The Sand Emperor Dragon
“…Unnie. I don’t know about this—”
“I know, Ha-eun. I’ve got a plan.”
“Somehow that makes me more nervous.”
“What?”
While we were following Ansusa, Ha-eun sidled up beside me and whispered. Her reason was simple enough. No matter how much of a fan someone claimed to be, how were you supposed to just trust a total stranger?
Truth be told, I didn’t fully trust her either. She could easily play nice until she was in position to stab us in the back. Still—if she really did know the entrance to the Ark, it would save us a lot of time. After that, whether she double-crossed us or tried to cook us alive… honestly, I wasn’t too worried about being on the receiving end.
If she was genuinely on our side, things would move faster. If not, it was just a minor inconvenience. Finding the entrance on our own would take forever anyway, and even if we found it, getting inside would be a pain.
Clack!
“Hm?”
We were still walking behind Ansusa when three men suddenly burst out of an alley and shoved blades in our faces. Two rusted kitchen knives. One short dagger with a strange pattern etched into it.
“You lot look like you came from a rich neighborhood. Nice gear you’re carrying. Hand over everything you’ve got.”
“Boss, those girls look pretty good too.”
“Oho…”
Wow. What was this? A mugging? An actual mugging?
“Oh my god.”
“Stop staring and empty your pockets already—!”
“Isn’t this wild, Ha-eun? Hmm? Actual robbers!”
“…?”
“In all the hundreds of years I’ve been alive, this is a first!”
At the words hundreds of years, the muggers stared at me like they must have misheard. I was about to tidy them up myself when—
Zzt—
A wave of mental domination pulsed from beside me. The muggers’ eyes went blank, then glazed over with a pale pink sheen.
“Trash even the Ark threw out. Every now and then you get garbage that can’t even mix with the rest of the garbage.”
“Aww. I wanted to handle them.”
“If you spill blood outside, the master of the Ark might notice.”
“Blood? I was just going to chase them off.”
Why did everyone react like that the moment I tried to step up? This was dragon discrimination! This was exactly why humans were hopeless. No wonder the whole “die, human” meme existed. …Granted, Ansusa was a succubus, not a human.
“One of them’s a hunter. E-class, roughly.”
“Oh, really?”
“They were probably just looking for ordinary people to rob. Your current appearance is beautiful, but nothing particularly special.”
Because I had my tail and horns tucked away, I supposed. Still, it was a little fascinating. Same Seoul, and yet the atmosphere could shift this drastically.
“Since it came to this, I may as well absorb a little of their essence before we go.”
“…Huh?”
“It’s not much, but it should fill me up a bit.”
She started toward the dazed men. I clapped a hand over Ha-eun’s eyes and flicked out my tail to cover Terra’s as well.
“Unnie?”
“You’re not watching this.”
“Excuse me…?”
“Lady Goldy, I—”
“Quiet. You’re even less allowed.”
What the hell was this insane succubus about to do in the middle of the sidewalk?!
“…It’s not what you’re thinking. I’m simply using a skill called Essence Absorption.”
“Essence Absorption? That’s a thing?”
“Of course. It’s closer to an emergency transfusion, so the efficiency is poor—but it’s enough to get by.”
“Then why—”
“Heh… When something looks tasty, you want to sample it yourself. That’s just our instinct.”
No. Why was she looking at me while she said that?
“Anyway. Most of the Ark’s residents end up like this.”
“Well. Running from the light only to dive too deep into the dark. A classic human mistake.”
Whether in that world or this one, humans were a greedy species. They threw themselves at their own ruin like moths to a flame, never realizing where that greed would lead them—until they fell, or burned.
And yet, among them, a few clever ones always managed to climb out.
“Thinking about it that way, I am a little curious about whoever’s holding so many lives in the palm of their hand.”
If they called themselves a Demon King, they’d need an exceptional mind and extraordinary physical power. And while I didn’t know if it was true of every Demon King, the ones from the world I’d lived in had one condition in common: they had to reign from atop fear itself. A Demon King had to be fear.
Shhk—
I took my hand away from Ha-eun’s eyes and looked at her. Judging by the power she carried, she was the closest thing to a Demon King I’d met so far. Whether that power truly belonged to a Demon King or not, this would be good experience for her.
Click—
A little further on, we arrived at the entrance of an ordinary-looking semi-basement house.
“This is the entrance?”
“That’s right. One of many. Heh… to think you’d set foot in my little nest…”
Snap—
She stepped up to the door and flicked her fingers lightly. Gathering a strange, distinctive mana at her fingertips, Ansusa took hold of the doorknob and spoke in a low voice.
“Visiting the Ark.”
“Oh?”
The flow of air seeping from inside the door shifted. Spatial magic? Magic of this caliber would require considerable precision… Did Earth have archmages of its own?
“Just in case, I’ll say this now. Goldy. Terra. You two should show your tails and horns.”
“Huh?”
“The people here don’t like it when someone hides what they are. Too many con artists.”
I doubted anyone would even notice… or maybe they would. Given the magic they were already using, maybe they could tell.
Poof—
I let my tail and horns show. Ansusa swallowed hard at the sight—but, well… I’d pretend I hadn’t seen that.
“And… Fireblade.”
“Yes?”
“Do not leave Goldy’s side. Not for any reason.”
“Excuse me…?”
“As a B-class hunter—no, with the combat power I’ve seen from you on stream—you won’t last if something happens.”
Ha-eun’s brow twitched. She was a hunter too; being dismissed like that had to sting. Especially with all the insecurity her brother had left her with—getting brushed off here of all places couldn’t feel good.
But then—
“I don’t go around worrying about people lightly. I’m telling you this because you’re someone Goldy cares about.”
“….”
