The silence on the roof of the world was a profound, crystalline thing, broken only by the thin, whistling wind and the faint, satisfied burp of a twelve-year-old girl who had just swallowed a geological formation.
We stood there, my pack and I, a collection of seasoned warriors, brilliant strategists, and reality-bending glitches, utterly, completely, and profoundly dumbfounded. We had climbed to the very peak of existence, prepared to bargain with a mythical beast of ancient wisdom and terrible power. We had steeled ourselves for a negotiation with a god.
We had not prepared for a petulant, gothic lolita who had just eaten our only bargaining chip like a piece of rock candy.
Iris, the Matriarch of the Peaks, the last of the Ancient Wyrms, patted her flat stomach. "Ooh, sparkly," she said, her sapphire eyes wide with a childish, fleeting delight. "That one had a nice, chaotic little fizz to it. Tasted like static and potential. Very refreshing."
She then fixed her gaze on me, her expression shifting from delight to bored impatience. "Okay, fine," she said with a dramatic, long-suffering sigh that seemed utterly out of place on her young face. "Pact re-forged. Covenant renewed. Ancient oaths fulfilled. Whatever. Now, what do you want? Make it quick. My favorite dream was just getting to the good part. I was dreaming I was a giant butterfly made of obsidian, and I was laying eggs that hatched into smaller, angrier butterflies. It was very compelling."
My mind, which had just weathered a psychic war in a soul-trap and orchestrated a city-wide jailbreak, simply… blue-screened. I had no response. No strategy. No witty retort. I just stared.
It was Elizabeth who recovered first, her mind, though clearly reeling, defaulting to its core programming of logic and damage control. "Great Wyrm... Lady Iris," she began, her voice a masterpiece of strained diplomacy. "We are honored by your... swift acceptance of our tribute. We have come to invoke the Covenant of Stone and Fire. The kingdom of Althea, indeed the entire world, faces a threat of a magnitude not seen since the Age of Chaos. A threat that can 'unmake the stone itself.'"
Iris blinked, her massive sapphire eyes holding a look of profound, cosmic boredom. "Unmaking the stone? Ugh, that sounds so loud," she whined. "And messy. Why would anyone want to do that? The stone is so wonderfully quiet. It just sits there. For millennia. It's very relaxing to watch."
"A being, a 'Creator,' intends to initiate a 'Great Reset,'" I finally found my voice, forcing the words out. "He plans to delete this entire reality and start over."
"A reset?" Iris tilted her head, a flicker of genuine interest finally appearing in her eyes. "You mean, like, a full system wipe and reinstall? Ooh, that is a big one. That would definitely interrupt my nap."
This was our opening. The one selfish motivation that might just align with our own desperate need for survival.
"Yes," I pressed, stepping forward. "A very long, very permanent interruption. We need your help. The help of the Dragon Clans. The prophecy states..."
"Oh, don't quote that dusty old prophecy at me," she interrupted, waving a dismissive hand. "Kaelen was so dramatic. 'The world's heart will bleed static, and the children of the glitch will seek the fire of the mountain.' He was a terrible poet, you know. I told him that. But he was an interesting toy." She looked me up and down. "You're much less morose than he was. And your glitch is much more… chaotic. It's fun."
She skipped over to the massive, glittering crystal she had been coiled around, patting it affectionately. "The problem is, helping you sounds like a lot of work," she said, pouting. "Fighting, flying, roaring... it's all so dreadfully energetic. And for what? To save a bunch of noisy, short-lived lesser beings who are always running around and breaking things?" She looked at us. "No offense."
Lyra, whose Fenrir pride had been simmering since the moment Iris had appeared, finally boiled over. "No offense taken," she growled, stepping forward, her hand resting on the hilt of her greatsword. "But we are not 'lesser beings.' I am Lyra Silverwind, First Daughter of the Fenrir Matriarch, and we do not beg for aid. We forge alliances with those worthy of our strength."
