- Joined
- Aug 17, 2022
Right, so; did a bit more digging through the bowels of the internet, got a few more chapters of The Twin Fires - and another author - to mock. With the DDOS now gone, hopefully it means I can update a bit more, but... well, a lot of this shit is pretty rough to read, for a number of reasons, and things are picking up on my end with my personal and professional life.
So, let's ring in 2024 with some more messed up shit, shall we?
Regardless of how you view it; it's part of this Twin Fires story, which means that it's going to suck.
Speaking of: I'm going to go ahead and summarize the next several chapters of this story, and then go ahead and post a small bit on both SL249 as well as another author I'm looking at. Gonna be a short update tonight; my apologizes, but I've been busy.
And with that, I think I'm going to call it quits on this session; my apologizes, but things have been intense on my end, with Christmas and New Year's stuff going on, so I kinda had to cut this one several chapters shorter than I intended for New Year's. I will be coming back to this one in the future, once things settle down a bit more; believe me, this story just gets worse and worse the farther you go in.
Actually, I am curious; what are you guys thinking about the review so far? Any thoughts?
Also, for tonight's update, I wanted to bring something up about ShadowLugia249; namely, I think I might have a story chosen for the review - Latexed Lugia, which is basically a fetish story about a guy who buys a living Lugia balloon - though I am still looking. I am going to be making the review on this pile of shit later, most likely after I'm done with this story and the unfinished sequel.
Lastly, I got another author for us. Much like ShadowLugia249 above, this guy got mentioned here on the site previously, but there hasn't been much else written about him; guy's name is TombFyre. He's a fairly old member of the fandom, but contrary to many furries from the late 1990s/early 2000s, he's actually still REALLY popular and fairly active with the fandom these days. The guy's known for two things; 1. writing a ton of human-hating furry fetish fics, and 2. blindly supporting guys like Trudeau - yes, Tomb is Canadian - while supporting violence towards the political right. Guy's a certified loon, and I'll be giving his stories their own update; got 4-5 of them to review, so it's going to be a doozy.
So, let's ring in 2024 with some more messed up shit, shall we?
Regardless of how you view it; it's part of this Twin Fires story, which means that it's going to suck.
Speaking of: I'm going to go ahead and summarize the next several chapters of this story, and then go ahead and post a small bit on both SL249 as well as another author I'm looking at. Gonna be a short update tonight; my apologizes, but I've been busy.
Starting an unconfirmed morning period after the attack on Paris, we get introduced to a new character: Jerome Lebois, a journalist who's sole characteristics are "Asshole" and "lazy". Starting off in his office, which is apparently still in France from what I can gather, we get a brief overview of the place - it being filled with trash and old food boxes, and generally unkept, with the story itself stating that it shows that Jerome is lazy - before we introduced to Jerome's stereotypically angry landlord, who is angry because our new protagonist is two weeks behind on rent. Jerome, naturally, decides to be an asshole and start cracking jokes about it; the landlord promptly threatens to kick the guy out in a week if he isn't paid, Jerome blows him off and closes his door, briefly whining about his money situation since his wife recently divorced him, and then decides to just turn on the TV to get some ideas on how to make money.
I wish I was joking, but that's our introduction:
Naturally given the recent events, every channel is talking about the dragon, with Jerome mocking various people for trying to come up with increasingly-stereotypical ideas - i.e., the dragon was a government project, or a sign from God, etc., along with a brief mention of the dragon's interview with the French President. We also get a brief interview from both Leon - the riot officer that I mentioned back in chapter 5, turns out he's a military commander, my mistake - and another interview with a new character: Eva Mesman, a Dutch scientist who is part of a team that it trying to study the creature, but hasn't been able to get anything conclusive about the creature as of yet. After watching some cell phone footage of the event, as well as confirmation that the dragon was last seen in the town of Le Harve, Jerome decides to get in his car and try to find the dragon himself, so he can... conduct an interview with the city-destroying monster.
...
Right, I'm... just going to grab a drink for myself real quick, be right back...
Anyways... Jerome starts driving to Le Harve, and after briefly stopping to converse with a farmer trying to board up his house as protection - who confirms that the dragon conveniently landed a short distance away in a field, with Jerome "thanking" him by basically mocking the guy for thinking that wood would protect against the thing - Jerome finds the Chromatic Red Dragon asleep. There are several other journalists there, who are all ducked behind a stone wall that conveniently borders the field for some reason; Jerome chats with them, and despite their warnings not to make too much noise, he decides to walk right up to the sleeping dragon and wake it up.
From there, we get a rather jarring POV switch to Thomas, the misanthropic dragon in question; he wakes up, and immediately notices his reflection in a nearby lake that was never brought up beforehand. We get a description of the character starring at his own reflection, as well as doing some reflecting on recent events; just before Thomas comes to an epiphany and maybe acknowledges that he was a monster, however, Jerome decides to interrupt and demand his little interview. Surprisingly enough, Thomas doesn't immediately roast the guy, and instead starts answering a few basic questions; name ("Tholaxxius"), where are you from ("from the North"), why hasn't humanity heard/met more of your kind ("humanity doesn't know as much as they think"), any hobbies ("used to play chess"). With that, the two depart; Thomas notices some tanks approaching, and promptly flees, with the possible implication that Jerome just ruined a sneak attack that could have killed the homicidal dragon outright. Meanwhile, Jerome just walks off, completely unfazed by everything and apparently not getting stopped/detained by the rapidly approaching military; while walking, he passes by another one of the journalists, who recognizes him, and ruins Jerome's good mood by bringing up the "RM-5" incident that I don't remember ever getting explained in the story itself. End Chapter.
