B4 Ch50: Hatching (Patreon)

“I’m sad that the bandits had to die,” Joy said, as Arthur and the others went around harvesting the remains. They had to wait a few minutes as the ground around what was left of the corpses was too hot to step on even with shoes.

“I’m not,” Brixaby muttered.

“Nor am I.” Sams flexed his neck to nudge Horatio who pretended to bat him away.

Cressida knew exactly what to say to soothe her dragon. “On the other hand, now our territory is no longer in dispute, those eggs should be hatching soon.”

“Oh! Right!” Joy perked up.

“You never said what the reward was for your egg hatching quest,” Brixaby pointed out. “Was it these cards?”

“Of course not, silly. It was two new friends. And I want to see them be born! C’mon, let’s go!”

Arthur held up a hand. “Wait a moment. I want to see how that bandit leader was able to break through the shield. If others can do it, we need to know.”

With that, he harvested the lump of char that had been Rick. Wary of destroying the anchor deck, Sams had concentrated his power only on torsos and heads. Killing shots.

Arthur quickly skimmed through the cards he found for the most interesting. Not only did he want to know how Rick had broken into his territory, but he also wanted a portal-type card for Brixaby.

Despite his rush, he paused when he came to several familiar cards. His heart dropped. “Oh no.”

"What is it? Another trap card?" Brixaby sounded a little too enthusiastic about that.

Arthur turned the cards for Brixaby to see: Maniac Kludger and Natural Mechanic.

Cressida, who was nearby, glanced at them too. She shot Arthur a confused look. "I don't get it.”

“These belong to a friend that we made hunting scourgelings," Arthur admitted. "I'm surprised that they got to them."

"You guys, I don't want to miss the hatching," Joy whined.

There was nothing he could do for Claude at the moment. Arthur flipped through the rest of the cards. The last was the answer to what he needed to know.

Material Dungeoneer

Utility

Rare

Using mana, the wielder of this card will be able to furnish and manipulate materials inside a dungeon. It cannot create an initial access point for a dungeon, nor alter dungeon creatures without the aid of a dungeon blueprint. Seek out additional cards in his deck to gain more dungeoneering powers.

Arthur’s eyebrows rose. “I guess the Dark Heart is a type of dungeon after all.”

Horatio, who shamelessly read over Arthur’s shoulder, scoffed. “Figures. He wasn’t teleporting us. He was just…” he fluttered his fingers in the air, “moving the stuff around us.”

“The eggs—” Joy began.

“Yes, yes, dear.” With a smile, Cressida went to her dragon.

Arthur kept a hold of the cards as he mounted Brixaby and they flew back over the hill to the pavilion. Brixaby, showing off, buzzed directly down the stairwell in a way that Sams and Joy could not.

They found Marion and Soledad crouched anxiously by the eggs. One of them had gotten the idea of taking the bedding from the bunks and padding the shells in a pseudo-nest. The eggs looked entirely unharmed from the fight and there were no cracks or even striations in the shells, but they were jerking back and forth rapidly as the little dragons inside fought to get out.

Joy galloped down the stairs, and Sams took a more sedate way in, with Horatio, having dismounted and running down on foot.

Marion glanced over to them. "Well, I guess you guys all survived.”

“They're gone," Arthur said. "We got their cards."

Marion and Soledad could read between the lines and knew what that meant. Marion looked away, but Soledad kept her gaze on Arthur, her chin raised in defiance.

“Princess?” Arthur asked, pointedly.

“He was exaggerating to puff himself up. I might have been someone like that if N’awlens wasn’t dying.” She stared hard at Arthur. “I ain’t going back there.”

“Oh, you’ll fit right in here,” Horatio drawled. He pointed to Cressida. “She’s a fancy noble, Arthur was sort of a noble, too. That guy next to you used to be a prince. As for me? I’m practically royalty too, back in my old hive.”

Sams snorted his disagreement at that.

"What if this doesn't work?" Marion blurted, cutting through Horatio’s nonsense. "What if I don't have a card that matches this dragon?" As hesitant as he was before, he looked like he was going to be sick for waiting.

