"Annie... What are you doing now...?" a man asked as he observed the young girl appearing right in front of his work office dragging around a massive beast by one of its legs.

The girl wore a long black dress and a pair of similarly dark boots which clashed greatly with the red jungle that was her hair. She was showing a child-like smile as she continued to walk in while gazing at the furniture of the room with her massive pair of wide eyes.

"Oh, you know... Just carrying it out the job you ordered me to do" she replied while laughing innocently, "You wanted me to bring back little brother, Hughie, right, daddy?"

She was, of course, referring to the behemoth that was the red dragon knocked out behind her, a giant creature covered with red scales, golden horns, and the lower half of a centipede. The young lass simply continued to drag the beast through the room as if it was a sack of potatoes and causing it to completely destroy the floor and the walls due to its absurd size.

The one watching the entire scene, a man who seemed to be in his late thirties with long strings of red hair, much like the girl herself, tied up in a ponytail that reached all the way to his waist, simply sighed while calculating how much it would cost to repair all the damage she was causing to his chamber.

Right now, he was sitting behind a table while holding a book in one hand and making notes on a piece of paper with the other, "And you couldn't have brought him in his other form because....?"

"The other form is too soft... It breaks too easily..." she replied while tapping her fist against the hard crimson scales of the dragon she was carrying, making a sound as if she was knocking at someone's door, "this one is more resistant."

"Lovely..." the man responded while rolling his eyes, "Wake him up before you destroy my room."

The girl smiled at him and began to stare at her hand before red scales started to appear all over her skin and her nails began to enlarge.

She finally released the beast's leg and jumped on its stomach in order to stab its torso with what now was a reptilian claw in the place of her hand.

"Graaaghh!!!" the creature roared while feeling its body getting pierced. It tried to stand up but the lass suddenly appeared above its head making a bowing position in order to make their gazes meet.

"Hey, bro!"

"Annie!!?? What the-!? Where-"

The man began to tap his finger over his table in order to show his patience growing thinner by the second, "Hugh..."

From just hearing his voice, the dragon instantly froze on the spot as if someone had a sword aimed at his neck.

"Shrink... Now!" the man continued.

The dragon did not say a word and before long, simply started to lose all its mass and red coloring while also assuming a more humanoid form.

Once he was finished, the man stood from his seat and walked towards what was now a young lad on his knees averting his gaze.

"Do you have any idea of what you did?" the man asked.

"Father... I..."

His sentence was interrupted by the man smacking the boy's face with the back of his hand, causing him to fall on the floor.

"Yes... or no? Do. You. Know. What you did??" the boy's father asked again.

"I... I was just trying to show them the truth!!" the boy claimed while trying to stand up.

"The truth? Oh! And what is the truth, exactly? Enlighten me, my boy!"

"You know what it is! You know! I know! She knows! And they all should know it too!" the boy continued, "That the path towards survival is by walking through hell! That misery is what makes one strong! Strong enough to defeat every other faction and keep the legacy of our race protected!"

"Is that so...?"

"That is so!! What was it that I did that was so wrong??"

The man snapped his fingers and the smiling girl appeared on top of the boy, causing him to drop down once again as she pressed her boots against his back.

"Foolish boy... You achieved nothing through your childish actions!" the man began to speak, "Thanks to your attempt at displaying to 'truth' behind the path to power and survival, you managed to have the entire academy witness your fall against the combined efforts of three young kids!"

"No!! They saw me!! They saw me achieving my dragon form! They saw my true power!!"

"Indeed!!" the man nodded while snapping his things again, leading the girl into stomping the boy against the floor even more, making cracks appear beneath him, "And they also saw this same mighty power get defeated! Thanks to your idiotic game, they will now have been implanted with doubt!

This power that should have been invincible is not so invincible anymore! They saw that it was possible to achieve victory through other ways! Ways that diverge greatly from what we have been taught all these years!

Your antics might have just killed the entire meaning of what being a dragon is!"

The boy attempted to stand up while trembling, "No!! Father! That's not true!! You will see! They will all start seeking our methods even more now! The children will start searching for the truth!!"

"The children..." the man repeated, "The children should never be aware of the truth!

The secret to unlocking the dragon inside of our bodies is something that should only be shared amongst the adults! Those that are mature enough to know how to properly handle such a delicate situation!"

"With the only exception being the kids of the emperor, of course!" Anomalia added.

The man rolled his eyes at the girl's attempt at sounding smart, "With the only exception being the kids of the emperor, of course... That being you and your siblings... "

"But, father-"

"Don't interrupt me, boy!!" the man shouted as his eyes suddenly started to flare up, "And the reason we keep it a secret... You know what it is? It's because if children start finding out that they can transform by killing one another, our society will start to slaughter each other! Think about how many of our own we would lose in the process!!"

The girl raised her foot and stomped the boy again, this time shoving his face against the ground and causing it to break.

"So basically! You just revealed a secret that should NOT be revealed... While also making it look like an absolute joke in the eyes of dozens!! What do you have to say for yourself, boy??"

Hugh pressed his palms against the floor and tried to stand up one more time, but his sister's boot was refusing to budge even a little.

