Nefarian

As i see the red dragon get smaller in the distance i decide to return to the isle, while going back i look around wher red dragons eyes stoped during our talk but after inspection of the area i find nothing demn really got to smack some points in that perception....

Ten days have gone by since my talk and they happend to be one and the same as any other day, only thing that changed was that the teacher came for a permanent stay to speed up our training.

Being done with todays training i was resting in my self made cave, made with use of my Earth manipulation together with dungeon control worked to make a save haven ofc someone still could get hir but it was a lot harder to find then just going to the vulcano on the middle of the damn isle.

As i lay ther i try to come up with something to do with my time on this isle as long as wards hold i am save hir yes but it also means i am stuck hir and.. well... Truth be told, there was little to do on this island than fly around, train, fight, or hunt. Besides those four things, there was not really much to do. Of course there was a perpetual war going on to gain the favor of the teacher who had been left with us this year, but that was something restricted to the older years.

in the 20 years I had been alive in this reality, I would have done more, could have done more, if I hadn't been restricted to this island, but I was, so I couldn't. Aside from one hour each morning that the younger whelpings hade to learn from the teacher now, we were denied access to him unless we gained his favor, and considering how weak my brood is in comparison to the elder whelpings(who guarded him jealously), there was little we could do to gain it.

how do one gain favor well To gain his favor, we had to bring food, had to bring water, make a nice yellow hot pool of magma for him to bathe in, scrub him off, and otherwise attend to his every need and want. just as you would expect from a black dragon they loved to feel like kings of the world and that world to tend to ther needs and wants.

Of course, only one brood was allowed access to him at a time as mighty as teacher was he like all cursed black dragons feared his own shadow so he ain't letting more to him at once then one brood even if it's only whelps, so the lucky brood was constantly fending off attacks and sabotage meant to make them lose favor, and the teacher tended to be… displeased when a brood failed to meet his every need and want.

Being restricted to one hour each morning was fine if you were a dragon whelping who had all the time in the world, but I was still something of a human in mind, and my foremost instinct was that this island wasn't going to last forever, the Redwings were going to get in at some point. I need all the education I could get, NOW Not later.

Fortunately, there is a month out of the year where I had access to mother Sintharia, but the rest of my brood also had access to her and Nefarian tended to hog her most of the time in past 5 years, perhaps just to make me frustrated.

how ever finding scale of the red on the isle and my chat with Keristrasza helped me build resolve to keep Sintharia to myself this year, even if I had to have another bout with Nefarian again.

my planing was cut short by a voice.

"So, consorting with the enemy now, are you, Ancalagon?" said Nefarian in a snide voice right at my cave entrance.

Looking at him i see him with the biggest smirk of his life i was more then sure he felt victories having find me talk with Keristrasza

"What makes you say that?" I asked ambiguously, inspecting my claws. as he once said or will say let the games begin.

i hear him take a step closer but stop after that and speak again "I saw you talking to that Redwing," said Nefarian in a a gloating voice.

"Why Nefarian, with the way you follow me around all time, one might think you were my mate," I replied playfully. with my own smirk showing to him.

Nefarian spit in disgust only for me to open a small pool of lava wher he spited to(not in my home). "As if I'd want to mate with you!"

"Ouch," I replied sarcastically. "Well, for your information, I was not "consorting with the enemy" as you put it. I was just exploring the area and the Redwing jumped on me, well, figuratively I mean. I didn't plan to run into them." i replied with a shrug

"And who's going to believe that?" Nefarian snorted. "If I report you to mother, she'll punish you in an instant." growing irritated i answer

"Please, the little black whelping who's only 20 years old was trading classified information with the Red Dragonflight, yeah right," I show my strained smile to him "But go right ahead, Brother, tell mother her most powerfull and most promising son is traitor i will even come with you to see her not believe you, seeing you as the butt of a joke would be the highlight of my day."

Nefarian fallen silent for a moment.

"How do you do that?!"

"Do what?"

"You always know exactly what to say in any situation and even teacher can hardly keep up, how are you doing that?"

I frowned. The truth was simple: I was simply older than him, simply had more experience than him in all things such as, debate and wordplay. As a mere welp, Nefarian had no hope of keeping up with me in conversation. I suspected that was part of the reason why Nefarian was so jealous of me. Nefarian saw himself as being intelligent, but if he couldn't even keep up with his brother then how intelligent really is he It was why he was driven to rage when I succeeded and he failed.

"I honestly have no idea," I replied. "The words just come to me."

Nefarian stared at me for a moment, before looking at the ground, scraping his claws in the dirt nervously. I could tell that he wanted something, but was afraid to ask for it. Perhaps that was the reason why he had said I was consorting with the enemy, perhaps to gain blackmail materiel on me so that he could get what he wanted without having to ask for help.

"Just spit it out, Nefarian," I said impatiently.

He startled, looking up at me, perhaps surprised that I had sussed out his real reason for being here, before giving me a wry smile. Something felt weird about seeing that expression on his face, and I realized then that this was the first time Nefarian had ever really smiled at me.

"Do you think… do you think you could teach me.. to be more like you?" he asked hesitantly.

What ever I thought he was going to ask....that wasn't it.

"what?"

"You're always doing and saying things I don't understand," Nefarian explained. "at least, not until I think about them later, then they start to make sense. You always know exactly what to say or do in any given situation"

"just now, where you dismissed my attempt at blackmailing you with ease. You even figured out that I wanted something from you, before I even told you."

While speaking, Nefarian stared at me, as if I an interesting puzzle that he was trying to figure out.

"I want to learn how to do what you do, to be smart and capable like you".

If I were a lesser man… er, dragon, this would be something of an ego trip, but as it was It was just sad.

"To be honest, Nefarian, to you I might be smart and capable, but I had just as many flaws and make just as many mistakes as any dragon."

"Being like you would still be a step up, though." Nefarian pointed out.

"Just stop, Nefarian," I said, starting to feel a bit creeped out. "No one person can be exactly the same as any other person, ok? At best, all I can teach you is how to solve problems and think creatively. I can't teach you to be exactly like me, ok? And I wouldn't want to, anyway, that would be kind of creepy."

"Alright, I'll take whatever you can teach me" said Nefarian.

"Hoho! not so fast ther brother you see i have some...conditions"