Chapter 55
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The Last Dance Before Midnight
A masked dragon asks the lanternwright for one slow dance
After the conference ended, Ruri slipped away somewhere without Jed or Arwen noticing.
She already knew what the Grand Council Hall looked like.
So she knew where the humans gathered, as well as where the dragon spawns congregated.
Unlike humans, dragon spawns had little to do with high society.
They were not so weak that they needed to flatter someone to build a faction, and it was also a matter of pride as dragons.
Ruri headed to the second floor.
When she climbed the spiral staircase, she saw twelve doors arranged around it.
The Twelve Dragons of Cerdess.
All the dragons were there, whether evil dragons or guardian dragons.
Godwin was there, of course.
Ruri looked up at the grand door carved with a likeness of Silverwind.
“……”
Those sharply jutting horns and that sleek body.
A bearing no one could deny was the very embodiment of valor.
Though more than a hundred years had passed since he left this world, his image still lingered before her eyes.
That lingering image weakened Ruri's resolve.
The loyal maid of Castle Valdrova.
The sharp-witted maid who wielded the wind and answered no when something was no longer right had no place here.
The girl clutching her constricted chest in both hands could do nothing but open the door with difficulty.
Creeeak—.
The sound of the door hinges stretched out.
A long corridor lay beyond.
And soldiers guarding its far end.
They were Silverwind's warriors.
The warriors' idle chatter abruptly stopped.
They turned their gazes toward Ruri.
The entire scene froze in an instant.
“Who are you, kid?”
One of them approached Ruri swaggering, having no idea who she was.
“You smell like someone who carries Lord Silverwind's blood, but I've never seen you before. What kind of spy are you, and where did you come from?”
“……”
“If someone speaks to you, you answer. Or do you want to play rough with this big brother? Huh?”
“That's enough.”
The man sitting with a staff in hand was the one who broke the mounting tension.
He was the leader of the group.
“Don't worry, Captain! Do you think I'd cause an incident by killing someone in Blancaros's territory?”
“Be grateful it's Blancaros's territory. If this were outside, you wouldn't have a bone left intact.”
“What are you talking about? Do I look like some idiot who can't even beat a child this young?”
“You could beat a child.”
His eyes turned toward the maid girl.
“But I don't think you could beat the commander of the mobile brigade.”
“The commander of the mobile brigade….”
Fear appeared in the confident man's eyes.
“Could it be… Ruri of the Blade Wind?”
He turned his head with an expression of disbelief.
He had never seen her face, but her reputation was well known.
As a fellow Silver Dragon spawn, he must have felt fear at the mention of her reputation.
The man backed away, frozen stiff.
The hand he had reached out trembled as he pulled it back.
Ruri walked through the space he had opened and approached the man with the staff resting on his shoulder.
Ruri and the man met each other's eyes.
They had known each other for a long time.
“It has been a long time, Percival.”
“Indeed it has, commander of the First Mobile Brigade. No, since you've retired, should I call you former commander? No, even that won't do.”
The goodwill in Percival's voice had withered away.
“The word ‘turncoat’ suits you perfectly.”
Turncoat.
That three-syllable word seemed to stab into Ruri's chest.
But she had been prepared for this.
“So what brings you here?”
“I have come to see Lord Goz.”
“Then you've wasted your trip. Go back.”
“I would like to speak with him.”
Clang!
The black staff in the man's hand struck the floor.
“It seems you've forgotten a great deal over the past two hundred years, Ruri Silverwind. Since when have Silverwind's proud children been capable of conversation?”
“……”
Silverwind's warriors had been rough by nature.
They were the ones who hunted the demons and frost giants beyond the Ice Barrier.
Action over words.
They were more accustomed to speaking with their bodies.
“I understand.”
Knowing that all too well, Ruri bowed and withdrew.
She turned and began to walk away.
“Wait.”
Percival stopped her. Her half-raised foot halted in place.
“Go in.”
“?”
“The chieftain has given permission.”
She could hardly believe him, but soon learned that it was true.
The door she had thought would never be opened for her began to swing open.
Ruri walked forward again.
An even denser pressure than the one she had felt at the entrance pressed down on her.
Hostile gazes seemed to pierce her like spears.
Under those gazes, she moved her heavy shoulders forward.
The room resembled a king's audience chamber, with a throne facing the main entrance. A man as large as a bear sat upon it.
He was different from the soldiers guarding the entrance.
He wore a luxurious fur coat and gold rings.
Where the clothing failed to cover his skin, ritual-inscribed magical tattoos filled his body.
