The Unbidden: A New World (1) (Short Parts)

Part 68

***

I scratched another tally mark on the wall of the cavern. It'd been almost five months since I took over as the unborn dragon's guardian. No one, not even the Absolvers of Yuna, came back. I had gone out a fair distance and dug a very large hole in order to fit the dead baby dragon.

When I mulled around later, I found the essence from Loht had drastically increased my strength, as rolling the egg to the grave was much easier than I anticipated.

I ended up using Loht's body to nourish myself. It felt wrong at first, but I got over it rather quickly. Predators ate their prey. I was no different in that sense. Loht was by all technicalities my pre, and she would've eaten me all the same, so I figured it wasn't that big of an issue. I did, however, make sure not to eat near the egg.

I thought about coming up with a name for the dragon. It was pretty hard to tell the truth. I wanted to give it a name symbolic for its mother, but that idea flopped when I realized I didn't even know why they called her Loht in the first place. Were they names the dragons gave themselves, or were they ordained by those they preyed on? I probably wouldn't ever get to know the answer. I thought about giving it my name, but then I thought of the hijinks that might stem from that.

In the end, I decided I would name it after my late father, Hargen. It was a simple and plain name that didn't really assume much when you visualized it, but I wanted to keep my father alive other than in my memories, somehow. After all, I was never going to see him again.

I talked to Hargen occasionally throughout the days. Usually after I ate, or whenever I had deep thoughts and needed someone to talk to. Hours had turned to days, days turned to weeks, and weeks turned to months. I had been guarding Loht's child with my life for almost ten months before I noticed something was wrong with Hargen.

His shell had become cold over the course of several days. The first thing I tried was to heat it up, but the heat never lasted long. It was still almost a hundred degrees outside, so it didn't make sense to me. I thought long and hard about it for a while before I came up with a solution. It turned out to be the right close to the answer.

I spent almost four hours of my day everyday using my Palm Fire and increasing it to a moderate intensity to keep the egg warm enough, but it wasn't enough. I had to do it in the early mornings until the sun rose to its peak, then again in the afternoon, and before I went to sleep.

I thought if I went to sleep at all, the amount of time that transpired before I awoke would be the end of Hargen. My solution was pretty harsh. I stayed up for eighteen hours almost every day keeping a decent blaze going.

My body never really felt the exhaustion from using so much magic since I absorbing Loht's essence, but the physical exhaustion was something else. When you're reduced to a human space heater, things could get really boring and tiring. More frequently than not, I found myself dozing off. I nearly caught myself on fire a number of times, and through sheer force of will, managed to stay awake long enough to reach that gifted sleep time.

"You know, I hope you don't hatch and try to eat me right away," I joked.

As usual, I got no response. I never expected one, but damn would it have been nice to hear. My constant use of magic as a space heater prevented me from training at all. If I wanted to train, I couldn't keep Hargen warm. If I kept Hargen warm, I couldn't train.

I scratched a diagonal tally mark across four straight ones.

"Well, that marks exactly one year having been stuck here," I mumbled to myself.

I hadn't bothered to shave at all. My facial hair grew out rather splendidly, I thought. I didn't have a mirror to check, so I just assumed it was good based on touch. Hargen never told me otherwise, and silence was consent in this case. It was just another day of "heat the dragon".

If I could get paid to do this, I'd be one rich man, I thought.