95 Last Days on Telia

It took three days to harvest the 20 hectares of Afeaso, all of the blooms harvested were transported to Oldstrand for sale. President Andillevé had already arranged for buyers from across Telia, and Olstrand was packed full with buyers representing all four kingdoms, every inn and hotel in Oldstrand was fully booked. With the number of customers waiting for the herbs, the whole harvest of Afeaso was quickly snapped up.

Many of the buyers were thrilled with the high quality of herbs that they had bought, and when they found out that Oldstrand would have Sapphire Bloom, Golden Mallow, Wolf Seed, Monk's Bloom and Cemaley available within two months time, made arrangements to return.

Elder Ryunzo had already spoken to Master Rainer about Tardide starting their own alchemy workshop to create basic potions, there was a lot more profit to be made selling potions rather than herbs, but this would take a few more years to materialize as Tardide young mages still needed to grow and learn so, for now, all their herbs would be sold to Oldstrand.

After the Merchants' Guild took their cut, the village of Tardide earned just over 10 million gold coins. Elder Ryunzo gave each of the original 300 families of the Tardide 10 thousand gold coins, as a once off payment. This was more gold than most families made in their lifetimes.

And to the 1,000 new villagers who had joined Tardide he paid them a thousand pieces of gold each.

Up until now the villagers hadn't been paid any wages for their work, and Elder Ryunzo wanted to reward everyone for their hard work, this gold would also help each person in Tardide set up their new lives, buying new items for their homes and giving them start-up capital to opening their own businesses in Tardide if they wanted.

And now that the village coffers were overflowing with gold, the villagers that worked for the village were to be paid a weekly wage that would ensure that everyone benefited from the wealth generated. The balance of the gold would be used to expand the village and pay for services such as healers, teachers, farmers, and city workers including the villagers who labored in the stone quarry and mine.

Elder Ryunzo insisted on giving Jayde a cut from the gold earned, Jayde only took enough gold to fill two barrels, she would need this gold when she returned to Doha anyway. Thankfully like Doha the gold coins on Telia where similar in size and did not have special markings so she could easily use them when she returned. She had also requested five sacks of Afeaso, which she could trade on the inter-dimensional market when she returned to Doha.

When Elder Ryunzo insisted she take more gold, Jayde informed him that she would be leaving in a couple of days time to continue with her adventures and training, and she would have no use for the gold, she would rather the gold be spent on securing the village of Tardide.

Elder Ryunzo was devastated when he heard that Jayde would be leaving, but Master Rainer helped him understand that the worst mistake any mage could make was to stagnant and it was only by going out to explore and experience the world around them that they could grow stronger.

After dropping this bombshell on Elder Ryunzo, Jayde spent the next two days in the village, she had one last thing that she had to arrange before she left Telia and returned to Doha and that was to find a safe place for Yinxin and her children.

She had long discussions with Master Rainer about his travels, trying to find out if there were any places on Telia that he knew off where no people lived, he had given her a couple of good suggestion which sounded like they could be a safe place for the dragons to hide. Jayde asked him detailed questions about each of those areas, trying to find out more about them, and if they would be suitable for Yinxin and her children to move too.

They had been discussing the mountainous area to the north and the various beast that inhabited the area. Master Rainer had been under the impression that Jayde was looking for information on what she would encounter in her travels, so he had spent a lot of time with her, sharing all his knowledge.

During the conversation, Master had mentioned that once dragons had inhabited the mountains, surprised Jayde had asked if there were any dragons left there. Excited that there may still be silver dragons left on Telia that Yinxin didn't know about. If Yinxin could join them, then she and the wyrmlings would at least have some sort of protection.

Jayde had just started to feel hopeful when Master Rainer dashed her hopes.

"No, the dragons of Telia are no more," he said sadly.

"The last of the great dragons was slaughtered a couple of months ago, here in the Eastern Kingdom."

