One year had passed after that incident.
After counterattack by dragons, Hiccup pulled everyone back to the nest. Thankfully, there was no casualties from their side. They managed to save all the Hooligan tribesmen and women, minimize damage to the structure and buildings, all while showing no mercy to their enemies. Everything was good.
While their enemies were dead, Hiccup and Luna failed to hunt down Alvin and Dagur that day. The Secret nest razed the Outcast Island and Berserker Island to the ground, but they were not there. Since they brought almost all their men to invade Isle of Berk, there was not much retaliation that they faced there.
The Outcasts and Berserkers were destroyed and gone for good.
However, much later after that, Hiccup's dragons found Alvin and Dagur. The intelligence sector reported that they were spotted sailing to Northern Markets island. They were apparently searching for someone named Grimmel the Grisly.
After some more searching and investigation, they discovered who Grimmel was. He was a famed Dragon Hunter, responsible for killing and driving Night Furies into extinction. Hiccup decided to play the long game and keep track of Alvin and Dagur instead. He wanted to kill Grimmel for what he had done to his species.
Not much had changed with the Secret nest. Everything was still the same. However, the dragon population there was getting bigger. Last year, there were roughly thousands of dragons living in the nest. That was a good number.
This time however, there were roughly hundred thousand dragons living in the nest this year.
It was unknown why there were so many dragons joining his nest. However, Hiccup theorized that most of them were refugees from other various islands. The news had spread that Secret nest was a better alternative to many other alpha dragons that existed.
Dragons all over the world came to check out their nest. Most dragons that went to visit came back later and applied for immigration. As a result, the nest had all kinds of dragons from all over the world, such as Sentinels and Flightmares.
They were surprised to know that Hiccup was an alpha dragon, but they agreed on joining anyway.
Hiccup had to make a lot of adjustments around the nest. He had blocked majority of entrances on the Secret Island. Instead, he resorted on building multiple tunnels and passages deep underground that led to various places and islands. This was done to prevent dragons crowding the pathways in and out of the nest.
Hiccup had to further expand the nest to accommodate every dragon species possible that wanted to live in the nest. However, dragons were immigrating and joined their nest faster than Hiccup could expand them.
His sector leaders had outspoken their concern for overpopulation in the future. Hiccup was working on the solution.
Strange enough, other alpha dragon nests were ignorant of his nest population. It was not surprising, considering how the nest was structured and operate. His dragons smelled like wild dragon instead of one holding a call.
In addition, because of the various gateways on different places close to the island, they did not even know how big their nest was. Most dragons judge how big a nest is based off how many dragons coming in and out of the island.
They still did not know that Hiccup was an alpha dragon.
After the incident at Berk, Hiccup stayed at the Secret Island. He never returned to Berk. As an alpha dragon, he listened to other dragons' pleas and concerns. While his status was still incognito, he listened to them as the leader of the Secret nest.
Sometimes, visiting dragons would come to him for help. Hiccup would gladly help them, as long it was within his power to do so. By helping dragons outside the nest, it tempted them to join his nest and become one of his dragons.
If anyone knew of the situation, it looked like Hiccup was building a massive dragon army.
"Leader, a group of dragons wanted to see you."
Hiccup looked up. The 18-year-old man was in the throne room, in his dragon form. It was a place he made himself so he could talk with visiting dragons without being disturbed.
The throne room was a long, massive hall, illuminated by bright orange crystal on the rooftop. There were smooth, rectangle stone pillars on the sides, along with some cave ways around the gaps behind them. The largest cave way was at the end of the room.
It did not look like a cave way. Rather, it looked more like a large, doorless doorway.
The place was bright, smooth and clean. The floor were made of grey marble, and the walls were made of concrete. The middle section of the floor were differently coloured – dark red marbles that run along from far end of the room straight to another. The floor were reflecting the light above, bouncing and illuminating the whole room with soft, orange light.
The other end of the room was elevated. It was where Hiccup sat. There was not much there, not even a chair, except for the shimmering crystals at the edges of the elevated platform. Notably, there were a lot of wealth behind the throne – gold coins, jewellery and others. They were hoards of the Secret nest.
There were also other dragons around the place. Most of them were walking at the corners, doing their own errands. They enter and leave through the cave ways. The centre of the room served as a place where dragons could talk and interact with him.
Hiccup looked at the one who called him. It was a dragon standing at the doorway. The dragon was a Deadly Nadder. It was one of security dragons.
"Send them in." Hiccup ordered.
The Deadly Nadder bowed to him, before turning around and leave the room. Minutes later, a group of dragons flew into the throne room. They were Whispering Deaths. These dragons looked like a giant gulper eel with spikes, wings and sharp teeth. They did not have any other limbs, not even legs.
The group of dragons flew low in front of him. They bowed at the leader of the nest. After some time, they looked up to him. "Toothless." The one at the front spoke. "We need your help."
"What seems to be the problem?"
"We need information about human ships." The Whispering Death explained to him.
Hiccup tilted his head. "What do you want to know?"
"We are looking for some human ships." The boulder dragon responded. "We were chasing them, but we lost them close to your nest. We wanted to know if you know anything about it."
