged vampire said in a serious tone as he reported to the raid organizer. “We may need to reconsider our approach or reach out for assistance.”
“I see,” the organizer said as she wrote in her report. “Did you get any indication of the beast’s inclinations for the upcoming event?”
“Nothing concrete, but what little interaction we did have made it clear the wyvern is incredibly arrogant. I have a hard time seeing it submit even to a far more powerful being, and with its aggressive nature… I believe leaving it be is far too risky.”
“Very well,” the organizer said with a nod. “I will refer it to the upper brass. Now go to your team… I reckon they need you right now.”
“Thank you,” the middle-aged vampire said as he stood up. “But... once more, I must warn you. The wyvern is far more powerful than we believed, so make sure not to just send anyone to be slaughtered.”
“It’s fine; if worst comes to worst, the Patriarch has returned from Nevermore,” the organizer said with a smile, making the vampire’s eyes open wide at hearing his grandfather had returned.
“In that case, I can go rest with a peaceful mind,” the vampire said as he left to rejoin what remained of his failed raid party. Losing so many people was a horrible experience… but it had to be done, even though he regretted the outcome.
Preparation for the Prima Guardian’s arrival was already well underway, with the World Council having made a strategy plan. Based on the knowledge provided in the original system message regarding the event, it was clear that beasts who had consumed system-provided natural treasures had to either sit out the event or join the Prima’s side.
Additionally, It was theorized that when the Prima Guardian event truly began, all protections of human lands would be lifted. Putting these together, it had been decided to address certain known powerful monsters living close to where humans lived, while actively exploring the unknown zones of the planet.
One of the most powerful examples of a known powerful beast was the Northpeak Wyvern. It lived in between Skyggen, Haven, and two other smaller cities, all so close that the wyvern could reach them in a very short time if it decided to attack. To leave it unaddressed would be the same as leaving an enemy behind your own frontlines.Originally, the vampires hadn’t even gone to fight the wyvern but to try and reach some kind of compromise. Perhaps have the wyvern sign a system-bound contract making the wyvern agree not to fight for the Prima Guardian during the system event.
However, they hadn’t even gotten that far before the beast attacked them, forcing the vampire squad to switch to plan B: simply killing it.
It was something they wanted to avoid when possible, but the Northpeak Wyvern had left them little choice. Plus, based on reports, this wyvern was incredibly aggressive toward anyone who entered its domain. It would kill without even asking any questions, so even if it wasn’t going to ally with the Prima, getting rid of it was probably for the best, as keeping such a dangerous beast that couldn’t even be talked to was simply too risky, especially with its domain being so close to human settlements, and its high level of power.
Sadly, it seemed that even with their high assessment of the wyvern, they had underestimated it. His party had been one of the elite teams that hunted down these known high-level monsters, so they had genuinely believed it was a done deal and that there were few monsters they couldn’t handle, at least on the ground. The Sky Whale was leading the assault on the underwater creatures to ensure there wouldn’t be an invasion from the depths during the arrival of the Prima.
As with many others, the vampires all had gone to Nevermore but not stayed the full fifty years. They were all fully aware they were not competing for any kind of Leaderboard position, so they had only gone there for the leveling and stayed a couple of decades until they exhausted most of their potential after evolving to C-grade.
The middle-aged vampire had returned not even a month ago and had already disappointed himself and the family immensely. Alas, with the return of the Patriarch, they hopefully no longer had to hold any fear of these powerful creatures hidden across the planet.
Especially when one considered that his return would also mean the return of all those who had competed in the Leaderboards alongside him. With all those elite members of Earth, he had a bright view of the future and foresaw a less-than-bright future for the wyvern.
Jake walked through the icy cave but remained unbothered as he channeled arcane mana through his veins and protected himself with an outer layer of arcane energy. He saw the wyvern ahead of him within its cavern, in prime position to launch a breath at the entrance. Seeing this, Jake had already made a resolution.
If it dares attack, I kill it.
No arguments or discussions. Jake wanted to talk, sure, but he did say he wanted to remind it of how rude it was to use its breath on people without warning. If, even with this warning and the wyvern’s wounded state, it still decided to attack, Jake would rule this particular beast a lost cause.
Luckily for the wyvern, it didn’t attack even as Jake reached the entrance to the large frosty cavern. Instead, it just raised its head and looked at him with wary eyes, seemingly considering if maybe it should attack.
Jake just stood still as he observed the wyvern for a moment. It was pretty large, about nine meters in length, which, in retrospect, probably wasn’t that large. Or maybe it was; Jake’s only comparison was the Viper back in the day, and he knew sizes between wyverns, dragons, and pretty much all kinds of beasts could vary significantly.
