Dragon Den

If Haalfrin had walked all the way, who knows how long the journey would've taken. Being nearly on the other side of the world, Haalfrin could've spent years. Given his propensity to get distracted, it might have even taken decades or centuries to finally get to his destination.

Instead, Dakka volunteers to carry them most of the way. Thus, Haalfrin hangs on tight to the bone ax while it zips through the air at impossible speeds.

Given the speedy nature of their journey, they only fly for half a day before Dakka sets them both back on the ground.

In front of Haalfrin and Dakka is an impossibly deep gouge in the earth – maybe a mile or 2 down, and about half a mile wide. The walls of the pit are all charred black, and carved into the sides is a spiraling ramp extending from the top of the pit all the way to the bottom.

With a spell of enhanced vision, Haalfrin sees an ornate garden covering the entire bottom of the pit, along with a huge set of double doors carved into the wall at the bottom.

Seeing Haalfrin stare at the huge garden, Dakka says, "Oh, those? That's grandma's garden. She's an alchemist, and that's where she keeps a lot of the more pretty to look at herbs. She says it's important for visitors to have a good first impression before they show up."

He then points to the set of double doors. "That's the entrance to grandpa's palace. Most of it is underground."

Haalfrin then notices something strange in the air. "Why didn't you just fly us to the bottom of the pit?" he asks.

"Oh… that?" Dakka coughs and gets a little uncomfortable. "Grandpa doesn't want… er… people to escape, so he set a barrier that prevents anyone from flying."

"…Escape?" Haalfrin scoffs, "does he keep a lot of prisoners?"

"He's a dragon!" Dakka cries out, "dragons are very protective of their young!"

"…I'm listening…," Haalfrin says with a mirthful smirk. He can sense a good story a mile away, and he has to hear this one. "Mind as well tell me while I walk all the way down.

"Ugh," Dakka whines, "fine!"

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On the way down the spiraling ramp, Dakka explains to Haalfrin about a very, very old tradition among the Drakin.

"Only adult dragons are allowed to leave their parents' home," Dakka explains, "…except there's a catch. Er… you see, there's a growing-up ritual…"

"…Keep talking," Haalfrin goads him on. Evidently, this is an uncomfortable subject for Dakka to talk about.

"You see," Dakka continues after some thought, "dragons will protect their young until the children prove they don't need protection anymore. So… a dragon isn't considered an adult until they either defeat their parent in battle, or until they prove they're cunning enough to escape."

"Escape?"

"…Yeah. Dragons tend to lock their children up – to keep them confined at home." After saying this, Dakka squeals out in embarrassment, "I KNOW it's a weird tradition! It's always the old people like grandpa who insist on keeping the old ways!"

"…Are they in prison cells or something?" Haalfrin mutters – clearly a little disturbed.

"Nah!" Dakka admits. "The palace is huge. They're free to go anywhere, so long as they don't leave the palace's east wing. If they get permission, they can even go through the rest of the palace."

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The conversation grows dead after that, but after Haalfrin walks for a few more hours steadily downward, he suddenly asks again, "Do Lord Fheldin's children escape very often? How did your father get out?"

"…He didn't," Dakka huffs. "My father is a disgrace!"

"Oh?"

"Yeah!" the dragon spirit suddenly grows angry thinking about it, "That lazy, fat lizard never even tried to leave his parent's house! He just stays locked up in the basement with his books! He ended up marrying one of the servant girls, and he had me. I'M the one who escaped this place, not my father."

"How did you escape?"

"Eh heh," Dakka laughs in prideful glee, "Let me tell you the story…"

Dakka's story is overly long and embellished, but the gist of it is that he tricked his grandmother into letting him go pick flowers for her from the garden down below.

He had also memorized the date of his grandparent's wedding anniversary, which dragons only celebrate once every 100 years.

On the night of the celebration, when Dakka knew his grandma and grandpa would be… er… making more uncles and aunties, he went to "pick flowers", only to run off instead.

