' x ' = thoughts

" x " = talking

[ x ] = author notes

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------Arriving back at the village------

After the unexpected and unintended session with Dawn’s rear extremity, Xaramax finds himself gravitating towards the fuzz repeatedly. Dawn herself has already accepted the situation and even her innocent personality can’t help stray to the addicting path of teasing. For example, when she knows he is looking at her (women have that sixth sense that automatically knows you are sneaking a peek) she will deliberately wave her tail back and forth in a fashion that’s similar to using a laser pointer to tease a cat. It’s just a subtle version of the cat analogy.

Anyways a discussion among the group is happening,

“Hey what are we going to do about the quest now, wasn’t it supposed to end up with us killing Dawn? How are we going to turn it in?”

Nikki points out the problem that everyone forgot until just now. Immediately everyone else freezes in place and looks at each other to see if anyone has an answer. Well, all except for Xarmax who bluntly replies,

“Why don’t I just burn down the adventurers guild and then we leave?”

A silence descends upon all of them when they hear his indifferent suggestion. Thankfully he follows up with,

“I was just kidding…” ‘…Sort of’

That last part was kept inside his mind to not reveal.

At once everyone calms down (especially Rexx) but they don’t laugh at the morbid joke even though he believes it was comical. Nikki follows up with her own suggestion:

“What about we beat up Rexx and when we enter the guild with him to turn in the quest we can say that he told us to retreat so he could hold the wolf off since it was S rank and not A rank and then he finally escaped and caught up with us? *grin*”

Rexx at this moment looks as if he was told he had 4th stage cancer and one month left to live. Luckily Dawn throws him a bone at the last minute replying,

“But then wouldn’t they have to investigate the cave and see if this ‘wolf’ is really S rank? They would make us stay there to verify the information so it doesn’t look like we just skipped town.”

Like this they go on and on until the poor guy that got himself into this mess raises his own proposal.

“I can just pay the fee for cancelling the quest you know?”

Xaramax thinks to himself, ‘To think that he is actually coming in handy already? He’s starting to fit right in like a whore in a drugstore.’

[A/N: I had to put a contraceptive/abortion joke in there…forgive me]

Decided on the plan Rexx made, they start to enter the Adventurers Guild. As they enter the whole place goes from laughing and talking to a deep tense silence. Dawn is the only one who doesn’t understand why they all cease their merrymaking.

“Hey why are they all quiet? It’s kind of creepy…”

At that moment a girly shriek comes from a man sitting at one of the tables.

“Hiii-!!”

The group looks at the fellow who unleashed the ear-splitting wail, and automatically recognizes him. It’s the pervert whose name is Gerald and a victim of Nikki’s wrath. Even after the days that they were out finishing the quest, the bruises still remain on his body. To make it even worse Nikki teases,

“Oya, it looks he still remembers me, I’m flattered! Maybe we can spar together sometime soon?”

‘Demon!’ Is what all the spectators thought. He didn’t even reply and let out another miserable scream while running out of the building. His two friends from that day follow him as well with a face that says ‘Damn he’s going to need therapy again.’

Nikki gives out a “fufufu~” while the rest of the group goes to the counter where the receptionist is. Meanwhile the rest of the people in the guild finally relax seeing that and return to their drinking and storytelling. Rexx, being the so-called ‘leader’ of the adventurer group since he accepted the quest and has higher rank; walks up to the counter and tells the lady that they want to cancel their participation of the quest.

“Well since you are abandoning the quest the fee is half of the reward so that will be 15 gold.”

After the employee said that, Rexx puts on a pained expression while reluctantly passing over the required amount of gold. Thoughts run through his head such as, ‘First they take my freedom and now my money! I can never be a bad-ass hero that gets a harem wuuuu.’

Then they prepare to leave with Rexx trudging behind them with slumped shoulders. However if he is looking for pity, there isn’t a speck of it lying around.

Xaramax hears an interesting topic discussion amongst a group of adventurers drinking around a table.

“Did you hear that one of the princes of the kingdom is rallying together soldiers along with adventurers as mercenaries to raid a dungeon outside of Temrock village in the north?”

“Yeah apparently you just need to show up and the army will allow you to fight together and gain some of the riches inside!”

