Isekai Elf King: Architect of a New Empire

Hugh laughed, a mocking sound. "You? How will you pull that off? You couldn't even beat a few goblin trainees. The Blood Elite would eat you for breakfast. For a breakfast appetizer. Maybe even a dawn snack, or…"

 "We get it, Hugh," Leo said, trying not to laugh.

 Lily flushed, uncrossed her legs, and started to rise before coughing and sinking back to the rock.

 "Or even get up," Hugh helpfully quipped.

 "May your magic abandon you, dragon!" Lily said venomously.

 Hugh's eyes narrowed and he bared his fangs as he stepped forward, his huge, eight-foot-long frame dwarfing Lily while she sat.

 She hit harder than she thought she would there, Leo thought. Better defuse this.

 "Whoa, guys, whoa!" Leo said. "Everyone, take a chill pill! We just barely escaped the goblins. Let's not kill ourselves now! C'mon, can you guys try to be the one ray of sanity in this kooky world?"

 Hugh relaxed and settled back down on the rocks. "Fine. But don't think to break our deal, okay, Leo? Not even if you want to breed with this elf."

 Leo facepalmed, then dragged his hand down, distorting his face briefly. Nope, no sanity. I swear I should just swim the river and leave these two behind.

 At the same time, Lily spoke in a shocked voice, her cheeks pink. "Why would you suggest that, dragon? I've barely met this man, and I would not engage in, in… carnal relations so casually. Or risk bearing a bastard heir to the throne. It wouldn't be proper for a noble lady of Averia."

 "Huh," Hugh mocked, his eyes wide and at odd angles again.

 Lily's blush moved toward a deeper red, and her eyes narrowed.

 Leo desperately tried to stave off disaster. "So, Lily, why don't we go back to the basic question. Why do you think that you can become the Queen of Averia?"

 It worked, and both Lily and Hugh were distracted. But Lily didn't immediately answer. Instead, she stared at them for a long time, shifting a bit and breathing deeply. It started to get awkward.

 Finally, her face firmed, and she spoke as calmly as her breathing allowed. "I'll not reveal the reasons at this time, I'm sorry. Despite you saving me, I have absolutely no reason to trust you two. Hugh, you are going to go steal the treasures of my oppressed people, and you, Leo, are going to help him."

 "Okay," Leo said. "Good luck, then."

 Leo pushed himself to his feet, his legs feeling like Jell-O but now working. The worst seemed to have passed.

"What did you say?" Lily asked. "And where are you going?"

 "I said 'good luck.' You'll need it. Between the dragons, the elves, the goblins, and a bunch of other people Hugh named, apparently everyone is after that hoard, or will be once they figure out Hugh's dad is dead."

"Merely missing," Hugh said.

Leo ignored him as he continued. "You already encountered some of them. As to where I'm going, I'm going to go help Hugh here complete his quest. I genuinely hope you re-establish your elf kingdom, but I have things to do."

 Lily fidgeted with her hands, and with heroic effort, managed to stand, swaying slightly as she did. "You can't leave! I'm the last heir to the Averian throne, all alone out here. My retainers, um, they died for me…"

 Her lip quavered for a moment, but her face firmed again.

 "I can leave you," Leo said. "In fact, I intend to. We're not your retainers. We helped you because you were in danger, and it's the decent thing to do. But we have our own goals to accomplish."

 Hugh stood back up and stretched. "And Leo needed to punch his good-deeds card."

 "Nice," Leo said, turning to Hugh and giving him a thumbs-up as he started to climb back up the riverbank. "I'm surprised you remembered that."

 Lily's hands were making little grasping motions. "Wait! Please, wait."

 Leo stopped and waited.

 "Look, I, um… Is this because I didn't tell you my plans? Because that seems like a very shallow reason to abandon me out here."

 "Among other things," Leo said, sighing. "I really do have things to do. And I don't want to travel with someone who distrusts me."

 "But how could I not?" Lily asked. "You're allied with the son of our kingdom's killer, from his own mouth."

