Ch. 5 - Sandonaar

After the young dragons returned to their nest, they put the reindeer in front of the sleeping Dragon Mother, then Amos flew toward the pile of gold coins and slept there. He was pretty accustomed to his life's daily rhythm: eat, sleep... and some more sleep. Which was also the ultimate goal he had in his previous life.

A few nights later, the four siblings were woken up by their Dragon Mother.  

Amos opened his mouth and yawned. He did not understand why their mother would wake them all by herself. Normally, she patiently waits for them to wake up. It was without precedent.

"Follow me," she said in her deep voice and led the way out through the cave's mouth, fleeing into the sky.

The four young dragons followed behind her, but they couldn't keep up with her pace.

Salilina deliberately slowed down so that the young dragons could keep up with her flying speed.

The journey was quiet throughout. Salilina and the four young dragons flew southwards and soon left the North Wind Icefield. This was Amos's first time leaving his dragon mother's lair.

After flying through a series of majestic rolling mountains, the landscape changed and transformed into something that was completely different from the barren lands of North Wind Icefield.

Under dragon vision, night and day had no particular distinction.

Steep ridges covered with ice and snow, and a vast green conifer forest that stretched from the mountainside to the banks of a rushing river.

On the other side of the river was a city, indicating intelligent life. In the square of the center of the town, people were singing and dancing around bonfires. Even from far away, Amos could hear the cheerful singing.

Under the blanket of darkness, Salilina led the young dragons down the snowy mountainside.

She gazed at the festive city; her eyes revealing endless greed.

Northern Quibao---Sandonaar, the holy city under the Chogori Mountains; the pearl of the Chorum River; the commercial center of Northern Quibao and the political center of the barbarians.

Salilina had been peering at Sandonaar's wealth but soon she withdrew her gaze, as if she was deeply afraid of some existence within the city.

The northern barbarians were nomadic people. The harsh cold environment of the north made them tough in both character and strength.  

According to barbarians custom, on the night a baby was born, it would be placed outside the door, subjected to the cold and ice of the night and left to be judged by the Barbarian God, Barrino. Only strong babies had a chance of survival. The custom was said to have been handed down from tens of thousands of years ago, reaching far back towards the reign of the frost giants.

In ancient times, tens of thousands of years ago, barbarians were slaves, like animals kept in captivity, by frost giants and resources were said to have been extremely scarce. They had no choice but to abandon the weak offspring.

As the saying went, 'where there is oppression, there is resistance.' The barbarian hero, Sandonaar, who couldn't stand the cruelty and tyranny of the giants lead the barbarians to an uprising and successfully put an end to the brutal rule of the frost giants.

In the final battle, Sandonaar and the chief of the frost giants died together.

The grieving barbarians buried Sandonar's remains on the banks of the Chorum River and established the original and only colony around the cemetery in the memory of the giver. To honor the hero who brought hope to the community, the barbarians named the community Sandonaar.

Sandonaar also became a sacred place in the hearts of the barbarians. And later, with the convenient shipping conditions of the Choru River, the barbarians started trading with the central region of the mainland. Sandonaar also developed from a community of hundreds to a trading city of tens of thousands.

At that moment, a quick shadow sprang out of the coniferous forest, and in a few deft leaps came before Salilina.  

He was a four-meter tall white winter wolf with a single white scale embedded on his forehead.

Amos had seen it before. It was the most powerful familiar of Salilina, Winter Wolf Fingale, a top ice hunter with a racial level of 16.

Fingale went up to Salilina, it bowed its head down in respect, and said humbly, "Welcome, master."

Winter wolves were ruthless hunters in the ice field and they lived together as a family. The average winter wolf pack had seven or eight adult wolves, plus two or three little cubs.

Once a winter wolf reached adulthood, its racial level would reach level 10.

Among them, the robust individuals could even break through to level 15 and above. These wolves would be intelligent enough to speak.

Salilina nodded in response to Fingale, then she asked in a deep voice, "Where is that bastard? Why didn't he come out to see me?"

As she spoke, a black figure flew over from the foot of the mountain.

Amos's pupils narrowed.

Dragon Wing?

Dragon Warlock!

Once the warlock landed, his dragon wings began to shrink away. He was encased in a black cloak, only half of his face exposed, he was clutching a badge that had an insignia depicting a vertical flaming pupil with one of his claws.

The Dragon Shrine!

Amos suddenly realized that the inheritance included a wide range of things, and the Dragon Shrine was also recorded in it. Dragon Shrine could be said to be an organization that worshiped dragons as gods. Most members of the organisation were either dragon warlocks or necromancers.

There were dragons who joined the organisation and provided various services to other dragons and had connections with most of the famous dragons.

The warlock bowed and said, "Salute to you, the great Lord of the North Wind Icefield, the legendary white dragon Salilina."

"Humph!" Salilina's nostrils flared up in anger as she shot out two jets of steaming breaths, and said "You are late, Warlock."

"I ask for your forgiveness, Sandonaar has strengthened its guard during this period, and it took me some time to get out of the city."

The unknown warlock pondered for a moment and said, "But the news that I've brought is definitely worth your wait."

"Oh," Salilina stopped delving into the issue of the warlock being late, and asked curiously, "What news?"

"This time Sandonar went south to purchase goods. And according to our sources, the goods cost as much as 800,000 gold coins."

The warlock didn't wait or stop to build suspense but directly said, "And the leader of the team sent to the south is your old friend Severred."

When Salilina heard Severred's name, her aura suddenly turned cold, she then gritted her teeth and said, "This really is good news."

Listening to the conversation going on between Salilina and the warlock, Amos finally understood the reason she waited for them earlier.

A plague had broken out in the north this year. As the epidemic had a long incubation period, only a few livestock fell ill and it was completely harmless to the human body. Therefore, it did not attract any attention from the rulers of Sandonaar. But when they did, however, it was already too late.  

The plague then broke out completely, and plenty of livestock died. Livestock was akin to lifeline to these barbarians and many of them were having problems surviving due to the outbreak. To make things worse, unknown monsters had begun appearing in the lower stream of the Chorum River and their supplies were cut off.

After the Mudala celebration was over, Sandonaar's higher-ups decided to organize a team to buy food from the south to resolve the crisis, and Severred, one of Sandonaar's three legendary warriors, was chosen to be the leader of the team responsible for bringing the supplies.

The Dragon Temple, who learned the news, passed it to Salilina through Fingale. That's how they had decided to come together to contrive a plan to plunder Sandonaar.

The Warlock and dragon mother discussed further details of their aid and finally said, "Then I wish us a happy co-operation, Lord Salilina, I will trouble you with the cannon fodder. I will be taking my leave first."

After the warlock left, Salilina called Amos and the other young dragons and said, "Go! Children! Go and gather those humble Kobolds and Goblins. They will be honored to fight for a real dragon!"

The young dragons responded, "We will follow your will, Mother."

Comments