Goblin Slayer - Volume 11 - Chapter 6

Chapter 6 – Never Ever Cut A Deal With A Dragon

Dragon. 

What can be said about the creatures that bear that name that hasn’t already been said? The earth-shaking, sky-shattering roar. The shining red scales. The hot breath reeking with sulfurous miasma. The impossibly sharp claws, fangs, and tail. Creatures with enough treasure to fund an entire nation, intelligence that outstrips the greatest sages, and eternal life. 

And one of them, among the most powerful life-forms in the Four-Cornered World, was standing before the adventurers now. 

“GROOGB! GOORGGBBB!!” And on its back rode a gloating, cackling goblin. 

“…This is like some bad joke,” Goblin Slayer said, almost in spite of himself, and who could blame him? 

Then the aggrieved red dragon struck out with its long, coiled neck, catching the pillars around the party in the blow. The adventurers had jumped backward almost before the dragon moved, so they were unharmed, but rubble and gold coins flew around like projectiles. 

“GGOOGRGGBB!!” Seeing the adventurers raise their shields or crouch down to avoid the flying debris, the goblin rider gibbered irritably. He pulled the reins in every direction, and each time he did so, the dragon would twitch with evident anger. 

High Elf Archer, who had jumped to another pillar, sounded uncharacteristically bitter for a high elf as she exclaimed: “How does a dragon let itself get harnessed by a goblin?!” 

“Oh, I think that goblin only believes he is in control,” Lizard Priest said, far more at ease—perhaps even excited—than the situation would seem to warrant as he slapped the ground with his tail. “The dragon, in my estimation, is paying him no mind.” 

“You think Communicate could get us out of this, Scaly?!” 

“Ha-ha-ha, this poor beast has just woken up and has no interest in conversing with anyone. My humble prayer would hardly make a difference.” 

“But we can’t fight a dragon…!” The words escaped Priestess without her really meaning them to. Regardless, they weren’t an expression of defeatism. Merely a recognition of the reality of the situation. 

Dragon Slayer! Dragon Buster! Dragon Valor! These were names given only to the greatest heroes of legend. Many adventurers had challenged these monsters, and only a handful had emerged victorious. It was a strenuous test. The party had just finished an entire adventure in this desert land; in their exhausted state, it would be suicide to challenge this beast. Adventures always entailed some measure of danger, but there was no call to foolishness or recklessness. 

“Half-hearted attacks aren’t going to get us anywhere,” Goblin Slayer said, quickly appraising the situation in the hopes of seizing the initiative. “I believe a quick strike is our only option, but what do you think?” 

“I very much agree,” Lizard Priest replied immediately. “Battle has been rather constant for us. We are much spent.” 

“And we haven’t got many resources left—magically, I mean. I think we do this in the first shot, or not at all…though I don’t like it.” Dwarf Shaman was frowning; he had a catalyst from his bag in his hand and was summoning the last of his strength. “Stone Blast won’t even scratch it.” 

“In that case…” 

Lightning. Priestess said the word without speaking it. Female Merchant’s face became a mask of anxiety and terror and determination, but she nodded. “I’ll…I’ll give it my best shot!” 

They didn’t have long for this little strategy session with the enemy right in front of them, and now the adventurers went decisively into action. 

“Y-yaaaahhh!” Female Merchant cried. To repeat, adventuring is always dangerous, but simple foolishness or recklessness is no adventure. Yet, when Female Merchant summoned all her courage and launched herself forward, none could deny her valor. How many would have had the nerve to do as she did when confronted with a dragon? 

“I’ll cover you!” High Elf Archer shouted and went hopping through the ruins, firing a series of arrows to draw the enemy’s attention. Needless to say, although containment may have been her only goal, her aim was unerring. She hit the dragon in the eye and landed a shot on the goblin rider. But the armor class of those scales was too high. 

