No Second Chances: The Beginning Of The End - Chapter 28

After the Protestants were cleared out by the authorities, the ruler took a walk around the front yard of the government building while being followed by the head researcher of the military. “Sir, I need to report a missing Hound; it was last located by our network in the mountains at the north of where the Pandora forest used to be. We presumed it was Lawrence Kaiser but it is only a hypothesis. A recon team was sent in order to scan the area and located any scrap left from the prototype.” –The researcher read a report on his hands while walking next to the ruler.

“Have you found the boy with the successor? The corpse of the thing we have in the research facility’s basement didn’t have an egg on its inside. So I presume there is a latent guardian we can obtain to invade other nations.” –The ruler thought out loud while remembering his ‘daughter’ went missing on the Pandora’s raid; however, he just saw it as the loss of an active.

The researcher dropped his arms and looked down, hesitantly. “No sir, we presume he left to Falladis with the former head weapon developer Grace Myers. However, the reports of the squad on the border didn’t notice anything similar to a successor. Given the time DD died, the successor must’ve been born already, so there is the possibility the guardian was not with them during the escape.” –The researcher answered while sweating due to the serious expression of the ruler who stopped walking to pay full attention to the report.

The ruler simply walked closer and tapped the researcher’s shoulder. “Then he is still in the nation, use everything you can to bring him to the dissection table, or else I’ll have to have a talk with you again.” –He eventually muttered while getting closer to the researcher’s ear. After leaving clear his intention, the ruler began to walk inside once again and commanded another team to go searching every city in the nation to get clues on Chronos. The Researcher, on the other hand, was pale, feeling his shoulder heavier and only remembering a dead stare with killing intent.

Cristobal and the head commander of the military went on a friendly meeting off-duty in a bar nearby. The discussion topic was mostly about family matters and plans on what to do once the missions from the ruler are over. Honestly, at first, I thought I would be able to go back to see my family and have a very enjoyable evening with my grandchild, but since I saw those eyes, the eyes of a being beyond warped, I knew that I had no right to think about my family anymore. I know I won’t be able to go back to them anymore. –Cristobal analyzed after having a long conversation with the Commander. A couple of hours later they came out of the bar while laughing about some past wars of the continent while Cristobal was holding the commander’s arm, preventing him from falling on the ground due to his current drunk state.

Once Cristobal managed to carry the commander to the living quarters he went back to an office assigned to him in order to investigate certain details about the Pandora Forest and the elves that used to guard it. It didn’t take him long to find out there was an agreement with the secondary objective of the Pandora Operation. The subject known as Archival was an elf that took care of the forest his whole life until developing a bond with it, the forest was studied to be sentient and able to receive commands from the subject. It was also recently discovered that Archival was hiding an Earth dragon, breaking a certain clause of the agreement and allowing the military to take over the forest and kill him if deemed a threat. This is too convenient for the government, but knowing this I can reassure myself there is nothing good in the ruler’s head, however, I can’t do anything, or else me and/or my family will suffer consequences. –Cristobal thought while analyzing the information from the Pandora operation.

After some hours of researching, the guardian’s file appears and Cristobal begins to read it thoroughly. He finds out the dragons were created in order to become biological weapons hundreds of years ago, the ones in charge of taking care of them were called the guardians, and so the dragons created a certain affinity for a singular human being through their lives. Given the dragons were unstoppable forces at the time, some of their guardians left them free in the wild, which altered the food chain and became a threat to human beings. With the combined efforts of the Prophets and the current nations, the dragons learned to be more discrete thanks to the generation of humans and humanoids that were chosen to be their trusted guardians. It is still unknown which are the requirements for the dragons to choose a Guardian, but once they do, the guardian attains a power able to subjugate nations. The Prophets on the other hand we’re unable to fight against other human beings; however, their power was able to keep dragons at bay. Technology was eventually developed in order to match certain factors of the ongoing wars at the time, and so the Prophets were also known to be traitors of humanity and were hunted one by one.

Conveniently, once all the known Prophets were hunted and eliminated, rulers began to appear across the dying nations that were brought to a world war, then the TDW-A01 came into play and the new generation of dragons also appeared, choosing new guardians but becoming less of a threat to humanity due to their ability to hide from the population. Under the ruler’s commands, some guardians became protectors of their nation and became what they were meant to be in the beginning, biological weapons able to turn the tables against any of the current nations.

After learning about the guardians, Cristobal had to stop the research there before the system showed to the higher-ups about his sneaking into classified information. Some Hours later the head researcher called him in order to augment certain aspects of his custom weapon, once a protocol routine was executed to it, the researcher began to question certain things to Cristobal in order to acquire extra information about the way he uses his custom weapon. “Seemingly, the former weapon developer didn’t give enough information in her reports about the nature of these weapons, so I need to fill up this form in order to let us see your growth with it.” –The researcher explained while taking notes on the general size and aspect of the whip.

