Chapter 45: The pelled Colborator

  The dragon's gaze was undeniably oppressive.

  Baron Todd looked up, his crimson eyes filled with fear, any trace of his former arrogance gone.

  Yet, he still tried to maintain his posure, g his hands behind his back, f his voice to stay steady:

  "You’re the one called ‘Flying Fme,’ correct?"

  "May I ask what brings you to my domain… Is there something important?"

  Cassius sehe fluctuation in the Weave, realizing the baron was strug a spell, and his expression darkened slightly:

  "Baron Todd, is this how you greet guests who travel far to visit you?"

  "With discourteous magic,"

  "Instead of noble hospitality and courtesy?"

  Realizing he’d been exposed, Baron Todd’s expression ged drastically.

  Still, he fumbled through his robes, pulling out small vials and bat fur he’d prepared in advance, quickly casting a spell.

  “Darkness!”

  With a puff of bat fur, a thick, dark mist spread from Baron Todd, creating a five-meter-radius sphere of darkness around him.

  This magical darkness was imperable, even to creatures with dark vision, and couldn’t be dispelled by non-magical light or spells below the sed tier.

  Cassius merely observed, unhurriedly remarking:

  “An impressive spell, my lord baron.”

  “If it were an ordinary human, they’d surely be thteo move, left to let you drain them ierror of darkness.”

  His tourned cold.

  “But have you fotten that you’re fag a dragon?”

  Cassius suddenly turned, his massive tail sweeping through the air with immense force.

  The bck mist was torn apart, uo resist physical attack.

  Baron Todd, still preparing his spell within the darkness, was struck directly.

  “Boom!”

  He was sent flying several meters away.

  Fortunately, Baron Todd possessed a regeive ability. Though this blow fractured his bones and flesh, they quickly began to mend before the naked eye.

  Coughing up blood, Baron Todd y on the ground, struggling to retrieve a shriveled viper’s bdder.

  “Melf’s Acid Arrow!”

  A fshing green arrow shot toward the red dragon.

  “Shield.”

  With a cold smirk, the dragon jured an invisible barrier, blog the arrow, which exploded in a mist of acid without harming Cassius in the slightest.

  “A spellcaster?”

  Baron Todd’s face went pale—a dragon mage; this was the worst possible sario.

  He hastily structed another spell.

  “Misty Step!”

  His inal positio behind a trail of silvery mist as he appeared dozens of meters away, beside a twisted vine hanging from the manor wall.

  Cassius followed with a leisurely fp of his wings, saying, “Baron, please, don’t waste your energy on futile struggles.”

  “Your little tricks…”

  “Are insequential.”

  Fmes danced in the dragon’s eyes.

  Seeing the dragon advang, Baron Todd desperately focused, building another spell.

  He grabbed a vine, which shot upward, lifting itself vertically into the air, suspending him.

  Just as the dragon closed in.

  Todd climbed up the vine and vanished, and the vine disappeared with him.

  “Rope Trick?”

  Cassius observed with i.

  This spell was a famous mage-exclusive escape spell, enabling the caster to enter a small, extradimensional space for the spell's duration.

  No attaagic could enter or exit the space’s entrance, but the octs could see outside through the “rope” position as if looking through a window.

  When the spell ended, everything iradimensional space would fall out.

  Ihe extradimensional space, Baron Todd’s pale face was teerrified that the dragon would notiething amiss.

  If he’d o breathe, he’d have been gasping by now.

  Cassius murmured almost to himself:

  “An iing spell.”

  “But as I said earlier…”

  “Your little tricks are insequential to me!”

  With his words, a shimmering barrier radiated from the dragon, enveloping the entire area.

  “Antimagic Field!”

  The extradimensional space shattered like gss, and the hiding Baron Todd fell, crashing to the ground.

  Fag the dragon’s open, deadly maw, Baron Todd finally colpsed, falling to his knees and pleading:

  “No, no, please don’t kill me!”

  “I am the son of Duke Brad, a baron of the La family, Northwind’s Eagle.”

  “Spare me, and my family give you gold, far more than you would gain by killing me!”

  “Great dragon, I… I will serve you…”

  As a mage, Todd knew enough to uand a dragon’s i greed.

  The dragon looked down at him, eyes narrowing. “You need only agree to three ditions for cooperation.”

  “I agree—I agree to everything!”

  Todd quickly plied, desperate to avoid being reduced to ash by this merciless, votile dragon.

  Though the dragon seemed reasonably posed.

  But who could say for sure?

  Cassius nodded slightly and stated:

  “First, I require all of your spell scrolls, remember—all of them—to pensate for your incursion into Embers erritory. This is the basis of our cooperation.”

  “Sed, I wele trade and will even provide gold, but I need you to trade for all goods, including ons and armor. Hart will oversee this ‘friendly trade’ caravan.”

  “Third, I’ll assign some of my retaio guard the caravan and take up residen Sager Town to ehe safety of you, my colborator.”

  “Aren’t you worried I might betray this cooperation?”

  Baron Todd cautiously asked.

  The terms seemed fair, so he hoped to secure the dragon’s trust.

  Cassius let out a derisive ugh and replied, “Baron, I’ve told you, we’re here to cooperate, a mutually beneficial arra.”

  “Think about it: without trade with Embers , without gold, without a strong force, you and your barony are nothing, merely a grain-produg area that could be discarded at any moment. A northern invasion alone could devastate you.”

  “I think… you uand what I mean.”

  The dragon’s eyes gleamed, fmes seemingly dang within them.