Dragonheart Core

I pondered Akkyst's words as I moved.

The new schemas burned in my core, enormous as they were. I was still far too empty of mana to try and create them, but a wriggling little thought in my mind told me I couldn't afford to make the remorhaz. It was just too large, too complex, too evolved—my maximum pool of mana wasn't enough to make it. And that wasn't all I needed mana for, damningly.

I swept through the Skylands, eating at the corpses remaining as soon as the Magelords finished gathering supplies and armour. Hopefully they would take those to better improve themselves, but I needed the mana, and I needed it now—my temporary fix wouldn't last forever.

A final hobgoblin corpse and then I flew to the back, intangible wings spreading wide; and I slammed ten points of mana directly into the hole.

Limestone bloomed like an avalanche, woven through with granite and iron veins for stability. I couldn't build it all the way back into the mountain, considering that was far beyond my control, but I could close the opening. Enough to at least stop those unknowing from walking right into my fucking floors again.

I ate through more of the scattered corpses, gnawing at their bones until they splintered apart into motes of silver light. I burrowed through my various floors until I emerged back into the desolation of the Hungering Reefs, the other entrance that had been blasted into what had previously been security, and wove another stopper there. The stone creaked and moaned as it forced itself into existence.

Then I settled back, a mere two points of mana left after all that destruction.

It had been a success, but it didn't feel like that. I was not a fan of Akkyst telling me this wasn't the full force of the War Horde. It made damning sense, considering Akkyst had been able to defeat their original stone-wurm when he was still an unevolved lunar cave bear, but the remorhaz seemed so much more powerful, the horde filled with ranks of those stronger. It should have been all.

But it wasn't. And I hated that.

The singular good thing was that the raid had been long enough that Nicau and his posse had finally made it down to the Hungering Reefs.

Gods, had that whole debacle with Veresai truly been less than a day ago? It felt like years, after the attack. Time was moving the same way, but there was so much more happening in it than it seemed to crawl on. I couldn't believe my start, where I had peacefully waited for my Otherworld mana to refill before creating a single mushroom. There were pros and cons to my new strength.

I guided them a little faster through the tunnels, mana slithering alongside. Too many things had happened for them to dawdle.

Emerging into the first room, Nicau blinked. His mouth fell open as he beheld the Hungering Reefs.

I had already dissolved the remorhaz's corpse, but its destruction was plain to see. The lagoon was lopsided where its enormous bulk had dug into the surf, sand bandied about from thrashing claws. The waters bloomed scarlet where its blood diffused through the currents, swept wide by the armoured jawfish's lashing tail or the sea serpent's return to his shipwreck.

Seros was still here, moving slowly so as to not disturb Rihsu on his back. He was traveling to my core, the densest area of mana in my entire dungeon—there she had the best chance of healing. He was frightfully scared even now, anxiety thrumming through our shared connection. He truly cared about her.

She would survive. I refused to believe otherwise.

Nicau padded cautiously out of the tunnel, fists half-clenched like they would do anything. Chieftess moved alongside him, tail flicking and head tilted. Kriya bobbed in her arms.

She was still unconscious, the strain of Veresai breaking her geas rippling over his fragile mind. I hoped she would wake soon, so Nicau could talk to her, and either convince her to my side or put her out of her misery. Neither were particularly wonderful options, but I would prefer the first over the second. A healer would never go amiss in my dungeon.

Judging by how Nicau had reacted when he saw her, she would be treated much kinder in the kobold's den than Veresai's tyranny. I still bared intangible teeth when I thought of how bad that had gotten—slavery was the one evil I would not allow, not when it was all I fought against.

And, well.

Perhaps, if Kriya was amenable to joining me, she could help heal my creatures. Bring Rihsu back from the brink, regrow the sea serpent's eye. Do the things I couldn't when they absorbed my mana instead of healing from it.

Later. I needed to finish my preparations first.

Go, I soothed, tugging on my Otherworld connection with Nicau. It is safe. Return to the den.

He nodded, adjusting the cut of his coat with a warble to the kobolds. Chieftess widened her stance and slipped into the water, trusting the twin circling kobolds to beat away interlopers, and started to swim out to their home. Nicau morosely joined her, clothes hanging waterlogged off his body. He had no chance of ever getting close to a sea-drake, even if he had all the requisite scales. That was something he really needed to work on.

