Dragon Gods Reign

[Dragon peaks]

Gathering together with everybody in the main hall of Irsyr's lair a few days after Allaire's advancement to the mythic rank, Darganth was already looking forward to the coming days. After all, with the Emperor meeting only weeks away, they promised to be the most tumultuous ones he experienced since his rebirth.

Even that day wasn't going to be uneventful, with Darganth having agreed to Caedmon's request to meet with the vampire's emperor candidate. And though his situation has changed massively since their meeting at the vampire's castle, he still intends to follow through with the agreement the two had made back then.

As such they were currently preparing to set off for the vampire castle they were invited to. Or more accurately, they were waiting for the agreed-upon time before using the relic Irsyr had prepared to open a portal to their destination.

"Actually, do you know which king they plan to put forth as their candidate for the emperor seat?" Neandra suddenly asked amidst their conversation.

"Hm." Surprised by the sudden change of topic, Darganth needed a moment to think before he shook his head.

"Probably the one whose city we're going to visit. But I have no idea who that is." He guessed.

"Too bad, I never paid much attention to them so I know just as little." Neandra said with a shrug.

Remembering what Caedmon had told him about the alternative plan of his kind and seeing Neandra's disinterest in contrast, Darganth shook his head with an amused smile in response.

"Maybe don't let them hear that, they seemed to have a high opinion of you." Darganth said to her.

"Really?" Neandra asked surprised.

"I think so. Convincing you that they can keep monsters in check is even their alternative plan to get an emperor seat." Darganth said.

Pausing with furrowed brows, Neandra needed to think for a moment before she remembered why that would be the case.

"Right, that was the argument that Arkuns made to deny them a seat." Neandra said, slowly nodding as she thought back to the conversation.

"Let me guess, you didn't care at all about that." Jennia asked though she was already sure of the answer from Neandra's expression.

"Not at all." Neandra admitted, "I'm honestly not even sure anymore what exactly made me vote against it, only that I thought it would be too much of a bother if they got a seat."

"Even though Venrie was in favor?" Allaire asked surprised.

"Neither of us found it important and in such situations, we don't vote together." Neandra said with a shrug.

"Makes sense." Allaire said.

Taking a look at the time during the pause that followed her words, Darganth soon opened his personal pocket dimension to bring out the transport relic.

"We'll have to end at this, it's time." He said as held up the palm-sized cube.

Along with those words, Darganth started channeling mana into the small relic.

Immediately, a perfectly round hole started to appear on the side facing away from him as a part of the smooth and unblemished metal surface sank deeper into the cube. Doing so in a cone shape despite the physical impossibility of this, the process left a hole all the way to the glowing core that hovered inside the tiny hollowed-out portion at the center of the cube.

As soon as the inner ending widened to its full size of about half the diameter of the glowing sphere, a pulse of energy erupted from the latter. Shooting through the opening in the form of a concentrated beam, it projected a flat, unstable sheet of energy onto a spot in the air at the end of the beam trajectory.

A moment later this was followed by circular a shimmering energy extending out from the opening, extending the cone until it reached nearly three meters in diameter at the still unstable portal. Simultaneously, pulses of the same silver colored energy that the beam consisted of shot out along the same path, with the portal's edges stabilizing with each wave that struck it until it turned into a perfectly round whirlwind of energy after a couple of seconds.

Deactivating the artifact once the portal was fully stabilized, Darganth lowered his arm again before reopening the small space rift to pace the cube back into his pocket dimension.

"Well then, let's take a look." Darganth said.

A few seconds later he stepped through the portal with Allaire at his side, with the two following after Serania and Yldra. A moment after them Jennia followed behind them, with Neandra arriving another couple moments later.

As they stepped out of the other end of the portal one by one, they found themselves beneath a pitch black sky as dark clouds completely obscured the noon sun that should have stood high above. Stretching far into all directions only to come to clear up unnaturally abruptly, they blocked nearly all light from reaching the sprawling city their group found themselves in.

The city itself was equally as dark as the sky under which it stood, with only a handful of light sources being visible from the large but empty street they had found themselves in. And even in these few illuminated spots, there was barely any color, with the builds they were mounted on consisting entirely of gray wood and black stone.

"Surprisingly empty." Allaire commented, not entirely sure whether she should be glad or unnerved by it.