Hiccup frowned. He did not like the insinuation. "What does the ship look like?"
"It was large and made of wood." The dragon described. "There was two large metals in front of them."
It was vague, but that was expected. Fortunately, there were few tribe ships that fit the description. "Did you know the large cloth they have on their ship?" Hiccup asked. Seeing a nod, he continued asking. "It should have a symbol. What does it look like?"
"It have the shape of a dragon with sword and arrow on them." The Whispering Death described to him. "It looked like the dragon was being attacked."
The Night Fury grimaced. He knew what tribe it was. "Based on your description, we know which Vikings that you were looking for."
The Whispering Deaths looked eager. Hiccup continued speaking. "The ship you described was a Dragon Hunter ship." He explained. "Dragon Hunter is a Viking tribe that specialised on hunting and killing dragons."
"Do you know where they live?" The Whispering Death at the front asked, looking hopeful.
Hiccup nodded. "They have multiple places where they live and operate." He explained. "You might need to be more specific."
The Whispering Deaths looked at each other. Finally, the one at the front looked at Hiccup and spoke. "What about the one that passed your island?"
"We did spot a Dragon Hunter ship passing by, somewhat far from here." Hiccup told them. "It was unusual for them to roam this far."
"They did not seem to know that there was a dragon nest here." Hiccup explained to them. "We have no interest on attacking them. It was done to prevent attracting their attention to our nest."
The Whispering Deaths chattered amongst them. Hiccup was curious. "If I may ask, why are you looking for this ship?"
The dragons looked at him. After some time, the one at the front spoke. "The Dragon Hunters had stolen our eggs." He explained to him. "They somehow managed to get past us and stole our eggs."
"We can't travel too far around the ocean. We can't track them down without exhausting ourselves." The Whispering Death continued explaining. "That's why we come to your nest. We need help."
Hiccup let out a sigh. "I will do what I can." He replied. "We're going to search for them and tell you when we found them. If possible, we'll get the eggs back for you."
"You may rest in my nest while we went to look for them." Hiccup told them. "If we're lucky, we'll find them soon before night-time."
"Thank you, Dark Chaser." The Whispering Death bowed to him. "You are too kind."
"You may go." Hiccup spoke. "My dragons will lead you."
The Whispering Deaths bowed to them. Then, they flew out of the room.
Hiccup stayed silent for some time. Then, he stood from the ground, before walking down and entered one of the cave ways.
Exiting out of the cave way, Hiccup arrived at the living quarter section.
The whole place was much, much bigger than before. There were thousands of dragons flying around. There were huge, tall pillars with balconies and cave ways on them. Dragons of various kind were moving around the place, carrying food on their claws, talking with their friends and families, or generally doing their own errands for the nest.
There was also a massive hole at the centre of the section. It led to the old terminal, where the old sections were before. A lot of dragons were entering and leaving through the hole.
Hiccup yawned. He flew up and entered the old living quarter section. It was still used and not much changed there. The exit on the top had been closed, so dragons could not travel from there anymore.
He entered his quarter. At the centre, there was a certain Light Fury resting there. Luna was sleeping.
The Night Fury came to her and licked her side. Luna opened her eyes. She looked at him and crooned. "Welcome back."
"Hey." Hiccup whispered. He nested himself next to her and nuzzled her cheek. "Are you feeling okay?"
Luna hummed. "It's not as painful as before now."
Hiccup smiled. Several months ago, Luna had moved to live together in his quarters. He had gotten approval from her parents to court her. They were both still courting each other.
Night Fury and Light Fury mating habits were different than normal dragons. It was not that uncommon for certain elusive dragons, such as Deathgripper, to have different tradition. Normally, dragons could become mates at any time, but they could only laid eggs during mating season.
In case of Hiccup and Luna, they were not restrained to such thing. The female could mate at any time, and they will lay their eggs whenever they were ready. Their pattern were like human female instead of regular dragons.
However, there was a caveat. Night Fury and Light Fury courtship usually lasted years before they finally become mate together. Luna agreed to mate with Hiccup when they returned to the Hidden World. Hiccup agreed with the condition.
While they were not officially mate yet, the nest agreed Luna belonged to Hiccup.
"Are you going to take some rest now?" The Light Fury asked.
"Sorry. I still have other things to do." Hiccup shook his head. He frowned as he thought. "There's the Cave Diggers that was looking for their eggs. Highway project for fast travel I need to do. Overseeing joint-sector celebration for next week. Opening more pathways for the nest…"
"You're doing too much at once, Toothless." Luna softly spoke. She smiled. "You should let other dragons handle them."
"I already did." Hiccup nodded. "Most of the works were delegated. Unfortunately, some things just need my presence."
Luna frowned. "You really need to take some rest, Toothless."
"Well, I am here." Hiccup slowly spoke. His tail slowly swayed behind him. "I have free time today. I can spend the whole day with you."
That cheered the Light Fury. "Do you want to fly outside?" She enthusiastically asked.
"Sure."
The two stood from the ground. Then, they walked out from the place.