I wish I was joking, but that's our introduction:
The small office gave a rather unkempt outlook, the shutters were closed, allowing little sunlight to stream into the room, the stacks of old newspapers lined against the walls, the empty pizza boxes and take away Chinese cartons indicated that the owner was living neither healthy or clean. This sorry excuse of an office belonged to the French freelance journalist Jerome Lebois. The journalist was about to pour himself his fourth glass of cognac that day when the door was almost knocked out of it's hinges.
"Jerome! I know you're in there! Open up!"
Jerome recognized that voice, it belonged to the landlord and it seemed he was in a pleasant mood today, well, compared to his usual mood. No doubt he had been drinking sour wine again "Chateau Migraine" by the sound of it. Jerome opened the door and stood face to face with a bear of a man. Jerome always found that the landlord looked somewhat like a modern day Viking with his long blonde hair, he even had the attitude of one to match, pillaging and raiding the wallets of his renters.
Bonjour copain! Jerome greeted the landlord with a radiant smile which only seemed to annoy the burly man even more. "Jerome! You are two weeks late with your rent! Why haven't I gotten my money yet?" he asked threateningly.
Jerome didn't show any signs of distress and added cheerfully. "That's a simple one, you haven't gotten any money because I haven't send any? Easy, what did I win?" Jerome watched the landlords face turn from red to blue and then purple, great, was he going through the whole rainbow? Maybe he should take a step back in case he exploded. When his face had reached the color of a cooked lobster the landlord began to scream again.
"That's it! I'm getting tired of you Jerome, if I don't have my money by the end of the week I'll kick you lazy behind out! Did you hear me." Jerome nodded. "I heard you, and so did probably everyone else in this building. Don't worry Goldilocks, you'll get your money. Au revoir copain" with that he slammed the door shut.
Get the money, get the money? He had none, his lovely ex-wife got the money and he got...well, not much. Jerome was the type that only worked when he absolutely had to, it would appear this was one of those times. With a weary sigh he picked up the remote and switched his old TV on, maybe that would give him some ideas. Of course, he could have guessed it, only one thing on TV now, every single channel was talking about the same thing.
"Ah yes, the big bad "dragon" who has everyone worked up."
"Jerome! I know you're in there! Open up!"
Jerome recognized that voice, it belonged to the landlord and it seemed he was in a pleasant mood today, well, compared to his usual mood. No doubt he had been drinking sour wine again "Chateau Migraine" by the sound of it. Jerome opened the door and stood face to face with a bear of a man. Jerome always found that the landlord looked somewhat like a modern day Viking with his long blonde hair, he even had the attitude of one to match, pillaging and raiding the wallets of his renters.
Bonjour copain! Jerome greeted the landlord with a radiant smile which only seemed to annoy the burly man even more. "Jerome! You are two weeks late with your rent! Why haven't I gotten my money yet?" he asked threateningly.
Jerome didn't show any signs of distress and added cheerfully. "That's a simple one, you haven't gotten any money because I haven't send any? Easy, what did I win?" Jerome watched the landlords face turn from red to blue and then purple, great, was he going through the whole rainbow? Maybe he should take a step back in case he exploded. When his face had reached the color of a cooked lobster the landlord began to scream again.
"That's it! I'm getting tired of you Jerome, if I don't have my money by the end of the week I'll kick you lazy behind out! Did you hear me." Jerome nodded. "I heard you, and so did probably everyone else in this building. Don't worry Goldilocks, you'll get your money. Au revoir copain" with that he slammed the door shut.
Get the money, get the money? He had none, his lovely ex-wife got the money and he got...well, not much. Jerome was the type that only worked when he absolutely had to, it would appear this was one of those times. With a weary sigh he picked up the remote and switched his old TV on, maybe that would give him some ideas. Of course, he could have guessed it, only one thing on TV now, every single channel was talking about the same thing.
"Ah yes, the big bad "dragon" who has everyone worked up."
Naturally given the recent events, every channel is talking about the dragon, with Jerome mocking various people for trying to come up with increasingly-stereotypical ideas - i.e., the dragon was a government project, or a sign from God, etc., along with a brief mention of the dragon's interview with the French President. We also get a brief interview from both Leon - the riot officer that I mentioned back in chapter 5, turns out he's a military commander, my mistake - and another interview with a new character: Eva Mesman, a Dutch scientist who is part of a team that it trying to study the creature, but hasn't been able to get anything conclusive about the creature as of yet. After watching some cell phone footage of the event, as well as confirmation that the dragon was last seen in the town of Le Harve, Jerome decides to get in his car and try to find the dragon himself, so he can... conduct an interview with the city-destroying monster.
...
Right, I'm... just going to grab a drink for myself real quick, be right back...
