Chương 139: 06. Dragon Advent 2

High above, I naturally couldn't see the minute shifts of expression inside the royal bedchamber. But I could see Cliffhold Fortress's bells, towers, crossbow mounts, and the layered defensive lines being roused awake one after another. I could also see that the warning signals rising along the capital's outer walls were no longer the localized fury of a border commander—they were the cold, systematic order that only appeared when the Empire's capital itself had been dragged into maximum alert. Perfect. I thought.

At Typhon Fortress, at least the bag of money had landed near the border marquis's feet. This time, if I get a single word wrong, what falls won't be money. It'll be any chance of living a peaceful life for whatever time I have left. I pressed lightly against the scales at Ignicia's neck, signaling her to hold steady.

This dragon's personal interpretation of hold steady was evidently somewhat more liberal than standard definitions—but she at least had the grace not to deliberately perform aerial maneuvers above the capital. The occasional short flames she exhaled, however, were more than sufficient to communicate to any watching human: she hasn't turned hostile yet, but she is absolutely not something you can simply shout into retreat. I drew a cold breath of high-altitude air. The next few words cannot be too soft.

Too soft, and the capital concludes I've been taken hostage. They cannot be too hard. Too hard, and City Defense reads it as a direct threat. And under no circumstances can I let Ignicia speak first. If she opens with "this Princess has come to apologize," the entire palace will assume they're hearing someone's final joke. This round can only be closed by me. And it needs to happen fast.

I planted my feet, let the amplification magic carry my voice down through the gap between the royal bedchamber and the city defense towers.

"Your Majesty! Please issue the order—hold your fire!" When those words landed, the air above the capital—wound to its absolute limit—seemed to tear open along a single seam. At minimum: the person on the dragon's back still had enough presence of mind to ask not to be shot first. That was generally considered a positive sign. I didn't let the opening go to waste.

"Your servant was dispatched south to negotiate. En route, Black Dragon Pass suffered an incident. Typhon Fortress nearly mobilized. The southern situation has been temporarily stabilized, and I have returned bearing the Dragon Kingdom's first installment of compensation and formal explanation—" Even as I said it, I was aware of how absurd it sounded. The Dragon Kingdom's compensation. Personally escorted back by their envoy. On dragonback. Wonderful. This has moved beyond a question of Imperial protocol.

This is a question of whether diplomatic history is going to have a section snapped clean off and attributed directly to me. At the high window, Valerian III finally raised his hand. Not a welcome. Not a stand-down. A gesture sufficient to communicate to every guard and city defense officer present: do not fire yet. A nearby officer turned and sprinted out immediately, carrying the Emperor's intent to every city defense position along the towers.

Then Valerian III looked up, across the high altitude, at the circling dragon and the young man on its back, and his voice carried out with weight that matched the ancient bell.

"Cedric." No relief in that tone. No clemency. Not even the most minimal emotional buffer. Only one very clear question.

"You had better give me a reason sufficient to make me decide, before tonight, that I don't want to have you executed for treason first." High above, I closed my eyes briefly without a sound. Right. That's exactly what he would say. That's also exactly what an Emperor who just had a dragon appear at his palace gate before finishing his morning routine would say first. I exhaled slowly, and when I opened my eyes again, I had pulled the tangled wreckage of the situation back into something workable.

Don't lead with details. Establish control of the scene first. Don't defend Ignicia yet. Make the Empire understand this is not a dragon come to flatten the capital. And most critically— Do not let her interrupt. I turned my head, dropped my voice to something only the dragon beneath me could hear.

"Your Highness." The tale has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.

"Mm?"

"From this moment forward—please don't speak."

"Why?"

"Because I am working very hard right now to make them believe you didn't come here to turn Cliffhold Fortress into a second Black Dragon Pass." Ignicia was clearly displeased. Heat rolled through her breath immediately. The crossbow operators below tensed in collective unison. My eye twitched. I raised my head again immediately and called downward:"Your Majesty! The Dragon Kingdom's Princess carries no direct hostile intent!

If she had come to act, she would not have limited herself to circling at altitude—nor would she have permitted your servant to speak first!" It was a strained argument. It was also an accurate one. Because given Ignicia's disposition, if she had genuinely come to demonstrate force, she would long since have planted herself directly on top of the capital's towers—not stood here patiently while I used my mouth to drag the entire situation backward.

I drew a full breath and raised my voice, delivering the single most important line with absolute clarity.

"Your servant requests that Your Majesty classify this as a diplomatic incident—not as the opening of hostilities!" That was what I had actually come to put into the capital's ears. Not to beg forgiveness. Not to perform innocence. But to establish the classification of what this was— Still an incident. Enormous, catastrophic, and deeply unpleasant—but still an incident. As long as it remained classifiable as an incident, the Empire retained the space to avoid dragging the south into full-scale war immediately.

And as long as that one step held, no matter how difficult everything after it became—there was still room to negotiate. The moment I dropped from Ignicia's back and touched ground, the spears were already there. Not metaphorically. Literally there. Dozens of Wave Garrison soldiers closed in from the outer perimeter, spear points leveled at us in a continuous ring.

The sound of boots, armor plates, and iron-shod feet grinding stone layered over each other as they converged—fast enough to suggest the entire fortress was in competitive hurry to prove it hadn't been frightened stupid by a dragon. Behind the spear formation, crossbow operators held short bows raised, fingers tight on triggers—tight enough that watching them made my own hands ache in sympathy. Further in, the night-duty Tideguards had enclosed Valerian III in something resembling a sealed iron barrel.

