"There's something wrong here," Fishlegs whispered as they landed. "The air feels... heavy."
"He's wrong," Astrid said fiercely. "What you and Toothless have is real."
Hiccup returned to the riders with a heavy heart. He told them everything.
Ruffnut nodded. "Or when we set them on fire. Same thing, really."
"Worse," Astrid said. "There's a new warlord. They call him Kreel the Chainmaker . He doesn't want to control dragons — he wants to erase the bond between human and dragon entirely." Three weeks later, dragons began disappearing from allied tribes.
Kael watched from below, his expression unreadable. What happened next was not a battle — it was a reckoning.

