A dragon’s maw descended on me. My mammal-suit and half a ton of dirt disappeared within it as the fangs slammed closed behind me. Exactly as I’d intended. This guy did not favour mouthwash, and I suffered the consequences.

  I clamped my own mouth shut. I’m not too proud to admit I screamed a little as he ate me, and I preferred to avoid any further sense of the local fragrance. Bits of rotting animals were lodged between some of the rear teeth.

  Umbraxis kept his lips closed but moved his jaws in an effort to give me a good chewing as his head reared back, and my world tilted upside down. He must have raised his head to the sky to help shove me headfirst down his throat.

  I used the Bracelet of the Avenging Photon, and the rear fangs passed straight through my arm as I disappeared down his gullet. It was an interesting experience in some ways. I got to see first-hand what so many fluffy creatures, and a handful of humans, had gone through when I ate them.

  The throat was impressively wide. A load of dirt and I slithered down the serpentine neck like it was a grimdark waterslide. About halfway down, the gullet stopped being scaled on the inside and pulsing flesh, with peristaltic waves contracting to force the muck and me deeper towards the dragon's stomach.

  I wasn’t hoping for a collection of half-mad survivors living on the shores of an acid lake, nor did I fall into prayer in the darkness as I splashed down into the stomach juices. I didn’t technically splash; I was currently intangible, I simply slipped headfirst beneath the surface, holding my breath out of reflex rather than necessity.

  It suddenly occurred to me that there had been no need for the theatrics and fighting for my plan to work. I could have just walked through the bastard's rib cage and achieved the same effect. Once again, I checked to see if a little being called regret had formed in my mind. It hadn’t, and to be fair, there was no need for me to ever mention my mistake to anyone, so I could chalk this up to experience without anyone taking the piss.

  I continued on my journey through the bowels of a dragon. The sphincter at the base of Umbaxis’ stomach let out onto a long intestine that was truly worthy of the name. Not that it was a competition, no one was handing out awards for having the biggest, but I felt a little intimidated as I threaded my way through towards… oh shit.

  Bowels. And literal shit. How long did the effect from the bangle I’d nicked from Bulb actually last?

  Naturally, the effect wore off just after I passed the point where the bile was released into the semi-digested mash. I kept my mouth firmly closed, then my eyes. There weren’t enough eyedrops in the world to make this right again.

  It was time. The pressure around me was crushing, and the acidic environment was eating at my clothes. My skin burned.

  So I turned back into a dragon.

  I wasn’t anywhere near as large as Umbraxis, but I was considerably larger than the intestines around me could accommodate. I waited a moment after the pain passed before I blinked my eyes open, making sure to keep the nictitating membranes closed, as though I were flying.

  A storm of scales and gore was pouring down around me, for once managing to mute the rain of golden motes that Bulb had cursed me with.

  Ancient Dragon slain.

  Gold earned!

  Four hundred thousand, thirty-three thousand and four gold added to the Hoard.

  Dragon slain. Hoard stolen!

  One hundred and eighteen million, two thousand and fifty-six gold added to your hoard.

  Items acquired!

  Nimbleplink’s Adjudicator

  Holistic Mana Core Continuators x19

  Kilbride's Manual of Shadows

  Bantz Blade of Baiting

  Shadow’s Clasp of Concealing

  The list of items went on and on. I scanned down it as the chunk of Umbraxis that I had detonated continued to fall like rain. His upper torso and chest were still intact, and his tails had been blasted across the village to wrap themselves around a tree trunk, but his lower middle section had popped like an angry zit.

  “The scales are all mine!” I called out, slightly woozy from the beating I’d taken before, and being on the internal end of the pressure differential that had exploded the other dragon’s rear end. Scales were valuable. I staggered around, my own midnight scales slick with blood and regrettably poop, as I scooped as many of them as I could find into my dimensional storage. Umbraxis must have been saving up a dump for months.

  The narrative has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the infringement.

  I approached the surviving fore section and flicked my tongue in and out for a taste of the air. A mistake. I reached out tentatively and smiled as the whole thing vanished into my storage. Cyrus would be pleased.

  “You survived?” called Cornie from the staircase above me.

  “I find your lack of faith disturbing,” I muttered, grabbing all the nearby scales as quickly as possible.

  “I mean, you survived! Amazing job! And… by the gods, you need to clean that up!”

  “I’m grabbing all the valuable bits. The rain will deal with the rest.”

  “Aren’t you going to eat the evidence?”

  “It’s all covered in bile and poop. I’m not really feeling very hungry.”

  “But… you don’t know?”

  My snout swung up to look at her, and purple and gold motes fell from my eyes. Killing the older dragon must have caused them to reassess the threat I posed. A trio of idiots wandering through a forest in human and little grey man forms probably hadn’t given off the best impression.

  “What don’t I know?” I asked.

  “Eating the flesh of an ancient dragon guarantees an epic roll on your next evolution. Not just for you, but for any monster that evolves instead of levels.”

