‘Ah, is there no magic?’

It’s a world where dragons exist, and I might have been mistaken because Orbis used magic so easily.

‘Is it because Orbis is a divine dragon, and humans can’t use magic?’

Still, in a world that assumes magic and transcendent beings, don’t magical stones or something similar usually exist?

Litania looked around and blinked. Everyone was looking at her with incredulous expressions.

“Did I make a mistake…?”

“I told you to stop.”

“Pardon?”

“There’s nothing good about letting that thing keep interfering with imperial affairs.”

The ‘thing’ the Crown Prince was referring to was, irreverently, Orbis.

Judging by how they immediately mentioned Orbis at the word ‘magic’, it seems humans indeed cannot use magic.

Litania quickly understood.

‘Wait. Rain?’

Orbis and rain. There’s something familiar about this.

Not just because of the Oriental legend of dragons bringing rain.

〈Oh my, the rain has troubled you.〉

〈It’s not really because of the rain… well, yes. It would have been better if it hadn’t rained.〉

〈Yes, indeed.〉

Litania felt a chill run down her spine.

Come to think of it, they said it hadn’t rained since the Spring Festival, or more precisely, since the light drizzle on the day of the Spring Ball, the weather had been consistently sunny as if the rain clouds had evaporated.

‘Coincidence. It must be a coincidence.’

It could be a coincidence.

But what if it wasn’t?

Litania thought. If Orbis had cleared away the rain clouds to prevent rain because Litania had been depressed about her dress getting dirty that day…

‘Should I… make a request?’

She should. Even if she doesn’t want to, even if she’s scared.

If there’s no rain and the crops fail, it’s not just the people’s livelihoods that will be in chaos. People could starve to death, and in this era, food shortages are likely to lead to war.

“If the crops fail, people’s livelihoods will be in chaos immediately, and public sentiment will worsen. In the long run, tax revenues will decrease too.”

“What are you trying to say?”

“It’s a lose-lose situation any way you look at it, so wouldn’t it be better to just swallow your pride and ask?”

“Do you think this is about pride?”

Is it because they’re embarrassed to ask?

Litania tilted her head in confusion.

“What conditions will you set for the deal?”

“Pardon? Conditions for a deal?”

Not a request, but a deal?

It might make sense. If you think about it as the divine dragon staying in the dragon’s nest and protecting against monster invasions in exchange for the Emperor granting a title and treating it as a ‘noble being’.

Whether Orbis proposed this or not is unknown.

‘Well, he ignored the request to bring me to the hunting festival, so he might not listen to a simple request.’

It means that to ask for rain to solve the drought, we need to offer something in return.

What could Orbis need?

‘The beautiful natural scenery he likes?’

That’s not something humans can prepare. If anything, they’re probably damaging it.

“If you’re not confident you can keep a promise, don’t even bring it up.”

The Crown Prince spat out, as if shuddering. Litania had no choice but to keep her mouth shut.

“Then how do we solve this? Irrigation works can’t handle it. It’s not like we’re going to perform some rain ritual…”

“That’s a good idea!”

Prince Vapor, who had been watching cautiously all this time, brightened up and said.

‘Is he in his right mind?’

Even as Litania stared at him with wide eyes, Vapor clapped his hands softly as if he didn’t see what the problem was.

“I mean the rain ritual. Isn’t it worth trying?”

Litania couldn’t understand at all what value he saw in it.

The territory of the divine dragon Orbis. In that place called the Dragon’s Nest, there stood a large dragon castle.

While the imperial palace was majestic and splendid enough to overwhelm those who entered, the dragon castle was cozy and snug enough to naturally relieve tension.

The wind blowing through the large windows was cool, and the thick carpet on the floor didn’t even make a sound when stepped on.

Instead of massive chandeliers so huge you’d be afraid to walk under them lest they fall, soft indirect lighting reminiscent of afternoon sunlight gently spread out from behind the tapestries.

Orbis slowly walked down the corridor, looking around. The sunlight coming through the windows shimmered and broke upon his long golden hair.

“It’s changed a lot.”

The window seat where the afternoon sun shone was perfectly structured for a small woman to sit and read a book.

Under the lace curtains lay round cushions, and beyond that, the balcony was filled with a warm and bright atmosphere.

