Haku, king of all dragons

The days immediately following Zamor's appointment as interim leader weren't easy, especially for the lizardman. The epidemic had begun to affect more victims, who by now numbered around a hundred. The disease, which by now everyone called 'blood death' because of the very macabre way in which it killed is victims, was flourishing especially in those who had eaten the infected meat, but others who had not done so were also showing some symptoms. Making a quick calculation of the probabilities, Zamor estimated that by the end of the week there would be at least half a thousand sick, and in another two weeks the number would reach five thousand. Considering how dangerous that epidemic was, such numbers were nothing less than terrifying.

Fortunately, for the moment Isaac was managing to take care of all the patients. The idea of ​​acting on the symptoms had proved successful: for the moment no one had died yet and some had even recovered. The main remedy was a potion that allowed the blood to flow more rapidly and therefore not get blocked along the respiratory tract; since it was usually enough, Isaac was satisfied with producing it in large quantities and supplying it to patients. A couple of times he had needed surgery to relieve the pressure in his lungs, both of which were successful. Seeing that no one was dying, the population had begun to relax a little, convinced that all would be well… or at least most of them. But in any case Zamor, as well as Haku and Tzegorn, knew that the more patients increased, the more work would become unsustainable for Isaac. Luckily Thora was managing to find a good amount of staff, especially some of the ex-slaves, who even though they didn't have particular healing skills could take care of the patients and give them the right medicine, so Isaac could focus mainly on identifying the people most in need of surgery and take care of them right away.

However, the main problem was obviously resources. First the ingredients: even though they now knew which potion to make to ease the symptoms, the number of ingredients at their disposal was very limited. On the proposal of Tzegorn, who despite his (mutual) hostility towards Haku was proving to be an excellent advisor, Zamor had made an inventory of all the resources in their possession and had then made Isaac read it so that he could establish how many potions still could produce. The forecasts hadn't been good: Isaac had determined that he could continue to create potions that made the blood thinner only for the next two months, assuming of course that the growth rate of the epidemic was as expected and not worse. Luckily some of those ingredients could also be found in the oasis, and Haku planned to have Sisna send him more; however, it was clear that in the long run they would no longer be able to handle the situation.

Tzegorn had proposed that they try to make Isaac's other remedies that hadn't been applied easier and safer, and indeed that was exactly what he and Isaac were trying to do. However, Haku had had a much more brilliant idea: if he really wanted to exploit the situation to get his food production project approved... why not really exploit it to the fullest? And so, secretly from everyone, he began to move the pawns. Obviously he couldn't intervene directly, since being an adviser to the provisional leader it was already a lot if he could get away from Zamor for more than five minutes... but he had many people who could work for him.

"Damn, but where are they?" Keita grumbled when he didn't see anyone coming. She and Darbi were sitting in a small clearing in the forest, and had been waiting for over an hour now. "They didn't stand you up, did they?"

"Be calm, sister. They're just a little late" Darbi tried to calm her down. "You know how it is... they aren't exactly very punctual... but I can assure you they are reliable. They will arrive"

Keita let out an annoyed growl and was about to retort, but suddenly a familiar smell entered their nostrils. Darbi smiled pleased and looked at his sister, who on the contrary shook her head angrily and turned away. Finally, in the midst of the vegetation, the silhouettes of a minotaur and several lizardmen appeared. "At long last! We were reporting you missing" Darbi teased him.

"Thanks for the trust you show in us, friend" Brenno said approaching out of breath. "Sorry for the delay, but we had some mishaps"

Darbi was a little surprised. "What kind of mishaps?"

"What do you think? This evil genius here is a living mishap, that's what happened!" Gord exclaimed, pointing to the minotaur. "He got the patrols schedule wrong! He just had to do! I mean, he's the one running the patrols for the whole village, yet he managed to get it wrong! Is such a thing possible!? We had to improvise to avoid get caught!"

"Ugh, you're never wrong?" Brenno grumbled. "I just confused the morning times with the afternoon ones! And I already apologized!"

Keita looked at Darbi sideways. "Reliable, huh?" she murmured in a disappointed voice, and her brother avoided answering knowing that otherwise she would probably lynch him. "Well, anyway, you're here now. The people you brought with you..."

Behind Gord and Brenno were five lizardmen who had several farm tools in their hands. One of them stepped forward. "I am Filyus, and these are my brothers Itoro and Rhogoto and my two nephews Lobo and Gherm. We are here because Gord has offered us a rather interesting job"

"They're my friends" Gord said. "I can assure you they are trustworthy and won't tell anyone anything"

"The first rule of our family is to help where there is help. Everything else doesn't matter" Filyus said with a laugh. "So, our friend told us you need good farmers to improve the situation in the village. What do you need to grow?"

