To Grandfather's Palace

Despite all the local weather callers predicting warm, sunny days, a huge shadow drifts across the land like a great cloud, yet when looking up, there's nothing visible in the sky but the blue atmosphere and golden sun.

If one were to look at it from far enough away, they'd see that the shadow looks to be a giant dragon's. Alas, no one is able to tell for sure what it is, since it's so big.

As for why none of the locals are able to see a mountain-sized dragon drifting across their landscape, there's a simple reason.

Fina was worried about freaking the locals out, so she cast an invisibility spell on Dakka, though this didn't erase his shadow. She also insisted on him flying slower than the sound barrier. A creature of his size flying quickly could seriously mess with the weather.

Dakka, of course, thought nothing of upsetting the locals. "It's not like we're going to kill them or anything…," he tried protesting her 'unreasonable quibbling'.

He was only convinced to obey her when she ripped one of his scales off (something she hadn't been able to do before) and said, "You're not my boss."

Suddenly realizing that she may be as powerful as him now, Dakka complied.

Now, this brings us back to their current, sluggish flight across the land.

"Are you sure we're going the right way, Dakka?" Fina asks from atop his head.

"I'm very sure…," he replies, though he sounds a little confused in his tone.

"Then why do I feel like this flight is taking forever?" she crosses her arms and huffs. She then lays down on his skull and stretches her back with a bored expression.

"Hey, you're the one who insisted on flying so slowly. Besides, you're forgetting how big the world actually is. My grandfather lives all the way across the world, which means this might take a few days. Plus, we've only been travelling for a few minutes. We've hardly gone anywhere."

"Sure… sure…" Fina sighs. "I'm bored, Dakka."

"I can't exactly play a board game with you while I'm flying." Judging by what she's feeling from his spirit right now, he's actually thinking of *something else* that they could be doing right now, but he doesn't say it aloud.

"Fine, then," Fina smiles. "Sing me a song, then."

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"What do you think happened with the great barrier?" one Fox man says with fear in his eyes.

"Why would I know?" his captain shrugs irately. "Why else would our matriarch send us off to the black dome? It literally just disappeared."

"Do you think there were monsters trapped inside, and that they're going to eat us all?" the younger Fox asks in a quivering voice.

"Ha!" the captain laughs, "If you ask those stupid badgers, then it would be gods visiting our lands and bringing salvation from whatever." He pushes the kid on the back of the head – making him stumble a little. "Anyway, keep walking. With a 3-Horned dragon with us, we're going to be perfectly safe anyway."

"I don't see the dragon anywhere, though," the younger Fox quivers. "Do you think he got bored and abandoned us?"

"No, no. Look UP! He's flying above us, keeping watch over the land from afar."

They both look up and see a small dragon's silhouette flying in circles around them. Seeing the dragon's reassuring presence calms the younger Foxes down.

"Wait… what's going on?" another Fox further in the back asks in a forced calm voice.

Right as he says this, they all feel the earth quaking, and the trees swaying, despite there being no wind. Pebbles skip on the hard road, and their ears start to hurt.

Worst of all, their 3-Horned dragon suddenly dives out of the sky and plummets toward them. When the dragon gets close enough, they hear the great warrior screaming in fear, "GET DOWN! NOW!"

The dragon lands on the ground beside the entourage with a thud, and he lays his head on the ground in a prostrating posture.

"W-what's going on!?" the Fox's captain demands from their guardian.

"Don't speak unless he speaks to you!" the dragon warns with a fearful look in his eye. "There's a very powerful dragon nearby. I haven't felt this scared since I've met Lord Fheldin."

Once the captain gets closer and kneels beside him, the dragon continues in a hushed voice, "I felt a faint presence for a while now. Suddenly, I heard his voice. His singing is nearly too low for me, so this may be Lord Fheldin. I don't know of any other dragon who can speak that low."

"Lord Fheldin himself!?" the Fox captain exclaims. "Is the black barrier really important enough for him to come personally!?"

The Fox captain can't be blamed for thinking this. The history behind the barrier's creation is only known by the people who were alive more than 10 thousand years ago, when the Ant Queen first terrorized the world. Many of the dragons had either moved to different worlds to seek their own fortunes or perished in battles. The remaining ones mostly keep to themselves.

This left most of the local Rehkin tribes to only guess what was within the dome-like wall of pure Death Aura.

"Since Lord Fheldin is going himself, are we even needed here?" the Fox captain asks.

"No. Whatever concerns a 5-horned Dragon is none of our business," their draconic escort says grimly. "Tell the others to turn back now."

