Chp.22: Maldor's idea

While Sisna, Darbi and Rhaegal carried on their play with the humans, their sisters watched secretly. As already mentioned Corgorin, Finiar, Serengal, Malchia and Keita were protected by the invisibility rune and were directly behind the adventurers, but all the others instead were hiding in the bushes much further away and weren't using the invisibility rune, since it was impossible that humans notice them at that distance and so well camouflaged.

The reason for this was simple: if humans had become aware of the dragons' first line of defense (precisely their five sisters standing behind them) they could have used some sort of spell to reveal the presence of all the other dragons as well, making an ambush impossible. After all, they knew it was possible to erase magic, since they possessed the nullification rune; there was therefore no reason not to believe that such magic or spell could exist and that humans knew how to use it. It was unlikely, but there was never the limit to caution when it came to survival. If the adventurers had used such a spell, then being at a great distance Maldor, Kotaru, Tikka, Teramon, Kialandì, Glausar, Jatara and Maleficent would not have been affected, and consequently they could have organized a counterattack. The fact that they weren't using the invisibility rune also served the same purpose: if humans possessed a way to detect nearby magic, using the invisibility rune would reveal their location, while not using it they would instead continue to hide.

An outside observer might have thought that the dragons were far too paranoid. But from their point of view, their actions were dictated solely by prudence. They had too little and fragmented knowledge of the world, and it was essential to think of all options, even the most far-fetched ones. That was how they had all managed to stay alive all this time.

While their siblings dealt with the adventurers, Kotaru took the opportunity to address Maldor: "Sister, earlier you were going to tell us something. What is it about?"

Maldor appeared to blush slightly. Of all the dragons in their group, she was by far the most shy and reserved. She rarely spoke and when she did it she seemed afraid of being judged by others. As a result, Kotaru knew that she must have tried very hard to reveal to everyone that she had an idea, but unfortunately before she could explain herself she was interrupted by the arrival of the adventurers, and everyone's attention was immediately focused on solving that problem and they forgot about her.

Maldor was clearly surprised by Kotaru's request. She probably thought everyone had forgotten that she wanted to say something. "Um... yeah. Well, I had an idea... but I'm not sure it will work..."

"At least tell us, then we'll see if it can work" Kotaru encouraged her. "After all, for the moment we have zero ideas. Even if it doesn't work, at least we will have a starting point"

Maldor glanced at Kotaru hesitantly, then stared one by one at her sisters, who were listening to the conversation and seemed quite interested. "Okay" she finally said, starting to rummage through her dimensional bag. After a few moments she pulled out a large flask (probably one that once held a healing potion or something like that: even after they'd been used, the dragons kept the containers, since anything could come in handy sooner or later, and they also didn't have a way to get rid of it without leaving a trace) and showed it to the others: "That was my idea"

Kotaru brought her face close to the ampoule and looked at it well. Inside was what looked like a strange greenish vapor. It didn't take long before Kotaru realized what it was. "Maldor, but... that's the poisonous vapor of the hydra!?"

"Y... Yes" Maldor answered very insecurely.

Kotaru shivered slightly. The effects of that horrible vapor were still well engraved in his mind. "How did you...?"

"I-I didn't take any risck!" Maldor exclaimed. "While we were still in the woods, a couple of days after Haku was... captured... I returned to the hydra's corpse and climbed the trees, away from the vapor. After that, I tied a vine to some empty ampoules and used it to lower them, collect some of it and then pull them up again. As you well know this vapor is heavier than air, so I just had to hold the opening of the ampoule pointing upwards to prevent it from coming out once it was pulled up. And once I got it, of course I closed it..."

"Well... nice job" Kotaru said. Indeed that would have been something for everyone to think about: the poisonous vapor of the hydra could have been very useful, as had been the venom of the great basilisk. They should have collected some. "How much did you take?"

"Seven bottles" Maldor replied. "And then I did some experiments with it... and I discovered that it doesn't work just for hydra"

Kotaru didn't understand. "What does 'it doesn't work just for hydra' mean?"

