Unlike most of the structures belonging to draconic nobility, the Dragon King's Palace wasn't situated atop a sky island, but rather built into the side of a mountain.
Though mountain might be too weak of a word to describe the behemoth that towered in front of Vivi. Thronemont was almost incomprehensible in size, with even the part that jutted up through the sea of clouds dwarfing a regular mountain. Her mind boggled to visualize what it would look like without the blanket of white obscuring the truth of its bulk.
And yet somehow, the Dragon King's Palace didn't look small on that titanic slope. Here was a building that was the culminating effort of the most powerful race in the world… and also the vainest. A structure representing the might of dragonkind, built over who-knew-how-many years. Millennia? These people were immortal, after all, and very concerned with their image.
As far as sheer scale went, nothing came close. The palace clung to the rock face, carved predominantly of polished gray stone. Dragons were fond of strong, imposing shapes—roofs coming to sharp peaks and huge platforms lifted by heavy square columns.
From this distance, not many fine details were visible, but she knew the craftsmanship was unequaled too, every column intricately sculpted and every architectural choice deliberated over by artisans with centuries or millennia of experience. Dragons were people in the end, and that meant some pursued art—and they'd had thousands of years to refine their skills.
"Remember, let me do the talking," Embralyne said, interrupting Vivi's admiration of the Palace. "They'll have detected us coming in, so the Lord Commander will be awaiting me."
She recognized the title. "That's the one who knows I should be a prisoner, isn't it?"
"He knew my mission, yes."
"So should I put the manacles back on?"
"There's no need for that."
"You're going to tell him who I am?"
"Rather, I'll simply decline to explain."
"You don't trust him?"
A plume of smoke came out of the dragon's nostrils. "Hold your tongue. Of course I trust him. He has served my family faithfully for longer than some of your kingdoms have existed. But the first person to know that the Sorceress is in the Sky-Pillar Range will be my father. No one else."
"I see." Some of Embralyne's prickly mood seemed to have returned. Probably anxious to see how all of this plays out. Can't say I'm any different.
Thronemont and the Palace kept growing and growing as Vivi and Embralyne flew toward them. Despite the sheer speed they were traveling at, it took minutes to arrive. The effect bordered on absurdity; she had already seen the Palace while playing Seven Cataclysms, so she'd been mentally prepared, but the utter, ridiculous mass of the building would've left her gawking if not for her body's resistance to reactions like that.
It's not just that they're vain, wealthy, and long-lived, she thought. They also use magic as easily as mortals breathe. Quarrying stone and shaping it isn't that difficult, not for powerful sorcerers. Normal architectural limitations just don't apply.
They entered through the bottom of the palace, a wide-open area twenty times the size of an airplane hangar—or larger than that. It was big enough she couldn't gauge the scale. Certainly, a dragon could fly and maneuver around without worrying about colliding with the walls. There weren't even pillars holding the massive ceiling up. Magic took care of such mundane details.
Even this foyer, so to speak, was larger than any manmade structure she'd seen. Four of the High King's Palaces could fit inside, including the surrounding estates.
Just absurd, she thought.
Embralyne's claws scraped against polished black stone about the same time Vivi set herself down. The gray dragon looked small compared to the open space, but someone like Cinereus wouldn't make it appear nearly so roomy. Dragons didn't keep growing infinitely, but it did take a few millennia for them to finish filling out.
Meaning most dragons never reached their full size. Several thousand years was a long time to survive even for immortals. They might not die of natural causes like old age, but in this world, there were plenty of unnatural causes to bring down powerful beings.
Which was another reason Cinereus was so dangerous. Anyone who could avoid death for that long, especially without becoming a hermit who shunned all conflict, wasn't just powerful, but more than a little shrewd.
Embralyne transformed to Vivi's side. At roughly the same time, she felt a pocket of space begin to warp a meter to their right, and she turned in that direction by instinct. She realized late that the instant detection of spatial phenomena was probably giving away her magical ability, especially when Embralyne herself hadn't reacted.
Another dragon in halfdragon form materialized. This one had red-scaled wings, red hair, and yellow eyes. He struck as imposing a figure as any of their people, broad-shouldered and seemingly shaped from marble. Vivi had to look up to meet his gaze. While she might stand six and a half feet in this new form, that was on the short end. Women tended to be smaller than men, the same as with the mortal races.
Weirdly, she felt more comfortable all of a sudden. She'd grown deeply used to being the shortest person in any given room, and it would take a while for that ingrained expectation to go away.
"Scorian," Embralyne said.
