Chapter 24 A Long Road Ahead

"That dragon really torched the entire road…." Tina frowned as she saw the charred remains of many people. The people that died ranged from all ages. Dragons really did not care if they were young or old.

"It did a sloppy job of it. It didn't seem to care too much about anyone that escaped. To them, we are nothing but bugs that are meant to be exterminated. They can kill us at any time. Well, all except for one." Blake squeezed Lillia's hand, causing Lillia to smile and rest her head on Blake's shoulder.

"All except for one?" Tina was confused. She did not understand what Blake meant by his words.

,m "I am a dragon," Lillia answered with a yawn.

Tina looked at Lillia, then at Blake, and then back at Lillia. "Haha… You can't trick me." She really thought that she was being teased. But her eyes soon went wide and almost fell out of her head when she saw Lillia's hand suddenly turn into a claw. While it was not huge and still had a human shape, the black scales and sharp claws were very visible and very real.

"Am I still tricking you?" Lillia asked. She was very amused by Tina's reaction.

Tina shook her head. She did not know what to even say to this. But before she could even say anything, a magic circle suddenly appeared under her feet, and Lillia stepped forward and poked her forehead. "You are no longer able to speak about this to anyone but us. Nor are you able to even think of my Blake as a love interest. Since you choose to walk this road with us, you will need to follow our orders without question, do you understand?"

Tina felt cold sweat building up on her forehead and her back as she looked into the orange eyes with pupils that were far from being human. While she did not like the fact that this was being forced upon her, she also knew this was her only path to survival. Clenching her fists and staring Lillia square in the eye, she said with determination: "I understand."

"Good," Lillia answered before returning to Blake's side. "Remember. We are now a single group. If you wish to be alive in the time to come, you will need to pay attention and follow what you are told to do. The contract I made does not bind your actions besides the ones I stated. You have a free will of your own. You can think of it as a kind of slave contract, but I promise you. As long as you are loyal to Blake and never betray him or I, I will do my best to protect you until the day the Age of Magic arrives."

Blake looked at Lillia with a questioning gaze. He never expected her to do something like this. Lillia looked back at him and smiled as she leaned in and whispered: "If dragons decided to capture her in the future, they could easily force her to talk. With this, if she does talk, she will die. Now that she knows I am a dragon, I had to make sure she would never speak about it to anyone."

"Mm… it's fine. I was just curious. Were there actually slaves besides the ones the Dragonic used during the war?" Blake asked.

"Mmm… There was even a Slaver Guild. It was quite profitable. Although there were many rules. Slaves had to be paid a certain wage and could not be abused in any way. Like you could not starve a slave, nor could you kill to beat them. You also had to supply them with all their living necessities and put a roof over their head." Lillia answered.

"From what you are saying, everything else was a go then. So I guess sex slaves were pretty popular back then." Blake did not hear anything that would not allow a person to use a slave for sex.

"How did you know?" Lillia asked. She was surprised Blake would know such a thing.

"Lillia, sex slaves have been a thing in human history as well as in many books and tales. And they have always been a high commodity item." Blake answered while rolling his eyes. Lillia lowered her head. She never realized Blake thought about such things.

'I guess he is a man after all….' Lillia thought as she blushed from ear to ear. She wondered just how long it would be before he could no longer hold himself back.

"Anyway, we will need to keep going. There is no telling if the dragons will take time to recheck this area. We will skip using the road and continue passing through backyards. But keep an eye out for people who might still be holding up in the houses. They have a tendency to shoot first and ask questions later." Bake warned before turning and walking towards the field.

Tina quickly checked her pistol to make sure it was loaded and turned the safety off, holding it in her hand. She didn't want to risk being caught off guard. Lillia nodded her head in approval. She was starting to not mind this human anymore. But this was just because Tina could no longer fall in love with Blake even if she wanted to.

The trio walked for a few hours when they finally came upon a more secluded area. Only then did Blake stop. "We will rest here for now. Now that I am thinking about it. Tina, you have been carrying that bag this entire time. Lillia, can you store it away for her, please? It would be troublesome if she dragged us down because she was carrying something so bulky."

While he sounded rude, he was saying it this way so that Lillia would not suddenly get jealous. But in truth, he could see that it was causing Tina quite a bit of trouble. She looked exhausted from carrying it. Since she was now their comrade, he would not let her suffer. If it was before when he had not been able to gain his magic and had Lillia by his side, he would only think about himself, but now he could at least look after a person or two.

"Ah! Sorry I was not even paying attention." Lillia quickly grabbed Tina's bag from her and tossed it into her space. Tina just stared at her in shock. She had never seen someone just make something so big disappear into space and at the same time do it so nonchalantly like it was an everyday thing.

"This…." Tina was having all these new experiences thrown at her and was having a hard time keeping up with it all.

"It's magic. When we reach the mountain and can create a sealed area, I was planning on having Lillia try to help you evolve as well. Although whether or not you will be able to live through it or not is another question." Blake lightly explained.

"What do you mean by evolving?" Tina asked. She kept feeling like she was a newborn chick who knew nothing. But this was only natural as no humans knew what was to come except for the young man standing in front of her.

"Ah right, I didn't tell you yet. In about six months' time, the Dragonic will open a rift to allow in the other races that were separated from this world billions of years ago. That is when mana will return to this world, and the Age of Magic will begin. During that time, you can think of it as humans returning to their roots and evolving back to their original state." Blake really did not know how else to explain it, even if it did sound confusing.

"Wait, other races? There are other races that will come to this world?" Tina thought dragons were enough, but now more races will also appear? Not to mention the fact that Blake talked about mana.

"I should be the one to explain," Lillia spoke up as he pulled out a tent from her space and tossed it on the ground. "The world that you live in has gone through a reset. Basically, a long time ago, a war broke out, and the Dragonic tried to take over the world by enslaving all the other races. It was my dragon race, the Ather, and humankind that stood up and fought. We won but at a great cost. I then reset the world to a new state of beginning to allow humans to start all over without mana and did my best to erase what I could of the old world. In other words, your human history is sort of a lie."

Tina took a deep breath, trying to take everything in. "So you are saying…."

"To put it simply, all myths come from some sort of truth. Dragons, dwarves, elves, all of these races that you would see in fantasy tales, once lived on this world and the reason they pop up in human tales of old is because they were actually seen in real life."