Dragonheart Core

Nicau had returned.

Chieftess stood, brandishing her spear—the other kobolds crowded, churring and chittering their excitement at the return of the Named among them, but she chased them back. Her understanding of the strange fleshy creature of Nicau was limited, but she thought he was tired, needing a short hibernation.

After even watching him commune with the Great Voice, she felt like she needed one, too.

So she helped guide him through the den, shoving back at the other curious kobolds scampering for even the smallest connection to their creator. "Thank you," he warbled in that strange, too-accurate voice that only came out of his mouth half of the time, not so much entering his den as stumbling. Within seconds, he had fallen flat on his mossy protection and didn't move again.

"Sleep," she offered, though it seemed like he was already diligently listening to her. Chieftess watched him, then, sitting down next to his mossy bed and the sweetwater dripping from the rocks overhead. He was covered in unfamiliar blood, some in the scarlet she saw from rats and toads, and some the colour of water, splashed over his second feet made of skin. Green wrapped around his leg, green like moss but different, shaped like the white of the trees but longer. More smooth. Even his spear had changed, worn and damaged, covered in more blood with slivers missing and the bone tip barely sharp anymore. He would need a new one.

But he had seen the outside.

Chieftess sat, pondering, now that she knew the word and that action existed. She had only seen these forested halls, even though she knew of others; she remembered Rihsu before she had been Rihsu diving into the water below, watched smaller creatures crawl down from higher above. But she had only ever been here.

Was there more? Had he gathered all these creatures and magical things on just the floor above? Was her own floor so weak in comparison that the Great Voice had to send Nicau elsewhere for strength?

She pondered that, running her claws over her own spear. It had been some time since she had fought, too busy organizing all the hunts of her fellow scale-kin. Was she losing out on the favour of the Great Voice, not hunting or going to other floors?

The thought was uncomfortable. She didn't like it.

But if she didn't do that, who would? They needed the organization, someone to know which kobolds were out on hunts and which were back in their den. The corpses wouldn't skin and clean themselves. And that was before Nicau taught her what he'd promised, this "fire" that could make food last for longer, make warmth, and sharpen wood. Then that would need more organization, and more thought. Everything she had been doing.

But if she wasn't collecting mana, was it worth it?

She stared at her own spear, the one she hadn't used since she'd helped to capture Nicau. It was still pristine, covered in the markings she'd clawed into it. Some sort of mimickry of the other fleshy things she'd watched come through, the markings they had on their own weapons and clothing. She didn't know if they meant anything, but she liked them. It made her feel unique.

But was that enough? Did the Great Voice know what she did?

Maybe she didn't stand out enough. When it had only been the three of them, it had been easy to stand out. Her tools, stealing wood from the living trees and adding bones; that had been her. Her brother had focused on the animal, Rihsu on strength; but she had used tools. That had been her.

But now, with dozens and dozens of scale-kin, no longer was she unique. She didn't like that thought, either.

Would it be worth it to go back? Leave the kobolds to organize themselves, go back to her tools and her hunting, try to gather power and get the Great Voice's attention that way? She had seen how it worked for Nicau, even as the fleshy thing that he was. Same for Rihsu, sworn to Seros and evolving.

Chieftess tightened her grip on her spear. That wasn't her. She didn't want that. Evolution was beautiful and a Name even moreso, but not at the cost of her leadership. The kobolds listened to her and she liked that, maybe even liked it more than creating tools. Commanding hunts, commanding food; all the parts of being a leader.

A lesser Great Voice, in a way.

But if she still wanted its attention, then she needed more work. Something more to differentiate herself from the others. Maybe create new tools? Come up with better hunting styles?

Her eyes slid to Nicau, slumbering away on his algae bed.

Maybe she needed to be more like him. More like these fleshy things who could communicate with each other, make proper weapons that didn't break, use magic.

Maybe she needed to learn from the humans.

-

Another shark fell dead to the sandy bottom.

The silver krait curled around himself, shaking off the jitters of battle. Once more he'd won, killing another shark. Using his venom, using his fangs, even trying to wrap around a smaller shark's head once. It had all worked.

And he'd grown from it, grown longer and longer until he was more impressive than he'd ever been. A coiling, writhing mess of silver scales, invisible in the murky water, spiraling through the darkness.