"Your Highness." He bowed. "You've returned." The man's gaze shifted to Vivi, and she could see that he made a note of how she bore no restraints. "With a guest?" he asked curiously.
Vivi assumed this was the Lord Commander of the Royal Guard, then. Embralyne had said he would greet them.
"I have. And yes, a guest. I'm afraid I can't explain. I need to speak with my father."
"An emergency?"
"Not as such. But urgent, still. Please make my father aware on my behalf."
"I see."
Despite holding high station, the man didn't question Embralyne, much as the gatekeeper hadn't. He simply bowed, spared one more look at Vivi, and teleported away.
Embralyne dusted a perfectly clean shoulder off, appearing agitated. She turned to Vivi, then paused. "Why are you frowning?"
"Did you see that?"
"See what?"
"In his eyes."
"His… eyes?" The dragon seemed bewildered.
Vivi's frown deepened. Had she imagined it? No, she definitely hadn't. Before the man had [Blinked] away, some dark sheen had passed through his sclera, like a layer of oil sliding across the white. Not physically or literally—but rather her magical senses detecting something sinister.
She knew what she'd glimpsed. She just didn't want to entertain the idea, because it explained so many things at once that she felt overwhelmed. And because it spelled nothing good, even for her. A real threat.
"Where can we talk safely?" Vivi asked. She had thrown up her own blockers, of course, but she'd rather leave this entry chamber.
Embralyne furrowed her brow at Vivi's question. She deliberated for a few seconds, then said, "Follow me."
The dragon [Blinked] away. Vivi traced the direction and popped into existence six hundred feet up and eastward. She turned in a half-circle as she looked around at her new environment—some ridiculously luxurious waiting room—but she'd seen plenty of displays of wealth recently, and she had something far more attention-grabbing to worry about than the room's decor.
"That was your Lord Commander of the Royal Guard, I take it?"
"Scorian? Yes."
"He's been compromised."
Embralyne stared at her.
"Mind magic," Vivi said. "I don't know to what extent. Total mind control would've been more apparent, I think. It was subtle. I would need to run a full analysis, but that's rather conspicuous even if I take steps to conceal myself."
Dragons, unfortunately, weren't on the same level as even Titled mortal mages. She was bound by the rules a little more than normal. She didn't know where Scorian stood in the global hierarchy, but he was probably as strong as Embralyne, if not even more powerful. Meaning at the very peak of mortal ability or beyond it.
"You're serious."
Vivi hesitated, suddenly confused. "You mean this isn't the problem you brought me here for?"
Of course she had made that assumption. Embralyne's comment about wanting to keep the Sorceress's senses intact, along with the woman having gallivanted off to charge the Fourflame Amulet, were both instantly explained by her wanting the Sorceress to detect a mental manipulation threat inside the Palace. It was why Vivi had stood there, reeling, for a moment—her surprise so visible as to manifest as a frown on her face as she parsed all the implications.
Specifically, Vivi suspected that Embralyne's worries stemmed from her father, which was also the ultimate reason Vivi herself was unsettled. Anything that could take over the Dragon King's mind was, at a very minimum, an insidious Cataclysm candidate. And on the high end of that threat spectrum, not the low.
So why did Embralyne sound surprised? And at the same time, her silence was telling—she still hadn't responded.
"You suspected it of your father only," she surmised, closing the logical gap. "Not that multiple people in the Palace had been taken over."
That snapped Embralyne out of her previous silence. Her eyes narrowed, and she replied hotly, "My father would never in a thousand millennia be overcome by any assault. Magical, physical, or otherwise."
Vivi fought an exasperated sigh. "We need to speak plainly. If I'm right, this is serious. The only reason you would run off to empower the Fourflame Amulet is if there was a monumental threat that your father couldn't solve… or rather, if your father himself was the threat. The one who needed saving. No?"
"The idea that the King of Dragons needs saving from anything or anyone is ludicrous at its very core. I won't entertain the notion." The words weren't as heated this time. In fact, they came out as a mumble, the least certain Vivi had ever heard the woman sound.
A pang of sympathy went through Vivi. Though a few centuries old, Embralyne was, in reality, just into adulthood. And she'd spent her entire life viewing her father—rightfully—as a nigh-impervious, all-powerful being. Cinereus de Caldaros had turned away even the Ashen Hierophant from invading his lands.
"You need to explain what you know," Vivi said firmly. "I have to understand what I'm up against."
"You intend to help?"
Vivi fought the immense urge to summon her staff and deliver a thwap onto Embralyne's head. She thankfully restrained herself. Doing that to her apprentice was one thing, but a prickly dragon princess another.
