Chapter 495 - The Dragon bones

Before they were to leave for the bones, it was important that they looked at the two knights that were lying dead in the tunnels. It was clear that an assassin had killed them by the way their throats were slit. The problem was, what for?

Why simply just kill two men not closely related to the leaders, had someone from the Dark guild managed to infiltrate the Lion's mouth and was now roaming around? If that was the case, then they were quite the strong assassin for Ray not to be able to catch their presence.

While examining the bodies, Harry looked a tad little impatient, as if he wanted Ray to hurry looking at them. But what Ray was trying to do was going to take some time. Ray was casting one of his skills that would show him the last few moments before a person's death. 

It would raise their body in a spirit like form and show how they were killed, Yet for some reason, it was proving difficult to activate his skill with these two. Perhaps it was the shadow that was still surrounding them. 

So Ray was trying his best to figure out how to get rid of the lingering shadow to then activate his skill. Confirming their suspicions.

At that moment, more footsteps were heard down the tunnel, and both Martha and Lenny had appeared. Lenny looked even larger in the tunnels. If he was to raise his hands he was sure he would be able to touch the ceiling easily.

"Have you guys found anything out yet?" Martha asked.

'Not quite, but Harry wanted us to look at some Dragon bones after this." Kyle replied. "If you ask me, that sounds a lot more interesting."

"I know it does, but it's important we find out just what the shadow is planning, and why they would attack us. After all, we now know Monk is behind this." Martha said, with a saddened voice. 

"Our spies confirmed it, it looks like he has officially taken over Gary's role. Which also means Gary and Morfran are probably both gone." Lenny said. "I would suggest all of you prepare yourself for the worst. I know you know what I mean by that."

There was a brief moment of silence from them all. What Lenny meant was to be prepared to kill Monk. It was clear to a lot of them that he was already too far gone now. After what happened with Gary, it was pointless to try and get them to come back over to their side. What they needed to prepare was to kill their friend to save the lives of many.

The others started to watch Ray carefully, they could see his face twitching as he was concentrating, and the wounds on the neck of the two knights, a strange shadow started to lift and run up Ray's arm. But when it reached his elbow, a strange red force would collide with it and force it back down.

After this, Ray stood up and shook his head. 

"I can't activate my skill on it, it looks like something is blocking it." Ray said. 

"A power that not even a dragon can surpass?" Lenny said, with an interest. "Just what is the shadow? It seems to be too strong to be a god, maybe gods coming together to create something."

"We can ask questions like that when we get rid of it." Harry said. "If there is nothing else we can find out about from these two, then we shall bury them. We will make sure the guards and knights are on high alert and look out for the assassin. If that's all, let's head to have a look at those Dragon bones." 

Harry had already started walking down the tunnel before anyone else, and soon after Kyle and Ray followed. 

"Why don't you go and take a look as well Lenny/" Martha said. "Your knowledge of beasts will surely help, and while you're there keep an eye on Harry, he has been a little twitchy these days."

"I was already planning to." Lenny replied, rubbing his beard as if he was in a deep thought.

On their way to see the Dragon bones, Kyle seemed to be a little excited.

"Hey, do you think we could use the bones to create a weapon? I know there's no beast crystal but I heard Dragon bones are as strong as Glathrium."

"And you want to end up the same way as Gary. Remember Gary's Hamer was originally called a dragon hammer. Perhaps that too was made from a dragon infected by the shadow." Lenny replied.

Harry led the three of them down some more tunnels until they eventually entered a chamber that was lit up with light crystals. On a stone table there stood the dragon bones laid out on top of them. Most of the army was still stationed underground. 

This was because a lot of the inside of the castle had been destroyed and had poor conditions, but a lot of structure was actually built in the tunnels, so the army could last underneath the castle seemingly for a very long time. Although, Some of the men felt like they were going mad living down here, so they would go out from time to time.

And they were building structures on the outside as fast as possible, hoping to leave these dark tunnels.

When Lenny laid his eyes on the bones, the immense power coming off from them made him feel uncomfortable, Kyle was faring a little better but this was more due to him not being able to sense the power coming from them. 

It only took a single look for Ray to confirm that these were indeed real dragon bones, but what he had seen that day was not a real dragon. 

Harry walked up to the table, and started to run his hand across the bones, a large piece that had been chipped and already looked similar to a blade. 

"The way he's rubbing that thing is a little creepy, don't ya think?" Kyle whispered to Ray.

"Let me just speak my mind for us all." Lenny said. "These bones should be destroyed. It seems that there is power still lingering in them and if we don't want what happened to Gary to happen to any of us, it would be wise of us to get rid of them."

"I thought the same at first." Harry replied. "But then I started to turn around. The shadow has great power, we haven't even begun to fight it's full force yet, we measly fought against one of it's guards. There are still more and the Redwing army is small.

"Perhaps, we need to start to rely on some outside powers." 

"Did you even listen to a word I said, or have you already been possessed?" Lenny asked.

"Hey, I can see you two are going to get into a right argument any second now." Kyle said, trying to interrupt the two of them. "We have someone who will decide what we do in the end anyway."

Everyone in the room then looked at Ray for a decision. Walking up to the Dragon bones, Ray placed his hand on top of part of its skull. This seemed to be infected with the shadow the most. 

He was hoping that maybe, he would be able to extract something from it, to see the dragon's will or maybe a past memory of the dragon itself when it was alive.

Just like before with the two dead knights. A dark shadow started to seep out of the dragon skull and run up Ray's arm. The red aura came out seeping from Ray and tried to collide with it like before, only this time, the shadow was stronger. 

It had engulfed the red aura and continued to travel upward. 

"Ray are you okay?" Kyle asked. 

"It's the shadow, I told you those bones were infected!" Lenny shouted. "We have to do something." 

At that moment, Kyle tried to approach Ray but the shadow looked like it was starting to hop on towards him.

"Stay where you are!" Ray shouted. "I won't die, don't worry." 

Harry, realising his mistake, drew his sword and was ready to try to crush the bones where the shadow had come from. He swung down as hard as he could, but his sword simply bounced off the thing.

The shadow had creeped up towards Ray's head and his vision was no more. He had now entered a pitch black dark room. Opposite him he could see strange shadows. It took the form of a dragon, the same one that Gary had summoned. 

Then they started to change and shift into something else, a more human looking form, but there were no finer details shown, just an outer body. 

"Now, now Sen." The shadow said.  I'm finally happy that we get to talk like this face to face."

"Who are you?" Ray asked. Of course he wouldn't know who this was, it was just shadows in a human shape.

"What do you mean, I'm a bit upset you don't remember me Sen. I'm what you have been trying to get rid of this whole time. I am the Shadow the humans hate."

*****

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