Chapter 1: Dad, your apprentice is a bad boy ( Part 1 )
Twenty Days Later, the Border of the Human and Dragon Territory, a Mountain Cave.
Rebecca and Tiger were seated on opposite sides of a wooden table.
In front of them were piles of handgun parts.
The two stared at each other briefly before Rebecca softly said, “Begin.”
At the sound of her voice, they both lowered their heads and began assembling the parts in front of them.
Barrel, slide, return mechanism… Various intricate parts were swiftly pieced together in Rebecca’s hands.
In just ten seconds, Rebecca had fully assembled her handgun.
She raised it, aiming the muzzle directly at Tiger’s forehead.
On the other hand, Tiger had only assembled about half of his gun.
“You lost again, old man,” Rebecca said teasingly.
“One more time!”
Rebecca set down her gun, propping her chin up with both hands and smiling at the stubborn old man across from her. “Again? Old man, this is the thirty-fourth time you’ve lost to me. No matter how often you try, the result will be the same.”
The crazy girl has a point, Tiger thought to himself.
Tiger sighed, tossing the half-assembled gun onto the table. He leaned back slightly, resting against the chair, closing his eyes, and massaging his brow.
Rebecca picked up the unfinished gun, slowly continuing to assemble it. She commented, “Why isn’t the Silver Dragon King here yet? It’s already past the time we agreed to meet.”
She and the old man had arrived that morning, and now it was nearing noon.
At the speed of the Silver Dragon tribe, they should have arrived long ago.
Tiger shook his head. “Not sure, maybe something held him up.”
Rebecca’s thoughts wandered, and she suddenly recalled, “By the way, didn’t the Empire try to wipe out the Silver Dragon Tribe a while back, to eliminate them But in the end… they failed?”
“Yes, I don’t know how the Silver Dragon King managed to repel the Empire and the combined forces of other Dragon tribes.”
“Could it have been outside help?”
“The only reliable ally the Silver Dragons have is Rosvitha’s sister, the Red Dragon Queen Isha, but Isha’s been caught up in her war lately. She probably doesn’t have time to help others.”
Rebecca pouted, resting her hands behind her head. She raised her legs and propped them on the edge of the wooden table, leaning back in her chair, the front legs of the chair lifting off the ground. But she maintained perfect balance with ease.
“If they wanted to eliminate the Silver Dragons, they wouldn’t give up so easily, would they? I still think the Silver Dragon King must have found some kind of outside help,” Rebecca speculated.
“Let’s hope so,” Tiger said, his expression grim, staring down at the table. His voice lowered, “If there is outside help, I just wonder if they can be powerful enough to bring Leon back.”
Rebecca quietly observed her father. She knew how important the captain was to the old man.
Though Leon was adopted, the old man had treated him like his own flesh and blood all these years.
Aunt Charlotte had been even more affectionate toward Leon.
After Leon disappeared, if she and Martin hadn’t stopped the old man, he would have stormed the Royal Guard with a blade in hand.
Their group of “old, weak, sickly, and crippled” had already lost one powerful member. If anything else went wrong, they might as well disband on the spot.
As for Leon’s departure, Rebecca felt deeply dejected.
Years ago, in the Silver Dragon War, she had abandoned Leon, fleeing back to the Empire with the Dragon Slayer Army in disgrace.
But at that time, she had still harbored a glimmer of hope. She believed that the captain, such a resourceful and capable man, would never die so easily.
And sure enough, three years later, Leon had reappeared, full of life.
But this time, Leon had vanished into a space rift.
There was no body, no trace of him alive or dead.
No matter how optimistic or confident Rebecca was in Leon’s survival, she couldn’t convince herself that the captain was still alive.
Now, all they could do was avenge him, expose the Emperor’s and the Dragon Tribes’ conspiracy, and make it public.
Rebecca exhaled, letting go of her thoughts.
She glanced at the old man again, still looking grumpy.
Thinking for a moment, she said, “Old man, take out your granddaughter’s, photo, and let’s have a look.”
After Leon disappeared, the photos of the little dragon girls became the old man’s only source of comfort.
Whenever he was in a bad mood, looking at them always worked wonders.
Sure enough, Tiger nodded, pulling a few photos from his chest pocket.
Two of them: one was an old, yellowing family photo, and the other was a solo picture of a little pink-haired girl.
The remaining photos had been brought by Rosvitha during their last meeting after Leon’s disappearance.
Rebecca stood up, walking over to Tiger’s side, gazing at the girls in the pictures.
Despite the constant warfare of the Silver Dragon tribe, the girls’ clean faces and the tidy rooms in the photos showed that Rosvitha had protected them well.
“Wow, the little half-human, half-dragon babies grow up so fast! They’re so much bigger compared to when they were in the family photo,” Rebecca said.
“Mm…”
Tiger looked at his granddaughters in the photos, and a smile finally appeared on his weathered face.
Seeing the old man’s mood lighten, Rebecca playfully added,
“If I get the chance, I want to be their godmother.”
Tiger blinked and smiled, “You’re in your twenties and already thinking about becoming a mom?”
“Being a godmother isn’t the same as wanting to be a mom!”
Rebecca picked up a photo of Muen and Aurora hugging each other’s little tails and said, “I could skip the whole marriage and pregnancy part and just get to have such adorable daughters. What’s not to love?”
Tiger chuckled, “That depends on whether the Silver Dragon King agrees to you being their godmother.”
Rebecca opened her mouth, about to say something.
But just then, a familiar voice echoed from the cave entrance.
“No need to ask her. I agree.”
Both Tiger and Rebecca froze for a second at the sound.
Slowly recovering, they turned toward the cave entrance.
There stood two figures.
One, of course, was the Silver Dragon King.
The other was…
“Captain! Captain!”
In a brief moment of stunned silence, Rebecca’s eyes welled up, and she ran toward Leon, calling out.
Seeing this scene, Leon’s heart skipped a beat.
Oh no, the crazy girl’s going to give me a reunion hug.
In the future, she had done the same thing, and Leon had responded with a big hug back.
But that was when his wife wasn’t around.