Anyways... Jerome starts driving to Le Harve, and after briefly stopping to converse with a farmer trying to board up his house as protection - who confirms that the dragon conveniently landed a short distance away in a field, with Jerome "thanking" him by basically mocking the guy for thinking that wood would protect against the thing - Jerome finds the Chromatic Red Dragon asleep. There are several other journalists there, who are all ducked behind a stone wall that conveniently borders the field for some reason; Jerome chats with them, and despite their warnings not to make too much noise, he decides to walk right up to the sleeping dragon and wake it up.
From there, we get a rather jarring POV switch to Thomas, the misanthropic dragon in question; he wakes up, and immediately notices his reflection in a nearby lake that was never brought up beforehand. We get a description of the character starring at his own reflection, as well as doing some reflecting on recent events; just before Thomas comes to an epiphany and maybe acknowledges that he was a monster, however, Jerome decides to interrupt and demand his little interview. Surprisingly enough, Thomas doesn't immediately roast the guy, and instead starts answering a few basic questions; name ("Tholaxxius"), where are you from ("from the North"), why hasn't humanity heard/met more of your kind ("humanity doesn't know as much as they think"), any hobbies ("used to play chess"). With that, the two depart; Thomas notices some tanks approaching, and promptly flees, with the possible implication that Jerome just ruined a sneak attack that could have killed the homicidal dragon outright. Meanwhile, Jerome just walks off, completely unfazed by everything and apparently not getting stopped/detained by the rapidly approaching military; while walking, he passes by another one of the journalists, who recognizes him, and ruins Jerome's good mood by bringing up the "RM-5" incident that I don't remember ever getting explained in the story itself. End Chapter.
Another new POV character; taking place in a monastery over in Tibet, we are introduced to a new character, Li Jeng, who has turned 20 and is about to become a full member of a group known as "The Order of the Golden Sun". We get several walls of poorly formatted text detailing her appearance, her backstory, how she was an orphan, and how her master Huang took her in and raised her in the monastery when her parents died. She also talks about dragons; specifically, the Golden Dragon/Lung, and how it has great significance to Chinese myth and such.
I don't think you could've foreshadowed much harder...
Anyways, after several poorly formatted paragraphs detailing Li getting ready for her initiation and talking about myths, she finally gets summoned to the monastery courtyard, where... Huang, and only Huang, is there. He promptly informs her that she has a "different path to walk", before taking a deeply confused Li to another part of the monastery; the two start to converse, with Huang asking Li to repeat what she knows of the monastery's history. We get a bit of storytelling; Li states that the monastery follows the "Way of the Dragon," which states that acquiring knowledge is the true path to enlightenment, and that this path, according to myth, was started by none other than the dragon themselves. However, the dragons eventually had to leave because...
...
TL;DR: "The dragons are the real good guyz who had to teach humans in secret because HUMANS ARE DA REAL MAWNSTERZZZZZ!!!1!"
Anyways, after that little bit of preaching, Huang confirms that yes, those "myths" are true, that the dragons either went into hiding or were killed off by humans using "science and logic", and that the Order was waiting for the day the dragons would come back. Huang confirms, after several more paragraphs of text, that that time is now; unfortunately, over in Europe, a certain red dragon has woken up apparently early, and is going on a rampage. Hence, the Order feels the need to stop it, to both help there be a new peace between mankind and dragons, and to stop a violent lunatic. However, there Order itself can't fight it; they need a dragon on their side.
You guys probably know what's going to happen next.
Huang reveals that Li is a dragon, and reveals that the ancient dragons took human forms to better hide amongst humans - fuck, this really is a rip-off of D&D, isn't it? Huang reveals that the ancient dragons created special chambers that could only be opened by those with dragon souls - Otherkin, anybody? - and that each of these chambers contained a vial of dragon blood which, when consumed, would turn the individual into a dragon. Naturally, Li is encouraged to open the chamber by Huang, and she opens it by slamming her bare hand onto a stone pedestal; the chamber opens, revealing the dragon blood, and after getting encouraged by Huang, Li promptly drinks it.
Another unnecessarily detailed transformation occurs, ending with Li turning into a giant gold dragoness. After a brief conversation with Huang to make sure she isn't too disorientated, Li decides to pretty much immediately test her new body out by... throwing herself off a cliff, so she can fly. Naturally, she's able to do so immediately with no issue; after flying back up to the monastery, Huang decides to teach her the fundamentals of dragon combat, including how to breathe fire. After a brief training montage, the duo decides to retire for the night.
The following morning, the duo gets up to discover that the people of a nearby village that wasn't mentioned until now have come up to the monastery to "ask for the Gold Dragon's blessing," having noticed Li when she went flying yesterday. After handling the crowd, Huang decides to give the next lesson; shapeshifting back into a human, which she's able to do pretty much immediately again... sans clothing.
After that, we get a poorly written time skip of several weeks that apparently involved more training, and Huang finally sends her off to go fight the red dragon. Her gives her one last gift - a golden pendant - and the two depart; Li flies off to fight - despite the fact that it was never actually confirmed where Thomas was at this point, especially with a several week time skip, other than "over in Europe" - while Huang watches her go, before leaving to contact "an old friend." End Chapter.
(Also, for the curious, I didn't cut anything involving other Order members; no other monks ever showed up in this chapter. It's a bit weird, frankly.)
I don't think you could've foreshadowed much harder...