Berk became different after that incident.
Even after a year, everyone still remembered that day. It was the day when the Berserkers and Outcasts attacked and took them as hostages.
It was the day when Hiccup was revealed to be the Dragon Conqueror.
After everything calmed down, the whole village were both glad and horrified. While there were not that much damage in the village, there were dead bodies littered all over the place. Poisons, broken ambers, scorch marks, dried lava were all over the place. It took them months to clean up the whole village.
Even after cleaning the village, they sometimes found dead Outcasts and Berserkers somewhere in the island. Even after a year of cleaning things up, they would occasionally find remains of them somewhere in the forest.
Thankfully, none of Hooligans tribesmen and women died, surprising enough. There were some missing livestock, which later found wandering around in the forest. Food were all still there. They had to fix the Great Hall, as well as some of the houses.
Fortunately, they did not need to rebuild any of the buildings. The damage were not that bad, except for the poisons and ambers littered around the place. Gothi had to work overtime to cure the poisoned villagers that tried to clean them up.
Thankfully, those poisons disappeared after rain. From there, the villagers broke them with pickaxes and threw them away.
"Thinkin' something, chief?"
The chief looked to the side. It was Gobber. Both were standing at the cliff, overseeing the empty docks. They were staring far at the horizon. Notably, there was a fleet of ships far away, passing by their island. They were both alone there, standing under the late morning sun.
Stoick let out a sigh. "Just… Hiccup."
The aftermath of the incident were scandalous. The villagers were all shocked to know that Hiccup was the Dragon Conqueror. They were even shocked to learn that Hiccup could really control dragons.
The villagers were terrified of him. They wondered where his allegiances were. Most assumed that he was still loyal to the Hooligan Tribe. However, that idea was shot down when it was revealed that Hiccup had planned them to happen. Everything was orchestrated by him, and nobody were any wiser.
They remembered him revealing that he wanted to break their trust to him. That somewhat did the intended effect. The Berkians were wary. They were terrified. They had slowly moved on from the incident, but the memories were still there.
It helped that they never saw Hiccup anywhere ever again.
The biggest revelation was when they moved to retaliate against the Outcasts and Berserkers. When they arrived at their island, they found nothing but burned buildings and bunkers. Everything was destroyed. All that remained was rubbles and what remained of the inhabitants.
The Outcasts and Berserkers had been wiped out by the dragons.
Then, other villages learned of what happened. It became the talk to the whole archipelago. They become even more jealous and afraid. Thankfully, nobody tried anything, as they feared that the Dragon Conqueror might come after them if they offend the Hooligan tribes.
Gobber was the most affected. He was somewhat close to Hiccup. While most of their interactions were at the forge, he had grown fond of him. Stoick was also affected. He was there when he moved to attack Alvin. He had watched Hiccup blew up the retreating Viking ship into pieces.
Hiccup had saved his life for the third time through his dragons that day.
"I hope the kid's alright." Gobber grumbled.
Stoick snorted. "He have his dragons keeping him safe." He muttered. "Why wouldn't he be alright?"
"Lots of things could happen." The blacksmith shrugged. "He seem to trust those fire breathing lizards more than we do."
They stayed silent for some time. The chief was reminiscing something. Hiccup reminded him a lot of his wife. "I wonder what Valka would say about this."
"I saw a lot of her in him that day, Stoick." Gobber spoke, looking at him. "I saw a lot of you in him too."
"He look exactly like you that day." The blacksmith continued speaking. "Ruthless. The kid's smarter than any of us."
"I just don't know what to think about him anymore." Stoick spoke as his shoulder slumped to his sides.
"Just move on." Gobber simply replied. "Hiccup's off to nowhere to do adventure. Maybe he'll come back. Maybe he won't. It's best if we just think less about it."
The chief slowly nodded. Suddenly, he spotted something at the distance. It was a small flock of dragons. It was flying together in a formation, very high up in the sky. It was flying right above the passing ships.
It was extremely rare to see any dragons flying around Isle of Berk. After that incident, they barely see dragons flying around. Villagers could go on their day for a whole month, and they will not see any speck of dot in the sky. It was as if dragons had vanished overnight.
Gobber seemed to notice it as well. He frowned. "How much you'd reckon those were Hiccup's dragons?"
"I'm not sure." Stoick muttered. "But how they fly looked familiar…"
"Like that day when they brought us food?" Gobber suggested.
That reminded the chief. "Aye…" He spoke, frowning. "… those were Hiccup's dragons."
Hiccup was confused.
He was flying relatively close to Berk. While it was considered far by ship travel standard, it was close enough for a dragon.
The Night Fury was flying next to Luna. They were doing their regular flying routine to stretch their wings. There were eight dragons behind them – four Woolly Howls and four Skrills. They were grouped into two, each in diamond formation.
The dragons insisted on escorting them during their flight. While Hiccup thought it was unnecessary, Luna saw a benefit of it. The Night Fury allowed it to happen, seeing that it was possible that there was a chance that they might be attacked during their flight.
