That day, Elaine danced for the first time in her life.
She had suddenly gotten a dance teacher a while ago, but she didn’t realize it was for this day.
And she never knew dancing could be so fun and exciting.
“Speaking of being a temple student, you also have learned to dance well. You’re pretty good at it considering you only studied for a short time.”
“Thank you. I’ll be careful not to step on your foot.”
“You can step on it. As long as I don’t show that you stepped on it, no one will know.”
Elaine burst out laughing at Sergey’s joke.
It was the first time in a while that Elaine had laughed out loud like that.
A clear laugh, dangling sapphire earrings, rosy cheeks, a dress embroidered with flowers like stars, pale, slender arms, and shoulders, a fragrant smell that is hard to describe.
Sergey felt good about everything about Elaine.
‘Is this what they call pretty? Yes, that’s right. Elaine is pretty! Oh! I guess I can finally tell the difference between a human’s beauty and ugliness.’
Although his thoughts were somewhat off-focus, Sergey simply looked at Elaine with a pleased look and led the dance.
Without even noticing that Elaine’s heart was trembling endlessly at that gaze.
And the two people, excited by a strange emotion, did not even notice that Malek was watching them.
‘The dragon energy that was coming from Elaine disappeared again. Wait. Then the one controlling it is…!’
Malek’s gaze was fixed on Sergey.
‘Sergey Lindell! This human is blocking all the energy coming out of Elaine’s body!’
He couldn’t help but think that way right away.
Sergey is a human that Malek can’t sense any energy, and when Sergey isn’t around, Elaine’s body radiates dragon energy.
As Malek thought about it, the puzzle began to come together in his head.
‘That’s not human, it might be the dragon I know…?’
Malek’s smile grew deeper than ever.
* * *
During the time when Malek was desperately searching for the Dragon Stone, he also heard the story of a black dragon appearing in the human world.
It wasn’t all that surprising that the dragon was born from a mother dragon with strong magical powers but was abandoned in the human world because the egg was deformed, or that the dragon that was born healthy was much stronger than the average dragon.
What was surprising was the story that Rabes had given his contractor a magical core and that he was interfering in the human world at his contractor’s request.
‘You’re having all the fun by yourself. I should have just come down to the human world by myself instead of trying to convince other dragons.’
‘If that were the case, I could have ruled the human world as I wished.’
Anyway, at that time, he was so busy looking for the Dragon stone that he didn’t have the energy to pay attention to anything else, so his impressions of the Black Dragon Rabes ended there.
But when he heard that the dragons, having failed in their attempts to calm Rabes, were going to seal him as a last resort, he had an idea.
‘It seems that Rabes cares a lot about his contractor, so wouldn’t it be possible to use that human to seal Rabes?’
This was an opportunity to obtain a large quantity of dragon stones.
He could seal Rabes on behalf of the dragons who were reluctant to come down to the human world and receive the dragon stone in return.
‘I’d like to ask them to take the magic cores themselves, but they’d probably be destroyed on the spot, but with the amount of dragon stones floating around in the human realm, they’d probably agree.’
After doing some calculations, he risked his life and went to see the deputy elder of the Dragon Clan Council.
When he returned to the dragon village after being banished, the dragons treated him as if they were going to kill him at any moment.
But the moment he brought up the elder’s most troubling concern, all attacks stopped.
[I will help you seal that black dragon!]
[What can you do with not much magic power left?]
The elder’s eyes were murderous, but the fact that his attacks had stopped meant that he was interested in Malek’s story.
Malek hid his fear and negotiated with a gentle smile.
[Just leave it to me. Even if I fail, you won’t suffer any losses.]
[What are you planning to do now?]
[I don’t have a plan, I just want a deal. If I succeed in sealing the black dragon, give me ten dragon stones.]
[Dragon stones?]
The elder seemed puzzled by Malek’s desire for the dragon stone but soon nodded as if he understood.
[You’re trying to suck out the magic power in the dragon stones.]
In a way, he was correct, but the dragons, who did not know what happened when a dragon ate a dragon stone, thought that Malek was trying to survive by feeding on the dragon stone’s magic power.
[Okay. If you succeed, I’ll give you the ten remaining Dragon Stones on Earth. But what are you going to do? You can never seal that Rabes with your magic power.]