Anyways, after several poorly formatted paragraphs detailing Li getting ready for her initiation and talking about myths, she finally gets summoned to the monastery courtyard, where... Huang, and only Huang, is there. He promptly informs her that she has a "different path to walk", before taking a deeply confused Li to another part of the monastery; the two start to converse, with Huang asking Li to repeat what she knows of the monastery's history. We get a bit of storytelling; Li states that the monastery follows the "Way of the Dragon," which states that acquiring knowledge is the true path to enlightenment, and that this path, according to myth, was started by none other than the dragon themselves. However, the dragons eventually had to leave because...
..."Throughout history dragons and human beings have been unable to live peacefully side by side. As a result, mankind has not been able to benefit from the ancient dragon knowledge.Man's craving for power and religious beliefs have kept the world engulfed in interminable and bloody struggles. The dragon kings could not understand the reasons for man's self-destructive behavior, and kept well out of the way, retreating to remote hiding places far from all this confusion. Shrouded in mystery, the dragon's trail remained lost in the obscurity of legend.
However, the dragons secretly pursued their quest for knowledge without completely excluding the human race, since they accepted and taught those few men who sought the essence of truth. These few, these chosen ones are we, the Order of the Golden Sun."
(Yes, this is how the original text was formatted.)
However, the dragons secretly pursued their quest for knowledge without completely excluding the human race, since they accepted and taught those few men who sought the essence of truth. These few, these chosen ones are we, the Order of the Golden Sun."
(Yes, this is how the original text was formatted.)
TL;DR: "The dragons are the real good guyz who had to teach humans in secret because HUMANS ARE DA REAL MAWNSTERZZZZZ!!!1!"
Anyways, after that little bit of preaching, Huang confirms that yes, those "myths" are true, that the dragons either went into hiding or were killed off by humans using "science and logic", and that the Order was waiting for the day the dragons would come back. Huang confirms, after several more paragraphs of text, that that time is now; unfortunately, over in Europe, a certain red dragon has woken up apparently early, and is going on a rampage. Hence, the Order feels the need to stop it, to both help there be a new peace between mankind and dragons, and to stop a violent lunatic. However, there Order itself can't fight it; they need a dragon on their side.
You guys probably know what's going to happen next.
Huang reveals that Li is a dragon, and reveals that the ancient dragons took human forms to better hide amongst humans - fuck, this really is a rip-off of D&D, isn't it? Huang reveals that the ancient dragons created special chambers that could only be opened by those with dragon souls - Otherkin, anybody? - and that each of these chambers contained a vial of dragon blood which, when consumed, would turn the individual into a dragon. Naturally, Li is encouraged to open the chamber by Huang, and she opens it by slamming her bare hand onto a stone pedestal; the chamber opens, revealing the dragon blood, and after getting encouraged by Huang, Li promptly drinks it.
Another unnecessarily detailed transformation occurs, ending with Li turning into a giant gold dragoness. After a brief conversation with Huang to make sure she isn't too disorientated, Li decides to pretty much immediately test her new body out by... throwing herself off a cliff, so she can fly. Naturally, she's able to do so immediately with no issue; after flying back up to the monastery, Huang decides to teach her the fundamentals of dragon combat, including how to breathe fire. After a brief training montage, the duo decides to retire for the night.
The following morning, the duo gets up to discover that the people of a nearby village that wasn't mentioned until now have come up to the monastery to "ask for the Gold Dragon's blessing," having noticed Li when she went flying yesterday. After handling the crowd, Huang decides to give the next lesson; shapeshifting back into a human, which she's able to do pretty much immediately again... sans clothing.
After that, we get a poorly written time skip of several weeks that apparently involved more training, and Huang finally sends her off to go fight the red dragon. Her gives her one last gift - a golden pendant - and the two depart; Li flies off to fight - despite the fact that it was never actually confirmed where Thomas was at this point, especially with a several week time skip, other than "over in Europe" - while Huang watches her go, before leaving to contact "an old friend." End Chapter.
(Also, for the curious, I didn't cut anything involving other Order members; no other monks ever showed up in this chapter. It's a bit weird, frankly.)
Fuck me, I remember this one a bit too well.
The chapter opens with Thomas flying over the English Channel, looking for a place to make a lair; bear in mind, we still don't have a consistent timeframe for this, so who knows how long it's been since the Paris attack. Anyways, we get a brief talk about Thomas flying, as well as some more misanthropy with the twat talking about how humans bother him and are "too developed," as well as finding it "pathetic" that they would really send soldiers and tanks to fight him, since he's "so superior", and I swear, I'm going to end up drinking myself into an early grave at this point.
Anyways, we get a bit more of the loon talking about his current desire for finding a shelter and how much he enjoys his power, when his thoughts suddenly get interrupted by a group of four jets flying in to kill him. Led by "Kaboose," a pilot who was always last in line-up, the group consists of "Shaker," a guy who refused to shake hands with his squad commander and was something of an idiot with a stereotypical Scottish accent, "Drone," an emotionless female pilot, and "Beagle," a pilot who's really excitable; these four actually managed to basically defeat the dragon in open combat, with Thomas constantly trying to flee the battle like a little bitch and only able to really knock down Beagle's plane in retaliation... with said piolet being able to easily eject to safety.
