21 - Freeing The Women And The Dragon

Val walked towards the center door with Jamal and Leo following behind. There were quite a few keys on the keyring, and he ended up trying 2 before getting the door unlocked on his third attempt.

When Val opened the door he saw 5 women and 1 young girl, around his age, with chains around their hands. The chains were then attached to the walls preventing the woman from being able to move far.

The room did not have any torches in it so it was fairly dark, but Val could make out the fear on the faces of the women. Val entered the room and quickly spoke to explain the situation,

"You don't need to be scared, we're not going to hurt you, we are here to rescue you. We have already killed most of the bandits, including the bandit boss. We're going to get you guys out now."

Val's attempt to calm the situation, worked a little. The women were still fearful but also could not think of any other reason for a young boy being here. As Val tried to unlock the chains with the keys he had taken from the dead bandit, Jamal, and Leo walked in.

All the women quickly shuffled backward, it seemed the trauma caused by the bandits had made them extremely uncomfortable around men. Jamal quickly noticed the condition of the woman and said,

"I'll be waiting outside, come out when you are done."

Val just waved his hand in the air, without turning around. It took him 5 tries to find the right key, but he eventually was able to free the first woman who had light brown hair.

Val then proceeded to unlock the rest of the women's chains, the last one to have her chains unlocked was the young girl who was a similar age to Val.

As Val was unlocking her chains, she just blankly stared at him. Val was feeling very uncomfortable, for two reasons, firstly because she had not even blinked since he started unlocking her chains and even before he started, when he was still freeing the other women, and because she was extremely cute.

She had pitch-black hair and bright blue eyes, and she was slightly shorter than Val.

Val did not know what to do, so, with slightly red cheeks, he asked her,

"Why are you staring at me?"

The girl finally blinked a few times, seemingly coming out of her daze. Her cheeks turned crimson red in embarrassment, lucky for her it was dark and hard for Val to tell, but the other women had acclimated to the darkness as they had been in the room for days and could clearly see her embarrassment.

"No no, It's nothing, thanks for saving me."

She quickly said, with a higher-than-usual voice, afterwards she immediately lowered her head, trying to hide her embarrassment.

Val finished freeing her and stood up, for some reason he felt the urge to offer her his hand to help her stand up. She took his hand and stood up, still unable to look Val in the eyes.

The brief interaction had caused the women who had been crying from the happiness of being free, to all start having small smirks and grins at the young boy and girl.

When everyone was free they left the room. Outside the room, waiting for them was Jamal, Leo, and the blonde-haired woman. When they saw that the blonde-haired woman was alive and safe they trusted Val's words even more. They had been a little reluctant to believe Val, it was hard to trust the words of a kid, especially when he claimed to have killed more than 40 bandits, even if it was with the help of another man.

The woman also noticed the dead body of the bandit and the blood surrounding his head, the brown-haired woman who was the first to be freed decided to speak up, and said to Jamal,

"Thank you for saving us and killing this man and the other bandits."

She was still slightly fearful of Jamal but decided it was the right thing to do to thank her savior, after all, she and the other girls would still need his help to get out of there and back to safety.

Jamal looked at her and quickly corrected her while pointing at Val,

"No need, it was Val who killed that bandit and the majority of the bandit crew. Our group was attacked in the middle of the night by 45 of the bandits, including the bandit boss, we took them all down and interrogated one of the bandits, who informed us of your capture. We came here to rescue you and to take all the loot that these bandits had acquired, as well as exterminate the last remaining bandits."

The women were all surprised by Jamal's words, they found it hard to believe that the cute little boy had killed so many bad men. But the blonde-haired woman, who introduced herself as Anna, did not say otherwise forcing the group to take Jamal's word for it.

The brown-haired woman decided to introduce herself to her saviors,

"I am Tina, again, thank you for saving us."

Val just waved his hand and Jamal nodded.

The woman all introduced themselves, the black-haired girl was the last to introduce herself,

"I am Savanah, but you can call me Sav."