  I flapped my wings and landed next to the tails, stuffing them away in my pocket universe as well. “I’m afraid I’m going to have to charge you for the cleanup here. Happy to leave the smaller bits for you and your brothers and sisters, but I’m going to need some more horns in return. Larger pieces will be for sale for a short period before I depart.”

  “You just ruined our village!” Cornie objected as she came down the stairs.

  “I didn’t pick this fight, and I was already your bloody guest.”

  “You don’t say no to someone like Umbraxis,” she scuffed a rear hoof in the dirt, throwing mud of Jace and Bargleblaster's unconscious forms.

  “I did. And I blew his ass up. Pretty sure ridding the world of an ancient, evil dragon is really good karma as well… speaking of which–”

  “If you lay a claw on any of us, we will destroy you.”

  “I just killed–”

  “By cheating. You wouldn’t have stood a chance in your real form. You are a cheat.” She said it like I’d committed some heinous act.

  “So what? I should have just let him kill me?”

  She stamped a hoof, and yellow butterflies shot up from the impact. “You should have taken it outside the village!”

  “You’re trying to negotiate. Any meat scraps are going to cost you. It was my kill.”

  “Fine. Three more horns, and we get what’s left.” She waved her head at the scattered lumps of dragon that lay between the picturesque housing.

  “Cough up.”

  She coughed. I glared. Reluctantly, she approached and produced three more horns from some pocket dimension, which I accepted with magnanimity and courtesy.

  “Fill your boots. How long until those idiots wake up?” I waved my snout at the snoring dragons.

  “Days, maybe weeks?”

  “God dammit. Right, I’ll–”

  “You still need to tell us your tale so we can understand the IMPS plan!” objected Sternite as she drifted to the ground next to Cornie. Ponies look kind of cute when they are pissed off.

  “I didn’t say when I’d do that.” I walked between them, shifting back to human form as I went, and scooped my erstwhile companions over my shoulders. I dropped the pair of them and hastily pulled on some clothes, then picked them back up.

  “Porta Auferet!”

  A glowing blue portal appeared next to me, and I tossed my companions through to land in a heap at the foot of Kat’s tiny desk, then turned back to look down at the tiny horses.

  “I’ll come back. I know how to get here easily enough now.” I eyed my mana reserves. I’d nearly bottomed out by not using the portal stones in my pouch.

  “When?”

  “A few weeks. I’ve got some business to deal with in the capital.” And a pile of loot to sort through, an alchemist to get working on Immortality Injections, a civil war to win… the list went on and on. I was pretty sure the dude whose bowels I’d detonated, not an ideal way to phrase it, had been a leading member of the Shadow flight.

  With a bit of luck, the rest of them would give me some space. The downside was that when they did come against me, it would likely be in force. Again, I wasn’t happy with my phraseology.

  “Four weeks at most,” Cornie snapped. I nodded, stepped through the portal and let it close behind me.

  “I am never going back there ever again,” I declared loudly. “You… you… Stumblenump?”

  “I am a Shraknelbink, master.”

  It looked like something Pablo Picasso would discard as too weird if he sketched it out, but I wasn’t too worried about that at the time.

  “Take these two and stick them in their lairs. If they make any, and I do mean any, requests for shares in the loot from our little adventure, tell them Kat will be negotiating on my behalf. I’m going for a beer.”

  I turned and stalked away, towards my favourite blue portal. That way lay the Cod, and Esme’s warm embraces. I stepped through, flicked my tongue out to taste the air, expecting the stench of stale beer, fresh-cooked food and whatever the hell it was the old guys smoked in the corner. Instead, I tasted… myself.

  “Jesus, I need a shower,” I muttered as I headed towards the counter. Esme beamed at me as I arrived at the front of the short queue, then took a step back.

  “You’re covered in… stuff.”

  “Stuff indeed. I blew up a dragon’s asshole a few minutes ago. I could really use a back rub.”

  “I am not touching you until you’ve had a bath. Into the yard. Now.” She waved a hand and gestured me through the bead curtain that still separated the kitchen from the aleroom.

  “Don’t touch anything!” she snapped as she followed behind me. I refrained from touching anything, holding my hands over my head like she had a gun to my back.

  Into the yard I went, where I turned to face down her wrinkled nose and angry glare.

  “That expression makes you look cute.”

  “As cute as Lady Artington?” She pursed her lips as she poked me towards a barrel of freezing water.

  “More. You know it’s winter, and that water is going to be HOLY HELL THAT’S COLD!” I yelled as the first splash hit me. She did not care about the season.

  She set to scrubbing me down, peeling off my clothes as she went. The chill in the air didn’t bother me, and I quickly grew numb to the water as it hit my skin. I looked down as she scrubbed my stomach, the cold water having a predictable effect on her own anatomy where it had soaked into the front of her dress. Which in turn was having an equally predictable effect on my own.

  “Say… how about we call this clean and head somewhere a little more–”

  A crossbow bolt sprouted between her perfect breasts.