Unfortunately, just before Kaboose was able to finish the dragon off, a civilian airliner suddenly and conveniently comes flying into the area, giving Thomas something to hide behind. Unable to dislodge the dragon, the four piolets are basically left sitting ducks getting blasted out of the sky and are eventually forced to retreat; once the pilots leave, Thomas immediately destroys the civilian plane, killing everyone on board, apparently just for kicks.
We get stuck back with Thomas's POV, with the loon flying all the way to the coast of Moracco in North Africa, against headwinds; despite damn-near getting killed, the dragon was apparently able to make the journey, finding a convenient cave complex to make a lair at the Toubkal Mountain. We get a few again poorly formatted paragraphs about our dragon talking about how great the place was for a lair, noting that the "human stink" meant that humans frequently came there and that he could get free meals by killing and eating them, as well as a bit about him taking a few days to relax and organize his treasure.
Oh, yeah; remember that bit in Chapter 5 where Thomas was mentioned to have been looting the museum? Apparently, he's been carrying a crap-ton of valuables with him this entire time; how did he carry it all? By eating it... meaning that for him to have organized it in his cave he would have had to... get it out, somehow.
Yeah, I'm just moving on...
Anyways, after that shit, Thomas ends up suddenly having a mysterious vision while sleeping one night; he gets confronted by a voice telling him to go to "Hullenhoshi" and to "fulfill his charge." After waking up, Thomas briefly ponders about what the hell that was about, not knowing what "Hullenhoshi" was, before deciding to bully a nearby human village into doing the research for him, stating that he won't do it himself because he's superior. This plot point is pretty much immediately dropped in favor of more dull villain crap.
This is followed up by several more paragraphs of Thomas briefly examining the area; eventually, he flies down to a village of farmers, and immediately commands them to worship him or be killed. They immediately do so, and we get several more paragraphs of how Thomas, known by another nickname of "Al Tineen"/"The Dragon" was going around and terrorizing the countryside. Eventually, the king and parliament of the area, in the capital city of Rabat, decide to handle the dragon by... sending someone up there to negotiate with it. The unlucky fucker was Hasan, an envoy of the fifth prince of Morocco, who arrives in the dragon's lair with no backup or gear other than a tuxedo and suitcase full of documents. He converses with the dragon a bit, and invites the loon to the palace of Prince Izmir, for negotiations. Thomas decides to humor the guy and agree... before immediately and graphicly killing Hasan while the envoy is begging for mercy. Thomas then decides to take a nap.
The following day, Thomas flies over to Izmir's palace, which was prepared for the arrival of the dragon. Thomas lands in the gardens, scaring the crap out of most of the people present, while the prince, given a brief description of "middle aged man with black hair, wearing a suit with an expensive brooch," rises to greet the dragon. After a brief introduction, Izmir commences the little party, in which Thomas immediately starts hogging the food for himself, while everyone else, except Izmir, is shown to be in constant terror of the monster.
Anyways, after a few paragraphs of words, Izmir clears the area, and then walks up to a pedestal and recites a poem he made:
Anyways, after the random poem, of which Thomas shows absolutely no respect to, the servants promptly bring out dessert for the human guests, while Thomas decides to kill and eat one of the servants. After that little display, Izmir calls Thomas over to play chess - Jerome's interview apparently got published - and the duo promptly converse. Izmir reveals that he summoned Thomas because there's a "political situation" that the prince wants handled, and he wants to recruit Thomas to his side; more specifically, he wants the king assassinated. Thomas is initially skeptical, until Izmir has his servants present the dragon with a gigantic golden bracer, which the dragon immediately puts on without a second thought; afterwards, the two depart, with Izmir allowing Thomas to head back to his cave to think on the issue.
The following day, several more of Izmir's servant arrive at Thomas's lair to invite the lunatic back; Thomas agrees to come, graphically kills both of them - we get more "lovely" descriptions of how the dragon savored their deaths and made them painful - then flies to the king's palace, where he demands to speak with the guy. The king reluctantly comes out, Thomas immediately incinerates the guy, we get another "lovely" description of the man burning in agony, and the dragon promptly heads back to Izmir's palace to report.
Izmir immediately begins celebrating, as it means that he is now automatically king, apparently, while Thomas starts to argue that his end of the bargain in fullfilled. However, Izmir reveals that the bracer that Thomas oh-so-greedily put on contains a bomb that'll detonate and kill the dragon the moment he tries to remove it or defy the guy; this pretty much instantly changes Thomas's attitude. From there, Izmir proceeds to reveal that he somehow knows that Thomas used to be a human, and that while humanity used to be the slaves of dragons, now the humans will be the masters. Furthermore, he also knows about the Order of the Golden Sun, stating that it will be reborn as people who will properly control the dragons, that the reborn Order will take over the world, as well as the fact that he somehow knows about Li Jeng coming to kill Thomas... despite the golden dragoness being headed towards Europe, not Africa. End Chapter.
The chapter opens with Thomas flying over the English Channel, looking for a place to make a lair; bear in mind, we still don't have a consistent timeframe for this, so who knows how long it's been since the Paris attack. Anyways, we get a brief talk about Thomas flying, as well as some more misanthropy with the twat talking about how humans bother him and are "too developed," as well as finding it "pathetic" that they would really send soldiers and tanks to fight him, since he's "so superior", and I swear, I'm going to end up drinking myself into an early grave at this point.
