Chapter 625

“Seal the hoard.” Aurexion growled as they left. 

Ajax’s first instinct was to disagree but after taking a moment to think about it. “That might not be a bad idea.” he said as he looked towards the guards. “Word that I returned from the Wild Lands with dragon bond will spread fast, don’t want to risk any thieves getting ideas at least for a little while.” 

Elija only took a moment to consider the point before he agreed and Judy dashed back in to grab a number of gold coins before the contents of the vault were to be sealed again.

“I assume you have a communication stone for the capital.” Ajax turned towards the prince. “I need to use it.” 

“What for?” The prince asked. “I hope you’re not expecting to take your time coming to the capital, it wouldn’t be good for anyone.” 

Ajax very much agreed with the assessment. Coming home first was fine but he couldn’t stay long, he needed to come before the king to show he wasn’t planning a coup now that he had a dragon bond. More than that, the meeting alone would give the king and the crown prince a pretense to make things easier on House Hearthbound regarding the war based on information gained from them.

“No, I’m pretty sure we’ll be leaving tomorrow.” Ajax answered as he used his good arm to pull Lexi next to him, ideally he’d have liked to take his whole family with him but that wasn’t an option, the duchy still needed to be run. Lexi on the other hand had plenty of support in the capital from her family and the duchy could run without her for a while especially now that political pressure was about to drop. “I need to start making arrangements in regards to my missing arm.” 

“What kind of poison makes it so you can’t grow it back?” Quinn asked, curious as she hadn’t encountered such wounds before. She had extensive experience dealing with overkill wounds that came from powerful attacks that made them harder to heal but not something that made others refuse healing. 

“Werewolf.” Ajax’s answer instantly put the entire group of champion level people on guard with their hands drawing towards their weapons, a deep growl from Aurexion in the tight tunnels had them rethinking who the threat might be. “I’ve not gone feral.” Ajax said exasperated. 

“There’s no known cure for a werewolf bite.” Quinn responded not relaxing in the least. “Even cutting the limb off right after being bitten just slows down the poison's progression .” 

“Life Mana can neutralise it so long as most of the poison is removed.” Aurexion’s words drew attention to the one being that was possibly the biggest font of new knowledge in humanoid lands right now. “ The poison also loses a lot of potency after the werewolf dies meaning you can counter it even without cutting it off so long as you kill the floor boss.”

“Then why do you need preparations?” Quinn asked. 

“Neutralizing the poison and reverting the changes that happened before it was neutralized are not the same thing.” Ajax answered. “Regular healing would just regrow the changed arm. I need to talk to Luna to work with one or preferably more of the royal healers to regrow my arm not based on the soul but rather based on what a human arm should be.” 

“That research we’ve been doing will help a lot.” Kate joined the conversation. “I’ll have copies of the scrolls from the research center prepared to take with you when you depart.” 

“I’ll get that started then.” The prince said as he moved ahead pulling something out of his spacial ring before putting up a privacy sphere.

“I want to go with you too, uncle Ajax.” Jake joined in.

“Not this time, buddy.” Ajax ruffled his nephew's hair much to the boy’s displeasure. “But next time for sure.” 

“How did all of you come here so quickly?” Silvia asked. “I thought we’d already sent the reinforcements for the war.” 

“We sent the elites.” Rex answered. “We at the champion and squad level move a lot faster. It’s why we made it here within a day of a dragon being spotted flying into Gryndor. We get to leave later. The elites should arrive in about three to four weeks and we’ll arrive at about the same time.” 

“We’re sending a lot of champions, why is that?” Ajax asked. “Also almost no regular soldiers otherwise there would be no reason to skip over our duchy there.” 

“Regular soldiers aren’t the issue.” Evelyn answered. “The beastkin have been planning this for a long time, they have a lot more elites than their kingdoms should, the same applies to champions though a lot of them are barely strong enough to count as champions.” 

“How strong is that?” Ajax asked. 

“A little stronger than you were before you left.” Patrick answered. “Something tells me you’ve more than closed the gap in your time away.” 

“I’m not sure what tells you that, I blocked your inspection Skill.” Ajax chuckled, having felt [Enigma] shut out Patrick’s attempt. That got a few laughs from everyone else.

