Versatile: Alternate World

After a few hours of staying without doing anything after my motivation disappeared, I sit up from the bed and stood up. There is no need to cry over wasted resources. I stood up and was ready to upgrade the other equipment mine using the other shards when someone suddenly barges inside my dwellings without warning.

"Bladeheart! are you there?!"

The one who showed up unannounced was Sigma who seemed to rush here as she is still catching her breath when she arrived at the doorway.

"Oh, thank goodness you are here. Quick, come with us, we discovered something not too far from here. If we leave it alone, it might destroy the settlement once it awakens!"

I frowned after hearing what Sigma is saying and stood up. I equipped the coat back again and followed Sigma. I can tell she is in a rush as she didn't even explain or say anything that she saw there.

She moved quickly and I followed her closely behind. It didn't take long before we arrived in the thick forest where everyone is gathering wood to use for construction every day.

Just what did they see? Sigma continued to lead me deeper into the woods. She didn't say anything and I didn't ask. We just continue running until we arrived at a cave where some of the rebels and even Harmless Sparrow are gathered.

"Bladeheart is here."

"What is going on? Sigma just led me here but she didn't say anything. Care to explain?" I looked at everyone around including the NPCs but Sigma decided to be the one to answer.

"Sorry about that, Bladeheart. It's an urgent matter to discuss with everyone and not just me but that includes you as well. And since you are the main guy in most operations, we will have to ask you about this."

"Alright then. Care to explain what you guys see and why are we in front of this cave?"

"Some of the scouts send some scouting clones to check this cave to see if it was safe to enter but they saw a threat there that can threaten the village. I won't make you remain in the suspense, the enemy is a dragon."

The moment Sigma said it was a dragon, I immediately remember the boss in the past timeline that destroyed our defenses when we blocked the advance of the rebels to the church. The reason they easily break open through our tough defenses was that they brought a dragon.

So, does that mean, this was the dragon that helped the rebels almost win? As much as I want to know how they managed to employ the dragon to their aid in the past timeline, my mind wanders to how we can employ its help this time around too. Having a dragon to fight against the church will be a big boost to the rebel's firepower. The dragon alone is worth enough to replace multiple armies at once.

The only reason it lost in the past timeline is that it was sealed and got ganged by players which resulted in its death.

"What are we going to do about the dragon, Bladeheart?" Sigma asked.

"Aren't you guys strong enough to handle the dragon by yourselves guys?" I asked SIgma and Harmless Sparrow.

"We are going to be fine fighting against dragons but we are just asking you if it's a wise idea to deal with the dragon now rather than wait for it to awaken. We can defeat it as soon as possible but we don't want to risk it from flying and going on a rampage, especially with the cave being near the settlement," Harmless Sparrow explained.

"Then, the only good method of action with this is to deal with the dragon as soon as possible. If the two of you are not busy, go back to the village and try to get ready in case of trouble, I will deal with the dragon, myself," I declared.

"Huh? Are you serious about this, Bladeheart? It's a dragon and I don't think it is something you will be able to handle easily," Sigma frowned.

"It would have been fine if we don't have a village to handle on..." I tried to reason out but then, one of the villagers interjected.

"We can handle the preparation of the village in case the dragon decided to go on a rampage. You guys can handle the dragon right? Then please take care of it, we will be the ones who will inform the people back in the village to prepare."

Hearing them volunteer, I decided to agree although I was ready to go solo this time around as I am curious about how the dragon became part of the main force the rebels got. If I go solo, I can hold back my attacks and see whether it has something to do with fighting against the dragon that would allow it to join the rebels. With Sigma and Harmless Sparrow, on the other hand, it might end up as big trouble as they can definitely go ahead and kill the dragon before it can do anything and I don't want to lose the dragon as it will help the rebellion much better.

Before we go in, I handed them potions and mana potions for supply just so that in case I fail to cast heal immediately, they can just go and chug one bottle to restore their health.

Now that everyone is good to go, we entered the cave's entrance. The entrance was big and I was surprised that the cave was not discovered by the villagers much sooner as the entrance alone is eye-catching enough. Perhaps they didn't make it that far when they were still the only people gathering wood.

"Just so we are clear, you guys have yet to enter this cave and see what the dragon is like, right?"

"We don't want to risk ourselves entering a dragon's lair. Even back on the mainland, we don't just go inside a cave without scouting ahead. Unless it was inside a dungeon, we keep ourselves ready and vigilant before going in," Sigma answered.

Pretty typical answer of Sigma. With her on the team in the past timeline, it is sure that every kind of raid will remain to have zero casualties with 100 percent of wins against the raids.

Sigma cast out her [Light] and led the way of the cave. It was a very big cave, without any pathway around here and there, it was just one single path straight which means we won't get lost inside the cave but we will also have no way out or a hiding place we can have without any other pathway out.

Also, the cave's pathway is leading deeper and downward compared to most caves that rely on multiple paths. This one just leads you to one, singular path that has an uncertain ending point you don't know where will end up.

As we get deeper into the cave, the smell of vegetation started to linger on our noses. It's not as strong when we are still at the entrance and I am assuming that the smell came from the forest itself but now that we are getting closer to the deepest part of the cave, the stronger the smell of the vegetation like it was a place filled with moss, trees, grass and any kind of nature that has yet to be disturbed by any human for how many years.

Soon, the cave's interior no longer have just rocks but green moss and grass started to fill our view in the distance. Not only that, the cave's deepest part should at least be dark but when we arrived, it was bright enough that Sigma's [Light] was no longer necessary to continue moving forward.

"A lush green habitat inside a cave?" Harmless Sparrow frowned as we continue to move forward.

"This looks more like a primordial forest that continues to grow without any kind of intervention from the elements of nature. Are we sure this is still a cave?"

Even I am surprised by it as well. The cave was something that has any kind of stuff that would correspond with nature except for mushrooms but seeing trees, grass, mushrooms, and moss together in one dark place is something I didn't know exist. Not only that, it was like some kind of man-made ecosystem, a terrarium as it was limited to one enclosed space where the greenery remained in one enclosed space.

"Look at the center guys, prepare yourselves. It seems this is not just a simple enclosed habitat. It seems to be like the nest of what we are looking for," as I point to the center of the place.

A grey dragon, big enough to rival an airplane used in airline transportation. It was big and it's not just an exaggeration. Compared to us, the size of this guy is something we can't just joke around. This is a big dragon that can kill us. And it is indeed the same dragon that destroyed the defenses of the anti rebellion squad in the past timeline.