Under the Red Dragon

"All of you, step back, you fools! She has a knife to my throat! She'll cut me open!" Stilgar craned his neck, trying to avoid being cut by Lady Jessica's knife, but his tone remained calm.

Fremen are formidable warriors, but Jessica, as a Bene Gesserit witch rigorously trained, was proficient in physical control, combat, and mental influence. In the instant the conflict erupted, she countered the Fremen leader who underestimated women.

A Fremen warrior lunged at Jessica's knife, but the witch simply sidestepped and struck the warrior's neck with a precise palm strike, knocking him down.

Stilgar, too, was quickly subdued by this combination of witch and warrior, and his crysknife was taken from him.

However, judging by Stilgar's tone, the formidable leader didn't seem worried about his situation. Perhaps he welcomed it.

Similarly, Paul Atreides, trained in combat by the swordmaster Duncan Idaho since childhood, dodged and weaved through the Fremen warriors' attacks, easily breaking through their encirclement.

He leaped onto the canyon rocks, past the other Fremen who nonchalantly lounged as if watching a show, and quickly reached the highest point, taking out a weapon and aiming it at the Fremen below, controlling the scene.

The weapon in Paul's hand wasn't a primitive firearm that fired bullets. It was a laser weapon. After traversing interstellar civilizations, humanity had long abandoned primitive firearms.

The Holtzman shield, a human invention, was a protective device that generated a protective energy shield around the entire battlesuit at a specific vibrational frequency, making it the bane of kinetic weapons.

Holtzman shields could only allow slow-moving objects, such as air and slow-moving blades (with speeds below six to nine centimeters per second), to pass through. However, they could completely block high-speed objects like bullets that used kinetic energy to inflict damage.

Laser weapons and spaceship laser cannons could penetrate these Holtzman shields, but they would trigger a small nuclear explosion.

Therefore, due to a tacit agreement, the various noble houses' battle groups now primarily used specially crafted cold weapon blades in many internal conflicts and wars.

Warriors proficient in switching between fast and slow attacks were the elite soldiers of various legions.

Only when conquering alien planets would they use extremely powerful weapons capable of destroying cities, such as the main cannons of spaceships, or during genocidal wars of conquest, like when the Harkonnen family and the Emperor exterminated House Atreides.

However, these native Fremen didn't have such high-tech Holtzman shields and couldn't block the weapon in Paul's hand. As a result, all the Fremen stopped, no longer daring to attack rashly.

"Why didn't you say you were a witch-like woman earlier? Why didn't you say you were also a powerful warrior?"

Lady Jessica's face was calm, completely different from when she faced the ancestral red dragon.

Her smooth hands gripped the knife without wavering, pressed tightly against Stilgar's neck.

Her eyes, like those of a mother wolf, scanned the Fremen surrounding her, and she slowly brought her mouth close to Stilgar's ear, calmly saying, "No time to explain!"

"Calm down, don't act rashly, woman, calm down," Stilgar took a breath, raised both hands to show he had no other movements, and calmly said, "I was presumptuous earlier."

Jessica glanced at Stilgar, then brought her cheek close to Stilgar's headscarf, lightly kissing the man's robe, and released the formidable warrior.

"Uh," Stilgar was released from his crouch, stood up, slightly tilted his head, and looked at the witch, reaching out his hand to Jessica, but his words were directed to all the warriors.

"Dawn is approaching. We must reach the Tabr cave before sunrise. The fate of these two outsiders will be decided there."

Jessica stared into Stilgar's eyes and returned the crysknife made from a sandworm's tooth to his hand.

Stilgar then turned around, faced the Fremen, and loudly said, "Until then, they are under my protection!" At that moment, the man removed his glove and lightly cut the back of his wrist with the crysknife, performing the Fremen act of oath-taking. "I guarantee it!"

One by one, the Fremen who acknowledged Stilgar's leadership also made the same gesture, indicating they respected the tribe leader's decision and would protect the young man and woman until they reached the Fremen's Tabr cave.

Paul Atreides, who controlled the situation from above, prepared to put down his weapon.

But a young woman's voice sounded behind Paul, "I won't let you hurt my friends!"

Paul Atreides quickly turned around, pointing the weapon at the source of the voice.

