Monster no Goshujin-sama - Volume 8 - Chapter 6

Chapter 6: The Dragons’ Mediator

With Thaddeus’s arrival, the dragons stayed their fangs—for now, at least. The clan still didn’t know about us, so we needed to inform them of everything from square one. We decided to leave this all to Thaddeus.

At the same time, we had Thaddeus ask the dragons to leave for the time being. The stray dragon had calmed down and was no longer rampaging about, but I could tell through the mental path that it was extremely frightened. It was like a trembling child. I had to put my hand against its body every now and then to keep it calm.

Considering how wounded it was, its reaction was perfectly normal. Conversely, the dragons who’d come to capture it had also suffered a severe counterattack. They hadn’t intended to wound the stray, but the situation had developed to a point where they’d had no other choice. Since things had escalated so much, it was better for both sides to back down for now. Thaddeus was of the same opinion, so he’d immediately agreed with my request.

After Thaddeus gave them a quick explanation, the dragons pulled back with him and Fukatsu. Once they left, the stray calmed down. With that, we could finally begin treating it.

“All right, then. Lily, can you heal it?” I said.

“Okay,” Lily replied with a nod.

She tried to approach the stray, but it bared its snarling fangs.

Lily gave me a troubled smile. “Master...”

The stray appeared to be fine with me by its side, so I plopped my hand on top of its large head.

“Calm down. Lily is my companion. You can tell that through the mental path, can’t you?”

It turned its lizard-like eyes toward me, then let out a huff. It seemed discontent. Given its earlier rampage, this wasn’t much of a surprise, but the stray appeared to be rather rowdy by nature.

I once more started petting its head to comfort it. The stray let out a purr, put away its fangs, and quietly lay down. Lily approached once more, and though it clearly remained wary of her, it didn’t snarl again. Lily deployed a white glyph of healing magic in her hand.

“Hmm, this is pretty awful,” she muttered.

“Can you not heal these wounds?” I asked.

“Oh, no. I can. It’s just that, unlike simple fractures and gashes from sharp cuts, wounds inflicted by bites and tears caused by claws are difficult to heal. The same goes for burns. These might leave scars.”

In that sense, it was the same as natural healing. I still had burn marks on my arms too. Nothing could be done about this to a certain extent.

“Also, it looks like the wing will take a bit of time. Entire parts are missing and all. It wouldn’t be much of a problem with Gerbera’s recovery speed... Anyway, I don’t want to stick things back together all weird, so I guess we have no choice but to take it nice and slow.”

“So long as there are no long-term effects. We’ll just have to compromise in that respect. Anyway, all that’s left is to wait for Thaddeus and them to come back while we treat—”

“Wh-Whoa!”

Lily cut me off with a surprised yelp. The stray dragon had gotten up.

“Will you calm down already, you simpleton?” In no time at all, Gerbera grabbed the dragon by the scruff of the neck and forced it back to the ground. “You haven’t healed yet. Be still.”

The stray had tried to run away, but it couldn’t react to Gerbera’s speed. It wriggled about on the ground, no match for her physical strength. Were it capable of moving its long tail, it might’ve been able to resist, but that hadn’t been healed yet.

“What has you so displeased, anyway?” Gerbera asked with a cock of her head.

“Spider,” Berta said.

She’d brought Thaddeus and Fukatsu here by chasing our scent. After that, she’d lain down on the ground and remained a spectator.

“This is one of that dragon’s clan members, right?” she asked.

“Hrm?”

“It should have an ego now. You may simply ask it what’s wrong after you have it take on a human form like that man does.”

“Ooh, you have a point there.”

Seeing that Gerbera was convinced, Berta huffed and closed her eyes. Incidentally, Ayame was curled up around Berta’s stomach. She looked like she was feeling really down, like she could start whimpering at any time. That was because she’d gotten a late start earlier. I hadn’t had the composure to pay her much attention, but thinking back on it, Ayame had tried to leap into action with me when I ran off. I remembered seeing her at the edge of my vision, tumbling off Berta’s head when she’d woken up in a panic. Apparently, she’d eaten too much. I decided I would comfort her later.

