Reincarnated as a Dragon – The path of the Dragon God

A pink-haired girl with a pink fluffy tail and a pair of fluffy fox ears, which were just as pink and fluffy as her tail, dashed towards Henry with unrestrained glee. She was none other than the Princess of the Kivu Tribe, Rinea.

The Princess kicked off the ground in her final steps and leapt into Henry’s open arms. She locked her hands behind Henry’s back and buried her face in his chest, rubbing her cheeks against the subtle but toned muscles.

“Princess!” shouted Vira, Princess Rinea’s personal guard. “This is unseemly of you. Behave yourself.” She then turned to Henry. “A thousand apologies, Lord Henry.”

Henry shrugged with a wry smile.

Vira’s gaze shifted to Rayne, who was standing in a lonesome corner, far away from them. “I see she’s doing well,” Vira muttered in passing. “Anyway, Princess, how long do you intend on bothering Lord Henry?”

Rinea parted her face from Henry’s chest and pouted at her guard. “What’s the problem, Vira? Lord Henry’s not bothered by it.” She then turned to face Henry. “Are you bothered, Lord Henry? You can be truthful with me.”

Asking so with upturned eyes and smiling anticipating face, Henry found it difficult to nod his head and break the girl’s heart.

But Yula didn’t have any difficulty in breaking the Princess’ heart. She and Saryn, along with Alayne, had followed Henry out of the cave.

“Yes, Henry’s bothered,” Yula answered and pried Rinea off of him with her shadows.

“Put me down! Put me down!” Rinea flailed around as she was pulled away from Henry. Her struggle was futile against Yula’s shadow, who handled her like taking candy from a baby.

The four other guards behind Vira were about to draw their weapons and lunged in response but Vira held them back with a single gesture.

“Put me down, you damn monstrous lady!” Rinea continued to kick and punch the air.

“Monstrous? Me?”

“Are you not? How else can you describe a lady having such a huge pair of mountains on you?”

Yula was handing the Princess over to Vira gently, though, after that remark, Yula had half a mind to just toss her off.

“Don’t,” Henry whispered to her.

Yula let out a faint sigh and dropped in front of Vira.

“Ow!” Rinea cried as she hit the ground with her posterior.

“Thank you, Lady Yula,” Vira said and scooped Rinea into her arms.

“Why are you thanking her, Vira? She hurt me!”

“Please be silent, Princess. You were the one who forgot your courtesy and ran straight to Lord Henry.”

“I’m sure Lord Henry will forgive me for such a small thing. Lord Henry likes me.”

Henry arched an eyebrow. “I don’t recall professing my love for you, Princess.”

“You don’t need to, Lord Henry,” Rinea said with a giggle. “I can feel it. We are meant for each other.”

“Henry already has us, Princess,” Yula cut in.

“I don’t mind,” the Princess answered without a pause. “I will allow him to have as many concubines as he wishes, so long that he does not forget that I’m his main consort.”

Yula stared at the Princess with her mouth agape in surprise and disbelief. Sarynn was finding the entire scene humorous. Alayne had the same expression she did since the arrival of the Kivu Princess.

Henry frowned and turned his gaze to Vira.

“Forgive the Princess’ delusion, Lord Henry.” Vira bowed deeply. “I will make sure she learns from her mistakes today.”

“What delusions and what mistakes, Vira? Lord Henry, tell her that she’s wrong. She is wrong, right?”

Henry sighed. “She’s not, Princess.”

“Eh?” Rinea turned wide-eyed.

“We are friends at best, Princess. I held no affection for you.”

“B-but… you saved me from that Necromancer…”

“At the request of someone else. And I don’t see how that denotes me having any affection for you, Princess.”

Rinea went limp in Vira’s arms. Her mouth fell open. “T-that’s… that’s not true… Surely you held some affection for me, right? A little, at least. Right, Lord Henry?”

“None, Princess,” Henry answered with a heavy heart. Though he didn’t want to break a little girl’s heart, he didn’t wish to lead her on and give her false hope. It was better to make things clear now than to let the misunderstanding drag forever.