"Yeah." Darganth commented somewhat irritated.

Taking another look around, he himself didn't notice something new but found Jennia looking down the street. Following her gaze, he also started noticing a tall structure that was only barely visible amidst the darkness that surrounded it.

"We could try our luck there." Jennia proposed when she noticed that he was also looking in the same direction as she was.

"Better than wandering around aimlessly." Darganth said in agreement.

Just as he was about to turn around toward the rest of their group and share this plan, Darganth briefly noticed the edges of one of the shadows that were projected onto the street flicker.

Abruptly raising an arm, he didn't hesitate and let a torrent of flames shoot out from his palm in that direction.

His actions immediately alarmed the others, with four of them spinning around and dropping into a fighting stance. Conjuring defenses before them, they watched attentively with attacks already prepared.

The exception to this was Neandra, who calmly turned and let her mana sense sweep across the area. Smiling at what she found, she stepped in front of the rest right as Darganth's attack ended.

"Stop hiding, I can sense you." She said, her gaze jumping to every individual around them one by one.

Waiting for a few seconds as no answer came, she nodded content as parts of the shadow started to rise from the ground. Before her eyes, these pieces of tangible darkness slowly shifted until they formed the outline of an unmistakably humanoid form before solidifying into over a dozen vampires that stood scattered across the street.

"This part of the city is currently off limits, what are you doing here?" One of the vampires asked as he stepped forward.

"We were invited." Darganth said, calmly lowering his arm.

"That doesn't matter, his Highness King Zeron himself forbade entry into this part of the city, so unless-" The same vampire started, though before he could complete his threat Neandra interrupted him.

"Ah, Crelvic, makes sense for him to become emperor. He might not be the strongest but he's been doing a good job leading their delegations to the meeting for nearly a century." Neandra said.

Freezing up at her words, the vampires turned to Neandra with puzzled expressions.

"How would you know-" The leading vampire said.

Stopping mid-sentence, his gaze flickered to the rest of their group. Studying them for a moment, he unconsciously took a step back as a realization seemed to dawn on him.

"You're Lord Caedmon's guests, aren't you?" He asked somewhat shakily.

"Are you expecting any other dragons?" Yldra asked sarcastically.

Twitching in annoyance at her reply, the vampire took a deep breath before shaking his head.

"No, but he's been waiting at the main gate of the outer wall for you, so I would have expected you to travel with him." He explained.

"Well, we kinda skipped past it." Jennia said.

Seeing the vampire sigh defeated, Serania decided to intervene.

"How about one of you calls him over while we wait here, then this should all be cleared up, right?" She proposed.

"That sounds like a good idea." Darganth said, voicing his support.

Wordlessly accepting the idea, the leading vampire turned to his right and gave his subordinate standing there a short nod. Understanding the meaning, this second vampire immediately sank back into the darkness before taking off as a moving patch of blackness that rushed over the street and into the distance.

Barely a minute later over a dozen such patches of darkness came rushing back from the same direction. Parting around where Darganth's group stood, they headed for the group of vampires that had confronted them and rose from the ground around them.

As the darkness sank back into the shadows below a moment later, it revealed a small host of fully armed vampires standing amongst the other group and staring at them with sharp gazes.

"Fane, what did you do this time?" Darganth heard a familiar voice ask.

Turning toward its source, he watched as Caedmon appeared out of a streak of mist that had arrived together with the second group of vampires.

"It's just a misunderstanding, nothing major." The leading vampire of the first group immediately answered.

"Hope that my guests see that the same. For now, you can leave but I'll talk about what happened with you later." Caedmon said, turning away from Fane as he sent the other vampire away.

Instead of facing Darganth, he greeted their group with a courteous bow.

"I'm glad you could make it."

"Well, the meeting is soon so seeing who I'll help install as new emperor isn't exactly a low priority for me." Darganth said.

"That's reassuring to hear." Caedmon said.

"There also seem to be a few new faces among your group, I'm pleased to make your acquaintance." He added with a slight bow.

Prompted by his words, Serania and Yldra also introduced themselves. Neandra meanwhile only gave her name, and though Caedmon momentarily narrowed his eyes at it, he ultimately didn't suspect anything and simply invited them to follow him toward their destination.