At the same time, Female Merchant interlaced her fingers, focusing on an image of lightning. She bit her lip, concentrating as hard as she could on her spell, staring down the dragon even though she was pale with fear. 

Or was she staring at the goblin on the dragon’s back? 

“Tonitrus…oriens…iacta! Rise and fall, thunder!” She formed the sigil of the spell and thrust her hands forward, and a white bolt of electricity came howling forth. 

There was an instant between when the crackling snake left her fingers and when it reached the dragon, and Goblin Slayer didn’t miss it. 

“Hraaah…!” He spun the sword in his hand into a reverse grip, then took one step, two steps, three, and flung it as hard as he could. All but invisible against the great white flash, the weapon hurtled through the air toward the goblin. 

But then the lightning ricocheted away. Perhaps the magical power in the dragon’s scales, or in its eyes, was simply too much. The creature gave a lazy flap of its wings, as if swatting away a fly, and Goblin Slayer’s sword was smacked down and broken. “Wha…?!” 

“Eek?!” 

And then the red dragon roared. 

The rumble of it wiped out the crack of thunder from a moment earlier, shaking the air around them. If one were to hack away at a stringed instrument while wearing thick leather gloves, perhaps one could catch the faintest echo of this sound. 

The pressure of the sound wave easily cost Female Merchant her balance, and she went tumbling to the ground. 

“Hrm…!” Goblin Slayer, for his part, was already moving. Perhaps it was the grit of a Silver-ranked adventurer at work. Or maybe he was just putting into practice his master’s old advice: “Anyway, keep moving!” 

Whichever it was, he was in time. He swept Female Merchant up while she was still squeaking and shaking and dove into the shadows of a pile of loot. 

“Eep?!” Female Merchant exclaimed, but he ignored her, putting her in front of him and shielding her from the rush of wind with his back. There was a whirlwind as the dragon took in a breath so deep it seemed it might use all the air around, its throat and chest expanding dramatically. 

“…?!” Even Priestess could tell what this meant. She clutched her sounding staff, almost stumbling forward as she brought the words of her prayer to mind. But… 

I’m not going to make it…! 

This was the reality: One small human girl was going to find it very difficult to seize the initiative. 

The dragon’s jaws opened. She could even see the blinding light hovering behind its fangs. The light that would mean death itself if she couldn’t avoid it. Search as one might, one would find nothing in any of the four corners of the world that could stop it. It would scorch a hero’s armor, blacken the white walls of a castle—indeed, if it didn’t simply melt them away. 

Sweat beaded on Priestess’s forehead. Her hands shook. Even here in front of a dragon, she tried to weave together the words of a prayer… 

“O Dilophosaur, though it be false, grant to my breath the miasma that proceeds from your organs!” 

Before she could get the words out, though, a massive form leaped in front of her with animal agility. Lizard Priest sucked in the biggest breath of air he could, then released it with all his strength. “Kaaaaaahhh!” 

The dragon’s breath collided with Lizard Priest’s own burning exhalation. 

The blinding, searing cloud expanded through the ruins faster than the Wind of the Red Death. Lizard Priest met it head on, but even he was at a disadvantage here. He was pushed slowly, ever so slowly, backward, scales melting and falling away with the poison. “Nrrrgh…!” 

“No, stop…!” This time, Priestess was not too late. She rushed toward the lacerating heat, placed a hand on Lizard Priest’s back, ignoring the way it burned the flesh of her palm, and prayed. “O Earth Mother, abounding in mercy, lay your revered hand upon this child’s wounds!” 

Let the blessings of the Earth Mother be upon him! 

Using Protection might well have cost her her life. She was thinking in part of the dancing girl’s performance. But what power was more fitting than that of the Earth Mother to resist a dragon’s poison befouling the land? In response to this faithful disciple’s prayer, a divine miracle protected and healed the lizardman’s huge body. The skin that looked like it had been about to melt off the bone regained its power immediately, and Lizard Priest steadied himself on the ground. 