 "I had no idea of any of this history when I allied with him," Leo said, exasperated. "I'm not from around here, to put it mildly. I have no vested interest in whatever prior drama you guys have going on."

 "Then why are you here?"

 "He's from another dimension and arrived by accident," Hugh said.

 Lily's eyes widened at his comment, and she tensed where she stood.

 Hugh continued. "It's some sad dimension without magic, where everyone grubs in the dirt all the time. Everyone there is kinda pathetic."

 I swear on all that is holy to me…

 Leo watched as Lily relaxed. He decided not to push the explanation of his home world, despite feeling a bit maligned. Personally, and as a society.

 "Fine," Lily said, twirling her finger in her hair. "Fine. You win, since you have me at a disadvantage. I'll tell you. I'm the legal, and magical, heir to the throne of Averia. By the time the king died, there were no blood descendants to the king left. But my family is a cadet branch of the royal line—I am third cousin to the previous king. My father died defending the kingdom against the Blood Tribes, and my older sister—well, we received notification that she was dead two days ago."

 "Okay," Leo said. "And I'm sorry to hear about your sister. But why does it matter that you're related to the old king? I mean, the kingdom was defeated, right?"

 "Yes. It's true the kingdom was defeated. The majority of the elves who survived are enslaved in the camps of the tribes now. Or the kingdoms they were sold to. But a few of us escaped—including my sister and me."

 She sat back down on the rock. Leo went back and took a seat on another rock.

 Leo waited, assuming she would reach the relevant information soon. There was a brief pause, and Leo stretched.

 "I was still an infant when all this happened, you understand," Lily finally said. "But my sister was an extremely talented research mage—like I am now, I add. The combination of her position as the duchess, and her natural talent, meant she was close to the king. When the dragon attacked, she and the king hatched a plan to hide the greatest artifacts of the kingdom, the ones that had been built before the Blood Tribes and Chaoliocecatheka came."

 "Wait, the elves hid even more treasure away?" Hugh asked, licking his lips.

 "This is why I didn't want to trust you," Lily said. "Dragons are always led by greed, just like my instructors in magical fauna told me."

 Leo held up a finger. "My question is, who is this Chowlio guy and how does he fit in the story?"

 "That's my sire," Hugh said. "We call him 'Chao.'"

 "Not sure how that never came up, but alright."

 Lily leaned back on the rock she was sitting on. "To answer you, shiny little thief—yes, the king, before he died, hid away some of the kingdom's most powerful artifacts in a vault. A vault protected so that only the true heir to the king may open it, sealed by ancient magic, deep below ground."

 "And you're sure my sire didn't get this treasure?" Hugh asked.

 "No, he didn't," Lily replied heatedly. "My sister had ways to know, and the wards were never broken."

 "Huh," Hugh said, this time without accompanying kooky facial expressions.

It weirded Leo out that the dragon was instantly adopting the 'huh' mannerism.

 "And you can use this treasure to rebuild the kingdom? It's that powerful?" Leo asked.

 "Well… no." Lily sighed and turning her gaze to Leo. "But I could get a start. With that and the remains of Calasti that, um, Chao seized, anyway. Here in the ruins of the capital, Calasti, I could rebuild. I could make the perfect home for the elves, even grander than before."

 "And you can get this treasure? Or to the vault?"

 Lily slumped where she sat on the rock, then straightened, still trembling, her head held proudly. Pride was the only thing sustaining her at this point, Leo figured.

 "I doubt that I can, but I will try regardless. But I had a party before. Ranger Lowali Whitecloak and his son, my betrothed, Ilothulin. And Jeralt, a mercenary under our employ. We were ready, I thought. And we had a wagon to haul out the best of the treasure, so we could return to Lakusi and gather the resources and personnel to come back and claim the city for real."

 "They're dead?" Leo asked. "For sure?"

 Lily nodded once. "Almost certainly. Ranger Whitecloak told me that they would die if necessary to give me a chance to escape. They all pulled blades and faced the Blood Tribes raiding party. I wanted to stay with them, but they made the case that I was the only one left…"

 Lily gazed at Leo, her blue eyes red-rimmed, her stare distant.

