Dragon Knights

The superior dragon had succumbed to the pressure and realized that the only hope to even survive was to listen to his every order. Thankfully for them, his only orders at the moment were to give him information and to not tell anyone—orders to ensure his own safety and secrecy as he was going to traverse the city, and information to do just that. By the looks of it, even though they were in a state of panic and were feeling fear, the guards still knew that Velios could kill them whenever he wanted. He already had them trapped in a box, which they had realized none of them could break, even if they were to work together. They didn't even know what sort of creature was in front of them. The massive amount of mana, bloodlust, and malice directed towards them had completely removed any way to see what the individual behind truly was. The aura Velios emitted was so strong that it basically dulled all of their senses, leaving only the bare minimum.

"I'll take your silence as a no." Velios could see that they had no resolve left to fight. Velios would normally act all mad if the dragons had done something to him, but Velios had actually realized that he was the reason they met in the first place. If it were a different situation, Velios might have been all friendly with them to make their conversation easier, but he did not want to let his guard down. With his experience, humanoid monsters have always been the worst, after all. The literal first dragons he had met tried to destroy a whole city and kill all of the people there without any mercy. Velios couldn't be sure of how friendly they truly were, since his overall trust in monsters was still pretty low, considering that monsters' natural instinct is to kill. Velios just wanted information about the city, places to visit, and things to do since he didn't really have any plans. Ragaja would force him to hide anyway, and he was actively trying his best not to kill anyone.

"W-What kind of information do you need, sir?" One of the guards spoke, scared he was as he was shaking. No one else was speaking, and Velios grew more impatient as he had to repeat his questions over and over. It was only until the fourth time that one of the guards actually gave him what he wanted. "The further inside the forest you go, the more smaller villages you will see. In the center is the huge capital with the volcano in the middle. The only dragons allowed to fight inside the walls are us, the guards, and the dragon knights, the order of the strongest dragons this forest has to offer. Is there anything more you wish to know?" The guard was forced to speak confidently, fearing that the dominant creature standing before them was going to kill them if they spoke even a second too late. "I get that the capital is huge and stuff, but what can you do? Is it just your average city with streets and a bunch of dragons walking around?" The dragon guard was shocked by the sudden shift of tone from the man speaking to him.

"No, no, no. Of course, there are many things you can do. We have annual tournaments taking place in the capital in just a few days' time. There are multiple academies scattered around, and we even have something similar to what you humans call the 'adventurers guild,' where anyone can take up a task, and the dragon who completes it gets a reward depending on the difficulty. But if you mind me asking, you're not from around here, are you?" The guard was bold in asking a question back, knowing that a possible outcome would be death. The question was asked in the heat of the moment, created from the curiosity that had sparked in him. "No, what of it?" Velios changed his tone to make it sound more serious yet again. "If you're asking for stuff that you can do, then what business do you have here?" Velios was actually struck aback by this sudden question. After thinking, he himself had realized that he didn't know why. "Bored."

Velios had now left the guards be. In the end, he did not have to hurt them, and the guards gladly listened. He doubted that they would tell anyone about him, and even if they did, it wouldn't necessarily be as much of a problem for him as for the dragons. Velios was left behind by Ragaja and even Ajagar, who were making their way to the capital. Of course, he could just force them back and then resummon them, but he found no necessary need for it. After all, he was free to do anything he wanted since there was no one to constantly keep him in check. He wanted to see what the city of dragons has to offer, what knowledge he could obtain, the secrets he could unfold, and how much he could increase his knowledge and capabilities of magic. But out of all the things, the most important one that he found immediate interest in was the annual tournament that one of the guards was talking about. "Then let's head... to the dragon capital!"

Velios stayed true to his way of constantly training. He had unlocked an ability to "see" the world around him like a perfect 3D plane. That was only possible thanks to his heightened senses, and the ability itself was based on the sixth sense. Through the use of using it constantly, he was always seeing whatever was happening around him while training himself. Together with magic, the ability gets far more perceptive of smaller details, and the range is increased many times. This also helps Velios further increase his mana supply. Velios was also focused on proficiently flying without the use of creating highly condensed mana wings by using only wind magic. To increase his understanding of wind magic, he had to train it as often as possible, and learning how to carry a human by solely manipulating wind is still only the first step, yet not easy. Velios knew exactly where dragons around him were and could, therefore, change his path as long as he knew where the capital was. It did not take long for the ever-progressing Velios to begin seeing the massive Volcano, standing proud at the center of massive wooden and stone buildings.

The first order of business that even he found necessary to not stick out too much was to hide his identity in any way. The easiest way was to get a coat, but there was a slight problem that he was going to have to face. Upon arrival, he could feel a sudden shift in the air, not as present as before. The air was really rich in mana. Extremely much so. It was as if Velios could feel his fatigue slowly begin to vanish with every second that passed. The dragon city seemed to be very populated as the streets were filled to the brim with dragons. For monsters, they sure do look and act human. Velios looked for the exact shop that he needed while trying not to cause too much attention. That was at least his plan. As soon as he landed, he could feel the atmosphere around him change; people who seemed to be in a hurry had stopped, and every dragon there could instinctively sense that something was very wrong but no one seemed to know why.

Velios was beginning to become extremely worried, a feeling that only increased with every passing second. Only superior dragons and above have a sort of humanoid look with some having definite traits of dragons like tails or scales. That means that every single dragon there who had stopped, they who amounted to over a hundred at least, had stopped were all superior dragons. Even for Velios, he did not know how he would handle the sheer amount of superior dragons if they were to attack. Velios realized how bad the situation was for him, and just when he was about to disappear, something could be heard from the massive entrance behind him. It was the sound of the marching army, the dragon knights who had returned from their mission were now entering the capital, marching ever so gracefully. It turned out that the superior dragons had stopped to acknowledge and applaud the return of a successful mission.

As they were marching forwards, the man who stood at the front turned his head to wave and smile at whomever he saw. I'm guessing that the dragon in the front is the most powerful. His aura is completely different than the rest of them. It's like I can sense the mana leaking out as if it can't be contained. I would guess that the mana alone is... ten times the amount of Ajagar, I think. Velios was deep in thought thinking of how powerful the leader of the knights must be as they kept on marching. Because of this, a natural smile had formed on Velios's face as he was locked on the one powerful dragon. Little did he know that the dragon who was all happy and cheerful would look into his direction specifically. Not only did he look directly at Velios, but he stopped walking completely. His face looked onto Velios, he spoke with a dark voice and with an angry and serious tone. "What is a human doing here in the capital?"