Dragon Goddess’s chosen

Upon reaching the guild hall, Max and I got food for ourselves before we went to find the other two of our group.

“Why a dusty old ruin, though?” Eris asked as she sat across from Kat. 

“Because I don't want to deal with bandits.” My girlfriend answered then smiled when she noticed us approaching. “Hey, Alex, how'd it go?”

“Fine, Mrs.Wells didn't really have anything she could do for me. Said I was healthy, though, despite the changes.” I replied and sat next to her. Max hesitated a bit then resigned himself to sit next to Eris. ‘Sorry, you probably wanted to sit next to me…’

“That's good at least”

“So, what are you two talking about?”

“Kat wants us to take us to some old ruin to the south.” Eris replied as she picked at her half-eaten plate of food “I think we should take care of a small group of bandits that's been attacking merchants”

“And undead have been coming from the ruins and attacking the next town over.” Kat countered.

“I'm with Kat on this,” I said flatly. ‘Much rather re-kill undead than actually kill people… didn't want to kill those kobolds either but we had little choice’ 

“Undead are slow, at least bandits have a bit of fight in them…” Eris groaned then looked at Max. “What about you? You going to side with them too?”

“U-um… I don't know… did it say what kind of undead…?” He asked, shyly glancing at Kat. “My dad told me stories of fighting them before and there's some I really don't want to run into…”

“Quest makes them seem like zombies,” my girlfriend replied with a shrug.

“Even worse, Alex and I will probably just be able to cut through all of them… at least ghouls would be interesting…” Eris sighed.

“Anything but ghouls..” Max's voice came out as a soft whine. I tried to comfort him a bit by putting my hand on his but that got him flustered and he froze up for the moment 

“Then it should be a quick one, go in, find the quest giver to confirm that it's zombies, then we can go deal with it” I said to Kat, trying to ignore Eris. 

“It's a day by foot to get there…” she added.

“Fine, if we're going to take it, I'll go try to see if there's any carts heading that way and I'll get us a ride…” the redhead grumbled as she finally gave up. “Not going to walk for a day just for zombies”

“Ok. You can do that when we're done here. Alex and I can take care of merging our parties.” She then made me freeze up a little when she subtly moved her hand onto my thigh. I glanced at her but found she was acting like she was doing nothing. 

“U-um Max, if I gave you some of my money could you go get some travel food and a couple tents and sleeping bags for us just in case we need to stay outside?” I suggested and he perked up a bit.

“u-um yeah I can do that” he responded, practically yipped, as he seemed happy to be given something to help with.

“Ok so after we're done eating we can go do everything and Kat and I can go find you guys when we're done to help with anything since we'll probably be done first.” When the others agreed with the plan, we continued onto small chatting over the rest of the meal.

 

---

 

 

Tempest Adventuring Party

Composed of Parties:

Cœur de Lion and Tempest 

 

Rank: D

 

Tempest Members:

Alexandra Steele, 25, 1/4 dragon, Dragon-blood Bloodrager Rank:E 

Maximillian Wells, 21, half-inugami, Dragon-blood Sorcerer Rank:E

 

Cœur de Lion Members:

Eris Castellane, 20, Human, Duelist Fighter

Rank: D

Katrina Torres, 24, wood-elf, Hunter Ranger Rank: D

 

I read over the new blended party card as Kat, Max and I waited for Eris at the cart that she arranged for us since she had to run back and get her belongings from the room she rented. During that time, Max even had the time to go back and keep the promise with his mom and inform her about going away for a couple days.

“So, Lionheart…? What's that from?” I asked Kat as I put away the card and prepared to hoist myself up onto the open-top cart.

“Eris made the party with just herself before she got me to join. Her family coat of arms has a lion on it so apparently she took inspiration from that.” She answered with a shrug and leaned against the cart, watching me as I started climbing up. I was very thankful for having a stronger upper body in this world for things like this but I still ended up getting stuck for a moment with my hips still hanging off the cart while I readjusted my hands. “Need help, shorty?”

“I'm fine… and I'm not that short anymore” I sighed then pushed myself the rest of the way up, with my tail flicking a bit in irritation, and turned to face the two of them again.

“Mhmm, shorter than me, though. Lovely view of your butt, by the way, right, Max~?” She laughed and I followed her look to our mage. He was blushing extremely hard and quickly looked away from me with ears folded back cutely.

“S-sorry, didn't mean to stare…” he whined softly. 

“It's fine… I wasn't thinking when I was climbing…come ere… I'll help you up…” I sighed again and offered him my hand. He shyly got closer to the cart and accepted my help, taking my hand. I did notice a bit of a smirk on Kat's face as I easily pulled him up. “What?”

