Dragon Royale 2: An Urban Fantasy Adventure Read online

  The unnatural combination of the four colored rivers produced equally unnatural behavior of the black one. Instead of flowing away, the inky blackness seemed to spread on the sides of the giant warehouse, like it was being infected. Some of the water stayed on the pavement down on the lot, but most of it flowed up the walls.

  “We can’t just leave him,” I responded. There didn’t seem like any way we could get him on his feet, but it wasn’t right to leave him out in the open. If the tank troopers broke through to this place, they might shoot him or accidentally run over him.

  “Master, Raven and his Anton are both dead.” Banger stepped away from Raven looking a little more like a dry cat.

  “Well. Shit.” I said dejectedly. There was so much left to learn from the old warrior, I felt like I’d been robbed of all those lessons. I knew I should have thought about him dying and all, instead of worrying about my own selfish needs, but he no longer had to worry about being killed by a billion different threats.

  “Goodbye, sir,” I said after a moment of silence.

  We had to move out.

  “OK, let’s—” I was cut off by a bright white light shining a few feet beyond the bodies.

  “Hark! Good knight.” Anton stood before us dressed in white battle armor with an axe that looked like it just came out of the foundry. His skin was no longer dark gray and wrinkly, but was much lighter and taut, like his muscles had filled back in. He was translucent and ethereal like the magical links between me and the girls, and his large green eyes now glowed with energy.

  “General?” I said with amazement.

  His wolf companion stood at his side, looking twice as big as he did when he was alive. His fur was no longer gray and matted, but was raven-black and beautiful as if he’d come right from the groomer. Like Anton, he wore some white battle armor on his sides and neck.

  “I go to fight the next war, good friends. I thought I was destined to an afterlife of despair when I fell by that tree in the forest, but you kept me in the fight until I was ready for what comes next. Now I can take on anything.”

  “But, general, I thought you hated war?” I replied.

  “There is such a thing as good war, Sir Matt. You are fighting it to protect your friends and your land. If you stop Conflict, her evil war will end. It is the victory you must seek. As for me, I go on to the next plane of existence. There are many good wars that need my axe.”

  “I could use your axe and those fangs,” I said despite knowing he and his furry partner were now beyond our realm.

  “You seem to do much better with your women, Sir Matt. They are your best allies for what you must do. Trust in them like they do in you. And I’m sorry, Echo, for doubting you when you carried Raven over the river. He thanks you.”

  The big wolf dipped his head.

  Echo bowed in return. “You’re welcome.”

  “I don’t suppose you have any magic items you want to donate to my party?” I’d been in a million role-playing scenarios where non-player characters awarded me for helping them. It couldn’t hurt to ask.

  “Aye, I had a lifetime of items on me before I was attacked this morning. Charms. Rings. Gauntlets. But most of them were stolen when that little bone bag knocked me out.”

  I kept it to myself, but he believed it was a male warrior that struck him. I was pretty sure it was Tissy, or her female accomplices.

  “What a waste,” Anton added.

  Despite his misfortunes, Anton sounded more hopeful than beaten.

  “You said most of them were taken.” I hung it out there to see what he would say.

  “They were too weak to take my axe.” He laughed merrily. “And they forgot my last ribbon. Will you take it, and, if fate should favor such an impossible task, return it to my command in the Imperium. They will want to know my fate.”

  “We will,” I replied as if he’d given us an important mission.

  “The thieves also missed my Final Day potion, because I kept it woven into a pocket of my breeches. If they’d been a little more thorough, we might not be here right now.”

  I thanked our luck he was that cautious in the first place. Perhaps an example to follow.

  “Finally, they missed one last thing I’m rather proud of: my Seventh Sense ring.”

  He puffed up his chest and stroked his angelic-white beard. “I kept it somewhere no one would ever find it. I stuck it up—”

  I held up my hands. “Please, no!”

  “My beard. What did you think I meant?”

  “Oh, nothing. Forget I said anything.” My face was probably red with embarrassment.

  “The ring only requires contact with your body, so it doesn’t have to be on your finger all the time. I hung mine deep under my chin where no enemy would ever think to look for treasure.”

  I pointed to his fallen body. “It’s right over there?”

  “Aye, friend. It is.”

  Jo spoke up. “But general, does it even work? You said you were ambushed and lost all your treasure, and a good part of your face.”

  A bit of sadness bled into his happiness. “Young warrior, you have a long way before you can truly understand this, but when you reach a certain age, even knowing the attack is coming cannot help you. My old bones couldn’t move fast enough to meet the threat. That’s when I knew my life was over. I was blessed by the goddess of fate to have one more day with the likes of your beauty.”