Upon closer inspection, Jake also noticed that the wyvern’s injuries weren’t actually that bad. Sure, they weren’t great, but the frost wyvern seemed to have a lot of Vitality based on how it was already healing. Likely assisted by some passive skill, allowing it to heal faster in a cold environment like this.
What was clear, though, was that it had spent a lot of energy. The half-baked dragon’s heart in its chest had been entirely emptied of gas and would take a while to fully recover. Which made Jake wonder why it had unleashed all of the mana at once into one attack. Did it have to? Or was it to ensure the vampires became the living popsicles they currently were.
Off to the side of the cavern, he had already spotted all the frozen vampires, with the wyvern throwing glances toward them as if afraid Jake was going to try and rob it of its loot.
“So, you really don’t remember me?” Jake finally asked after a bit.
“You do perhaps smell faintly familiar, but no, I do not remember any creature such as you,” the wyvern said in a cautious tone.
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“Oh, so you know how to speak normally?” Jake said, a bit surprised. What the wyvern had done before was more or less mana-speak, if one can call it that. It was sound produced solely through magic, not any physical movement of vocal cords or anything like that.
“What do you want?” the wyvern asked, not bothering with Jake’s question or any kind of politeness.
“I told you already, I want to teach you about hospitality,” Jake said with a smile. “The last time I came here, I did so with genuine curiosity. You see, this was my first time encountering a wyvern in the wild. Imagine my dismay when said wyvern proceeded to unleash a breath on me before I could even introduce myself, blasting me off the mountain. You really don’t remember that or who I am?”
The wyvern was silent for a moment before speaking. “… do you have the slightest idea how little that narrows it down?”
“Wow,” Jake exclaimed. Was… was this frost wyvern just an asshole? So far, all information pointed to the answer yes. “So you just attack anyone who comes here for no good reason?”
“No reason?” the wyvern huffed. “For an inferior creature to invade my domain is more than enough reason!”
“Inferior creature, huh,” Jake said, his smile entirely fading, and instead of using words, he answered with actions as he fully unleashed his aura upon the cavern, even going so far as to use Pride of the Malefic Viper a bit.
Instantly, the wyvern reacted as it opened its mouth, seemingly to release a breath, but at the very last moment, it stopped itself as its eyes opened wide. It had felt Jake’s killing intent the second it showed any indication of an attack, making the wyvern wisely hesitate.
“The only inferior creature I’m seeing here is you,” Jake said as he stared down the wyvern. “And not just because you’re a wanna-be dragon. You’re also a fucking idiot.”
Jake’s words were harsh and insulting, yet the wyvern did nothing but close its mouth as it lowered its head before the pressure.
“Do you have any idea about humans or the enlightened races in general?” Jake asked, making the wyvern hesitate. “Of course, you fucking don’t. Because if you did, you wouldn’t have decided to kill a group that clearly came here and sought you out specifically. Much less flee back to this lair as if nothing happened afterward.”
Based on the weapons that the raid party carried – and the fact they had shown up with a raid party in the first place – it was apparent to Jake that they had come here with the express purpose of hunting down the wyvern. Or at least to be able to fight it should negotations go south.
Seeing as they were also from the Sword Saint’s clan and failed their raid, it also wasn’t hard to see what would come next. They would send an even stronger party… or the old man himself. Even if the wyvern was pretty strong, even for its level, it wasn’t peak-tier genius. Jake reckoned he could have killed this wyvern even if he was a lot lower level than he was now, and the Sword Saint would also be able to slay it without any issues whatsoever.
In some ways, this realization was a bit disappointing, though it would also be kind of weird if some peak-genius wyvern appeared on a random mountain on Earth. The mere fact a wyvern with the potential to evolve into a dragon was born there in the first place was already pretty damn impressive in its own right.
“Answer me, what do you think is going to happen now with that group of vampires who came to kill you?” Jake asked the wyvern.
It was silent for a moment before answering. “They will have learned to not attack my domain again… or report to their kin and come back with a stronger group for me to overcome.”
“Let’s assume it’s the second one – because it’s definitely the second one – what do you plan on doing when that happens? Keel over and die?”
“I shall defeat the-“
“Wrong,” Jake cut the wyvern off. “You die. If not with the next attack, the one after. The enlightened races operate like that. If you kill one member of their faction, they will keep coming back until they wipe you out, and the people who attacked you belong to a faction where I’m aware of at least one person who could easily kill you if he so desired.”
