Oh man, I'm back. Sorry I took so long to make another chapter, I was quite a bit busy in my regular life. Hope you all can understand.
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After saving the distressed Aaron, we reconvened in the throne room. Tsubarian was back to his feet and was already waiting for us there.
"Welcome back to the waking world, Cason." he smiled in his dragon form. "Likewise," I said.
"So, the reason I called you all back here is to decide what to do about Kani." I said. "If she's anything like Tsubarian, she could be rather useful, but I won't let her marry you," Luna said.
"What do you think, Deliva?" I asked. She didn't answer as she was more focused on what was in her hands. "So fluffy~ ❤" she smiled as she kept petting Kani, who was struggling to escape. Her smile, pierced and radiated the entire room, banishing the darkness. It hurt too much to look at for too long.
"I guess that's the answer to that ..." I said. I looked back at Luna.
"Any objections?" I asked the other 2. "Only to the marriage," Luna responded.
"I do ..." Aaron said as he poofed into his humanoid form. "I don't think I'll be able to handle it." he wined.
"You have shown yourself!" Kani smiled as she did one last Super Struggle, which broke her from Deliva's tight grasp. She jumped up and with her tiny wings, tried to fly over to Aaron in great difficulty. She landed in Aaron's hair, "So fluffy~ ❤" she snuggled on it.
"Do you see what I mean?" Aaron sighed. He tried to pull Kani off his head but to no avail. Kani was instead happy that Aaron had touched her.
"So what do you think, Kani?" I asked her myself. "I want to come with, as long as I have him," Kani responded with glee.
"Guess that answers that ..." I sighed, "Bad luck buddy.". "Fine ..." Aaron tried once more to get Kani off of him, this time he succeeded. "I'm going to have a bad time with you... " He set Kani down, and fell on the ground with a clatter, in his sword form.
I bent down to pick him up, but Kani beat me. She bit Aaron from the hilt and had begun to drag him away. I took Aaron from her, "Not now." I said to her. I handed her to Luna to hold, where she stayed put.
I sheathed Aaron back on my back; I turned to the big lizard in the room. "What?" he said with confusion. "So the marriage?" I asked him.
"Oh that." he took a second to think over it. "She doesn't seem to be that interested in you ... " he sighed, "I don't want her to be unhappy. You can travel with her for now. Maybe Imis has a better call ..." he sighed.
"Who's Imis?" I asked. "Well... that's a little complicated. Erm, you see, I had a wife, the mother of Kami here. And well ... some stuff happened and she, erm, dragged me to dragon court. There the judges were so ruthless they gave her everything, almost full control of the kingdom. But jokes on her, I still had this cave and I still have Kami." he huffed.
"So you aren't the dragon king anymore?" I asked. "I mean, I still am on paper ... but she kinda ... banished me from my own kingdom." he sighed. "Harsh ..." Luna commented.
"I won't poke into your personal issues too much. Where exactly is the dragon kingdom?" I changed the subject. "Head southeast from here, it's about 2 days flying distance. On horseback that would be ...." he moved his claws in the air. "- 1 week and a day. Then there's the Dragon Forest to travel through... So a week and a half?" he said.
"We're going to need some supplies for that trip, anything you can give us?" Luna said to him. "I can give you a carriage full of food and some gold, not much else. I don't have any horses to give you ..." he looked off to space. "We don't need gold. And how do you think we'd go anywhere with that carriage without horses?" I asked.
"How else did you get here with her?" he pointed at Deliva, who was busy petting Kani in Luna's arms. "Good point ..." I sighed.
"Anything else?" Tsubarian asked. "Nope," I said to him. "Then begone, you have some traveling ahead of you," he said.
The other dragon from the room opened the door for us and bowed. After all of us had exited the room, he followed us along the hallway and opened the door that lead out. A snowstorm was taking place outside.
The dragon sighed, "Cursed cold-bloodedness, I'll have to set up the heating systems for Tsu. Go along now, I can't help you out there. I'll bring out the carriage in a second.".
"Thanks ..." I said as he slammed the door behind us. It was freezing out there, Kani was trying to snuggle as close to Luna as possible, which annoyed her greatly. She handed Kani to Deliva, who had better insulating material and then cursed to the sky.
"We should get back to the horses..." I said. "Not in this weather." Luna pointed out. "Maybe I have something ..." I opened my skills.