“Ha-ha! Compared with the Fusion Blast of my forebears, this is nothing!” 

When the smoke from the dragon’s breath cleared, Lizard Priest was still standing proud, ready for more. The girl who had fought so hard to save his life, and all his other companions, were at his back. Defeat—death that does not bring forth life—was the shame of a lizardman. Nor was it proper to use weapons and equipment against such a powerful enemy as this. Lizard Priest flourished his claws and fangs and tail as he prepared to face the dragon, howling out: “O proud and strange brontosaurus, grant me the strength of ten thousand!” 

Then he flew at the enemy with a shriek, his limbs lashing out, colliding with the claws of the red dragon. 

But even this could be only for so long. His forefathers’ strength would not last forever. The creature in front of them might have been young, but it was still a dragon. Even a lizardman could not resist it. 

Priestess, determined not to waste the time that he bought, tried to breathe evenly as she worked her way backward. Maybe that last miracle had taken a lot out of her, or maybe it had something to do with the dragon’s breath, but her vision seemed dim; everything around looked so dark. She couldn’t quite seem to get breath into her lungs. Her arms and legs felt numb, and she stumbled the last few steps. 

“GOOROOGGBBB!!” The way the goblin cackled even though he probably hardly understood what was going on irritated her immensely. Clutching her staff, her eyes brimming with tears, Priestess still managed to fix the monster with a glare. She wasn’t weeping from fear. It was simply the way her body responded as she battled the pain. 

How could it be from fear? I’m not afraid. 

“You all right?!” High Elf Archer shouted to Priestess, jumping down from one of the pillars and running over to Goblin Slayer and Female Merchant. She kept shooting as she went to buy them time to get on their feet and to help back up Lizard Priest. But the bud-tipped bolts bounced off the dragon’s scales, and the rare shot that did stick surely did the monster no harm at all. She could try to aim at the goblin instead, but each time the dragon flapped its mighty wings, her arrows went spiraling away. The goblin was convinced it was his tugging on the reins that was causing this and was looking quite pleased with himself… 

High Elf Archer ground her perfect teeth and turned to Dwarf Shaman. “Don’t you have some kind of dwarf magic that can do something about this thing?!” 

“Stupor, Sleep… It’s too big for anything I’ve got!” Dwarf Shaman replied, a dispiritingly rational answer. He had one hand in his bag of catalysts, but he didn’t unleash Stone Blast, just coldly surveyed the scene of battle. He understood that if Lightning couldn’t stop this thing, his own spells weren’t likely to break through its defenses. 

How he chose to use his few remaining spells could determine the party’s destiny. One who simply intoned whatever came to mind without considering the consequences would not survive very long. 

“Might get the goblin to fall asleep, but when the dragon moves, he’ll wake up again. Not going to knock them both out, I’m afraid.” 

“Can you do just the dragon, then?!” 

“Then the goblin would give the dragon a whack and wake it up!” 

What to do, then? 

Goblin Slayer groaned from the burning on his back but slowly rose up. The Dragon might have just woken up, but apparently it wasn’t upset enough to incinerate its own hoard; Goblin Slayer didn’t appear to have any injuries to his limbs. Pain meant one was alive, that one could move. There was no problem. 

“Are you all right?” 

“I-I’m sorry…,” Female Merchant said in a small, trembling voice. She was still curling into herself, her body tense. Her short-cut hair, her excellent clothing, and the rapier at her hip all showed no sign of scorching. His master had told him that having something between it and an explosion or fire did a lot for the human body, and it seemed he had been right. Privately thanking his master from the bottom of his heart, Goblin Slayer took Female Merchant’s arm and pulled her to her feet. 

They were fighting a dragon, and they still hadn’t suffered any losses. He thought that was a pretty good job for someone as witless as he was. Not, of course, that he had done it all on his own. 