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Of course, it wasn't just the scouts from the Fox tribe who were scared away from investigating the battle ground of the Eternal War. All of the other scouting parties from the surrounding tribes all immediately turned tail and ran back to where they came from…

…all because Dakka decided to open his mouth and sing for his wife.

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"Well, that was nice, dear," Fina congratulates her husband. "It would've been better if you weren't so huge, and your voice wasn't too deep for me to hear without you using telepathy."

"…Sorry…"

"My bad," she laughs. "I didn't think about it either. Plus, I AM the one who asked you to sing."

She looks down and rubs her belly. "I'm hungry. Let's set down and eat something. I think I see a village there."

Dakka shifts into his humanoid form, and he catches his wife out of the air. He then glides downward in a spiral shape.

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Once they arrive at the village, Dakka realizes that he's having trouble with fully containing his powerful Aura; he's never had to conceal himself since becoming an Elder Dragon.

So, Fina ends up using her absurdly powerful spiritual Aura to constrain his. Once they're both set, they walk into the village hand in hand.

"Huh, this place must be well off," Dakka surmises. "Look at the roads. They're all well paved and enchanted." Suddenly, Dakka guesses that this place must be pretty important for even the lamp posts to have mana stones in them.

What amazes Dakka even more is when he sees a pair of Badger children run through the street twirling an enchanted string kite over their heads that made the paper dragon flap its wings.

Since when did common children get the money for this kind of thing? Aren't only royalty and dragons the only ones who raise their children with magical toys?

What Dakka hadn't accounted for is that arcane technology never stopped advancing. What was once the markers of a rich town became commonplace, due to enchantments and mana stones becoming dirt cheap with more advanced production methods.

"I smell something good over there," Fina eagerly pulls Dakka over a stall selling grilled meat on a stick.

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While the pair of husband and wife are eating their meal, Dakka picks up an annoying voice with his sharp hearing.

"…and pray to the Other gods for mercy! It's surely a sign of great catastrophe, now that their great shield is gone! Beware! The gods' barrier coming down is a sign that they're returning!"

'What's this old man spouting off about?' Dakka wonders. Still, it's something about gods 'coming back', so this interests him.

"Here, you can have mine," Dakka says as he puts his unfinished grilled beef on his wife's plate. "I'm going to go check something out."

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Dakka walks closer to the strange voices, and he sees a crowd of local folk from the Badger Clan. Standing on a box is an elderly fellow spouting on and on about what he thinks the signs are.

Maybe it's because Dakka is a dragon (it certainly is), but he stands well higher than everyone else in the crowd. Despite not having any of his horns on display, it's obvious that he's a dragon.

Dragons – especially 1, 2, and 3-Horned dragons – tend to spend a lot of time among the people, whereas 4-Horned dragons tend to rule over territories. Because the locals are all familiar with their local dragons' faces, all of them assume that Dakka is a stranger in these parts.

Dakka realizes this too, so he speaks with a loud voice, "What's this drivel about the land of gods?"

The elder speaking twitches his eyebrows awkwardly; clearly, he didn't like his passionate speech being called 'drivel.' Even still, his guest is certainly a dragon, so he doesn't dare be rude. "My assistant here can answer all of your questions."

A young lady standing in the back pulls Dakka away; she too seems anxious to not let Dakka interrupt her master again.

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Dakka takes the young priestess back to the table he'd left his wife at, and he has the girl explain what's going on.

Apparently, it had been a well founded religion for thousands of years now that the barrier of Death Aura leads to the Realm of their Ancestors, where the gods dwell.

It seems that stories had been passed down since mythic times that a portal to another Realm lies beneath a mysterious mountain, and a race of strange people guard it in an indestructible fortress.

Over time, it seems that the common people have forgotten what kind of world laid beyond the world gate. Due to the place being covered by an uncrossable shield of Death Aura, many people began assuming that the Death Realm lies beyond the barrier and through the mysterious gate.

Due to the Rehkin's strong Spiritual bonds, they can even feel their ancestors from beyond the grave. Thus, most Rehkin clans deeply revere their predecessors – some clans even worshipping them as gods.

Thus, it's only natural that rural people like the Badger Clan believe that the land beyond the "black wall" are their own ancestors, and that the Realm on the other side is the Realm of gods.

Now that Haalfrin's barrier has gone down, a lot of these clans are freaking out; they really think that the world is ending, or some other nonsense.

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One has to give credit to Dakka for managing to hold his laughter in until the priestess left. When she IS gone, food is snorting out of his nose, and he accidently breaks his table from pounding on it too hard.

"You're being silly," Fina scowls at him. "Get up. We're leaving." Suddenly, she doesn't want to sleep here.