The dragon's low growl shook my bones as it bore its fangs at me. Its monstrous, silver eye glared at me curiously. Perhaps it was perplexed by the audacity of a person as frail as me getting this close to it. It opened its maw, letting out vile, toxic gas.
I collapsed to my knees and cupped my mouth as I started to cough violently because of the sudden influx of fumes. Tears welled up in the corners of my eyes, obscuring my ability to see. My eyes darted around, but everything was simply blurry.
'Crap, crap, crap! The hell is wrong with me.'
I got far too reckless this time. I deserved to die for this. That didn't mean I wanted to or would be okay with it. There had to be something I could do.
I could feel the dragon's fangs inching towards my neck. I turned around, trying my hardest to crawl away. My hand weakly reached out for the dragon's scales for support standing up, but instead, I missed it and fell flatly.
"Aaargh!", A roar, equally as monstrous as the dragon's ripped through the tense atmosphere, immediately drawing the dragon's attention.
Descending from above with his claymore drawn, was Corin the Loyal. His black blade sliced through the air and collided with the dragon's horn thunderously. Sparks flew, changing the once muted and dim room bright orange and immediately clearing up all the gas in the air.
The dragon pushed back against the force of Corin's attack, throwing him back. It quickly jumped on all fours, roaring vengefully at the knight. Its protruding spines easily broke the walls of the chamber, letting in more moonlight and dropping more debris. The floor shook, threatening to crumble under its weight, as it took a single step forward.
Fortunately, I was no longer the target of its murderous wrath. I wiped the tears out of my eyes, trying to take in a better view of the scene, but it was pointless. The dragon's body took up the entire view, but now that it had moved, the entrance was open.
I scurried over to the door – It led to a dark, large descending staircase. Using the wall, I aided myself in standing up. I took in deep breaths, struggling to deal with the heat. Before I could leave, the sound of Corin's sword clashing with the dragon filled my ears once again.
'Damn it.'
Once more I looked back and saw Corin slam the side flat side of his claymore into the dragon's maw, slapping its head away. In that same motion, the dragon swiftly slammed its left leg into Corin, and I could hear his armour crack, right before he was pushed back.
Quickly, he stabbed his claymore into the ground ensuring that he skidded to a halt and narrowly avoiding being thrown out of the room. The knight fell to his knees, huffing heavily as he looked up. Blood seeped through the holes in his armour. And then, he turned to face me.
It felt like he was asking for help. I gulped.
Corin was clearly no ordinary man. The fact that he even charged at the dragon like that to save me could only mean he was an exceptional and selfless person. But he wasn't a person. He was a character who served his purpose. He protected both the princess and I. If he died now, it wasn't my fault.
'Y-Yes. That's right. He's just a character.'
Having reminded myself of this fact, I grit my teeth and solemnly descended down the stairs. The further I descended, the more the sounds of their clashes began to fade and the more I repeated Ami's words.
'It's all set dressing and characters, not real places and definitely not real people.'
I kept going till I eventually couldn't hear anything anymore. Shaky breaths left my lips. I stumbled, almost tripping over nothing when I tried to take another step. My legs trembled, as did the rest of my body.
'He's just a character, damn it!'
I reminded myself.
It had been roughly five minutes since I left. There was no way Corin was still alive. Alea was also somewhere else and I didn't have my sapphire anymore, so there was no way to be recalled to her. Now, I was stranded in the palace.
'I really screwed this one up, huh?'
I reached to my side for my emergency flask, but met nothing.
"Right."
I slumped against a wall while trying to control my breathing. This was a monumental fumble, but there was no time to beat myself up over it. There were four more days till the story dome, and less till a good ending for the princess.
"This was really dumb."
So far, I underestimated the dragons, I came up with a dumb plan that almost got me killed. It actually got Corin killed. The princess was alone in the castle with no safe way to leave the castle. The people under the castle were doomed to die now. This was going to be a worse ending than before. And it was all my fault.
'Well, I may have been a disappointment to him, but I'm definitely following in his murderous footstep. The great Atlas, humanity's second worst genocidal maniac! Has a nice ring to it, I guess.'
I coughed. First it started out light, then turned heavy and painful, till I coughed out blood.
'Or maybe not.'
"Why are you just sitting down?!", Corin barked, as he barrelled towards me. My eyes widened, at the sight of the black knight.
"C-Corin!?"
The man didn't respond. Instead, he reached me in a second, lifted me up into a princess carry and kept bolting down the hall in one swift motion.
"How?!"
His Armour had a few dents here and there, but overall looked fine – a stark contrast to what I saw just five minutes ago. And for some reason, even though we escaped, Corin was still terrified. Looking back in the direction we both came from, I saw nothing, but chose to believe his concern was not random.
Even if the corridor was too small for the dragon to appear, it could still use the means it did to appear in that chamber. That was most likely Corin's thought process as well.
