B5 Chapter 625: Bloody Baptism, pt. 2

Stone clattered as Kaius picked his way along the partially buried flank of the wyrm. Further ahead, the nobles were hard at work uncovering the remains of the tail. Porkchop went to work next to them, rearing up and plunging his claws into the ground, before flicking chunks of stone towards Kenva to cart off.

He wasn’t skipping out on the ardour. The wyrm was too valuable to leave behind, and far too large to fit in even the storage artefacts of the nobles. They would have to butcher it.

Bit by bit, he moved the largest and most annoying stones to a growing mound by the creatures head, until he came to a troublesome specimen. A large spike of rock had been driven deep into a gaping wound on the creature’s side, snapping one rib entirely. Judging by the semi-molten scales at the edge of the wound, and the deep char on the bones themselves, it was likely the result of the nobles' onslaught of enchanted bolts.

Kaius gripped the stone, and braced one foot on the carcass itself, carefully placing it between the large spines that dotted the wyrm’s back. He heaved. The stone came out with a wet squelch, a slop of churned viscera splattering against the rubble that still remained.

Sighing at the waste of it, he tossed the spike to the side as the scent of yet more magic-charged meat washed over him.

A Father’s Gift screamed, pulsing with a hunger that had long lied dormant. He froze. An upgrade material.

The thought had crossed his mind of course. His sword had reacted in the past to wyvern bone, so it stood to reason he might find something suitable from the corpse of Katarex. When there’d been no reaction upon the creature’s death, he’d thought that maybe its awakening had made draconic materials less suitable.

Apparently not.

Excitement and apprehension filled him with equal measure as he dropped into a crouch, peering into the wound. There, at the end, he saw a rounded hunk of muscle, deep in the centre of the creature’s chest. His blade yearned for it. Even with his limited view, he could see a pair ropey blood vessels worming away from the organ. The heart.

Kaius frowned. Of all the gods-rotten luck.

Upgrading his blade had been on his mind for a long time. It was already a potent weapon, and rising to a second tier Epic artefact would only make it all the more unimaginable. Let alone the fact that it would be working off draconic material. It was clear to him that his blade took after the characteristics of what it fed upon — and what could be a grander meal than a dragon?

But did it have to be the heart? It was the single most potent resource that could be found in a dragon’s body. The blood and even its flesh might have power, but it was the heart that was the source. It was, quite literally, priceless — another Natural Treasure in its own right, and one that could be preserved far longer than the blood itself. Even without being outright consumed, it was an incredibly potent reagent.

If it had just been him and his team, Kaius would have claimed the organ right then and there. Unfortunately, they weren’t the only members who had taken part in the battle against the wyrm, and he couldn’t rightly say that they would have won without the noble’s assistance. They had a claim, just as much as he did.

“What have you found?” Porkchop asked, feeling his warring avarice and honour.

“The heart. I need it for my sword,” Kaius replied, stretching his response through his communication ring to include the rest of his team. “We’re going to need to haggle for it.”

“For your sword?” Ianmus replied, giving him a look of surprise as he awkwardly carted away a rock that Kenva had tucked under his arm. “About time — I'm sure we can get it, even if we have to make a few concessions. Most of the value in a dragon carcass is in material for the creation of goods. That doesn’t much help us, and we’d find little use for them.”

“Ianmus is right,” Kenva agreed. “Draconic material simply does not appear on the open market, so it is of outsized value to the nobles. They have lots of money, supplementary materials, and longstanding agreements with the menagerie of artisans needed to fully process the body. I say we push for the heart and a few choice pieces of gear, and they can simply pay us out for the rest. I can handle the negotiating, if you would like?”

“Are you sure?” Kaius replied. While he trusted her to do it, he didn’t want her to feel pressured.

The ranger dropped the stone she was carrying and turned to face him, her arms crossed. “Half of my family are traders of some fashion or another. I think my father might actually disown me if I missed the chance to haggle over a dragon’s heart.”

Right, he’d forgotten about that. Even if she had picked a different path in life, Kenva had definitely had the most exposure to mercantilism of any of them.

“Go ahead then.”

Kaius kept busy, not wanting to give away their ongoing discussion. Plus, they did need to clear away this section of rubble.

“If we’re happy with simple coin for most of it, I'll push for the nobles to cover the cost and extra materials to get a few artefacts made from the remains,” Kenva said. “We should still get a small mountain of platinum out of it as well. Armour makes the most sense. The belly scales are perfect for a gambison for Porkchop, and a shirt that Ianmus could wear under his robes. The sturdier ones on its back could be used for a suit for me as well, and the right crafter could include some in a proper set of scalemail as well. Any other ideas? We could probably squeeze another item or two.”

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Kaius came up blank. New armour sounded fantastic, but he couldn’t really think of anything else he would want. He was already getting the damned heart.

“One of its spines, and perhaps some horn,” Ianmus added. “Dragon bone is a remarkably pure mana conduit, so it would make for a fantastic staff. Perhaps not as good as if the beast had been a celestial-aligned caster, but such is life.”