The confusion that Hiccup had was from observing the ships under them. It was a fleet of Dragon Hunter ships. The ships were massive. It was very unusual to see them roam that far. "Huh. I wasn't expecting them to be here."
"It looked much better than other Viking ship I've seen so far." Luna commented.
"Dragon Hunter ships are usually more modern than regular Viking ships." Hiccup replied, still looking down at the ships. "But still… they were not supposed to be here. They don't have any base of operation anywhere in this area."
"Maybe they're lost?" The Light Fury suggested.
"I'm not sure…" Hiccup squinted his eyes. He focused onto the deck to see what was on them. "Maybe their rudder is broken. I'm not sure if…" Then, his eyes went wide. "Oh."
On the deck of one of the ships, Hiccup saw a large open crate. It was filled with dragon eggs. They were dark turquoise eggs, with some spots being darker than the rest of them. The Night Fury recognised them. They were Whispering Death eggs.
Luna saw it as well. She gasped. Hiccup grimaced. "Well, that's one clue for the lost egg problem." He commented.
The other dragons behind them seem to notice it as well. They were whispering amongst themselves. The Light Fury looked at Hiccup. "What should we do?"
"I'm going to call the others." Hiccup muttered. "Let's bring those eggs back."
Back at Berk, Stoick and Gobber were still observing them. They were not sure on what was going on. The ships were flying a flag that they did not recognise.
"They're not heading here, that's for sure." Gobber commented. "At least they're not bringing whatever they're about to do to the village."
"Hmm." Stoick frowned.
After some time, they see a large group of dragons coming towards the existing flock. They joined the small flock, turning it into a large flock of dragons.
"Uh…" Gobber raised one eyebrow. Stoick dreaded at what would happen next.
The dragons swooped in and dove to attack the ships. They heard explosions coming from there, as dragons were attacking the ship. Stoick could see familiar purple flashes, meaning that both Night Fury and Light Fury were there.
"That's definitely Hiccup." The chief nodded, agreeing with himself.
"What's going on there?"
Gobber and Stoick looked back. Spitelout was coming towards them after hearing some noises. He approached them and looked at what they were looking at. "What the…"
"It's Hiccup." Stoick grimaced.
Spitelout was silent. After that incident, he had sobered up when it comes to Hiccup. Stoick did not know what happened to him, but the man was more compliant than before. He appeared to be sad whenever Hiccup was mentioned.
It was not surprising. After the incident, there was an investigation as to what really happened that day in the woods. Ruffnut and Tuffnut finally blabbed and told the truth about attacking Hiccup because of the marriage. It matched with the story that Fishlegs had told them.
They harshly punished Snotlout when the truth came out. Ruffnut and Tuffnut got themselves lighter punishment because they told the truth. Spitelout's son had to clean up dead bodies in the woods with the search party. The twins were punished to mine out the ambers along with the miners.
"What the Hel is he doing?" Spitelout asked, curious.
"I don't know." Stoick admitted. The three of them moved to watch the whole thing unfolding.
"Careful with the hull!" Hiccup shouted. "They have more of them inside!"
Hiccup and his dragons were raiding the ships. They had killed the Vikings on the deck. The dragons were securing the eggs that they could see.
After taking out the Vikings, they had moved to loot the place. They took the eggs and blow up the decks. They were horrified to find even more eggs inside. More dragons were summoned to loot the ships. Smaller dragons moved in to take out the Vikings inside the lower deck.
When they thought it was done, they found even more eggs on the other ships. It was then they realised that the whole ship was filled to brim with dragon eggs. They were various eggs of various species. They did not bother identifying them. They moved to loot everything out from the ships into their nest.
"How did they have so many eggs?" Hiccup wondered. He had counted them. There were thousands of them!
Scorpion was flying next to him. He was barking commands to the others. "Blow up that deck! Secure the cabins. Don't let any of them escape!"
More dragons swooped in and entered the ship. Dragons were moving in and out to grab the dragon eggs from the place. Scauldrons surrounded the ships. They pushed the hull and made sure that the ships were not going anywhere.
The Night Fury was concerned. He dove down to one of the ships and fired plasma blast to the lower hull. It put a hole onto the hull, revealing a huge deposit of eggs inside. Massive streams of eggs came out of the hole. Scauldrons immediately went to grab the falling eggs.
"There's more on the hull!" Hiccup shouted. "Burn the sail! Kill the Vikings inside. We're pushing the ships to our nest!"
Stoick was getting worried. The dragons destroyed the sails and the ships completely stopped moving. He assumed they had blown up the decks. Some dragons had moved to enter the ships, most likely through the damages they made.
"Should we sail to get the survivors?" Gobber asked, concerned.
Slowly, the ships started moving. He noticed several bumps on the ocean pressed against the hull. The dragons were pushing the ships. It was then the chief realised that the dragons had hijacked the ships.
"No." Stoick firmly spoke. "I don't think there would be any."
"Why would Hiccup attack those ships?" Spitelout wondered aloud.
"I don't know."
True to his assumption, the ship started accelerating to different direction. They watched as the ships turned around and began moving away from Berk.
