Draconic Redemption

"I'm afraid the dragon is already dead."

The man with a long grey beard and white robe knelt down next to a golden chest. He picked up something from the box, examined it, then put it back in. His eyes darted around the dark room, searching for something.

It sat on the dusty wall, covered in cobwebs and dust. The old man wiped the dust off with his sleeve and pressed an odd looking symbol, causing a small hole to open up in the wall.

His hand reached inside, grunting as he pulled out what looked like an iron chain. Attached to the chain were two large metal cuffs, connected together by an iron rod that was covered in black soot. The old man held them up to examine them more closely.

"This is it. This is how we're going to save him."

"Now what exactly are we supposed to do with these?" Billy asked Elmer as they walked towards their horses with the old man. Celia was already mounted on hers.

"We have to get them heated up red hot before they'll be able to cut through that," he pointed at one of the many chains that were wrapped tightly around a large boulder. It was blocking their path and they couldn't move forward until they had cut through it.

They had been travelling for almost half a day before they encountered their first obstacle. They had been able to avoid most creatures that had tried to attack them, but this one was just too big for anyone of them to move on their own. Even Billy didn't think he could budge it without damaging their weapons or causing himself some injury if he tried using brute strength alone.

Elmer used his magic to light fire under each cuff, then handed them over to John and Billy who held them carefully above their weapons and kept swaying them back and forth over the flame until they turned bright red. Then Elmer took them back from them and instructed Billy to strike at the chain with his sword as hard as he could while John held on to both cuffs so they wouldn't fall into the pit of lava that was underneath it all.

After ten attempts (and four times when they accidentally dropped one of the cuffs because Elmer hadn't tied them well enough) they managed to break through part of the chain and create an opening big enough for Celia's horse to fit through. She went ahead while John cut as much as he could while Elmer prepared another set of cuffs so they could continue moving forward after this obstacle was behind them.

They made good progress on their journey until night fell, so now they were having a short rest break when Elmer revealed that piece of important news about their quest - the dragon had a mortal wound inflicted upon him by his father before he died and couldn't be healed anymore even if all seven pieces of his body were put back together again by an army of powerful wizards like himself, who knew how to use healing magic.