“But there is no room for error…” He shook his helmeted head, forcing himself to focus, and then he took stock of the situation. Lizard Priest had the red dragon in check, but the next round of its breath would likely overwhelm him. Goblin Slayer suspected the only reason any of them were still alive was because the dragon was still shaking off sleep. 

The dragon is not protecting that goblin, he concluded. No dragon could be controlled by the likes of a goblin. At least not so long as there were no goblins with dragon blood in their veins, but such a ridiculous thing could not exist. That left one explanation. It’s trying to knock the goblin off. 

Yes, that was it. The dragon had awoken, bad mood and all, when a goblin had jumped on its back. But that didn’t mean they could leave well enough alone or try to simply run away. Once the dragon got its wits about it, it would smash the goblin, kill all the adventurers, and give one of its great roars. And the next meal it would find would be the women who had been saved from the goblin breeding ground. 

In other words, as ever, goblins are at the root of all my problems. 

“If I take out the goblin, do you think you can get the dragon back to sleep?” 

“I can at least give it a try!” Dwarf Shaman pounded himself on the chest. 

“Good enough.” 

Goblin Slayer nodded. Their collective stamina was much reduced. They had few spells left. He had lost his weapon. He had comrades. Former captives were behind him. His enemy was a goblin. The situation was grim. 

But what about it? 

He almost thought he could hear the sound of dice rolling in the heavens. He groaned softly. He didn’t care about them. 

Now it’s only a matter of do or do not. 

He pulled a stamina potion from the item pouch at his hip, popped the stopper and poured it through his visor in one gulp. It was better than no relief at all. He tossed the bottle aside, then took his item pouch clear off his belt. 

“You know how to use this, right?” 

“Huh? Oh…!” 

He tossed the pouch to Priestess, who scrambled in surprise but managed to catch it. 

His equipment: He was entrusting it to her. She found that gave her strength. 

“…Yes, sir!” 

“Take care of it, then.” 

Priestess nodded energetically; Goblin Slayer simply placed a rough, gloved hand firmly on Female Merchant’s shoulder. She stiffened. The young woman looked upset—was it from anxiety? Fear, maybe? Her eyes appeared to be wavering, but Goblin Slayer looked right into them from within his helmet. 

“I’m going to kill all the goblins. That hasn’t changed.” 

Female Merchant swallowed. She clenched her fist to still the trembling of her hands. Then she nodded. “Right. I understand.” 

“Good.” 

All was well, then. What he had to do next was clear. He would kill the goblin. All he had to do was focus on that. Goblin Slayer looked at Lizard Priest fighting the dragon and then at the rest of his party. “I’m going to do it now. Back me up.” 

“Against a dragon! All right, this just got interesting!” 

Goblin Slayer and High Elf Archer started moving at almost the same instant, kicking up gold coins from the ground as they went. But the high elf quickly overtook the human, jumping from one pillar to the next, finding her aim. 

She took three arrows from her quiver. Then she loosed them in a literal rain. They flew faster than the speed of sound, rocketing toward the dragon’s eye, its throat, and the goblin on its back. But none of them could penetrate the dragon’s defenses. For a red dragon, the puny arrows and the obnoxious goblin were both only as annoying as flies. The creature shifted irritably, and the arrows bounced off it scales with a dry clack-clack-clack. 

What I wouldn’t give for a dwarf-forged wind lance and some black arrows right now…! High Elf Archer thought, a very frustrating thing for an elf to have to think. She compensated by shouting, “What are you doing down there, dwarf?!” 

“Pipe down, I’ve got my own way of handling things!” Dwarf Shaman replied with rather familiar conversation. But sweat was beading on his forehead, and his concentration was worn down to the nub. 

He was going to try to cast a spell on a dragon. It was an all-or-nothing gamble. If he didn’t use everything he had at this moment, when would he? They had nothing to spare. Well, the adventurers didn’t. The same couldn’t be said of the dragon. 

