Beneath the Dragoneye Moons

3000 Years after Elaine became a professor at the School of Sorcery and Spellcraft

Artemis had long divined Iona’s goal and had given up trying to talk me out of it. She conjured a comfortable stone chair - the System didn’t care about oxymorons like that, not with people close to level 2000 - and sat down in it with her fingers steepled.

“Alright. You lot have been discussing and working around this for ages, but you’ve been holding off on the planning session. Reasonable, when you don’t know all the factors you’ll have. You’re too close now, let’s talk. Placate, Kill, Drive Off, or Tolerate. What’s it going to be, and how are we going to do it?” Artemis asked.

“Brrpt.” Auri insisted we paused on the discussion for a minute. She zipped off to the kitchen, then zipped back a moment later with a dozen snacks and drinks orbiting her. I snagged a cheese sampler off the lazy-Auri, and a jug of mango juice. Everyone else helped themselves, and Auri dropped the rest onto the table, letting her usual Lava rocks orbit her instead.

“Kill.” Fenrir promptly growled out, then curled up for a nap. In his mind, it was that simple, and all the intelligence he’d developed over the years went straight to his mystery solving.

Actually, that was a good point. I nudged Fenrir with my foot.

“Oi, we’ve got a mystery for you.” He continued to snooze, and I rolled my eyes. Iona swooped in with a whisper.

“Case.” She said as softly as possible. Fenrir bolted upright, reminding me of a puppy.

“Case?” He asked.

I kicked my feet back as Artemis leaned forward.

“As much as the Moon Goddesses are suggesting that we kill the Stygian Deceiver, it’s not the direct text of their missive. The goal is to free the moons, and we should explore all the options. As lovely as the four Ranger options are, there’s also ‘negotiate’. What does she want, and can we give it to her?”

“That’s just a subsection of placate.” Artemis grumbled. Iona waved it off, not wanting to get into the argument.

“The bigger question is, how has the Stygian Deceiver avoided ascending?” Artemis asked. “The System’s designed not to let powerful people annoy others and linger. If someone really wanted to oust Flora, they could try it around level 3900 or 4000, and use the level advantage to hammer on her, forcing her to ascend or die. It’s not happening with the Stygian Deceiver. She’s staying right at level 4090 or so, from what scattered reports have made it to the School, and it makes no sense. Even napping she should’ve gotten enough experience to finally ascend.”

“Does she have a skill preventing her from gaining experience?” I asked. “Or like, a companion bond? I could see that working. Bond, all of the experience is funneled away, drop it when the companion is too high level, bond again. She’d only need what, a dozen bonds going all the way to have kept herself from ascending between the time the Dragoneye Moons first rose and now? My math might be fuzzy, I think my concept’s sound.” I said.

“Brrrpt?” Auri asked Iona.

“I haven’t gotten a great look at her stat sheet.” She confessed. “I was too busy looking at my goddesses at the Gladiator Gauntlet, and it’s not like she regularly flies around for me to take a peek at.”

“If you tried to negotiate with her, you’d be able to get a good look at her stat sheet.” Artemis pointed out. “Puts you in a win-win situation. Either she accepts and you’re done, or she declines, and you get vital intelligence.”

“Your blessing will let you directly talk with her.” I added. “Might be novel enough that she’ll listen.”

“My concern negotiating,” Iona started to say, and I held up a hand to pause her. I theatrically dug out some earwax.

“Sorry, hang on. Ears are all clogged up. I swear I just heard the famous silver-tongued bard herself use the words ‘concern negotiating’ outside of a song or play. Or did I miss the-”

I didn’t get a chance to finish my sentence before Iona threw a pillow at me. Artemis threw her own, and Auri put a Lava rock right where I jerked my foot, making me stub my toe.

“Take this seriously!” Iona protested as I unburied myself, swearing vicious vengeance on Auri. I swapped her sugar and salt storage, which would cause utter chaos the next time she tried baking. Then again, I’d need to sniff test the next few batches of cookies in the never-ending prank war.