That was the big question. No one said anything for a moment, though glances were exchanged.

"You're the one who fed it shards," Joy said brightly. "Of course it will match to you."

But no one knew that for sure. And judging by Marion's expression, he was less than convinced. Soledad looked anxious as well.

"Well," Arthur said, "Its shell is silver, so if the dragon is too, it will likely be attracted to something to do with strong magic."

"What color does a healing dragon have?" Marion asked.

"Green," Joy said unhelpfully, "but maybe silver too. I think, but green is nature and healing is naturey... right?"

They looked at one another, unsure.

Marion pressed his lips together. "I have an illusion and healing cards. Is that enough? Did you harvest anything from the bandits that could help?”

Brixaby bristled. Clearly, he wanted the first pick of the cards.

"I don't know if right when the thing is about to hatch is the time to add something new to your deck," Horatio said. "Hatchling dragons can be kind of sensitive."

"I added a card to link with Joy," Cressida countered.

"I don't think it will hurt," Arthur said, though he wasn't entirely certain. But he quickly pulled out the stack from his pocket and flipped through the cards. As was usual with the locals, there were quite a few body modification cards, most of which he didn't think anybody would. What was 'Instant Dinosaur Foot', and why would somebody want that?

“I have Ten Points of Strength...but that probably won't help with being a dragon rider." He flipped through some more. The combat cards were fairly mundane. He read them off as he flipped through them. "Ice daggers, Water Whip, Sharpened Sword...a net made of mana that always binds up their enemies. I'm surprised they didn't use more of these, but I think that they probably just added them and didn't have a lot of practice. A lot of these are Commons."

"He'll need a Rare," Cressida said, and everybody nodded. 

"I get dibs on any fire-type cards," Soledad said. 

Brixaby let out an aggrieved growl, but her request made sense.

Arthur came again to Claude's cards and set those aside, too.

"No fire cards, or portal," he grumbled. "Here's a couple interesting ones...Assassin Dagger: it's an Uncommon, but I’m sure that's the one he used to try to kill Brix and Joy. There’s Teleport In a blink. That’s useful, but it only allows one person to teleport at a time. And this next one...It's rare." He held up the dungeoneering card, thought for a moment, then held it out to Joy. "Do you have any feelings about this card?"

"What?" Distracted, she turned her head away from where she was watching the still-jerking eggs intently. "No, not really, but I would like that 'Teleport in a Blink' for myself."

"Then I want the ten points of strength," Horatio said. 

"We are not giving out cards until I have had my own pick," Brixaby said, "and besides, the Dungeoneering card should obviously go to Marion."

"What?" Arthur looked in surprise at his dragon. 

"Of course." Brixaby was equally baffled at Arthur's reaction. "He wants pure magic, and there's nothing more magic than a dungeon."

"He is correct," Sams said. "I once knew a dragon rider in Horatio's father's day who had a dungeoneering card."

"What color was his dragon?" Horatio asked. 

"Silver."

Arthur would have liked the dungeoneering card for himself, but he had no room in his heart deck. He consoled himself with the thought that if it was going to someone in his retinue, he would still have access to the card in a way. So, he shrugged and held it out to Marion. "It's a Rare."

Marion took the card and gazed down at it. It said something about how nervous he must have felt about the hatching that he immediately put it into his heart without much fanfare.

He gave them a sickly grin. "If my career as a healer doesn't work out, maybe a dungeoneer would be a good second choice. I could build myself an endless library... Oh..."

"What is it?" Arthur asked. He glanced at the silver egg, but it was still shifting back and forth without a crack.

"Whoever had this had a lot of control over this area," Marion said idly. “And not a lot of imagination.” Then, with a wave of his hands, the eggs were no longer sitting propped up on the floor, surrounded by hasty sheets and pillows they'd torn off nearby beds, but a soft padding of straw. "That's much better."

"Okay, but what do we do when they hatch?" Soledad bit out.

Cressida answered. “They will look into your heart deck and decide if what you have is a match to its core card. They’ll offer their own, and then you link the two.”

“And create a new card,” Joy finished. She and Cressida shared a fond look, likely remembering their own moment of linking.