Whoosh. Sand particles jumped up from the ground as the air went rushing by, and High Elf Archer’s ears flicked. 

“Hnrr…rrrgh…ghhh!” The Partial Dragon miracle was still in effect, but blood was pouring from Lizard Priest’s body. Even so, he laughed aloud as if he was truly enjoying this, the crazy thing; he faced down his adversary, but it couldn’t last long. The red dragon opened its jaws wide, sucking air into its lungs once again. 

Dragon breath! 

If they got hit with another one of those monstrous exhalations, neither Lizard Priest nor any of them would walk away. The flesh would rot off their bones in the heat and poison, and they would die where they stood. In this, the high elf—the descendant of fae who had lived for virtually eternity—was no different from any of them. She felt the fear of encroaching death just as they did. Yet, she didn’t run but nocked another arrow into her bow and pulled back the string. She had to aim. Take aim at the— 

“The jaws!” Lizard Priest howled. “We bite with great force, but the muscles that keep our jaws open are much weaker!” 

“That’s it! Here…goes…nothing!” High Elf Archer looked up at the heavens, then loosed the arrow with all the strength she had. 

The instant the arrow was away, she started running, rushing through the wind, toward the blinding light in the dragon’s jaws—she was heading just underneath it. Even as she slid and twisted, the next arrow was already in her hand. “Take this!” she shouted, firing the bolt straight upward. Just as she had planned, it lodged in the dragon’s lower jaw. 

Suddenly, the arrowhead was not a bud but a flower and then a seed. At the exact same instant, the arrow she had fired from above came rushing down like shooting stars, slamming into the dragon’s upper jaw. 

The jaws met with a slam, and an explosion began inside the creature’s mouth. 

“GOORGBB?!” the goblin on the dragon’s back screeched as it was licked by the flames coming out of the creature’s mouth. The goblin gave a hard pull on the reins. 

As for the dragon, it could by no means be killed by its own flames; even the poisons in its breath would not be fatal. But the goblin on the dragon’s back, so confident that no one could touch him? He was a different matter. 

“GOROGBB?! GOOROOGBB?!?!” 

Goblin Slayer saw it all as he ran straight toward the monster. He stayed low, dodging the flying debris and treasure that the flailing dragon kicked up. He suddenly found himself remembering the story of a legendary king that his sister had once told him. 

His helmet was suffocating, his shield too heavy—wasn’t that it? 

That king had challenged, not a dragon, but a transformed god. Goblin Slayer wished he had even one ten-thousandth of that courage. 

He grasped his shield and, without hesitation, threw it aside. What he needed was speed and mobility. He would not take off his helmet, though. However much it might restrict his vision, he couldn’t afford to risk being hit in the eyes at a moment like this. 

He had only one goal. To kill the goblin. And how could he do that? In his proverbial pocket, he had everything he needed. 

Goblin Slayer grabbed a sword out of the pile of loot, an enchanted blade whose name he didn’t know. Answering the warrior who had taken it up after all its many years of sleep, the blade glowed a golden color. 

“Now…!” 

The girls sprang into action. They had been watching the battle, biding their time, and if they didn’t move with utmost speed, they certainly acted with precision. 

Female Merchant leaped forward in front of the dragon, whipping her hands into a sigil. Long, long ago, great braves had used this spell to defeat evil sorcerers and send demons back to the hell from whence they came. It had to work on a dragon, she told herself, focusing on her enemy through a haze of fear and vision blurred by tears. 

“Together now!” she called out as Priestess arrived beside her. The bag was in her hands. The gear she had received from the master she respected so much. She knew what she had to get out of it. The same thing that had once saved their own lives. 

“Right!” Priestess nodded firmly to her. Then they counted, one, two…! 

“Tonitrus! Oriens! Iacta!” 

“Yaaaaahhh!!” 