We’d stopped keeping track thousands of years ago.

“As I was saying!” Iona took control of the conversation back as I started to nibble on some cheese. One of Auri’s better attempts from her brief obsession with full-stack supply chains. “Negotiation concerns me a bit. If she decides to simply attack while we’re relatively undefended, we’ll be caught flat-footed against the most powerful monster on Pallos.”

“Seventh.” I coughed. Iona rolled her eyes.

“Seventh most powerful monster on Pallos. I know we’re high level, but we’re not exactly tapping on those rankings ourselves.” Iona said.

Auri looked like she wanted to disagree with her, but didn’t say anything. Fenrir was starting to doze again. The ‘case’ turning out to be ‘just walk up and say hi’ wasn’t interesting him.

“How do you negotiate with her?” Artemis asked. “What does she want? What does she not have? What could you possibly get a dragon who’s outlived all of us, who had a treasure hoard greater than Elaine’s now when she was a kid? Who’s had 30,000 years to get anything and everything she wants?”

I shrugged.

“If we’re going to play the ‘we can’t possibly win’ game, why are we here?” I said. “Pessimism like that doesn’t work. If it was Remus, sure, we could try to divine a placate, if a dinosaur’s nest was being threatened or something, but she’s intelligent. We can literally just ask, and come back later. That nonsense with the Moon Cult suggests there is something she wants, and can’t directly get herself. It’s not impossible, and we’re trying to explore all of our options.”

“Fair.” Artemis agreed. “I wanted us to think about things we could bring before we start negotiating. ‘What can you give me’ needs a better answer than ‘I dunno, what do you want?’ That’ll get you roasted.”

“She’s got a point.” Iona said. “Let’s ask Arachne? She’s a smart lady, she might have some insight with her years of experience and the whole Moon Cult business.”

I [Teleported] paper and a pen from the endless depths of the palace we lived in, and started taking notes.

Negotiation - possible. Contact Susan and see if we can figure out what SHE wants.

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Oh wait. Speaking of Susan, she was married to Night. Night hated owing favors to people. For good reason. Maybe Arachne would know a favor Lun’Kat owed somebody, and we could use that as leverage? Be easier to barter for a favor. I made another note.

“Anything else on the negotiation front?” I asked.

“Case!” Fenrir plaintively cried out.

“Case indeed.” Iona agreed. “Is there a way to try and figure out how she’s sticking around? Besides peeking at her stats during hopeful maybe negotiations that she might not even show up for. Love, you ended up in her lair at one point, anything helpful?”

It made sense. If we could ‘unstick’ Lun’Kat, she’d be forced to ascend. If she ascended, no more Dragoneye Moons. Iona’s mission would be complete.

“I don’t know.” I frankly admitted. “She had everything in there. Like our home here. Sentimental items, practical rooms. Libraries and groves, treasure and weapons, altars and lighting.” I shrugged. “I didn’t know very much then, but it wouldn’t surprise me if she had a dozen divine items stashed away, collected over the years. She could have hundreds by now, and any one of them could be an ‘amulet of don’t get the last level’ or something else that breaks all the rules. Unless we want to try to rob her and… destroy… it… all. Fuck.”

A wide set of grins met my idle mutterings.

“Robbing her seems much more feasible than killing her, don’t you think?” Iona was practically beaming. I side-eyed her.

“Isn’t there something in your [Vow] that would prevent you from robbing a dragon blind?”

“Nope. Also, Nina would do well with that sort of mission.”

“Brrrpt.” Auri disagreed.

“She’s got thousands of levels on Nina.” Artemis said. “Nina’s a clever girl, but it’ll never work. Not with that power disparity, not even working in a team.”

Given how many times Artemis had worked in a team to kill a higher level monster, I was inclined to agree with her. Given how she’d been wrong with me… I was still inclined to agree with her.

