Chapter 857 - 867 - Dragon

Chapter 857: Chapter 867 - Dragon

Luke and Cienna were already waiting near the gate, while Lucien stood a short distance behind them with Seran, Aurelia, Mirelle, Tavian, and Auren.

Their luggage had been packed since morning, although Luke had deliberately kept most of it near the houses until they confirmed exactly how many people the tax collector was willing to take.

The carriage passed through the gate with its mounted escort following behind.

The tax collector descended and looked toward Luke.

"Have you decided who will represent the village?"

Luke nodded.

"We have."

The older man waited.

Luke glanced behind him.

The tax collector followed his gaze, then he stared.

Lucien almost laughed.

"All of them?"

Luke scratched the side of his face.

"Eight of us."

The tax collector counted them once.

His eyes paused on Lucien, Mirelle, Tavian, Auren, Seran, and Aurelia.

"Six of you are barely adults."

Luke looked somewhat embarrassed.

"They all have reasons for coming."

The tax collector continued staring at the group for several seconds.

Then he laughed.

"Fine."

Luke blinked.

The older man waved one hand.

"Young people should see more of the world anyway. If all they know is one village and one road, they will never understand how large the kingdom actually is."

That settled the matter far more easily than Luke had expected.

The tax collector surprised them again before departure.

He called one of the officers accompanying him and spoke quietly for a moment. Ten armed men stepped away from the escort and remained near the village gate.

Luke frowned.

"What are they doing?"

"Staying here."

The tax collector said it as though the decision required no discussion.

Luke looked toward the men.

They wore proper armor bearing the insignia of their household.

Even Lucien understood the value immediately.

Any bandit might ignore a village wall.

A man planning trouble would think much harder after seeing armed retainers carrying the insignia of a noble house.

"You do not need to do this," Luke said.

The tax collector looked toward the repaired wall.

"Your village has already dealt with enough while I was late."

Luke seemed ready to argue.

Cienna touched his arm.

That ended it.

Luke bowed his head slightly.

"Thank you."

The tax collector accepted the gratitude without ceremony.

Not long afterward, they departed.

The village gathered beside the road to see them leave.

Lucien looked back once as the wagon began moving.

The wall was stronger now.

Lookouts stood above the gate.

Ten additional armed men were visible near the entrance.

For the first time since deciding to travel, the last portion of his concern eased.

The village would be fine.

At least for a while.

...

The road toward the capital proved far calmer than Lucien expected.

Traveling with a tax collector had obvious advantages.

Every settlement recognized the insignia before the entourage arrived. Guards opened gates quickly. Merchants moved carts aside. Innkeepers somehow discovered better rooms than they had claimed to possess moments earlier.

No bandits appeared.

Lucien found that unsurprising.

Even desperate criminals understood that robbing an ordinary merchant and attacking someone responsible for collecting the Crown’s taxes were very different decisions.

Auren spent most of the first day near the front of the convoy.

He had discovered the tax collector’s coachman within an hour of leaving and immediately started asking questions.

Lucien saw the older driver pointing along the road several times while Auren listened with the concentration of a student receiving secret knowledge.

By afternoon, Auren had already learned which bridges flooded during heavy rain, which crossroads became impassable during the wet season, where horses could safely drink, and which inns should be avoided despite appearing respectable.

Lucien was beginning to understand why Auren’s future ability had revolved around movement.

Even now, the man could barely travel along a road without wanting to understand every possible alternative.

The others spent much of the journey inside the largest carriage with the tax collector.

It was spacious enough to hold them without becoming unbearable, although Tavian complained after several hours that Auren had somehow managed to choose the best seat before climbing outside.

The tax collector used the opportunity to explain more about the ledger.

Lucien finally learned the man’s background as well.

He belonged to House Valedorn, one of the Marquis houses directly serving the Crown in the eastern portion of the kingdom.

He was not the head of the house, though his position and age gave him enough authority that most lesser nobles treated his presence seriously.

Lucien smiled when he heard that.

Marquis.

For a moment, memories of his own era surfaced. His uncles would probably have found the situation amusing.

He had once moved among powers capable of deciding the fate of entire worlds.

Now he was sitting inside a wooden carriage listening to politics.

Somehow, the problems sounded remarkably familiar.

The tax collector explained that the ledger named several minor nobles.

Most were Viscounts. A few were Counts.

Their village itself belonged to the territory of a young Viscount whose family had only recently passed the title to him after his father’s death.

"He is clean," the tax collector said. "At least from everything we have found."

Luke looked relieved.

"Then why were the Iron Jackals operating inside his territory?"

"Because he is young."

The tax collector sighed.

"He inherited the title before he had enough people willing to take him seriously. His household is respected, but several neighboring nobles see inexperience as weakness."

Lucien understood immediately.

"And the Count behind the Iron Jackals took advantage of that."

The tax collector nodded.

"He began with trade."

He explained how merchants associated with the Count had gradually increased their presence near the young Viscount’s territory. Moneylenders followed. Then warehouses. Then gangs such as the Iron Jackals began appearing in districts where local guards were already overstretched.

Nothing happened quickly enough to justify a military response.

Every step looked small when viewed alone.

Lucien leaned back.

"So he was swallowing the territory piece by piece."

The tax collector looked at him with mild surprise.

"That is essentially what we believe."

Luke’s expression darkened.

"If nobody stopped him?"

"Eventually the young Viscount would have found himself ruling a territory whose merchants answered to someone else, whose criminals were protected by someone else, and whose officials were being paid by someone else."

The older man looked toward the ledger stored inside a locked case beside him.

"Thankfully, the young man stole more than money."

Seran nodded solemnly.

"I continue to be underappreciated."

