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Demon Queened - Chapter 66 - Rough Draft
🕑 Added 2025-02-21 04:47:27 +0000 UTCDevilla
Watching Lucy disappear on the teleportation pad was honestly a little jarring. One moment she was present, the next she was gone - off to the tower, beyond my immediate protection, where who knew what could happen to her… And yet, that was a risk she’d willingly chosen to take. She wanted to get to know Abigail outside my presence. My people, too, for that matter - she wanted to know what they were like, when not under my gaze. Something I could accept, no matter how much it worried me…
That didn’t mean I could simply stop worrying, though. Not only for her physical safety, but for our relationship. What if she overheard people talking about me in the tower? Spreading rumors, whether lies or truth… I’d informed Lucy that I was hated by my own, but would seeing it for herself cause her to start doubting me? Would knowing everything I’d done turn her affection into hate?
I knew it was unlikely. Lucy wasn’t the sort to take rumors as fact. She’d ask me, first and foremost, and likely accept whatever I’d done besides… but still, my mind was roiling with worry.
As such, it was something of a relief when a loud knock came from my door.
“Eena!” called a familiar voice. “Heroine! You in there? I thought we could finally have that arm wrestling competition!”
“Funny,” I remarked, opening the door. “I don’t recall agreeing to any such event.”
“Aw, come on,” Grell whined, crossing her arms now that she was in sight. “This is my one chance to arm wrestle the Heroine while Dyona’s too busy to scold me!”
“Where is your shadow, anyways?” I asked. “I would have thought her all but glued to your side, from the way you talk.”
“She’s scouting! For food stuff, I mean. Mapping out all the most popular places to hit, and searching for any hidden gems.She, uh, said it wouldn’t do to feed me something that didn’t meet my taste, so she said it was best she went alone… I think she might just be enjoying some alone time, though… But that’s exactly why this is the perfect time to arm wrestle with you and the Heroine!”
“You know, she might be more tempted to agree if you’d just use her given name,” I pointed out.
“No way!” she objected, immediately. “I might be a failure of a duke’s daughter, but even I know better than to act so familiar with the Heroine!”
“You’re also apparently a failure at keeping secrets,” I teased. “Or did you intend to tell me your social position?”
“I mean, I’ll tell you mine if you tell me yours! It was mostly the Heroine I was hiding from anyway.”
“Mine?” I asked, feigning innocence with a hand to my chest. “I’m just a traveler.”
“Like anyone would believe that! You’re probably, like, a foreign princess on the run or something, right? Or maybe you’re traveling incognito so that it doesn’t look like the Heroine is favoring any one kingdom…”
“If I was hiding my identity for such a reason, then I hardly see why I would stop.”
“Oh come on!” she pleaded, clutching her hands together. “I’ll tell you mine! I’m Duke Darrington’s seventh daughter! The theoretically terminally ill girl nobody ever gets to meet, Agrellissa!”
“You…” I resisted the urge to slap my own forehead in exasperation, shaking my head. “You do realize that simply telling me of your own accord does nothing to move me, yes? In the first place, you’re the one who single sidedly declared I’d have to tell you if you told me. A change in rules I have not accepted. Not to mention the way you revealed your secret so casually - it hardly garners trust on my end!”
“...Will you at least arm wrestle me, then?” Grell asked, giving me puppy dog eyes. They were inferior to Lucy’s, but…
“If you wish to be crushed, then fine,” I agreed, with a sigh. “But only until Dyona comes back from her errand. Assuming you don’t mind me joining you on your trip through the stalls?”
“Nope! I’d love to have a pretty girl with me! Though I guess you’re sort of taken, what with dating the Heroine and all… ahhh, if anything you might scare off other potential hotties! Unless… one of them comes up to challenge you to an arm wrestling contest, after noticing how hot you are… Hmmm…”
“Do you want to arm wrestle me or not?” I asked, arching an eyebrow.
“I do! I definitely do! It’s just… You know… Ah! What about the Heroine?”