Jayde knew that he was talking about Yinxin's mate, Master Rainer went on to tell the whole story of how the last great dragon of Telia met his end.

It turned out that the Great Warlord of the Northern Kingdom was dying, he only had one child a daughter to inherit his kingdom. The warlord was a brutal tyrant, and had no plans to die quietly — he had declared that whoever bought him the flesh and blood of a silver dragon would marry his daughter and inherit his throne.

This announcement set off a thunderous wave on Telia, as the Northern Kingdom was the wealthiest out of all four kingdoms. Tens of thousands of men set off to hunt for dragons.

A large group of men and mages hired by the son of the warlord of the Eastern Kingdom, tracked the last known dragon to their small kingdom, after an intense battle, that cost hundreds of lives — the last dragon was slaughtered.

The Great Warlord of the Eastern Kingdom was ecstatic. With his son marrying the daughter of the Northern Kingdom and inheriting the throne, the two kingdoms would be united, and with their combined power, they would be able to crush the Southern and Western Kingdom.

But disaster struck as they were transporting the dragon carcass to the Northern Kingdom, the Great Warlord of the Western Kingdom, who had been at war with the Northern Kingdom for decades ambushed the caravan and stole the dragon carcass.

When the Great Warlord of the North found out, he tried to arrange a parley, but the Western Warlord refused. The Western Warlord wasn't stupid, why would save his greatest enemy's life, once the Northern Warlord ate the flesh of the dragon he would gain decades of life, and with the blood of the dragon his rate of cultivation would increase.

If he managed to breakthrough he would gain an even longer life, which meant the old bastard would take forever to die. He knew his old enemy too well, and had already figured out that the Great Warlord of the North wouldn't step down once his daughter was married off, so why would he bother marrying his daughter when it would gain him nothing. Better to let the old man die, and when the kingdom fell into chaos he would invade and crush the north finally, gaining all their wealth and annexing the kingdom and taking possession of all their valuable resources.

"The latest scuttlebutt [1] is that the Great Warlord of the North sent his army to pressurize the west to give up the carcass, but that crazy Warlord of the Western Kingdom, in front of his enemy set the dragon carcass alight, burning it to ash. Now war has officially broken out between the north and the west. The Northern Warlord is so desperate that he has offered anyone who can bring him some flesh of the dragon not only his kingdom and his wealth, but that he would personally enthrone the person who delivered him the flesh."

Shaking his head, Master Rainer lifted his cup of wine and drained it. He had been drinking steadily while telling his tale and was already quite tipsy from the amount that he had drunk.

"Such a f*cking waste," he said bitterly.

Jayde initially thought he was talking about the burning of the carcass, but changed her mind with his next statement.

"The silver dragons were the gods' gift to us — their messengers — and we killed and slaughtered them just to gain a few more years."

Grabbing the flagon of wine Master Rainer stared at the night sky smiling bitterly, then lifting the flagon as if to salute the heavens, he then drained it.

"Ah young Jayde I wonder if the gods will abandon us now" he mused.

Turning around he stumbled off, mumbling under his breath "I would if I was them, I would."

Jayde was really worried after she heard Master Rainer's tale. Yinxin and her children were in even more danger than she thought. Jayde could feel Reiko panicking through their bond.

Returning to the cave Reiko and Jayde discussed what to do, both of them were really worried and starting to panic about their silver dragons.

After they entered the cavern and seeing that the four dragons were fast asleep, the two of them sat down quietly in the corner of the cavern to carrying on their discussion.

[Jayde what are you going to do?] Reiko asked his voice betraying his distress.

[I don't know Reiko] Jayde answered him honestly. She really had no clue how to protect these four dragons.

[You going to have to tell Yinxin] Reiko said, laying his head on his paws tiredly.

[Tell me what?] Yinxin voice interrupted the two.

[Yinxin!]

"Yinxin!"

Jayde and Reiko exclaimed simultaneously jumping in fright.

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Note

[1] Scuttlebutt - in slang usage means rumor or gossip