System Change

“Sure,” Avery said and nodded toward Lyra in the distance. “We were just about to head that way.”

“Great!” Derek replied, then turned to the rest of the party. “It was good meeting and working with you all. I’m sure we’ll see each other again soon.”

After that, Derek turned back to Avery, and the two of them walked over to the clearing that Lyra was waiting in. With a quick kick off the ground, Avery landed on his companion’s back and gave her a pat, then, Derek, with Silvi still resting on his shoulder, followed suit, and soon, they were all three on the amphithere’s back.

“Wait!” a voice cried out as Lyra was getting ready to take off.

Derek looked down to see Shae, Walter, and a hesitant Tyron coming over as well.

“Mind if we join you?” Walter asked.

Avery shrugged. “A few extra people’s not going to make a difference to Lyra,” he said. “But you better hold on tight. We’re not going to slow down just because you can’t stay on her back.”

Derek nodded at the trio as they made their ways up. It was obvious why Shae wanted to catch a ride to Savannah—he was the Adventurer’s Guild Master in the city, and his wife was waiting for him to get back. There was both excitement and fear in the man’s eyes. He was excited to get back to his wife, but also scared of what she might do to him for leaving her with all the guild work for such a long time.

For Walter, it would probably be the best way for the old man to get information about his family. They all knew that the city formerly known as Torith had been hit during the war, and Walter had mentioned that some of the contracts he had with his family members were dissolved—meaning that those on the other end of said contracts had most likely perished. On top of that, Clare and Bronson should be in the capital and Savannah’s teleporter would definitely be one of the few there were still active in the kingdom.

He imagined that Tyron was just looking for a way to get to a big city with an active teleporter to get to wherever he wanted to go. Derek didn’t actually know where Tyron was from. Most likely, as the best smith in the kingdom, his forge was probably somewhere in the capital.

Once everyone was mounted on the back of Lyra, with a strong flap of her wings, and after kicking up a sandstorm, they were off. Derek held on tight—used to the pressure caused by the rapid increase in speed. The other three had a harder time, but managed to hang on without much of a problem. Tyron had less of a problem than the other two, but he still looked sick to his stomach. He really wasn’t much for flying or being off the ground in general. Avery stood closer to the front with his arms crossed and eyes closed. The man looked like he was deep in thought.

In a matter of seconds, everyone they left behind looked like ants, and soon, they were no longer visible. Derek had to hand it to the Avery and Lyra, they were a very fast bonded pair with Lyra dipping into Avery’s obviously high dexterity and endurance stats. They really did work well together.

Once Derek got acclimated to being on the back of a flying beast, he let go with his hands and got back to his feet before taking a few steps and arriving next to Avery. “What’s on your mind?” he asked.

“Like I said before,” Avery started. “Something’s not right. I don’t think Alanah would just go out and fight a war alone, just out of the goodness of her heart. Something must have happened that really pissed her off. It also doesn’t help that I can’t reach either her or Edgar with my communication crystal. Either they are out of range, which is possible, or something is blocking communications.”

“Did you try contacting Stella?” Derek asked.

“I am now,” Avery replied.

Derek nodded and waited. He didn’t want to interrupt him while he was talking to Stella. Instead, he looked at the man and tried to read his reactions. Avery was pretty stoic for the most part, nodding his head occasionally in reaction to whatever information Stella was providing. However, at one point, Derek saw anger flash through the man’s eyes, then disappear as quick as it came. Soon, he put his communication crystal away and sighed.

“Well?” Derek asked.

“She is indeed angry,” Avery replied, and clenched his fists. “After or even during her defense of Savannah, a few of our lower tier restaurants in some sub-cities were annihilated. She was able to save most, but didn’t have enough Deathsworn to protect them all. Luckily, most of the invaders had withdrawn to join the all out attack on Savannah. It wasn’t a big loss, definitely not as big of a loss as the combined army suffered at her hands, but it was her people, so she’s not going to take it sitting down.”

“I see,” Derek said, and he did. He didn’t know Alanah all too well, but she seemed to be a rather lonely person who cared about her people. So, even the most minor of losses for her would hurt her.

“All of your people are safe,” Avery continued.

“Oh?” Derek had been thinking about contacting Malorie soon, but it seemed like Avery had asked Stella about them already.

“Yeah.” The man nodded. “They’ve all stayed inside Savannah for the whole war, and mostly stayed inside the Void Emporium. After Alanah’s attack, there isn’t a safer place to be in the kingdom than Savannah. Plus, Natalie is still there, and she and Marcus also put a major dent in the combined army’s capabilities.”

“Void Emporium?” Derek asked.

“Apparently, it’s what they decided to name your shop while you were gone.”

Void Emporium… I like it! Derek was happy that he… allowed them to have the job of naming the shop. “Not a bad name.”

“It’s a little flashy,” Avery replied with a smile.