"Even if I wasn't indebted to you, and I wasn't indebted to him, I wouldn't just let some nascent Cataclysm infest the Sky-Pillar Range."
She wasn't afraid of any individual threat. What she did fear was a danger of scale. One of her biggest limitations was that she could only exist in one place at a time. An army of dragons led by a mind-corrupted king scouring the mortal lands would be impossible to contain. And while certain members of mortalkind could fight off a dragon, by collective might, there wasn't a question at all which society would win in a war.
Embralyne thankfully responded seriously. "Presuming this ludicrous theory is true, it's still my father we're speaking about."
Vivi tilted her head, unsure what the woman meant by that.
"Meaning even you couldn't defeat him." Embralyne appeared to wrestle with herself for a moment. "…easily," she gritted out. "You'll be in danger. That's why I'm surprised you're so nonchalant."
Vivi didn't think the dragon would've ever admitted the Sorceress could defeat the Dragon King if she hadn't opened up the sky and summoned a barrage of sky-meteors not two hours prior. "It still needs to be done," she said with a shrug. "But this is tricky. If he really is compromised—"
She gave the dragon a significant look and received a terse nod and a growled response of "He was possibly acting strangely, hence my expedition."
"—then depending on how deeply the mind magic has rooted, breaking it all at once with the Fourflame Amulet might be dangerous."
She studied Embralyne curiously. While the dragon might claim to not be skilled with magic, she had to know that much. Indeed, the princess clenched her fists and stared down.
"I didn't believe he was… compromised. Merely suspected, against all hope. But if he was, then breaking such an enchantment is my duty, no matter the cost. No matter if his mind is left shattered afterward. My father would disown me for even hesitating, when the alternative is him being left as a puppet for forces that would ruin his kingdom."
Her sympathy grew. "It's not going to come to that."
"Won't it?"
"No." The surety in her tone made Embralyne look strangely at her. "But first, you need to explain. We're well past speaking in circles around each other. So please—start from the beginning."
***
Max Level Archmage is now available on Kindle Unlimited!!
If you feel like reading an edited/cleaned up version of the first book, you would help me out a ton by buying/reading/reviewing today or this week! The initial launch is super important for a story's success. Much like with RR, algorithms drive a lot of traffic and an initial boost to fly up the Best Seller rankings can make or break a launch.
So I would really appreciate your support!
For audio readers, I expect the audiobook to be available either today, tomorrow, or the next. Most likely tomorrow? It's in final review right now, and at the end of the predicted timeframe they gave me.
Thank you for all the support you've shown! I'll make an announcement on Wednesday if the audiobook is ready by then. I was hoping for it to be ready before or on the same date as the ebook, but sometimes things don't always shake out perfectly right.
Vivi waited patiently for Embralyne's response. Eventually, the dragon grimaced and said, "I don't have much for you. As I said, it was a gut feeling. If I had real evidence of a threat, I would have been far more expeditious about addressing my concerns."
Vivi didn't fully buy the explanation, but to be fair, she didn't think Embralyne was lying to her any more than she was lying to herself. The princess's worries had to have been more than minor to urge her out of the Sky-Pillar Range. Or maybe she'd had mixed motives and had ventured out half from curiosity, wanting to explore the human lands? Vivi shouldn't pretend she knew everything about this woman and how she thought.
"But something gave you that gut feeling," Vivi pressed. "It didn't come from nowhere."
"He was behaving oddly. Distracted at first, which was unusual to begin with, but then… sluggish?" Her tone tilted upward, uncertain. She shook her head. "I tried speaking with Solfirus, but he didn't share my unease. Went out of his way to assure me I was being paranoid, in fact." She twitched as a realization hit her. "You said Scorian is 'compromised.' How many others do you think are too?"
Vivi could intuit what Embralyne feared. "Solfirus very well might be. I would have to investigate, but if both your father and the head of the Royal Guard are, I doubt it would be just them. Considering Solfirus's talent, he would've figured out what was wrong by now if he were free from influence, so I would add him to the list. Honestly, we should assume most of the Palace is affected."
A deep frown settled over Embralyne's face. "If it wasn't targeting only my father, why was I spared?"
Vivi shifted uncomfortably. She hedged, "How strong is Scorian?"
No dragon would take such a question well. Embralyne glared, but eventually grouched, "In a duel, he would probably win more often than not, if that's what you're asking."
"A lot more often than not?"
The heat in the dragon's gaze doubled, which was answer enough.