Everything about him belonged to the Goz Silverwind she knew.
‘No, there's something different.’
The pressure Ruri felt was on an entirely different level from back then.
There was a hierarchy even among dragon spawns, but it was never absolute.
Yet what she felt now was the weight of standing before absolute authority.
The senses sleeping within her told her the answer.
‘Lord Silverwind's… essence?’
After Silverwind's death, Goz, the leader of the Silver Dragon spawns, had absorbed the dragon essence.
‘But it's unstable.’
He possessed the essence, but it had not completely dissolved into him.
He had not fully absorbed Silverwind's power into his own body.
That must have been why he could barely stand on his own two legs like this.
“How is Valdrova?”
He opened his mouth.
He offered no greeting about how long it had been.
“Is Valdrova well?”
He swirled the whiskey in his glass.
Ruri nodded.
“Yes. She is working day and night to drive the monsters from the Far Eastern territories and protect the continent.”
“I see. That must be possible because you have taken good care of her, yes?”
“……Yes.”
“Are you proud?”
“……”
Ruri found it difficult to open her mouth.
Goz's cold gaze stared at her.
“Did I ask a difficult question?”
“No.”
“And yet you have no answer.”
Her answer came like a rope finally snapped by a terrible storm.
“……It is something to be proud of.”
“Yes, I see.”
Crash!
The glass in his hand shattered.
The frigid atmosphere froze completely.
Ruri's body began to stiffen beneath his gaze as well.
“Then will you tell me what nerve this turncoat, who has served that woman so well, has to show up here?”
The atmosphere surrounding Ruri was hostile toward her.
Even so, Ruri opened her mouth.
She had come for this moment, so she had to do it.
“Do you still… hate Lord Valdrova?”
At her question, Goz's gaze grew fierce.
“I understand that your master speaks that way. But do not call that woman ‘Lord’ in front of me. You are a spawn who carries Silverwind's blood. Your only master is Silverwind.”
“I am a Silver Dragon spawn, but she is my master now.”
“Before that woman became your master, Silverwind was your master. Who was Lord Silverwind?”
“The great master of wind and steel.”
“Yes. He was the master of speed whom no one could defeat. He was someone who never wavered.”
The veins in Goz's neck stood out sharply.
“But……”
Ruri felt something within that calm voice.
“But…!”
He was still honing the blade of his vengeance.
“She bit his throat! That woman! She drove her teeth into the inside of his neck and severed his artery! I witnessed that slaughter with these very eyes! I felt it with this very heart!”
“……”
“Did you ask whether I hate her? My hatred for that woman is still burning fiercely in this heart.”
Ruri squeezed her eyes shut.
She could not control the emotions surging higher every time he shouted.
Goz snorted as he watched Ruri suffer.
“His death is still vivid in this heart, but it seems that isn't the case for you.”
“I saw and felt it too. And that pain as well… I feel it vividly.”
Ruri had also taken part in the Dragon-Demon War to kill the demons.
And she had witnessed Silverwind's death.
As a spawn, she too had felt her master's death and grieved.
“I resented my master too.”
It had been unavoidable.
Silverwind had been a father to Ruri.
She could not help but hate Valdrova for driving her father to his death.
“But… I cannot hate him.”
“No, that isn't so.”
Goz denied it.
“If you had truly felt what we felt, you would have abandoned your place at her side.”
“……”
“You were only a little removed from us, yet she tainted you. You forgot your origins.”
Goz picked up a fresh glass and poured himself more whiskey.
“Valdrova is still our enemy. As long as she exists on this continent of Cerdess, our hatred will not end. This is the will of all Silverwind.”
“I see……”
It was what she had expected.
She had already known it was a futile dream.
“But… I will give you a chance.”
A chance.
Ruri raised her head.
“What is it?”
She allowed herself to hope that perhaps she could lessen his hatred for Valdrova, even if only a little.
Goz extended a hand toward Ruri.
“Ruri Silverwind. Return to the embrace of your clan.”
The thread of hope snapped.
“When you say I should return to the clan's embrace… do you mean I should leave Lord Valdrova's side?”
“Now that she has a regent, you have no reason to serve that woman any longer.”
“……”
“You have completed everything Lord Silverwind gave you to do. So return to the clan and become a warrior. Ruri of the Blade Wind. Take your place as commander of the mobile brigade again, crush the vermin pouring down from the north, and serve us. If you do so, I will erase the stigma of ‘turncoat’ from you.”
It was a name that had stabbed into her chest.
But that pain was nothing compared to the responsibility she carried.
“I cannot….”
A natural refusal was about to leave her lips.
