Dragon Gods Reign

[Crown City]

As soon as the full extend of the city before them started to come to her, Allaire started to frown. While she had no idea what to expect from it, it certainly wasn't the clustered mass that stretched before her. And while not quite as overcrowded as the human cities, it had many aspects that were far worse.

The first and most obvious one was the pollution caused by the large chimneys all over the city. Each one had a constant stream of thick smoke pouring out of it, something that lead to a blanket of it hanging below the ceiling.

Before she could even fully process this she accidentally breathed in a bit of the smoke.

“How can anyone live here?” She coughed.

“Can? Easy, the better question is want.” Darganth answered her with a slight frown.

He too was annoyed by the smoke despite being less affected by it. He and Jennia had both only grown uncomfortable from it, partially due to having reacted in time to prevent themselves from inhaling clouds of smoke.

But seeing Allaire's troubles he acted. Casting a wind magic spell in an instant, he let a wave of fresh air erupt around them before controlling it to form a bubble around them.

“Ah, better.” Jennia said with relieve.

Seeing the trio's troubles, Sarkia could only offer a sympathetic smile that switched to regretful when she saw the method Darganth used to deal with it. When she first visited the city she herself had trouble with the air but contrary to him she didn't even consider using wind magic to alleviate this. This lead to a few uncomfortable hours as very few beings would enjoy such an environment even if it didn't harm them.

As for her regret about not thinking about using wind magic in this way, it dimmed quickly as she rationalized it away. After all, it was only shortly after her transformation into a draconian and she didn't have access to the element before that.

“Let's get going, I don't want to spend a second longer than necessary in this shitty air.” Darganth said after a short moment.

With the rest agreeing with this they were soon on their way through the city. During this they could see the source of the smoke at every chimney they passed by, with forges of varying sizes packed around them.

Just like the rest of the city these were completely constructed out of metal and stone, though they lacked the decorations that the other buildings had. This made it seem as if one stepped into a whole new city that came straight out of the industrial era.

While the rest of the city had at least some semblance of comfort which made it seem somewhat livable, these parts lost even that bit. Instead of well designed houses with beautiful, if industrial looking, decorations, these forges were just bland buildings that barely kept from collapsing, their run-down and inhospitable look resembling early factories from earth.

The only difference to them was the fact that contrary to their counterparts, these weren't filled to the brim with workers. Instead each was worked by a small number of dwarfs that would logically be far from enough to operate such a large operation. This was without even considering the narrow spaces they had to pass through, with large furnaces and other equipment being packed as dense as possible.

Despite this they worked with an efficiency that would put nearly every other artisan to shame, forming weapons and armors by the minute.

Whenever their group would pass one of these workshops the dwarfs accompanying them would practically radiate pride around them, seemingly forgetting that they were the ones needing outside help.

The rest ignored this and they made their way towards the palace without trouble. Walking ever deeper into the city, their surroundings became more and more eloquent, with the houses soon also incorporating valuable gems and metals in their designs. This predictably peaked at the palace in front of which they now stood.

Ignoring the pompously designed outer walls, they walked straight through the already open front gate. Inside, they found themselves lead directly through the initial room and into the throne room. In the center of the opposing wall stood a throne on whose sides a replica of the name giving peaks protruded, each one made from a different rare material.

On this throne sat the dwarfern king, though contrary to Darganth's expectations it was a rather young man. He didn't even wear any form of formal attire, instead beings seemingly dragged directly out of one of the forges right before the meeting. Anyone with heightened sense would easily detect the lingering smell of flames on him, reinforcing that idea.

“My king, I come with a new group that will hep us in our cause.” The leader said, kneeling before the throne.

“Great work as always Mordrim, but I already told you that I trust you with matters concerning the war. I doubt that I could offer any input so I keep out of it as much as I can.” The king replied, his tone betraying his disinterest in being there.

“But they asked to use one of our forges so I wanted to at least inform you.”

“Let them, the palace has enough.” He said before just simply leaving again.

While the group around Sarkia reacted as if it was normal, Darganth, Jennia and Allaire were left stunned by this. Seeing their puzzled looks, the man that had been standing next to the throne the entire time made his way to them.

“Please excuse my brothers behavior, he much prefers his forge over the court.” The man said.

“Karrazil, fifth prince originally but by now second in line behind my brother.” He said, holding out his hand as greeting.

“Darganth.” “Allaire.” “Jennia.” They introduced themselves one by one.

Once they finished their introductions, he motioned them to follow him before leading them towards one of the halls exits.

“Unusual group, rare to see a human-” Karrazil started but was interrupted by Darganth.

“Dragon.” He corrected.

This caused the dwarf to snap his head to him, something that looked somewhat comically as Darganth towered over him by around forty centimeters due to his height of slightly below 1,90 meter.

But instead of saying anything he just stared at Darganth with a mix of emotions.