“Pft, dumbasses that’s not even the best part! I heard that the prince’s army has a rare beastwoman-race slave they use to unleash upon the enemy. They let it out of the cage and use the Lightning Slave Collar to zap it into fighting and slaughtering their enemies!”

“What kind of race? And a female, kekeke…”

“Hmmm, I think the name of it was a harpy?”

“Fucking idiot it’s called a Valkyrie!”

“Oi, doesn’t the Church keep those as guardians? How the hell did the Prince get his hand on one?!”

“The hell if I know, man.”

Hearing this, Xarmax asks Rexx if he knows how long it would take to get to Temrock village.

Rexx ponders for a moment using all of his brainpower then replies,

“It should be about 3 days by cart/carriage and 2 by horseback.”

Xaramax cracks a rare smile and says, “1 day by dragonback then.”

-----Outskirts of village about to leave for next village----

Making sure they aren’t in line of sight of village, the group stops at a clearing in the forest. Valexii hops off of Xaramax’s shoulder and slithers over to Nikki for the time being. The only person super excited to ride on top of a dragon is Dawn. She is wagging her tail in a frenzy, waiting for him to transform.

Without delay Xaramax shifts to his dragon-form. Fully displaying his might and supreme feeling aura, his gargantuan muscles flex and his tough black scales reveal a slight glimmer mesmerizes one who looks upon them. His wings stretch completely as if waking from a midday nap, ready to lift off into the sky above. His blue stripes have undergone changes from the past and only recently has he noticed. The stripes form a more tribal design different from what he created before he was born.

[when he was customizing himself in the void, Chap 1]

The ancient dragon never mentioned this would happen and Xaramax just added it to his list of questions about his heritage.

At this moment Dawn is looking at him with stars in her eyes, and Rexx is reminding himself that he should give up on slaying a dragon. Xaramax lowers one of his wings on the ground without saying anything, gesturing them to get on.

Everyone starts climbing on until the last person being Rexx tries to but Xaramax lifts his wing and grabs him with his claws, taking flight to the skies. Throughout the whole flight he would carry Rexx in his claws while the others would enjoy talking and having mini-picnics on top of Xaramax. He was tempted to drop the poor guy when he vomited once.

After that Xaramax only used minimal claws to carry him, as if a person was carrying a dead rat to throw in a trash bin.

They finally made it to their destination, with Xaramax stopping far away enough to not attract attention as a dragon then changing form while all of them walk towards the army’s camp. The camp was massive and set near outside of a large cave opening which he assumes to be the dungeon. Using his superior eyesight he spots what brought him to this place initially.

She is sitting curled up in the middle of a metal cage and gazing around at the soldiers. Xaramax however feels a familiarity with her for some odd reason. Looking closely he realizes it’s her eyes. The exact same dead-fish-looking eyes that he had in his past life before he found something that made him keep living (martial arts). The eyes of an abused person who has lost all hope, living as if one were a zombie. As someone who understands her feelings, it pulls at his past life’s feelings which he thought he left for good.

She looks like an angel with the white wings attached to her back. Unfortunately her whole body is sullied and stained with dirt and grime, disheveled hair, even her wings are a remnant of the beauty she once was. The slave collar also adds to the tragic disposition. A Lightning Slave Collar. It’s this world’s version of a dog shock collar, only a more intense version. Regular slave collars only constrict the neck of the slave making it harder to breathe as the punishment, however the Lightning Slave Collar uses the lightning attribute to send electrical charges into the slaves body at the master’s command. These type of collars are used on stronger slaves since if used on regular common slaves they would suffer a major backlash or in worst case scenarios, die.

Xaramax isn’t completely sure he can take on the whole army even if he could dragon-form. Furthermore the rest of his group might be able to help, but they would still by outnumbered by the thousands of soldiers and adventurers. It would be hard to make sure no one escapes to explain there is a new dragon in existence. All it takes is a couple commanders or other high ranking soldiers to convince the king to further convince other kings and start a large scale man-hunt. Rather, a dragon-hunt.

So the group starts to decide on a plan to capture the Valkyrie slave and maybe some extra profit on the side. The first step: infiltration.

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Sorry for the cliff-hanger...