“If you don’t listen, I can’t even predict what might happen to you. Rape. Murder. Human trafficking. Honestly, you’d be lucky if it stopped there.”
Ansusa put real force into her voice. Ha-eun’s shoulders slumped under the weight of it.
“Don’t worry. Even without the lecture, I’m not letting Ha-eun out of my sight.”
“I am here as well. She is a human Lady Goldy cherishes. I will protect her.”
I snorted a quiet laugh and ruffled Terra’s hair.
“She’s got two dragons stuck to her. You think it’ll be that easy? And Ha-eun’s been training a lot lately, you know.”
Terra could be surprisingly sharp when it counted. Moments like this, he was reassuring.
“Then that’s a relief. I don’t particularly want to see you looking sad. Water is plent—”
“That’s enough.”
“Heh…”
Ansusa nodded and opened the door. What greeted us, of course, was not the interior of a semi-basement house—
Shhhh—
—but something like the mouth of a cave, wind whispering out of the dark.
“This is really the entrance? Feels like we’re about to film a cave-exploration special…”
“That’s the idea. It’s meant to make you wonder if you took a wrong turn.”
“Hmm. Looks an awful lot like an earth dragon’s lair to me. Terra, what do you think?”
“It feels like coming home, Lady Goldy.”
“See?”
Building an underground city in a place like this… people really were either incredible or completely unhinged.
Thud, thud—
We followed Ansusa deeper in. After several sharp turns guided by magic, the cave-like stretch finally ended.
Clack—
“Present your identification.”
Figures clad head to toe in black clothing stepped out and blocked the path. Gatekeepers?
“Succubus Rachel. The ones behind me are my guests.”
“Picking up women these days, are you? There’s even a kid.”
“I said guests, not clients. Though I won’t deny they’re tempting.”
“And their IDs?”
“Just let us through. I’ll throw in a free service later.”
Ansusa added a suggestive little hand gesture. The gatekeeper looked her over for a moment, then—
“Pass.”
—cleared the way without further fuss.
“They just let us in like that?”
“That one’s one of my clients. He looks the other way for me. This is why connections matter.”
“I… see…?”
“And this place is finished soon enough anyway. So it hardly matters.”
There was something almost cheerful in her voice, and something wistful underneath it. I had no idea what she was thinking. Trying to understand a succubus’s thoughts was a fool’s errand to begin with.
“Well… still. Welcome. To the Ark—where every kind of trash gathers.”
We descended further, and a wide plaza-like space opened before us. Tents pitched everywhere, goods piled high. A marketplace?
“Ark Zone Three. The market.”
“Zone Three? So there are other zones?”
“Of course. The Ark isn’t some small-time hideout. Even I can’t gauge its true size.”
“Huh…?”
“This is just one branch among many. Only the founder knows how big the Ark really is. They forced the space to expand.”
Expanded space? I vaguely remembered Magic Towers that used techniques like that…
Thud—
“Well, well… clean young ladies all the way down here. How about one of these? I’ll give you a good price.”
A man approached and held out a cluster of green fruit—five berries, each about the size of a grape. I recognized them at once and grinned. Ansusa picked up the pace.
“This way. Ah—and don’t touch anything over there. It’s all poisonous.”
“Been a long time since I’ve seen these.”
“…Goldy?”
Of course I had no intention of just walking past.
“How much?”
I asked lightly. The man held up two fingers.
“Two hundred thousand.”
I handed over the money and took the fruit—the ones that hadn’t been sitting in his hand, naturally.
“…What exactly are you doing?”
Ansusa asked carefully, watching me.
“These are Phantom Grapes, aren’t they?”
“That’s right. A Grade-1 toxic substance with a powerful narcotic effect—”
Nom—
I popped one into my mouth before she could finish.
“U-Unnie?!”
“What do you think you’re—!”
“Terra, want one?”
“I’m fine, thank you.”
The two of them looked ready to faint.
“The way they burst in your mouth is the whole fun of it. That little pop-pop.”
“What are you even—”
“It’s fine, it’s fine. Ptooey.”
I ate the flesh and spat out the skin. A faint, floaty haze drifted through my body.
“Whew. Didn’t know these existed on Earth too.”
“Unnie, are you okay?! Why would you—”
“You guys forget I’m a dragon sometimes, huh? Poison like this doesn’t work on me.”
Phantom Grapes. Back in my old world, they’d been something like a snack I ate now and then. Sweet and sour—junk food, basically. The component that acted as a hard drug on other creatures just gave me a brief buzz. The problem, of course, was that if even a dragon felt that much, other races would get blasted out of their minds on the juice alone.
“You know those are illegal, right, Unnie…?”
“The stream’s not even on. Who cares? Still wild that they exist on Earth—and that someone’s selling them.”
I’d only ever seen them in the world I used to live in. Had someone brought seeds back with them when they returned? Or had they come through a Gate?
I was still popping grapes into my mouth when—
Bwooooo—
—a horn blast rolled out from the center of the market. Merchants everywhere started packing up their tents and heading somewhere.
“What’s this? Prayer time?”
“Gambling match. They throw monsters or people into a ring and make them fight.”
“Oh? That actually sounds fun.”
“…Unnie, haven’t you been enjoying yourself a little too much since we got here?”
“It’s stimulation I never get in everyday life. Come on, let’s go!”
I fell in with the crowd flowing toward the market’s center. There, a makeshift fighting pit had been dug into the ground and ringed with fencing. It looked more professional than I’d expected—I was even considering putting some money down—when I caught a scrap of conversation nearby.
“So that guy’s coming out today?”
“That’s what they said.”
That guy? Sounded like they had a named fighter.
“Is there a match card somewhere… ah, there it is.”
Curious about the name, I found the bracket and checked it—
“Huh?”
What was he doing here?