I Guess I'm a Dragon Now (Part 1)

Captive

"Is it really alright to be this close?" Someone nearby asked, and Ergen slowly opened his eyes as the voice woke him up. For some reason, he felt as if he were on a moving platform, and he also felt horribly restricted as he seemed to be inside of a cage that was way to small for his large body. And as he found himself in this situation, Ergen suddenly remembered how he'd gotten here in the first place. The fairy and the elves that he'd went out of his way to help had betrayed him, even after he'd risked his life in fighting both the fenrir and the frost trolls... Even if he'd been human himself once, his every experience that this world had given him led to nothing but mistrust for the other races, and Ergen was starting to think that he couldn't trust anyone but perhaps other dragons until he spotted Rae sleeping in front of him. And when he spotted her, all Ergen could do was glare at her, snorting as he began trying to bend the metal bars of the cage with his claws.

"You're awake..." Rae said softly as she sat up from the wooden plank she'd been sleeping on. "I'm... I'm so sorry. I never thought that this would happen... Please don't look at me like that."

Watching the tiny fairy, Ergen snorted again in disgust as he saw that she was about to cry again. Her tears wouldn't work on him again, not after what had happened last time. And even if she hadn't led him to the people who had now captured him on purpose, Ergen still felt betrayed enough to see her as an enemy.

"It sounds like it's awake..." The same soldier from before commented nervously, though Ergen couldn't even see the man past the large tent that had been thrown over his cage on the wagon. The only thing that he could see were the bars and boards front of him, but that was only thanks to the small holes in the fabric above him that allowed a small amount of sunlight inside. Rae's light was also helping him see, but he didn't want to credit her with anything at the moment.

"Why don't you climb inside to make sure?" Another person asked in a teasing tone. "It should still be asleep, so it should be fine."

"Are you kidding?! I don't want to die yet!" The man from before said in aghast.

"Aren't you supposed to be a soldier? Are you going to cry from just one overgrown lizard?" The other soldier mocked.

'Hey...' Ergen thought as he heard the man, his feelings slightly hurt at being called a lizard. He had a dragon's pride, after all.

"I- I'm not going to cry!" The first guard, who sounded very young, seemed to have had enough of the goading before Ergen saw that the tent's fabric started fluttering around his head while someone messed with it. And as the person did, Ergen waited calmly before the tent finally was removed to reveal what appeared to be a beastkin in his late teenage years. He seemed to be completely human save for the wolf ears, tail and fangs sticking out of the side of his mouth. However, Ergen was the monster here, and he couldn't resist suddenly slamming the side of his head against the metal bars restraining him as soon as the tent had been removed. And, just as planned, the spooked beastkin stumbled backwards, completely falling off of the wagon before landing with a thud outside. Everyone outside started laughing hysterically at the kid, and more than anything, Ergen wished that he could have seen the scene outside as he took revenge against at least one of his captors.

Continuing the attempt to free himself, Ergen soon found that the metal bars forming his cage seemed to be incredibly strong. Strong enough that he couldn't break them, at least, as he was merely bending the metal with every hit instead of ripping it apart. He just needed to get outside long enough so that he could fly away, though for some reason the stubborn bars refused to break completely, even if the wood keeping the bars to the wagon didn't seem to be as durable.

With the wood splintering as Ergen tackled the side of his small cage, the fabric completely fell off as the cage finally separated from the wagon and rolled onto the ground beside it. Rae was left behind on the wagon, leaving Ergen to thrash around even more in an attempt to free himself as his cage was instantly surrounded by people with long spears. And before they even grew close, Ergen attempted to breathe a stream of frost at them, only to be surprised as the bars of his cage seemed to somehow have the same barrier that mages could cast. He wasn't about to give up there though as Ergen lunged forward and grabbed five of the bars in his jaws, attempting to ignore the pain of his teeth as he applied pressure and slowly bent the bars apart from one another.

"Stop now or we'll skewer you!" Ergen heard one of the soldiers yell, and he looked around them begrudgingly as more and more soldiers ran forward, all of them holding large spears so that they could stab at him from a safe distance.

"Please stop! They'll kill you if they can't capture you!" Rae flew into Ergen's cage and landed on his snout before pleading to him, and he felt the anger that had suddenly taken over him slowly dissipate as he knew that she was right. But what right did they have to take him anyway, and what did they want? Why couldn't he talk to ask them this himself?!

Growling in frustration, Ergen reluctantly released the bars, glaring daggers at everyone around him before Farell and the same group of elves that normally followed him walked up to the cage. And when he did, Ergen continued his low growl before the man sighed to himself and got off of his mount. Once on the ground, Farell took what looked like a scroll out of his saddlebag before unrolling it and turning towards Ergen. As he cleared his throat to speak, Ergen tensed as he thought that he was possibly about to be struck by a spell of some sort. However, that didn't seem to be the elf king's intention as the man simply began reading from the scroll.

"By the edict of the Demon King, the water dragon by the name of  Ergen is to be captured but not harmed in any manner. The soldiers under the command of King Farell are to detain and escort Ergen to his majesty's castle, in which he will be free to do as he chooses." Farell announced before lowing the scroll and looking at Ergen with a hint of fear in the man's pure green eyes. "Apparently, your coming to the mountains was foretold by an oracle of all things, and the Demon King followed that oracle's advice which led us to where we are now."

'How do they know my name?' Ergen thought to himself as he cautiously watched the man.

"The oracle also said that you were intelligent, so I will make you an offer, Ergen." Farell said. "Follow us willingly to the Demon King and hear what he has to say and I will free you from that cage. If you do not, then we will be forced to transport you there in bars. So, do we have a deal?"

'How can they possibly know all of this?' Ergen wondered as he replayed the man's words in his mind again and again. He'd never met any of these people before save for Rae, and they'd known that he was intelligent before having even come to the mountains? Was saving this man's daughter just a side quest or something similar to lead him into a trap?

 This 'oracle' seemed to have some kind of divine vision or something, and Ergen wasn't to happy about these people being able to find them whenever it suited them. Though, seeing as they had gone through all of this trouble, Ergen was curious as to just what the Demon King wanted from him. However he was also hesitant enough to wonder if he should approach the man or not. Who knew just what kind of powers the demon king in this fantasy world had, and would Ergen even stand a chance against him? All of these questions stormed through Ergen's mind, though even if he didn't know what he wanted to do just yet, one thing was absolutely clear. And that was that he wanted out of the cage as soon as possible.