“Lucy is busy,” I replied, wincing a little. I’d hoped she’d remain distracted from the topic for at least a little while.
“Really? I didn’t notice her leaving the inn…”
“She’s busy sleeping,” I amended, lying through my teeth. Thankfully, Dyona wasn’t present - I was sure I had a hundred tells she could pick up on.
“Wait… Then wouldn’t it just be me and you arm wrestling?”
“If you can’t beat me, then how can you hope to beat her?” I asked, arching an eyebrow. I knew that no matter how strong Grell thought me to be, I couldn’t possibly compare to ‘the Heroine’ in her mind.
Grell, for her part, sucked air through her teeth, before biting her lip and rocking back and forth on her heels. “I guess that’s true,” she muttered, eventually. “But I really did want to arm wrestle the Heroine…”
“That sounds like a bad idea at the best of times,” a new voice declared, causing Grell to jump. “Speaking of which - did you not notice the dragon?”
“...The what now?” I asked.
“The dragon. There’s one descending down the mountain. It seems to be headed towards the city as we speak. People are evacuating as we speak.’
“A dragon,” I asked, again, my voice flat. “Is attacking. And everyone’s just… evacuating? You speak of it almost as if it’s normal…”
“Despite a lack of recorded dragon attacks in recent times, the people of Gour nevertheless practice evacuation procedures as a precaution before each festival. Grell always called the practice stupid.”
“Well, they’re preparing to run away!” Grell pointed out. “Why isn’t anyone preparing to fight it instead?”
“Because most people are not stupid enough to fight a dragon,” Dyona replied, shaking her head. “Speaking of which, if you intend to go punch this dragon you will need to go through me.”
“Wh-what do you mean, Dyona!?” Grell demanded.
“I mean exactly what I said,” Dyona answered, lifting her chin. “If you wish to throw your life away, then so be it - but I will not stand by and watch.”
“I told you I was going to fight it from the start, didn’t I? I’ve always said I’d love to fight a dragon!”
“And I never thought you’d actually find one,” Dyona replied, through gritted teeth. “An oversight on my part. One I intend to rectify, here and now.”
“Ah-hem?” I coughed, causing both women to swivel their heads about. Their combined glares almost made me take a step back, but I didn’t falter. “Apologies for interrupting your fight, but I need to make my way towards the door.”
“...Of course,” Dyona said. Her smile was bright, but I sensed an edge of danger to it. I’d likely be paying for my interference later.
…Well, assuming she still wanted anything to do with me after all was said and done, that is.
“I’m sorry,” I said, pushing between the two of them so that I could move down the hallway, towards the front door of the inn.
“You said that already,” Dyona pointed out, even as she fell into step behind me. “If you’re truly sorry, then help escort us to safety.”
“I’m afraid that won’t be a possibility,” I replied, pushing open the inn’s doors. The streets outside weren’t quite empty, but there were certainly less people than there’d been just an hour ago. “This dragon… appearing now of all times… Should I thank it for coming too late to ruin Lucy’s fun? Or hate it for the position it’s placed me in?”
“What are you talking about?” Grell asked. “I thought Lucy was sleeping?”
I made no reply, choosing instead to glance up at the skies. I couldn’t see anything, at first. Not until I focused. Then, I saw a dot, which morphed into a blur the moment I locked onto it, before finally settling onto a picture of a dragon. A four legged beast, with dark red scales and a triangular head set on a sinuous neck.
“It’s still quite a distance away…”
“You can see it?” Dyona asked, surprised. “I’m told the person who saw it was using a spyglass.”
“Yes, well, my senses are quite a bit better than most,” I replied, drawing an odd look from Dyona. I ignored it, for the time being.
“I’m sorry,” I repeated.
“Again?” Dyona asked. “Isn’t that the third time?”
“I once apologized a hundred times to get Dyona to forgive me for something!” Grell piped up.