 Then she whispered, bereft and hopeless, "And I was a coward who didn't want to die."

 "You're one of the most agress—bravest women I've met," Leo said. "I wouldn't worry about that. But why are you the last one? The last what?"

 "I just told you. I'm the last member of the royal line, which is otherwise extinct. Our sub-branch is all that's left with any blood at all. Sis died a couple of days ago. We had a falling out, over her plan and mine, but she would have been able to enter the vault, I think."

 Leo was pretty sure she hadn't actually said there was no one else, only that she was next in line, but he let it go.

Lily heaved a sigh before continuing. "Now I'm all that's left with any connection to the royal line. Since Sis is dead." Then she paused. "Sorry, I'm repeating myself. It's been a day, obviously. The point is, I'm all that's left to recover the greatest treasures of the kingdom and save our people."

Leo nodded along.

Lily played with her hair again, her eyes downcast. "I'm not sure I'm cut out for it, frankly, but I have to try. I'm better at getting people to do what I want than personally going into danger. I was at university, learning about magic and the flora and fauna of the world."

"All right."

Lily glanced up and stared at Leo through her lashes. "I don't think I can do it alone. But I will try."

Leo met her gaze. She was obviously—very obviously—trying to manipulate him to help. But beyond that, she was exhausted and probably in shock to some degree. He saw the perfection with which she still tried to hold herself, and the willpower within her.

But she was young. Maybe not even eighteen—or whatever the elf equivalent was. Her face was almost without blemish, and she had no laugh or worry lines. The face of someone who wasn't who they would become yet.

She should be going to prom, in his mind. Not shouldering the cares of an entire people. But she was.

Leo's heart went out to her. I can afford a tiny bit more time, and she said she's a researcher. So helping her is helping myself, most likely.

 "Well, how about this?" Leo said. "We'll all go together. Hugh can have his sire's hoard and we'll get you the vault and its crazy magical things. Then you can rebuild your kingdom. Or at least get a decent start on it."

 "You won't stay and help me re-establish the greatest elven kingdom in the thirteen continents?" she asked, looking at Leo with a smile as she twirled her hair.

 "And how come I don't get that treasure from the vault as well?" Hugh asked.

 Leo ignored Hugh. "You guys have thirteen continents on this world, huh?"

 Lily tilted her head at him, and all of her artifice fell away. "Thirteen? We have, by popular count, a thousand continents on Toth. Most of the learned scholars put the number closer to eight hundred, however. Thirteen are simply clustered here, with tens of thousands of miles of oceans to cross to reach the next continent in every direction."

 For a brief moment, Leo's head spun.

 "A thousand continents? Like islands?"

 "No, continents. Everyone agrees a continent has to be at least a thousand-mile landmass in one direction, absolute minimum."

 That's not possible, Leo thought. The size that implies… the gravity would crush us. Even if these bodies were stronger, well, substances would behave differently! The surface area would be about a hundred and ten times larger than Earth. Jupiter has a surface area about a hundred and twenty times larger, but Jupiter is mostly gas and still has gravity two point four times higher, and this seems like a rocky world, so—

 "Leo, buddy?" Hugh smacked his tail on the rock next to Leo. "Snap out of it."

Almost by sheer force of will, Leo brought himself back to the present.

 "Okay, sorry. That one caught me by surprise."

 "You'll agree to this, dragon?" Lily asked. "You'll help me, and in return, I help you get your sire's hoard?"

 Hugh sighed. "It doesn't seem fair."

 Everyone waited, saying nothing.

 Finally, he nodded. "Okay, fine. It'll still be an amazing hoard, and I'll finally get respect. And Polly."

"So, a team?" Leo asked. "All of us together?"

Hugh and Lily eyed each other, but after a moment, everyone nodded. Lily held her hand out, and Leo took it. Hugh covered it with his huge claw. They all shook.

"Excellent. To our own tiny fellowship—let's do this."