“Very well. How about you take on this human form right away?” Gerbera said. The stray dragon turned its eyes toward her. “Hm? What’s wrong?”

“Grrr...”

“Say, My Lord. Is this fellow perhaps incapable of turning into a human?”

“Grr...” the dragon growled briefly, affirming her question.

“No, it should be possible,” I said, shaking my head.

With no ego, the stray had remained in this form all this time. I could understand why it believed it couldn’t take a human form, but that was a needless anxiety.

“If that’s a characteristic of a dragon as a monster, then anything Thaddeus can do should be possible for any other dragon.”

I was convinced. If my guess was right, it’d be stranger if the stray couldn’t do it.

“Calm down and give it a try,” I said.

I knelt down and put my hand on the stray dragon’s head. I closed my eyes and reached out to it through the mental path.

“Grrr...”

The tension binding the dragon’s heart unraveled just a little. Then its mana began moving. In this world, there was a law that dictated that a specific mana flow would generate a predetermined phenomenon. Using that law, dragons could turn into humans. The enormous body of the stray shrank, and at the same time, it began changing shape. Its shattered carapace turned to skin, its fangs and claws retracted, and its silhouette turned more and more human. Red hair much like a burning flame grew out. The body that had once been seven meters long from head to tail was now about my size, but it kept shrinking. Then it was about the same size as Lily, then Katou, and then kept going until it was even smaller than Kei.

“Huh?”

Before us now was a little girl who looked to be about ten years old, with red hair as long as she was tall. Unhealed wounds still marked her scrawny body, and torn wings grew from her back. She had a long tail, its end covered in a mass of bones. Dragon scales were still visible here and there on her face and limbs. She didn’t seem to be as good at transforming into a human as Thaddeus was.

Despite the grumpy look in her eyes, she was a cute little girl. I was shocked. It was completely unexpected...but maybe it shouldn’t have been. Now that I thought about it, the stray dragon had appeared somewhat smaller than the others. It turned out she was still a child.

“Aaah?”

Her voice, still hard to distinguish as that of a boy or girl, had a bluntness to it. She looked down at her hands in a daze. They were no different from human hands, aside from the scales still visible here and there.

“No way... I really changed like everyone else...?” she said, her voice trembling as she turned her chestnut eyes my way.

Tears gathered in the corners of her eyes, but once she noticed my gaze, her eyes narrowed sharply. Her already grumpy-looking expression now had a fiendish air to it.

“The hell are you staring at?” she said, her choice of words about as curt as I’d expected.

“O-Oh. Sorry.”

Still, that was my fault. Even if she was just a child, she was a naked girl. It was rude to stare, so I averted my eyes.

“Ah...” the girl mumbled, a tinge of regret in her voice.

“What’s wrong?” I asked.

“Nothing...”

This puzzled me, but I didn’t turn to look at her again. In any case, we had to get her some clothes. We could talk after that.

“I think we’ve got some spare clothing in our luggage. Wait here a sec, I’ll go get something.”

Because we’d suddenly dashed away from our campsite, Fukatsu had brought us our luggage while Thaddeus was negotiating with the dragons.

“Ah. Hey!” Lily said in a panic as I began looking for clothes in our luggage.

I turned around because I sensed someone approaching me. The naked stray dragon was right behind me as Lily chased her, still in the middle of casting healing magic. The stray looked up at me with a sullen expression.

“What?” she asked bluntly.

“Umm, that’s my line.”

“It’s not like healing magic stops working if I move around.”

She had a point, but it wasn’t really a good reason to follow me around. Still, I felt it would worsen her mood even more if I pointed that out. I couldn’t understand children. I had a little brother, but he wasn’t that much younger than me, so the experience didn’t seem particularly useful for someone this young. Although, seeing how she was a dragon, it didn’t really matter how much experience I had with human children.

“Oh well,” I muttered, seeing no reason to pay this any mind.

I went back to fishing through our stuff, when suddenly the stray reached into the luggage on her own.

“H-Hey.”

“I’ll take this,” she said after grabbing something.

“That’s mine. It’s men’s clothing.”

“Whatever.”

