Pele laid her head down tiredly, hoping that none of her dragonets would arouse. The gray wind dragon concerned asked, "What's wrong, Pele?" Pele hummed in response, "I want to leave the territory and wander and fight, but I can't bring my dragonets with me." she sighed.
The gray dragon, Ninlil, tilted her head, "Why don't you just evade other territories then?"
Pele rolled her eyes in annoyance, "Apparently my dragonets are gonna wait a couple of weeks to start fighting because they want to get to 'know' the territory"
The black dragon, Erebus, looked impressed by the matter, "That's good tactics. You should be less pressing towards your offspring"
Pele glared at him, "They'll realize eventually how useless getting to know the territories is. Not even I can get around such a vast realm without assistance."
Ninlil looked worried, "Still, shouldn't they wait longer so they can do battle practice with each other?"
"The best battle practice is battle itself. I have two females which should make fighting easier for all of them." Pele grumped, matter-of-factly.
Erebus was confused, "Two girls? That's lucky. How many offspring do you have again…?"
"Hah! You wouldn't believe it. I had like eeleven!" laughed Pele, who threw her head back in an exaggerated manner. "Maybe more but who knows." Pele joked one last time.
Erebus didn't catch onto it, "You had more than eleven dragonets!? You must've been blessed by every dragon lord with such luck!"
"No, Erebus. True it was very lucky, but I have seven." Pele replied nonchalantly. "Who in their right mind would choose to have eleven dragonets?"
Ninlil was confused, "If you had eleven eggs, why do you only have seven dragonets?"
"Heh.." Pele chuckled evilly , "It's a funny story."
"Pele…" Erebus warned. Pele knew that Ninlil had a soft heart, and cried over everything. Not that Pele would care of course.
"The first egg got eaten, it wasn't an accident, I was gonna eat all my eggs but then chose against it," Erebus and Ninlil assumed shocked faces. "The second one got sat on, that was an accident, the third fell off the ledge I placed them on, the fourth egg got kidnapped while I was out picking fights with nearby dragons. Not gonna make that mistake again. And the fifth egg also fell off the ledge."
With a shocked and worried face, Ninlil pressed on, "Um… why do you have seven dragonets and only six eggs?"
Pele answered, her excitement dulling down again, "Oh, I had a pair of twins. I believe the potential got separated into them both, magic and brawn."
Ninlil huffed in disappointment, making a 'maybe we should pay a visit in a couple of months as well.' face at Erebus.
Eagar to change the subject, Erebus pressed on about the otherworldly situation.
"What if the sea creature doesn't belong to Oxidanom? What if it belongs to another celestial body?"
Pele answered this question confidently, "We don't need to worry about that. If it doesn't belong to Oxidanom then the dragons that live there will deal with it, they should know more about aquatic bodies than us." Her gaze darkened, "What we do need to worry about is whether they've infested our world or not."
Erebus and Ninlil's expressions turned serious, there was no need to elaborate on them.
Usually, an invasive species would wreak mayhem among the native inhabitants, but they all belonged to the same world at least. One invasive species could damage or destroy an ecosystem, so imagine an otherworldly entity that would normally live in an ocean, being found in a lake.
The creature that Tiny killed was a juvenile. If he could hunt it they were not hard to kill, but being hard to kill wasn't the problem here. It was the reproduction rate.
"…"
"Pele, will you be attending the meeting with the other world?"
"Nah, I don't feel like juggling my kids and business."
"…" Awkward…
After a final farewell, Ninlil was the one to break the connection. Pele weighed her options, staying here with her children while they fight other dragonets, but leaving the planet in potential danger? Or leave her dragonets alone to fight, and risk another dragon to steal the territory for her dragonets, but potentially helping the planet.
I'm sure someone else will deal with it actually, there are plenty of us around. If not… there are always ways to postpone their territory battles.