“Do you belong to their faction?” the wyvern asked with a hint of nervousness, making Jake believe he was finally getting through to the dense lizard.
“No,” Jake shook his head. “Not directly.”
The wyvern was silent for a while before Jake sighed. “Seriously, you have a Greater Blessing and yet you are this clueless?”
“My Patron has never interacted with me outside of our first meeting…”
“Well, that sucks for you,” Jake muttered. “Could have at least told you to not stay in the same place if you piss off people you shouldn’t. Makes you a sitting duck.”
“I must remain here,” the wyvern said with a tone of certainty.
“Even if it means your death?” Jake questioned with a raised eyebrow.
“Leaving would be the end of my ambition,” the beast said, once more not leaving anything up for interpretation. This made Jake frown a bit, but he soon realized something.
Jake had walked a lot on the mountain, and while his boots had certainly made him aware of natural treasures, Jake honestly filtered away the feeling most of the time when on stuff like mountains. All the random metals inside the rock registered, which wasn’t particularly interesting. He did pick up when a potent piece of metal entered his radar, but that had not appeared on this mountain.
However, now that he checked again, he did notice something peculiar. While there wasn’t any particular piece of ore that registered as particularly valuable… there sure as hell was a lot of it. As in, the entire mountaintop was one big piece of metal with a thin layer of rock covering it, with a shitload of ice and snow stacked on top.
With this in mind, Jake quickly reached a conclusion: “You need this mountaintop to progress as you absorb the energies here?”
“Yes,” the wyvern confirmed.
Jake also reached another conclusion as he scanned the room and found quite a few skeletons of different beasts encased in ice. “And you feed the mountain itself living creatures you capture in ice?”
The wyvern remained silent to that question, pretty much confirming that as a yes. It did also help that Jake faintly felt energy being drained out of the frozen vampires stashed off to the side of the cavern. With his sphere, he also saw what looked like the body of a large vulture hidden under some snow, having died recently from the looks of it.
“You plan on feeding those vampires to the mountain too?” Jake continued questioning the wyvern, even though it was mostly rhetorical in nature.
Despite it taking a moment, the wyvern slowly confirmed. “I need it for the cold energy to keep increasing.”
Jake now also knew why the mountaintop had gotten so much colder since his last visit. The wyvern was the direct cause. From what Jake quickly gathered, the metal around them was rather unique in that it wasn’t just cold; it also actively absorbed all heat energy others expelled. Freezing people would keep them still, and they would passively fight back against the cold energy until they ran out of energy and died, giving plenty of nourishment to the metal.
“I’m not saying that’s necessarily wrong of you, but capturing any enlightened like this isn’t going to end well for you,” Jake sighed. “With that in mind, release them.”
“What?” the wyvern exclaimed. “I thought they were not part of your tribe?”
“I’m not part of theirs, but that doesn’t mean they’re not part of mine,” Jake said, shaking his head. “They live within my domain, after all.”
“How can they live in your domain if-“
“You seem to misunderstand,” Jake cut off the wyvern with a smile. “You are also living within my domain. Everyone and everything on this planet is.”
His words seemed to insult the wyvern, but with his aura bearing down on it, it didn’t say anything as Jake continued. “Now, I’ll give you an easy choice. Release those vampires and stop messing around with the enlightened species. Additionally, if people come here, don’t just fucking attack them, but kindly ask them to leave if you really don’t want them here. You can do that… or I’ll kill you right here, right now. To make the decision easier for yourself, do me a favor and contact that Patron of yours.”
“My Patron will not be plea-“
“Just tell him the Chosen of the Malefic Viper demanded it of you,” Jake sighed.
It took the wyvern a lot longer than Jake thought it should before the wyvern finally reached out. Jake knew that anyone blessed could reach out at all times to their Patrons, though more often than not, they were just ignored or filtered out passively. He did hope that the Everfrost Dragon God would respond, though, as that would make things a lot simpler.
More than a dozen seconds passed as Jake saw the wyvern clearly preoccupied mentally. He saw its lizard face frown and change a lot during this time, probably partly due to dealing with a direct divine message and partly because of the nature of the message.
After what felt like half a minute, the wyvern finally looked at Jake, lowered its head to the ground, and spoke. “This lowly one begs for forgiveness and swears fealty to the Chosen of the Malefic One.”
Jake stared at the wyvern that had an entirely changed demeanor as he sighed internally.
… maybe I should have just gone with telling the wyvern to get divine customer support from the beginning, huh?