< 89. Hell of Disbelief (17) >
***
Sea dragon lairs like Kallieter are located on the ocean floor, so they cannot employ ordinary races. Even trolls, who are known for their health, are reluctant to work under the sea, and commuting to and from work is difficult.
That is why the sea dragons, unable to find a suitable labor force on Earth, turned their eyes to other worlds. This is the origin of the Daphni tribe, which has been increasing in number, although not on a mass migration scale, setting foot on Earth.
They breathe with gills in the water and breathe with their skin on land, and they are the best candidates for sea dragons because they are descended from marine amphibians that went extinct on Earth long ago.
“Hmm? Team leader. Take a look at this.”
The frog-like race looked at the monitor and said, something unidentified was approaching the lair. At a very fast speed.
“What? A submarine?”
The staff said.
“No. It’s fish.”
“No way. What kind of crazy fish would come that close to a rare?”
Even fish with low intelligence instinctively avoid swimming around here. This is because of the dragon pier that occasionally flows out from here. However, the object on the radar was approaching in a straight line.
“There was no request for an audience today. Show the screen.”
“Yes, camera number 16 is transmitting video.”
Pot!
The underwater highlights installed outside pierce through the dark water. The staff who saw it on the screen were astonished.
“······What is it, tuna?!”
The head of the fish swimming hard was clearly a fish he knew well. A species of fish that could not possibly live here.
“It’s been 60 years since tuna dried up in the North Sea?”
As he said, tuna have long been unseen in the vicinity due to ruthless fishing. The team leader, who has a long history of immigration and is well-versed in the Earth’s fisheries resources, looked closely at the screen and said.
“That’s right. It’s tuna. Pacific bluefin tuna, to be exact. It’s a species that lives on the other side of the globe. Zoom in a little bit.”
Immediately after the screen resolution changed, something new caught the eyes of the two Daphnis. The two legs of a mammal with a tail attached to its lower back were kicking their feet hard.
“You’re a person with special abilities.”
“What should I do? Should I go on air?”
The announcement was that this was private property and that no unauthorized entry was allowed. But the team leader shook his head.
“No, let them in for now.”
“yes?!”
The staff was surprised. They were not the type of people to make decisions without the permission of the Rare owner.
The team leader was looking closely at the ankle of the approaching ability user. To be exact, the artifact that was there.
“This is a guest who has already received permission.”
***
“Please wait here for a moment. The manager is coming.”
“Yes, thank you.”
Cassie, now back in human form, waits for the person in charge in a rash guard. Dozens of eyes are watching her as she holds her head and squeezes the water out of it as if she were wringing a towel.
It was the Daphne staff muttering through the glass window.
“What is it, Breed Shift?”
“Can land creatures transform into sea creatures?”
“It’s not common, but I heard there are cases. This is my first time seeing it myself.”
“No, wait. So that person… is capable of both sea life and land life?”
“But… how can you be so pretty? You’re prettier than the people I see on TV?”
A shout was heard behind them.
“Stop talking nonsense and get to work right now! Master, you’re my guest!”
The team leader, who had chased away the curious employees, entered the reception room.
“Agent Ye Min-jun must have sent you.”
‘They said if you wear this around your ankle, people will notice right away.’
Confirming that her boss’ guess was correct this time, Cash handed over the artifact.
“You said it was very urgent.”
“Lord Calitere is not in Rare right now···.”
“I thought that if you’re a manager, you’d know how to use this.”
Cash only knew that there was a magic message there, but she didn’t know what it actually contained.
The Daphni muttered an unfamiliar language, as if they had a set synonym. Then, I felt magic flowing out of the bracelet.
And the team leader’s face hardened noticeably.
“······Okay, I understand. I will contact Lord Callieter immediately.”
***
– I don’t expect much. Just buy as much time as possible. So that they don’t come back to the city. Since they know they’re dragons, they won’t be able to harm them anyway.
Ha Eun-seong recalled Min-jun’s earnest words. And he was acting with all his might to faithfully carry out his assigned mission. It was the performance of a lifetime (in his own opinion) as he pondered the inner psychology of the stubborn Hatching who had never been outside the lair in his entire life and became one with his role.
‘Wow, I can’t move at all? What a shame. I didn’t realize I had this talent until after I was dead.’
Ha Eun-seong thought that the prisoners were struggling because of his excellent acting, but in reality, it wouldn’t have made much of a difference whether his acting was awkward or smooth. After all, his body was definitely that of a real dragon.