None of our kids should be at risk for our quest. It wasn’t their fight, nor was it something near and dear to their heart. Might not stop them trying something dumb, but I didn’t want them dying on me. Not for us. Also, Nina wasn’t going to out-Mirage the Stygian Deceiver. It just wasn’t going to happen.

“It’s not like we can wait for her.” I said. “However, we should talk with Amber. If we’re willing to dramatically overpay for items that Lun’Kat wants, she should be able to locate them for us. Then we can offer them to her.”

I’d been quite deliberate invoking Lun’Kat’s name there. She should hear us, and our ‘scheme’ was ‘find things she likes and give them to her.’ Iona’s approving wink and Auri’s flaming thumb’s up told me they knew what I was doing.

“I’ll check ‘gifts for Lun’Kat’ off the list.” Artemis declared. “Next up, dinner. Who’s cooking, who’s cleaning?”

We continued our inane conversation for another hour before swapping back to the topic at hand.

“Good call, poor timing.” Artemis said. I shrugged.

“Saw the moment and went for it. Now she’s more likely to come out and talk with us, although I hope I haven’t made her too interested in Amber’s coin. That’s not ours to offer up.”

“It does raise an interesting point.” Iona said. “It might not be divine items that interest her, but treasures from the faery realm might be desired. Either way, Amber’s a great idea.”

I sadly looked around the room, my mind wandering through the entire palace and the fields afar.

“Not to get too off topic,” I said. Iona interrupted with a snort while Artemis laughed. Auri just shook her head.

“Love, when do you not go off topic.” Iona gently teased me.

“Veering wildly off topic like that one chariot race of yours.” I glared pointedly at my wife, and Artemis fell off her chair laughing. “We should start planning what goes to whom, and maybe start distributing everything. It’s not like we can take it with us when we go, and a lot of art and other luxuries could… could start to find another home.”

I nearly broke up at the end of it. It wasn’t about the objects, it was about what it represented. We were preparing to no longer be on the material plane, one way or another. Stripping our home down was the right thing to do, but the idea still hurt. At the same time, there were rooms that I’d only visited once or twice, simply for the sake of saying I had, and I’d never set foot in multiple storage rooms. Why would I need to? I could sense everything, teleport things in, teleport them out.

Iona grinned.

“Or we just dump it all on Artemis and let her sort it out. She’ll do the right thing.”

“Hey!” Artemis shot up, protesting loudly. “No! No fair! No way!”

I tapped a finger on my chin.

“That is a good idea, but maybe we should see if Amber wants to cart half of it off first. Hang on.”

I opened the door to my pocket dimension, expecting the fae-touched woman to be standing outside.

“Brrrpt.” Auri suggested, then flew off to start implementing things. Doors opened, floors were greased, and I knew someone would find a use for an entire bucket of swan feathers. Iona beckoned, and more snacks were brought in.

“We’ve talked about negotiating, going around her. Bite the belt, let’s be honest. It’ll probably come down to a direct confrontation. How are you going to handle this?” Artemis asked.

I opened my mouth with an idea, then shut it.

“Something to say?” Artemis prompted. I chose my words carefully.

“She is an intelligent dragon. I have no doubts in my mind that I will find myself in a situation where I’m able to participate in the battle, should one occur. However, I’m already toeing the line with an expanded version of my [Oath], and a number of my ideas at this point would be a significant step over. I don’t want to overstep right now, you remember what happens when I do.”

Artemis looked at me, and I couldn’t hint at more. I was hoping she’d remember the first time I violated my [Oath] by trying to give the Rangers improved weapons, and make the logical connections.

“Could we poison her?” Artemis wondered. “Poison and Miasma can both punch up something fierce. Find the right Classers, pay them enough, and just quietly gas her while she sleeps.”

“That’s pushing the line for me as well.” Iona reluctantly admitted. Artemis gave us shrewd looks.

