After a long climb to the very top of the highest tower in the palace, you're confronted with a bolted iron door engraved with the ducal sigil of Nova Q'lynnesti. You place your hand upon the door, and it feels a little warm to the touch. Kind of odd, you think, as it is an iron door.

You fumble at the door handle, and find it unlocked. You push the door inward, to be hit by a blast of heat. You close your eyes for a moment... When you open them, your heart skips a beat, and despite the furnace heat your blood runs ice cold.

A booming voice resonates "WHAT BUSINESS HAS A MORTAL WITH THE GREAT AURIALASTICA?" Your eyes immediately lock on what is at once the most terrifying, and the most beautiful sight you've ever witnessed. A coiled wyrm, as big as one of the whales that occasionally beaches itself on the shores, is resting against one of the stone walls. Scales as golden as a new coin, and as big as saucers completely cover its body, and it has ivory white horns frilling around its neck. A golden beard dangles from the beast's chin, and smoke curls up from its mouth, but you notice the eyes most of all... Eyes of an immortal, eyes that have seen things that mortals can but dream of... Before you stands a golden dragon, among the firstborn of the Gods.

You stammer what you hope is a satisfactory reply.

"HO HA HA HA HA...", the wyrm laughs... the room trembles. "SO YOU'RE JUST CURIOUS? YES, I CAN READ YOU'RE THOUGHTS. DON'T BE SURPRISED, MORTAL; I AM A SUPERIOR BEING," The dragon puffs up its chest and preens itself, "YOU WANT TO KNOW WHY I AM HERE?"

"YES, OF COURSE YOU DO... ALL HUMANS ARE CURIOUS. YOU'RE WONDERING WHAT THE PRAETOR IS DOING WITH A GREAT BEING LIKE MYSELF WAY UP IN THIS TOWER. IF YOU MUST KNOW, I AM NOT A PET, BUT AN EMISSARY FROM THE DRACONIAN EMPIRE."

"I AM HERE AS AN ADVISOR FROM FARAWAY DRACONIA, WHERE OUR GREAT EMPEROR DWELLS. YOU MAY HAVE NOTICED THE DRACONIC EMBLEM ON SOME OF THE PRAETOR'S MEN. THOSE ARE BLOODKNIGHTS OF THE EMPIRE... I'D ADVISE YOU NOT TO CROSS THEM, AS THEY ARE WELL TRAINED IN BOTH THE WARRIOR, AND THE MYSTIC ARTS. THE PRAETOR BROUGHT THESE LOYAL WARRIORS WITH HIM WHEN HE MADE HIS EXODUS TO THIS CITY. YOU CAN LEARN MORE ABOUT THE DRACONIAN EMPIRE THROUGH THE DRUIDS HE BROUGHT WITH HIM. THEY LIE IN THE NEXT ROOM." He points at an iron-bound door across the room with a crooked claw. Right in there!

"WOULD YOU LIKE TO KNOW MORE ABOUT THE EMPIRE? I CAN TAKE YOU TO DRACONIA, WHERE MY LORD DWELLS. WHO KNOWS? MAYBE MY LORD WILL FIND YOU WORTHY OF KNIGHTHOOD...."

"IF YOU WANT TO GO TO DRACONIA, JUST MOUNT MY BACK." The dragon flexes its metallic wings, and a clawed hand reaches out and opens a huge door in the wall that you didn't see when you first came in. It opens silently, and you see the starlight beyond, the sky blending with the earth during this most quiet of times. You jump on the dragons back, and fly away to Draconia..."

Go back to the Antechamber?