But he was no longer happy with his results.

He thought the sharks were the answer. Surely they were—so large, so unkillable for little things like him. It should have been what he needed to evolve once more, to escape the call of the horned serpent on floors below.

Shark corpses littered the sand below.

No, that was wrong. They were on the same scale as him, maybe even weaker; not what he needed to survive. The sarco killed the sharks only to eat, not to train; it fought Seros for strength. The silver krait had to fight the same way.

He needed something larger.

-

Lluc sat, fiddling with his hat.

It was too nice of a hat to be ruined by this. He continued twisting it.

He'd failed once more.

It wasn't an easy kind of failure, either; where it had been his men or the Dread Crew or their enemy who had done enough of the failing that it reflected back on him. No. This had been him and two idiots, and considering half of them were dead and the other half were running free to the wildlands, there was only him left to take the blame.

In truth, it was the failure he'd joined the Dread Crew to escape, clawing his way up the shattered ranks of mistrust and greed until he'd arrive at the position of First Mate because there, surely, he would only be on top. There would be no more of the vitriol and fury Calarata was so determined to shove onto whoever was at the bottom. It would be him being the boot instead of the one flattened beneath.

But no matter how high you climbed in Calarata, there would be always be one above you, and Lluc was smart enough to know that Varcís Bilaro would never relinquish his position.

So he had failed.

He continued twisting the scarlet wolf's pelt around the brim of his tricorn hat.

But if he was interested in staying alive and mostly whole, he had to convince the Dread Pirate that it wasn't a complete failure, and as he waited in the carpeted floor and quartz-light lined room before Varcís' office, he was running through every possible option he had for information.

The easiest was just how much he knew of what the dungeon had. At least two floors, probably more considering the mana density on the second hadn't been particularly well-developed or strong, and already a wide and varied selection of creatures. Including the strange ones he didn't know from where—while mangroves were theoretically in the nearby jungle, the dungeon wasn't in the jungle. It was in the mountain, rather deep underground. So that didn't make sense.

It had also gotten a boon from a deity. He had felt it, even as he ran from the second floor; not a god he recognized, but the familiar star-burn sensation from feeling a god's presence. Also a particularly bad sign.

Gods didn't like sentientborn dungeons. They weren't created by them, made in order to fulfill some kind of purpose; fill a gap in a collapsing ecosystem, revitalize an area devoid of mana, that sort of thing. Gods created dungeons in order to patch the world, so when some upstart creature simply refused to die and shaped themselves into dungeons, the gods tended to get finnicky.

For them to be supporting it, well.

He knew it was sentientborn, though. There was no other explanation—the gods wouldn't create a dungeon to bring new creatures or mana into Calarata with the jungle on their doorstep, full of wild, dangerous creatures and all various shades of unique mana, and their ecosystem was plenty fine. He knew of no ley lines or powerful eclipses that had happened in recent memory; the only event had been the dragon's death.

So that did not speak well of what the dungeon was.

But Varcís had told him explicitly that it was not a sentientborn dungeon. Had told him to investigate it to find out how powerful it was without believing it was sentientborn.

Lluc winced. Unless that had been another deliberate effort on his part. It hadn't been the first time that Varcís had pretended not to know something in order to test his crew's loyalty. Would they tell him what they had found out and risk opposing him, or let the lie stand for fear of retribution?

It was never a fun choice.

But why would Varcís not fight back against the dungeon? Surely he had to understand that it was eating away at Calaratan citizens, pushing out more and more dangerous levels. There couldn't be a reason to keep it alive. Varcís had to investigate it himself, squashing its burgeoning might under his own incredible powers. Then he would see that it was too dangerous to keep alive, that they had to stop it before it could threaten them. Just because Varcís was Gold—or more, Lluc didn't know, it wasn't like he shared any material that could let anyone even contemplate the idea of threatening him—didn't mean the rest of them were. These threats could kill everyone else. The dungeon had to be stopped. That was the only thing that made sense.

The familiar calm voice echoed from under the borwood door. "Enter."

Lluc swallowed, jammed his hat back on his head, and stood. It was time to make his case. Sink or swim.

He hoped Varcís was in a kind mood.