Book 12: Chapter 28
“Dragon in the west?”
Mommy Vyvyan bit into a berry. The juice resembled blood when it ran down from her lips. She picked up a napkin to wipe her lips. She smiled and explained, “That’s a legend. To our West is scorched land. No plants can grow there; or rather, no living organisms can grow there. All that’s there is tumbleweed. The entire area is bright red as though the Earth is burning. Living organisms there are abominations whether it’s wolves with ingrown fangs or huge birds with sharp claws. The place is forbidden grounds for living organisms and the scorched earth for spirits. Elves should not be there. That place is the home ground of huge dragons. The last dragon resides there. It’s a huge dragon that can cover up the entire sky just by spreading its wings. Its scales are the same as city walls. It can flatten an entire village with its claws. The fire it breathes can leave an entire forest burning for an entire week. That huge dragon resides there, protecting the dragon race’s final pride and treasure.”
“Mom, have you personally seen it before?”
Mommy Vyvyan basically used the equivalent of half of a sheet of paper to tell a fairy tale story with a huge dragon in it. It was impossible for me to believe the existence of such a creature, because Mom sounded so confident when I didn’t even know if she had seen it before.
Mommy Vyvyan shook her head with a smile, and then took a bite of the berry. She maintained her smile as she replied: “Of course not. It’s just a story Mommy heard. All children in the North will hear the story once. It’s a fun story. There’s a story of an adventurer going there, which is the same story. Of course, Mommy hasn’t seen that place. It’s out of bounds for elves, the same way the North is. That place is not out of bounds due to mana or something but simply because it’s dangerous there.”
“Didn’t you say it was a story?”
“The dragon is real, though,” replied Vyvyan.
Vyvyan licked the juice running down her fingers. Voice soft, she continued, “The dragon truly exists, and so does the dragon race. Dragons have a long history as elves do. Dragons and elves initially had a decent relationship. However, the dragons faced the crisis of extinction at one point in time due to their inability to reproduce. The dragons opted for the most unwise option, which was to kidnap male elves.
They kidnapped male elves to reproduce with them. The issue was that elves couldn’t satisfy the high volume of mana required by dragons. In addition, elves began to resist the invasions of the dragon race. War and a struggle to reproduce gradually led to the disappearance of dragons. The Northwest is their territory. We will pay a big price if we attack that place. Additionally, we don’t want a race as old as ours to be exterminated. That is why we forbid anybody from going there. We don’t know what became of the dragon race thereafter.”