Later that night, Hiccup and his dragons successfully moved the ships to one of the nest entrances. The dragons had looted and disassembled the ships. Everyone were horrified to find hundreds of thousands of eggs inside them.
"That should be… your eggs." Hiccup spoke, exhausted.
He had finished sorting the eggs with the dragons at the Nursery area. The Night Fury was in the medical sector, along with several other dragons and the Whispering Deaths. There was a pile of Whispering Death eggs that they had found in front of them.
The Whispering Death at the front bowed to him. "Thank you, Toothless." He thanked him. "That was all of them. Where did you find them?"
"We found them inside Dragon Hunter ships during our flight." Hiccup explained to them. "It was amongst hundreds of thousands of other eggs."
The dragons gasped. "That many eggs?"
Hiccup grimaced. He nodded. "Yes. We are currently sorting them out to see if we can find the owners of those eggs."
"We are indebted to you, Dark Chaser." The Whispering Death bowed to him. "We wish you luck on your situation."
"Thank you."
With that said, the Whispering Deaths moved to grab their eggs. They used their mouth to do so. After that, they flew out from the nest.
Hiccup spread his wings and fly up into the sky. He moved and entered a large cave way. It was the way towards the Nursery area. Exiting the cave way, he lowered himself and landed at the centre of the place.
The Nursery looked somewhat identical to the rest of the medical sector. However, there were hatchlings around the place. Dragons were flying around and sorting things for the nest.
On the ground area was the eggs. They were piled everywhere. Each pile were sorted by their colours and patterns. They were being sorted by the dragons. There was Obeah the Prickleboggle at the centre, overseeing the place.
Hiccup approached her. "Did you finished sorting them?"
Obeah looked at him. "Yes." She answered. "We also managed to identify them. There were a lot of dragon eggs around. Some of our dragons were willing to adopt them. We have our teams ready to take care of the orphans, in case we couldn't find the owner of those eggs."
Hiccup nodded. It was a similar scenario like many years before. "Any interesting eggs to note?"
The Prickleboggle looked hesitant. That made the Night Fury concerned. "What's wrong?"
"There were some eggs that we could not fully identify." She slowly spoke. "There were few of them. We had separated them to a cave when we couldn't find out what they were."
Hiccup slowly nodded. "I see." He responded. "Was there anything special to it?"
"I…" Obeah was hesitant. "It's best if you come with me and see for it yourself."
Hiccup and Obeah entered a cave. It was a medium-sized cave. The place was illuminated with crystals. There was nobody there but them.
At the centre of the cave, there was a pile of eggs. Hiccup did not recognise any of them. However, he noted that they were slightly bigger than most eggs he had seen before.
The Night Fury approached it. He sniffed the eggs and found unknown scents on them. He frowned. "I don't think I ever seen anything like this before." He commented.
Obeah was blocking the cave way. "The medical dragons were unable to identify the eggs." She spoke. "However, I recognise some of them."
"Why didn't you inform the others about it?"
"I kept it a secret because of what some of those eggs are." The Prickleboggle slowly spoke. She looked serious. "I would recognise it anywhere. One of them was a Tree Hugger egg."
Hiccup's eyes widened. He looked at the eggs. "Alpha dragon egg." He whispered.
Obeah nodded. "There were also Great King eggs, Red Death eggs…"
"They were all titans." Hiccup whispered. The Prickleboggle nodded sombrely.
They were silent for some time. Hiccup was processing the information that was in front of him. How did the Dragon Hunters managed to get their hands on alpha dragon eggs?
"Alpha, if I may."
Hiccup sharply looked at her. He had insisted everyone to call him 'Leader' unless it was something relating to his alpha status, or after his status as an alpha dragon was revealed. "Yes?"
"This is an opportunity for us to test your call." Obeah explained to him. "If we were to do this, we could become the superpower nest in the world."
"What do you mean?"
"Do you remember the time when you were at Berk for two years?" Obeah questioned.
"I do." Hiccup nodded.
"You delegated the immigration process to us." The Prickleboggle explained. "We learned that dragons could hold your call by having them close to us. We simply mentally request you to capture the dragons needed to be captured. However, the dragons must not have any calls on them beforehand for you to capture them."
The Night Fury nodded. It was how the immigration process was done when he was away.
"However, what you were not aware was the fact that some of the immigrating dragons were not supposed to be… captured." Obeah looked hesitant.
"What do you mean?" Hiccup frowned.
"During the initiation process, some of the dragons brought their hatchlings." Obeah explained to him. "When we requested a capture, it also captured the hatchlings."
That surprised Hiccup. "What?" He blankly spoke. "That doesn't make any sense. Hatchlings are immune to alpha call."
"I assure you; we were surprised as well." Obeah explained to him. "We thought the dragons simply looked young. However, it happened on other immigrated hatchlings. It goes as far as a newly hatched dragon."
That shocked the Night Fury. He sat on the floor, staring at her. "Their minds are not developed enough to hold a call." He numbly spoke.
"You are correct." Obeah nodded. "This is a mystery to us. How else do you explain their immediate obedience to your general nest commands?"