“Nothing,” she giggled and waited until I offered her the same help and playfully whispered in my ear. “Both of us definitely appreciated the show~” 

‘Dammit, her teasing is probably going to be worse now, isn't it? And I can't do anything back to her right now…’ I thought, feeling my cheeks get warm from the embarrassment. I sighed and sat down on one of the crates that belonged to the merchant that agreed to take us. Max shyly but quickly sat next to me, much to Kat's amusement based on her face. She happily just sat across from me on a different crate. “She's taking forever…”

“Yep, she probably unpacked a lot from her bag when we got here.” 

“How much could she have unpacked…? How much does she have?”

“Alex, she has a bag of holding…” Kat sighed. “It's a small one but it definitely can't fit all that I've seen her pull out of it without having some magic space thing on it. Don't have her carry anything in it, I'm still missing some camping stuff I couldn't fit in my pack at the time”

“She's really lucky to have a magic item like that…” Max said softly, a little in awe.

“Yep. To be honest with you guys, I don't want to find undead either but we just got to D rank but we haven't had enough people to take on a C rank quest yet… I was kind of hoping we find some other magic item and if we're lucky it's another bag of holding that one of us can actually keep organized.”

“You can handle that if we find one.” I said as I stretched a bit and leaned back against the wall of the cart, fatigue starting to come over me.

“Yeah, as if I'd let you have full charge of keeping something organized. I grew up with you, I know how you are.” She laughed softly. I rolled my eyes and stuck my tongue out at her, she paused for a moment at this and looked away as a faint blush started to appear. Max seemed kind of confused at the reaction as he looked between us.

‘Hehe maybe my thought earlier with the snake tongue was a good one’ 

“Anyways,” she continued, “any magic item would be nice. Hell, armor that can grow with you would be even better so you don't have to strip to-”

“I-i wouldn't call it stripping” I interrupted and she smirked a bit at me, already getting her confidence back.

“You dropped your armor against the boar. And your clothes were straining with how big you got. God… gods forbid when they can't can't take your size or if you're hit with fire or something-....” I followed her gaze to a very flustered Max. “Oh~? How much did you see, Max~?”

“U-um…” he stammered and became very interested in just looking at the floor of the cart. 

“Kat…” I scolded her and she smiled innocently.

“What? I'm just curious~” she giggled 

“And you're being a tease…”

“You know how much I like being like this~ you don't seem to mind too much ~”

“Because I'm used to you.”

“I-it's ok… I know she's just joking around. “Y-you don't have to protect me from her” Max mumbled.

“I do want to know now you ended up flashing him~ and how bad~” Kat laughed.

“S-some other time… I'm tired and I don't want to get started on that…”

“Fine, I guess ‘everything’ over the past day probably took a lot out of you” 

‘Keep teasing, I'll just get back at you the next time I have a chance’ I thought and stretched out my wings a bit to try to get cozy while we waited for our fighter. We talked for a bit longer but I eventually drifted off as fatigue overtook me.

---

I woke back up from my accidental nap to a sudden jolt upwards that made me sit up and instinctively start charging my lightning breath just in case it was trouble. I quickly calmed back down when I saw Eris and Kat talking in front of me without reacting to whatever that jolt was from. Then I felt Max nuzzle up against my chest and my heart rate just jumped back to where it was. He whined softly in his apparent sleep and his ears twitched a little with my movement.

“Oh you're finally awake” Kat greeted me. 

“Thanks for agreeing to stay up when it gets dark,” Eris added.

“W-what?” I asked, still recovering from waking up to an adorable dog boy cuddling against me in his sleep.

“We're not going to get there until after dark. You and Max napped so you lovebirds can stay up to watch the wagon. Part of the agreement is to protect this thing”

“I-I wouldn't say that…we're just friends…”

“Mhmm, big effort to move him when you found him,” She laughed softly. I sighed and looked down at Max again, knowing that I can't bring myself to wake him up. I ended up just hesitantly draping a wing over him instead.

“I don't blame her, he is cute~” Kat teased.

“You could join in too if you're jealous, Kat” I responded and she froze slightly, obviously not ready for me to tease her back for once. I gave an innocent smile and playfully opened my other wing to offer her a spot.

“Would love to, but someone has to be ready for trouble…” I shrugged and folded my wing back. 

‘Too bad… kinda hoped she'd take the offer… though it would be awkward for Max to wake up and find me cuddling both of them…’ I thought with a sigh and let some of my built up energy discharge in audible electric sparks and pops in my mouth. I vaguely noticed Kat get more flustered when I did that, a blush spreading out to her ears. ‘What's that about?’

