Spending My Retirement In A Game

Eisen placed his hand onto her back as he returned her look, and then turned back toward Silber, who seemed quite surprised.

"You're someone's champion? And a dragon's, at that?" Silber asked with a wry smile, as if he was trying to hold back a laugh, "I mean, if you met someone like her through that, I guess that's worth it..."

Eisen scoffed, "What's so surprising about that? It's an Ancient Dragon. They're amongst the most powerful beings in this world," the old man pointed out, "And the dragons gave me some pretty useful abilities in return. Well, technically, they were sort of mine to begin with...

I don't fully remember, but apparently Trygan and I moved some things around so that I could use the Ancient Dragons to get some of my abilities back, like these eyes."

His eyes flashed a golden colour, but Silber wasn't focused on that at all, "What do you mean, 'the most powerful beings in this world'? Dragons are just some lizards... That doesn't mean they can't do anything, or that they're all super weak, but... that's an exaggeration, right?" Silber pointed out. Kirisho and Eisen looked at each other a bit confused.

"Lizards? I guess so, but... Silber, Dragons really 'are' the some of the most powerful here. They're powerful magical beings, and even newborns are at least at second or third rank the moment they hatch," Eisen pointed out. Silber frowned, "What? No, they...

oh man, did that much change? Really? Now that whole 'dragon war' thing seems a lot more serious..."

"It's extremely serious... I thought I explained what's at stake there."

"Well, you do have a flair for the dramatic, so don't blame me," Silber replied immediately, tapping his foot on the ground, "You're not messing with me, right?"

The old man let out a deep sigh, "No, I'm not messing with you. It's the truth."

"It is as Eisen says; Dragons have been a massive influence over the world for millennia. While they don't all mingle with the people all too much, in a lot of cases, they're seen as the closest to divinity without truly being gods," Kirisho added, "They are supremely skilled in many ways, and extremely powerful beings. A single Ancient Dragon could cause irreparable damage to a nation."

Silber ran his hand over his short-trimmed beard, "Huh... That... is unexpected... hold on, does that mean those half-dragon kids that are running around are also strong?"

Eisen let out a deep sigh, "Of course they are. Frankly, excluding us five originals, the Half-Dragon knights are probably the strongest force in all of Asgard."

"...Huh..." Silber muttered, before quickly shaking his head, "Honestly, whatever. I know that there's a lot for me to catch up on. Anyway, so you just arrived here?" he asked, looking at Kirisho, "The other... 'Originals', I guess? Well, they said that Eisen summoned them earlier, did he do the same with you? I didn't see you around anywhere.

Oh, or were you somewhere in that 'dungeon' place? I explored a few of the floors but I didn't get very far since I didn't want to waste too much time."

Once more, Eisen and Kirisho locked eyes. Slowly, Kirisho held her hand forward, letting her fingers dissolve into a mist, "No, I'm a Mist Spirit. A type of Ghost who became one with Mist and Fog. I live within the amulet around Eisen's neck."

"Due to a few circumstances that I think we haven't really properly figured out yet either, Kirisho was asleep for the past few days. But she just woke up earlier," Eisen added, "She can't go too far from her amulet, so we're usually together. Of course, if either of us need some time, she will take the amulet herself and move freely."

"A Ghost, huh?" Silber muttered, looking Kirisho up and down, "I saw a few Ghosts before, but they were all a lot more... unstable than you. No offense."

"None taken. It is the truth. It is rare for specters to have the capability of holding onto their whole conscious even after their death. In my case, it seems very briefly after my death, my soul was bound to the amulet, and due to its special nature, I was able to hold onto my mind," Kirisho explained. Silber leaned forward and took a closer look at the amulet, frowning lightly.

"Eisen, didn't you make that?"

The old man raised his brow, "No, I didn't. According to the item description, it was made a few thousand years ago by a Necromancer, and there's no falsehood there either... why? Do you remember something like this?"

"I mean..." the half-giant was deep in thought, "It looks vaguely familiar, at least. I remember you working on some jewelry like that before, but I guess that wasn't anything to trap a soul, but more like... a mental protection thing? You were going to the Feywild on one of the other continents and made some of those because a lot of Fey have the ability to manipulate the mind."

Eisen thought deeply, "...Is that so?" the old man muttered. He knew for sure that he didn't make that amulet; he had already checked on the creator, and if there were any clues toward Kirisho's past there, but there were no leads.

Things like this weren't particularly uncommon; they were amulets meant to bind powerful specters to another object and trap them in there, in case there were no other ways to get rid of them. The one that Kirisho was connected to was of particularly high quality and rank, but it still wasn't much different. But of course...

"I did heavily influence the craftsmanship in this world, so I guess this shouldn't be a surprise either. And necromancers tend to be tied very heavily to the past, so maybe they found some of the things that I made and used that as a base. Or frankly... maybe I came up with the base for this sort of item and spread it around myself."

Kirisho nodded slowly, "Right... it seems like that could have been the beginning of your process of creating life? Finding a way to contain and house souls could be a logical starting point," she suggested, and Eisen slowly nodded his head, "That could definitely be it..." the old man thought for a while, but soon saw the colour that the sky was taking on.

It was very early in the morning right now, and Eisen already wanted to have started working again by this time.

"We can talk about this later, alright?" Eisen suggested, starting to make his way back toward the stone 'quarry', or rather, the massive stone plains that now existed where the peak of a mountain used to sit, "I really need to keep at it. I'm trying to build a new statue for the town," the old man explained to Kirisho, who quickly followed after him.

Silber also trodded along for now, hoping to help out a bit more on the old man's side as well. Even if he couldn't cut the stone to the point where it would become a high-quality material like what Eisen could do, he could still take over the job of actually placing the golem cores and let Eisen just fully concentrate on cutting the massive stone cubes out of the mountain.

It might not save a huge amount of time, but anything helped at this point.

Silber and Kirisho kept speaking for a while as Eisen began to concentrate on his work together with the duplicates. Of course, those two didn't slack off either; they were helping out however they could, even if it was just small things that would take a load off Eisen's shoulders, so that he could work a little bit more effectively.