When neither he, nor Porkchop had anything else to add, Kenva moved closer to Julian and helped him grab a stone slightly too large for him to manage alone.

“We need to discuss how we’re going to split the corpse.”

Julian nodded as if it was the most natural thing in the world. Everyone in the tunnel focused on them closely, though none of them stopped working. There was simply no time for them to lose.

“I need the skull in its entirety — it is too valuable as a symbol.”

“Spare a few of the smaller horns? Ianmus wants a staff made from some of them and its largest spine.”

Frowning slightly, Julian eyes the blackened head of Katarex, lingering on its crown of sweeping spikes.

Labouring next to them, Kel grunted as he set down a heavy stone. “You’ll need to remove a few of the rearmost ones anyway, if you’re going to mount it in the audience hall.”

Julian nodded slowly, before he glanced back at Kenva as they made their way back to the tail. “What else did you want?”

“Half the corpse in platinum value, and the heart.”

Julian gave her a stark look before he started to laugh. “The heart?! Are you insane? That is the most valuable part by far.”

“The heart is non-negotiable — we bore most of the risk, the creature would have slaughtered you without us here. It’s entirely possible we could have managed to slay it alone.”

Kaius doubted that — the nobles had left some hefty wounds on the wyrm, and it was far less certain that Ianmus and Kenva could have caved in the roof alone — but he wasn’t about to say that out loud.

Julian ground his teeth. “We brought down the roof! That alone secured victory. Do you know how much money we have spent on bolts today? One hundred and fifty thousand platinum, double that again for the loss of the mounts! Our stocks have been bled dry!”

Porkchop made a strangled sound of shock, and Kaius stared at the man in surprise. The enormity of the expenditure…he couldn’t even grapple with it. Half a million. He didn’t even know what he would buy with that amount of wealth.

Kenva stayed firm. Perhaps it was for the best that she’d chosen to haggle. Kaius certainly wouldn’t have kept a straight face.

“That changes nothing, all of you would have died before even stepping foot into the Wellspring without our assistance. I need that heart, and we have earned it. The rest of our claims are reasonable. Enough belly scale for an armoured vest for Ianmus to wear under his robes and a gambeson for Porkchop, a set of tougher light scale armour for me, and a set of true scalemail for Kaius. You can take the other material and labour costs out of our cut, after fair appraisal back in Baanswell.”

Julian growled, gritting his teeth as he started at Kenva. A moment later, he flicked away — settling on Kaius for just a moment.

His heart skipped a beat. Had the man intuited something? Whatever that had been, he hoped the lord wouldn’t use it to squeeze them dry. The other nobles were completely stone-faced; Kaius could glean a lick from their expressions. Kel in particular was watching him closely. The man inspired caution by his very presence.

“If he asks, tell them it's for you.” Kenva said. “I think he’ll soften his stance if he knows it's for an actual need, rather than profiteering.”

“Who is the heart for?” Julian asked a heartbeat later, scanning their number.

“Me,” Kaius replied after only a moment’s hesitation.

“Why?”

Again, Kaius hesitated. He didn’t exactly want to tell the lords about the fact he had a bloody growth weapon. And yet, while he didn’t think that Julian was a friend, he had certainly become an ally. More importantly, he had no idea if the heart would remain available for an extended time. He knew it could last longer than the blood, but that was with preparation and care. The damn thing wouldn’t fit in the preservation boxes they’d gotten with their ascension fruit.

Rotten roots, he couldn’t let the opportunity slip away due to carelessness or fear. Which meant the nobles would find out anyway, and he would lose the opportunity to show some good will as a show of trust.

Besides, these men had watched him kill a High Gold alone — and stand strong in the face of draconic rage.

Kaius tugged his blade a fingerwidth out of its sheath. “My sword,” he said simply.

Julian's eyes twitched wide, just for the barest of moments. “An inheritance indeed. Fine — on the condition we split the value of the carcass after it had been exsanguinated. The blood will be ours in its entirety — after we have used it for a shared baptism, of course.”

“Deal,” Kenva says immediately. “Let us seal our pact, and perhaps sweeten the pot a little more. We’ll swear to keep the location of the Wellspring to ourselves without your express permission, and you and yours will swear to do the same with our skillsets, various abilities, and belongings.”

Quick as lightning, Kenva pricked her finger against a ragged edge of dragon scale and slipped her hand behind her back. A gleaming shard coalesced from the blood beading on her finger. She flourished it, as if she’d summoned the stone from her storage ring.

While most of the nobles nodded without complaint, Kel saw the gleaming red stone and sighed, shaking his head.

“Now, how am I supposed to leverage your secrets to secure aid in my time of need if I can’t even talk about them?”

Kenva snorted. “That’s the point. You can’t.”

Not easily, at least. No oath was flawless, not even old magic — but rotten roots, it was better than nothing.

Kaius vaulted over the carcass, hurrying to join them so they could make their oaths.