Chapter Eight - The Bet

With everyone gathered around the fire, it was time to get a meal cooked. Yami stood up from the group and moved to one of the smaller dragons. It was just shy of being three metres tall when sitting down, its scales were a dark muddy brown. It seemed a little bit more girthy than the other dragons.

It raised its head and leaned towards Yami, he reached out and scratched its nose. The dragons mouth opened wide and its tongue rolled out, its breathing quickened too. Yami smiled and scratched its nose a little harder and fast for a minute or two more before jumping onto the dragons back onto the saddle.

There must have been a pouch on the right side of the dragon because Yami pulled out two dry ducks from nowhere. With them, in hand, he slid down the side and walked back over with two metal poles.

He sat at the fire planting one of the poles into the ground and pushing the ducks on the other over the fire to cook them a little. They might be dehydrated meat right now but with a few magic words from Yami that Noah couldn't quite make out, the ducks were as if they were fresh hunted and were cooking above the fire properly.

It wasn't long before everyone's mouth was watering in anticipation of the food in front of them. The dragon was staring at the humans with a pitying look in their eyes. Such a meek meal would never be enough to even tie a dragon over. They were unsure why humans loved such small delicacies.

The chatter around the fire mainly came from Neil and Oliver, Isan was whispering things to Alan but not a word of it could be heard by the rest.

Neil and Oliver started getting rowdy and arguing over who could throw a rock farther. Soon they decided they would have a competition and the winner would get half of the losers food.

Isan got roped into being the judge, he stood between the two facing outwards ready to keep an eye on the rocks.

"Alright Reed, let's see how true your smack talk is."

Oliver smiled, taking a step back and quickly swinging his arm from the side and releasing the rock. It pelted out and zoomed so fast Noah lost sight of the stone.

"Beat that!" Chuffed at himself for a decent throw.

"Alright, not bad at all. 280 Meters [918'6] is pretty good even for one of us. Benedict, you're up. Put him in his place."

Neil didn't say anything, he just walked back a few steps with a smirk on his face before rushing forward and throwing the rock overarm. Noah could feel with wind move against his face when the rock took off. Oliver's smiled dropped.

The dragons at the back could be heard thumping against the ground when Noah turned and looked it was Hallan that seemed to be very entertained at the crushing defeat. The dragon between Hallan and the one Yami jumped onto earlier was also thumping the ground. It was nearly the same size as Hallan just shorter by half a metre. It was a green hue, like a dark leaf hidden in shadows.

Noah turned back to the guys and saw Oliver being a good sport. Shaking Neil's hand and joking that he nearly has the force of their dragons tails. Everyone had a laugh and headed back around the fire.

It was more comfortable now that the group was used to everyone, even Nereem was chatting nicely with Isan and Alan. They talked about the capital and what she was in the store to see.

The capital was the centre of everything, education; merchants; jewellery. If you needed something in the Empire that would be the place to go. There were places to study the world of magic. There were Gardens and parks protected by knights and even in some rare cases a member of the Dragon Troops would even protect an area.

They told Nereem the layout of the city. There were four rings to the city. In the furthest city ring [4th Ring - Phili] there was mainly housing for the citizens and there are plenty of general stores and parks there. Surrounding both sides of the outer layer were two giant walls with enough room for Hallan to land on.

In the ring [3rd Ring - Bernard] before that part of there is then mainly shops, from clothes and armour to weapons and high-end jewellery. With small garrison buildings in between them all. The knights ran the operations around the city. It was their job to keep the peace and enforce the laws.

In the outer centre ring [2nd Ring - Sil] of the city was the park areas. There were giant fields nature was incredibly freeing, they also had a giant park specifically just for the dragons to go to and play in or relax were they would be undisturbed by people.

Finally, there was the inner ring [1st Ring - Edgur] which had a giant tower that loomed high above into the skies. In that tower was the main base for all dragon troops, it could be seen from at least 48 KM [30 miles] away and Isan said it could be seen further away when you were in the skies. Each ring is named after the Emperors closest friends who helped him unite the empire.

Just beside that was a large mansion, bordering close to a mansion. That is where the Dragon Emperor lived. He had lived there since the founding of the kingdom and it was rare to see him outside of it, unless for a traditional ceremony.

After everyone had eaten, they went to their tents to sleep for the night. Isan had his own tent. the four Dragon Squad members shared one and the final tent was for Noah and his mother. Yami apparently didn't like to share with so many people and chose to sleep with the dragon he had kept the food on.

Noah was lying down facing the top of the tent, thinking about how crazy of a day he had. From trying to save the beast person to this moment right now. It was crazy how much stuff had happened. He was really starting his adventure, he couldn't believe it.

Tomorrow he was going to wake up and FLY to the capital with Isan and a dragon squad as well as his mother. He would have never even dreamed of this as a proper possibility.

He forced his eyes closed and breathed in deeply, in and out. Until before he knew it he was asleep and the moon was high in the sky.