General nest commands was just as the name implied. They were general rules in the nest that everyone must obey. They were things like; do not kill other nest members, do not fight in the nest, and other such things. They would be pressured to serve Hiccup and the nest, unless they were too old or too young.
They stayed silent for some time. Then, Hiccup sadly chuckled. "Well, my call was already different than any other alpha dragon." He bitterly spoke. "I can already capture dragons unwillingly. Why not have me capturing hatchlings as well?"
Obeah stayed silent. The Night Fury let out a sigh. "… so how can it make our nest become world superpower?"
"We have yet made an experiment on this." The Prickleboggle slowly spoke. "I am under assumption that you can capture and control any dragons in existence. I would like to know how young of a dragon you can capture."
Hiccup knew what was being insinuated. "You want me to try to capture these eggs."
"Yes."
The Night Fury looked at the eggs. He hesitantly extended his call and moved to capture them. His eyes widened upon sensing responses coming from the egg. He pressed further and the eggs were instantly captured. When that was done, he could feel that those eggs were his dragons. Some of them even twitched a bit, as if they were excited to serve him.
That was too much for Hiccup. He limped to the ground as he stared at the eggs in shock. It came to his realisation that he had captured the eggs. However, they were not simply just eggs. They were titan dragon eggs!
Those dragons were meant to be rare! They typically become alpha dragons!
"I can see why you think it could make us become superpower." Hiccup weakly chuckled. "I could claim an egg before they could even make a choice!"
"Alpha." Obeah formally addressed him. "I would like to make a recommendation."
The Night Fury let out a sigh. He could see where it was going. "Go on ahead."
"If possible, you should capture all hatchlings and eggs in this nest." Obeah told him. "If my theory was correct, they would be undyingly loyal to you when they hatched and become adults."
"When did you become the general, Obeah?" Hiccup questioned.
"When I realised that we need to rise above everyone else." The Prickleboggle explained. "Ghost and Scorpion had informed me of this during our weekly protocol exercise. The alpha dragons were getting suspicious. They were starting to suspect that you were behind the death of Red Death."
Hiccup raised his eyebrows. He had read Ghost's mind about it before. He did not have any plan when other alpha dragons finally discovered his status. "What are you proposing?"
"I propose to capture all dragon eggs and hatchlings in this nest." Obeah formally spoke to him. "Additionally, I wanted to be able to add unrelated things to our invasion grocery lists."
Occasionally, his dragons would perform raid to Viking villages for resources on their own. They were usually handled primarily by Scorpion, with Ghost supporting them with information. The grocery list were list of things that they needed to get whenever they raided a village.
"… Granted." Hiccup finally spoke. "Any other things that I should be aware of?"
"If it is possible…" Obeah slowly spoke. "… you should try capturing alpha dragon."
That went too far. "No."
"It would ensure our victory-"
"Obeah." Hiccup interrupted. "Capturing and growing our own titan dragons are one thing. Capturing existing ones, especially another alpha dragon… that will start a war."
"Then let it be a war." The Prickleboggle firmly spoke. "We will rise above them."
"I never knew you as the warmonger type, Obeah." Hiccup dryly spoke.
"Alpha, please." Obeah pleaded.
Hiccup stared at the Prickleboggle in front of him. He could feel that she was determined to ensure the survival and safety of the nest. However, the method she was suggesting were unethical and immoral.
Then again, when did dragons ever care about morals and ethics?
All of them only care about surviving and growing their nest!
"… I will consider it." The Night Fury responded.
Obeah let out a relieved sigh. "Thank you, Alpha."
Hiccup grunted. He used his call to contact all dragons that held his call. Then, he informed them of what he had learned and ordered them to keep it a secret. Ignoring the shocked look from the Prickleboggle in front of him, he spread his call and instantly captured all hatchlings and eggs in his nests.
Thankfully, there were no visitors that time. The Great King nest were hosting an event and majority of dragons were there to see. Hiccup and his dragons was left to his own devices.
"There." Hiccup spoke, looking at Obeah. He pulled back his call after that was done. "It's done. Take care of the eggs. I'm going to sleep."
The Prickleboggle moved over as Hiccup went out through the cave way. Exiting the place, he noticed shocked expressions from dragons all around the Nursery section. The Night Fury rolled his eyes as he flew up to the air. Then, he took off and went out of the area.
He needed to think more about it.
Several months had passed.
After finding hundreds of thousands of eggs, Hiccup finally realised how dangerous the Dragon Hunters were. They somehow managed to get their hands on titan dragon eggs. It was absurd to think about.
Hiccup ordered his dragons to focus on keeping track on Dragon Hunters and raiding them. He saw them as a threat, as they could potentially amass a dragon army in the future. He wanted complete destruction of their bases as well as their deaths. They had to loot everything they could find in those bases and strip them from every possible resources.
He knew who they were and what they were. He did not want to take any chances.
In a somewhat related note, the nest had been drastically expanded. The dragon eggs he had captured were beginning to hatch. They expected them to start hatching in a few months. Strange enough, the titan dragon eggs were about to hatch as well. It would be interesting for them to raise titan dragon species in the nest.
