Perrath can’t comprehend what is going through Nieven’s head. The man seems narcissistic, and the dragon takes all of his well wishes entirely as sarcasm. Regardless of Nieven’s intentions with his words, however innocent and genuine, Perrath cannot see them as such. So, the dragon leaves.

Well, he leaves for a while. He did promise the rancher that he would retrieve the woolfuls to the best of his ability, and it really would take so little of his abilities to do this. It would be easy.

But Perrath is also spiteful, and he refuses to let Nieven take any credit for the work that he does.

So once he’s far enough away, Perrath disappears into the shadows of the forest^[1], eventually making his way back toward the pit and climbing up into a nearby tree to perch himself and watch Nieven struggle, however that may be. So, concealed in the shadows of the tree’s canopy, Perrath sits and has himself a little show. How long will it be until Nieven gives up and leaves, he wonders? This could be quite entertaining so long as the dragon doesn't lose patience. All he has is time though.

---

1. Pass without a trace

Nieven begins pacing around the hole thinking about the best way to take the woolfuls out of their trapped pit. He only had two things under his glamorous sleeve, the ability to change the weather and his trusted lance. He had already tried using the weather to at least make it nice for the trapped little fellows but that didn’t seem to help as much as he would have liked it to.



“Hm, how about my masterful lance”, he thinks as he takes a good long look at his faithful weapon, “What can I do with this? There has to be something, anything I can do to do this myself! After all, I’m so great and wonderful the world must follow my whims for that is the natural order of things”.



He then thinks of a plan that although strange and silly might just work, he just needed his lance, a large tree, a very strong vine or rope, and these woolfuls were as good as saved. He then giddy cackles at his genius doing a little victory dance to his brilliant idea before jogging into the forest looking for the right materials to put his plan into motion.

It’s no surprise to Perrath that Nieven quickly gives up. The entire time Perrath sits in the tree watching the elf, he takes great pleasure in watching him struggle. After all, if the elf really is so great, he should have no problem getting the woolfuls out of the pit. Still, after a while, Perrath begins to grow bored and almost considers doing something, but instead he just sits and waits.

Then, Nieven leaves. The elf seems to have some idea possibly? Will he put his mind to work and do something helpful? Or has he given up and is going to simply report the whereabouts of the missing livestock to the owner? The victory dance at least tells Perrath that this might be an idea. Now he has to decide if he watches it play out.

No, he doesn’t want Nieven to know he’s been here the whole time. So once he’s gone, Perrath opens his wings and glides down below, landing in the hole amongst the panicked woolfuls. After feeling around for a moment, he figures out a decent way to grab them then picks up one under each arm and leaps out of the hole, pumping his wings until he can get up into the air. This isn’t exactly helpful, and he doesn’t have rope or anything to tie them up, so he decides he’ll save a couple of them for now and takes them back to the farm. There, he drops them in the pen, explains where he found them to the farmer, and starts back to get the others, being cautious to avoid Nieven in case the elf is back at the hole already.

Nieven worked as hard as he could looking in the forest for the supplies for his utterly genius plan. He was planning on making some sort of human fishing rod; it was truly one of his best ideas ever. He just needs a large tree, some strong sturdy vines, and the most important piece of the puzzle, himself of course. It was truly genius and he was feeling pretty confident about it as he even found a large piece of fallen tree in the forest. He struggled to pull it and it did take about thirty minutes to do so mostly because he took a minute break after two feet but he did it. Found some vines and he was ready to go. He made it back to the clearing where he was starting to set up his master plan and as he was about to tie himself to the log he took a glance to count how many woolful he’d be saving. To his utter shock and bafflement almost every single one of the woolfuls that was there was gone, only a single one remained.



“What?”, he stammered in surprise and shock, “How can this be? I-i…It-was just here”.



He takes a second to think before a wide grin emerges on his face and he shrieks in delight, “It can’t be…my greatness doesn’t have any bounds, the gods themselves have recognized my beauty and efforts and simply did the work for me. Or a more likely reason was the woolfuls simply were so stunned by beauty and handsomeness that they couldn’t move as soon as I left they simply got up and walked home, yes that must be it”.



He grinned and walked in a circle with excitement truly his ego was over the moon at this self-realization. After about five minutes of celebration which included dancing and singing of his greatness, he then proceeded to enact his plan wrapping the vines he found around the log and pulling up the woolful with himself using it as a support as he climbed up the ditch.