The armoured jawfish snapped at them once, his tidewalker sprite swirling beneath his fins, but he knew well enough that Nicau was not on the menu. He swam deeper into the second room, moray sharks skulking out of his path and a prismatic dartfish shoal billowing away in a rippling wave of green-yellow. Pissed he hadn't gotten to participate in the battle, though with how even the sea serpent hadn't evolved, I doubted he would. That was odd, worryingly so. I didn't like not knowing why things didn't happen. But I couldn't do anything about it now.

Nicau dragged himself out of the waves, spitting a mouthful of water over the sand as he shook out his arms. Chieftess emerged flawlessly, as per normal, never once having even allowed Kriya's head to dip below the surface. She wasn't as attuned to the water as Rihsu, but she was a damn powerful swimmer, all her training in the lagoon paying off.

The other kobolds swarmed, chittering and warbling happily. They hadn't gotten involved in the fight, being mostly morsel-sized against the remorhaz, but they'd all felt the ripples. A battle of that scale echoed through my halls.

Or a battle of that supposed scale, since it was apparently not that strong. I hated goblins.

Chieftess hissed something brightly, shifting Kriya's position in her arms. She padded into the den, Nicau following at her tail. I drifted back into his mind, plucking through his memories of the Myvnu Jungle. He had been more confident this time, both with others at his side and a greater grasp on his blessing, but the real interest was how Chieftess had reacted. She had devoured the world outside, all its myriad differences and manners of living. Though I didn't have a connection to her mind yet, I could see how much seeing the city of Calarata had changed her. Already she was looking around their den with sharp golden eyes, noting primitive methods and lesser avenues. She was going to change this place into something worthy of the crown of kobolds.

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But not quite yet. I had something to offer her first.

Take Kriya, I murmured to Nicau, guiding him around. Settle her. Then prepare Chieftess.

He blinked. A strange excitement thrummed through him as he sensed my intention, eyes widening. "Really? You're going to?"

I am, I said. She deserves it.

She really did. One of my earliest creatures, back when I had shouted and raged against the unfairness of my death, when I wondered if kobolds would ever worship me as a sea-drake—but that wasn't my life anymore, and instead I had her. And she had led her tribe to heights, and then to heights beyond. She would do wonders with a Name.

Nicau carefully took Kriya from Chieftess—nearly buckling under the weight, I thought he was supposed to be getting stronger—and headed to the back of the den, to a carved-out room they had been using for kobolds to sleep in before Abarossa's boon took away that need. He set her down and she twitched once, her hood unfurling from around her neck, but didn't wake—a healing sleep, rather than a restful one. She still needed to recover.

Which was good, because I imagined Nicau would have other things on his mind that alliances for a moment.

My mana snaked through the den, tugging at the crimson scales of their leader. Chieftess raised her head, a curious warble in the back of her throat. She knew something was happening, but not what.

Hello, I whispered to her, flexing the gap between us that would soon be closed. Would you accept a Name?

Chieftess went very still.

Her eyes, bright like golden flames, lit up as she tilted her head back, staring at the ceiling like she would find my core there. A raw want burned through her thoughts, the idea of rising above to heights she had only ever seen in Nicau. A promise to be more. To be Chieftess.

…this was the second Name I wasn't choosing for myself. Nicau I could understand, and he was just a baseline human that I hadn't had much hopes for when I'd chosen him, but Chieftess was made of my mana and my creation. She deserved a powerful name.

But I supposed Chieftess would do.

Actually, I hadn't named Akkyst or Rihsu, either. How many of my creatures were meandering around to find their own names? Terribly rude.

Focus on the present.

She glanced back at Nicau, emerging from the side room. He was smiling, a facial expression the kobolds had only picked up on recently, his thoughts full of brimming enthusiasm for her. The right choice.

Chieftess turned to the ceiling, which wasn't where I was but the thought was appreciated. She hissed a ringing agreement.

My sixth Named. My chosen.

I poured into her mind, wrapping my soul around hers until the differences blurred away. I felt stone under my claws, flecks of blood caught in jagged teeth, the heat of a latent fire in my chest and the warmth of quartz-light on my scales—she felt the press of limestone walls and the hunger of thousands of creatures, the golden runes of my existence, the untapped potential of gods so high above our mortal world–

Chieftess.