The dragon put on the shirt Gerbera had made for me, finally looking slightly satisfied. Because of her wings, she couldn’t wear it properly, so her bony shoulders remained exposed. If Lily or the like were to dress like this, it would give them an erotic air, but that wasn’t the case for a scrawny child.

“So? Why did you try to run away?” I asked.

Her fellow dragons had chased her and nearly caught her, so she had put up a fight. She hadn’t had an ego at the time, so there wasn’t much that could’ve been done about that. However, right now, she had a proper sense of reason. She could at least understand that the dragons bore her no ill will.

“You tried to run away when we mentioned Thaddeus coming back. Why is that?” I elaborated.

“I don’t...” the dragon started with a frown. “I mean...”

She’d ended up keeping quiet before when I’d tried to urge her on, so I patiently waited for a while. Before long, she slowly forced out words.

“I don’t want to return to the stupid settlement...”

“Why’s that?”

“If Thaddeus comes here, he’ll drag me back. No way I’m going back,” she answered. It wasn’t much of an explanation, but she began elaborating a little at a time. “I’ve always been locked up. Always. From the very moment I was born. I never had freedom. Even though everyone else was allowed outside, I was the only one locked away inside that damn cave. I hated it... But I had no choice...”

That reminded me that Thaddeus had said the clan held the egoless stray dragon in the settlement. I’d never really tried imagining what that implied. Suitable measures had to be taken to keep a winged beast confined to a settlement. Apparently, they’d done so using a cave.

“But you didn’t have an ego at the time, right?” Lily asked curiously while casting her healing magic. “How did you hate it?”

“It’s simple, Lily,” Gerbera said. “She’s basically the same as I was.”

“How so?”

“Before meeting our lord, I had something close to a consciousness. It was but a fleeting thing that one couldn’t really call an ego, though.”

That was exactly what had caused the white arachne to run wild. Similarly, the stray dragon had likely possessed a faint consciousness. That was why she’d run away from the settlement. Up until now, we thought that she’d escaped by accident, but that wasn’t the case. That was the reason she’d been so desperate to get away when the others came to capture her.

Now that I thought more about it, it had been quite some time since her escape, yet she hadn’t attacked a single human settlement. Perhaps that hadn’t been a simple coincidence. She’d avoided attacking humans precisely because she’d had a faint consciousness.

“I lived for near eternity within a deep slumber,” Gerbera said. “It had always been like that until the day I met our lord. And in her case...”

Gerbera looked down at the little girl, who was biting her lip.

“No way I’m going back...” the dragon said. The deep resentment and gloominess in her voice didn’t suit a child at all. “I don’t have a single good memory from being there...”

It pained me to imagine having been locked inside a cave since birth without ever having the chance to go outside. Her obstinacy was born of fear from being forced to live in such an unreasonable environment.

I was beginning to understand. The red-haired girl before me was, in truth, an enormous dragon. She had a foul mouth and a willful look...but beneath all that, she was exactly as she appeared: a ten-year-old girl.

“I’m never going back. Who the hell would want to?” she muttered, her voice shaking.

“That can’t be allowed,” another voice said.

The dragons had returned with Thaddeus at the fore. None of them were in their true forms. Much like Thaddeus, they wore clothes native to northern Aker and couldn’t be distinguished from normal humans. One among them stepped up next to Thaddeus. She was a woman with red hair. Among the seven dragons that came with Thaddeus, three of them were women.

“You may not leave the settlement without the elder’s permission. That is the law of Draconia.”

They had apparently overheard some of our conversation. The stray dragon’s shoulders jolted, and her mouth flapped open and closed. She couldn’t speak. Her expression stiffened with fear. I could tell at a glance that she was terrified. Her eyes darted around the area like a small animal’s and settled on my figure. She shot up to her feet and hid behind me. With that, she finally managed to find her voice.

“B-But Thaddeus leaves the settlement all the damn time,” she said. Her choice of words was strong-willed, but her voice wavered.

“Thaddeus is the explorer. He has the elder’s permission,” the woman said, glaring down at the stray. “We must bring you back to the settlement.”

Seeing that the dragon hadn’t come all the way here for fun, she was justified in this statement. Judging by the suppressed emotions I could hear in her voice, this woman might’ve sympathized with the stray’s circumstances, but her sense of duty painted over such personal sentiments.

