The Dragon's Fear
Gion had been racking his brain over the sudden changes in the Zairan Forest. 'There are no requests.' To be precise, there weren't enough of them. The flood of commissions that had poured in after the abrupt cold snap had all been canceled one after another, leaving the adventurers with nothing to do. Those without savings were practically out on the streets. They were scraping together whatever work they could find or barely hanging on through various support policies, but if this damned cold didn't vanish soon, things would get ugly.
That was why he had posted a request to investigate the abnormal phenomena in the Zairan Forest, offering a whopping four gold as a success reward. Then, out of nowhere—
“I know why the bitter cold has arrived.”
Gion’s expression inevitably darkened. No matter how impressive Bagan’s skills were, he couldn’t tolerate a rookie who had only just become an adventurer treating a request like a joke.
“Since hearing what you just said has put me in a foul mood, let’s end this consultation here.”
Gion didn’t trust Bagan. His life experiences had been far too rough for him to place faith in someone based solely on a first impression. However, Bagan reacted as if he had expected exactly this.
“I figured you’d say that. But I’m serious.”
“Hmph. That’s what they all say.”
Gion made it clear that, for now, Bagan was no different from the other adventurers who had come before him. Bagan needed something decisive.
“Actually, I’m a victim in this.”
“Is there anyone living in De Meca who isn’t a victim?”
“That’s not what I mean. The cause of this whole situation is me.”
“That’s a new one. Go on.”
Even so, Gion didn’t fully believe him. He was simply a little curious. His head had been pounding over this matter anyway—if there was an interesting story to hear, he might as well listen.
“You’re a Lycan, aren’t you? And the Lycan race hates dragons, right?”
“I don’t know what you’re trying to say, but you’d better stop.”
Gion spoke as a warning, but Bagan didn’t stop. He hadn’t asked the question to hear Gion’s answer. This was unavoidable if he wanted to persuade him.
“I’ve never understood why the Lycans always get tangled up with dragons.”
“Are you saying this current crisis is also the work of a dragon? I’ve heard enough. I don’t need to listen any further. That’s a story other adventurers have already tried to sell me.”
Gion assumed Bagan was spinning lies and prepared to send him away. If he left now after ending the consultation, Gion would even overlook the fact that he had dredged up the past. But Bagan instead dug even deeper into Gion’s history.
“I heard the Lycans once lived together in the Palpon region. Then some wicked dragon burned the entire village and kidnapped every young Lycan in the tribe.”
“...Didn’t I tell you to stop?”
Ping.
Gion’s intimidation naturally washed over Bagan. It was only natural for Gion to react so sensitively. After all, he had been a young Lycan who watched his parents die right before his eyes during that tragedy. That was why even hearing legends or stories about dragons made his blood run cold.
Bagan waited patiently until the pressure subsided. Seeing this, Gion regained his composure.
“What exactly do you want to say that you’d go so far as to bring up my past?”
It was because he knew Bagan’s intention wasn’t to mock him.
“The Gold Dragon Palamus, father of all dragonkind, is dead.”
At Bagan’s words, Gion’s emotions shifted in a subtle way. It wasn’t joy, nor rage, nor sorrow—just a vague confusion. He had known of the Gold Dragon’s existence, but not where it dwelled. And while it was the father of the dragon that had attacked his tribe, it wasn’t exactly a target for revenge. The one who had gone mad was that wicked dragon, Reberius.
After a single wave rippled across that lake of subtle emotion, Gion asked,
“Are you saying that death is connected to this sudden bitter cold?”
Gion realized Bagan wasn’t simply making things up. Bringing up his past like this, and speaking of Palamus rather than some other dragon—these weren’t the kinds of details one could casually fabricate.
At Gion’s question, Bagan nodded.
“I killed him.”
“You subjugated him?”
Gion looked at Bagan with suspicious eyes once more. Then he completely retracted his earlier judgment. He had misjudged the man.
“Even if your strength far exceeds expectations, a dragon is an existence beyond the pale. Let’s pretend I never heard this.”
Thinking Bagan simply didn’t understand what a dragon was, Gion waved his hand dismissively, gesturing for him to leave.
“If you needed money, you should have just asked me to lend you some...”
Gion assumed Bagan was doing this for the request completion fee. Of course money was part of it, but for Bagan, there was a need to reveal this truth to someone.
“You still don’t believe me?”
Gion’s attitude was more stubborn than expected, so Bagan had no choice but to use a special method. The strange sensation in his heart that had been bothering him ever since his fight with Clorsus. The reason all the mana he had painstakingly gathered had vanished. The cause was simple.
Bagan’s heart had become like a dragon’s because of that foreign entity.
He had no idea how he had absorbed it. But the changed heart could do quite a lot.
'Like this, for example.'
Ping!