Kobold Chief

Chieftess

A group of scavengers no longer—a leader rises to claim dominion over its brethren, leading them to greater peaks than ever before. With a vastly improved intelligence and sense of self, this chief commands its fellow kobolds to rise above.

Blessing of the Creator: all things witnessed are made manifest.

Chieftess exploded in light, tinged fire-red and gold; every other kobold barked and jolted and sprang back, but Nicau just watched her, grinning ear to ear. He understood what that meant. We both did.

And gods, her blessing—it fit with who she was. My beast-tamer kobold had used other creatures, Rihsu had used her claws, but it was Chieftess who had developed tools, traps, dens. And it was her that had gone to Calarata and devoured all knowledge there, filling herself with dreams and ideals for her tribe. It was her that would create.

I couldn't wait to see what her Name did.

Just as soon as she woke up.

I still wasn't entirely clear on how the Naming process worked; it seemed like a proto-evolution, considering they slept it off for a few days and came back changed. Akkyst had grown, Seros had become more aquatic, Nicau—well, nothing happened for him, really—and Veresai had brimmed with new psionic potential.

Even Svythe, whom I thought would have taken to her new hunger with the ferocity she always did, took a length of time before awakening. Even now, she prowled over her main island, having not gotten close enough to the remorhaz to act.

Actually. She was moving quite a lot. I swept a few points of awareness towards her.

Svythe was perched beneath her Ancestral Tree, bristling. After her Name, she was taller but more hunched, a jagged collection of bark and limbs and claws. Even less like a humanoid dryad, and more like a beast, her legs protruding backwards and the beginnings of a tail lashing behind her. Her crown of thorns lifted high above the sand, pure white eyes gleaming. Fully Named, fully connected. Otherworld mana pulsed in her channels.

Her blessing of the hunter—all gateways are opened.

She tilted her head to the side, baring thorned fangs. The hunger I knew her for surged within, a thrashing pit of void that could never be filled, even with the blood dripping over her muzzle. And a new thought, one I hadn't encountered before and neither had she. Something curious.

Svythe pressed her clawed hand to the base of her Ancestral Tree.

And it opened.

The bark shifted like a living thing, unpeeling in crimson strips and bared softwood as mana pulsed from it like a heart. Svythe's feline ears perked, crown of thorns shifting; she stepped forward, claws sinking into the sand, and pushed. The vampiric mangrove seemed to absorb her, tugging at her remaining arm until she was in up to the shoulder. Then her torso, her legs, her head; within a moment, Svythe was gone, disappeared from my halls. Eaten by her own protector.

I could still feel her though, lingering within the tree. Healing, maybe? I hoped it would give her back her arm, perhaps, if she could remake herself as necessary within the bark. But oh, was that an interesting form of her ability. Perhaps she could plant others of her Ancestral Tree, grow a forest she could disappear into at will. A way to protect her form while wrecking devastation on all those who challenged.

Fascinating.

I turned back to the kobolds, who were all chittering over Chieftess' glowing forms and mostly making fools of themselves, warbling dreams of that happening to them. They had a long way to go to prove themselves before it did. I pushed into Nicau's mind, murmuring reassurances. Keep watch over her and Kriya, I instructed. Guard them.

He nodded, though his thoughts said he was already planning on doing so. He had come truly so far from the whining brat that had begged for his life.

Before I could get too sentimental, I shoved a brief flicker of pride into his mind and then fled out of the kobold's den before he could respond.

The goblin's attack had weakened me, but not to the point of devastation. Just enough to remind me there were more threats than Calarata, and that I needed to be more prepared. Akkyst had said they were below, whatever that meant. And I didn't want them getting anywhere before I did.

So for now, I gathered what bare scraps of mana I had—nothing, genuinely nothing—and darted down to the core. I would leave points of awareness throughout my floors, watching over should anything rear its miserable head, keeping my halls safe. I was waiting for Akkyst to interrogate that blasted miserable goblin he'd captured, for Chieftess to awaken, for the next batch of adventurers. But I had new schemas for my Heartwood, and a brimming unease that drove me to think of the next, though I only had a handful of creatures to fill it. Something told me I needed to be faster.

Something told me I needed to start my ninth floor.

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