Reincarnated as the Strongest Dragon

I woke up the following day to something pressing on my chest. I opened my eyes to see Liz on top of me, her head resting on my chest while her emerald eyes were fixated on me.

“Uhm, good morning?”

“Good morning!” Liz said with a beaming smile and kissed me. “Did you sleep well?”

“Uhm, yes? You are awfully chipper this morning. Did something happen?” I asked with a yawn.

“I woke up next to you,” Liz replied, batting her eyelashes.

“Well, aren’t you trying to be extra cute today,” I smirked.

“Is that bad?”

“Not at all,” I said, putting my arms around her. “I can’t think of a better way to wake up.”

Liz was about to say something when a loud rumble could be heard coming from her stomach, instantly making her face turn red.

“Are you by any chance hungry?” I chuckled.

“A little,” Liz replied, turning her head to avoid showing her face.

“Do you want to go eat breakfast?”

“We might be late for that. I think it’s almost time for lunch.”

“Really?” I asked, surprised. “Why didn’t you wake me up?”

“Because then we would get out of bed,” Liz replied, turning back. “But I guess we should get up soon. What do you want to do after lunch?”

“Honestly? Nothing at all, but I should probably go visit Chloe,” I groaned.

“Chloe and Hanna will be happy that you are back.”

“I have a few questions for Chloe anyway,” I replied, pondering over past events. “We can look into taming skills at the same time.”

“Let’s go eat then,” Liz said before rolling off me and getting out of bed. “I’m actually starving.”

 

After lunch, we made our way to the adventurers guild, and the moment I had dreaded came as soon as we entered the building.

“Luna!” Hanna yelled from across the hall as she ran over.

“Ehm, I’m back?”

Before Hanna could say anything, Liz interjected. “Do you know if Chloe is busy? We have some business with her.”

Hanna appeared to have something she wanted to say, but instead, she nodded and beckoned for us to follow. “Chloe just came back from lunch, so she should be available.”

Liz grabbed my hand and pulled me along as we made our way up the stairs. Hanna knocked on the door to Chloe’s office, and we were promptly let in.

“I see you’re back, Luna,” Chloe said as she looked up from some documents she was holding. “Now, where did you go after leaving us with such a mess?”

“I’d like to think I left you with less of a mess than if I had done nothing,” I replied nonchalantly as I sat down on the couch. “I had some personal business to take care of.”

“I can’t disagree with that. Things would be very different if you hadn’t,” Chloe said as she put down the documents and leaned back in her chair. “Personal matters, you say? You didn’t cross any borders, I hope?”

“Are you asking if Kaydossa is still on the map?” I asked with a smirk.

“Yes.”

“I didn’t cross any borders.”

“That’s good then. I was afraid you would have either gone there or gone to the Troadis kingdom since you asked about it before you left.”

“You never told me that!” Liz, who had taken a seat next to me and was holding my arm, blurted out.

“I saw how depressed you were that Luna had left. I couldn’t have one of the two A rank adventurers that were in the city at the time jump on a horse and leave for the Troadis border on a whim.”

“I wouldn’t have done that,” Liz muttered.

“You would have,” Hanna said from the other side of the room.

“Don’t bully Liz,” I said, putting my free hand on her head. “I came to see what the situation was now that I’m back.”

“There isn’t much to tell. There has been no activity along the border since you wiped out the army,” Chloe said as she glanced at a paper on her desk. “If there are any soldiers left, they are hiding somewhere.”

“Speaking of the army,” I replied, glancing at the map on the wall. “How could such a large army advance that far across your borders before they got spotted?”

Chloe stood up and walked over to the map, pointing at an area north of Kleadan. “This whole area is a large swamp. The large river that comes from the sea marks the border between us and Kaydossa.”

“And that is where they crossed over?”

“Yes,” she replied with an annoyed expression. “But the swamp is hard to traverse. There are also pockets of poisonous fumes, which makes it even harder.”

“You relied on a natural obstacle to deter invasion?”

“Of course not,” Chloe frowned, pointing at a few places along the border. “We have several watchtowers along the river, as well as a fortress guarding the only road crossing the border.”

“Then how did an entire army manage to sneak past?”

“There is only one watchtower in the swamp due to the fumes, but it’s up on a hill that can oversee the entire area. There is no way for that many soldiers to simply sneak past without getting discovered,” Chloe replied, her frown growing. “The watchtowers use a similar magitech device as we do to report to the fortress, and all reports were normal up until you destroyed their army.”

“Then how?”

“When a squadron of soldiers was sent to the watchtower from the fortress, they found all the guards murdered, most of them in their beds. However, three guards stationed there have yet to be found. Those three were the ones that had sent in the reports for the last couple of days.”

“So either Kaydossan infiltrators or turncoats,” I muttered, clicking my tongue. “They really planned for this.”

“Yes, but… We investigated the remains of the army’s camp,” Chloe said before returning to her desk and flipping over a paper. “But we found no siege equipment whatsoever. They must know that Baruda’s walls are built to withstand a siege. Crossing the swamp with siege equipment is impossible, and building them here would take too much time. In the end, we don’t know what their objective was.”

“Walls are just walls,” I shrugged. “Gryphon riders care little for stacked bricks. Mages riding gryphons could easily bring down Baruda’s walls unless you got defensive barriers.”

Chloe stared at me, raising an eyebrow. “Gryphon riders?”

“Don’t you know what a gryphon is?”

“Of course I do,” Chloe scowled. “But riding them?”

“Yeah? They had a little over a hundred of them, I think?”

Chloe put her forehead on her desk. “Are you telling me they not only managed to tame gryphons, but they had over a hundred of them?”

“I guess so?” I pondered. “I don’t know the exact number.”