[Please let me know the sealing order. It will look great.]
Until then, it was half a gamble.
But perhaps it was fate. Molly, a witch who was Lancer’s assistant, helped him.
“De Jarre Omnia! Divine dragon, answer my call!”
While hanging around Lancer and Rabes, Malek happened to witness Molly trying to summon a dragon with her poor summoning skills. He decided to take advantage of her, who was filled with inferiority and jealousy toward Lancer.
Malek, who appeared as if responding to her summoning spell, studied a method to seal Rabes using Molly.
The Emperor’s support at that time also helped considerably.
“I will make sure that you will have nothing lacking in this Calais Empire, so eliminate Lancer Aquinal.”
The emperor secretly asked Malek, who pretended to be a foreign wizard, to do something.
The emperor’s inferiority complex and anger toward Lancer was evident on his face as he asked Malek, a foreign wizard, to get rid of Lancer he had been using for so long.
‘Everyone seems to feel inferior to that human called Lancer. After all, He’s only human, so what’s the difference?’
He thought it was so easy, but Lancers were definitely different from humans like the Emperor or Molly.
Not only did he become a contractor for the black dragon Rabes, who possessed tremendous magical power, but he also received a piece of his magical core. Instead of trying to become the ruler of the world or enjoy wealth and honor, he only focused on incomprehensible things.
He visited villages that the royal family and nobles had neglected, dug wells, eliminated evil spirits, and eliminated bandits. He also secretly spent his own money to help slums where witches lived.
He traveled to villages where natural disasters had struck and brought relief to the people, hunted down the wicked and reduced the crime rate, and took nothing in return from the poor.
That is why the people praised the Lancer more than the emperor or the royal family.
‘The Emperor doesn’t like the fact that Lancer is more popular than him, and the witch named Molly is upset that Lancer is a dragon’s contractor.’
The human called Lancer was incomprehensible, but the other humans were not much different from the humans Malek had seen for a long time.
Although Lancer was a truly nobleman, Malek did not like him either.
‘Imitating God to a human subject, it’s very disrespectful.’
He was offended that a mere human would try to take his place.
Malek and Molly spent days thinking over how to seal Rabes.
“Can’t you just recite the sealing spell yourself, Malek?”
“It’s not a spell that just anyone can recite. It must be done by a dragon much stronger than the one to be sealed, or by the dragon himself. I don’t want a clash of magic.”
“If a dragon is much stronger than Rabes, how strong does it have to be?”
“Well, maybe the elder of the dragon? But the elder has withdrawn from this matter, and the rest of the dragons are also reluctant to come down to the human world. Why are they so stubborn about that?”
Malek sneered at the dragons.
He couldn’t see what fun they were having living such tediously long lives.
“Anyway, that’s why we need Lancer. Lancer is probably the only one who can put a sealing spell on Rabes.”
“You mean it’s like a dragon putting a seal spell on itself? He only has a tiny bit of Rabes’ magic core.”
“I’m not entirely sure, but it’s certainly possible. That’s why it’s such a big deal for a dragon to give away its own magic core.”
Molly was even jealous of that fact. That’s why she agreed with Malek’s idea of using Lancer to seal Rabes, but at the same time, she was worried about her own safety.
“Malek, what happens if we fail to seal it?”
“Don’t worry about your safety, we won’t be directly in front of Rabes. If you’re asking about the affairs of the Rabes, you don’t need to worry about that either.”
“Why?”
“If I fail, the dragons will eventually come out. Rabes has already rejected the dragons’ attempts to persuade him, so if I fail and the dragons come back to the human world, it won’t end with a seal.”
“If it’s not a seal…”
“It will be destroyed. No matter how strong the magic power of Rabes is, if several dragons, including the vice-elder, attack at the same time, Rabes won’t be able to withstand it.”
Malek said, recalling the past when his magical core was destroyed.
“Anyway, sealing Rabes would be the best way, right? But how can that human, Lancer, cast a sealing spell on Rabes?”
“Yeah. That’s the problem.”
The problem was that Lancer and Rabes had a very good relationship, so they had to trick Lancer somehow.
* * *
I feel so bad for Rabes my poor baby 😭😭