Lunch at the Dragon Sanctuary was hearty, at least for meat-eaters.
Lynn sat at a rough wooden table with a stoneware bowl larger than his head placed in front of him.
The bowl was filled with freshly stewed meat on the bone.
Each piece was larger than a fist, piled into a small mountain, while the broth continued to bubble and steam.
Here, refinement was out of the question.
The primitive and the rugged were eternal truths.
There was no delicate plating.
No complex sauces.
No decorative garnishes that you could not name even after finishing them.
There was only meat.
Large chunks of meat, stewed until tender and presented in the most direct way possible.
Lynn reached out and grabbed a bone.
The meat attached to it had been stewed perfectly, falling away at the gentlest nudge from a fork.
There were not many unnecessary seasonings—only salt and a few simple spices—completely preserving the meat's most natural flavor.
It was tender, melting in the mouth while still retaining a pleasant chewiness.
Every bite carried the meat's inherent sweetness.
Of course, food could not be limited to meat.
Staples were essential as well.
Hard-baked flatbreads were piled in a large basket.
Each was about the size of a palm, baked golden brown and giving off the aroma of wheat.
But after a single bite, Lynn realized that these flatbreads were much harder than he had expected.
In any case, Lynn ate only one piece.
That was enough.
It was not because he was full.
His jaw was simply tired from chewing.
He placed the remaining half of the flatbread on the table, took a sip of water, and thought:
If this thing were any harder, it would definitely be rock cakes 2.0.
Lynn reckoned that Hagrid would love these things.
After all, with Hagrid's teeth, he could crunch through rock cakes.
This kind of flatbread was probably no different from ordinary bread to him.
While eating, Lynn also spotted Edward and Cedric, but he did not go over to greet them.
They were accompanied by several elegantly dressed Wizards who appeared to be from the Romanian Ministry of Magic.
Their robes were made from fine material and tailored to fit, with golden badges pinned to their chests.
They looked rather out of place among the Dragon Keepers in their old coats.
They were also eating stewed meat and baked flatbread, and they ate with great enthusiasm.
One of them even dipped his flatbread into the broth, then licked his fingers afterward with a satisfied expression.
At that moment, a burly middle-aged male Wizard walked over to Charlie.
The man was large and heavily built.
A deep scar stretched across his face from his left eyebrow to the corner of his mouth on the right.
He wore an old leather jacket covered in scratches and scorch marks, clearly someone who had worked alongside Dragons for many years.
"Someone told me you brought three kids to wander around the sanctuary."
His voice was gruff and carried unquestionable authority.
"Are they your brothers?"
He paused, glanced at Lynn's group of three, and furrowed his brow.
"They don't have red hair… Fine, whoever they are, you'd better get them out of here quickly."
His tone was firm, as though he were giving an order.
Charlie smiled and patted the man on the shoulder.
"Hoffman, you've misunderstood. They are not my brothers. They are guests invited by the shareholders."
"Guests?!"
Hoffman looked at Lynn in disbelief.
His gaze lingered on Lynn's face for a while, then shifted to William, then to Ollie, before returning to Lynn.
These kids looked no older than sixteen or seventeen.
The youngest might have been fourteen or fifteen.
Guests invited by the shareholders?
He knew who those shareholders were.
They were all prominent figures in the Wizarding World.
The guests they invited should not have been a few green boys.
Despite his lingering disbelief, since Charlie had said so, there should not have been a problem.
Hoffman smacked his lips and began considering whether he should send someone to protect them.
After all, they were guests invited by the shareholders.
If something happened to them inside the sanctuary and those shareholders came demanding answers, he could not afford the responsibility.
But the sanctuary's manpower was truly stretched thin…
For today's Dragon "succession election," almost every Dragon Keeper had been mobilized.
Everyone had a position.
Everyone had a task.
Every post was filled.
There was simply no one available to specifically protect a few "guests."
Charlie seemed to notice Hoffman's hesitation and laughingly began introducing his colleague to Lynn's glorious deeds—the ones he had heard about from his brothers.
"The youngest recipient of the Order of Merlin, First Class," Charlie counted on his fingers. "He single-handedly took down a group of Dark Wizards and came out completely unharmed. He has received the Special Contribution to the School Award multiple times.
"Oh, and the Triwizard Tournament—you know about last year's tournament, right? In the first task, he drove off a Norwegian Ridgeback all by himself…"
Charlie spoke casually, but Hoffman listened in a daze.
He looked at Lynn as though he were looking at an alien.
Good heavens. A genius like this absolutely cannot be injured.
If those shareholders learned that a guest they invited had been injured on his watch, would they not skin him alive?
Sure enough, he should find an excuse to keep them at the outermost perimeter…
Hoffman cleared his throat, preparing to speak.
"Um, Mr. Lynn—"
Before he could finish—
"ROAARRR—!!!"
An angry Dragon's roar exploded from deep inside the valley.
Everyone eating nearby stopped at once, their gazes snapping toward the source of the sound.
Lynn also looked up.
A plume of flame fifty feet high suddenly erupted from the valley.
The fire was orange-red and so hot that the surrounding air distorted.
A Hungarian Horntail flew out from that plume of fire.
It was enormous, with a wingspan of at least fifteen meters and a body covered in bronze-colored scales.