"Whoever's responsible for the mind magic probably tried to take out the biggest threats first," Vivi said bluntly. "Because if they hadn't, then Cinereus or Solfirus would have detected what was going on. So it prioritized the most important targets."
Embralyne clearly hadn't sensed anything magically wrong back then, not on a conscious level. Her intuition had come from knowing her father and detecting a change in his behavior—with perhaps a sliver of help through her arcane instincts.
The dragon's expression shifted from outrage to sour displeasure. She no doubt saw the logic in Vivi's argument and resented the implication: that she'd been spared not out of oversight, but because she hadn't mattered enough.
"I see," she said tightly. "These are a lot of assumptions based on very little, though."
"What I saw in Scorian is undeniable. That your father, brother, and possibly many others in the Palace have also been compromised is an assumption, yes, but given the facts, a plausible one. Setting that aside. Do you really have no suspicions what caused it? An opponent? Something your father was investigating? A personal project that went wrong?"
"Opponent?" Embralyne scoffed. "None that could threaten us. My father's rule has always survived on strength. There isn't a clan in existence who would accept being ruled over if there were any other choice. As for investigations or experiments… Solfirus is always doing something of that ilk."
"Did your father find or bring something back with him?"
A pause. "What do you mean?"
"That's where many of these kinds of threats come from," Vivi said, shrugging, thinking about the debacle that had ensnared Eshara. The long-dormant Seed of Genesis. "Buried things that should've stayed so. I imagine the immortal lands have even more forgotten treasures, so to speak."
Embralyne stared down as she thought. "My father trusts me, but he hardly confides every adventure of his. As I told you, I don't have a theory. Not even a starting point, else I would've shared it."
Vivi hummed in response. "With luck, he's not fully under the control of whatever or whoever it is. I can't imagine anything would instantly overtake him, and the fact that you saw small changes rather than an immediate, major shift tells me that the magic is working slowly. Burrowing past his defenses. I doubt it's completely penetrated, but it's probably advanced from what you last saw. Maybe by a lot." She shook her head. "Regardless, things could be worse."
"Worse," Embralyne repeated. "The King of Dragons, the appointed First Prince, the Lord Commander of the Royal Guard, and potentially half the Palace is infested with Cataclysm-level mind magic, and you think 'things could be worse.'"
Vivi didn't bat an eye. "Yes. We're fortunate in the grand scheme of things. There haven't been any casualties." That she knew of. "All we have to do is break the magic and deal with whatever caused it."
Embralyne stared at Vivi for nearly five seconds. "I see now why my elder siblings speak of you as they do."
"What does that mean?"
Embralyne snorted and didn't answer. "Then, what is our plan? Will you withdraw and muster a defense?"
"Withdraw?" she asked curiously. "No, we'll just go and see him. Hopefully Scorian has told him you're here by now, and we'll be summoned shortly."
"What?"
"There are some steps I could take, but every hour—maybe minute—we delay carries way more risk than preparation would offset." Filling the Codex would set her at ease, but that would take too much time.
Her thoughts brushing against that artifact, and against how recent events with Prismarche and the Archbishop had drained it more than she would've preferred, a realization hit her like a thunderbolt. A full-body twitch went through her.
Embralyne's hand instantly shot to her sword. "What is it?"
Embarrassed, Vivi answered, "We forgot to link scrying tables with Meridian." The discovery that the Dragon King had been taken over by mind magic was one of the more excusable reasons a person could grow distracted, but she should have linked tables the moment she arrived at the Palace. A large oversight, and one with possibly catastrophic consequences.
Embralyne relaxed, though she seemed annoyed. She'd probably thought that the reaction had meant something far more serious had happened. "Of course. We can take care of that now."
The errand was brief, with Embralyne [Blinking] to a scrying room and Vivi linking to Meridian, confirming with the staff there, and then ending the connection. No void rift had split open in the short time Vivi had been gone. Two minutes later, they returned to the sitting room.
"You really intend to stride into a meeting with my father with no plan?" Embralyne insisted.
"We have so little information there's not much of a plan to make. I need to lay eyes on him and analyze the situation." And things would almost certainly devolve during that meeting. "But no matter what's going on, I don't believe any amount of waiting is beneficial." She pursed her lips. "That said… and I know you're probably not going to be happy with this… it'd be for the best if you gave me the Fourflame Amulet."
"Excuse me?"
"It's a very useful item, even by my standards. Should I need to break the mind magic on Cinereus forcibly and instantly"—and she could imagine a few reasons she would have to, though only after mitigating steps had been employed to prevent mental damage—"then I'm better equipped to put it to use when necessary."
