Polymath Redux

Chapter 24//Assault on Drakenholdt (1)

While Morialia was away on a ‘business trip’, Mordred had stayed back at the village to work on the next step of his project regarding the dragons’ subjugation. The ‘plan’ had been formulated mostly with the information gained from Petra, along with a little bit of creativity and malice. Disregarding all the villagers’ concerns, he had secluded himself down in the basement for the past few days concocting a strange black potion. All-the-while, Morgana who had also never seen the light of day since her creation, assisted him in various aspects.

She stared like a curious animal as he mixed various formulas and mysterious liquids. At this point, her personality was still in the midst of developing and thus possessed an air of innocence and curiosity about her. All her ideas, her morals and motivations, she had learned from her creator, and even now she continued to acquire further knowledge by watching from the side-lines. Still, for him it was an amusing sight- she was almost infantile compared to her graceful and mature appearance. Her long platinum hair swayed side to side as she moved her head trying to take a closer look at what he was doing. The sound of her soft breathing stood out in this silent and sterile room. Her cherry pink lips licking themselves in intervals as they dried. He could smell the soft, floral scented bath soap off her body whenever she moved around. ‘Clink’, ‘clink’, ‘clink’, echoed the glass when she inquisitively tapped on the test tubes with her skeletal right arm.

While it may have been a queer choice at the time, there was a definite reason why he purposefully created that skeletal arm, though it would still pose a problem if others saw it. ‘I should prepare a glove or a cover,’ he internally pondered.

“Are you interested?” he asked while not missing a beat with his precise measurements. It was a rather interesting topic to ponder, that was Morgana’s personality and interests. Not only was there never a system of creating an individual person in the game, but even if there were, it would’ve been based on a scripted artificial intelligence, so it would never truly be a person. However, this ‘Morgana’ was much more than that; despite having been created from aspects of the game, she was a real person with her own wants and desires, though Mordred’s personality was used as a base. That said, she was not a clone either; the moment she viewed and experienced the world from a different angle she was her own person. Perhaps in future her ideas and motivations would diverge from his.

The question was now: ‘did Mordred trust his own base personality enough to gamble that Morgana would never turn on him’? When is a ‘person’ truly born? Are they a person the moment they come out of the womb? Or do they become a person after they’ve experienced the world for themselves and have come to their own conclusions of it? Was it ‘nature’ or ‘nurture’ that made a person? Certainly, experiences will affect an individual’s personality and view of the world, however the gamble was on to what degree that change will affect Morgana. Of course, Mordred was vastly more powerful than she was and would likely ever be; he could destroy her at any moment. Yet, he never believed himself to be infallible; if ever she did turn her fangs upon him it was a real personality that she could overcome their differences through ingenuity. It was often said, after all, that the weak must use their creativity if they want to survive. By the same merit, the powerful are usually stagnant by the very nature of their existence.

Indeed, the entity known as ‘Morgana’ was a large gamble he was willing to take. As cautious as he wanted to be, he also understood that nothing could be gained if chances are not taken. Though, even then he still had several contingencies just in case.

“What are you trying to make?” she asked while tilting her head to one side. Her large, rounded azure eyes sparkled with excitement. Was it merely her infantile nature that made her so receptive to new knowledge? Or was Mordred also that kind of person deep down inside. In a very real way, this current Morgana was like a mirror into his own psyche; a completely untainted Mordred.

His hands stopped as he wondered how he should answer. The intended purpose of this potion was to conjure a narrative of suffering. “The dragons are an interesting race,” he started to explain. “There are three difference faces to the entities known as ‘Dragons’. First there is the ‘Feral Dragons’, these are powerful, but ultimately no different to monsters. By their very existence they are nothing more than mindless beasts that move on instinct. To put it simply, they are to real dragons what monkeys or gorillas are to humans. Then there are the ‘Draconians’. They are mostly humanoid in appearance, but they are vastly stronger than the average human. Aside from their superior strength, agility and magic however, they also possess a unique potential.”

“Unique… potential?” she parroted. Her eyes gleaming with excitement as though she were a small child being told a bedtime story.

“They have the potential to become the third type of dragon: the ‘Ascended Dragon’. A powerful entity with the strengths of a feral dragon and the intelligence of a human. Upon reaching this point the Draconians are able to freely shift between their humanoid and dragon forms. However, the requirements to reaching this point is extremely difficult and, in most cases, Draconians never unlock their ability to become an Ascended Dragon for their entire lives. If I had to give a statistical estimate, only about 0.005% of the entire Draconian population ever become Ascended.”

“0.1%?” Morgana considered the statistic for a moment. “Isn’t that… too little?”