“Says the guy with a winged serpent companion,” Derek laughed back. “So Natalie and Marcus fought, huh?”

“Yeah. Stella didn’t say much about it, but while Alanah was fighting the army commander, Marcus somehow took out a good portion of the enemy’s Portal Mages.”

“That’s good,” Derek said.

“Also,” Avery said. “Your boy is still at the academy. It’s been on lockdown since the war began, so they haven’t been able to go out and do the usual dungeons for tests. I imagine there has been a lot of sparring and learning, but none of the real life or death combat that the academy likes to put its recruits through.”

“Thomas?” Shae asked from behind them. “That kid’s got the heart of the spear. He’s going to go far. He’s probably already top of his class. Haven’t seen a better spear user since myself.”

“Haha,” Derek laughed. “Hopefully, the kid’s found some trustworthy friends there. He hasn’t had the best track record with that. After his last attempt, I’m not sure he’ll even try to put himself out there again. At least not for a while… but I can’t blame him.”

“You live and learn,” Shae said. “I’m sure he’s fitting in just fine. Just got to prove to everyone his strength, then they’ll go flocking to him in troves.”

Derek nodded and focused his attention back on Avery and Lyra. After hearing about Alanah and Edgar, he was getting an idea, but he wasn’t sure if he’d be able to pull it off. If here were going to, he’d need Avery’s help. “Hey, Avery.”

“Yeah?”

“Do you think Lyra would be able to control all the dragonkin with her mental abilities? You know, the extra ones?” Derek asked as he mentally counted the number of dragonkin in his cells. Let’s see, we have four amphitheres, one of which is meant to go to someone of Tara’s choosing. He nodded along with his thoughts as he continued.

Then there are three drakes, including a lightning drake that Rayna will hopefully be able to tame. After that, we have two wyrms. One of them is nature, so Jacks shouldn’t have a problem fighting one of them with his fire, I just hope he ends up with a rare enough class for it. Then we have Alanah and Brandi’s pair of wyverns. Though, with how Lyra and Avery bonded, Brandi could try for any one of the bunch. By the time she’s ready, her class will surely already be a legendary one.

Avery frowned and crunched up his brows before shrugging. “She said that she doesn’t know. The lesser ones would be fine for a while if she didn’t have to take complete control, but the two wyverns would be a bit much. It would be hard to control everything without accidentally killing one of them.”

“I thought so,” Derek sighed. He still hadn’t used his Void Travel ability, and the last thing he wanted to do was possible harm all the dragonkin they painstakingly collected by using it. Looks like I’ll have to think of something else.

“Why?” Avery asked.

“I had a way that I think I could get to Alanah and Edgar quickly after settling everything in Savannah, but there’s a possibility that it could harm or even kill everything inside my prison,” Derek explained. “That’s not a chance I want to take after all that effort we put into catching them.”

“Hmm…” Avery put his hand to his chin. “I guess that’s the skill that caused Silvi to give all her stored food to that assassin?” There are what? Nine of the lesser dragonkin and two wyverns, right?”

“Yeah,” Derek answered.

“What were there? Two wyverns and a combined nine drakes, wyrms, and winged serpents?”

Derek nodded. “Yup.”

“Lyra could probably handle the drakes and such, and I could constrain the magic based wyvern pretty easily. I’m not sure about the second, though…” Avery seemed lost in thought for a second. “We could get Edward and Edwin’s help, but I’m sure they would want one in return…” It seemed that Avery very much liked the idea of Derek going to find sooner rather than later. “Seems like too much work to just give another one away to the Royal Family.”

“M-me and… Rocky can do it…” Tyron shakily muttered from behind them, causing both Derek and Avery to turn toward him. “No… problem.”

“Great, it’s settled. We’ll do that,” Avery quickly agreed. “I even know just the spot close to Savannah for us to keep them.”

Derek nodded. “Sounds good. Thanks, Tyron.”

“Of course,” Tyron said, but the man looked like he wanted to throw up.

Derek couldn’t help but chuckle again. Apparently, all the stats in the world couldn’t help someone get over heights or being thousands of feet in the air, moving at a rapid pace on the back of a monster. “Hey, Tyron?”

“Yeah?” the big man answered.

“Are you going to be okay?”

“We’ll be fine,” Tyron said, motioning to Rocky, who was curled up around the smith’s feet doing its best to stay as close to the back of Lyra as possible. “If we were meant to fly, we’d have wings,” he muttered.

“I do have wings!” Avery cut in and turned before a magical pair of dragon wings sprouted from his back. “See?”

Derek and Tyron rolled their eyes as Avery put his wings away.

“You know, Tyron…” Derek started. “You could have just gone into my separate space and I could have let you out when we got to Savannah.”

“Oh…” the giant of a smith’s eyes widened in regret. “Can we…”

“No, it’s a static door. We’d have to stop completely. Looks like you’re stuck up here with us.” Derek smiled and turned back around to look ahead. Not long now.