A red carpet with snowflake patterns, a round beige long-haired rug, dark brown low wooden wardrobes and dressers covered with white lace covers.

Brown, red, white, beige… This place filled with furniture of various colors and materials was actually quite far from Orbis’s taste.

“I have prepared everything as you instructed, master.”

“Mm, well done.”

As the gray-haired man dressed neatly in a butler-like suit bowed, Orbis nodded slightly to commend his efforts.

Below the ear of the man with his hair neatly combed back, patches of skin had turned gray here and there, and there were deep wrinkles on his neck.

It looked like wrinkled old cloth, or like dry tree bark.

Instead of pointing this out, Orbis lightly flicked his fingers near the man’s ear.

The spots disappeared, and the neck that had been covered in rough fine wrinkles became clean.

“I’m still inadequate at perfectly imitating humans.”

“Make sure to imitate properly before Litania arrives. She’s afraid of monsters.”

“Monsters…”

The man’s expression darkened, as if his mood had sunk a little at Orbis’s words.

“It’s strange, isn’t it? They call them animals when they simply exist as animals, but the moment they imitate humans, they call them monsters.”

It seems that to humans, the idea of something non-human imitating humans is more terrifying than hideous appearances or threatening cries.

Orbis didn’t feel disgust at seeing humans imitating dragons, just finding it absurd, but that was probably because the thought processes of humans and dragons were different.

‘Yes, different. But because we’re different, there are choices we can make.’

Humans and dragons can’t understand each other because they’re different, but also because they’re different.

‘This is why I can use methods like this.’

Orbis looked around the dragon castle decorated in a comfortable atmosphere. This should be enough for Litania to stay comfortably even if she comes to the dragon castle.

“She should like it this time.”

Dragon’s Nest. This place called the dragon castle was located on the border between the habitat of magical beasts and the Verivervi Empire.

It’s unknown since when. Orbis had been staying alone in this dragon castle in human form for a very long time.

Although pillars of fire rose from various places and knife-like cold winds raged, such things were no problem for a dragon.

Orbis’s smooth and elastic white skin couldn’t be torn even by a blade, and his glossy golden hair never tangled or got dirty even in a storm.

The beautiful owner of the dragon castle spent time in the stone-built castle. Unrefined sharp stones, stairs difficult to climb due to varying sizes, windowpanes without glass let in sparks, and icicles larger than a human’s height formed on the ceiling.

It looked like an old castle on the outside, but it wasn’t a castle where humans could live.

It was in such a place that Orbis had been spending his boring time. As long as he stayed in the dragon castle, neither monsters nor humans approached nearby, so he had nothing else to do.

Orbis always lay in a large room on the top floor of the dragon castle, where half the ceiling had collapsed. Sometimes when he got up, he would go out to the railing and look outside, but the outside was desolate.

In the distance, an active volcano was erupting and lava was flowing down, and on the opposite side, a blue iceberg stood like a tomb with snow flurries swirling around it.

Orbis, who wouldn’t die even if stabbed with a sword or if he drank poison, didn’t particularly feel pain even as he spent scorching hot summers and freezing cold winters. He also didn’t properly recognize that beings other than dragons couldn’t withstand such harsh environments.

He sometimes went outside to count how many times the volcano had spewed flames, but soon quit when that too became boring.

He wasn’t lonely. Orbis, who had hatched from an egg and grown up alone, didn’t know what loneliness was.

The blood of a dragon that grows rapidly without the help of parents or other guardians made Orbis a being who didn’t know what deficiency was.

Spending time was boring, but not unbearably tedious. Just as trees grow for thousands of years if not cut down and rocks endure tens of thousands of years if not broken, Orbis wasn’t afraid of enduring eternity.

Just a little, boring.

Even maintaining a human form was just one form of amusement to escape boredom. It wasn’t an action with any special meaning, nor did he have any attachment to human beings.

It was just because imitating humans stimulated his interest ever so slightly.

Because it was less boring than turning into trees or rocks that always had to stay still.

Orbis, who possessed all the knowledge of the human world, had no particular intention of interacting with humans.

It was just a meaningless curiosity, like approaching flowers to smell them when he saw them, or flicking dewdrops off the tips of leaves to make them fall to the ground.