“But…” Chloe muttered. “We didn’t find a single trace of any gryphons.”

“I doubt there would be anything left,” I shrugged. “I used enough force to disintegrate them, magic stone and all.”

Chloe leaned back in her chair and closed her eyes, letting out a deep sigh. “Hanna, tea.”

“Eh? Uhm, right away,” Hanna replied, leaving the office.

“It would appear that we owe you even more than we thought,” Chloe said, still keeping her eyes closed. “How do you even tame gryphons to begin with?”

“I honestly don’t know. I don’t know anything about taming.”

“There is an experienced tamer in the capital,” Chloe pondered. “I will have to send word to Grahl to investigate. It would be troublesome if they had more of them.”

Experienced tamer, you say? How convenient.

“Want me to go?”

“Huh?” Chloe turned to me. “You’re volunteering to go?”

“That’s what I said.”

Chloe looked at me, eyes full of skepticism. “Why?”

“As I said, I don’t know anything about taming. That alone would make it a worthwhile trip.”

Chloe tapped her fingers against the desk a few times before taking out a pen and some paper. “It would be a big help if you did. I’ll write a letter to Grahl.”

While Chloe was busy writing the letter, Hanna returned with tea.

“Liz,” Hanna said. “There is something I need to discuss with you.”

“Me?” Liz wondered. “What is it?”

“It’s the, uhm… Next of kin in the guild registry,” Hanna replied, an uneasy expression on her face.

“Ah, right…”

“What’s that?” I asked.

“In the event of an adventurer’s death, any money they had stored with the adventurers guild would be given to the person listed as their next of kin,” Hanna explained.

“Put Luna as my next of kin,” Liz said, squeezing my arm.

“Me?”

“Yes, you,” Liz replied. “I can’t just leave it empty, after all.”

“You can’t?” I pondered. “I don’t have one, I think?”

“About that,” Hanna interjected. “We usually request a next of kin when an adventurer first registers, but your registration was a bit… unique.”

“Can you put Liz as my next of kin then?”

“I can do that,” Hanna replied, writing something on her clipboard. “Usually, we request a second person if you put an adventurer in your party as your next of kin, but I doubt that is needed.”

It’s just a formality anyway since I will never let anything happen to Liz.

Chloe put down her pen and put a wax seal on the letter she had written. She got up, walked over to me, and held out the letter. “Can you give this to Grahl? He can decide what to do next.”

“Okay,” I replied, taking the letter. “Do you want me to go right away?”

“I would appreciate it if you did,” Chloe said while returning to her desk. “But please use the door this time.”

“The door?” Liz asked with a confused look on her face.

“You didn’t even notice the boards on the wall when you came here last time?” Hanna replied, hiding a smirk. “When Luna heard about the army, she smashed a hole in the wall over there and jumped out.”

“You didn’t need to tell her that,” I frowned, sensing the heat on my cheeks.

“I think she did,” Liz smiled, tightening the grip on my arm while gazing affectionately into my eyes.

“Ahem, Luna,” Chloe cleared her throat, interrupting our moment. “Marquess Riese, as well as a few higher-ups in the military and most likely a few nobles, know that our SSS rank adventurer defeated the army.”

“That sounds annoying,” I muttered.

“I know you probably didn’t have any intention of taking credit,” Chloe sighed. “But I had no choice. Knowing that something unknown out there could wipe out an entire army created quite a panic.”

“I guess so.”

“You can expect some kind of reward from the king,” Chloe continued. “Even if we don’t make it public.”

“What kind of reward?”

“I don’t know. It’s far above my pay grade to discuss things with the king,” Chloe replied. “You might get an answer if you ask Grahl, but I’m not sure if he knows either.”

“I guess I will ask when I go there,” I pondered. “I already know what I want, though.”

“Oh? And what is that?” Chloe wondered.

“A dungeon core.”

“Why do you want one of those?” Chloe asked. “It’s easier to get a mansion in the capital.”

“I don’t need a mansion,” I smirked. “But I want to study a dungeon core for personal reasons.”

“More personal reasons…” Chloe muttered. “I would give you one if it was up to me, but they are extremely rare. You might be left disappointed.”

“If they don’t have one, I can always collapse another dungeon.”

Chloe squinted at me. “You know collapsing dungeons without permission from the guild is illegal, right?”

“Surely there are one or two useless dungeons around that I can get permission to collapse?” I asked, batting my eyelashes. “I did defeat an entire army.”

Chloe sighed and rubbed her forehead. “There is only one dungeon around here, and we can’t have it collapse. You can suggest it to Grahl. The guild in the capital handles all dungeons.”

“What if I went to Kaydossa and collapsed a dungeon there? I pondered. “They didn’t even have a guild, right?”

“I would appreciate it if you didn’t go to Kaydossa for the time being,” Chloe frowned. “At least until we get a better grip on the situation here.”

“I could always go and burn their capital to the ground,” I muttered.

“No burning capitals,” Liz said, poking my cheek.

“Remember what I told you about ruined countries?” Chloe frowned. “We don’t want even more problems.”

“You guys can’t even take a joke.”

“It doesn’t sound like a joke when it comes from you,” Chloe sighed.

One part of me was joking, the one that doesn’t want to kill innocent people. The other part wants to burn the country to the ground. What’s happening to me?

“Fine. I’ll go to the capital then,” I said, looking at Liz. “Are you coming with me?”

“Can I?” Liz asked.

“Of course,” I smiled, getting up and pulling Liz to her feet. “Let’s go then. We can’t dally when we have a personal request from Chloe.”

“You clearly have an ulterior motive,” Chloe muttered, staring at me suspiciously.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I grinned, turning to leave. “We will be back later.”

After leaving the guild, we found a place to put up a telenode close to Baruda before teleporting to the capital.