The monster of Drakona

After a few hours, Cletus finally woke up. his head still hurting from the mysterious encounter. The corpse of the dragon had already disappeared. And so were his horse and his new sword.

"Firmei is gonna be furious at me." He said, as he started walking back to the castle. 

Upon arrival to the castle, he noticed something was off: the gate, no, the wall, no, everything seemed to have gotten a little bit smaller. Or did he just get a little bit taller? He saw some guards on top of one of the towers, surprisingly sharp. Did Cletus also smell him? Couldn't be. The guard was still really high up. The guard summoned more guards, all drawing crossbows and aiming at Cletus.

"Guys, don't you see me?" Cletus yelled. "It's me, Cletus!"

The guards seemed to ignore him and shot at him. Cletus was shocked. But was even more surprised that none of it hurt, or rather, all arrows either missed, or bounced off him, like he was wearing really strong plate armor. Cletus looked around in terror. This could not be happening. He lost his sword, grew out of his armor, the gates don't open, the arrows still not penetrating his skin, Cletus looked into the castle moat for his reflection. All he saw was a weird cross between a human and the dragon he just killed. His scales were covering most of his body, He counted 5 horns on his head, and felt 4 more on the back of his head and neck. He now had wings on his back and the only thing he still wore was the oversized pants the squire have him, now somehow perfectly fitting. Cletus was fused with the dragon he just killed. He had little time to be horrified. From above, the guards prepared a hot oil shower. He dodged the oil and fled. He tried running fast, but his new wings made it difficult for him to be stable. He tried to fly, but he ended up falling on his face. After some trial and error, he finally found a good way to run. 

Meanwhile, in the castle, Firmei was busy sparring with his knights. It was the last knight's turn to try to defeat him. In a swift move, he failed as well.

"Am I so good or are you lot so bad at this?" Firmei asked.

"I think... ugh... you're just so good." a knight said.

A messenger walked into the room to talk to king Firmei.

"Your majesty, the dragon has been killed. Cletus, however, is gone. All that we found was his sword."

"I see. At least the experiment was succesful. The plan just has to wait for now. At least we can have Soskarei try to find him."

"Yes, your highness."

The messenger left the room to find Soskarei.

After finally figuring out a good way to run, Cletus noticed how much faster he has become with his new body. It was only 15 minutes until he arrived at his hometown, Riverborn Barrow. He remembered how it took an hour to tavel between Riverborn Barrow and Drakona Castle. Despite trying to avoid the town, some knights still caught his leg and he stumbled. He used his improved strength to free himself and fled to Faeric Woods.