Deus Necros

Right in front of Ludwig, a dragon, that seemed almost as if it was birthed by nature itself stood. The creature filled the clearing without needing to move; the forest seemed to have grown around it long ago, a living hill of layered bark and emerald scale where moss clung like old velvet and lichen threaded pale sigils over the curve of its ribs. Antlered horns, grown in spirals like seasoned oak, swept back from a brow ridged as a cliff. When it breathed, the air warmed as if a green furnace lived behind its teeth, and the scent that came with it was rain in leafmold, split resin, crushed pine needles, clean, but deep, old, and absolute.

Panic? Fear? None of that was even crossing Ludwig’s mind. No, it was simple awe of majesty. His fingers tightened, then steadied; the steadiness surprised even him. Somewhere in his chest, the Heart of Wrath gave one slow, deliberate thrum, as if marking the presence of something it would never dare to rage against.

“Wow, you really are pretty,” Ludwig said.

The words left him without ornament or mockery, only the frank observation of a swordsman who had seen too many ugly miracles. His voice seemed small against the breadth of the chest before him, yet it carried plainly, the forest itself bearing it along the dark, green corridors of bough and shade.

“Pretty?” the Dragon tilted his head, and the tilt moved branches high above as though a whole canopy had considered the phrase. “I do not know what to feel about that… regardless, young one. How did you come to the conclusion that I was here?”

The question did not pass the lips; it rang within bone and thought, each word set down carefully, like a heavy stone placed into a river to shape the current. As it spoke, a scatter of dry needles slid from its horn-crowns and fell soundlessly to soft humus.

Ludwig resisted the urge to inspect the dragon, after all, most high leveled and powerful people can feel it. And he would probably turn to tree nutrients the moment he does that. His gaze stayed on the meeting of scale and moss, on the way sap had crystallized along one corner of a plate like amber caught mid-tear. He measured breath through his teeth and let it out as a thin ribbon. The lantern’s weight at his belt felt suddenly more conspicuous than metal should.

Ludwig held his lantern up, “Do you know this?” Ludwig said.

The iron ring bit against his glove. The pale flame within the glass lifted as if to look, a small pupil of fire gathering itself.

“I do, it is one of Necros’s trinkets. A tool that defies the laws of the world, but it is a tool of a god, and those are more than allowed to do as they wish… still,” the dragon reared its head, and the clearing seemed to widen just to make space for the motion, “You have yet to answer me.”

A slow crease chased along its throat scales as it drew in the scent of the thing. The moss along its shoulders trembled, then lay flat again. The weight of attention settled so wholly upon Ludwig that the hush around them deepened to a pressure.

“Inside it, there is a lich.” He did not lift his chin when he said it. Statements, here, needed no height, only clarity.

“And you dare bring that abomination to a land of life and greenery? Explain yourself, else you’ll find yourself back at your lord’s embrace.” The low vibration of the last word made the humus crawl, tiny white rootlets writhing as if they, too, could understand threat. Somewhere behind Ludwig’s ribs, instinct drew lines: here the breath, here the distance to the jaw, here the weight of Nightbreaker at his back, and then erased them all as useless. There was no line to draw against this. If he acted in violence he’ll be met with more of the same. Deadlier even.

“Hold your horses now…” Ludwig realized the irony of his own statement and coughed, a short, dry acknowledgement of his own mouth running before his thought, “I mean, I slew the Lich, and his soul is now in the lantern; this is one of his tools.” Ludwig held up the Lich’s staff.

The black wood drank the dim; it did not gleam. Rings of old sigils etched with thin, hungry script caught a little light and gave nothing back.

“A branch of the world tree… the corruption on it is too powerful, you must rid yourself of this thing.”

The dragon’s pupils narrowed. A wind that had not existed a moment before slid through the clearing and combed the moss backward, as if the forest itself recoiled from the staff. The taste of iron rose on Ludwig’s tongue, sudden and thin.

“I still need it, I got a lot of enemies I need to beat,” No bravado. Threadbare practicality. His forearm tightened and loosened on habit, as if testing a parry he would never need in front of this being. The words left a small wake of heat in the air, his need, spoken aloud, felt almost vulgar under these boughs.

“Then was the lich the one that told you of my existence? I have had an encounter with him before, slippery as a snake, still I find it difficult to… never mind… I can see your heart… so that is how you won…”

“I didn’t have the heart when we fought, and technically I never won against him.” The admission was cool water down a hot blade. He let it stand without embroidery. Truth sometimes was the least offensive offering.

“I see… still, young one, you seem to be in a precarious position, your body doesn’t feel as if it should exist. You have too much vitality for that tiny body of yours, even a young dragon would find it hard to maintain their sanity with the Heart of Wrath inside them… but you… A feeble, weak, and scrawny human are more than capable of suppressing its nefarious urges… I lived long yet learned something new…” As the judgment unfolded, a hush moved through the leaves around them like beasts lying down.

“Everyone has their secrets old man,” Ludwig said.

“I am no man,” the dragon replied, not with offense but with the patience of a mountain correcting a traveler’s map, “But I understand your reasoning… the lady of the elves had spoken of you, young one, I see that you still carry her keepsake.”

“The acorn,” Ludwig placed the staff back inside his ring and pulled the acorn forward.

It lay in his palm like a small, living sun gone to seed, golden, veined, warm with a quiet life that did not belong to his story and yet had found its way into it. The light around them bent a fraction, as if to greet an old authority.

“I came to see with my own eyes the intruder to the forest, but it seems you have your own invitation. You may leave,” the dragon said.

No rustle as a gate opens; no creak of hinges. Only the sense of a lock withdrawing its teeth from a door not visible a moment ago.

“Oh, thank you,” Ludwig nodded and was about to head forward. He did not hurry his first step; he set it carefully, as one sets glass down on stone. Nightbreaker rode light along his shoulder, subdued as a hound in a cathedral.

“Still, young one. Be wary of that which you cannot understand. The weapon you carry, the heart you hold, and the task you’re given… Not all is as it appears, and not all that is spoken is true.” The counsel moved with the warmth of breath across the back of his neck and then away. No lecture, no weight, only direction set down like a cairn on a high road: pass this way with care.

The dragon, like how it appeared, simply melted into the very forest, disappearing from sight.

It did not withdraw; the forest received it. Scales unspooled to leaf, horn to branch, mass to hill. In the end, there was only a drift of warmer air, then even that belonged to the trees.

[You are no longer being watched]

The message thinned and went out like a wick pinched between forefinger and thumb.

And immediately, the forest, which looked like a maze, simply opened up in front of Ludwig. Light tore through the trees, and the darkness dissipated. Opening a path forward that even Ludwig didn’t see before.