'Better equipped' was a generous way of putting it. Vivi was trying to minimize how much she inadvertently insulted Embralyne, but there was no way to tiptoe around the fact that Embralyne would be outclassed in the coming conflict. She was strong for a dragon, but not top-tier. Solfirus himself was far out of her reach, to say nothing of Cinereus.
Vivi almost felt bad about how visibly Embralyne wrestled with herself. The draconic princess tended to face facts when she needed to, though, and to reject Vivi's words would be to deny obvious truth. While Embralyne might be in the habit of doing just that anyway, she wouldn't when her family and kingdom were in peril.
She looked like she had swallowed a lemon as she fished the artifact out from her breastplate, unclasped it, and handed it over. Vivi took the item wordlessly, sensing that acknowledging the exchange any more than necessary wouldn't go well.
Unfortunately, the next topic would be no easier. "There's also the matter of what part you'll play," Vivi said carefully. "If a fight breaks out, then I'll need to focus on Cinereus and Solfirus." She could hope that the latter, the second-largest threat in the Palace, wouldn't be present for whatever conflict was brewing, but she'd learned to stop thinking so optimistically.
The temperature in the room seemed to rise several degrees as Embralyne crossed her arms and glowered. "What are you implying, demon?"
Vivi held her ground. "It would be easiest if I went alone, or barring that, if you had some means of fleeing should the situation deteriorate." Because having to watch over you would just complicate things, she didn't finish explaining. The sentiment was exceedingly clear.
Embralyne flatly replied, "If you think I won't fight for my family and kingdom, you are delusional."
"But—"
"Which is not to say I don't understand the danger. The solution, however, is not for you to tend to me, but rather that if I am too weak to contribute, then I will die. Refusing to participate in a battle of this importance, no matter how little I could help, would be gross cowardice and invalidate any claim to nobility I hold."
There was zero yield in Embralyne's voice. Vivi supposed that she had already received more reasonable responses than she would normally get from dragons—prideful and obstinate beings to the point of infamy.
Suggesting that Embralyne stay out of the fight went too far. It would not happen no matter how much logic Vivi tried to use on her. She could read that in Embralyne's clenched jaw and burning eyes.
Vivi sighed. "You've been potion-sick before, I assume."
The statement made Embralyne uncross her arms and furrow her brow. "I… have, yes. What of it?"
A thin green vial and a fat, square elixir containing bubbling yellow liquid appeared between Vivi's fingers. She handed them over. "Double whatever your worst experience has been—that's what you're in for if you drink those. You're not strong enough to properly digest them, but you're high enough you'll get some portion of their effect."
With Embralyne still blinking—and then her eyebrows rising at the descriptions she read from the potions—Vivi pointed her staff and began layering her strongest stat-boosting and defensive spells onto the woman.
Protecting Embralyne was Vivi's smaller concern. [Prismatic Barrier] could hold up to serious abuse, including taking blows from Cataclysms. But as far as making Embralyne truly useful in a high-tier fight, Vivi couldn't do much. She was no [Priestess]. Her buffs were better than her healing abilities, but not by a lot. The potions would do more, but still, not nearly enough to bring a 1400- or 1500-tier fighter up to 1900.
She would rather the dragon sit the event out entirely, but at least this way Embralyne could contribute, and Vivi wouldn't have to worry about her dying. A fight against the Dragon King would need Vivi's full attention; she wouldn't be able to babysit Embralyne.
The princess had recovered from her shock by the time Vivi finished casting. She seemed embarrassed, thankful, and, in classic fashion, aggravated, probably at needing help to begin with. She didn't face that anger toward Vivi though. Instead, in a rare display, she dipped her head and mumbled, "My gratitude, Lady Sorceress."
"It's your family. I understand why you want to fight."
"I won't forget the aid you've rendered us this day."
"This is just us getting even, as far as I see it."
She wasn't sure Embralyne's assistance would make up for the mana she had just expended—her top-tier buffs and defenses weren't exactly free, and those potions weren't cheap either—but a second set of hands and eyes on the battlefield wouldn't be worthless.
A knock at the door drew both their gazes. "Princess Embralyne?" The voice belonged to Scorian, which probably meant he'd finished informing Cinereus and was fetching them for an audience.
Vivi shared a look with Embralyne. The princess's expression firmed, and she nodded.
Well then. Time to go and see the Dragon King. Find out how bad this really is.
She had a feeling things were about to go off the rails, even by her standards.
***