“You're getting used to this quick” Eris observed and her voice distracted me from my thoughts. “You move your wings and tail like you've always had them.”

“Moving them isn't hard and I'm definitely not used to having them all the time… I need to figure out where to keep them that doesn't tire out my shoulders… “

“Wrap them up around you like a cape,” she suggested with a grin. “A lot of the great duelists from my country wear capes~"

“Maybe I'll try that, might be easier than walking around with them like an angel.” I shrugged then glanced at Kat when I heard a suppressed laugh from her.

“Mhmm… angel… with big leathery wings” my girlfriend giggled softly. 

“You know what I meant.” I sighed and gently tried adjusting Max a bit so that I could get more comfortable but this only made him whine more and bury his face against my breasts “... W-why couldn't I find you with your head on my thighs or something…? So much easier than this…”

“Well now he's going to wake up or suffocate in your tits,” Kat laughed more. 

‘You're having too much fun with this… I would've expected some jealousy at least’ Max's ears started flicking a little then they folded back suddenly and he quickly pulled himself back, blushing extremely hard and trying to catch his breath a bit.

“S-sorry! I-I didn't realize …” he stammered and tried to pull back more then realized my wing was over him and froze.

“I-Its fine, you were asleep, you didn't know…”

“Y-you guys could have told me I was falling asleep!” He whined softly towards Kat and Eris and both of them smirked a little.

“Could've, yeah, but you two looked cute cuddling,” Kat replied.

“Mhmm and you know what people say, let sleeping dogs lie” Eris added 

“... pretty sure that doesn't work here…” he mumbled.

“Why not? You're part inugami and you were sleeping ~”

“Sorry for all the noise” I sighed to the cart's driver, a human merchant, as they argued a bit and he just waved me off

“ ‘s fine. Keeps animals and bandits at bay” he laughed. “And it beats the silence I'm used to”

“Ok… I was just making sure we weren't bothering you"

“Don't worry about it, miss, I don't mind”

“... the horses still bothered by me…?” I asked, remembering how afraid of me they seemed to be when I tried to pet one when we first met the merchant.

“They get spooked a little when the wind changes direction but they're doing fine with you for the most part. Don't take it personally, we ran into a pair of drakes before and they've been skittish around anything with scales ever since.”

“Oh… ok. I'm glad it might just be that…”

“- really that comfy anyways?” Eris continued, bringing my attention back to the other three.

“...she's warm…” Max mumbled softly and hesitantly relaxed against me again as he seemed to realize I hadn't pushed him off yet. He also seemed that he had more to say but Kat beat him to it.

“And I'm sure her chest is a better pillow than the cart” she teased and he shyly looked down at the floor. “I'm right, aren't I?”

“...yes…”

“Hehe, maybe I should try sometime~” she continued.

“I offered earlier and you didn't take it” I teased her. “Thought you'd be willing to share.”

“She did offer it…” Eris giggled.

‘Good to know that she won't always team up with Kat with the teasing’

“I thought you were on my side here,” Kat protested.

“She was right though~”

“What did you get us into…” Max mumbled softly and I shrugged. 

“Some entertainment I guess.” I responded, silently cursing myself as it came out as a slight giggle.

“If you say so…until they turn on us again…”

“We just need to find stuff to use against them and it'll be fine”

“Maybe…” he shrugged, then his ears folded back again “... can I lay my head on you again?…it was comfy…” I couldn't help but smile a bit at this.

“Sure, I don't mind”

“R-really?” His curly tail managed to thump against the crate we were sitting on as his ears perked back up.

“Yep, go ahead” he happily cuddled up against me completely again.

 

---

 

A few hours later, and after a short stop to eat, the driver of the cart startled all of us by suddenly yelling into the night.

“Hey! Out of the road, you git!” He quickly brought the wagon to a halt and I reluctantly moved Max off of me to stand and stretch while I checked to see what was going on. My new eyes made nighttime feel weird, everything seemed almost as bright as normal out to a certain distance, especially with the nearby lantern, but the lack of color beyond the lantern's light was odd. With this new vision, though, I quickly found who the driver was yelling to: an emaciated humanoid walking out from the forest aimlessly and dragging a battle ax on the ground behind them.

“Um… I don't think they'll listen…” I told him as I grabbed my sword.

“Why not? What idiot just walks out onto the road in front of horses in the middle of the night?”

“Just looks like a guy to me, what's wrong?” Eris asked. I glanced back at her to explain and quickly found Kat already hopping out with her bow and quiver.

“Undead.” My girlfriend said flatly, in a serious mood right away.

“Aw only one? Alex, you can get him” the redhead sighed. 

“Don't jinx us” I replied and I climbed over the side of the wagon and dropped down to the ground. I made a wide berth around the already-spooked horses and met up with my girlfriend in front of them. 