Keita looked at Darbi; she was clearly suspicious, since she didn't usually trust the first one who passed by. But her brother with his eyes replied that he trusted the judgment of his friends, and that if they had brought those five people, then they must be reliable. Keita sighed and motioned to Darbi that he could continue; satisfied, the dragon opened his dimensional bag and took out some seeds. "You have to cultivate these" he answered. "They are medicinal herbs. Calendula, chamomile, borage, mallow, dandelion, rose, lily of the valley, peony, bellflower... alone they can't do much, but if put together they will become the ingredients with which Isaac can create his potions. If you are able to germinate all these seeds, Isaac will have enough ingredients to protect the village for another month"

Haku had thought of everything: how to solve the problem of ingredients and at the same time convince the villagers of the safety of his food production project? Easy: combine the two. Medicinal herbs grew faster than common vegetables, so they would have speeded things up a lot. Once Zamor had seen this, thanks to his powers as interim leader he could have authorized the creation of a project of mass production of those herbs; if Haku had limited himself to proposing it to him, the other members of the Council could have questioned Zamor's intentions and accused him of going beyond the competences they had entrusted him with... but if the proof of the success of the project had been in front of them, then Zamor could have simply said that growing medical herbs was part of his skills since they served to stem the epidemic, and therefore he could have authorized the construction of a canal and a reservoir in the desert. At that point, convincing the members of the Council to expand cultivation with edible vegetables would have been quite simple. All Haku needed was to grow those medicinal herbs in the middle of the desert, and for that he needed farmers. The fact that they were growing medicinal herbs would have greatly facilitated finding trusted people: in a moment of crisis like that, there were always generous people who hated seeing others suffer and were willing to do anything, even to act in secret, for the sake of being able to help stop the disease and avoid feeling helpless. Exactly the kinds of people Haku needed. After all, it wasn't a deception, just keeping silent about the further benefits that could come from their actions.

Filyus and his family were those kinds of people: they'd been lucky enough not to get sick (yet), but many of their friends hadn't been so lucky. They were afraid for themselves and for others, and sadly they had seen the effects of the disease on the patients. Furthermore, Filyus and his brother Rhogoto both had children, and he knew that until the emergency was over they should stay away from the village and never see them again. They were ready to do anything to help with that bad situation. "Mh. Many of these seeds should germinate within a maximum of one week and grow big and strong in just another two. This of course assuming we have the right soil, the right amount of water and the right conditions..."

"Right... about that..." Darbi said with a little embarassed tone. "As Gord and Brenno must have already told you, you won't be able to farm in the oasis. Therefore..."

The two dragons led their new 'accomplices' to the edge of the oasis, where to the farmers' surprise there was a small pool of water surrounded by solid soil instead of the usual sand. It was Inpu who had changed the composition of the soil to make it less friable, even though it still lacked all the essential nutrients for plants, and the dragons had then transported large quantities of water there. "Do you want us to grow crops here?" Filyus asked.

Darbi nodded. "I know it's not exactly what you expected, but I can assure you that..."

"Hey, don't worry, you don't have to justify yourself! It's not the first time we've worked in bad conditions!" Filyus immediately stopped him with a smile. "But I warn you, we're going to need a lot of stuff. A lot of fertilizer to start with. Then we'll need someone to build some sort of roof to cut down the sunlight. And then..."

"You can ask us if you need something" Keita intervened for the first time. "My brother Darbi and I will be at your side throughout the work. Whatever you need, we are at your disposal. Don't hesitate to ask, the important thing is the success of the harvest"

Obviously the dragons weren't acting out of charity: maybe Darbi cared about something, but Keita didn't care about helping the farmers. In his view they could do all the work themselves. However, Haku had asked them to assist them for a very specific reason: to gain knowledge about agriculture. Dragons didn't need to farm, since they were carnivores... but Haku had started to think that maybe that knowledge would be useful. If he wanted to avoid having an increasingly large territory and therefore conflict with the newcomers, then the best choice was to start a breeding; but such breeding was useless without the animals having food, which is why Haku was interested in agriculture. If he had managed to obtain all the knowledge of the peasants, it would have been enough for him to own a small piece of land to start a large-scale food production and be able (perhaps) to feed even adult dragons. Since they already had the ability to raise sand worms, which could provide virtually infinite meat if they were in sufficient numbers, all they needed now was to get all the knowledge needed to produce food for those sand worms, at which point they would taken a further step towards the total safety of his family. If his plan was a success, then he would at least get a long-lasting food source that could feed all his siblings and thus prevent them from having to raid other territories and risk angering the wrong people.

Filyus was surprised by Keita's willingness, but didn't ask too many questions. "Of course! Let's work together for a better future, right?" he exclaimed with a laugh. "Come on, let's get busy! So, first of all we need..."