Only after a few seconds did he get his emotions back under control, no longer looking like he was at the verge of an outburst. While his mind was still racing, he did his best to appear calm.

“Sorry, living with dragons flying overhead regularly makes us somewhat, let's say impulsive, towards your kind. And the retaliatory attacks against fortresses that lost their cool don't really help with it.”

“No problem. And I am surprised that you call it retaliatory attacks, didn't expect the clarification.”

“Well, someone has to ignore the pull to simply side with our kind or we would have far more enemies.” Karrazil said with a laugh that failed to hide the exhaustion in his voice while saying that.

Following this an awkward silence broke their conversation, with neither of the three knowing how to answer to this. Instead they continued following him in silence, sending questioning glances between each other for a while.

Only when Allaire took the initiative to switch the topic did this silence end.

“I've noticed that your brother doesn't want to be king, then why did the throne go to him?” She asked.

At this question Karrazil frowned, recalling bad memories. Quickly noticing this, Allaire was just about to apologies when he answered her.

“Because only mythical ranks are eligible for the throne and we are the last two of the direct family. He is my younger brother, by over three decades actually, but his talent is practically unmatched among dwarfs. Compared to me who is still stuck at the third rank at nearly 120, he reached the mythical rank at fourty. So when our parents and many of our siblings died three years ago he was forced into this position.”

“I'm sorry for your loss.”

“Thank you.

With this the same silence that Allaire had originally tried to end returned.

Luckily for them they soon reached where Karrazil was leading them, stopping before a large, heavy door. After he pushed against it with unexpectedly little force, it slowly glide open thanks to the support of rails that bore the brunt of the weight.

Stepping into the room beyond, the three experienced a wave of heat rushing by them. And while it would have been dangerous for a normal human, all three had no problem and instead looked at its source.

Standing in the rooms center was an enormous contraption of tubes that were all connected to one massive metal forge. Spread out across the room were sixteen different metal containers connected to it, though most stood empty.

“Tsk, those two were to be expected but this little?” Darganth complained.

“What are these?”

“Containers for sources of elemental energy. Dwarf place certain materials, mostly magical ones, inside them to help them produce better pieces of equipment. And while this is an innate ability, by knowing how to one can still make use of such forges to replicate it.” He explained.

“But you are missing many.”

“Yes, but I only care for the space and time ones and for that I can just use some of my scales. Light they still have and I didn't plan to use the other elements.”

With this explanation he started his work while Jennia and Allaire watched from the side to not disturb him.

Taking on a shrunk down version of his true form to have access to more of his power, he first separated two of his scales and floated them to two empty containers. Closing every one of them, he let a flame spring to life in the main body of the forge. Despite taking no five seconds his two scales had already regenerated.

Waiting for a few moments till the flame grew a bit, he started shedding scales again and caught them with telekinesis. Gathering them together and taking out a block of magically processed steel, he let both float into the forge.

Simultaneously he opened the connection to the two containers with his scales, causing the flames to firs become dyed sliver before an emerald green became mixed into it. This resulted in flames of similar color to those he used in his attack against Salin, just with a far lower intensity.

Slowly these flames turned the steel hot enough to allow Darganth to easily form it. Arranging his scales in the form of a breastplate, he started working the steel into the construct as a base that keeps them together.

This process took him over an hour and by its end he finished it by directing two small steams of elemental energy into the nearly finished armor. Making sure that the steel took the elements into itself, he nodded in satisfaction before taking the armor out of the forge.

Returning to his human form, he held it in his bare hands despite still being fresh from the flames. Instead of bothering with that he inspected the innate enchantments, those that only the armors destruction could permanently deactivate, while also looking for any mistakes.

One of these is the opening mechanism, with the smaller, interlocking scales at the armors sides opening up once he pushed a bit of mana into the enchantment. Once he made sure that everything works as he intended he let the armor hover in the air to let it cool down naturally while he himself continued working on the next piece.

They spend the few next hours in the forge, with Darganth's work flow only stopping from time to time to rest and talk with Jennia and Allaire. By the he put the last piece into the gravity free area where the rest was hovering he was visibly exhausted, despite having taken these breaks.

Hovering there were two sets of similar armor along with a bow and short-sword. The main difference was that while one of the two had purely space and time properties, the other set also had the light element.

The second large difference was that the first set didn't have a weapon to it, having instead heavier gauntlets that ended in claws. All in all it was a bit more restrictive to it's wearers movement, focusing on defense and improving casting abilities.

The armor for Allaire meanwhile was designed with her magic archer fighting style in mind. While it offered a bit less protection it allowed for better movement and it's innate enchantment's added onto that. From agility increases to slight diversions to incoming projectiles with space enchantments, nearly every archer would drool over it.

“Alright ladies, it's time for presents.” He said with a chuckle.