Shields and spears interlocked, wall of bodies stacked against wall of bodies, without a gap wide enough to let a spark through. In diplomatic terms, this was called protecting the sovereign. In practical terms, it meant everyone present had silently agreed that whatever was about to happen next was probably severe enough to secure the king before discussing anything else. I understood completely.

After all, any reasonable person jolted awake before dawn by a bell that hasn't rung in over a century, looking up to discover a genuine fire dragon circling their castle with yesterday's southbound envoy standing on its back—well, anyone would first suspect they hadn't finished waking up yet. Ignicia, for her part, saw absolutely nothing about this scenario worth being tense over. She merely produced a contemptuous sound and, in full view of everyone assembled, shed her dragon form and returned to human shape.

The transition felt profoundly unsettling. One moment she was the colossal nightmare that had terrorized an entire capital into ringing its ancient bell; the next she had compressed into a tall woman—red hair cascading down, scale armor still present, eyes radiating an undisguised what exactly are you short-lifers panicking about that she didn't bother to conceal.

If I hadn't just dismounted from her back and nearly surrendered my stomach to the upper atmosphere, I might have genuinely wondered whether I'd joined the city defenses in being knocked into hallucinations by the bell. Then she opened her mouth and confirmed that my supply of bad luck for the day was nowhere near exhausted.

"A king of a nation, requiring this many spears to hide behind just to receive a guest." Her gaze swept the formation, her innate contempt for human displays entirely unfiltered.

"You're even more fragile than I anticipated." I closed my eyes briefly. Wonderful. When I was dropping compensation bags over Typhon Fortress, I had genuinely believed the most difficult part of today was behind me. Apparently that had merely been the appetizer. I turned immediately, dropping my voice.

"Your Highness. I am begging you as a personal favor—please stop talking." She looked at me with the expression of someone who genuinely couldn't fathom why such a request would exist.

"Did I say something incorrect?"

"This isn't about factual accuracy." I worked very hard to keep my voice sounding human rather than like someone who had been dragged through the sky by a dragon all night and was now expected to manage the Royal Guard's collective blood pressure.

"This is Cliffhold Fortress, not your mountain cave. One more sentence from you, and I may need to start selecting my own coffin." She narrowed her eyes, clearly displeased with this framing—but apparently deciding I remained marginally useful, she refrained from delivering an immediate follow-up strike. The next moment, heavier footsteps pressed in from behind. More Tideguards flooded the courtyard, shield formations interlocking with barely a gap.

The man at their head wore full heavy armor, moved with rapid, grounded steps, and locked his gaze on me the instant he appeared. The message in that stare—you had better provide an acceptable explanation right now—was so concentrated it could have been transcribed directly into a military report. Commander Gallus Eberhart. Of course he was here. More accurately: he had no choice but to appear. Anyone who actually controlled the inner keep's guard deployment couldn't pretend not to notice a dragon.

He stared at me for two full seconds, eyes entirely devoid of goodwill. Right. Don't look at me like that. I'm not enjoying this either. If I'd had any choice in the matter, I would currently prefer to be in my own bed rather than standing in the royal courtyard under a hundred hostile stares, with a fire dragon princess beside me who could reignite the entire situation with a single careless word. Valerian III finally spoke.

"Lord Rosa." Not loud, but carrying enough weight to pull the entire courtyard into silence.

"Explain. What is the meaning of this?" I drew a breath, recognizing that any surplus words would only accelerate my execution, and started from the beginning. From the Black Dragon Pass explosion. From the charred beam embedded outside Typhon Fortress. From Margrave Frank nearly mobilizing on the spot.

Then how I had temporarily held the border, how Ignicia had dragged me skyward to survey the situation, how I had entered her treasure-stuffed cave, how I had swept coins with a broom while extracting the connection between Black Dragon Pass, the Sea Dragon King, the Yanxia Empire, and the drake towers. And finally— The part where she insisted on coming to the capital personally to apologize. Even as I said it, the entire sequence sounded like something a drunk bard had invented on a suicidal dare.

Unfortunately, every absurd detail was standing right beside me, fully prepared to supplement my account without warning. I paused, then added one final line with complete honesty.

"Your Majesty, your servant did attempt to dissuade Her Highness." I lowered my head, tone landing somewhere between composure and complete resignation.

"I simply... was entirely unable to stop her." Dead silence fell. Even Ignicia didn't immediately respond—apparently recognizing that this wasn't deflection, but a statement of fact the entire capital had just personally verified. The dragon you currently see did not arrive because I brought her. She flew here herself. And Valerian III proved exactly why he was Valerian III. His expression remained grim, but he didn't allow the atmosphere to slide further toward chaos.

He raised one hand—a brief, sharp downward gesture. The surrounding guards immediately eased their weapons fractionally. No one actually lowered anything, but they stopped looking like they were preparing for collective suicide in the next second. Then he said three words.

"Follow me." No further questions. No immediate eruption. Which was, somehow, considerably worse. Because it meant the genuinely problematic parts weren't going to be resolved here in the open—they were going to be calculated slowly, in somewhere quieter, more enclosed, and entirely lacking exit routes. I exhaled quietly and tilted my head toward Ignicia.

"This way, Your Highness."

"You humans always prefer walls when you talk."

"Yes—because certain conversations, if held without walls, would cause half the audience to collapse from shock before we finished." She seemed to find this simultaneously foolish and mildly interesting, made a dismissive sound, and followed without objection.