When the Secret nest were openly attacking the Dragon Hunters, other nests were curious as to why they were attacking them. Hiccup expected some to ask him that. As such, he informed them that they had attacked and took his dragons' eggs.
It was technically a lie – not that they knew about it. The Whispering Deaths had come back and joined his nest, along with several Screaming Deaths. The Dragon Hunters did take their eggs. He intentionally neglected to tell them that they become his dragons after they rescued them.
The alpha dragon nests had yet learned of their attacks against Dragon Hunters. However, it would not be long for them to learn about it.
Hiccup and Obeah had been experimenting with his call. There were interesting things that they found during their experiments-
"Leader!"
Hiccup looked up. He was in his throne room. At the doorway, Ghost had come running towards him. He stopped when he was close enough and stood there. "Leader, we found him."
Hiccup raised his eyebrows. "Grimmel the Grisly?"
"Yes." Ghost nodded. "Alvin and Dagur had found him. They are currently travelling away from Northern Market as we speak."
That significantly improved his mood. Hiccup stood up. "Get back to your post." He spoke, smirking. He began walking down from the elevated platform. "I will deal with this… personally."
Hiccup and Luna were back up in the air. The 18-year-old man was in his human form, sitting at the back of the Light Fury. They were flying up high in the sky, looking for something. Both were invisible in the sky.
Luna was one of the dragons that had most of dragon magic abilities. He had authorised her a lot of abilities for her to use. Silent invisibility was one of them.
Hiccup looked around. Then, he spotted something in the sky at a distance. "There."
Luna looked under them. There, they see a flying contraption. The contraption was a tube-shaped metallic cage, hoisted by four metal cranes that were held up by four dragons. There were two dragons guarding it. Those dragons were all Deathgrippers.
Inside the cages were three humans. The two were familiar; Dagur and Alvin. The other one was someone that Hiccup recognised. It was Grimmel the Grisly. The man was a middle-aged man, with grey hair, pale skin and sharp chin. He was tall and slender for his age.
"Is that the man?" Luna asked, glaring at the contraption.
"Yes." Hiccup nodded. He narrowed his eyes. "The man who drove Night Fury into extinction."
They stayed somewhat afar from their target. Luna stayed right on top of the contraptions. "What should we do?" She asked.
"Let's see if he knows much about dragons as I do." Hiccup smirked. He extended his call to capture all six Deathgrippers.
It was successful. He tried commanding them, but they seemed to struggle a bit. That seemed to confuse the humans inside the contraption. Hiccup frowned. He noticed the collars on their neck. His eyes widened upon realising what had happened. "He used their venoms to control them."
Hiccup recognised the symptoms. It was not surprising, considering he had Scorpion to study Deathgrippers with.
"That doesn't sound good." Luna commented.
"Good thing I'm unusual then." Hiccup remarked. He used his call to grip onto the Deathgripper's mind. The dragons' eyes glazed over. They stopped moving and started hovering there. Because they control the contraption, it also stopped there.
It was an ability that Hiccup discovered together with Obeah during her experiments. He could directly control dragons with his call. It bypassed through their consciousness and memories, ignoring all mind affliction that might had affected them. They would do and say nothing but follow Hiccup's order.
It was useful on stopping rampaging dragons.
Hiccup mentally ordered the two hovering dragons to rip all the weapons off from them. The two Deathgrippers screeched as they attacked the airship. They ripped some contraptions off the airship. Then, they moved and ripped the weapons off the humans. After some time, the dragons stayed back and hovered.
Luna and Hiccup turned visible. The dragon flew down and hovered right in front of them. The three humans were surprised to see them. "Hi!"
Alvin and Dagur were staring at him with fearful expression. Grimmel narrowed his eyes. "You must be the Dragon Conqueror."
Hiccup smirked. "You must be Grimmel the Grisly. The famed Night Fury killer."
"How did you find us?" Alvin asked, shocked to see them there.
The dragon rider snorted. "You think you can escape from me?" He chuckled. "No. I let you live long enough to serve a purpose."
Hiccup looked at the Deathgrippers. "Bring them down to that island."
The dragons obeyed. They flew down to a nearby island down below. Everyone landed at the shore. Hiccup jumped off the Light Fury, while Alvin, Dagur and Grimmel walked out of the airship.
The Deathgrippers landed right behind Hiccup. Luna moved to burn off the restraints and contraptions off the dragons. The dragon hunter was curious. "How did you control my dragons?"
"Well, they call me Dragon Conqueror for a reason." Hiccup drawled. Then, he looked at Alvin and Dagur. "Thanks for leading me to him. You wouldn't believe how tempted it was to just simply kill you. I see my patience was greatly rewarded."
The dragon hunter glared at Alvin and Dagur. The two looked nervous. Grimmel looked back at Hiccup. He crossed his arms. "What do you want from me?"
"You and I were a lot similar than you think." Hiccup started. He slowly began circling them. "You live for the hunt. You breathe for the hunt. The lone Dragon Hunter who went lengths to get what he wanted. I can very much see myself in you."
Grimmel frowned. "You worked with Drago Bludvist?"