Even if Ha Eun-seong had barked like a dog instead of giving a speech, the prisoners would not have been able to treat him rudely.
Because it’s a dragon.
=Mom told me not to call you?=
“Yes, please. We’ll try to work it out…”
=But if I go back home like this, there’ll be chaos. Where did you get it? I can’t say I fell down on the street.=
The inmate who had been trying to appease him said,
“I understand that dragons do not have the same regenerative powers as trolls. Your best bet for a quick cure is to ask a high priest.”
It wasn’t for nothing that dragons signed sponsorship contracts with the sect. They had talents that even dragons couldn’t do.
“Please wait here for a moment and we will bring the priest…”
=Don’t make me laugh! Are you trying to run away like this?!=
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“Oh, no! If you’re worried about that, one of us will move separately.”
=No, if they all disappear one by one like that, what am I supposed to do?=
As the scuffle continued for a while, the prisoners eventually noticed that something was strange. Anyone who wasn’t an idiot could not help but notice.
‘Are you really doing this because you’re so retarded?’
What he was demanding, through his persistence, was that the prisoners be kept here without a single one of them leaving.
‘Wait a minute, now that I think about it… I was so flustered at first that I didn’t notice.’
Callieter’s husband is a fire dragon. If he was born from the blood of the two, he should have retained at least some of the characteristics of a sea dragon. At first, I thought that the characteristics were not very noticeable…
‘Not at all. No matter how I look at it, there is no trace of the Sea Dragon’s genes. Even if it is a deformed child, is this the extent of it?’
Eventually, one of the prisoners made a decision. It was as if he was floating.
“Then how about this? We teleport into the city with you as a group. Every single one of us. No one escapes.”
‘Miss, that won’t work?’
Minjun told them not to drag them into the city.
He hesitates and cries out.
=I hate that too! How can I trust you guys!=
Then the prisoners’ gazes turned cold.
“······You don’t want to call a priest, and you don’t want to go to the priest with us? Then there’s no solution. Do you and I just want to stay here and waste time? Is that what you want?”
‘Miss, have I been caught?!’
It was at that moment that Ha Eun-seong swallowed dry saliva in tension.
Pot!
Everyone’s eyes were entangled in the air.
“!”
The prisoners suddenly realized that the weight of the air had changed. A heavy fear that would have made a normal person’s stomach ache and unable to move permeated their surroundings.
A woman in a suit floats in the empty space of the forest, looking down. The prisoners sense the ferocity of a predator and the majesty of a monarch from her.
“you are!”
Even the species that specializes in polymorphs often have fixed forms that they use frequently. This is because it is bothersome for them to render it in their head multiple times. Also, when they are occasionally exposed to the media, it is effective in controlling public psychology to change the appearance of the avatar that psychologists have painstakingly created.
So the prisoners knew. That blonde woman who had just appeared here, that face, that dragon’s favorite body.
Someone speaks with a blood-drained face.
“Callieter!”
They found out that their initial guess was correct, and in the worst possible way.
That deformed child was really a hatchling born of Callieter!
A cold gaze scans them. There is a lot of contempt in the eyes that look like they are looking at insects.
The prisoners who saw it all screamed inwardly.
‘Fucked!’
The retarded dragon threw a tantrum, and before he could do anything, his mother came looking for him.
Suspicion and horror swirl in my head. But how do you know? You said the lair was definitely empty.
Meanwhile, Ha Eun-seong also screamed in his head.
‘Fucked!’
Call it Caliether?
I don’t know how he knew. One thing is for sure, if you look at it through the eyes of a dragon, you will know that you are not a hatchling. And you will know even better that you are not one of his own.
What if he gets mad and asks why I’m impersonating him? What if he catches me wandering around the territory without permission? If that woman is a psychopath like Changcheon, even the dragon would be imprisoned or killed!
“······.”
While Ha Eun-seong and the prisoners were all trembling with fear.
The dragon finally opened its mouth.
“I won’t make it long.”
Ha Eun-seong flinched and shook his scales.
Her gaze stopped at the prisoners.
“I feel like I should tear them all to pieces and kill them all, for doing ‘this kind of thing’ on my territory…”
Dragon Fear floating in the air.
The prisoners wait for the next words with their hearts pounding in excitement.
“You must have all been on the move with that sudden mission from the committee.”