While Cristobal’s weapon was being investigated after being used; Chronos, Elvira, and Sinns ran up to a certain male with long and fluffy black hair, around the same height as Elvira but with wilder looks. The individual presented himself as Hisato Kamagura, also after a whistle, a long green Dragon began to crawl out of a crack from the mountains; the looks of this beast were the ones of a snake ready to attack at command.

“You have quite the nerve to come here without anything to protect yourself other than these two ladies. You should know that this means you will die helplessly for crossing my domains.” –Hisato proudly spoke as if he was giving his prey a last chance to escape.

Elvira looked at Sinns and she simply shrugged while holding Chronos before motioning him to stay still. The Guardian took this as a surrender from their part and snapped his fingers for his dragon to attack immediately. However, Elvira’s gloves returned to their original form before Sinns held onto Chronos, and so Elvira manages to grab both jaws of the dragon and keep them open before slamming the animal against the ground and the mountain as if it was a ragdoll, leaving the formerly prideful guardian on the ground since he fell back due to the sudden impression. “I think you are not well aware either, but you are very unlucky to have come across us especially.” –Sinns countered Hisato’s previous statement while Elvira was holding down the dragon as it kept jerking around in order to get her off.

Hisato looked at Chronos desperately as if he was the leader of the group and Chronos simply shrugged with an emotionless expression, as if he was seeing an everyday event. I never expected Elvira to have such strength, but it makes sense since she was able to use Sinns battle-ax with such ease, maybe the gloves are more powerful than they seem, and I should not try to enrage her. Thankfully Sinns was there in the moment she was processing who I am, if it wasn’t for her, It is very probable we would’ve clashed once again.-Chronos addressed the situation in his mind right after taking a glimpse of what Elvira was able to achieve with her brute strength, sending a shiver down his spine.

Sinns walked up to Hisato and punched him once on his jaw, knocking him out, and carried him back to the crack on the mountain from where the dragon came from. Helplessly, Hisato found himself tied up and with the hound in front of the crack in the mountain to avoid any possible escape route. “Now we need answers. Who do you work for and why are you in Delcyt? Did another nation send you here to attack this kingdom?” –Sinns began to question the much-disoriented guardian. Hisato could barely put together what just happened since it was too fast.

“I don’t know what you are talking about I just know that guy is my enemy, for some reason, I keep getting nightmares about this guy destroying everything and he must be stopped.” –Hisato began to babble while being scared of being killed in the spot.

“why wou-“ –Chronos attempted to question him as well before getting interrupted by Sinns who was raising her hand, blocking Chronos from moving any closer and swiftly lowering it to slap Hisato.

“I’m the one asking questions, the only thing I can guarantee you is that we won’t kill you as long as you are useful to us” –Sinns replied with authority, looking down at Hisato as if he was a kid about to throw a tantrum. Hisato simply nodded in fear while shaking. Elvira on the other hand already managed to calm down the dragon and even let it move freely around her; seemingly the dragon took a liking to her as well.

A couple of hours later, Hisato stood up and took a deep breath before speaking. “I am a native of Delcyt, I used to live in one town nearby the Pandora forest and then I meet a dragon five times bigger than my friend there, I was very scared but It made me follow it. I was sort of kidnapped by it but then it suddenly died, leaving an egg behind. Since I heard stories of the elves knowing a lot about these animals, I went to meet the ones by the Pandora forest. They explained to me with sign language and symbols something about me being a protector and helped my dragon hatch, but then I was forced to do a certain rite where I had to survive for a time and I just couldn’t take it and left, since that time I came back to the same place where the first dragon took me and the one I have simply grown up over time and here we are now.” –Hisato explained quickly, very nervous of what Sinns would do or say. He then sat back down and went to a corner.

“It really matches certain things I was suspecting, but it doesn’t take away the fact that this thing cuddling with Elvira is a catastrophe that one day will probably kill millions. So we have to either take you to the gove-“ –Sinns stopped herself from continuing speaking as she realized she was talking with a protocol mindset as her lips moved naturally. “Never mind that, for how long have you been taking care of the dragon?” –Sinns asked trying to shake off what she previously said.

“2 years, since that moment I escaped from the Pandora forest, maybe I would have to go back and face the rite again.” –Hisato replied and snapped his fingers twice, making the dragon crawl closer to him, coiling around.

“I have bad news for you: the forest was burned to ashes.” –Chronos replied while staring at Sinns who closed her eyes and sighed remembering how she also killed Archival under the control of a certain drug she couldn’t overcome by herself.

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