"How dare you put your hand on this princess?" she grumbled, her hands on her sore rear end. 'My butt must be red by now!' she thought to herself before looking at the cause of the pain.
Ryker ignored her gaze, merely saying, "I told you I have something to tell you but you wouldn't listen. So I punished you so you will be willing to listen,"
The dragon princess continued to glare at him, Ryker returning her gaze, making her look away, the trauma from having her butt abused to such a point would likely stay for a long time.
"You say you have something to tell this princess, get to it," while the princess still acts all mighty, at least the haughtiness is no longer there.
"It's about your attendant," while she was happy to hear about her attendant, she couldn't help but feel something was wrong, her gut-wrenching as Ryker talked to her.
-x-
"So, he sacrificed himself to protect me for more than a century," Ryker couldn't help but be disturbed.
The arrogant dragon princess had such a defeated look that he didn't know what to say. So he decided to remain quiet, letting her sort out her emotions.
In the meantime, Ryker decided to look at his captive, still bound up and unconscious. The young master was only gagged and bound, but the brief clash between Ryker and the dragon princess caused him to be frightened so much that he fainted.
Making sure he was okay, Ryker returned to see the dragon staring blankly at an empty space. He sighed, he needed to help her, his conscious wouldn't let him do otherwise.
"Do you want to talk?" he asked, sitting next to the dragon. The dragon remained silent for some time. When he was about to repeat his question, the dragon finally answered.
"Why do you help me? After how I treated you?" her voice was low but to cultivators, it still could be heard easily.
"Because I make a promise to your attendant. In exchange for a part of his treasures, I will help you as long as you plan to travel together with me and my family," he replied.
"So, it's because of the attendant, huh?" she said out loud, continuing to stare at nothingness as silence descended upon them.
"Do you want to hear my thoughts about it?" Ryker broke the silence, the dragon princess turning her head to look at him, giving him a little nod.
"It depends on what you want to do. Do you wish to remain here, living your life safely or do you wish to get revenge on the one who killed your entire clan? It's all up to you," he shared his thoughts before letting her think through.
Finally, the dragon princess said, "I want to avenge my family. I want to kill those bastards that attack my clan. And I want to rip off the throat of the traitor that made it all happen,"
Ryker let the dragon princess continue speaking threats and expletives to the one responsible for the destruction of your clan. Finally, after nearly half an hour, she stopped. He thought the reason she stopped was because she ran out of both threats and expletives to say.
"Get it all out yet?" he asked, the dragon princess nodding, her heart feeling better after she heard her attendant had died.
"So, what do you want to do? Do you wish to travel with me or are you going to travel on your own?" the dragon princess pondered it before giving her answer.
"I'm following you for now. I'm not used to the Human Realm and with my strength, it's impossible for me to get to the Monster Realm. So I will be sticking with you until I'm strong enough to get my revenge," Ryker hummed, secretly sighing in relief that the dragon didn't take the latter option. He didn't want to break his promise after all.
"By the way, what is your name? If we travel together I need to call you something other than princess," he asked, the dragon princess remained silent for a while before answering.
"Mashia, yours?" "Ryker,"
"So, I'm going to be in your care for now Ryker," she said, looking away as she said that.
He chuckled lightly at how embarrassed the dragon princess acted. He was about to say something when he sensed several presences coming towards them, "Mashia, hide,"
Hearing him sounded so urgent, the dragon quickly hid, the pendant can both hide her linage and aura, making others unable to detect her unless they were too strong.
Ryker looked at the source to see 3 men, the supervisor and one-arm. One-arm looked at him with fear before bowing, "Great master, this is all you ask for, plus some extra," Ryker quickly checked the content before nodding, satisfied by the loot.
"Your young master is in that cave over there, you can go and take him out," one-arm nodded but before he could get close to the cave, he issued him one last warning, "If the Tres Family tried anything else, I would destroy them,"
The threats sent a shiver down one-arm's spine as he knew the young man in front of him was more than capable of following through with the threat.
As he sprinted, running away from the monster, the supervisor took a look at him before gasping in surprise, "8th Stage Genesis Condensing! You must be really lucky to raise your cultivation so quickly," he exclaimed.
Plus, even if his cultivation is one minor stage higher, his instinct tells him the young man is more than his equal. The young man is a rising star that would likely soar to the next sky. Having a connection to such a person would only benefit him.
"Oh, take this," his musing was broken when Ryker threw him a storage ring. He looked at the content and couldn't help but gasped.
"Genesis Grade 3 resources! And so many of them! You must be extremely lucky to find them," he exclaimed.
Ryker merely nodded, for it was the truth, just he was lucky in that he had a powerful concealment technique to avoid the detection of the more powerful beasts, as even if he was ten times more lucky, he still couldn't grab the resources close to the more powerful beasts.
"You really someone who returned a gift with a gift," the supervisor said as he put the storage ring into his pocket, before asking, "Do you plan to leave this city?"
"Yes, I would like to go to the capital city, and see if I can find more opportunity there," he told him. The supervisor nodded, saying, "Before you go, let's have a chat about the Adventure Guild at the capital city, so you know what to expect,"
Ryker nodded before following the supervisor, but not before silently throwing a communication token to the nearby tree.
As they left, Mashia walked towards the direction of the token, finding it quickly before connecting to it. She let out a wry smile as she read his message.