As purple electricity shot from Female Merchant’s hands, Priestess flung the bottle. The lightning went everywhere. The bottle crashed against the dragon’s face and shattered open to release a dark, viscous liquid. The dragon roared. No sooner had it landed than it ignited into flame. The stuff went by many names: Medea’s Oil, petroleum, Iranistan’s fire. In short… 

“Burning water!” 

Even a great red dragon couldn’t abide getting fire in its eyes and being struck directly by lightning. With a roar like the crazed strumming of a stringed instrument, it flailed its massive neck. It was, of course, paying no attention to whatever might be on its back. 

Goblin Slayer didn’t miss his chance. “Hrrrah!” 

He had practiced this. His footing was sure. His aim was true. He could feel the weight of the sword in his hand. Now all he had to do was throw. 

The adventurer called Goblin Slayer took the nameless, enchanted blade and flung it as hard as he could. We cannot know who forged this weapon, but they would surely have been pleased to hear of its fate. After wasting away in a dragon’s treasure hoard for so long, it would finally know battle again, casting aside any lingering dissatisfaction with its existence. 

Whether it be wielded against a red dragon or a mere goblin, to faithfully serve its master is a weapon’s pride. 

There was a golden flash like daybreak, as if the sun were rising here and now. The enchanted blade became a single ray of light, piercing the goblin’s neck like a hungering fang, tearing through his throat. Even at the very last instant, the goblin rider did not realize he was dead. 

His decapitated head still jabbered as it tumbled down off the blade, which had lodged itself in one of the stone pillars. 

“An awfully grand death for a goblin,” Goblin Slayer spat as the rest of the rider’s corpse slid off the dragon’s back. What happened next was out of Goblin Slayer’s hands. But he had faith. 

“Sandman, Sandman, rasp of breath, kin to th’ endless sleep of death. A song we offer, so take your sand and on our dreams now place your hand.” 

He was confident that the most capable spell caster he knew would not slip up at a moment like this. 

When Dwarf Shaman tore up a piece of paper and scattered it about, the sand around them began to swirl up once more. It formed a gigantic corkscrew, and amazingly, immediately swallowed up the red dragon. The creature’s massive body listed to one side. 

Claws had not scratched it, arrows had not pierced it, lightning had not hurt it, fire had hardly burned it. But now, it wobbled like a great tree in a storm—and then fell over, almost as if it were being sucked back down into the hole from which it had emerged. There was a crash from deep underground, a literal earthquake, as if to prove it was gone. 

The red dragon was defeated. The adventurers had been pushed to the limits of their endurance and had put the creature to its slumber at last. 

§ 

“……” 

They stood all but doubled over, their breath coming hard. They were still trying to take in the situation. They couldn’t see the dragon anymore, and they heard the gentle rumble of its snoring, but somehow it still didn’t quite seem real. 

Even as they acknowledged the fact of their achievement, they still felt no triumph or joy. All of them were smeared with soot and dark smoke. The stench of sulfur and miasma clung to them, and their heads hurt. Their skin was preternaturally dry from exposure to the great heat, and their eyes and throats burned. Some of them wanted nothing more than to jump into a river right about now. Others would have given anything for a drink of wine. 

As for Goblin Slayer, he just wanted to go home. Go home and eat some stew and sleep. 

Or perhaps he was dreaming now. He could hardly believe such a thing had actually happened to him. It was like the silly imagining of some child. 

“Ah…” 

Then it came to him. He had felt lost before this battle, a feeling that vanished entirely during the fight. He picked up a single red scale that had been torn off during the battle, but when he moved to put it by his hip, he was reminded that he didn’t have his pouch. 

“…Here you go.” Priestess jogged up to him and handed him the pouch with an exhausted smile. 

“Thank you,” Goblin Slayer said and took it, then tucked the scale carefully inside. 

“What are you going to do with that?” 

“A gift,” he said. 

He had no interest in taking any of the dragon’s treasure. It was said that if you took even a single gold coin from a dragon’s hoard, it would chase you to the grave to get it back. There was even a story of a land where the vassals of a certain councilor had stolen a cup and been burned up by a dragon, which the aged king had then destroyed all by himself. 