In the time it takes Nieven to concoct and enact his master plan, Perrath makes two trips to the farm, returning four of the five Woolfuls back to the farmer. When he makes it back to the pit for the final time, he hears Nieven’s shock and then immediate gloating of his own greatness. How could anyone be so narcissistic?? (How could Perrath be so oblivious to his own faults?)

The dragon clambers up into a tree to watch Nieven struggle to pull the final woolful out of the ditch with some kind of… contraption. Is that a fishing line? No, more like a fishing vine. Well, if this activity could be described as fishing. No, certainly not.

To Perrath’s surprise, Nieven manages to pull himself and the final woolful out of the pit. Well, then. Instead of congratulating the self-centered elf, Perrath heads back to the farm and announces to the farmer that his squire is on the way back to deliver the final wayward woolful.

When he sees Nieven finally approaching, he calls to him with the farmer at his side. “Ah, and there he is! Come, squire, deliver the final woolful to this here farmer.” Then he turns to the farm with a smarmy grin. “I’m afraid I am just so capable that I unfortunately make my squire look inept by comparison.”

The final woolful is brought up from hole Nieven using the vine to pull himself and the woolful up. It took great effort and as he set the woolful done and petted them on the head he proceeded to lay down for a minute trying to regain his breath and energy considering how difficult that was.



He then stood up and talked to the woolful, “Alright there little friend me and you are now going to go back to your home okay? Just follow me and we’ll get there in a flash”, he said with a smirk thinking the creature could understand him, which it didn’t.



So with that the sylvan elf leaves with the woolful following behind not because he trusted Nieven but because he knew his way home. Eventually after about thirty minutes (it took so long because Nieven made the two take breaks) the two of them had arrived. To his surprise, he hears someone call out to him ahead and next to the farmer he looks up and notices Perrath up ahead. He briefly scowls at the other man’s remarks considering them to be really weird and just plain untrue. He bows towards the farmer and the little woolful fellow walks towards the pen and Nieven opens it to let him in.



“I’m afraid this fellow here is a delusional madame farmer, I am not his squire for someone as great as me could never be under someone else for I shine so much brighter”, he pauses to cackle, “I mean have you seen me?”, he then motions to himself.



“This fellow over here left me while I was helping get all of the woolfuls out because I was simply too marvelous for him to bear. It was a pleasure to help out there my friend. After all, it is the sworn duty of the great and noble to help out those in need, instead of running away like someone here did”, he scoffs.

Perrath’s expression stays proud though his eye twitches when Nieven tries to take credit for something he clearly didn’t do. After all, Perrath made it obvious that he’s the one responsible for returning the majority woolfuls by hand delivering them himself.

“Run away?” the farmer says with a quizzical expression. “This knight here brought back four of my woolfuls.” Looking between the two, the minotaur woman can sense the rivalry in their scowls. Someone isn’t being truthful here, and she decides it must be both of them. “Either way, my woolfuls are returned thanks to both of you. Here’s your payment. Split it however you want.” After handing Perrath the bag of coins as payment, she then she promptly removes herself from the conversation and goes to check on the health of her poor livestock.

“Of course, ma’am,” Perrath says in a friendly tone. “Happy to have been of service.” As soon as she’s out of earshot, he shoots an irritable look to Nieven. “I will be taking eighty percent of the payment since I returned four out of the five woolfuls,” he says authoritatively. If the elf wants to argue, he’ll simply fight him, possibly kill him, then take all of the payment. “All you really did was stand around and try to look pretty.” Emphasis on ‘try’ because Perrath does not find him attractive whatsoever. While part of that is that Perrath is not largely attracted to humanoids, he also just really does not like Nieven.

Then he counts out the coins and keeps ninety percent for himself, doing his best to not allow Nieven to see his shady behavior, and offers the elf the remaining. “Here you are. Twenty percent.”

“Yes, madame the fellow ran away and oh that’s interesting those woolfuls simply just walked over here to my understanding. I guess Perrath was just around and walked with them over here. Good job Perrath I’m sure those fellows enjoyed your company well not as much as they enjoyed mine I’m sure”.



The Sylvan elf bows as the farmer minotaur leaves the two to their rivalry; he grins ear to ear as he looks at the reward. A sizable chunk, surely that would be enough for about an hour's worth of shopping at Sol City. Yes, that would be nice considering how stressful and exhausting a day he was having.



