Ch 22: The Boy That Slayed The Dragon

'It's pretty boring here, even at the academy I had movies to watch but here I can only watch the waves I guess.'

Edward silently stared at the dark sea, behind him Sunny and Nephis were sitting still awake, he could feel that Sunny was looking at him in an unfriendly way. As for Nephis? She was staring somewhere, probably, he didn't have eyes behind his head.

"Sunny, do you have something in your mind?"

Edward asked Sunny.

"Well, there is indeed something I wanna know about you."

"About me?"

"Yeah, I meant to ask it from you for a while but didn't know how to. Since I got a chance I wanna ask you, is it okay?"

"Sure, shoot it."

Edward didn't bother to put much meaning behind his answer, he simply kept looking at the endless dark sea.

"Are you really simply civilian?"

"Hm?"

"I mean, you don't seem like a simple civilian teenager you know, you are armed with Memories and you just seem unnaturally powerful for a simple Sleeper. I am sure everyone had that kind of thought about you one way or another."

A smile appeared on his face making Edward wanna let out a chuckle, if you put it that way indeed he doesn't seem like a normal person from any angle you look at him.

"Legacy huh? Sorry to disappoint you Sunny but I am not one. As for how I gained these Memories let's just say I was very lucky."

"Then after we left this place what are you planning to do?"

Nephis's sudden voice rang in his ear, making him look in her direction, her face was still expressionless making it hard to read.

"I will probably go independent if possible. What about you guys?"

"I'm not sure myself, but probably something related to earning money and having a good life."

"I can respect that. How about you Nephis?"

Nephis become silent for a few seconds before saying:

"I will probably pick up my mom and spend some time with her."

"That's a nice one too."

"Besides Nephis is a true Legacy right? After all, fallen or not you are a descendant of the Immortal Flame Clan. One way or another it was possibly one of the greatest Legacy Clans to ever exist if it weren't the greatest."

"..."

Edward knew he poked a somewhat sore spot of Nephis with what he said but it was a somewhat great way to distract Sunny from himself. As for the reason he doesn't wanna get questioned by Sunny he just didn't feel like being questioned without preparing any backstory.

"But still, how did you get so many Memories? I don't think you would have been able to collect them with only First Nightmare. Even I only got two Memories from my First Nightmare."

Nephis directed the subjects towards him again making him blink towards her before admitting his defeat and simply decided to spin some BS to save his skin from any suspicion.

"During my first Nightmare, I wake up among a group of prisoners that's captured by some unnamed Imperial soldiers. When we arrived at their base I was almost executed there but luckily saved by the attack of a powerful Nightmare Creature. You won't believe me if I say what it looks like."

Both Nephis and Sunny listened with great importance, after all, just from the beginning this First Nightmare of his didn't sound simple in any way. Both of them were hoping that his First Nightmare would reveal some secrets to them that he didn't say during their discussion.

"What?"

Sunny asked a little impatiently.

"Hehe, it looked like a dragon - no, it was a dragon. It has black scales shined with metallic luster, its size was as big as a building easily overshadowing the watch tower of the base. Its teeth were as big as a sword, claws long as a spear, and every time it swung its tail a thunderous roar echoed through the base. Whenever it flapped its huge wing the wind raged while whenever it roared it spewed flame that's like a natural disaster burning everything that's in its way."

"I barely managed to escape it from there, almost dying in the crossfire between it and the Imperial soldiers, death was so close to me yet so far away. There I killed a human being first time, I crushed one of the guard's skulls with a stone to take away his armor and weapons. I pretended to be one of them when the Imperials evacuated the base."

"With no other choice, I followed them and reached one of the cities under the Imperial, luckily it was close to the base so it didn't long since they too were afraid of the dragon raid they were already prepared for their troops and ready to battle with the monster."

"When we came to the base we were not only greeted by the dragon but also the reanimated corpses of the fallen soldiers they were turned into undead creatures named Draugr similar to zombies but smarter and much more resilient. Most of my Memories come from killing them, and believe me some of them were powerful beyond words there were even Awakened Demon among them."

"We were lucky, when we faced the dragon it was going through metamorphosis so it was in an extremely weakened state allowing us to overwhelm it with a number and finally bring an end to it. Do you know what rank it was when we killed it?"

With a smile on his face, he said.

"Awakened Titan. Just before it is death it successfully ascended to Titan from Terror, the peak of its life was during its death. That's who I got my Memory [Volcano] from."

Both of them fell silent did they believe Edward is a story, not really but do they think it was a complete BS? Not exactly that either. From their experience, they knew something like this was possible to happen but they were also sure he wasn't telling the whole truth either. If he had truly gone through what he said then he would have gained True Name just like them.

Perhaps he had some kind of reason to not expose his True Name? Like Sunny where his True Name is his weakness or perhaps instruction from the higher-ups of his clan?

Suddenly Nephis thought of Edward's words just a few minutes ago about going independent, perhaps even his clan doesn't know about this at all? Perhaps he was trying to leave his clan?

As for Sunny, he was convinced that at least and possibly the whole story of his was the truth but not the complete one, just like how he deceived everyone at the Academy only telling the half-truth. Is it possible that Edward was doing the same too?

'So he is at least Divine rank Aspect holder for sure.'

"That seems pretty grand for a First Nightmare. Almost too grand is it even real?"

"That's up to you guys to decide Sunny and Nephis. I won't ask you guys about your First Nightmares because say the truth I don't wanna know about them. It's not that I look down upon yours but that I know sharing it with someone is hard."

"Even though my First Nightmare sounded like something came out from some fairy tale you would hear as a child. Believe me when I say it... it wasn't pretty as I put it in my story."

Both Sunny and Nephis become even more silent because if you think about it Edward's is story as grand and fantastic as it sounded. There were subtle but obvious important facts one might ignore if they just took it in surface value, for example, him being a prisoner and killing the guard to disguise as them.

"Edward, do you regret the decisions he made during your First Nightmare?"

After a while Nephis's soft voice broke the silence it was unusually soft and filled with unnamed emotions far different from her usually monotone voice. In her mind the memory of her First Nightmare flashes.

"No..."

"I don't regret a single thing I did in there. Because thanks to those choices I have survived till now."

***

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