What was more, though—Goblin Slayer had no desire to obtain treasure. He was already satisfied. He knew from experience that giving her money only seemed to make her angry. 

“She had one particular request—but as for anything more, I couldn’t decide what to do.” 

That was all it took. Those words cut the tension among the party, and suddenly everyone relaxed. The first to let out a sharp breath and toss herself backward into the sand was High Elf Archer. “Are we alive? We are alive, aren’t we? I kinda can’t believe it.” 

“Yes, we are alive. ‘By the skin of our teeth,’ I believe the expression is.” Lizard Priest sounded downright easygoing—and the nod he gave was truly satisfied. The strength of his forefathers had already fled his body, and blood seemed to be pouring out of him. But he looked almost pleased about this, making a strange hands-together gesture of thanks to his forebears. “I did not imagine that one so small and weak as myself might be blessed with the chance to confront a dragon!” Still grinning, he began to intone prayers of healing. 

High Elf Archer remarked that “Oh yeah, he’d had one miracle left, hadn’t he?” 

“…You think this makes us dragon slayers?” she asked after a moment. 

“More like dragon sleepers,” Dwarf Shaman said, sitting down heavily. “Not quite as, uh, cool.” He sounded distinctly sour about it. “As if we were ever going to beat a dragon fighting like that,” he spat out. He turned his flask upside down over his mouth, licking out the last drops of wine. “Not to mention when we get home, I’ll have to make up a song about this adventure. Gods, it makes my head hurt…” 

He continued to complain: This was why he hated relying on the Sandman. 

“Want some help?” High Elf Archer offered, but he snorted, “Don’t need it.” 

In the blink of an eye, they had gone from this simple disagreement to a full-fledged, classic argument. Priestess, finding the familiar sound oddly sleep-inducing, let out a little yawn. 

“I’m…tired,” said Female Merchant, sitting down as if her legs had failed her. She probably didn’t have the strength to get up. Exhaustion had never seemed a better descriptor of what they were feeling. Priestess, feeling much sympathy with Female Merchant, sat down beside her. Her whole body felt heavy; she let out another yawn. “Me too.” 

“Let’s stay at least a day in town,” Female Merchant said, after murmuring to herself. “Yes, that’s a good idea. We can take a bath. I will take a bath.” 

Priestess chuckled and nodded at her. As they sat there side by side, their heads bumped into each other. They couldn’t even sit up straight anymore. They leaned against each other for support, and Female Merchant’s warmth made Priestess even sleepier. 

Maybe the Sandman is…still here… 

A third yawn accompanied the thought. As she rubbed her eyes, she heard Lizard Priest laughing. “After goblins, a dragon. Whoever the enemy commander may have been, they chose a poor way of doing things.” 

“…?” Priestess, not understanding, opened her mouth in an effort to ask what he meant. 

“It’s a warning from the Age of the Gods.” The answer came from Goblin Slayer, busy emptying the contents of a canteen into his visor. “My master mentioned it to me once.” 

It is said, one must not cast the good “pawns” after the bad. 

“It means that when you’ve been defeated, you shouldn’t be so set on using up your trump card.” 

That made sense. Priestess nodded. She didn’t understand it completely, but it made a certain kind of sense. Her thinking didn’t quite seem steady; thoughts with no context bubbled up and then faded away. 

Someday, a dragon. 

She remembered the red-haired wizard saying something like that. Not the elf. Someone more familiar—just the once. 

The boy with a sword. The girl with black hair. They hadn’t all had time to get to know one another, yet still the words had been said. They had been a sort of promise, a sort of wish, a sort of hope. 

“Warnings? I know one, too.” 

Someday. Someday, certainly. But for now… 

“Never make a deal with a dragon.” 

For now, it was a bit too soon for dragon slaying.