Tales of Astora: Legacy

Chapter 26: Birth of a new empire (part 1)

Chapter 26: Birth of a new empire (part 1)

The Oros continent was an ancient land to the west of Mara, inhabited by an enigmatic race: the dragons. Majestic creatures with the skin hard as stone, they were renowned as the world's most powerful race. Even among their kind, there was a great variety in size, shape and power. You can find dragons at the size of a mountain but also those pygmies which were even smaller than human. Some had a serpent like body while others with a colossal body adorned with two wings. Because of this, it was quite difficult to discern between some dragons and monsters and some unfortunate accidents happened when adventurers mistook dragons for monsters and decided to slay them.

Of course adult dragons wouldn't go down easily but young ones were still vulnerable as their skin has not developed enough. Therefore, to protect its people, the dragon council which served as the government of the dragons, forbad any adventurer or everyone in general to enter Oros without permission.

And yet here they were, a group of a hundred adventurers making a camp on the eastern coast of Oros.

"All right everyone! As you probably know, we are here to hunt down a certain dragon. I know it sounds scary and while most of us here are no match for a dragon, worry not my friends! For this time not only do we have a great number of adventurers ranging from rank B to A, we also have the honor to be accompanied by three S -rank. I present to you ladies and gentlemen: the Sword of Justice party."

From behind the orator, walked up three individuals. From the left a dwarf with a long brown beard holding a giant hammer on his shoulder, from the right a sorceress with a floating crystal orb and finally a swordsman in the middle. The three formed together an S-rank party named Sword of Justice, a rather ridiculous name but mostly because of the captain swordsman who always proclaimed himself as a hero.

"There they are, as glorious as ever. Mind you that there are no more than a twenty S-rank adventurer officially recognized in the world. They are seen as the epitome of power, the hope of the world against monsters and demons. And here we are, three of them are helping us in this mission. How more reassuring can it be? Please give a round of applause everyone!"

The crowd joyfully cheered at the trio. At first many had doubt about this whole expedition. Dragon hunting was no easy task. The creatures were immortal, meaning they would live until someone actually killed them. There were of course exceptions but that usually was very rare. But then a member raised his concern.

"But what about the dragon council? Sure we may be able to kill this dragon but if this gets out and they come after us, we won't be alive for long"

"That's a very good question mate. There is no need to worry about any kind of retaliation as this is a request from a member of the dragon council itself. Therefore no need to worry friend!"

If you were wondering on why on earth would such a quest be accepted by the Guild, it wasn't. This was actually an illegal quest as dragons were considered as a Prime race, meaning this would be counted as assassination rather than monster extermination, therefore forbidden under the law of the Guild Master. However there were many kinds of adventurers and since the reward was unusually handsome, not everyone could turn a blind eye to it.

"All right! Let's do this guys! So which dragon are we hunting?"

"Hum....dragon lord Celdora!"

"....."

"....."

"The fuck man? I thought we are hunting some unknown dragon. Not only the guy is a hero, he is a freaking dragon lord for god' sake. We will be slaughtered." Shouted an adventurer.