Iris turned to look at Lyra, a slow, curious smile spreading across her face. It was the smile of a cat looking at a particularly loud, angry mouse. "A little wolf," she cooed. "How cute. You smell of pine trees and righteous fury. And you're very, very proud. Pride is so entertaining in creatures with such a limited power scale."
"I am a warrior!" Lyra roared, her pride wounded. "I have fought trolls and demons! I challenge you!"
Elizabeth groaned and put her face in her hands. Luna let out a small, terrified squeak.
I was about to intervene, to try and de-escalate, but Hemlock had warned me about Lyra's pride, and ARIA's last tactical analysis had highlighted the need to establish a clear hierarchy. This was a necessary, if terrifying, part of the pack-forging process.
Iris giggled, a sound like tiny, tinkling crystal bells. "You challenge me? Oh, that's adorable! To what? A contest of who can pout the longest? I'm very good at that."
"To a trial of strength!" Lyra snarled, drawing her massive greatsword. The blade, a masterpiece of dwarven steel, sang in the thin mountain air. "If I can land a single blow upon you, you will honor the covenant and lend us your full strength!"
"And if you can't?" Iris asked, her eyes twinkling with mischief.
"Then I will serve you as your personal whetstone for a hundred years!" Lyra declared.
"Hmm," Iris tapped a finger to her chin. "A hundred years of sharpening my claws on a wolf-girl's pride... tempting. But boring. I have a better idea." She clapped her hands together with childish glee. "If you lose, you have to wear a pretty pink ribbon on your tail for a year. A big, frilly one."
Lyra's face went from furious to apoplectic. The insult was so profound, so utterly dismissive of her warrior spirit, that she lost all reason. With a roar that shook the plateau, she charged.
She was a blur of silver fur and flashing steel, her greatsword scything through the air with enough force to cleave a lesser man in two.
Iris did not move. She simply stood there, a small, delicate figure in a frilly black dress, and watched the charging wolf-princess with a look of mild amusement.
Just as Lyra's blade was about to connect, Iris sighed, a sound of profound boredom. "Tag," she said.
She reached out and poked Lyra gently on the forehead with a single, slender finger.
The result was not an explosion. It was not a grand display of magic. It was a simple, absolute, and terrifying negation of physics.
Lyra's charge stopped instantly. Her massive greatsword, her forward momentum, her furious strength—all of it just... ceased to exist. She was frozen in place for a fraction of a second, her eyes wide with disbelief. And then, she crumpled to the ground like a puppet with its strings cut, landing in an unconscious, undignified heap at Iris's feet.
The silence that followed was absolute.
Iris looked down at the unconscious form of one of the fiercest warriors in the North. "See?" she said with a pout. "No fun at all. He didn't even twitch." She had used the word 'he' as a final, dismissive insult.
She had defeated a Level 44 warrior with a single poke.
Elizabeth stared, her scientific mind completely shattered. Luna looked like she was about to faint. I... I was beginning to understand the true, terrifying scale of the power we were dealing with.
[Analysis: The subject did not use a conventional spell,] ARIA's voice was a quiet, stunned whisper in my mind. [She did not use mana in any recognizable form. She issued a direct, root-level command to the simulation's physics engine. A 'PAUSE' command targeted at a single entity's kinetic values. The level of administrative privilege required for such an act is... god-like. My previous assessment of her power was underestimated by a factor of ten thousand.]
Iris yawned. "Well, that was exhausting. I'm going back to my nap. Wake me up when the world is finished ending." She began to shimmer, her form dissolving back into a cloud of silver-blue light, ready to merge back with her dragon self.
"Wait!" I shouted, my voice desperate. "The Great Reset! It will delete your dream! It will delete you!"
The shimmering paused. The form of the little girl solidified again, a look of genuine annoyance on her face. "Delete my dream? My butterfly dream? But I was just about to teach them synchronized flying! That's just rude."
"Yes!" I pressed, seizing on the one motivation that seemed to work. "The Creator, the one causing the reset, he's a tidy-freak. He doesn't like chaos. He doesn't like interesting glitches. He wants to delete everything and replace it with a boring, orderly, predictable world. A world with no angry butterflies. A world with no naps."