'Okay. I need to do something. But what?'
What could I do? I'd made bad plans so far. I was physically incapable and not so intelligent. I didn't have magic like Alea and there was so little I knew about this world that I was less than useful. In fact, I was an actual obstacle to Corin and Alea.
'Shit. What's the goddamn benefit to being a [Story Forger] then?!'
According to the Tome, I had access to the first tier, and with that came the ability [Intuition].
'What's the point in having it that?'
[Intuition] had been a painful ability so far, but extremely useful. It pointed me towards the city, then towards Alea and Corin, then at the dragon. In all instances, I hadn't even thought of using intuition.
'Why?'
I found myself baffled. Why hadn't I consciously tried to use [Intuition]. Regardless of how it seemed, it was still an ability I possessed. Meaning it was something I should have been able to use. Even semblances weren't given if the walkers would be incapable of using it.
Having realised my oversight, I frowned, then focused. I simply wished to use [Intuition].
'Guide me to the God Heart.'
There was a gentle signal in my head that pointed me in a certain direction.
"Corin, turn left!"
The Knight didn't hesitate to listen to me, most likely because of the potential danger coming after us.
After a series of sharp turns in the castle's labyrinthian structure, we came before a large pair of wooden doors.
"In there!"
Not taking in any time to admire the beauty of the craft that went into making the doors, Corin, pushed them open and callously threw me in there.
I moaned from the pain of hitting the tiled ground so harshly. Slowly, I sat up and took in the marvellous view.
The cavernous room was painted orange, by the bright light of the burning kingdom from the massive window on the second floor. An unlit crystal chandelier, reflecting the fire, dangled from the bowl like ceiling, which was covered in strange, beautiful paintings.
The room gave the illusion of being hollow and spacious, but all I could see were rows of books, lined into the walls of the upper floor, which extended as a narrow walk way alongside the walls of the room, till they parted, forming two separate staircases on opposite ends of a desk on a slightly elevated platform.
Behind the desk, there was a thick marble wall, with two statues, standing with swords planted at their feet, on opposite ends. The statue to the left was one of a man in armour similar to Corin's, the other was another man in elegant attire, adorning a crown and a fur-line cape that touched the ground. Infront of the desk, leading up to where I stood, was a red carpet that parted two pairs of book shelves.
The door behind us shut close as quietly as possible. The one who closed it, however, was the furthest thing from quiet. His cold, hollow glare underneath his visor was the loudest wrath I'd ever experienced.
I stumbled backwards as he stomped over to me, then stabbed his sword right behind my shoulder, blocking off my retreat path. He growled underneath his helmet, puffing out clouds of steam. The steaming surface of his helmet met my nose and I could feel every ragged breath of his from the holes of his helmet.
For the first time, I saw light from underneath his visor – A vicious, vile golden.
"You fool. I knew I should have killed you."
"W-Wait. I'm sorry. Please, I di-didn't mean for that to happen.", My teeth clattered.
"Why did you wake the dragon? Do you intend to have us killed? Were you sent by them to ensure that Alea dies? And I will warn you one last time, fool. Lie and you die."
Something about the way he said it, convinced me that he wasn't joking. He genuinely had a way of determining if I was lying or not.
"No. I swear. It was a mistake. I just wanted to put my sapphire on the dragon, so that when it flew off to get a meal, we could just teleport onto its back. I thought a sleeping dragon would be easier to plant it on than one that's actively burning down the city"
The glow from his visor faded, then he pulled back, giving me breathing room. Finally, he simply shook his head and his voice returned to its usual subdued yet imposing tone.
"You shouldn't have done that. Gods."
"I-I'm sorry. I won't try that again."
"No. That's not the problem.", He tore out his sword, sheathing it. "Your plan wasn't bad. It's just, the target of your plan was horrible."
"What do you mean?"
"Did you not wonder why such a large dragon was in the chamber even though there was no way for it to get in?"
[Intuition] went off, sending alarm signals into my head and directing my gaze towards the door. This time, it was much different from all the other times. Neither the soothing guidance nor the painful pointing. This time, it was like alarm signals going off. From outside the library.
Sharp, needle-like claws ripped through the doors, like a hot knife through butter. Another set of claws came from below. When the two converged, they pulled back, effectively prying the doors of their hinges and destroying them. Wood splinters and marble debris flew off, creating a small dust cloud.
From behind the veil of dust, a pair of silver eyes glowed menacingly. However, they were much smaller than what I was expecting. In fact, they were about as small as a human's.
Their armour was pale white, just like the dragon's scales. Large, bony claws, easily twice as large as the actual man, formed a massive makeshift dragon head around the knight's head, extending from their back.
The knight's bone-like armour rattled as they stepped forward.
"Some dragons –the stronger ones– have the ability to change forms."