“The first apology was for interrupting,” I told her, ignoring Grell for the moment. “The second was for pushing you aside. But the third is for something different.” I took a deep breath, then let out a sigh, running a hand through my dyed brown locks. For a moment, I considered removing the false coloring and showing myself in all my glory - but in the end, it would be a waste of magic, just for vanity’s sake. Against a dragon, I’d probably need every drop I could spare.
“You wanted to know who I was,” I said, finally focusing on Grell. “My identity. I’ll tell it to you, when all is said and done - assuming I survive, and you actually want anything to do with me… Tell Lucy I’m sorry, too. I’m probably not coming back. I’ll be waiting at the sight of the fight, though - I’m sure it’ll be obvious enough, by the time we’re through.”
“What are you…?” Dyona started, only to trail off as pitch black wings sprouted from my back. Thankfully, my current outfit was backless.
“Once again, I am sorry,” I repeated, beating my wings and bringing my magic to bare. A moment later I was floating five feet in the air. “But I really must take care of this…”
Another beat of my wings, and I was gone.
***
Grell
***
I stared at the speck that used to be Eena, watching until she passed out of sight completely before turning to Dyona in confusion.
“I’m dumb. Explain what just happened to me?”
“Our savior - your target of affection - just revealed herself to be a demon,” Dyona replied. “She also apologized. Profusely.”
“Right…” I muttered. Profusely meant a lot, right? I was pretty sure it did. “Why was she saying sorry so much, again?”
“Because of the difficult position this will put us in, politically, if anyone learns of our involvement, I imagine,” Dyona replied.
She used big words, some of which I only sort of understood, but I nodded along anyways. Dyona might be feisty, and prone to biting the hand that fed her, but she knew her stuff. I trusted her. “So what do we do now?”
“That depends on how you want to handle this,” Dyona replied. “This is likely your one and only opportunity to separate yourself from what’s about to happen.”
“What? No. Why would I do that?” I asked, confused. “I want to help them. I mean, the Heroine is probably gonna be in trouble, too, right? I don’t really get why she’d be with a demon - maybe she doesn’t know? - but even if she did… we traveled together. We laughed at shitty jokes together. We complained together.”
“And you still haven’t gotten to challenge either of them to an arm wrestling competition.”
“That too! How am I supposed to just walk away from all that?!” I demanded, shaking my head. “So… what do I need to do, to help?”
Dyona didn’t say anything for a moment. Then she let out a loud sigh. “I knew you’d say that, my Lady. Which is why I’ve already compiled the best way forward. We need to stop any new messenger birds from being sent out. Some were likely already released, on account of the dragon, and that’s fine - but we don’t need word going out of Eena’s activity. Especially not if anyone connects her to the Heroine.”
“Alright,” I agreed. “Go do that, then. You know where I keep the family medallion - should give you enough credit to stall, at least. And check on the Heroine whenever you can, too!”
“What about you?” Dyona asked, frowning.
I grinned back. “I’m going to go punch a dragon!”
***
Devilla
***
It didn’t take long to reach my target. No matter how far it had seemed, initially, the sheer speed at which we both were flying ultimately made the distance trivial.
The dragon must have noticed my approach, at some point, but it made no attempt at slowing down. Instead, it met me head on, with a roar that forced me to cover my ears and fly in place for a moment. Then, it swung at me, its claw raking through the air. There was no time to dodge from left or right, but there was plenty below - it was simply a matter of halting my flight and falling towards the ground, as the dragon’s claws swiped through the space I’d been.
Then I was up again, drawing my hand back and punching the dragon in the side. A move that most would likely find useless against its hard scales was nothing to me, as I punched through them like paper mache, digging into the flesh within. The dragon roared, in response, shaking wildly to throw me off, and a moment later I was spinning through the air, coming to a stop a few seconds later, hovering over a sea of trees.
