Candace's fox-scent filled my nose, her aggressive chest wiggling beside me muddling my thoughts.

"Lawyers?" I repeated, struggling to focus on the conversation. "Dragons eat lawyers?"

"Dragons eat anything they can catch," she said, her elbow resting on my head. "Fish, birds but most of all—lawyers. Denver had tons of law firms back before the dungeon bloom."

I looked down. Water lapped at rusted beams. Mossy vines crawled up concrete walls like green veins forming more dragon nests in various nooks and crannies. Waterfalls poured from lakes within building innards smashing into the waves below. The skyscrapers looked big. Too big, too wide in some parts to be built by human hands.

"Want to enjoy the sadge tale of Denver?" Candace asked.

"Sure," I nodded. "Would be fun to hear it from a professional Binder's perspective."

"Right," Kristi commented. "Real professional, can't even keep her paws off our Alpha even for a minute. And here I thought that Nessy was the clingy one."

"Shush you," Candace waved the raptor off. "I'm just compensating 'cus I was raised in a hug-less house!"

Nessy laughed from my right side, her hand entwined with my right hand, claws softly kneading my palm.

"Right then. The tale of the dungeon that sheared a nation! This dungeon started so small," Candace started on her tale with dramatic enunciation. "Innocuous. Just a law firm in a tiny room on floor 28 with an irregularly thin door. D & D & D Co. Leased on October 8, 1988 according to the submitted paperwork people dug out of the Astral. Their prices were lower than average and they specialized in property rights. It could have been expunged quickly had anyone noticed it back then. Nobody did. The law firm grew, expanded. Acted normal, collected clients, paid their taxes. It wasn't. Soon it took over the entire floor, then the entire skyscraper. Again, nobody noticed it."

"The Lawyers looked exactly like humans. Wore suits. Drove cars. Had lunch meetings. Pushed paper. Talked about stocks and bonds," Nessy added from my right side. "Rented out more office spaces."

"But they were actually concept-type dungeon Sentinels," Candace said. "Conceptoids masquerading as people. The dungeon was mimicking humanity in conniving ways. Learning. Studying. It grew quietly for decades. By the time anyone realized something was wrong, it had already consumed most of downtown Denver, infested far too many buildings all over the place."

"The government tried to contain it," Nessy added. "Evacuated people. Brought in military-grade barriers. None of it worked. The Lawyers had spread out too far, made contracts with far too many people who supported them foolishly. Denver contracts and offices were discovered across twelve states later."

"They nuked Denver after the evacuation, right?" I recalled.

"Sure did," Adelle commented. "Didn't do shit."

"'Cus it was a conceptual infection. Denver just bloomed back out of the glassified desert thirty times as big," Candace said. "Then it sued the USA government."

"The government lost," Adelle commented. "Hilariously enough."

"How exactly did the government lose a case against a dungeon?" I asked.

"They used mundane lawyers against high level conceptoid Lawyers," Nessy said. "The dungeon entities had mastered contract law down to an arcane science. The human and prad lawyers never stood a chance in court. Denver didn't just have Lawyers by then, it had Judges too. It had infested the USA Supreme Court and infiltrated the lower courts, sabotaging decisions on every level."

Terry snorted. "My granddad said people used to make jokes—'when did Denver go to hell?' The answer: 'when the lawyers took over.'"

"Nuking Denver and fighting it in court weren't functional solutions," Candace said. "People stopped trusting each other. The Denver Dungeon spread rapidly like mold in a petri dish, sheared continental USA from Arizona To Maine into NUSA and SUSA and then started to fragment it into smaller and smaller independent nations. The Pradavarian Senate must have begged the Omnids for help because overnight lake Erie expanded tenfold into continental-sized lake Eerie and all of Denver-controlled territory ended up underwater. The Denver-controlled Judges and Lawyers rapidly vanished from human and prad territories too, their offices found torn apart and empty in the morning of June 2nd 1989. They claimed it was a massive cooperation effort between Seers, Binders, Earth Archmages, Elementalists and Hydromancers, but that was obviously false since nobody actually knew any of the mages involved nor could name any names of the people responsible for the operation."

"It's inactive now, right?" I asked.

"No. Denver isn't dead," Nessy said. "It's just… half-asleep, drowned, trying to get back on its feet."