Its tail was covered in dense spikes, each as long as an arm and gleaming coldly beneath the sun.
Smoke still rose from its mouth.
It had just breathed out that plume of fire.
The next second, the roars of Dragons echoed from every direction.
The sounds rose and fell one after another.
They intertwined, forming a chaotic symphony.
The Dragon Keepers grabbed their Flying Broomsticks as quickly as possible and flew away from the area.
Their movements were swift and practiced.
Clearly, this was not their first time dealing with such a scene.
"Dammit, couldn't it wait until I finished talking?!" Hoffman cursed before hurrying away.
"Stay safe, everyone."
Charlie stuffed a piece of flatbread into his pocket, mounted his broom, and rushed over to help as well.
The number of people in the area instantly dropped by more than half.
The remaining people also lost the smiles on their faces and quickly moved away.
Lynn stood up as well.
He did not follow the crowd outward.
Instead, after getting his bearings, he headed toward the current leader who was supposedly about to retire—the Ukrainian Ironbelly.
One should not underestimate a leader just because it was about to retire.
Since it had held its position for so many years, using its blood as a fusion option would definitely not be a mistake.
As Lynn's group of three made their way near the location of the Ukrainian Ironbelly, Newt was crouching on the ground not far away.
Beside him lay a Peruvian Vipertooth.
It was not especially large, only around a quarter the size of the Ukrainian Ironbelly.
Its body had suffered extensive burns.
Its scales were charred black, and in some places, the tender flesh beneath them was visible.
Its left wing twisted at an unnatural angle, likely broken.
Its eyes were half-closed, and its breathing was extremely weak.
Newt crouched beside it with a bottle of Potion in hand, carefully applying it to the wounds across its body.
His movements were slow and gentle.
After each application, he stopped to check the Peruvian Vipertooth's reaction.
When he saw Lynn's group of three approaching, he conscripted them without hesitation.
"These are the Potions required for treating Dragons. The instructions are written on the bottles.
"Take a moment to look them over. Don't get them mixed up."
He took several bottles from the case beside him and shoved them into Lynn's hands.
Then he gave several more to William.
Then several more to Ollie.
The three hurriedly accepted the bottles and looked down to examine them.
The largest bottle had a label in scrawled handwriting:
Burns, apply topically.
A line of smaller text sat beneath it:
Three times daily. Apply a thin layer each time.
Another bottle read:
Internal injuries, oral.
Below it were dosage instructions:
One bottle per dose for adult Dragons, half a bottle for juveniles.
Another read:
Scale regeneration, apply topically.
The directions beside it were more detailed:
Apply to areas where scales have fallen off, once daily for one consecutive week.
Lynn looked through the bottles in his hands.
There were seven or eight in various sizes, each carrying a label and instructions.
Once Newt saw that they had read enough, he waved a hand, signaling them to come help.
"You three, go to that Welsh Green Dragon over there." He pointed toward another Dragon lying on the ground not far away. "It is not seriously injured, but its wounds need cleaning.
"Take those jars and bottles and use them according to the labels."
The three hurriedly gathered their bottles and walked toward the Welsh Green Dragon.
It was slightly larger than the Peruvian Vipertooth and had suffered quite a few burns, though they were not as severe.
Its eyes were closed, and its breathing was relatively steady.
Several claw marks on its body continued to seep blood.
Lynn knelt down, picked up the bottle marked Burns, apply topically, uncorked it, poured a little onto his finger, and carefully applied it to the wounds on the Welsh Green Dragon.
William and Ollie also knelt, each picking up a bottle of medicine and beginning to work.
The three remained crouched beside the Dragon, applying ointment, administering medicine, and cleaning wounds.
…
The sky gradually darkened.
By nightfall, the battle showed no sign of subsiding.
The sun sank below the western horizon.
The sky changed from azure to orange-red, then from orange-red to ink-black.
Stars emerged one by one in the firmament, while moonlight spilled across the cliffs, coating the towering rocks in a layer of silvery-white light.
But the Dragons' battle did not stop.
In less than one afternoon, Lynn's group of three had collected seven bottles of Dragon blood, a large bag of Dragon scales, more than a dozen broken teeth, and an entire claw.
The Dragon blood came from injured Dragons.
The scales had fallen from fighting Dragons.
The teeth had been knocked from the mouths of defeated Dragons.
As for the claw…
That had been the work of the Ukrainian Ironbelly in the sky.
From the afternoon until now, it had intervened only three times.
The third time was the most ruthless.
A young Ukrainian Ironbelly—likely its descendant—attempted to challenge it.
The older Ukrainian Ironbelly flew straight down from the cliff, charging toward the younger one.
The two Dragons collided in midair.
Claws gripped claws.
Teeth bit teeth.
Tails lashed tails.
The battle lasted less than three minutes.
Then, the young Ukrainian Ironbelly plummeted from the sky.
Its left front claw had been bitten off, blood still spraying from the stump.
Its body was covered in torn wounds, and more than half of its scales were gone.
It slammed into the ground with a dull thud before lying completely still.
From Lynn's perspective, that Ukrainian Ironbelly did not look like it had any intention of retiring at all.
---
Happy Reading. Be sure to leave a review!!!
Join my P@treon to receive extra updates daily and read up to 70+ chapters ahead.
P@treon: patreon.com/mrfanfiction140