"I... Just... Wanted... To... Show... Them!!!" he managed to utter with his mouth filled with rubble.

"Oh... Trust me... You showed them a lot" the emperor commented while pressing the button on a device on top of his table and revealing a series of monitors appearing in front of his windows.

One of the monitors showed a girl covered in lightning blasting two other girls by herself. Another one showed a young lass with long white hair and covered with white scales on her hands and feet rescuing a couple of kids from three boys by knocking them all out. And one last monitor showed a boy with red hair and one with black hair falling from the sky and knocking out a giant red beast with one punch.

One of the images then changed to a black lizard of the size of a man transforming into a boy with curly hair looking like he was being influenced by some sort of speech from the red-haired boy from before.

{Then... I'll just become the next emperor, and change the rules!!} the voice of the boy screamed through the monitor.

While the boy watched the scene on the screen with baffled eyes, the emperor simply pressed one of his devices and regressed the recording.

{ I'll just become the next emperor, and change the rules!! ...I'll just become the next emperor, and change the rules!! ...I'll just become the next emperor, and change the rules!!

...change the rules!! ...change the rules!! ...change the rules!!

...change the rules!!}

"The... The little dude said that...?" Hugh muttered as the scene kept playing over and over again.

"You did all this to bring him to our side... And you managed to make him stay even further away than before" his father commented while rubbing his forehead, "Congratulations, boy... This is a level of stupidity some don't manage to see every day... I would almost feel proud if I didn't want to strangle you so much!"

{I'll find a way to make sure things work out for everyone!!} the recordings said before the man pressed his device again and turned everything off.

Hugh simply turned his gaze away, "Tha doesn't mean anything. He is only saying that because he hasn't suffered enough... He hasn't gone through hell like we had..."

"Oh..." the girl commented while looking at the boy below her boot by bringing her head down so much that her face began to turn upside down, causing her entire hair to fall and making it look like her head was on fire, "Trust me... He has! I made sure of that!"

"Guaagh!!" Hugh cried after getting stepped on one more time.

"He just doesn't remember it... But he will, soon enough! He will remember every tiny detail of the precious time we shared together!

Our lovely brother-sister bonding moments!

And nothing would give me more joy than being on the first seat to watch as that face so full of hope, dreams, and confidence...

Comes crashing down like a broken vase that can never be put together again!! Just like it did the first time!"

Hugh raised his head to stare at his sister as she talked to him. He couldn't help but feel like something about her gaze had changed.

Anomalia always had a very disturbing way of looking at others, but this time was different. It wasn't just a gaze of intimidation, it was also filled with ecstasy, insanity, obsession.

These were the eyes of someone who was ready to take a life and enjoy every second of it.

"Not yet, Annie..." the emperor reminded her before she lost herself in her own passionate state, "First I need to make sure if he's useful or not to me!"

The girl tilted her head, "You mean that plan about dropping the kid on top of your personal stalker and trying to get them to kill each other?"

"Arent all stalkers personal stalkers...?" Hugh mumbled, "Isn't that kinda the point?"

Anomalia just ignored him, "He's not gonna fight for you, dad... And even if he did, she would just trash him to pieces. Kid's too green for that."

"Oh... He will fight for me..." the man muttered while pressing his device one more time and turning the monitors on again, each one paused while showing a different kid on the image.

Gaby, Saramin, Trevor, Nala, Leon, and even Dorothy.

"If he won't fight for me... I'll just have to make him fight for them!" Lian Garen stated while pressing his red dragon claw against the screens, "And don't worry about him getting trashed... It might be slow... Be he is definitely improving every day. He just needs a little more time!"

Anomalia finally dropped down from Hugh and came closer to her father.

"Why not let me go instead? No matter how strong he might be, you know I'm gonna be stronger!"

"Every dragon has its role. His place is by that thing's side, making sure she stays as far away from me as possible! Your place... Is on the frontlines of the battlefield! Wining my war for me!"

The lass began to puff her cheeks, "Can I at least give it a try? I'm sure playing with someone that gives shivers even to you is gonna be way more fun than some stupid boring faction troopers..."

Lian Garen stared at her with skepticism, "You're just afraid she's gonna break your favorite toy, aren't you?"

"I shall neither deny nor agree with that statement."

"Ugh..." the man groaned, "Very well... I guess I might as well use this as a chance to collect more data on her..."

Lian then pressed the button on another device and a series of floating image recorders similar to the ones Hugh used in the dungeon appeared from a secret room and started to follow Anomalia's position.

"Go have your fun, kid... Just remember to be back at home before dinner!"

"Oh, daddy..." the girl whispered with a smile as red scales began to appear all over her body, "she IS my dinner!!"

The scales continued to spread out all over her body, a pair of white horns appeared above her head, the massive wild red hair started to move forming a trail on her back that would go all the way down until it ended up to what was now a reptilian tail, and what used to be a girl was now a fully formed red dragon walking on all four legs with specks of fire coming out from her mouth and eyes.

"Don't wait up!!" she commented before dashing out of the room with the speed of a bullet, and starting the hunt of her new metallic prey.