"Because of Denver, prads declared all 1980's architectural style of boxy, tall concrete office buildings illegal," Kristi said. "All 'Corporate Modernist' buildings have been demolished worldwide just in case they were infected with Denver. Since 1989 all law firms and judges have been subjected to weekly checkups by high level Seers."

"Right," I said, spotting a half-submerged 'D&D&D Co' rusted sign occupied by three cat-sized dragons. "So are the local dragons a Systemfall thing or…"

"Cascade was conceptually reinforced by a hell-a-talented Binder Archmage as Ferguson's forepost to make sure Denver doesn't get back on its feet here in the Western Reaches," Candace explained.

"Reinforced how?" I wondered.

"With dragons," Kristi said.

"Binder Archmage Duphrane Slade bound the concept of dragons to the local Astral," Candace nodded. "Across about a thousand kilometers of local shoreline. Whenever lawyers bloom in those half-drowned buildings the dragons snack on them. Other Citadel cities have their own defence lines n' outposts. Cascade has dragons."

"That's pretty interesting," I said, watching as a few hundred pigeon-sized silver dragons took off into the sky, spooked from a half-submerged powerline stretching between two towers by our Pawber glider.

The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.

"A sandwich of many curious historic layers," Nessy nodded beside me.

I looked at her. "Did we… make all this?"

Nessy shrugged in reply.

"Technically, yes," Candace offered. "But also no. You might have successfully reached the end of time. You might have provided a catalyst for change with your wish… but the thing is—the world isn't a chess match between two players. It's an ecosystem connected to other Earths via dimensional gates. There are an infinite number of variables involved… and with each dimensional shift… novel problems arise that attempt to consume human civilization. For the most part, various problems swallowed up your wish. The biggest thing you've changed is my soul-state. A single soul divided in four is a new, curious variable."

"I see," I said.

The Pawber van banked away from the ruins of Denver and descended toward a quaint town on the lake's edge, backed by the mountains. We landed smoothly on a pier, the driver grunting a farewell as we disembarked.

The surrounding buildings evoked 1860s Gothic Revival, all pointed arches and ornate stonework, sporting mossy roofs covered in shifting colors. After a minute of squinting against the sunlight, I realized that the rooftops weren't empty. There were little dragons perched everywhere—crimson ones sunning themselves, emerald serpents coiled around chimneys, azure wyrms napping in clusters. The sizes of the beasts varied, their scales a rainbow riot against the earthy architecture.

"That's definitely a lot of dragons," I said. "Are they… dangerous?"

"Only if you're a Lawyer," Candace said. "Archmage Slate knew what he was doing. The big ones hunt the submerged towers. Many little ones are bred here and are basically the local wildlife, infrastructure and pets."

"What keeps them from infesting NUSA?" I wondered.

"They're a concept bound to a particular location," Candace said. "If they get far enough from Cascade, they suffer and decay, becoming subject to rapid entropy."

A tiny dragon about the size of a butterfly fluttered down, landing on my shoulder. Its transparent, rainbowy wings hummed softly, tiny claws pricking my shirt as it settled.

"Aww, she likes you," Nessy cooed as another landed on her head, then flitted to Kristi's arm, Adelle's tail, and finally Candace's nose.

The little creature on my shoulder chirped, its wings fluttering in the breeze, before taking off again. I watched it go, mesmerized.

Nessy opened a hand and a little fuzzy dragon landed on it, pawing at her pink pad like a miniature kitten.

"Welcome to Dragon Alley, Alex," Candace grinned, linking arms with me.

. . .

Dragon Alley buzzed with pradavarians shopping, tourists gawking, and tiny dragons zipping through the air like living confetti.

"What's first on our shopping agenda?" I asked, dodging a cat-sized crimson dragon that swooped low over our heads.

"Clothes for Terry for sure," Candace declared, eyeing the lynx's wrinkled dress. "Then whatever catches our fancy."

"I need a coffee first," Terry groaned, rubbing her bloodshot eyes. "My head feels like someone's using it for drum practice."

"Bubble tea would help your hangover better," Nessy suggested, pointing to a quaint storefront ahead. A sign reading "Bubble Dragon Tea" swung gently above the door, a tiny azure dragon perched on each corner.

"Fine, whatever," Terry mumbled. "Let's go."