Aurelia smiled.

Lucien barely heard the rest.

Politics tired him.

He had lived through too much of it already.

Kings, nobles, sects, churches, kingdoms, empires, and worlds all found different names for the same struggles.

Lucien had larger problems.

He waited until the discussion naturally slowed before speaking.

"Uncle, what have you heard about the disturbances?"

The tax collector looked at him.

Lucien had started calling him Uncle again sometime during the second day of travel.

The man had never objected.

If anything, he appeared strangely pleased by it.

"Which disturbances?"

"The animals moving strangely. The ground shaking. Reports from forests. Anything unusual."

The tax collector’s expression became more thoughtful.

"There have been many."

Everyone in the carriage became quieter.

"Other tax collectors reported similar things."

He leaned back.

"There is no single location. One district reports deer leaving forests. Another reports livestock refusing to enter certain fields. Hunters in the north found tracks from animals that should never have traveled together. Several villages felt tremors without any known landslide or earthquake."

Lucien listened carefully.

That matched what he already knew.

The disturbances were too widespread for the dragon near their village to explain everything.

Luke looked toward Cienna.

She returned his gaze.

Then Luke spoke.

"There is something we did not tell you before."

The tax collector waited.

Luke’s expression grew serious.

"After your last visit, when you warned us about the disturbances, the forest near our village changed."

He described the silence first, then the fleeing animals, then the herd of boars.

The tax collector listened without interruption.

Luke finally reached the part they had avoided telling outsiders.

"We saw a dragon."

The tax collector froze.

Lucien watched his face carefully.

There was no confusion and disbelief.

Recognition appeared first, then concern.

Seran noticed too.

His posture changed.

The carriage continued moving while the silence inside stretched.

At last, the tax collector exhaled slowly.

"Do not repeat that outside this carriage."

Luke frowned.

The older man continued.

"Some people will laugh at you. Others will believe you."

His expression became grave.

"The second reaction may be worse."

Lucien leaned forward.

"Uncle, have dragons always existed?"

The tax collector looked toward him for a long moment.

Then his eyes moved toward the others.

Everyone waited.

He finally closed his eyes briefly.

When he opened them again, his decision had been made.

"Yes."

No one spoke.

The carriage wheels continued rolling beneath them.

The tax collector lowered his voice.

"Only the royal family, certain noble houses, and a few people trusted by the Crown are taught the older records. Most stories about dragons have been allowed to become legends because that is easier."

Tavian frowned.

"So the stories are real?"

"Some of them."

The tax collector looked toward the window.

"Dragons have existed for longer than this kingdom."

Lucien’s attention sharpened.

That mattered.

"Are they causing the disturbances?"

The tax collector looked back at him.

"We do not know."

Lucien waited.

"There is no proof connecting them directly," the older man continued. "The records describe dragons as creatures that usually avoid human settlements."

Seran’s face changed.

"They killed our family."

The words came quietly.

Aurelia lowered her gaze.

The tax collector looked toward them.

Seran continued before he could answer.

"The caravan that raised us was destroyed by one."

The tax collector remained silent for several seconds.

"I am sorry."

Seran’s jaw tightened.

The older man continued carefully.

"What you experienced does not match most of the records I know."

Seran looked toward him.

"That doesn’t make them harmless."

"I did not say they were."

The tax collector’s expression became heavier.

"It means something may have changed."

That answer silenced Seran.

The tax collector rested one hand against the seat beside him.

"Dragon sightings have increased recently. Most reports never become public. Some come from hunters. Some come from soldiers stationed near remote mountains. A few come from nobles who prefer not to admit what frightened their horses."

Lucien’s eyes narrowed.

"So the Crown already knows."

"They know dragons are being seen more often."

"Do they know why?"

"No."

The tax collector looked genuinely troubled now.

"That is what worries me."

He glanced around the carriage.

"The old records never described dragons as creatures that wandered constantly through human lands. They stayed in remote regions. They avoided settlements unless disturbed."

Seran’s expression hardened.

"Then something disturbed them."

The tax collector nodded slowly.

"Perhaps."

Lucien fell silent.

The tax collector continued.

"If dragons truly begin moving freely through the kingdom, everything changes."

Luke frowned.

"Uncle, what does that mean?"

The older man looked toward him.

"We rule this land because armies, walls, roads, and numbers allow us to."

His eyes turned toward the passing countryside.

"A dragon does not care how many titles a man possesses."

Nobody laughed.

The carriage became very quiet.

Lucien remembered the creature he had seen above the village..

It had still been enormous enough to carry a deer in its jaws as though the animal weighed nothing.

The tax collector sighed.

"Perhaps the old records are incomplete. Perhaps time has changed them. Perhaps something else is happening."

He looked toward everyone.

"Until the Crown understands more, do not spread stories about dragons."

Luke nodded.

The others followed.

Lucien returned his gaze to the window.

His thoughts remained on the ancient world.

Dragons existed.

They had apparently existed for a very long time.

That raised another question.

Were dragons the only primordial creatures born into this world alongside humanity?

Or were there others?

Lucien did not know.

He knew very little.

The realization irritated him.

...

The journey continued.

Five days after leaving the village, the capital finally appeared beyond the road.

Lucien saw the walls first.

Then the towers rising behind them.

Even from a distance, the city looked far larger than anything he had seen in this era.

Auren had returned to the front of the convoy long before they reached the gates.

Tavian pressed closer to the carriage window.

Mirelle tried very hard to pretend she was not doing the same thing.

Seran noticed.

He smiled.

Lucien looked toward the city ahead.

For the first time since entering the ancient past, the wider world truly felt close.

And somewhere inside those walls, he suspected more answers were waiting.