Iris's face, for the first time, showed a flicker of genuine anger. Her sapphire eyes narrowed. "No naps?" she whispered, her voice a low, dangerous hiss. "No one... no one... interrupts my nap."
The power that suddenly radiated from her was so immense it made the air crystallize. A thin layer of frost formed on the ground around her feet. She was no longer a petulant child. She was a god whose comfort had been threatened.
"Alright, fine," she declared, her voice now holding a chilling, regal authority. "You have my attention, little glitch. This 'Creator' sounds like a bully. And I hate bullies. They are so... loud. And they always want to tell you what to do."
She looked at me, her eyes seeming to pierce through to my very soul. "You are the leader of this... 'pack'... of noisy lesser beings. You are the alpha. But you are weak. Your code is a mess of patches and corrupted files. You need... guidance."
A slow, mischievous, and utterly terrifying smile spread across her face. "I have decided. This is far more interesting than my dream. I am bored of this mountain. I am bored of sleeping. I will come with you."
The words hit me like a physical blow.
"Come... with us?" Elizabeth stammered, her face a mask of horror.
"Yes," Iris said cheerfully, her mood shifting back to childish delight in an instant. "It will be an adventure! We can watch you fight the boring Duke, and the shiny player, and the big, scary demon. And I can make sure you don't mess it up too badly. It will be my new favorite game!"
She skipped over to me and grabbed my arm, her grip surprisingly strong. "You are my new favorite toy, Kazuki Silverstein. I have decided to play with you for a while."
The 'Harem System,' which had been mercifully quiet, chose that moment to spring to life with a notification so bizarre, so unprecedented, that it almost made me laugh out loud.
[UNIQUE ENTITY DETECTED! ATTEMPTING TO ADD 'IRIS (DRAGON LOLI)' TO PACK MANAGEMENT SYSTEM...][ERROR! ERROR! ENTITY'S SYSTEM RANK EXCEEDS HOST'S ADMINISTRATIVE PRIVILEGES!][FORCE-ADDING ENTITY AS... 'ANNOYING LITTLE SISTER (GOD-TIER)']
[New Pack Member Added: 'Iris (Chaotic Variable)'][Relationship Level: 0 (Amused Indifference)][Loyalty: 1/100 (Based purely on her not wanting her nap to be disturbed)][Notes: Subject is not an ally. Subject is a cat playing with a ball of yarn that happens to be your entire reality. Do not provoke her. Do not reason with her. Keep her entertained at all costs. Her boredom may be an extinction-level event.]
"This is... a terrible idea," Elizabeth whispered, her strategic mind clearly seeing the million ways this could go catastrophically wrong.
"Nonsense!" Iris declared happily. "It will be great fun! Now, let's go! This mountain is boring. Your little world is so much more... breakable."
She waved a hand dismissively. Lyra, who was still unconscious on the ground, floated into the air, cradled by an invisible force, and was gently deposited onto the back of her own pony, which had been waiting patiently at the base of the plateau. Then, Iris simply grabbed my arm, and the world dissolved into a blur of motion.
We did not climb down the mountain. We teleported. One moment we were on the windswept peak, the next we were standing in our camp at the base, surrounded by our stunned Fenrir and Glitch Raider scouts. They stared at the sudden appearance of a small girl in a frilly dress, holding their unconscious commander, and then they knelt as one, their faces pressed to the ground in a display of primal, instinctual terror. They recognized the scent of an ancient, absolute power.
Iris looked around at our rough camp, at our hardened warriors, at the vast, green world spread out before her, and she clapped her hands with childish glee.
"Ooh, a whole new playground," she said, her sapphire eyes sparkling with a terrifying, chaotic light. "Let's go break something."
I looked at Elizabeth. Her face was a perfect, beautiful mask of utter despair. I looked at Luna, who was staring at Iris with a mixture of terror and a strange, nurturing pity.
We had come to the mountains seeking a legendary weapon to help us win our war. And we had returned with something far more powerful, and infinitely more dangerous.
We had returned with a god. And she was bored.