Chapter 1063 — Lifting the Veil

Once her eyes adjusted to the dim light, she made out certain details within—the furnishings in view and the house itself bore a strong, contradictory style. She saw many alloy panels plainly out of specification joined into walls by crude cutting and rudimentary welding; the lower half of the walls was piled from primitive stone; in a corner sat an advanced holographic projector, presumably retrieved from the ruins, working poorly, flickering out snatches of synthetic music from a bygone age and dizzying advertising clips. At the center of the room stood a heavy stone table, its surface carved with draconic runes forming arrays whose purpose she could not fathom, and above the table floated a crystal, its surface glimmering faintly as it projected scenes from around the camp.

The primitive and the advanced, the crude and the precise, a splendid age shattered and a future without a clear road—these contradictions were combined here in just such a fashion. Looking at them, Cassandra only fell somewhat silent.

"This is our present state," Metzen said, seemingly misreading Cassandra's silence. "It doesn't look like much, I know... but for keeping body and soul together, it serves. At this stage our foremost task is to ensure more of our kin survive, and to restore what social order we can. As for comfort and beauty... those must wait."

"I understand," Cassandra said, lifting her head, her gaze warm and gentle upon Metzen. "We have been through it too."

Metzen was taken aback. "You?"

"Many, many years ago—the Antavien crashed on this planet. Every factory fell silent, the engine core went dark; from the core fusion tower to the residential decks, every compartment was choked with metal debris and lethal radiation. We could only flee the ship and burrow into the primal seabed and shoals to survive, all the while enduring dreadful loss of bodily control and dislocation of mind... Truthfully, that may have been worse than what you face now—at least for you, this planet's atmosphere is not poisonous."

"I'm sorry..." Metzen did not know what expression to wear. "We did not know of these things..."

"Why apologize? We simply never had the chance to establish contact," Cassandra laughed. "We have both lived on this planet all these years and never dealt with one another—but perhaps fate arranged it: we can begin to know each other from today. His Majesty the Emperor of Cecil once said that the fates of all mortals in this world are bound together. Lately I find that rather reasonable."

"He has many reasonable sayings," Metzen nodded. "Most of them are coming true one by one. The rest... perhaps one day they will come true as well."

"When he learns what has happened in Tarronde, I fear he will be deeply astonished," Cassandra said from the bottom of her heart. "Beyond our sight, events so earth-shaking have unfolded on this planet... You have wrought the greatest upheaval this world has not seen in a million years; even the sea-dwellers would marvel at such a thing."

"But the opportunity that made all this possible came from the humans of the Loren Continent," Metzen said with a smile.

Then she paused, her expression gradually growing serious, and looked into Cassandra's eyes. "Lady Cassandra, please tell me of the Loren Continent as it is now—above all, of the Cecil Empire."

"Of course," Cassandra nodded and smiled. "This world is growing ever more 'interesting,' and the most interesting thing of all is... His Majesty Gao Yang Cecil is attempting to forge a new world order..."

...

The far-northern mountains bathed in the warm sun of the Moon of Revival; the snowcaps that never thawed were slowly beginning to shrink. Dragon's Rest Keep, as through the past centuries and millennia, still stood atop the mountain peaks, looking down upon the realm of the dragonkin.

The Archduke of Dragonblood had returned.

Bayang'er stood on the highest terrace, where the mist and clouds among the distant peaks caught the sunlight and rose and fell slowly across his field of view. Behind him and to one side stood the courtiers Sir Golosh Hikkel, Sir Eugene, and Sir Kessimir, quietly awaiting the Archduke's command.

Every nation of the continent had its own structure of rule and hierarchy of titles. In the Holy Dragon Duchy, "Sir" was a very particular address. Unlike in other lands, it did not denote a clearly defined tier within the noble hierarchy, but was the collective honorific for the highest order of nobility. In this country of towering mountains and steep ranges, all who bore the title of "Sir" were great personages entitled to come and go freely within Dragon's Rest Keep.

"...I never thought I'd come back alive," Bayang'er said softly at last, after a long silence. "Now the plan must change."

The coming-of-age ceremony of not long ago seemed like an unbelievable dream, yet everything in that dream had truly happened. Bayang'er could scarcely believe that after all he had been through, he had returned to Dragon's Rest Keep safe and sound. Recalling all he had experienced in space and in Tarronde, what remained to him now, besides marveling at the unpredictability of the world, was the rueful reflection that plans could never keep pace with change.

"We have not yet formally announced the notice of the Archduke of Dragonblood's demise—that should count as good news," said the comparatively young Sir Kessimir, tall of build and wearing his black hair short. "Though some word has still leaked out and stirred a ripple or two among the common folk, none of it is serious—we can still alter the plan with relative ease."

"...Indeed. Had I returned a day later, I fear I'd have had to attend my own funeral," Bayang'er said, his expression somewhat strange. "On the flight back I even thought about how to return to public view in a reasonable manner—including whether I ought to climb out of a coffin in front of everyone, the way Gao Yang Cecil did... Ah, if it came to that, things would get complicated."

"Ahem—well, fortunately all we need to do now is some reassuring and guiding, to push down all that gossip about a 'palace coup,'" said Sir Golosh Hickle, clearing his throat twice. "And since you have returned, the affairs of the Duchy can proceed as usual. Shall we now draft an official letter and send a fresh reply to the Cecile Empire? Our earlier response to their invitation was hardly appropriate..."

"A new reply is certainly needed," Baranyel nodded. "But before that... let us make a few things public first."

Curiosity showed on Sir Golosh's face. "Your meaning is..."

"The truth about this long, so-called 'exile'; the price the dragon race paid for freedom; the true state of Tarronde... the time has come to make it all public."

Sir Eugene, his hair and beard wholly white, frowned at once. "This will surely cause a great uproar—not every one of our people can accept all of this. Did you not decide earlier to let the truth stay buried?"

"The truth will out one day, and we must also guard against buried truths festering into hidden perils in the future—in this world, 'the unknown' and 'blindness' are truly terrifying things, and after seeing what Tarronde has become, I have come to understand this all the more deeply," Baranyel said slowly. "Guide the public opinion well, handle the aftermath well, and the rest... let the dragonkin make their own choices."