"I'm talking about the minions that it creates. You know… the dead bodies of animals that are reanimated and controlled by the hydra" Maldor explained. "At first I thought that the vapor just revives living creatures and then the hydra controls them via some kind of psychic link. I tested the steam on some lizards and indeed they became nothing more than drooping corpses, devoid of will, just like the minions of the hydra after it died. But then... I tried to mix my blood with the vapor"

Kotaru's eyes widened, "You did what?"

"I took no risks again!" Maldor hastened to specify. "I simply remembered that the hydra's blood was also toxic... and that the poisonous vapor was actually formed from the blood that supplied the lungs of that beast... so I deduced that perhaps part of that psychic bond between the hydra and its minions was due to blood". Noticing Kotaru's confused face, Maldor explained further: "As you well know, these strange powers are almost always due to mana. And as we have seen many times, mana is contained in the mana core of living beings, and is transported in the body through the blood. So, considering that the mana core and the brain are separate, the blood must be what binds them, since only the circulatory system passes through both the head and the heart. My theory is that since the control psychic of the hydra was due to mana, we can look for the source in its blood"

Kotaru considered, and had to admit that the theory held up. To send orders to its minions, the hydra had to use its brain, since it was the organ that controlled everything, but the brain was separate from the mana core. The mana core, on the other hand, was what created the poisonous vapor that turned creatures into minions. The only thing that connected those two organs was the circulatory system, so it had to carry the orders from the brain through the mana, so that they were then transmitted to the minions. This would have explained why the hydra's brain was located in the ribcage and not in the head, although this was apparently a disadvantage due to the lesser coordination due to the remoteness of the sensory organs: since orders had to be transmitted from the brain to the mana core, it was more convenient for those two body parts to be located close to each other.

"At first I thought that the hydra's orders were transmitted via vapor. Let me explain: the brain gave an order and then the mana contained in the blood carried it to the mana core which transformed it into toxic vapor and then released it via the lungs, and then the order was traveling in the form of a vapor to the minions. However, then I reflected that not only this would be disadvantageous, but it wouldn't make sense since some of the hydra minions attacked us while we were out of the vapor and that monster se she noticed it, a sign that the psychic link between them must have remained active even at a distance" Maldor continued. "My current theory is that the vapor is just a means of killing the victim and creating a connection between them and the hydra. After that, the brain decides the orders that are transmitted via blood to the mana core, and it issues some sort of pulse, similar to a sound wave, but created using mana, and which transmits orders to the minions. This would explain why during battle we instinctively sensed when the hydra minions were about to attack, because we felt this pulse even though it was at such a low frequency that even we couldn't hear it"

Kotaru nodded slightly. Actually during that battle she had sometimes felt a shiver along her spine, as if an instinct had activated, and soon after the minions had started to attack. "Everything is very interesting... but what does this have to do with..."

"I'm getting there. The thing is, while I was doing my experiments I wondered... what if emitting this pulse wasn't just a feature of the hydra's mana core? What if all mana cores could use it? After all, we know that There are spells that can control the mind, and the hydra isn't the only creature that can use this power". In fact, the dragons knew that mind control magic existed, since they had often seen the fairies use spells capable of confusing ogres, and also Darbi and Haku had once fallen victim to a trap that confused their minds (when they had met Ethan the first time). Furthermore, based on the few stories that Sarpa had given them about the outside world, they knew that there were beings called necromancers, capable of controlling dead bodies, or puppeteers, who could manipulate people as if they were puppets. Or again there were the golems, which were none other than clay statues animated and commanded by a mage. "And so I thought, what if all living things could emit this weird pulse from their mana core? What if blood and vapor was just the way to make the connection? So I decided to check it out. I cut myself and then, very carefully, I poured my blood into the ampoule of the toxic vapor. Obviously I didn't do it in this ampoule: I didn't waste a lot of vapor, I only used a tiny part and a few drops of my own blood After about half an hour, the vapor and blood merged into a strange greenish liquid. I tried pouring it on a lizard's face... and it worked!"

Kotaru gasped in amazement. "You mean... the lizard has become your minion and you can control it?"

