Power of Creation

I dust off my naked behind as I stand up and look around. “Huh, it looks like we landed on a mountain.”

“It’s not a mountain anymore…” Millie responds with a tight smile.

She isn’t wrong. The pair of us are in the center of a crater about a kilometer wide. There are traces of the mountain, but the impact has scattered the majority of the mountain and I now sit in a volcano-like divot created by our skyfall.

“Wait… I know this mountain.” Millie’s eyes start to hold a look of worry.

“Huh? You recognize crater mountain?”

“Well, it wasn’t crater mountain before!” Millie insists, covering herself up the best she can despite the lack of clothing for either of you. “Wait… we need to go! Master! We have to go now!”

“Go?”

Millie seems to turn very agitated, grabbing at my arm and pulling while I stand there dumfounded. “Please, master!”

Before I can respond, there is a loud roar that nearly shakes the ground. A moment later, more roars answer, and within seconds I hear a cacophony of monster sounds around me. I look around but don’t see any monsters.

“Those sounds are familiar…”

“It’s too late, they’re here!” Millie cries out, pointing up into the sky.

I look up in the direction she’s pointing, and that’s when I see emerging from the sky, dozens of dragons that are circling overhead. They start descending upon us. I merely stand there, naked, watching curiously. Millie seems to cower more and more behind me the closer they get.

Finally, the dragons land in a circle around us. They do not appear hostile necessarily. It is more like they are trying to put on a show of intimidation. While it’s true they are powerful, I check their stats and make sure mine are better. Suffice it to say, I'm confident I can take them. Just in case, I ready the instant-death dragon spell I made the first day I got there too, the one that killed Millie.

“They’re dragons?” One of the dragons’ roar.

“This one… could she be? Millie?” a silver dragon asks.

With those words, Millie hides even farther behind me. Several other dragons make surprised exclamations as they talk excitedly among themselves. Millie’s name comes up more than a few times.

“Hey!” I say casually. “How are you guys on this fine morning?”

I opt for pleasantries.

“You… strange dragon. We heard the sounds. You have taken this young dragon as your mate. That was a mistake, you will die!” A golden dragon shouts.

So much for pleasantries. “Excuse me, why is who I chose for my mate your problem?”

The dragon’s all look at each other, and then in a flash they all turn into human-like forms, landing on the ground softly. The whirling wind immediately dies down. I give a noise of surprise. So, dragons can turn into humans? The one who appears in charge is an older man with a beard. He had been the silver dragon. There also appears to be a cocky young man standing next to him with golden hair. He came from the golden dragon. He took a step forward, but the silver one stopped him by holding up a hand.

“You must be a rogue dragon. It’s rare to find a dragon that isn’t part of a colony. If you had been, you’d have known it is considered taboo to bredlock a dragon from another colony without expressed permission. This young dragon here appears to be one of ours. She is still quite young. Since she had gained the ability to hold a human form, she must have matured early, but she still belongs to this colony.”

I give a tight smile as I look back at Millie, who continues to shrink back and lower her head. So, normal dragons could appear in human form when they were adults. Millie is officially an adult. I certainly did not push her into premature adulthood when I resurrected her from the dead. That’s just crazy talk. A-D-U-L-T… confirmed.

“A bredlock… that is to say that because I’m Millie’s first, we are bound together, yes?” I clarify.

The golden-haired man became angrier while many of the other younger looking dragons winced. However, the old silver-haired bearded elder merely nodded.

“While it is true that you have bredlocked Millie, this sort of thing can be broken.”

“Oh?” I'm not terribly interested in the conversation, but I decide to humor him, since he’s been politer than the other dragons shooting me angry looks.

“A dragon can challenge and defeat you from Millie’s colony. If you win, we forfeit the right to Millie. If we win, you forfeit the right.”

“Well that doesn’t sound so bad.”

“The battle is to the death.”

“Ah.”

“It’ll be me who kills you, bastard!” The gold-haired man stepped forward.

“Mason! Enough!”

“But Millie was to be mine. It was all but decided.”

Millie put a look of disgust on her face when the one named Mason stepped forward. It was clear that she didn’t like the guy. If I had to guess, he was likely the reason she ran away in the first place.

“It was not decided, Mason, do not get ahead of yourself.” The silver hair man shot a tired and exasperated look. “It will be me who performs this fight.”

“No!” Millie said the first words since the dragon had spoken. “You mustn’t!”

“You have done this to yourself, my dear. Running away. Giving yourself to a rogue. You have much to atone for young lady.”

“Hmph.” Mason shrugged. “I guess you’ll die anyway. Prepare to face the wrath of the dragon they call the Dragon King!”

Millie turned back to me, tears in her eyes. Was she really so worried? This dragon king guy could hardly be that powerful.

“It’s alright, Millie.” I give her a smile. “I’ll just kill him and then we can go home.”

Rather than looking relieved, her eyes swell up even more. “Please! No. Master, you can’t kill him?”

“Master?” There was a rumble of unhappy murmuring amongst the dragons at the word master.

I look from the crying Millie to the silver-haired man questioningly. “What did I miss?”

“Ah? I guess we have not been properly introduced. Since we are about to fight to the death, we might as well exchange names. I am the Dragon King Xhou. You can also call me, Millie’s father.”

“Ah…” That’s problematic.