There sadly was nothing there that could help us. I picked up a close-by rock and chucked it out into the snow. "I don't have anything." I sighed.
The dragon reappeared, "Here." he pushed the cart toward us. He quickly closed the door on us.
The carriage was a painted black cedar wood frame, with a classic basic white tarp on the top. It was nothing special, the run of the mill, regular carriage.
I studied the cart some more, testing the wood in some places. The others hopped into the carriage and closed the tarp after them. "It has the food they promised," Luna said.
"We still need to get back to the camp, our horses are still there," Deliva called out to me.
After studying the cart some more, an idea went into my head. "Maybe..." a dark smile moved across my face. I started to look for wood on the carriage that could be put to better use.
.........
"You sure this is safe?" Deliva called from inside the warm carriage. "I am 80% sure it is. If not, you're not going to die alone." I called back as I was finishing up the tweaking and carving on a tail for the carriage.
No response came back to me.
I put the small wooden dagger into my pocket. It had helped me carve the design and parts to help build this odd idea. Aaron wanted to stay warm anyway.
"Time to roll out." I chuckled to myself. Damn, have been away from Earth for that long?
I walked to the front of the modified carriage and got up into the driver's seat. I got myself ready for the string of skills and spells to it started.
I cleared my throat and drew in a big breath of air, "[Aerodynamic] [Fluid Resistance Down] [Material Resistance Up] [Weight Reduction 20%] [Rapid Spin] [Mobility] [Heat Barrier] [Warmth]." I said.
The modified carriage began to move forward, being pulled by the 3 propellers.
The entrance of the indent leading to the Dragon King's was probably long enough, I hoped. The semi-good news is that if it failed, I would have a quick death. The terrible news is that I would feel that death, thanks to my Summoned Skill ...
All the HP and DEF in the world can't save you from all your bones being shattered and all your organs exploding when you crash from this high up.
"Fuck it." I poured more mana into the carriage, making the propellers spin even faster. The wind rushed around me as we moved to the very end of the cave.
"Come on, come on, come on come on come on comeoncomeoncomeon" I pulled back the controls as hard as the wood could withstand.
We flew off the runway at a good enough speed. We traveled a little in the air, that was before we turned down and went into a steep nosedive.
"Fuck!" I yelled, but the moving wind drowned out my voice. I pulled back even harder, to the point where I felt wood start to splinter in my hands.
The nose tipped back up the closer we reached to the sharp and rocky mountainside. "Come on," I said as we were approaching a dangerously close line to crash.
The wooden plane jerked up seconds before impact, which relieved me greatly. I took a reassuring sigh into the cold snowfall, which was slightly heavier than before.
"Yes..." I sighed again as we got a good enough altitude. The snow would bounce harmlessly off the barrier, although it would still block my sight as it drifted.
The spinning blades were a bit noisy, I would have made [Sound Barriers] for them but I couldn't take my concentration from the controls. Damn, who would have thought all the time I had spent learning about the World Wars would help me make this plane.
I focused back into the sky. 'I doubt it has enough power to get above the clouds right now.' I noted in my head. Maybe some upgrades when I had the materials, now was not the time.
I tipped the nose of the wooden plane a bit downward, to be parallel to the mountain. After a few minutes of following the mountainside, the snow on the ground reduced until there was no bit of snow left. The green trees and grass at the very edge of snowfall. It was an interesting sight.
It was about 10 minutes after flying down the mountain that we finally saw where it the camp was. I judged a close by a flat strip of flat land that I could possibly land on.
I realized my mistake too late. 'How do I land?' I semi-panicked. I just guessed that slowly going at a soft angle would help to some extent.
So I did, I circled around the camp for another 5 minutes waiting for the angle to connect to the ground.
I slowed down as much as I could before we landed. "Hold on!" I yelled back to them as we touched the ground. The plane bounced a bit, harshly until it dug into the dirt. I heard some wood snap.
The plane slowed to a halt and fell back from the stop. I canceled all the movement spells I had cast on it. I sighed as it was semi-successful. "We have landed," I said back to them.
I jumped off and looked for the piece of broken wood. After a bit of inspecting, I found a crushed wheel back wheel that couldn't take the strain.
"That's easy to replace, but also there's the control stick ..." I mumbled to myself. Time for some repairs.
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If you're wondering what the plane kinda looks like, here's a Very Very Basic Design that I drew.
Sorry for my shitty drawing skills.