In Bagan’s vision, Gion’s office was dyed blood-red. An indescribable energy flowed from Bagan’s body, turning everything around him crimson and scorning all it touched.
“Guh!”
This was the second time Gion had faced a dragon’s Fear with his entire being. The first had been when he watched his dying parents right before his eyes. He had forced back his tears, covered his nose and mouth, and barely endured by hiding among livestock excrement to escape its senses. And now this was the second time.
Gion struggled with all his might to hold on. But in the end, he succumbed.
“S-stop!!”
At Gion’s cry, Bagan withdrew the energy. It was a Fear he could now release and retract at will.
“Do you believe me now?”
Bagan asked the man who was panting heavily. Perhaps as a side effect of being wrapped in the Dragon’s Fear, Gion suddenly began speaking formally.
“P-perhaps… are you not Palamus himself?”
He now believed Bagan was a dragon.
“I have heard that dragons sometimes transform into humans to enjoy worldly pleasures. However, the dragon I hold ill will toward is Reberius. If you are a different being from that one, I have no reason to oppose you.”
“Pfft! Puhahaha!”
Bagan couldn’t help but burst into laughter.
“Yes?”
“I’m not. Brace yourself. Your ass is gonna hurt.”
Bagan told Gion about what had happened with Palamus. He left out the truly critical details that couldn’t be revealed yet and only shared the general storyline that had appeared in the game, along with the flow of the battle. He also explained that Palamus had used Dragon Words magic in a final desperate act before dying, which had caused the current situation.
“So you fought Palamus, absorbed his power through a blessing, and the aftermath caused winter to descend upon the Zairan Forest.”
Bagan nodded at his reaction, which showed he had understood correctly. Gion grew serious on his own after seeing that nod. It was an enormous story—one that could potentially change the world. But he decided to bury Bagan’s tale deep in his heart as the guildmaster of De Meca.
“You told me this because I am a Lycan and because you trust me. That was a good decision. I promise I won’t speak of it elsewhere.”
Bagan swallowed the words that he had only done so because he felt guilty about what had happened to the Zairan Forest and simply nodded. In truth, even Bagan hadn’t expected to reveal so much of his story to Gion. That was proof that he had underestimated the man.
'Gion isn’t someone to be taken lightly either.'
In the game, Gion had been a reliable ally to the player character. Separate from that, his position was so significant that he wasn’t the type to be easily swayed by words. Therefore, he was certainly not the kind of person who would blindly believe an adventurer he had met less than a day ago.
And—
'He’s not the type to carelessly spread something like this around.'
Bagan trusted Gion. While he was thinking that, Gion pressed his fingers against his temple, trying to soothe his aching head. It seemed the aftereffects of the Fear still lingered, causing a headache. Bagan felt strangely apologetic.
“Hoo… I understand. I’ll cancel this request immediately and give you the four gold as your completion reward.”
Gion had made his decision. There was no longer any need to investigate the anomaly in the Zairan Forest. He now knew the truth. He would have to call back the parties currently out investigating, pay them compensation, and handle many other tasks. But the most difficult part was how to announce the reason winter had come to the Zairan Forest. Having learned such an enormous truth, this was not something he could decide alone.
“How should we announce the reason for the anomaly? Decide for me.”
At Gion’s words, Bagan took a moment to think. He already had something in mind. He just needed to consider whether other adventurers would actually believe it. But the thought didn’t take long.
“Wouldn’t it work if we say Glacia stopped by?”
Once again Bagan spoke of a dragon, but this time Gion no longer found it offensive.
“That would make sense. She is said to live on the Mind Continent, but there’s no reason she couldn’t have come here. This place is relatively close to the Mind Continent after all.”
'The Ice Dragon, Glacia.' A being surrounded by rumors that she lived on the Mind Continent, the western land of Pangea. She was known as a dragon with a relatively gentle personality. While they couldn’t explain exactly why she had brought freezing cold to the Zairan Forest, it would at least provide a believable cause for the anomaly.
“Is that enough?”
“Mm. Let’s head down together.”
Gion immediately suggested they go down together to withdraw the request. Bagan nodded in agreement and followed Gion down the stairs to the first floor.
There were many adventurers inside the guild. In fact, it was almost completely packed. Half of them were standing because there weren’t enough seats. It was all because the bitter cold had left them with no suitable requests.
“Rina, immediately revoke all requests related to investigating the abnormal phenomena. We’ve identified the cause.”
“Pardon? Yes, sir.”
Rina was flustered by Gion’s urgency, but with her excellent efficiency, she quickly checked the parties currently in the Zairan Forest and those who had applied for the request, compiled the list, handed it to Gion, and removed every related posting from the bulletin board.