As for the wound I’d delivered to the dragon… well, I doubt it was more than a nuisance, truly. There was a detail about the dragon I hadn’t really had the time to process, yet - or perhaps it was better to say that I didn’t really want to process it: the fact that this dragon was larger than a house, and that my punches, no matter how viscous, were little more than flea bites to it.
Its claws were longer than I was tall, for goodness sakes! A single fang was as large as my entire body! Against something this huge, I feared I was little more than a bug.
I shook the thought off, trying to focus on the battle again - but too late. The dragon was upon me, again, its mouth open huge as if to swallow me. I flew up, and over its head, allowing it to pass under me.
Perhaps it was a mistake - if I was too small to attack its outsides, perhaps I could wreak havoc on its insides. Yet, no matter how easily I’d punched through its scales, I was a little worried about the hardiness of its organs. What if it had a literal iron stomach? Or perhaps the acid in its stomach was so strong, I’d dissolve in an instant.
Supposedly, even late term Heroines - ones strong enough to fight and kill Demon Queens like me - was hard pressed to fight this enemy. There had to be a reason for that, and since it surely wasn’t the creatures’s exterior defenses I had to question everything else.
For now, I chose to study it, weaving through its attacks in mid-air, harrying it without ever actually attacking it. I was looking for a weakness, something I could exploit. So far, the only idea I could come up with was grabbing it by the tail and spinning - a ridiculous, cartoonish notion that was unlikely to work, but… well, I was running out of ideas.
I was considering what spells I knew that could turn the tide when it happened - the dragon suddenly changed its attack patterns. Where before it had been swiping wildly at me, now it was falling on top of me. It had folded up its wings, allowing its weight to come down upon my head, roaring all the while as if challenging me to get out of this.
I spun towards the ground, beating my wings and flying down with all my might. Crossing my arms in front of my face, I broke through foliage and tore my way through branches, hurtling towards the ground only to go out at the last second, and barely - just barely - clearing the space beneath it as it slammed into the ground.
The earth beneath my feet shook, birds squawking as they took flight, animals running in all directions, and even a tree or two toppling over. Then there was silence. Me, catching breath I didn’t need off to the side, the creature laying flat and still upon the earth. For a moment, I thought perhaps it had been hurt in the fall - that the trees it crushed beneath its weight might have perhaps managed to puncture something - but a moment later the beast let out a loud snort, and began to move. It pushed its way up onto its feet, turning its head towards me.
I cursed, spreading my wings with the intent of taking to the sky. The dragon, meanwhile, spun with surprising grace, slamming its tail through nearby trees and towards me, moving too fast to dodge, angling upwards even as I flew towards the sky. It smacked me in the midsection, sending me flying, until I slammed into something hard. I heard something crack but there was no time to process it. The tail had pushed me forward, towards the head, which was now coming towards me, maw agape.
It wasn’t trying to swallow me, though. It was trying to roast me, roiling flames bubbling up from its throat. Before I could even take stock of my current injuries, its breath came spewing out towards me, bathing me in heat beyond anything I’d ever known. The air itself seemed to be on fire, every breath I drew into my lungs tinged with flames. I stopped breathing as soon as I realized, of course, but… surely, it was too late, with that heated breath already inside me.
I realized, in that moment, that I was going to die. Right there, right then, in a fight I hadn’t even thought through before picking. I’d tried to play the hero on a whim, and now I was never going to see Lucy, or Abigail, or anyone else again.
Except… Why didn’t I feel pain, then? Had the fire flash fried my nerves? No… I could still feel the flames, blasting away. I knew exactly how hot they were, but… it didn’t hurt. Even the discomfort I felt was more psychological in nature, stemming more from a dislike of the temperature than any actual physiological response.
When the pillar of flames at least ceased to flow, I realized something. A few somethings, in fact. For one, it wasn’t my body that had cracked, but the tree I’d slammed into. For another, I was nude, my body covered in nothing but ash. In fact, even my hair was coated in the stuff - though it was already flaking off, revealing gray tinged locks. Not a hint of brown dye, though - it had likely burnt off in the flames. Much like my clothes. And everything else I had on me, sparing the Empty Bag which had fallen to the floor by my feet.
