3 Chapter 3

"You can't stop him, Stoick. You can only prepare him." His friend warned him, " I know it seems hopeless, but the truth is you won't always be around to protect him. He's going to get out there again. He's probably out there now." Oh how right he was.

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Somewhere in the Berk forest

"Oh, the Gods hate me." Hiccup yelled out in frustration. "Some people lose their knife or their mug. No, not me! I managed to lose an entire dragon." 'How could this happen?' He asked himself.

In his anger, he slapped a branch away, only for the same branch to whip back into his face.

"Ow!"

He looked at the branch, like it was the one at fault and noticed that the tree itself was broken. He looked around, only to find a trail of mud and broken ground.

After carefully following the trail and trying to not make any noise at all, he looked over the clearing, only to see the Night Fury that he had hit. He quickly hid himself from the beast, before double checking if what he saw was even real.

Seeing the dragon once more, Hiccup tried to pull out his knife and almost lost hold of it for a second before gathering the courage to go closer to the beast. It was only after making sure that the Night Fury was tied

"Oh, wow? I.. I did it?" He asked himself before confirming, "Oh, I did it! This fixes everything. Yes! I have brought down this mighty beast!" He called out to no one in particular before stepping on the dragon like the heroes of any tale would do. However the night fury responded by flapping its ears, making him jump back in fear.

He slowly walked closer to it and noticed that it was wide away. It's emerald eyes were screaming danger, yet they felt similar, for some unknown reason.

"I'm gonna kill you, dragon." He tried to say with confidence, however sounded more like mutter to convince himself to do it. He continued to try to convince himself to do it, "I'm gonna... I'm gonna cut out your heart and take it to my father. I'm a Viking." Opening his eye's all he saw in the dragon's eyes was danger not fear or remorse.

"I'm a Viking!" He yelled out in frustration. Why was he not able to do it? He tried to gather up the courage as he lifted the knife high above his head. And yet when he glanced at the dragon all he saw, was acceptance. It had accepted that it would die.

The Night Fury closed it's eyes before relaxing its on the ground. Hiccup however was in denial. He was a viking. He should do this. 'SO WHY CAN"T I DO IT?' He screamed at himself. After a moment, he had realised he was unable to kill the dragon.

"I did this." He said to himself and started to leave before glancing back one final time. He saw that the beast was tied and couldn't move, he chose to release it. He started cutting away the ropes, and the moment he cut away the last one, the Night Fury pounced on him, and just stared at his eyes in anger.

It pulled back it's head and let out a roar so loud it almost deafened Hiccup, before trying to fly away. However, the attempt at flying away ended horribly as it bashed into a rock and fell into a large clearing. It looked like it was unable to gain any altitude.

Hiccup, on the other hand, was breathing hard. He felt like he had just escaped certain death, and glanced at the struggling dragon, before standing up and then fainting immediately after.

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It was almost dark, by the time, Hiccup woke up and got himself back home. Opening the door, he saw Stoick moving around the coals at the fireplace. Assuming that his father was too occupied by the fire to realise he was back, he tried to waddle back to his room, his assumption however turned to be wrong.

"Hiccup."

"Dad? Uh... I have to talk to you, Dad."

"I need to speak with you too, son."

The father and son gathered up their words and spoke in unison,

"I think it's time you to learned to fight dragons." "I don't want to fight dragons."

"What?" "What?"

"Uh, you go first." Stoick asked his son

"No, no, you go first." Hiccup insisted. After nodding Stoick continued, "All right. You got your wish. Dragon training. You start in the morning."

"Oh man, I should have gone first. Uh, cause I was thinking. You know, we have a surplus of dragon fighting Vikings but, do we have enough bread-making Vikings, or small home repair Vikings..." Hiccup tried to argue, but it seemed like Stoick was ignoring his words."You'll need this." He said while handing Hiccup an axe.

"I don't want to fight dragons." Hiccup pleaded. His father however thought that he was kidding "Oh come on, yes you do."

"Rephrase. Dad, I can't kill dragons." Hiccup tried again, while doing his best not to drop the axe, however Stoick still didn't seem to understand "But you will kill dragons."

"No, I'm really very extra sure that I won't."

"It's time, Hiccup."

"Can you not hear me?"

"This is serious, son. When you carry this axe, you carry all of us with you. Which means: You walk like us. You talk like us. You think like us. No more of... this." He said while pointing at Hiccup vaguely. It felt like people didn't like this current him.

"You just gestured to all of me." Hiccup retorted. Stoick seemed to ignore it "Deal?" He asked

"This conversation is feeling very one-sided."

"Deal?" He asked again with a louder voice.

"Deal." Hiccup did not have any other choice

Stoick nodded before grabbing his basket filled with necessities, "Good. Train hard. I'll be back. Probably." He said before walking off towards the ship leaving Hiccup alone in the house.