The parties who had only recently taken the request, those who had been about to, and even those who had been watching with interest—all of them looked utterly bewildered. And because of the commotion, the person most closely connected to the request stepped forward and asked,
“Guildmaster, may I ask why you have revoked all those requests? Please announce the reason now.”
It was Bertrand. No matter how sharp-tongued he was, he knew how to separate business from personal matters, so he didn’t make any inappropriate comments toward Gion. Normally Bertrand worked in the room behind Rina when nothing special was happening, but since Gion had unilaterally revoked a request he himself had created without any explanation, he had come out of curiosity.
The moment everyone’s attention focused on him, Gion opened his mouth.
“The cause of the abnormal phenomenon was Glacia.”
“How did you find that out?”
Bertrand dug in persistently, but since Gion and Bagan had already coordinated their story, the explanation was easy.
“It’s because the newly promoted gold-ranked adventurer Bagan witnessed it himself in the Zairan Forest.”
Faced with the expressions of Bertrand and the other adventurers demanding further explanation, Bagan spoke.
“I used to live alone in the Zairan Forest. Then not long ago, Glacia appeared in the forest and breathed the breath of winter into it. In the end, I was buried by the raging blizzard.”
Bagan explained simply, but the adventurers’ voices only grew louder.
“You lived in the Zairan Forest? Alone? That’s ridiculous!”
“Exactly! And if you saw a dragon, you should be dead! How are you still alive?”
The guild grew noisy as the adventurers raised their voices. It was then that—
“I, the representative of Dawn’s Wolf, can testify that Sir Bagan lived in the Zairan Forest.”
It was Paul. Seeing that Reina and Natalie were nearby as well, it seemed they had all stopped by the guild together because they had business here.
“Dawn’s Wolf participated in the request to subjugate Root Hunters in Alkali Village during the Ogre incident. That was when we first met Sir Bagan. Even then, he was living in the Zairan Forest.”
Paul spoke on Bagan’s behalf, lending weight to his words—while also revealing their own past mistake.
“R-right. They were the only party that survived that incident.”
“Of course, their ranking dropped below tenth because of it, but before that they were definitely a seventh-ranked party.”
The adventurers murmured as if they all knew of Dawn’s Wolf. But before they could dig up the mistake any further and turn it into a laughingstock, Reina’s sharp gaze swept over them. The interior fell quiet once again.
“This time as well, we took on the request to investigate the abnormal phenomenon. While investigating the Zairan Forest, we discovered Sir Bagan buried in the snow and rescued him. Therefore, I agree with the claim that Sir Bagan saw Glacia.”
When Paul finished speaking, the surroundings heated up once more.
“If Paul says so, then…”
“It’s Dawn’s Wolf. There’s no way they’d say something false.”
Paul was a well-respected and skilled adventurer, so his words carried weight. However, there were also parties that still held a grudge from the Ogre incident.
“But they’re already a failed party.”
“That’s right. They haven’t shown anything noteworthy since then either.”
When the argument was about to flare up, Gion spread his intimidation and declared,
“I said the cause of this incident is Glacia! If anyone wishes to object, line up in the training grounds! I’ll consult with every last one of you!”
The guild fell as silent as a grave. Does he usually do consultations in the training grounds? The thought briefly crossed Bagan’s mind.
“Now I’m satisfied. In any case, keep that in mind. From now on, the guildmaster will work hard to post a ton of new requests. So even if it’s cold, let’s all endure a little longer.”
With those words, Gion headed back up to the second floor. While his talk of “consultation” had come across as terrifying, the final remark he made as he left gave the adventurers a reason to celebrate.
“Were there that many requests piled up?!”
“Hoho! I can finally drink every day!”
“We can stay in warm rooms!”
“Our families can eat their fill!”
Even though the requests hadn’t even been posted yet, the adventurers were all filled with joy. It was then that—
“Sir Bagan.”
Natalie came trotting over and stood in front of him. Looking up with a sad expression, she said,
“Y-you must have suffered a lot.”
At her awkward attempt at comfort, a smile formed on Bagan’s face. The way his hand naturally went to her head was a bonus. After giving her a suitable pat, Bagan turned to Rina.
“The completion reward was four gold, right? Give two gold to Natalie.”
Rina handed over the reward without a word. Seeing this, Natalie naturally looked flustered and protested.
“Huh? Sir Bagan! You don’t have to do that.”
“It’s repayment to Dawn’s Wolf for saving my life.”
Rina placed the two gold coins in Natalie’s palm and spoke to the girl who was trying to refuse.
“Miss Natalie, my arm is getting tired.”
“Ah, Miss Rina.”
Natalie ended up accepting the two gold in a daze. She couldn’t even put them in her pocket and could only clutch them tightly in her hand.
“You must be happy, Miss Natalie.”
There was a subtle sting in Rina’s words. Feeling that, the situation finally came to a close.