The dragon blinked at me in surprise, clearly as shocked as I that I’d survived its breath. Then it brought up a paw and slammed it down on me, as if to crush me - but I merely lifted a hand. The weight of it came down, my feet pressing into the ground, but I myself did not move. Instead, I began to walk towards the edge of the palm, casually holding the clawed leg overhead until I could exit out from under it and throw it to the ground.
The dragon stared at me.
I didn’t stare back. I instead walked around the dragon, finding and grabbing hold of its tail. The dragon continued to stare, apparently dumbfounded, even as I began to beat my wings and fly up into the sky.
Only when its tail had gone taut did the dragon finally snap to its senses - likely due to the sensation of being hauled up into the air. It roared in complaint, and tried to wrest its arms free, but I fought back against the might of physics with all my strength - and a good dose of magic, my wings working overtime to keep me in control as I rose higher and higher.
The creature roared again, even louder, but I ignored it. It tried to wrest itself free from me, but I ignored it. It tried to fly up itself, but I outpaced it. And then I began to spin.
“W-wait!” came a loud voice, as the creature suddenly began to shrink. “H-hold on a sec!”
I paused, staring blankly down at the dragon, even as its form shrank down from the size of a house to something just a little larger than myself. A dragon girl, by the looks of it, with horns, wings, and a tail.
“L-look! I’m a person! Like you! S-so let’s be reasonable, here!”
I didn’t respond. I just stared at the redheaded girl dangling by her tail below me.
“If you start swinging me around like that, someone’s going to end up hurt! Namely me!”
“...You know, I thought you were a threat.”
“A-a threat?” the girl asked. “I-I’m not a threat! Nope! I’m just… uh…”
“I thought you were a danger.”
“N-no, I’m-”
“I thought our fight would be a life struggle. I thought I was at risk of not coming back! I thought I had to race off, and leave a massive mess for Lucy, just so that I could fight in a life and death battle for people I don’t even know! Because it was what Lucy would have done if she was here. Because it’s what Lucy would have wanted… I thought… I thought, for a moment, that I was never going to see Lucy again. But you’re… you’re so weak.”
“H-hey!” the beast in girl form protested. “I’m not… I mean, I… probably would have been a bad fight for a normal person, alright? Like your Lucy.”
“Perhaps as she is now, she would have struggled,” I conceded. “Though your defense is trash, the rather large forest fire beneath us is a testament to your attack power. Can you put that out, by the way? Or will I need to resort to spellcraft?”
“I-I’ve got it!” the dragon promised me. A moment later, the flames that had been dancing at the edge of my vision were snuffed out.
“Good… Now, as I was saying, Lucy as she is now might struggle, but I for one was told that you were meant to be on par with late stage Heroines. Not ‘challenging’ to rookies.”
“Hey! I could totally take a late stage Heroine!” the pitiful dragon protested. “Honest! I mean, not that I’ve ever tried, but I know a dragon or two who beat Heroines and they’re total wimps compared to me!”
“...What?”
“N-not that Heroines are weak or anything, either! I mean, I know they’re strong enough to beat your… Oh, shit, you’re the Demon Queen, aren’t you? Hey, I thought you were supposed to be weak enough for Heroines to defeat! You wanna talk about weirdly strong individuals, then what the hell’s going on with that?”
“That’s… something I would very much like to know, myself.”
~~~
Author's Notes
Devilla Has Questions :D
Did you enjoy the fight scene? I know at least one person who was excited for a proper fight with a dragon, so I tried to make the start as tense as I could - but plot compelled me to make the fight go this way, in the end, so there's a limit to what I could accomplish...
We've officially hit a part of the story I've been waiting years for... I'm so excited, I might just blast through the next few chapters. No guarantees, though! You might be stuck with this cliffhanger for a bit if my brain doesn't cooperate...
Anyways, hope you enjoyed!
