Chapter 30: Theft
“Is that… a Reaper Fragment?” The Little White Dragon reacted in a heartbeat, like a mirror catching lightning. Only two beings still wore her face: Star Canvas, and the three Reaper Fragments split from the Grim Reaper, the Nameless One.
Star Canvas must still be held aloft in the heavens, like a banner pinned to the sky. Lilith didn’t think those gods would lower her yet. Besides, Star Canvas was a true dragon-maiden, nothing like this half-naked figure soaking in a furnace like a sacrificial blade.
Litt should still be at Nidhogg’s side, a shadow by a world-eating root, so that one’s out.
That left the Bosaklie-side fragment. This thing was still inside the furnace, like ore yet unclaimed. Did the Golden Dragon fail to seize Bosaklie’s Reaper Fragment?
“Damn.” As the Little White Dragon weighed the odds, the shattered-walled furnace bled molten iron like a wounded river. A shrill alarm knifed the air, and sound-sensitive Lilith clapped her ears, squatting to cradle her head, pain thudding like a drum.
The Golden Dragon flinched too, a stag of bones and gold-blood jarred mid-flight. But bone and blood weathered shock like stone; Lilith did not.
While the Little White Dragon still rolled on the floor like a tossed pearl, two-thirds of the Golden Dragon had already lunged for the blazing furnace. The giant thrust bone talons lacquered in golden blood, trying to yank the Reaper Fragment straight from the crucible.
The fragment in the furnace kept its eyes shut, like a sleeper carved from night. Yet as the bone-dragon neared, it reacted on instinct. Molten iron moved like a limb of the Reaper Fragment. The Golden Dragon’s claw never touched its skin; the liquid heat slapped it back like a tidal lash. Even the gold-blood sheath on the dragon’s bones paled, as if sun beaten by storm.
“Hah. Not that easy.” The dragon beat back, away from the furnace still geysering heat like a volcano. The Little White Dragon realized the floor had turned into a hot river, so she fluttered her small wings and hung in the air like a white moth.
Suspicion chilled her gut. Lilith stared into the Golden Dragon’s hollow eyes, weighing what this thing really wanted.
“You can’t control the Reaper Fragment. You can’t even get close.” The Little White Dragon pinched her chin, cool as moonlight. “So you didn’t strike at it. After waking, you came straight for me instead.”
“Part one, you think you can swallow me, a divine fragment, and ditch the Grim Reaper, the Nameless One. Part two, you guess I might have a way to touch the Reaper Fragment.” The Little White Dragon’s analysis cut clean like frost; she couldn’t help a soft laugh, light as wind through bamboo.
“You have no clear sense of your own weight.” Lilith smiled at the Golden Dragon, a smile like a blade in silk. “If your blood, bone, and soul gathered, if that ancient Lord of Gold returned, maybe you’d matter. But a puddle of blood and a handful of bones—who gave you the nerve to covet a god’s fragment?”
“Even the boldest criminals wouldn’t indulge a fantasy this drunk on madness.” Lilith clicked her tongue, a small spark of frost in sound. The little dragon condensed a block of ice midair, and the White Dragon’s lotus steps touched down, feather-light on the crystal. “Forget the Reaper Fragment. Your plan won’t land. I’m sending you off right now.”
The Little White Dragon reset her stance, a blade-dancer under winter stars. The Primordial Ark was light. Its scissor-like build was tricky to handle, like holding a moonlit trap. Thankfully, it was so light that even Lilith could scoop it one-handed, like lifting a reed.
She’d never wielded scissors as a weapon, yet she managed a grip that looked almost right, like a novice painting a dragon’s eye.
Truth is, Lilith wasn’t much of a swordswoman. As a human, she learned noble fencing—florid flowers without roots, pretty but useless in mud. Their only use had been bedroom staging, warm-up dances for the Black Dragon.
As the White Holy Maiden and Hero, she fought inhuman monsters day after day, storm against stone. Against that lot, polished swordplay faded in worth. She lived on survival instinct and battle sense, not forms, and she didn’t stack much clean experience.
So with the Primordial Ark in hand, she couldn’t even run a full set. She knew only two moves: Grand Rend, and Two-Cut. The rest were unopened buds; the little dragon had no skill points to spend—for now.
Basic slashes weren’t worth counting. The Primordial Ark was sharp enough to cleave gold-bone like warm butter. But the Golden Dragon was colossal; even in full dragon-shape, the Little White Dragon looked like a child before a mountain. Betting it all on one blade felt unreal.
So Lilith banked everything on a single Grand Rend from the Primordial Ark, a lightning cut to end it clean and dodge needless risk.
Nerves tightened, then sparkled. Standing on the floating ice slab, her not-so-bright head spun fast, and a brilliant plan finally clicked like frost catching sunlight.
“Let’s do it.” The Little White Dragon slapped her head, then launched a razor ice lance at the Golden Dragon’s skull, like winter venom.
“Foolish!” The Golden Dragon didn’t dodge. Its gold blood skinned together into a new head, dangling beside the old like a mask. The mouth gaped and spat a golden orb, and it smashed into her ice lance like sun colliding with hail.
Lilith’s strike melted in a heartbeat. Upon that heat, the ice lance blew into clouds of scalding steam, a white storm.
White steam. Molten iron. A dissolving spear. The room fogged in an instant, smoke coiling like a dozen hands tossing endless incense.
The Golden Dragon realized what Lilith was doing. A true dragon wouldn’t fear this smoke; dragon-sight wipes such veils away at birth. But this Golden Dragon had no way—its shape was incomplete, its wounds deep, its dragon-sight gone. In the haze it was blind, while the foe saw, like night hunting day. At any second, Lilith could burst from fog and land a ruthless cut.
The Golden Dragon held a taut, trembling caution for several heartbeats. The bone-dragon tucked its wings and hung in the air like a hooked lantern, listening for the tiny chiming stir where ice congealed.
“Here!” The dragon caught the sound of frost knitting. It whipped its head and lunged a claw toward that whisper, like a hawk striking a ripple.
But it met no Lilith smashed to paste. Only a block of ice shattered to glittering shards, a decoy like winter glass.
“Not good!” The Golden Dragon realized it’d been played, a stag chasing phantom snow. As it reacted, Lilith blinked into being on the other side, Primordial Ark clenched tight. She swept the shear for its neck, like a guillotine of dusk.
The Little White Dragon’s strike was inescapable. The Golden Dragon shut its eyes, steeling itself like a cliff against a wave. It could only take this one head-on.