We entered the shop, a bell tinkling above us. The interior was cozy and quirky featuring worn wooden tables, mismatched chairs, and dragons everywhere. Most were tiny, flitting between sugar dispensers or nestled in potted plants.

"Check this out," Nessy tugged my arm, directing my attention to a corner of the shop.

A sturdy glass tank housed a rotund dragon about the size of a golden retriever. Its scales shimmered deep purple in the sunlight streaming through the windows. The tank contained large metal cylinders, tea shakers. The dragon lazily batted at them with its tail, setting them spinning at high speed.

"That's Bubbles," the raccoon barista called over. "Our professional tea shaker. Been with us eight years now."

The dragon noticed our attention and puffed its chest proudly before returning to its work, spinning three shakers simultaneously.

"Want tapioca in your tea?" Kristi asked me as we approached the counter.

"Yes please," I replied, staring at the tea-shaking dragon.

I glanced up at the ceiling. There, instead of regular lightbulbs, tiny glass spheres contained minuscule glowing dragons. Each one pulsed with soft light, colors ranging from blue to green to amber.

"Living lights," Candace explained, following my stare. "Basically, dragons, temporarily bound to the concept of light."

We placed our orders and waited at the counter. The barista opened a small fridge behind her to grab ice, revealing a long, serpentine dragon coiled inside. It glared our way and released a huff of cold air from its mouth.

"Dragon bound to the concept of cold?" I wondered.

"Yepperoni," Candace nodded. "You're getting the picture. They start small with barely any affinity, so even a low level Binder can bind them to do a particular job."

We found a table by the window where a patch of sunlight had attracted a cluster of fingernail-sized dragons napping in a pile.

Our drinks arrived, dropping onto our table in a basket carried by a cat-sized dragon. They were vibrant, colorful concoctions with tapioca pearls at the bottom.

"Pretty neat, yeah?" Nessy asked, chewing on her plastic straw.

"Definitely whimsical as hell," I nodded, eyeing the stirring pile of dragons in the sun beam. "Why don't binders do this in more cities?"

Candace set her cup down and leaned forward. "Because Dragon Alley isn't what it looks. Sure, conceptual dragons are cute and useful. They do basic misc jobs. But there's a cost."

"What cost?" I asked.

"Archmage Slade did try to expand it further. He aimed to make dragons bloom across the entire shoreline. The problem is—these dragons hate paperwork. The moment you try to regulate them or slap legal constraints on anything nearby, they notice. They attack permits. They shred contracts. They dive-bomb bureaucrats and judges," Candace explained.

I raised an eyebrow. "They rebel against paperwork?"

"Yep! Legal jargon feels slimy to them. Full of traps and loopholes. So they torch it. Or eat it. Or use it as nesting material. The older they get, the more their affinity skews towards hostiling Lawyers or anything Lawyer-related. Cascade basically does all of its lawyering business in Ferguson. It's not a legal city on paper. Technically—it doesn't even exist on a map. Any Lawyer or a Judge shopping here must wear an overpriced collar that conceals, nullifies their job status and skills."

Terry nodded from across the table. "My cousin tried to smuggle a clutch of eggs to Iona once. Thought he could sell them as exotic pets. The hatchlings ate his wallet first. By the time he got home, they had shredded every document in his house. Bank statements. Birth certificate. Even his divorce papers. Then they vanished."

"Probably just winked back home to Cascade," Candace explained. "Like I said, they don't like being too far from here."

I chortled into my bubble tea.

"Another problem is," Kristi added, "not every binder plays nice in Cascade. Some gangs set up cabins in the mountains n' screw with the newborn dragons, make them aligned to specific curses, death, Topaz or other horrid shit. They get caught, eventually, thanks to the Seers, but it still leaves a mess for the Rangers to clean up."

"So like if a dragon is aligned to work as a lightbulb," I said. "How exactly does it… uhhh…" I tried to explain my reasoning. "Do other dragon things? Or does it not need food and sleep, being conceptual?"

"Ah," Candace said. "The little dragon serves as a lightbulb for about eight hours on a particular shift set up by a binding rune, then it winks into the Astral and goes home. See how some of the bulbs are empty? Those dragons are chilling out at home now."

"Home?" I repeated incredulously. "Which is where?"

"Wherever it has a nest in the Ruins of Denver," Candace shrugged. "Where it noms newborn Lawyers and gets to spend time with other dragons."

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