Anyways, we get a bit more of the loon talking about his current desire for finding a shelter and how much he enjoys his power, when his thoughts suddenly get interrupted by a group of four jets flying in to kill him. Led by "Kaboose," a pilot who was always last in line-up, the group consists of "Shaker," a guy who refused to shake hands with his squad commander and was something of an idiot with a stereotypical Scottish accent, "Drone," an emotionless female pilot, and "Beagle," a pilot who's really excitable; these four actually managed to basically defeat the dragon in open combat, with Thomas constantly trying to flee the battle like a little bitch and only able to really knock down Beagle's plane in retaliation... with said piolet being able to easily eject to safety.
Unfortunately, just before Kaboose was able to finish the dragon off, a civilian airliner suddenly and conveniently comes flying into the area, giving Thomas something to hide behind. Unable to dislodge the dragon, the four piolets are basically left sitting ducks getting blasted out of the sky and are eventually forced to retreat; once the pilots leave, Thomas immediately destroys the civilian plane, killing everyone on board, apparently just for kicks.
We get stuck back with Thomas's POV, with the loon flying all the way to the coast of Moracco in North Africa, against headwinds; despite damn-near getting killed, the dragon was apparently able to make the journey, finding a convenient cave complex to make a lair at the Toubkal Mountain. We get a few again poorly formatted paragraphs about our dragon talking about how great the place was for a lair, noting that the "human stink" meant that humans frequently came there and that he could get free meals by killing and eating them, as well as a bit about him taking a few days to relax and organize his treasure.
Oh, yeah; remember that bit in Chapter 5 where Thomas was mentioned to have been looting the museum? Apparently, he's been carrying a crap-ton of valuables with him this entire time; how did he carry it all? By eating it... meaning that for him to have organized it in his cave he would have had to... get it out, somehow.
Yeah, I'm just moving on...
Anyways, after that shit, Thomas ends up suddenly having a mysterious vision while sleeping one night; he gets confronted by a voice telling him to go to "Hullenhoshi" and to "fulfill his charge." After waking up, Thomas briefly ponders about what the hell that was about, not knowing what "Hullenhoshi" was, before deciding to bully a nearby human village into doing the research for him, stating that he won't do it himself because he's superior. This plot point is pretty much immediately dropped in favor of more dull villain crap.
"I am a dragon now and I am not about to change who and what I am, so I'll have to change the world to suit my needs!"
This is followed up by several more paragraphs of Thomas briefly examining the area; eventually, he flies down to a village of farmers, and immediately commands them to worship him or be killed. They immediately do so, and we get several more paragraphs of how Thomas, known by another nickname of "Al Tineen"/"The Dragon" was going around and terrorizing the countryside. Eventually, the king and parliament of the area, in the capital city of Rabat, decide to handle the dragon by... sending someone up there to negotiate with it. The unlucky fucker was Hasan, an envoy of the fifth prince of Morocco, who arrives in the dragon's lair with no backup or gear other than a tuxedo and suitcase full of documents. He converses with the dragon a bit, and invites the loon to the palace of Prince Izmir, for negotiations. Thomas decides to humor the guy and agree... before immediately and graphicly killing Hasan while the envoy is begging for mercy. Thomas then decides to take a nap.
The following day, Thomas flies over to Izmir's palace, which was prepared for the arrival of the dragon. Thomas lands in the gardens, scaring the crap out of most of the people present, while the prince, given a brief description of "middle aged man with black hair, wearing a suit with an expensive brooch," rises to greet the dragon. After a brief introduction, Izmir commences the little party, in which Thomas immediately starts hogging the food for himself, while everyone else, except Izmir, is shown to be in constant terror of the monster.
Anyways, after a few paragraphs of words, Izmir clears the area, and then walks up to a pedestal and recites a poem he made:
Are you ready to remember
the myths told long ago.
When dragons ruled the fiery skies.
Creators of legend guard this place.
Hue of life's blood; the
Passion and fury beneath
Like molten lava.
Sky-high, blood and bone
The shred of wings - a fallen
Scream that marks the end.
Seeing all with their mystical eyes.
Begin to believe,
and you will come to see
Wonders of magic so wild and free.
the myths told long ago.
When dragons ruled the fiery skies.
Creators of legend guard this place.
Hue of life's blood; the
Passion and fury beneath
Like molten lava.
Sky-high, blood and bone
The shred of wings - a fallen
Scream that marks the end.
Seeing all with their mystical eyes.
Begin to believe,
and you will come to see
Wonders of magic so wild and free.
Anyways, after the random poem, of which Thomas shows absolutely no respect to, the servants promptly bring out dessert for the human guests, while Thomas decides to kill and eat one of the servants. After that little display, Izmir calls Thomas over to play chess - Jerome's interview apparently got published - and the duo promptly converse. Izmir reveals that he summoned Thomas because there's a "political situation" that the prince wants handled, and he wants to recruit Thomas to his side; more specifically, he wants the king assassinated. Thomas is initially skeptical, until Izmir has his servants present the dragon with a gigantic golden bracer, which the dragon immediately puts on without a second thought; afterwards, the two depart, with Izmir allowing Thomas to head back to his cave to think on the issue.