“Well… I imagine a certain kitsune might take offense to her parents trying to off themselves. She doesn’t need to be anywhere near the action to make a few deals.”

Artemis tossed her hair back at our identical glares.

“What? I’m allowed to try and protect you, Healy-bug, and Iona, you married into the family. You want to protect Nina, Sara, and the rest of your kids, I want to protect you. You’re not able to do it, but guess what? I swore no such promise, and I can. Selene and Lunaris are probably rooting in your ears right now.” The [Electromancer] looked up. “Hey Moon milfs! Can I get a nice blessing to help this all out?”

“Excuse me, they want to pass along a message.” Iona stood up and smacked the back of Artemis’s head, then sat back down. She glared at Iona as she rubbed her head.

“I’d ask what was that for, but I think it was pretty clear. Alright. Any other clever ideas to not fight an ancient dragon in straight combat?”

We bandied around various ideas, most of them terrible. The gas attack was the best one. Iona proposed seducing Lun’Kat, waving her hips outrageously the entire time. We got a little carried away - there was a potion for it, methods of application, gender-bending, and… none of that actually got the mission accomplished, which Fenrir of all people had pointed out.

Robbing a dozen other dragons and slipping their treasures into Lun’Kat’s hoard as a ‘reverse-robbery’ to incite a fight was a shadow of an idea. Except she was old and well established. It’d be like someone trying to off Night by robbing me and planting it on him. Assuming they could pull it off, he’d just walk up to me and return it, and I’d totally understand it wasn’t him, he was getting framed.

Genie was always an option, and impossible to find. Throwing Lun’Kat through a portal was very attractive. Given that Night was able to find his way back though, it would probably be a less permanent solution than what we were hoping for.

Getting her to violate a Divine Decree was a solid idea, but she already had multiple gods trying to slay her. She’d had angels hanging like a chandelier in her hoard, Lun’Kat was already pissing off half the pantheon and was still defiantly alive.

Which brought up the point of bringing other [Paladins] into our little conspiracy. The odds were poor, most [Paladins] weren’t Immortal nor did they have a powerful [Healer]extremely invested in keeping them alive. Plus, that was circling back to the ‘just brute force it’ option. It wasn’t the first time we’d had the discussion, and it was almost a comforting rote back and forth as we retreat well-worn arguments and points. We got so into it that Artemis just watched back and forth, none of us truly needing to think about it anymore. It was closer to putting on a play than having a debate.

Bargaining with the Fae was an option, but I pointed out it was more likely to backfire on us spectacularly, while fulfilling the letter of the agreement.

“We’re more likely to end up with no moons if we do this.” I said to general agreement.

Which was roughly when Amber tripped over the invisible line Auri had placed half a mile away. She fell onto a sled which promptly rocketed forwards on the greased floor, setting off an absurd chain of coincidences, wily traps, and wild luck. A bucket of honey, the swan feathers, and far too much screaming later, Amber landed directly on the sofa, directly in front of the snacks Iona had laid out earlier.

“One sugar or two in your tea?” My wife offered the shivering [Merchant].

“I don’t know if I want to cuss you out or hug you.” Amber’s voice was high pitched, and I had no idea how Auri had set up the helium. Amber’s look of outrage was hilarious! I took a sip of tea. After all, I was the ancient Immortal, all-knowing, all-powerful, always perfectly poised.

“How about you cuss me out, and save the hugging for after the bath. I don’t want to get all sticky.” Iona said. I snorted my tea out through my nose. Amber stood up with a grin.

“Aunty Iona! Let me give you a hug!”

“No! I didn’t even do this! Go pester Auri!” Iona fled Amber’s sticky grasp.

“Gems, if this is how the day’s starting, I can’t wait to see what I’ve got for you girls.” Amber rubbed her sticky hands in glee.

“Let’s go get cleaned up and talk it over.” I proposed.

“Brrrpt!”