"And I'll be here, maybe." He said to himself, before heading off to sleep.

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In the dragon training arena

"Welcome to dragon training." Gobber called out to the new recruits

"No turning back." Astrid walked inside with the others following her close behind

"I hope I get some serious burns." One of the twins said

"I'm hoping for some mauling like on my shoulder or lower back." The other one agreed. It seemed like they share views on some things which was interesting.

"Yeah, it's only fun if you get a scar out of it." Were all Vikings masochists?

"Yeah, no kidding, right? Pain, love it." Hiccup said in his favourite sarcastic tone.

"Lets get started. The recruit who does best, will win the honour of killing his first dragon in front of the entire village." Gobber announced. The others however chose to dish out more insults at Hiccup

"Hiccup already killed a Night Fury, so does that disqualify him or...?" Snotlout joked. Hiccup however did not react in any way, just taking the insult.

"Don't worry. You're small and you're weak, That will make you a less of a target. They'll see you as sick or insane and go after the more Viking-like teens instead."He tried to cheer up his friend's son, before walking to the left most door and addressing the whole class.

"Behind these doors are just a few of the many species you will learn to fight." He pointed at the first door "The Deadly Nadder."

Fishlegs followed right after, "Speed: 8, Armor: 16."

Gobber walked over to the next to and pointed "The Hideous Zippleback."

While Fishlegs recounted it's stats "11 Stealth times two."

"The Monstrous Nightmare."

"Fire Power: 15."

"The Terrible Terror."

"Attack: 8, Venom: 12."

"Can you stop that!" It seemed like Gobber had enough of his muttering, he breathed in before continuing with the next door, which held the dragon which they were doing to test with today

"And the Gronckle."

Fishlegs whispered towards Hiccup "Jaw Strength: 8."

At that moment, Gobber grabbed the lever, set next to the door, and was prepared to release the dragon inside before he was interrupted

"Woah, woah, wait, aren't you going to teach us first?" Snotloud asked with concern. Gobber just grinned before pulling the switch down, which the released the Gronckle inside "I believe in learning on the job."

The Gronckle slammed itself out of its cage, and tried to fly away, however the caged sky prevented it from doing so, causing it to slam into the wall. "Today is about survival. If you get blasted, you're dead." Gobble stated the obvious. "Quick! What's the first thing you're going to need?'

"A doctor?" "5 Speed?" "- A shield?"

"Shield. Go." He ignored the other two answers before confirming Astrid's, which made everyone run towards the wall to grab a shield

"Your most important piece of equipment is your shield. If you must make a choice between a sword or a shield." He lectured while helping Hiccup who was struggling to hold both the axe and the shield. "Take the shield."

The first to get out were the twins, mostly because of their nonsensical arguing over a shield.

"Those shields are good for another thing. Noise." Gobber lesson however did not stop. "Make lots of it and throw off a dragon's aim." The rest of the group followed his instructions and bashed their weapons with the shield, making the dragon become dizzy.

"All dragons have a limited number of shots. How many does a Gronckle have?" He asked the teens

Snotlout was the first one who answered "Five?" His guess was immediately corrected by Fishlegs

"No, six." which distracted him from the assignment at hand causing him to lose his shield by the dragon's fire ball

"Right, six. That's one for each of you." Gobber pointed out, "Fishlegs, out." He looked around trying to find all the member of the group before finding Hiccup hiding a wooden wall.

"Hiccup, get in there!" He called out, almost immediately a fireball hit the wall next to Hiccup, making him run back to his hiding spot.

All the while Snotlout was hitting on Astrid "So anyway, I moved into my parent's basement. You should come by sometimes to work out, You look like you work out." which distracted him frow the fire ball coming straight at him. He was lucky enough to hold the shield at the correct position otherwise he would be grilled meat.

"Snotlout, your done." Gobber declared

"So I guess its just you and me." He tried to start a conversation, however was interrupted by Astrid dodging to the side, "Nope, just you." The Gronckle shot another fireball which hit Hiccup's shield making it slip out of his grasp.

"One shot left." Hiccup seeing, his shield run away, chased after it. "Hiccup!" Gobbers shout made him realise the dragon was right behind him. After having no choice but to back into a wall, Hiccup covered his face with his hands, hoping it would do something to protect him. The dragon flew almost into his face and was about to fire another fire ball, fortunately a hook saved his life, making the dragon fire a few feet above him.

"And that's 6." Gobber declared before throwing the dragon back into its cage, "Go back to bed you overgrown sausage."

"You'll get another chance. Don't you worry." He mentioned to the disappointed teenagers before giving his final advice on the subject. "Remember, a dragon will always..."

"... always go for the kill."

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Hey Guys, thank you for reading this far, please check out my other fan fiction ATLA: The Master.

Cya tomorrow...

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