At that moment, Ruri's body swayed violently.
“There will be no refusal, Ruri Silverwind.”
The force emanating from Goz's body pressed directly down on Ruri.
“Lord Silverwind's authority now resides in my blood. You know what it means for a dragon spawn to oppose authority, don't you?”
Death.
For a dragon spawn who refused to obey authority, there was only death.
“You will gain nothing by resisting that authority. So….”
Goz pointed at the floor with his index finger.
“Kneel before me and submit.”
Goz was not bluffing.
Ruri, who had not even blinked, began to sweat coldly.
She felt as though someone were strangling her and squeezing her heart.
If she rejected his words, he would inflict pain equivalent to tearing her own heart out.
And this was after he had absorbed only a tiny fraction of Silverwind's essence.
‘I must not cower.’
Ruri resisted with all her might.
She gripped her apron with both hands and forced strength into her trembling legs.
That was the best she could do.
And that was all.
“You endure remarkably well.”
There was genuine admiration in his voice.
It was enough power to make any other spawn kneel long ago.
“Yes. That must be why Lord Silverwind favored you.”
Goz did not like that attitude.
He did not want to make her submit through authority alone.
That was far removed from the complete submission Goz sought.
“If it is so difficult for you to leave, shall I make the decision easier for you?”
Goz tilted his head.
“The regent surely knows your true identity. But does that man know why you went there as well?”
“……!”
The composure settled upon her face shattered.
Her sweat-soaked hands dampened her apron.
“Do you think that man will protect you even after hearing who you are?”
Ferda Valdrova.
He loved Valdrova.
And he was merciless toward anyone who posed a threat to her.
‘If Lord Ferda learns of this……’
What would Ferda do?
The resolve with which she had been enduring the pressure crumbled into doubt.
‘I…’
Fear overwhelmed her.
The pressure constricted her breath so tightly that she could not even scream.
‘What should I do……?’
She sank completely into a viscous swamp.
She screamed without making a sound.
Please.
Please, someone help me.
“Sorry to barge in unannounced, but…”
The answer that reached Ruri's ears came in a familiar voice.
“What are you doing to my servant?”
* * *
Ferda was making his way to find Ruri.
Finding Ruri was not difficult.
She had said she was going to speak with Silverwind.
So she would be beyond this grand door carved with Silverwind's likeness.
Ferda stood before it and thought.
‘Am I meddling for no reason?’
Valdrova's servant.
But she was also a spawn who carried Silverwind's blood.
She must have been angry at Valdrova, but perhaps she had no ill feelings toward Ruri herself.
Ferda had no reason to interfere in a family reunion.
But.
He tried to think that way, yet it was not easy.
While he had been at the Grand Council, Ferda had recalled the expression on Goz Silverwind's face.
At the same time, Erika's warning came to mind.
-The enemy you need to watch is someone else. Silverwind.
Dragons were immortal.
Once they embraced vengeance, they never let it go.
The same was true of Silverwind.
‘Was it a mistake?’
Even if Ruri threw a tantrum,
Even if Valdrova asked him to, should he have refused?
Ferda could not shake the thought.
That was why he reached the spawns' lounge.
What he saw were Silverwind's soldiers guarding the door to the inner chamber.
And a thick dragon fear.
There was no doubt.
This was not meddling for no reason.
Ferda walked toward the center of that presence.
“Are you Regent Valdrova?”
Percival, a dragon spawn with a staff slung over his shoulder, rose from his seat and asked.
“Is Ruri here?”
“Answer my question.”
“I asked whether Ruri Silverwind is here.”
Percival did not back down. He blocked Ferda's path.
“She is here.”
“Then move aside.”
“This is a family matter, Regent. It is not your concern.”
No matter what the circumstances, one should not meddle in family affairs.
Especially in dragon society, that was an inviolable boundary.
But Ferda did not respect that boundary.
“If you intend to stop me, you will have to break something.”
Ferda's blue eyes stared straight at him.
“Then Blancaros's Hand will discipline you. Can you bear the disgrace of Silverwind's descendants causing trouble?”
“……”
“If you are confident, then do it. I am prepared to lose something.”
Percival stepped aside.
He gestured to his subordinates, making them withdraw completely.
Ferda opened the door.
He saw Ruri.
He saw her about to kneel before Goz.
He saw her suffering.
At that moment, every distracting thought vanished from Ferda's mind.
His vision focused sharply on a single point.
On a thug pretending to be a king.
“Sorry to barge in unannounced, but…”
Ferda spat out the anger he had been holding in.
“What are you doing to my servant?”