Even though he was too young at the time to engage in such activities himself, Dakka was well aware (even as a child) of how powerful a dragon's instinct is to mate. On a night such as that, there's no way Fheldin wouldn't be busy.

Most of the dragons are terrified of just leaving like that, but Dakka was clever enough to understand when his captor would be the busiest.

…Of course, ever since Dakka escaped this way, Fheldin set a barrier preventing flight up the giant pit.

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Because Dakka meanders too much in his talking, the spirit blabbers on incessantly about how amazing he is, all the way until they reach the bottom.

As soon as they come within a thousand feet of the door, Dakka suddenly goes quiet, and his story trails off. Then, he says softly, "Haalfrin, I'm going to hide my presence. I don't want anyone to know I'm something more than an ax made from common bone."

"…Why?"

"If grandpa knows I'm with you, I'm not sure if he's going to take me back or not," Dakka answers. "I lost to a human, so he might think that letting me live on my own was a mistake, and that I still need protection."

"Yes, yes," Haalfrin comforts Dakka, "You're a big boy now!" He ignores Dakka's irritated feelings at being teased before saying. "Don't worry. I won't let anyone know."

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A scaley fist slams on a stone table, and a gruff voice growls, "Those pesky humans! How dare they lie to the Drakin Clan!"

The speaker is a man with 3 horns atop his head. He looks around at the gathering of other dragons, who mostly have 2 or 3 horns, though a few have 4 horns.

Ever since hearing rumors of a dragon slayer who recently came through the World Gate, the dragons had sent message after message to Commander Fisco, demanding Dakka's bones be handed over to them.

However, the humans always say that the dragon slayer broke his way through the fortress and is running loose in their world right now. If the dragon slayer isn't in the human's fortress (or even beholden to them), then they can't give up the bones.

One of the other dragons shrugs his green-scaled shoulders and says, "Who's to say the dragon slayer actually IS in the Threshold? We have no proof that the humans are lying in order to secretly keep the dragon slayer to themselves."

"Dragon slayers have all the powers of a dragon!" the first brown dragon refutes, "Wouldn't any human kill, much less lie, in order to keep that? They're greedy lowlifes who take what they want!"

Indeed, only the dragons are allowed to be greedy and take what they want from others; it's an entirely different story when someone steals from THEM.

Another dragon in the room slaps his tail on the ground in agitation as a tear threatens to fall out his eye. "I knew it was a bad idea to let Dakka join that cult of Freyya worshippers."

Being residents of Lord Fheldin's palace, the dragon folk in this room all remember Dakka being an adorable nephew – a cute child with a bit of a mischievous streak.

One of the other dragons sniffs back a tear of his own. "That poor little child must have been all alone in the human world. Those humans definitely bullied him to death!" He holds out his hands and makes a grasping motion – as if picking up a little child. "We can't let the humans keep Dakka!"

All the dragons growl in agreement. They all know that if they can get Dakka's bones back, then their Father can bring him back to life.

"What about father?" one of the 4 horned dragons says with trepidation.

"Grandpa said that we're to leave the dragon slayer alone," one of the younger dragons replies. "He said that it's the dragon way for power to belong to whom it's most suited for. If Dakka was defeated, then his power belongs to another."

"Bah!" the brown dragon spits back, "There's no way a human defeated Dakka by himself! Yeah! Even though Dakka is just a little 2 horned dragon, humans are too weak to fight him!"

"YEAH!" another dragon bellows, "It was probably some underhanded tactics! They probably ganged up on him, like ants!"

The vocal brown dragon then stands up straight and puts his clawed hand over his heart, "We dragons are righteous and chivalrous. We can't stand by while a villain tramples on our poor nephew's dignity! We have to rescue that child from the hands of his kidnapper!"

A lot of the dragons lift their heads up high and breathe out fire - ferociously scorching the ceiling in their agreement.

"So…," the green dragon says quietly, "Since father won't let us leave to retrieve Dakka, we can see how many of us can sneak out of here and go trample the Threshold?"

All the dragons in the room start thumping their tails on the ground as they get excited thinking about the coming battle.