“The result of this discussion will decide everything. Be prepared.”
They all nodded, with the faces of warriors who had steeled themselves for battle. I turned back to face the dragon.
“Oh?”
Valacirca spoke in a low growl. Maybe I looked quite different to him as well now.
“So you’re decided. Then state your choice, Faraway Paladin. Peace or death?”
“I won’t be choosing anything,” I said, rebuffing the question the dragon had taken such pleasure in asking. ”You’ll be the one making a choice, Valacirca.”
The foul-dragon twitched.
“Oh? And what will I be choosing?”
Before answering his question, I took a step towards him and looked up at him. The dragon which I had thought of as like a school building now looked at least a bit smaller. The size I had seen before was probably false, an illusion created in my mind by intimidation and pressure.
“Whether you will change, or not.”
I put the question to him directly. This was the first time the foul-dragon’s eyes went wide.
Once I thought about it with cold logic, it was simple, really. Bringing the powerful foul-dragon under my command appeared logical at a glance, but when
I thought about how someone only superficially obedient would act, it really was nothing but a fool’s choice.
Say that I did bring Valacirca into my forces. What would he do after that?
Obediently do what I say? Indulge himself in sleep peacefully? As if. I would kill him before long, because I saw him as a threat. So if not that, then what?
Obviously, he would be at work behind the scenes.
To raise the value of his own existence, to make sure that he wouldn’t be discarded, the foul-dragon would bring wars to me, make enemies for me, and continue to create conflict. And what’s more, they would be brutal, large-scale battles that required the power of a dragon. I wouldn’t be able to abandon Valacirca then. And as I continued to seek the dragon’s power and fight alongside him, the dragon would gradually become an emblem of vital importance. That would make it even more impossible for me to dispense with him. To ensure his safety until the day he flew away from me, he would eat away at me and the entire area around me while calling himself my subordinate.
I couldn’t imagine that someone like me would be able to control the machinations of a dragon living since time immemorial. I would have to stick with the dragon, for the sake of morale as well, even while knowing he was working against me. It would be like a nasty drug.
“Let’s be clear. The ‘peace’ you refer to is ‘a restricted peace between you and me’. It’s by no means ‘my peace,’ and it isn’t ‘peace for the innocent people,’ either. Am I wrong?”
When he heard that question, the dragon laughed as if he found this so very entertaining.
“Kaha… khahaha… khahaha! Precisely. You are correct.”
The elder dragons that had lived since the age of the gods were some of the closest creatures to the Words of Creation. And the power of Words was weakened by lies and untruths. Although the dragon might try to trick me, if I asked him a straight question, he would never tell a lie.
“In that case, I’m certain about my condition. You must change.”
“Heheh. Change how?”
“If you will swear to change your fanatical, scheming nature of always seeking war—”
I stared straight into his golden eye.
“If you will say you truly seek my protection—”
If he could say he would live in peace—
If he could say he would no longer seek bloodshed except when necessary, and express a desire to reign in his frenzy and live with the good gods—
“Then I swear on the god of the flame that I will protect you. As long as there is life in me, I will guard you from any and all adversaries.”
It made no difference whether he was a dragon or a person. Wherever there was someone in true sorrow, I would offer them a helping hand. Wherever there was evil that would harm the innocent, I would fight them. That was what I had vowed that day to my silent, black-haired god.
“That’s the way I live my life.” I had decided that it would be. “Now choose!
Will it be a change of heart, or else death?! I await your answer, dragon!” I shouted my question to him.
A cloud of heat and miasma rose up.
“Excellent!”
The first word from his mouth was praise.
“You have answered the Dragon’s Riddle well, Faraway Paladin.”
His wings spread to their full extent. He raised his chin.
“You are not a wretched savage wielding power without purpose. Neither
are you a crafty coward out to save his own skin. You possess courage and
wisdom and are prepared to follow the path you believe to be right!
Marvellous! You truly are the successor to those heroes who preceded you!”
The relaxed, lazy posture the dragon had shown until now was gone. He was no longer giving the slightest impression that he was treating me as a curiosity.
“I acknowledge you as a true champion.”
Before me stood a great dragon as old as the gods.
“With that in mind, changing my nature is out of the question!”
The dragon roared.
“I am Valacirca! The Gods’ Sickle, Calamity’s Sickle! The king of poison
and brimstone and brother to lava! Poison exists to kill and maim, lava exists to seethe and boil! War! Disaster! Decorations awarded! Treasure!
Death! Virgin sacrifices! Heroes! What is a dragon without these?!”
The god of undeath, Stagnate, had referred to the foul-dragon Valacirca as worldly and materialistic. I did think that description was fitting. He had worldly attachments, and what’s more, the things to which he was attached — money, conflict, safety, sleep — all seemed to be what could be called basic needs.
However, there was a true nature behind that.
“I am Valacirca! The strongest and oldest dragon, feared even by the gods!”
It was to stay true to himself as a dragon, to keep on living his life as a dragon with burning intensity. These were the out-of-place thoughts going through my head as the dragon roared at me loudly enough to make my skin tremble.
“Hero, and the warriors who follow you: It will please me to bury you here, and append another page to my chronicle of terror. And it will please
me to be slain here, and be spoken of in tales of valor across the four corners of the world.”
His fangs snapped and clicked. The enormous mass of tough muscle before me began to move. Negotiations had broken down. The dragon had refused to reform. The only way forwards now was battle.
“Now, if you are prepared to be incinerated to your souls by dragonflame
and vanish completely from the eternal cycle, you have my permission! Test
yourselves against me!”
Amid all this, for some reason, I was a little bit excited.
Dragon slaying. Charging at a fearsome dragon, relying only on the steel in your very own hand. Dragon slaying! It wasn’t in my nature to romanticize battle as much as Blood; at least, I thought it wasn’t. But this situation had some kind of irresistible draw to it. Valacirca was an opponent who was unquestionably deserving of my respect, and he was going to be the strongest enemy I’d faced so far. He was worth challenging. He was worth fighting!