Has the mission been revealed to the dragon?
The prisoners are shocked again.
But then Callieter said something even more surprising.
“good.”
A few seconds of silence.
“······yes?”
“You, sinners. You, the pawns of the Council. Get out of my territory now. I grant you five minutes of ample tolerance. If you wish to survive, squeeze out your meager mana to the limit. Use all means, whether teleportation or otherwise. So that your filthy feet may be removed from my land and your foul breath may be erased from the air. I repeat, five minutes. You must know that this is the first and last amnesty I grant you.”
A miracle happened!
The prisoners immediately fled in joy at having survived. Each of them casted teleportation themselves or ran away in a panic, tearing up the scrolls.
It was strange, when I thought about it. The hatchlings were injured, but the dragon let them go alive.
However, no prisoner wanted to ask the old dragon who saved him why he didn’t kill him. It wouldn’t be too late to guess and ponder the reason even after running away.
After all the prisoners disappeared.
=Ah··· I···.=
Crackle!
Ha Eun-seong flinched as he felt the sharp gaze directed at him. The gazes looking at him were not much different from those directed at the prisoners just a moment ago.
The dragon speaks in a cold voice.
“Stop that ridiculous act. It was a pathetic clown show that tarnished the reputation of the dragon. Even a dragon that has just hatched and whose scales haven’t hardened yet wouldn’t be that clumsy.”
That means…
“I know that you are not a hatchling, and that the spirit that controls your body is not a dragon.”
Minjun didn’t expect Ha Eunseong to be able to stall for long enough with the prisoners in the first place.
That’s why there’s another safety measure in place: to get half of the inmates chasing him off the stage.
If they hadn’t had the wrong perception and sense of crisis that they had hurt Hatching, even if the Elder Dragon tried to drive them out, they would have confronted him by bringing up the committee. Protesting that they were interfering with the committee’s mission. However, this time, it seemed that Callieter had a legitimate reason. That’s why they backed down without making a sound.
On the other hand, Callieter couldn’t kill them at will either. That dragon wasn’t a hatchling. It was impossible to kill a prisoner just because one scale of an independent dragon was peeled off.
Goryong said to Ha Eunseong.
“Slave, go and tell your master.”
=?!=
slave?!
master?!
“I accept the deal. And, with this, we confirm that we owe each other no debts.”
=Yes?=
The dragon got annoyed.
“It’s okay if you don’t understand the meaning. Just translate it as it is. How could such a brilliant person enslave a dull soul like you?”
=······.=
“Tell me. There is a truth that those religious cultists are hiding from the outside world. My contract with them ended the moment the previous Patriarch died from an ‘accidental accident whose suspect and grudge cannot be identified.’ This is because the sentence I swore in my mouth was as follows: ‘This sponsorship will remain in effect until the Patriarch dies.’ In other words, in order for my sponsorship to continue after his death, I must renew the contract, and they have been persistent in demanding it up until now, but I have not had the time to do so. I have been busy touring the territory.”
A faint smile appears on the corner of Goryong’s mouth. It’s barely visible.
It was the first time he had smiled since appearing here.
“Moreover, it does not seem like it will be concluded within a few days. The situation in the territory is still chaotic and eventful. Naturally, no matter where the priest requesting the renewal of the contract is waiting for me, an audience is not possible unless I permit it.”
This story was something that even Ha Eun-seong could understand.
Contrary to Minjun’s worries, Dreamland is not currently under the protection of Caliether. Even… Judging from the nuance, it seems like they are deliberately delaying the renewal of the contract.
Finally, the dragon spoke with determination.
“Even if he is resurrected, the effect will not be restored. It is beyond common sense and common sense that the dead will come back to life in a form other than that of a warlock, and it is meaningless to state such an assumption in the contract, so it was not written down. Therefore, I confirm. The sponsorship contract has ended and is not effective at this point. Go. Go and tell them, slave.”
=Yes!=
Ha Eun-seong spread his wings and flew up. Then he recalled the story he had heard so far.
‘After all, if you’re going to hit them, then hit them now, right?’
It appears that Kallieter is taking this opportunity to sever ties with the Order, though the reasons are unknown.
‘however···.’
As I was repeating her words as if I was memorizing them, certain words bothered me.
‘Why do you keep calling me a slave? It makes me feel bad.’
He just has some debts to pay.
So I felt wronged.
< 89. Hell of Disbelief (17) > End