“Dragon created cards are obviously the most powerful,” Brixaby added.

Suddenly, there was a snapping sound. A jagged crack ran down Soledad's egg, from top to bottom.

The features of the egg had continued to develop over the course of the battle. This one definitely looked like an active volcano, complete with red and orange lava... But the black spots which had become fissures were deep, deep black, like looking at the darkest part of the night. Arthur wasn't exactly sure what that meant. The shell did not necessarily match the future dragon—Joy’s had been like gemstones, which definitely reflected her glittering personality, if not her powers. But it certainly was a hint.

As if not wanting to be outdone by its sibling, Marion's egg started to hatch as well. The very tip popped off and the white membrane inside was slashed open by a tiny egg tooth on top of a wet silver snout. The hatchling's nostrils breathed in its first gust of air.

But then, all at once, attention was back to the red and black egg as a vividly dark red wing popped out of the crack, followed by claws that scrabbled and pushed.

Soledad reached down to help, but before she could touch it, the shell fell apart to reveal a striking deep red dragon with a rather squarish head who sat awkwardly on the remains of his shell. Soledad raised her hand as if to pet the little hatchling, but then paused.

"Hello." She breathed.

The dragon blinked up at her with unsettling dark, almost black eyes with darker irises. Its eyes seemed to be too large for its head, giving it an odd appearance somewhere between cute and strange.

He stared at Soledad for a few long moments.

"Soledad, project your cards to it," Cressida insisted. In the excitement of the hatching, she seemed to have put any enmity for the other girl behind her.

"Of course. Oh, yeah, right." Soledad gestured and her two cards appeared projected between herself and the dragon.

The baby red peered at them for a moment, studying closely.

Arthur didn't think that the little dragon could read, but the magic of the cards meant that they could be understood. Besides, Rare cards had moving pictures.

"Yes..." the hatchling said in a surprisingly mellow tone, "Your deck is somewhat unbalanced, but this will do perfectly for now." Then he projected his own card to fit along with Soledad's.

The face of the card was visible just long enough for Arthur to take in the title. A Touch of Summer and Winter.

That was a little unusual. The natural magic of red dragons meant that they usually dealt with high energy, which classically meant fire. But some, such as Shadow, had access to more esoteric types.

Then again, this red was a Rare dragon, and judging by the way his scales glittered under the lights, a shimmer type as well.

But in the next moment, Soledad scooped up her little dragon as if she had longed to cuddle him for hours instead of moments.

Arthur looked away to give them, and instead met with Brixaby's blood-red gaze. The dragon was not often touchy-feely, but he ducked his head and bumped the top of his skull against Arthur's chest very gently.

At that moment, Marion's hatchling finally seemed to win its battle over the egg. The shell more or less crumbled around it, leaving a very delicate, very feminine-looking silver looking bemusedly up at the world.

Crouching to her level, Marion gestured to bring all of his cards out. Silver looked at them, smiled, and started to gesture to her own chest.

Then, she suddenly stopped and recoiled.

She backed away steps, stumbling over the remains of her shell, shaking her head. "I can't," she said in a tiny, fluty little voice.

"Why not?” Marion hurriedly asked. “Is something wrong? Do you need another card?"

She backed another step, shaking her head, though she stared at Marion with hunger and horror equal in her baby blue eyes. "I want to, you're perfect for me. But I can't."

"Why not?" Brixaby demanded. "He is not, perhaps, as good as my rider, but he is perfectly acceptable. Besides, there are no other choices around here. You must pick him!"

Sams took on a slightly different tactic, bending his head to waft warm breath over the tiny hatchling. "What is wrong, little one?"

Arthur glanced at Joy to see what she had to say. She only watched on, slightly curious, but not too invested now that the eggs were hatched.

The little silver just shook her head again, staring at Marion as if begging him to fix what was wrong.

His shoulders slumped. "It's my heart," Marion said. "You feel the pain there."

"Yes, it hurts."

"It's because I had a Legendary card," Marion said, defeat thick in his voice. "And she's a Rare. My heart is too damaged for her."