"Martin? Are you okay?" Fred asked.

　　"My throat is in profound pain, Oh Spirit."

　　"Why? What`s wrong?"

　　"I`m sure you noticed that my breath weapon isn`t normally flammable. I changed it with a spell. But the cost was considerable. I`ll be healing for two days, at least. Have you a lozenge, Oh Great Spirit? Heh heh."

　　"All that, to kill the king&"

　　"I didn`t kill the king. I out-played him, destroyed his hope, toyed with him, and gave him a humiliating spectacle of a death. You will ask, was it worth it? Yes, yes, it very much was."

　　"Ya know, Kumbanaka isn`t always right. Humans are stubborn, you know. They`ll figure out new ways to kill you. And killing this king will just make a new one pop up."

　　"Stop shitting on my triumph, Fred. I`m in enough pain as it is," Martin complained. Fred still felt angry at Kumbanaka and Martin, certain that their choices would cause him trouble in the future. But he also felt sorry for Martin`s pain, and he didn`t feel the least bit sorry about the death of that king.

　　"I& I don`t have a lozenge. But the new stream is very cold and clear, straight from the mountain. I`ll let you go drink from it, north of the bridge. Just don`t hurt any humans over there."

　　"That`s& not a bad idea, Fred." Martin straightened up, with a big wheeze. He coughed several times, spitting dark dragon blood onto the grass. He then took wing, flying over the town, which collectively cringed as he passed. He landed in the streambed itself, with a big bellyflop, and Fred could hear his labored breath leak from him. Then he laid his head in the rushing water, opened his great mouth, and began greedily slurping up the water.

　　"Ahhhhhh, that is& very nice, Fred. I`m in your debt, just for this."

　　"Just don`t kill any more humans for a while, and we`re even. I mean, if they attack you again, you`ll fight them, I know. But other than that&"

　　"I swear to Tiamat, Fred, I`ve never met such a human-lover like you. You know you`re not one, right? And you never will be again."

　　"I know that, you big scaly goof. But I have a purpose, and dead humans don`t serve that purpose."

　　"Humph," said Martin, and continued slurping water. A couple of times he seemed to choke on the water, and then when he coughed, he also moaned in pain. But he recovered, and after drinking what seemed like an ocean of water, he heaved himself back out of the stream, and slowly winged his way back to the center of Fred`s domain. Once again, he curled around the top of the tree shaft, and Fred realized that Martin was simply getting as close to the tree`s healing magic as he could.

　　Now it was just after noon, and the town was quiet, the way it always was after a big dragon battle. Fred remembered that he`d wanted to make some improvements for the Forest Temple so he got to work. First, he made a proper road from the town to the temple. He kept it pretty straight, while keeping it a decent distance from Martin`s area. It quickly pierced the treeline, and Fred had to relocate some trees, to keep the road going straight.

　　But finally he completed it, and it rolled right up to the buildings of the Forest Temple. There wasn`t really a big flat spot (except for the teleport pad, which Fred assumed wasn`t supposed to be a road). So at the top of the road, Fred made a wide, flat area of stone. Now any wagons that came up the road wouldn`t have to move off the paved surface in order to unload and turn around.

　　Now Fred thought about a tower, to allow gryphon access to the Forest Temple. This was a bit tricky. All the trees around here were very old and tall, and Fred thought he`d have to make a very tall tower to stand above them. Instead, he thought that he should make a medium tower, and cut down the trees to the east and west, allowing gyphon riders to approach or take off from those two directions, flying through the trees. This was a good plan, he thought, so he got started.The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

　　First, the tower. It was very much like the towers he`d made before, so it wasn`t hard, and he snuggled the new tower close against the existing buildings, so people wouldn`t have far to walk (except for a lot of stairs, of course). He did make the tower with very few windows, reasoning that it would be especially cold up here in the mountains, and in such a tall building.

　　Now that it was finished, Fred aimed his sight east and west from the new tower, and started knocking over any trees that got in the way. He didn`t have an axe, and wasn`t a Wood Spirit, so he couldn`t directly affect the trees themselves. But he had full control of the ground they laid their roots into. He could have tried to push the trees to the side. But he reasoned that toppling the huge trees would make a clearer path, and make the lumber easier for the humans to harvest. The downed trees would also help show the flying gryphons the proper flight path, Fred reasoned.

　　If the new road and tower weren`t enough of a disruption for the humans, the crashing falls of giant timber certainly were. Everyone at the Forest Temple was scrambling about, trying to see what was going on. Though it was afternoon, some of the older, fatter men stumbled out of the buildings with night-clothes still on. "You`re welcome," Fred thought at them.