The following day, several more of Izmir's servant arrive at Thomas's lair to invite the lunatic back; Thomas agrees to come, graphically kills both of them - we get more "lovely" descriptions of how the dragon savored their deaths and made them painful - then flies to the king's palace, where he demands to speak with the guy. The king reluctantly comes out, Thomas immediately incinerates the guy, we get another "lovely" description of the man burning in agony, and the dragon promptly heads back to Izmir's palace to report.
Izmir immediately begins celebrating, as it means that he is now automatically king, apparently, while Thomas starts to argue that his end of the bargain in fullfilled. However, Izmir reveals that the bracer that Thomas oh-so-greedily put on contains a bomb that'll detonate and kill the dragon the moment he tries to remove it or defy the guy; this pretty much instantly changes Thomas's attitude. From there, Izmir proceeds to reveal that he somehow knows that Thomas used to be a human, and that while humanity used to be the slaves of dragons, now the humans will be the masters. Furthermore, he also knows about the Order of the Golden Sun, stating that it will be reborn as people who will properly control the dragons, that the reborn Order will take over the world, as well as the fact that he somehow knows about Li Jeng coming to kill Thomas... despite the golden dragoness being headed towards Europe, not Africa. End Chapter.
This chapter takes us back to France - more specifically, Marseille - where we join back up with Jerome again, sometime in the Summer... despite the fact that chapter 1 took place in October, and I don't think a full year has passed since the start. But anyways; he's gotten quite a bit of fame and a decent fortune after his story on the red dragon got posted - though his "greedy landlord and ex-wife" got most of his newfound fortune regardless - so he's agreed to go on a trip with Eva Messan, the Dutch scientist, to study said dragon for more money. Apparently, the dragon was successfully located in Morocco, but since "King" Izmir decided to close the borders of the nation "until he's successfully killed the dragon," there's nothing anyone can properly do about it.
As stated, I'm fairly certain this story is going to drive me to drink myself to death...
Anyways, Jerome heads down to the docks, where he sees the ship that's going to take the crew to Morocco: an old-as-hell cargo ship that was noted to be in poor upkeep. The crew of the ship were revealed to be Jon and Joe, the two dim of wit police officers from chapter 2; they got fired after their run-in with the dragon, with the chief of police not believing their story. Anyways, after a few paragraphs of poorly-edited dialogue, Jerome wanders off to search for Eva, only to run into Li Jeng; the dragon - currently in her human guise, dressed in blue and gold robes and carrying a katana - has basically lost track of Thomas, and has joined this expedition to track to lunatic down. To duo converse, with Jerome repeatedly trying to wow Li, only to repeatedly fail, and eventually he breaks the conversation off to go put his luggage on the ship. After that's done, Jon comes by and picks the reporter up, and they go to the gallery, where Jon, Joe, and Eva are waiting.
Eva confirms that the trip is going to be a five-week long trip, and is basically supposed to be strictly scientific; it's also revealed that said trip is highly illegal and off the books, with Eva hiring the others without government supervision to help her study the red dragon in Morocco. Li immediately questions why in the hell the crew is looking to study the red dragon instead of killing it, given the damage it's caused; Eva states that she's a scientist and "not there for vengeance," stating that it would be a wasted opportunity not to study the dragon in its natural habitat. After a brief introduction to the sixth and last member of the crew - the captain, Omar, who is also the cook, engineer, navigator and helmsman, as well as barely able to speak English - the crew of six finally head out.
That night, Li ends up having a similar dream to Thomas's back in chapter 8, hearing a voice calling her to go to "Hullenhoshi" and "seek truth" and "fulfill your charge." The dream promptly wakes the girl up, and she goes out onto the deck for some fresh air, only to run into Jerome again. The duo again converse, with Jerome trying to pry about her issues, only for Li to rebuke him and go back to sleep.
The following morning, Li, Eva, Jerome, and the two brothers all head out to the deck to try and relax; Li starts to read through some scrolls, and we get a few paragraphs about her reading up on the golden dragons and missing Huang. Jerome starts trying to read the scrolls over her shoulder and starts questioning her about them; Li rebukes him again, which leads to an argument between the two, during which she accidently let slip that there's more than one dragon out there. Jerome tries to question her about that, but the crew suddenly comes under attack from a battleship; they've entered Moroccan waters, and pretty much immediately come under fire. The shit engine ignites from getting shot, while Omar gets shot and falls unconscious, so Jerome immediately takes charge of the situation; he orders the two brothers to take care of the fire, orders Eva to try and attend to the captain, and, upon noticing that there's a bad storm suddenly brewing on the horizon, decides to steer the ship straight into it to lose the battleship.
To the surprise of no one, this proves to be a bad call; the storm overtakes the tiny cargo ship, leaving it at risk of sinking, while the battleship is quickly gaining ground. Upon noticing that everyone was distracted, Li briefly considers leaving the crew by transforming and flying off, but quickly decides against it; instead, she turns into her dragon form and attacks the battleship, managing to drive it off by summoning a bunch of light magic, basically flashbanging the entire ship, which somehow completely disables it and leaves it helpless in the storm. The rest of the protagonist group finally notices the giant golden dragoness; unfortunately, with the storm still raging on, Jerome ends up getting knocked overboard by a rogue wave.