“We don’t want to get rough. Be reasonable,” the woman said bluntly.

“But I don’t...” the stray murmured, hanging her head.

The hand she gripped my clothes with trembled. Her breaths were short. It was easy to guess what was going through her head. The majority of her wounds had already been healed by Lily’s magic. Her only choice now was to turn into a dragon again, recklessly flail about, and then run away. She had to be brooding on it. It was a hasty and childish train of thought, but I couldn’t make fun of her for it.

She’d been confined to maintain the secrecy of the hidden settlement. If she’d possessed a will, there could’ve been another way of handling this. But she hadn’t. As she was now, though, she didn’t need to be locked up. She could pass her time normally in the settlement.

However, Draconia—or perhaps the very existence of her brethren—was already the living incarnation of a nightmare for her. Nothing could be done about that, especially considering how she was still a child. She couldn’t control her emotions. It had been painful. It had been lonely. It had been so hard for her.

The dragons of the settlement had almost had no choice but to confine her. Still, it’d probably been hard for them to make such a logical decision, especially since it was impossible to get a child this age to accept such circumstances. That said, the dragons couldn’t possibly step down now that they’d come all this way to fulfill their duty.

Neither side could give in, so a breakdown was inevitable—if they were the only parties here, that is.

“Could you please hold on for a minute?” I cut in. “I’d like to say something.”

“Very well. Please go ahead, Lord Takahiro. We’ve heard about you from Thaddeus,” the woman, who seemed to be the leader of the group, said courteously.

Thaddeus had apparently spoken very well of me. He’d likely mentioned my contract with Salvia. I knew how important the Misty Lodge was to the residents of Draconia. Thanks to that, they would hear me out.

“It’s impossible for her to leave the settlement without permission. That’s what you said, right?” I asked.

“Yes, that’s right,” Thaddeus answered. “It is strictly forbidden for members of the clan to arbitrarily leave the settlement so that we do not risk exposing its existence to the world.”

“But you’re allowed to leave.”

“Yes, but that’s because—”

“In that case, we just need to get permission for her too, right?” I said. Thaddeus looked like he’d been caught off guard by this. “Frequently going in and out will definitely increase the risk of exposing the settlement, but if we carefully consider the risk and take appropriate action, it shouldn’t be a problem for her to leave. Am I wrong?”

It was, in fact, true that Thaddeus could leave the settlement. It wasn’t impossible.

The dragons all exchanged glances.

Thaddeus suddenly flashed me a smile and said, “I see. How about it, Kath? I think it’s a good idea.”

“If she has permission...then yes, it isn’t a problem,” the woman with red hair said with a nod.

“You heard them,” I said, looking down at the stray dragon clinging to me. “So long as you get permission, you don’t have to go back.”

“Huh? Wh-What?” Her eyes darted about in confusion, her narrow understanding preventing her from keeping up with our conversation. “B-But how am I supposed to get permission?”

“The only way is to talk it out. You’ll get dragged back against your will at this rate. If you don’t want that, then you’ll just have to convince them.”

There was no bright future for her there, no matter how the dice fell. But what could the stray accomplish by fleeing the settlement like this? Even if she tried throwing herself into human society, it wouldn’t work with no knowledge of common sense. She could survive in the wilderness with the power of a dragon, of course, but seeing her cling to my clothes like this, it was hard to believe that living all alone deep in the forests would be good for a young girl like her.

In all likelihood, the dragons would capture her before that could happen, but that came with problems of its own. If they brought her back, the stray would become even more obstinate than before and definitely try to escape again in a desperate struggle. Given time, her wings would heal and she could fly away. Even if they tore her wings to keep that from happening, she could still move her legs. There would be countless opportunities for her to attempt another escape.

If she did escape, would they break her legs? Or would they lock her up in a cave again? Things had settled with her capture this time around, but next time it could become a fight to the death. What they needed to do right now was talk things out.

“B-By convince them, you mean go back to the settlement?!” the stray screamed, her face going pale.

I gently nodded back to her. “Yeah. You need to go back and talk things out properly.”