"Well… almost, actually" Maldor replied. "My control isn't anywhere near as good as the hydra's. I was only able to get it to do a few basic movements. But it was my first attempt, so maybe there is a way to amplify the mental connection. If we could do that…"

"We could use the bodies of dead humans to disguise ourselves!" Kotaru exclaimed understanding the reasoning. "Maldor... you're a genius!"

Her sister looked somewhat embarrassed. "It was mostly luck" she replied. "I don't know if every existing mana core can emit that pulse I was telling you about earlier, and I don't even know if it's an exact theory... but since we dragons once we get a domain we can use any magic related to it, then we should also be able to use the mind control ones, and then our mana core shouldn't be too different from that of the hydra, or it would be impossible to maintain a stable connection. Even though we are still young and we haven't yet achieved our domain, we know that our blood is already full of mana, and therefore we must also have a mana core, and assuming that this impulse is something natural, it should already be active too. In any case, mixing our blood and the poisonous vapor of the hydra we can create a connection between the infected victim and us, and therefore create some sort of avatar that can walk among humans, talk to them and collect information"

"I repeat: Maldor, you are a genius! With this, we may be able to easily infiltrate among the humans or the other newcomers and find out what happened to Haku! No more waiting to meet some traveler and hoping he has the necessary information!" Kotaru exclaimed. "Why didn't you tell us about it before?"

Maldor shook her head and scratched the back of her neck. "I told you, right now I can barely control a lizard, and I can't get it to do much more than jerk its legs. I've thought about this for a long time, but I can't think of any way to strengthen the mental connection. If we can't improve it, then this idea is totally useless"

Even if they managed to disguise it perfectly, the humans would surely notice if one of them moved or spoke strangely. They weren't as smart as the dragons, but they weren't stupid. And unfortunately Kotaru had to agree with her sister: at the moment, she couldn't think of anything that could amplify the mental connection. They knew too little about that kind of magic to be able to think of anything concrete.

But suddenly Jatara said, "Maybe the adventurers can help us with that"

Kotaru and Maldor looked at her: "What do you mean?"

"That maybe while you talk to each other you could check how our siblings are doing, like we are doing" Glausar scolded. "If you did, you would have noticed that one of the adventurers cast some kind of mind magic on Sisna, dulling her senses for a few seconds"

Maldor's eyes widened in excitement. "If those adventurers know something about mind control magic, perhaps they can help us! Sisna was right to propose that we get them to lend us a hand, so that we might..."

"I don't think we'll get a chance to talk to them" Jatara said again. "It seems that the situation is degenerating over there"

Indeed, in the distance, it seemed that tension was re-exploding between the adventurers and their siblings. Kotaru grit her teeth: according to the plan, at that point their sisters should have killed them, but after what she had learned, she couldn't allow it! "Change of plans. Activate the invisibility rune and run over there, and stun those adventurers before our sisters intervene! They mustn't die!"

The others nodded and immediately complied. All of them activated their invisibility rune and ran towards the adventurers. Just when it seemed that the fight was about to start again, they arrived and gave the adventurers a hard blow on the head, knocking them out. After that they canceled the invisibility to show themselves, so that their sisters would not be alarmed. Corgorin, Serengal, Malchia, Keita and Finiar reappeared next to them shortly after, and they seemed rather upset that their sisters had 'stolen' their task. However, they seemed more interested in making fun of Sisna: "Jeez, for a second I really thought it would work" Corgorin muttered.

"It was working, until that woman pulled that bone out! Why didn't you kill them?" Sisna grumbled, who didn't seem to have realized that there had been a change of plans, or maybe she still hadn't noticed that it was Kotaru and the others who stunned the adventurers.

"We can't. Our sister has an idea. An idea that could allow us to get all the information we need without struggling" Kotaru answered by pointing at Maldor, and all of their siblings looked surprised, except of course for those who had previously listened. Kotaru almost sighed: she knew that a long series of explanations awaited her. But she didn't care: if they could find a way to improve the mental connection with the minions, saving Haku would become much more feasible.