  “Hey now,” I said in a good-natured way. “Don’t entice her to go to battle heaven with you.”

  “Well met, my young knight. I give you permission to loot my body for any of these items that may be of use to you, including, of course, your magic toaster.”

  He smiled and appeared happy again.

  “Use the ring to protect yourself and your female warriors from dishonorable strikes. It works at the army level, too, so if you ever gain command of ten thousand men, as I once did, your protection will extend to the unit. It is the most powerful defensive magic I’ve found on all my campaigns.”

  “I, uh—” I started to say.

  “I hope you’ll take my old axe. She’s been with me since the beginning and only needs a bit of spit and shine to get back up to her full potential.”

  He winked at me while holding the ghost version of the same axe.

  “Wow. I don’t know what to say.”

  Anton turned as if he heard something behind him. I faintly recognized the sounds of trumpets, like a call to arms. “How about goodbye, son?”

  I appreciated the word ‘son,’ because I never heard my real father say it.

  Anton waved a hand. “Goodbye my friends.”

  Banger appeared over by the new Raven. He must have been there the whole time, but I hadn’t noticed him. The little cat sat and looked up at the wolf like it was a holographic TV show. However, Raven nuzzled Banger’s face and he responded like the touch was real.

  I stepped forward to shake Anton’s hand, but the pair winked out of existence before I took step number two.

  I was left holding a hand out to the darkness.

  ***

  I crouched next to Anton’s body and felt around inside his giant beard. It was wet and grimy from being inside Merkur, but he was my friend and had honored me with the gift. That made it easier to tolerate.

  I soon found the ring. As he said, it was tied under his chin by the long strands of his ZZ Top beard.

  “Knife, Jo.”

  She handed me her giant combat knife and I easily cut the ring out of its secure hiding spot. I returned the knife and held up the gift.

  The ring was almost impossible to see in the twilight. It was made of some kind of metal that was also black. I held it for a few seconds as the battle sounds stormed from the far side of the warehouse park, wondering if I should put it on or save it for later. Some wisps of smoke floated by, carrying the smell of cordite from all those guns. I couldn’t dally there. I decided to trust that Anton wasn’t bullshitting me about what it did. Not even Conflict c
ould concoct such a meeting with Anton so he would give me some kind of cursed ring.

  I held it at the end of my finger for an extra second as I wondered if I was willing to gamble on that. I went with my gut and slid it on, then held my breath for a moment, but nothing bad happened.

  “Thanks, Anton,” I said aloud to his fallen body.

  “Thank you,” Tex said quietly from behind me.

  “Goodbye, Raven,” Echo added.

  Jo cut off the general’s last ribbon and put it in her pocket, then untied the toaster from his belt. I struggled to lift the axe, immediately wondering if it was worth the hassle, but once I balanced it on my shoulder it wasn’t too bad.

  “OK,” I continued in a rush. “Let’s get this stuff into the warehouse.”

  I followed Tex and Echo through the half-open sliding door and Jo came in after me.

  “Banger, keep watch, OK?”

  “Affirmative, master.”

  “Oh, and Banger, I’m sorry about your friend.”

  “Affirmative, master.” I figured he was repeating himself, but then he added, “Thank you.”

  I put my back against the sliding door, set down the axe, and whipped out my phone. The lock screen showed a ton of text messages had come in recently.

  “Hang on a sec. I think some of this can help us figure out where to go from here.”

  The first message was informational and reminded me Echo selected her level 1 ability. I already knew that.

  The second reported a new mission was available, and a reward of Dragon Bux was being assigned to me for completing Lord Bart’s mission.

  The third one almost made me drop my phone.

  “Would you like to add this girl? Yes/No.” A blonde woman’s avatar was attached below the words.

  “It says here Tissy has requested to join my party!” I was thanking my brilliance at putting the yes/no confirmation gate into the programming of my app. It was slightly flattering that a pretty woman like Tissy had the hots for me. My magic seemed to react to sexual attraction from women by suggesting I accept them into my party, but the yes/no option helped me tame that dangerous aspect.

  I scanned the room, wondering if she was still alive. I last saw her fighting to free her friend from Merkur’s clutches. Did she get her out and take off, or was she now dead? Swept away with all the other bodies inside the giant cube? If she made it, did that mean she was still out there looking to kill me and steal my women for her merry band of bad girls?

  “We shouldn’t stay here,” Jo advised.

  “I agree. Just give me another minute.” I swiped back to the mission screen to get more details. A green check sat next to the one we’d completed. We’d returned Bart’s Staff to collect the reward, even if we took it again.

  An unchecked box and mission appeared above the completed one.

  “Defend the Ice Realm from sunrise to sunset tomorrow.”