Her face spasmed as if she’d been betrayed. I had no intention of doing such a thing, though.

“Even if you run away because you don’t want to do this, it’ll only make things worse. You need to have a proper conversation with your elder. You’re finally able to do that now.”

“B-But! We don’t know if she’ll actually listen to me! How is this different from dragging me back against my will?!”

“It’s different,” I declared. I wasn’t trying to deceive her; I was going to take responsibility. “If you go back to talk, we’ll come with you.”

“Huh...?”

“If we do, at the very least, they’ll hear you out.”

I would be a mediator, in a sense. I was the Misty Lodge’s contractor, and she was special to the clan. Also, with everyone’s help, we could exercise our authority and make sure the stray wouldn’t be ignored.

It was possible that we could convince them to let the stray go, and it was also possible that they would soundly refute us. The stray’s wish didn’t necessarily have to be granted as is. We needed a point of compromise that both parties could agree to, no matter what shape it took. If I had to mediate things to that end, then I intended to cooperate.

“How about it?” I said, lowering myself to a knee and matching her eyeline.

She averted her eyes, frowned, and hung her head. She wasn’t used to such direct eye contact, which was why she acted like an awkward stray dog. Still, she definitely understood that things couldn’t go on like this. She turned her chestnut eyes back up to me and stared at my face for several seconds. Then she nodded ever so slightly.

“Fine...”

“Good,” I said, petting her head before standing up and turning to Thaddeus. “That’s the general idea. How about you?”

“Does that mean you’ll visit Draconia?” he asked.

I nodded. “Yeah. I mean, I promised Salvia I would to begin with.”

“A promise with the Lady of the Misty Lodge...?”

Surprise spread among the members of the clan.

“Well, I didn’t think it’d end up like this, though,” I said. “Anyway, that is, of course, only if you’re fine with it.”

“What do you think, Kath?” Thaddeus said, turning to the woman with red hair. “Such are the words of the Lady of the Misty Lodge. We can’t possibly ignore them.”

“Let’s confirm with the elder first. Will that do?” she asked me.

I nodded back to her. “Got it. All the same, until we get a response, I’ll be taking charge of the stray dragon.”

“That’ll do. I have one request, however. Could we have Thaddeus accompany you? It’s not that I don’t trust the contractor of the Lady of the Misty Lodge, but we need a minimum level of assurance on our side.”

“You good with that?” I said, turning to the stray dragon.

“Whatever.”

“You heard her. We’ve got a deal.”

With that, the woman with red hair smiled for the first time. There was relief in her expression, surely a display of her true feelings.

◆ ◆ ◆

After that, all the dragons aside from Thaddeus and the stray left in a hurry. They were immediately heading to the settlement to check with the elder. The little stray watched this in a daze as I plopped my hand on her head. She finally came back to her senses and looked up at me. She tightly pursed her lips and quickly brushed off my hand. She then gripped the hem of my clothes and pouted with a dissatisfied look. I really did have problems understanding children. Still, I could at least tell that she didn’t hate me, so I gave her a lopsided smile.

“Wha?!”

Immediately after that, the girl yelped. That was because Lily had suddenly hugged her from behind.

“Let’s get along, okay?” Lily said.

“Wh-What’s with you?! L-Let go!”

“Now, now. I’m not done treating you. No struggling.”

“Y-You don’t need to hug me, dammit!”

“It’s good to see you so energetic,” Gerbera said, walking up to the little girl, who was now bright red and flailing about. “Well, we’ll be together for some time to come. Let’s get along, shall we?”

“Stop rubbing my head, you idiot! And get off me!”

“Hmm. Now that I look at her like this, her impertinence has a certain charm to it,” Gerbera remarked.

“I think she’s just normally cute,” Lily added.

“Kuuu!”

Seeing Lily hugging her and Gerbera ruffling her head, Ayame didn’t want to get left out and jumped in. The little girl screamed and wailed.

“Takahiro,” Thaddeus called to me as I watched them. Thankfully, he didn’t use the “lord” title.

“Hm?”

“Thank you.”

I gave him a shrug. There was nobody here to stop this cheerful scene as it went on a while longer.