And girl, I merely saved you from the clutches of evil and that’s all it took to garner your affection?

Henry wanted to yell out such words but he would only make himself a fool by doing so.

“Can we move on from this masquerade already?” Yula muttered in annoyance. “I’m sure you all aren’t here just to lay the truth on the poor Princess, right?”

“This is about the promised feast, isn’t it?” Henry deduced.

Vira nodded. “It is. I’m here to formally invite you and your mates to the feast, Lord Henry. But of course, you are free to decline the invitation. You are not obligated to go with our wishes, Lord Henry.”

“Ooh, a feast. How nice,” Sarynn remarked. “I certainly would like to participate in one. However, who would be here to guard the nest while everyone’s at the feast? I don’t doubt some creatures would take this opportunity to wreak some havoc on our home.”

“They certainly wouldn’t,” Henry agreed with a nod. “And it’s not like we can just leave one of us here.”

“I see…” Vira muttered. “This is indeed an issue.”

“Does this mean Lord Henry won’t be coming?” Rinea asked in a whisper, having recovered some of her vigour.

“I’m afraid it might be so, Princess.”

“Does this mean Lord Henry and I are—”

“It’s merely a feast, everyone,” Sarynn uttered out loud. “No need to be downcast over such a trivial matter. It’s not as if it cannot be done another day or in other ways.”

“Other ways…” Henry mused. “Wait, that’s it.”

“Did you perhaps think of something, Lord Henry?” Vira asked.

Rinea’s face brightened a little.

“If we can’t go to the feast, why not have it brought over here? I’ll assist in the moving.”

Vira raised her brows in amazement. “That’s not a bad idea, Lord Henry. But—”

“But?”

“This feast is meant to be our gratitude towards you, Lord Henry. Having you assisting in the labour would be—”

“—fine. It would be fine, Vira. I don’t mind and neither should you.”

“If you say so, Lord Henry.” Vira bowed.

“Shall we say, in a week’s time?”

“That would be good, Lord Henry. Then I shall quickly head back to inform the Queen and make the arrangements.”

The Kivus were about to take their leaves, with a saddened Rinea in tow, when Henry stopped them.

“Before you do, Vira, I must let you know that the feast won’t be just us or the Kivus. There will be other participants.”

“A friend of Lord Henry is a friend of the Kivus.”

“I’m not so sure about that. Will you consider the Lavans a friend of the Kivus?”

Not only Vira and Rinea but also the four guards behind them, had an absolute look of incredulity.

“The Kivus, my lord?” Vira asked. Though she didn’t stammer, her brows were twitching as if she had just heard something unbelievable.

“Do you not believe me?”

“It’s not a matter of belief, Lord Henry. We have heard of your… benevolent feat in saving their precious saintess. It’s just… a lot to take in. More arrangements would need to be made and there will be many changes to the current arrangements if the Lavans are in the picture.”

“Are the Kivus not on friendly terms with the Lavans?” Yula asked.

“We’re not at war with one another and there is no animosity between us but I wouldn’t call us friends. We tried our best to mind our own business and keep our affairs to ourselves.”

“If it’s so inconvenient, then maybe it’s better that we—”

“Please don’t mind it, Lord Henry. If this is your wish, we shall see to it with the best of our efforts.”

“If it’s Lord Henry’s wishes, we shall make it happen,” Rinea was mumbling in a barely audible tone but it was more than clear in Henry’s ears. “We have to…” She clenched her fist.

Sarynn chuckled, seeing Rinea’s determination. “If I didn’t have such an excellent nose, Henry, I would have assumed you constantly exude a type of pheromones that attract females to you.”

Henry cast a side-way glance at Sarynn in response to her frivolous muttering. “I have you and Yula. Are you truly sure I don’t exude any of those pheromones?”

“What attracts us to you is not something at such a superficial level, my dear. I say it transcends mere instinctual desire to leave behind a legacy. My desire for you is primal but that’s just one side of it.”