He is taken aback at the other man’s curt and rudeness, “Oh well if you say so Perrath I mean I’d honestly give the credit to the woolfuls themselves. Thank you for thinking I am pretty, handsome, beautiful, and perfect in every way although I know that already it is nice to hear”.



He examines his share and smiles snobbishly, “Oh is this twenty percent I didn’t know you couldn’t count Perrath I mean this sure looks like less than twenty percent. I mean I’m willing to give you it all considering it seems like you're in such need of money. As a noble and kind person, I’m willing to just overlook your greed and let live after all if you’re a struggling knight then what type of mad villain would I be to take from the needy”.



He then pushes his share back to Perrath, “Take it all my friend I need no money I have more than enough I can assure you”, he chuckles. Although Nieven is indeed out of his family’s wealth he still has the attitude of a snobbish spoiled brat so has no real concept of money management. He is also partly playing up his nobleness for the sake of getting under the other man’s scales.

Perrath’s whole face twitches at Nieven’s comment that the woolfuls simply pulled themselves out of the pit and walked here themselves. The makings of a friendly expression on his face fade the moment the farmer turns her back. He really could just kill this elf, but that would tarnish his blade, honestly. Gods, he wants to just… UGH.

“You are insufferable,” he says simply, looking exhausted of being anywhere near Nieven. “Here I tried to give you some credit for your efforts, and instead you discredited all of mine. You really are revolting and self-centered.”

As he counts out the coins and purposely shorts Nieven, his expression sours even more – if that’s somehow possible. To assume that Perrath is a struggling knight is the worst thing he could insinuate. Greedy, sure. Struggling? If Perrath is struggling to do anything, it’s hold himself together in the face of the greatest challenge the gods could put in front of him: this petulant elf.

His scaly, clawed fingers snap shut around the meager amount he offered Nieven like a bear trap. “A dragon never turns down the opportunity to grow his hoard. Meager tributes add into mountains of wealth, something I’m sure you will never truly see in your time, and if you do have the honor or seeing a dragon’s hoard for yourself, I do not suspect it will be only moments before being snapped up in their jaws as an afternoon snack.”

Perrath shoves the earned coins into his pouch, a well-made leather coin purse with golden embroidery and a surface carved to resemble scales.

Then, he turns and opens his wings, only offering Nieven a passing glance over his shoulder. “I would tell you to travel safely, but I hope that the two of us never cross paths again. If we do, expect to meet my blade.” With a powerful thrust of his wings, Perrath is airborne and flying away from this situation as fast as the wind will carry him.

A manic grin emerges on Nieven’s face. It's unsightly for someone in his class but he doesn’t care at this moment, “It takes one to know one Perrath I’m perfectly sufferable I assure you, some credit for my work whatever do you mean? I genuinely was putting my best foot forward here trying to help you out by my presence alone. You go on and leave in a huff for no explainable reason then I return to see the woolfuls just gone. I assumed you just gave up and left. I saw no single trace of you there and took the woolfuls out. I’m not sorry for being honest and telling the farmer what I know to be the truth. As for revolting I’m sorry but have you seen me? The last thing I am revolting is just looking at my impeccable face. I understand you’re hurt and projecting but self-centered I’d agree with. But how can I not be considering I’m so great huh?”.







Nieven’s grin continues as the man takes his share, “I’m glad to have helped out the struggling and needy for even just being here I’m helping someone. Meager tributes oh please I know this is gonna make your week having such a small pouch of solars. Dear that sorry amount barely makes my hour alright. I promise you that not getting the reward will not keep me up at night because I know I’ll make the same amount easily. I’m sorry but Perrath I’ve seen more money than you have in your entire life. I know that for a fact. I don’t need to see some unsightly dragon’s hoard considering I’ve seen things bigger and better. Dying is not something I plan on doing and I wish you nothing but the worst for your travels. I hope you find some semblance of peace that makes you stop being an insecure jealous cretin. You running your blade through me? In your dreams Perath, although killing me would be the most popular and infamous thing you’ll have, it’s just a silly little dream of a desperate man who wishes to be my rival”, he waves the fellow goodbye smiling as he does so shouting, “Toodles” and simply walks into the woods headed towards a nice bath house to unwind after such an exhausting day.