　　That was all the work Fred did that day, and Martin didn`t move for the rest of the day, either. The humans were subdued, but they continued to hustle. Once again, Fred noticed a large band of pilgrims, fully healed, leaving his town. That made him happy. Fred also noticed that a significant number of birds were circling over his eastern field. Occasionally they would be joined by a gryphon rider or two, who slowly circled the area.

　　"Thermals! They`re riding thermals," Fred realized excitedly. His hot stones were causing the air in the field to heat up, which made the field air want to rise, while colder air from the mountain rushed underneath it to take its place. This process fed upon itself, causing surprisingly powerful updrafts that could sweep any bird upward for free. Fred once again marveled at his knowledge of aerodynamics, and wondered where he`d gotten it.

　　Fred watched the birds riding thermals for a while. He could see them fly high enough to disappear from his "sight", and he recognized how much farther up he could see than when he "started". He assumed that his growth, in every direction, was the reason for it, but he didn`t really know.

　　Not doing anything else, he did another "whole domain" check, looking in on every monster and every zone. Everything looked okay. There were plenty of afternoon battles going on, and the Healing Complex was doing brisk business. Fred looked down into the Cave Zone, and checked the Golden Celestial Wurm. To his surprise he saw the eggs had come. There were seven golden spheres, each about the size of a bowling ball, and another black sphere that was a bit smaller than the others. Fred wondered if it was dead, or malformed, or something.

　　The Golden Celestial Wurm mother was curled protectively around them all. The Silver Wurms still stood guard, facing the door. "Anybody wants those eggs, they`d better be prepared for a fight," Fred thought. He looked in on the Dragon Turtle and the Big Demon, both of which were undisturbed and sleeping. He looked in on the Ogre Zone, and saw humans battling several of the drakes.

　　He looked into the Lined Hallway Zone, and saw that the Lioness had been killed, and a group of humans were braving the lair of the Acidic Black Jelly. These humans were proceeding carefully through the cave-like lair, shooting fire spells everywhere. "Mebbe fire is the only thing that kills jellies?" Fred wondered. He thought about asking Martin, but decided to let him rest. Besides, he wasn`t actually that curious.

　　As he watched, the Black Jelly dropped from the ceiling, aiming for one of the humans. The human was really quick, so the jelly missed, and now that they knew where it was, they blasted it with fire spells. Its landing had splashed everywhere, and one of the humans had gotten some jelly on his face. The human was dashing about in great pain while two of his buddies chased after him. The rest succeeded in burning the jelly to death, and a bunch of Treasure Sprites popped. The happy humans collected their winnings, and their burned friend, and left.

　　Looking around at the Tree Zone, Fred saw that the naga had also been defeated, and a large group of men were leaving that lair. Several of them were distracted by an amazingly beautiful woman, long black hair spilling over revealing robes, who beckoned from the lair of the JorMgumo. A couple of the men began stepping towards her as though bewitched. The rest of the group tackled them, and began singing an outrageous song at the top of their lungs, while dragging their weak-willed comrades away.

　　As the men disappeared up the ramp, the JorMgumo put her hands on her hips, gave an extremely cute angry "humph" expression, tossed her hair, and marched back into her lair.

　　Fred continued his check. The Front Zone and the Ramp Zone were currently quiet. The Front steps were occupied by busy merchants, but they and their customers kept one eye on the sky, waiting for the dragon to cause trouble. Nobody was enjoying the hot baths. No one was in the Maze, or in the escape room under the front steps.

　　The pilgrim`s camp had re-configured itself to get maximum heat from Fred`s new hot stones. Instead of a single big encampment near the Town Wall, the pilgrims had relocated their tents into circles around a dozen of the stones. There was more room to walk between the hot stone tent circles, and the whole thing felt less congested, Fred thought. He knew that the pilgrims would be completely disrupted again, when the armies came.

　　Finally Fred checked on Shelley. She and her family all looked happy and sleepy. They were adorable, and irresistible. So Fred spent the rest of the day laying around watching them.

　　At dusk, Jim checked in again. Fred also heard drums from Michael. This made him wonder about the humans.

　　"Kumbanaka?" Fred reached out.

　　"Yes, Spirit?"

　　"I don`t want you to lose any sleep," Fred continued. "But if you wanted to go out and talk to the humans& I`d like to know what they say."

　　"About what?"

　　"Well, just everything. How do they like the temple expansion? Can they get the teleporter working? Is the army coming? What`s gonna happen about the dead king? Like, ya know, that sort of thing."

　　"I will endeavor to find answers to those questions, Fred."

　　"Thank you!" Fred said.