As she said this she was finally able to look at Val's face. She had been awed when she saw him in the dark room, but now that she could get a better look with light, she was even more amazed. To her, Val was the most handsome boy she had ever seen. Her heart was beating like crazy and she once again had to look away. It was only then did she notice Leo and she exclaimed,

"Wow... cute... what is that?"

Everyone heard her and shifted their view to Leo who was standing next to Val's legs.

Val looked down and noticed her attention on Leo and responded casually,

"He's Leo, my familiar."

Everyone was shocked, but quickly regained their senses.

Jamal did not want to waste time, so he decided to ask Val to open the last door in this corridor. Val agreed and after a few attempts, he was able to find the right key and open the door, and what they found surprised everyone.

Inside the room was a single cage with a small baby dragon inside. Dragons were very rare and adult dragons were extremely powerful. They could easily reach S-Rank with some even surpassing that.

The baby dragon's scales were light blue with purple zigzag patterns, shaped similar to lightning and it had piercing dark green eyes.

It was clearly just a baby, it should not have hatched too long ago, it was half a meter long and a foot tall. It was laying on its stomach in the small cage, which was covered in weird symbols, and was giving off an eerie vibe.

Val looked at Jamal, who was also shocked. This was the first time Val had seen Jamal lose his composure. Val was feeling an instinctual attraction to the dragon and wanted to free him from the cage but he spoke to Jamal first.

"I'm going to free the dragon from the cage and then attempt to [Tame] it, do you have an issue with that?"

Val's words snapped Jamal out of his thoughts, Jamal wanted to disagree with Val's plan, a baby dragon was worth a ridiculous fortune. However, he had stated that the loot gained from the bandit's hideout would be split based on contribution and Val had, by far, the highest contribution. So he reluctantly nodded. However, as Val got closer Jamal quickly said,

"Be careful though, it is very difficult to tame a dragon. It is only possible with baby dragons, adult dragons are far too proud to allow themselves to submit to a person. Also, try not to damage the cage, it is a valuable magic item, probably found in a dungeon."

Val heard Jamal's warning and just waved his hand, not bothering to turn around. He squatted down and stared at the dragon, the baby dragon raised its head and their eyes met. After a moment Val said,

"Hello, I am Val, I'm going to free you now, but do you want to join my family? You can be my partner, also this is Leo he is also my partner and family."

Val pointed at Leo, who had followed Val toward the baby dragon. The dragon looked at Val and then Leo and then back to Val. But did not make any noise nor attempt to respond.

Val did not know if he wanted to join him or not but regardless he was going to free him from the cage.

Val looked at the keys on the keyring, and could easily spot the matching key for the cage. He used it and opened the cage door.

The baby dragon stood up and slowly walked out of the cage, staring at Val the entire time. He walked closer to Val who was kneeling down on the ground and just stood there looking at Val.

Val suddenly heard a childish voice in his head,

"Who are you?"

Val did not know how the baby dragon could speak in his mind, nor how he should respond. So he tried thinking of his response and it seemed to work,

"I'm Val, I'm 10 years old, an orphan and I just became an adventurer. If you would like, I can use my skill [Tame] and then we will become partners and family, we will travel the world and kill monsters, beasts, and bad guys."

The baby dragon did not reply but instead looked at Leo, the baby dragon stared at Leo for a while, Val assumed that he may have been talking to Leo but was not sure.

After a while the baby dragon said,

"Okay, I will join you, I don't have anywhere else to go anyway."

When Val heard the baby dragon accept his offer he had a huge smile on his face, he asked,

"Do you have a name?"

The baby dragon replied,

"No, I don't."

Val just nodded, he then picked up the baby dragon and activated [Tame]. The skill worked and a link was formed between the two of them. However, the skill had used up the vast majority of his mana, which he had restored to full on their walk to the hideout. Val said out loud,

"From now on your name is Larz."