A Dragon’s Curiosity

 

 

“Given the testimony of Our trusted subjects so far, We believe it is in the best interest of the kingdom to give the matter at hand close scrutiny.

The palace will send out additional manpower to conduct a detailed investigation, whereas the Guild and the academy shall renew their efforts to find the truth.

As long as the Loewe house still stands, no one shall infringe on the safety of Our nobility and citizens!”

Filled with righteous anger, King Cederic rose from the throne and paced up and down before the assembled court.

Whether his anger was real or not, Nisha did regain a little of her admiration for the kingdom’s ruler right now, seeing how he acted in the interest of the victims.

Of course, his overall standing still fell drastically in the elf’s eyes after she figured out that most of the court proceedings were fixed beforehand.

It just did not seem genuine to her anymore, the outcome should not be decided before the involved parties had a chance to speak, but since the system had worked so far, perhaps Nisha did not see the entire picture for now.

Overall, the dragon had very contradictory feelings for the king.

He obviously had the qualities of a leader and carried himself very well in social situations, to the point where she still had the aspirations to learn from him in the future.

Contrary to that, the court sessions were rather orchestrated and had a pretty predetermined outcome, all in order to flatter the king and play to his ego.

She just got a very vague bad premonition whenever she looked at the king, unable to clearly explain why she felt that way, it just oddly struck her.

Perhaps it was just her intuition warning her about something that the elf did not actively recognize yet.

“As soon as results are found, We will reconvene the court to expand on the findings, this matter will not rest until the culprit is found.

The crown will bear all costs and spare no effort to ensure that this affront does not go unpunished!”

Distracted by her thoughts about the character of the king, Nisha failed to catch the rest of the speech, although the general content was fairly easy to guess.

His words resonated with the crowd, who had fallen into unrest at the thought of their own safety being compromised, and eventually calmed down and sang the praises of King Cederic with excited cheers.

Somehow, she disdained their opportunistic behavior, if they wanted to secure their own safety, they should put in the required effort themselves instead of relying on someone else.

 

After finishing his short speech and satisfied with the recovered morale, King Cederic returned to his throne and sat down with an imposing flourish.

Nodding at his underling, the ceremonial master stepped forward and knocked his heavy staff on the ground again to silence the praises of the gathered nobles.

“Since the affair brought to the attention of the court has far reaching consequences, our honorable King Cederic decided to pay special attention to this matter.

Court is adjourned for the time being, the relevant departments will get new orders shortly to coordinate the effort to investigate.

Funds and manpower will be dispatched as necessary, if you have any clues you can go directly to the palace to contribute them.

That shall be all, court is dismissed!”

Originally, one or two more topics were presented on the agenda and were supposed to be discussed after this break, yet the entire itinerary was thrown out with a decision from the ruler.

None of the attendees were upset about the decision though, they supported the choice and eagerly excused themselves from court.

Of course, the masses had to wait for the king to leave first, followed by the highest-ranked nobles, and then in descending order of importance.

Thanks to that, Nisha quickly found herself in a carriage back to the Dharnas estate together with Henry and Grand Marshal Luthais Dharnas.

Neither of the men spoke, each of them occupied with their own thoughts and recollections about the latest court session.

It was unusual to have a problem of this magnitude crop up, especially with no real answer from the royal family.

While the official stance was strong, there were no real leads about the monster that attacked or the perpetrator that attacked the noble children, making it an unusual case.

Perhaps at the halfway point of their journey back home, Nisha suddenly broke the silence in the carriage.

“Ah! I remember now!”

Surprised at the outburst, both of the other passengers looked at her in puzzlement, unsure quite exactly what the elf was talking about.

Henry suddenly recalled something and began to ask.

“Do you mean … ?”

Before he had the chance to finish his sentence, Nisha quickly interjected.

“Yes, it finally dawned on me why I thought that the account from Administrator Salas struck me as strange.

I figured out what’s wrong!”

At the mention of the former royal guard, the Grand Marshal also began to pay attention, his thoughts torn away from matters unknown he was pondering over.

 

Due to his position as head of the city guards, it was rather troubling that a major event took place so close to the capital.

While none had accused him yet of being derelict of his duties, it was a sensitive issue nonetheless and required closer attention from the Duke to prevent such accusations from sprouting in the first place.

Privately, he also pitied the young victims, albeit the half-elf did not allow himself to be swayed by personal reasons when it came to his work.

“According to the Sera, both of the victims show signs of damage inflicted by bites from a monster.

But that’s not really plausible if the attack took place in a short time frame described by the instructor.”

In her excitement, the dragon forgot that not everyone had the same basic information as her, cultivated from living in the Wilderness for ten turns.