“... inspect says it's a draugr…” she whispered to me. “And it's marked as a quest target for me…”

“You can have it do that for you?”

“Mhmm… we can talk about it later. Be careful there's more around here.”

“Shouldn't we tell the others?”

“No, I only know because of my gift, Eris doesn't know about it yet. It'll be fine, even you knowing and me telling you changes things.”

“Ok…” I shrugged then took a breath and slowly started approaching the undead. Its head quickly snapped to my direction with its bones creaking as soon as I came within about ten yards of it, its eyes glowing bright blue. 

 

Draugr Warrior

E Rank Undead Warrior

 

Stats compared to Alex Steele

 

Strength: Moderately Lower

Dexterity: Significantly Lower

Durability: Slightly lower 

Arcane Magic: Significantly lower

Divine Magic: None

Nature Magic: None

 

Conclusion: Low threat to user.

 

Warning: opponent has ability: Undead Resilience and will revive if user does not take action to prevent this event

 

I dismissed the threat analysis as I readied my weapon in front of me and watched the mummy-like undead limp towards me. Its stench of decay and seawater assaulted me first when it reached the halfway point and made me recoil away while cursing my new sense of smell.

“Max, Eris! Come down here, there's more” Kat called out and this made me look over to where this first one came from to see more pairs of glowing eyes appear in the forest. My opponent took this chance to slam its own fist into its hip and there was a loud pop as it seemed to relocate its leg back in place since it started moving a lot better than before. I was forced to jump back with the wild swing of its ax as it rushed me.

“Eris, these aren't zombies! Happy now?” I yelled and grabbed the ax just below the double bladed head before the undead could backswing at me. I quickly drove my sword into its chest and attempted to wrench the ax away but it had a death grip on it. 

“Maybe… if I could see anything!” She yelled back. I growled a bit to myself and wrestled the still-struggling undead to the ground. 

“Give me a moment!” I growled and let the fluid for my fire breath start flowing into my mouth, flaming drops nearly immediately dripping down onto the creature and its desiccated body starting to catch immediately. Once I was ready, I jumped back from it and breathed out a jet of flame that lit up the area and burnt away the struggling corpse.

 

Draugr weakness to fire revealed

Draugr resistance to piercing damage revealed

 

“You can breathe fire too??” Kat yelled as she loosed an arrow into the eye of the first of the other draugr leaving the forest. That one dropped to the ground for a moment but its remaining eye lit back up and its shambled back to its feet. Eris dashed past me towards that one and took the sword it was using to keep itself up. I watched as she used the broader sword to take its head once it fell to the ground.

“Ignus sanctus!” Max's voice called out and a different draugr deeper in the woods went up in a pale yellow flame that lit up the surroundings. The light let me see a large undead that lacked the glowing eyes just observing us further in the darkness.

“Eris, get back from the trees! Let them come to us!” I ordered. She seemed reluctant but followed my direction and backed up to my location.

“What? They're too slow and I want to get this over with” she said with a slightly confused look at me.

“There's something else in there” I glanced back to where I saw it but the light from Max's spell was now gone. I sighed and looked back at the wagon and its driver “Can you get your horses moving? We'll keep the undead away” 

“I can try, they don't like fire so it will be hard” the merchant yelled back. I sighed and turned my attention back to the forest as Kat hit another draugr with an arrow and roots suddenly grew and wrap around its feet. Eris darted forward again and finished the ensared corpse with her borrowed sword before retreating back again.

 A fifth draugr staggered out closer to me than her and I quickly grabbed the ax off the ground to go deal with it. The ancient weapon was certainly heavier and handled differently than the sword but it worked fine with cutting through the walking corpse. It was off-putting when it tried to block my first swing with its shield like a person more than a dumb zombie it looked like. It even tried to counter-attack but I easily blocked it with my tail before I took its head off with a second ax swing.

‘Just putting it back to rest…’ I reassured myself as I checked on the others. Kat and Eris were doing fine working as a pair. Max was staying near the cart nuking whatever ones he can see with his Sacred Flame spell. 

I tried to keep my sentiment of putting them to rest throughout the rest of the encounter but part of me had a growing disgust for them that felt beyond their stench and awful black blood that splattered out when they were cut. Thankfully, the big one did not show up again and we ended up destroying almost a couple dozen of the undead over the next half hour or so as we got the wagon moving again. It was concerning how many were just roaming in that group and it left me worried about how many were in the ruins we were after. With my insistence, Eris and I changed clothes before we got the wagon moving again, I refused to put Max and myself through smelling the god awful blood we got splattered with since we seemed to be the only two that could smell it.