  I studied the map attached to the mission and found the red push pin. It was somewhere to the east now, which put it to the right side of my screen.

  “It looks like we have to find some kind of ski resort,” I said with lots of doubt in my voice.

  “In summertime?” Tex asked.

  “I hate the cold,” Echo continued. “Maybe we should spend the night in a nice warm pond somewhere. With my improved ability I’m sure I could hollow out a nice, safe refuge so we could get some sleep.”

  She had a twinkle in her eyes.

  I looked from her, to Jo, to Tex. We’d been going full on for the entire day, ever since our meeting with Ivona. They were tired, and so was I.

  “I could also give you all baths,” Echo said matter-of-factly. Her elfish features made her suggestion seem hot and alien. It was all the encouragement I needed.

  “Jo, will you give me one of your grenades?”

  “Sure, Matt. What’s the play?” The Korean gamer-girl under that green exterior would understand exactly what I was doing.

  I drew a few things on my screen and then hit save. The picture glowed bright blue which cast a satisfying light upon my light-colored t-shirt.

  I knew what I was doing. “You said it yourself, maybe some of those big fireball weapons are inside this place. That will make a satisfying funeral pyre for the heroes of the day.”

  “Makes sense to me,” Jo responded.

  “This way.” I led everyone through the crates until I found the shipping container. I set the grenade at the base of the open door.

  “These weapons are probably for soldiers trying to hold off the same units that Anton abandoned. Do you think he would like us doing this?” Tex asked.

  “I’m tempted to leave it be, especially after Anton said he was trying to save his people, but I have to think about my people. I’m sure there are guys and gals from my home in Ohio somewhere out there. I can’t allow people like Lord Bart to use this magic on them. If there are more leaders coming out of the pit, they are going to have to fight without their pacification staffs.”

  “It might mean the armies close in on us that much faster,” Jo advised. “Not that I want to hurt humans, either. Just saying.”

  “I know. It means we’ll have to move toward Conflict at top speed to stay ahead of them. Nothing has really changed, except fewer of our people will die. Like General Anton, I’m here to win the final battle, but I don’t have to kill the home team to do it. I think he would agree with that, even if he didn’t want me to flush this place down the shitter.”

  “Kick Conflict’s minions in the nuts,” Tex said with gusto.

  “Hell yeah,” I replied.

  I stood up and looked at my friends. “We have ten minutes to get clear. Go!”

  We sprinted toward the back of the warehouse loaded with Anton’s gear. I was satisfied we’d survived another day in the royale. Two more teams were dead and out of the competition, plus however many deaths took place in the other parts of the giant gaming zone. It concerned me that Tissy could still be out there, but she wasn’t going to do to me what she did to Anton. His ring would make sure she couldn’t surprise me again.

  I had a new mission.

  There were more Dragon Bux to spend.

  Echo was a new girl in my squire stable.

  I barely made it out the door before I began to think about what it would be like to sleep with three women at the same time, and I was really intrigued about what Echo had said about spending the night in a four-person underwater bubble.

  We ran like mad into the forest, ever aware of the ticking clock I’d set on the grenade.

  “It’s almost time,” I called out to my friends.

  One way or another, this night was going to end with a huge bang.

  ###

  LEVEL RECAP

  Matt Radogain:

  Level 2 (needs to upgrade 2 women to reach level 3)

  Tattoos: Game Controller (Jo), Horseshoe (Tex), Water Drop (Echo), Glasses (Nora, removed)

  Core Magic: Trust in Allies, 3rd degree

  Curse: Linked to Conflict

  Enhanced Skills: Sorcery: 2, Mind: 0, Strength: 0, Speed: 0

  Jo Pak

  Level 1

  Core Magic: Surveillance

  First upgrade: Surveillance 2nd degree

  Enhanced Skills: Sorcery: 1, Mind: 0, Strength: 0, Speed: 0

  Andi (Tex) Texford

  Level 1

  Core Magic: Blend

  First upgrade: Staff Fighting

  Enhanced Skills: Sorcery: 1, Mind: 0, Strength: 0, Speed: 0

  Echo

  Level 1

  Core Magic: Water Warping

  First upgrade: Water Warping 2nd degree

  Enhanced Skills: None allocated

  THANK YOU

  The Dragon Royale rolls on. Amazon won’t tell you when book 3 comes out, so if you want to know, please consider doing either or both of the following:

  Follow Drake Powers on Amazon. You can also review this book while you are there! That will make me write even faster.

/>   Sign up to my mailing list to get first crack when it comes out.

  Thank you for being a reader.

  I’d also like to thank my great beta readers, especially James Farler and Andrew Kennelley.

  Drake

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