Henry looked toward his father, who looked pensive, yet said nothing, and then towards Nisha, who was in her own world after solving the question that bothered her.

Seeing that neither of them was going to say anything soon and he disliked being out of the lop, he could only take the initiative to get the answers he wanted.

“What exactly do you mean it doesn’t add up?”

Despite looking calm on the surface, Henry was quite taken with the latest affair from court as well.

He did not exactly fear for his own security like most other nobles, but it was intriguing nonetheless that two noble heirs were harmed inside the academy.

Surprisingly, it was the youngest member of the Dharnas household that possibly held a clue to solving the mystery.

Torn from her reverie, Nisha realized that the other two passengers had no idea what she was talking about.

“Sera Salas mentioned that the monster attacked the group and ate parts of the victim, so it should be a predator.

And predators only hunt when they are certain that there’s no risk or when they have no choice because of hunger.

You can’t exactly call a group of armed and armored warriors harmless, right? There’s little enticement for a monster to look for trouble with them.”

The dragon knew exactly what she was talking about.

Many turns ago, when the four dragon siblings had just had left their nest for the first time, they were meagre first rank pups that were at the mercy of fate in regards to their survival.

Whether it had been an ambush, ganging up on other weaklings or fighting to the last breath, it had taken a ton of luck and the natural advantage of the dragon bloodline providing a sturdy defense and strong healing factor that allowed the dragons to survive.

Although Nisha did not detest the struggle, or feared falling into similar circumstances again, it definitely taught her the law of survival in the wilderness and gave her excellent insight in the nature of a predator.

 

“The alternative is that the unknown assailant was desperate and hungry enough to be forced into a hunt.

Predators prefer safe targets, a struggle during a hunt can mean injuries or getting maimed later on by competitors and ultimately death, hence the attacker should always put recovery and food first.

Once they recover, they can look for safe prey instead.

But neither scenario matches the report, if the attacker was strong enough to regard the group as easy prey, all of them should have fallen on the trip.

Alternatively, if the predator was hungry and desperate, it would have stuck to the first victim and finished its meal first to recover, instead of going after two targets in a weakened state and risk death for no return.

That’s why I think that there is something strange about the entire incident, it just does not add up.”

Putting her concerns into words helped the elf with sorting out her thoughts.

The fog of confusion was blown away and her thoughts cleared up, giving birth to new possibilities and possible answers.

Perhaps there was more than one attacker, or the evidence was faked. Perhaps someone lied and that’s why the report is skewed?

New avenues of investigation and solutions sprouted in her mind, making her go absentminded once again.

She originally had nothing to do with the incident during the warrior trip, yet now the elf was considering various scenarios in her mind to solve the incongruencies.

At the same time, Marshal Dharnas started tapping the armrest of his seat with his finger tips, clearly preoccupied by the sudden revelation.

After a brief moment of consideration, he looked at his son and made a decision.

“That’s a very astute observation, no one has looked into the behaviour of the attacker yet.

It might readily highlight a very important loophole in witness accounts and help with determining the truth.

You might be on to something there.”

 

Overall, the Duke was always solemn and had exacting standards.

Getting words of praise from him was not just an empty talk, the man genuinely meant what he said and was not shy to point out mistakes when he saw them.

As a result, Nisha felt pride welling up within her and grinned with delight.

Henry was similarly impressed and had a look of admiration when he looked at the girl, although his state of mind did not last long before he was astonished for a different reason.

Duke Dharnas rapped the roof above them and the carriage slowed down, before it eventually came to a stop at the side of the road.

“Henry, you should get off first and make a trip to the [Adventurer’s Guild] and ask them to look into it, they should have an expert that can confirm Nisha’s theory.

It’s better to start early, the entire kingdom is paying a lot of attention to this matter.”

Before the young man had the chance to digest the news, he was heartlessly kicked out by his own father and had to make the rest of the journey on foot.

It was not even his idea, why was he the one who got kicked out?

Nevertheless, the young man had obeyed the stern marshal to the point where it became instinct, hence Henry started his journey towards the guild.

Back in the carriage, Nisha was rather grateful.

Luthais Dharnas took her idea seriously and even took steps to verify whether she was on the right track, not dismissing her for being young or inexperienced.

This was rather in line with the Grand Marhsal’s character, he did not care about the qualifications or origins of the information, only whether it was feasible or not and if it was of help to the kingdom.

Picking up speed, the carriage resumed the journey to the Dharnas estate and soon returned to its original route.

After a brief silence, the Duke sorted out his thoughts and put his eyes on the other occupant inside the carriage box that was left.

He originally intended to expose the two young ones to matters of the court in order to let them gain experience, and certainly did not expect the developments in court.

Contemplating as he studied the elf before him, he finally told Nisha what he had in mind for her.