“You humanoids have to be one of the most self-destructive races out there.” Aurexion’s words surprised a lot of people. “I’m guessing it's the isolation combined with your own natural greed makes fighting one another the only option once you rule everything else but can’t venture out further. I’ll have to ask my aunt about how you were before being so isolated, she was around back then.” 

“Humanoids have been isolated for more than tens of thousands of years, we have the records.” Evelyn pointed out.

“Khalysstra is more than a hundred thousand years old, though I would emphasise it as close to one hundred and fifty if she can hear you.” Ajax found it amusing that dragons took pride in how old they were, where old dragons actually rounded their age as high as possible. “While I’m sure a lot can change for you in a thousand years, things outside your little isolation take longer to change, since most Ascended races live a lot longer than you do.” 

“I don’t know about that second part.” Lexi said with a teasing grin as she tightened her hold on her fiance. “I think you’ll see some pretty big changes happening there as well in the next few centuries.” 

As Ajax had already proven for the humanoid territories he was a catalyst for change and so long as he survived big changes should also follow once he made entering the Wild Lands a regular occurrence instead of a special trip.

“My brother is getting in contact with Luna and preparing your team as we speak.” The prince returned. “Now we can get something to eat, I am feeling famished after the dash here.” 

Despite having already eaten breakfast with his family Ajax was still feeling hungry. He noticed how his body had gotten used to the higher Mana density in the food he found in the Wild Lands even if he also often ate his rations made here. 

Much to Ajax’s surprise Aurexion was a big fan of anything to do with honey. Watching his bond drink a barrel of honey mead by eating the barrel and breaking it in his mouth was a memorable occasion for everyone.

“You have quite the sweet tooth.” Ajax said, looking for any reason not to talk about his trip despite the questioning looks from the prince and the rest of their guests. Ajax didn’t want to go over everything a third time so he would wait until he got to the capital for another big recap. “I wouldn’t have figured that, the honeyed ham seemed to disappear pretty fast.” 

“It’s not bad.” Aurexion said. “Your honey however has the highest Mana density out of all your food, which I find surprising since not even we know how to get bees to produce honey with Mana density higher than the surroundings.” 

Having finished their meal Ajax was taking Aurexion for a tour of their mansion, or more accurately their lands around the mansion, he was joined by everyone as the novelty of a dragon being amongst them and being somewhat friendly hadn’t worn off and he guessed it wouldn’t for a while, it certainly hadn’t for him.

“Anything else interesting happen while I was gone?” Ajax asked. 

“My nephew seemed to be a little worried about the lake not far from here.” the prince answered. “Seems the Mana density of the water is slowly starting to go down.” 

“Why would that be?” Ajax asked. 

Before anyone could answer, Aurexion drew their attention. “You have Mana focusing trees planted in soil? As if it wasn’t enough that they are so close to a dungeon I doubt you are getting anything out of them like that, do you know how hard it is for them to work on earth and stone?” 

“What do you mean?” Ajax asked. 

“You should have bodies of water around those trees there.” Aurexion said as he pointed towards the ten trees of different sizes Ajax had replanted from the tree that had been in the center of the lake they had been discussing. “They’ll draw in Mana slowly and focus it in the water. I think the three big ones should do well to make a place where I can relax better in this low Mana density.” 

Ajax ignored Aurexion’s entitlement at claiming three of the trees just like that, after all he had just told him why they were useful and more than that he was happy the dragon was making plans of at least having a permanent home here with his family. “I think I found Xavier’s problem.” Ajax said as he turned towards the prince who was looking between Aurexion and the trees with an impressed look.

“Any chance we can negotiate with you about access to your bond?” the prince asked. 

“No way, I did enough negotiating while I was in the Wild Lands.” Ajax denied him. “If you want to know something you can ask Aurexion directly or talk with my sister, she needed a new way to grow her merchant Skills.” 

“Why is your sister trading on my knowledge?” Aurexion turned, a little peeved about the conversation. 

“Because that way you don’t have to bother with everyone who wants to ask questions.” Ajax explained. “More than that it will help her grow her Skills and she is the one doing the trading to exchange the treasures from our hoard into things better suited for us. You want those Skills to be high don’t you?” 

“You make some good points.” Aurexion accepted. “That works for me, I’ll trust in your sister looking out for our best interest.”