Hiccup did not recognise the name. "I'm afraid I'm not aware of him." He replied. "But thanks for telling me. I'll take a note on that."
That made the dragon hunter laugh. "You can control dragons, but you don't know Drago?" He asked. "Glad to know we have two different madmen trying to control the dragons."
Hiccup stopped. He stood where he was before. "No, no. I'm not trying to control the dragons." He briefly looked back. Luna had finished releasing and healing the Deathgrippers. They looked relaxed and better than before. The Light Fury looked at him and nodded.
He looked at Grimmel. "Trying implies I'm having trouble with it." Hiccup replied, smirking. "I don't even need to try." He snapped his finger. The Deathgrippers came forward and formed a half circle around the three humans. "See? They're responding to me."
The three humans took a step back. They were somewhat intimidated by the dragons that had turned their claws against them. The dragon hunter gritted his teeth. "Let's cut the chase. What do you want from me?"
"That's for me to know and for you to find out." Hiccup smirked. Seeing their reactions, he shouted. "Get him, boys!"
Luna took off into the air. The Deathgrippers came charging forward. The three humans took off into the woods as they dodged acids that were spit by the dragons. The Deathgrippers took off into the air, moving around to chase their target. Explosions and fire started to rage around the forest as the dragons began chasing after them.
While they were busy, Hiccup moved to check the airship. It was fascinating to him. It had some moving parts around. Some sandbags, chains and other contraptions were attached to it. It was surprisingly large for something that looked small.
The man entered the airship. He hummed as he observed the surroundings. There was a closed crate attached onto the inner hull. He moved to open the crate. Inside, he saw stacks of unlabelled books. It was nearly full of them.
Hiccup picked up one of them and opened it. Based on the pages, he realised that it was a journal. Specifically, those were Grimmel's journals. His eyes widened upon seeing it. Flipping more pages, he saw more and more information that was completely unknown to him.
The man had information about all sorts of dragons, contraptions, general designs and various other things. There were even ideas of putting weapons and armour onto dragons. It was far beyond his usual experiments at the forge.
The information was extremely valuable. It could boost his research on all assortments of contraptions. He could increase the efficiency of his dragons in the nest. There were even ideas and sketches of possible way to mass produce them.
Hiccup pocketed the journal. He began looting the journals and putting them into his backpack. When that was done, he began looking around the place to get more valuables. There were more books hidden in the airship – some were slipped around the top side, few were hidden inside the flooring, and others were inside small compartments amongst other junks.
After finished looting them, his backpack was full. He firmly closed it and wore it on his back. He heard wings batting. He looked out to see that the dragons had returned. They had the humans on their clutch.
Hiccup walked out from the airship. The dragons dropped the humans onto the ground and landed close by. The teen approached them. They were still alive, but they had stab wounds on them. Those were Deathgripper stabs, meaning that they were paralyzed by their poison.
Luna landed next to him. "They shouldn't be moving for some time."
The teen heard a groan from the dragon hunter. He saw another journal on his back pocket. Hiccup moved and grabbed the journal off from him. "Thank you."
Grimmel raised his head from the ground. He looked up and glared at him. "You came here just to rob me?"
"Well, I couldn't resist." Hiccup shrugged as he pocketed the journal. "You had a lot of things with you. I'm taking those for myself."
The dragon hunter gave him a deadpan look. "We could've made a deal together." He offered. "You control dragons. I hunt dragons. We could've shared instead of doing this."
"Tempting, but no." Hiccup shrugged once more. He moved and stood next to Luna. "Thanks for the offer, tho."
Three Deathgrippers came forward. They raised their stingers, before stabbing them into the three downed humans. The humans' eyes went wide, as more venom entered their bloodstream. After some time, the lights went out from their eyes. They were finally dead.
The dragons pulled their stingers. They breathed in and spit acid to the dead body. It instantly lit on fire the moment it touched them. Hiccup looked away as the body were being burned to ashes.
After some time, Hiccup walked away. The dragons followed behind him. He put some distance between himself and the burning body. The forest was burning, but it did not matter to him.
Hiccup let out a sigh. "That's one loose end solved." He muttered.
"What are you going to do with those Sharp Strikers?" Luna questioned.
Hiccup stopped and turned around. The Deathgrippers stopped in front of him. The man released the grasp on their mind. They were still holding onto his call, however. The dragons blinked. They took a step back and bowed down to him. "Alpha."
"You are free to go." Hiccup ordered.
The dragons looked up. They looked hesitant. Hiccup frowned. "What's wrong?"
"Where do you want us to go?" One of the Deathgrippers asked.
"Anywhere." Hiccup answered. "Don't you have a place somewhere?"
The dragons looked at each other, still looked unsure. Then, Luna realised something. "I don't think they really have anywhere to go." She suggested. "They probably had been poisoned by Grimmel for so long, they don't even know themselves."
Hiccup thought that made sense. "Well, Scorpion probably have a field day for this." He replied. Then, he transformed to his dragon form, surprising the six Deathgrippers. "Let's go. Follow me."
With that, the dragons flew up into the sky. They headed off towards the Secret nest.