“Your point, Sarynn?”

She tittered. “That’s just something about you that allows you to easily enrapture a woman’s heart.”

Henry rolled his eyes and turned his glance away.

The rest of the conversation with the Kivus was brief. The Princess was silent throughout the conversation after her love was rejected by Henry. Aside from Vira and Henry who did most of the talking, and Yula and Sarynn giving their occasional remark, no one else chimed in. And so, the transient meeting ended in under half an hour and all returned to normal, safe for Alayne.

After the guests had left, Henry and the others went back into the cave.

“I don’t think we can accommodate those two tribes with the current size of our nest,” Sarynn remarked. “Should we expand it?”

“Shouldn’t they be sensible enough to bring too many of their people here then?”

“That is true, Yula. Perhaps they wouldn’t bring too many of their people here. After all, it’s a feast for you, not the tribes as a whole. What do you think, dear?”

“I do not know.” Henry shrugged and sat down on the edge of the large round bed the three shared every night. “I’m not good at planning gatherings of any sort.”

“But you’re good at breaking a woman’s heart,” Yula said as she plopped herself down onto Henry’s lap.

Henry sighed. “Are we not letting this go? And she’s a girl, not a woman. Most of all, she’s just a child.”

“Actually, she’s already at the age where she’s capable of conceiving an offspring,” Sarynn said.

Henry widened his eyes. “You’re joking?”

“I am not, Henry.”

“How old is she?”

“Above thirty, I reckon.”

Henry’s eyes widened even more.

“Above thirty?!” Yula exclaimed. “She looks like she’s barely fifteen.”

“In human years, yes. But she’s a Kivu. And why are you so shocked, Henry? You’re less than a year old, if memory serves.”

“Yes, but I look twice the Princess’ age.”

“In human years. But you’re not a human and neither is the Princess.”

Henry sighed once again and rubbed his temples. “This is exhausting. Why is this all so complicated?”

“It’s only complicated because you possess the mindset of a human, dear.”

“Mindset of a human or not, the Princess is not to my liking, appearance and character-wise.”

A grin crept up on Sarynn’s face. “Am I not in her position just some time ago?”

Henry cast a firm glance at Sarynn. “Your appearance was already to my liking and you have helped me plenty. It was just your character that I disapprove of. However, you changed… you changed for my sake and I’ll be a fool not to requite your affection.”

“And what about me?” Yula asked, squirming closer to Henry despite already sitting on his lap.

“It was a fateful encounter, I must say. I knew I must have you the moment I laid my eyes on you, Yula.”

“Oh, Henry…” Yula breathed delightedly and cupped Henry’s face with her hands.

Sarynn giggled and plopped down right beside Henry and threw her arms around his neck. “I’m happy to know that I did not espouse the wrong male. I sincerely wish to have you in me right now and fill my cavern with plenty of your—”

“Pardon me!” Alayne shouted, catching the attention of the three. “Did the three of you forget that I’m still here!?”

“Oh, right. You’re still here,” Henry muttered.

“How boorish of you, human,” Sarynn huffed. “Can’t you be a little considerate of the blooming tenor here? You should learn from our dear humble Zeva slave.”

Oh, right. There’s also Rayne. Speaking of which, where is she? Henry glanced around and found Rayne standing quietly by the entrance of the cave. As usual, she had a face of indifference as if to say none of these affairs was of any concern to her.

“Considerate? You want me to be considerate when the three of you just started flirting right in front of my eyes without any warning?”

“You should have made yourself scarce then. Why are you still here?”

“Because I still have questions that I wanted to ask!”

“Such as?”

“Is that truly the Princess of the Kivu Tribe?”

“Yes?”

“So you’re acquainted with the Princess? And did I hear it right that you were also acquainted with the Saintess of the Lavan?”

“Yes, you heard it right.”

“Oh, god…” Alayne gasped and stumbled backwards.

“Is there something wrong with that?”

“...I’ll never be able to go back,” Alayne muttered with a pale face. “Not after knowing this much…”