“Hardly. The current population of Drakenholdt is estimated to be around one-hundred-thousand, meaning about five-hundred of those are Ascended Dragons. Each of them possesses enough power to wipe out entire cities. In my opinion there are too many.” The problem didn’t stop there however, because Drakenholdt wasn’t the only tribe of dragons in existence, and more were known to exist all around the world. Considering this, it was a miracle that humans and other weaker species were even able to survive for this long. For their safety, and his benefit, he wondered if it would’ve been easier on him to just wipe out the Ascended Dragons en masse. “No, there’d still be other Draconians with potential to become Ascended, and I don’t want to wipe them all out.” He shook his head and continued to work on his potion. “In any case, this fact is a vital piece of the puzzle,” he told her while smirking maliciously.

“Do you mean because most of their military strength is dependant on those 500 Ascended Dragons?”

“There is that, but more importantly, it’s a matter of governmental structure.”

“I don’t understand.”

“In the case of human governments, the figurehead can easily be replaced by the next person down, and you can keep going down without noticing a significant impact on the overall society. However, it’s different for the Dragons. Their leadership is based off strength- basically the strongest becomes the king- therefore there is an extremely limited pool of qualified potential leaders. Once the top leaders are removed then their entire society is crippled, much like a headless chicken.” Mordred then went silent for a few seconds before continuing, “though, if it could be helped, I’d rather preserve the leadership since they’re almost the most powerful, therefore the most useful.”

“Is that what this potion is for?”

“Indeed,” Mordred nodded as he lifted the vial containing the mysterious black liquid up to the light source. “The purpose of this potion is to facilitate the new era of dragons,” he told her with a sinister grin. “Remember, Morgana, to effectively conquer an enemy you should divide them up first.”

*

*

*

- Three Weeks Later -

‘Drakenholdt’ was both the name of the capital city as well as the country in which said city was based in. The reason for this was mainly due to the dragons’ low population, and therefore most of its inhabitants took residence within the city. The uninhabited lands could also be determined as ‘land that’s technically part of the city but not yet developed’… or something to that effect. The city of Drakenholdt itself had been built directly into a mountain range; several mountains had been hollowed out and massive tower-like structures served as miniature arcologies to house most of the population.

Erected around the mountainous city were numerous guard outposts that served as forward stations and defensive borders against hostile threats and invasions. While these outposts did have enough strength to repel most low-level invasion attempts from other, weaker species, their main operation was to scout for incoming armies and to report back to the city’s upper echelon. To the dragons these were mostly watchtowers, but to other races they were akin to entire fortresses.

Two Draconian guardsmen patrolled around the outer edges of the fortress outpost’s perimeter, though, most of the time they had merely been idling away while constantly yawning at the lack of anything. To their credit, aside from other dragons and fools, there hadn’t been anyone insane enough to directly challenge the mighty nation of dragons. Several weeks had already passed since the incident with the red dragons and their mysterious motives for attacking them, but due in no small part to the Golden Dragon King, that matter had already been settled. In fact, their invasion was so abrupt and unexpected that many of the soldiers hadn’t even heard of the attack until after the fact- they had not expected an aerial invasion which made their scouting outposts redundant.

For this reason, the unknown motives of the red dragons became a wild topic amongst them and many theories were thrown out with the gossip.

“So, you hear about the incident with the red dragons a few weeks back?” asked one guardsman to another who had been on patrol with him. After making their usual rounds they found a secluded area on the wall that could serve as a nice spot for respite while maintaining a clear line of sight towards the outer areas for potential hostile movement.

“Yeah, heard they all went insane and started yammering on about how they were the apostles of god or something.”

“I know right? It freaks me out,” the guardsman joked as he chuckled sarcastically. “I’m getting the shivers.”

“Tell me about it.”

“Didn’t they also say something about us betraying the world? Wonder what that was about.”

“Hell if I know,” the guardsman then stopped for a few seconds to dig something out of his memories. “No, wait… actually, I think I’ve heard of a similar occurrence happening somewhere else.”

“Really?! Where at?”

“I would also like to know,” suddenly the voice of a haughty and rugged woman interjected. The two men immediately stood up and offered a dragon’s salute by pounding their chests. Despite being a woman, she was physically bulkier than they were with much heavier and pronounced muscles all throughout her body. One might even liken her more to an ogre than a dragon, but the two backwards curved horns from the top of her head revealed her draconic lineage. Bright, golden hair and a sharp face, she was adorned in thick steel armour, and her footsteps clanged across the floor powerfully as she approached them.

“C- commander Shuri!” one of the guardsmen shouted in surprise. “W- we weren’t slacking off or gossiping or anything… ahahahhah…ah… Nope!” he told her as sweat profusely dripped down the side of his face like a waterfall.