Li dives into the water to rescue the guy, and successfully does so; after making sure everyone is safely on board, she dives back under the water, transforms again, then somehow manages to casually hoist herself into the cargo hold of the boat without anyone else noticing. Everyone else briefly questions the existence of the new dragon, before deciding to celebrate their survival with drinks. End Chapter.
As stated, I'm fairly certain this story is going to drive me to drink myself to death...
Anyways, Jerome heads down to the docks, where he sees the ship that's going to take the crew to Morocco: an old-as-hell cargo ship that was noted to be in poor upkeep. The crew of the ship were revealed to be Jon and Joe, the two dim of wit police officers from chapter 2; they got fired after their run-in with the dragon, with the chief of police not believing their story. Anyways, after a few paragraphs of poorly-edited dialogue, Jerome wanders off to search for Eva, only to run into Li Jeng; the dragon - currently in her human guise, dressed in blue and gold robes and carrying a katana - has basically lost track of Thomas, and has joined this expedition to track to lunatic down. To duo converse, with Jerome repeatedly trying to wow Li, only to repeatedly fail, and eventually he breaks the conversation off to go put his luggage on the ship. After that's done, Jon comes by and picks the reporter up, and they go to the gallery, where Jon, Joe, and Eva are waiting.
Eva confirms that the trip is going to be a five-week long trip, and is basically supposed to be strictly scientific; it's also revealed that said trip is highly illegal and off the books, with Eva hiring the others without government supervision to help her study the red dragon in Morocco. Li immediately questions why in the hell the crew is looking to study the red dragon instead of killing it, given the damage it's caused; Eva states that she's a scientist and "not there for vengeance," stating that it would be a wasted opportunity not to study the dragon in its natural habitat. After a brief introduction to the sixth and last member of the crew - the captain, Omar, who is also the cook, engineer, navigator and helmsman, as well as barely able to speak English - the crew of six finally head out.
That night, Li ends up having a similar dream to Thomas's back in chapter 8, hearing a voice calling her to go to "Hullenhoshi" and "seek truth" and "fulfill your charge." The dream promptly wakes the girl up, and she goes out onto the deck for some fresh air, only to run into Jerome again. The duo again converse, with Jerome trying to pry about her issues, only for Li to rebuke him and go back to sleep.
The following morning, Li, Eva, Jerome, and the two brothers all head out to the deck to try and relax; Li starts to read through some scrolls, and we get a few paragraphs about her reading up on the golden dragons and missing Huang. Jerome starts trying to read the scrolls over her shoulder and starts questioning her about them; Li rebukes him again, which leads to an argument between the two, during which she accidently let slip that there's more than one dragon out there. Jerome tries to question her about that, but the crew suddenly comes under attack from a battleship; they've entered Moroccan waters, and pretty much immediately come under fire. The shit engine ignites from getting shot, while Omar gets shot and falls unconscious, so Jerome immediately takes charge of the situation; he orders the two brothers to take care of the fire, orders Eva to try and attend to the captain, and, upon noticing that there's a bad storm suddenly brewing on the horizon, decides to steer the ship straight into it to lose the battleship.
To the surprise of no one, this proves to be a bad call; the storm overtakes the tiny cargo ship, leaving it at risk of sinking, while the battleship is quickly gaining ground. Upon noticing that everyone was distracted, Li briefly considers leaving the crew by transforming and flying off, but quickly decides against it; instead, she turns into her dragon form and attacks the battleship, managing to drive it off by summoning a bunch of light magic, basically flashbanging the entire ship, which somehow completely disables it and leaves it helpless in the storm. The rest of the protagonist group finally notices the giant golden dragoness; unfortunately, with the storm still raging on, Jerome ends up getting knocked overboard by a rogue wave.
Li dives into the water to rescue the guy, and successfully does so; after making sure everyone is safely on board, she dives back under the water, transforms again, then somehow manages to casually hoist herself into the cargo hold of the boat without anyone else noticing. Everyone else briefly questions the existence of the new dragon, before deciding to celebrate their survival with drinks. End Chapter.
And with that, I think I'm going to call it quits on this session; my apologizes, but things have been intense on my end, with Christmas and New Year's stuff going on, so I kinda had to cut this one several chapters shorter than I intended for New Year's. I will be coming back to this one in the future, once things settle down a bit more; believe me, this story just gets worse and worse the farther you go in.
Actually, I am curious; what are you guys thinking about the review so far? Any thoughts?
Also, for tonight's update, I wanted to bring something up about ShadowLugia249; namely, I think I might have a story chosen for the review - Latexed Lugia, which is basically a fetish story about a guy who buys a living Lugia balloon - though I am still looking. I am going to be making the review on this pile of shit later, most likely after I'm done with this story and the unfinished sequel.
Lastly, I got another author for us. Much like ShadowLugia249 above, this guy got mentioned here on the site previously, but there hasn't been much else written about him; guy's name is TombFyre. He's a fairly old member of the fandom, but contrary to many furries from the late 1990s/early 2000s, he's actually still REALLY popular and fairly active with the fandom these days. The guy's known for two things; 1. writing a ton of human-hating furry fetish fics, and 2. blindly supporting guys like Trudeau - yes, Tomb is Canadian - while supporting violence towards the political right. Guy's a certified loon, and I'll be giving his stories their own update; got 4-5 of them to review, so it's going to be a doozy.