“Eh, just relax,” she dismissed their worries as she collapsed onto one of the spare chairs. “So? What’s this about a similar incident happening somewhere else?”

“Right, about that… it was just a rumour from a few years back, so I can’t be sure if it’s really related to any of this.”

“About that, it was a story from a few hundred years back, so I can’t be sure if it really has any relevance to the red dragons’ invasion.”

“Doesn’t matter, tell me about it.”

“Then, Commander, have you heard of the Royland Corporation?”

“Hmm, it does… sound familiar,” she said as she scratched her head while making a puzzled expression. “But refresh my memory.”

“It’s a vast imperial corporation that blurs the line between market and country. They’re an enormous corporate entity that has several nations under its rule. Known as the ‘Free States of the Xedian Alliance’- or ‘Alliance’ for short- they’re what you get when you let merchants run everything from the military to the government. All races are accepted, and while that seems harmonious on the surface, it really just means more prey for the Royland Corporation that controls everything,” explained the guardsman. “Within the Alliance, money is God.”

“Okay, but how does that relate to the red dragons’ invasion?”

“Apparently, it had to do with the founder of the Royland Corporation. He’s an individual known as ‘Royland Blume’, and people have very strong opinions about him- most of which aren’t positive. After the creation of the Alliance millions were screwed over by his corporate policies and how those have affected the governance of the countries within the Alliance. There were numerous documented assassination attempts, but the most notable incident was about one that managed to get within an inch of his life. The assailant at t he time was recorded saying something about him being an apostle of god and how the Royland Corporation was an affront that needed to be removed.”

“That does seem similar to what the red dragons were talking about, but was it only a single person that time?”

“If the records of a few hundred years ago are to be believed, then yes.”

“So, whatever happened to this ‘Royland Blume’?” asked the commander.

“After that failed assassination attempt by the supposed apostle, he went into hiding. I mean, that’s what the records have stated, but Royland was an extremely powerful individual. Even though he was a human, he had power comparable to even Lord Aurendra.”

“As powerful as him? Surely that’s an exaggeration; they probably wanted to pretty up their founder with that kind of absurdity.”

“That’s probably true…” replied the guardsman, though he seemed to be unconvinced of it.

“Anyway, it’s a moot point now. You said it was a few hundred years ago, right? And that he was human? So, there’s no way he could still be alive after all this time. Or were there records of him obtaining immortality?”

The guardsman shook his head, “no, there weren’t anything stated of that nature. If we’re to believe that some mysterious and God-like entity really did influence the red dragons, and the same being was present all those hundreds of years ago, then it’s likely Royland lost his life while fighting them off. He struggled against one assassin, imagine if stronger beings like dragons were also added to that mix.”

“Seems likely,” Commander Shuri nodded. “Well, whatever. Even if they’re related incidents, we can’t really dig up a case that happened several hundred years ago. You two should also stop slacking and get back to work.”

“Y- yes ma’am!” the two guardsmen stood up and saluted as Shuri was about to leave. “Hmm?” then suddenly, one of them peered over the outpost’s wall and noticed a strange black miasma. “Hey, what’s that?” he asked his partner.

“It’s… a black mist?”

They stared at it for a moment, confused as to what exactly it was, but soon enough the answer walked out into the open. A ghastly black skeleton adorned in dark armour as if mocking a knight. It staggered towards the outpost at a snail’s pace, but as soon as it noticed the two guardsmen looking down upon it from up on the wall, the black skeleton let out a horrifying screech.

“Gyyiiaaahhhhhgggghhh!” the walls shook from the mere pressure of the horrendous sound. It stared back at them with its hollow sockets, and a dim green glow glimmering maliciously from behind.

“Ugh, what the hell?! An undead!” one guardsman cried as he drew his sword and jumped down to engage the skeleton. He thrust his sword towards it in the most straightforward and obvious manner, however this was excusable since undeads weren’t known to have the highest intelligence. At most they’re meant to serve as fodder, swarming and overrunning the opponent. His sword struck down dead centre at the undead’s skull, however, he was caught off guard when it suddenly revealed agile movement and dodged the attack and even countered with a swift knee to the guardsman’s stomach. “Argh!” winded, the guardsman fell to his knees.

“Hey, watch out!” shouted the other guardsman.

There was no mercy. The black skeleton took the opportunity and smashed the guardsman’s head with the bottom of its metallic greaves as if stepping on an ant. Draconian physiology was typically characterized by its sturdiness, yet this simple skeleton managed to tear through his head with a single stomp. Without even cleaning off the grim and grey matter off the soles of its boot, it turned its attention towards the others.

This incident would later be known as the start of a genocide known as the ‘Assault on Drakenholdt’.