It was the highest corner. Hidden in the shadows was a Fremen female warrior he hadn't noticed before, crouching in the corner, holding a knife, staring at Paul in a posture ready to attack at any moment.

Although the female warrior wore a stillsuit, her entire body and face were covered in robes, only revealing her eyes and a nose-mounted breathing filter.

But Paul could still recognize those blue eyes. Although many Fremen had blue eyes, he had seen the young woman's beautiful face and figure many times in dream fragments, as well as those wild, confident, yet gentle eyes.

Paul slowed his panting from the rapid movement and slowly lowered his weapon. The young woman's sharp eyes also softened, and the hand holding the knife retreated, her tense posture becoming relaxed.

The Fremen girl slightly tilted her head, looking up at Paul, then uncovered her face, scrutinizing the young man.

"They say you're the Mahdi (also known as Muad'Dib, meaning 'the one who is guided by God'), but you just look like a pretty little boy!"

The Fremen girl, like all warriors, patted the sand off her buttocks, then stood up and walked towards Paul.

"You chose the hardest path to climb. I admire your courage. Come with me, we should go."

The man and woman jumped down the canyon cliffs, joining the Fremen and preparing to go to the Tabr cave.

Paul knew that millions of Fremen lived in these Fremen caves.

But the Lion Throne Empire and the Harkonnen family didn't know the number of these Fremen.

Due to the peculiarity of the Dune planet, satellite surveillance was not allowed under the tacit agreement.

And these Fremen rarely appeared in the desert during the day, so the nobles thought that after the long-term slaughter and pursuit, there were only more than 10,000 Fremen left.

Fremen leader Stilgar took the weapon from Paul's hand and said to the girl beside Paul, "Protect the safety of the outsiders, Chani. Take care of the newcomers, let's go!"

"I don't accept them," a voice of opposition came.

Jamis, who had previously removed the robe covering his face, stepped forward and stared at Paul and Lady Jessica.

Stilgar stood between the two, facing the warrior from a different faction and said, "Jamis, I have spoken. Don't mess around."

Jamis's blue eyes looked at Stilgar without fear. He didn't mock or sneer, but spoke with the calm tone that every Fremen had honed in the desert, "Stilgar, you sound like a leader,"

"But only the strongest is qualified to lead. She defeated you,"

Jamis's blue eyes calmly swept over Jessica and said, "I want to use the Amtal Rule (destructive testing, commonly used on primitive planets to test the defects and limitations of the test subjects)."

Jessica turned around without hesitation, put down her baggage, and her calm eyes, like a mother wolf staring at her prey, she wasn't afraid of the Fremen's challenge.

"You can't challenge a Sayyadina"—the Fremen term for a female priest who hasn't become a Reverend Mother in the tribe.

"Then who will fight me in her name?"

Stilgar turned his head and glared. "Jamis, stop it, enough, the night is about to end!"

"Then let the sun witness this death!" Jamis's dark face was calm, indifferent, and stubborn. The previous leader couldn't change his mind.

His voice became rough, "Where is her champion?"

Paul Atreides looked at the stubborn warrior, his eyes filled with complexity, resistance, pity, calmness, and profundity.

He had to replace his mother Jessica and fight Jamis. Only by defeating Jamis as Jessica's champion could he gain the Fremen's approval and their protection.

But in Paul's dreams, he had already foreseen blood and death. This was a predetermined fate, but he had to do it.

Paul lowered his eyes, then raised his head again, stepped out from the Fremen, and stood in front of Jamis.

"I accept her champion." Fremen warrior Jamis acknowledged the young man's courage, then slowly turned around and waited quietly for the moment the sun rose.

Paul looked back at the stubborn warrior's back, as if he saw a deep web of fate sweeping towards him, about to entangle and envelop him little by little, making him deeply trapped in it.

His hand supported on the wall, facing the Atreides family's inherited ring on his hand, entering an extraordinarily peaceful state of mind.

In this strange tranquility, images and fragments of the future flowed through his mind.

In the sunlight, he and Fremen Jamis engaged in a duel, the touch between bodies and knives, the collision of combat skills.

The result was completely opposite to what he had predicted.

During the battle, Paul, who had never killed anyone, died under the Fremen warrior's knife because of his momentary kindness.

The flickering images, the voices of ancient female ancestors like chants, echoed in his mind, "Paul Atreides must die!"

"The Kwisatz Haderach can only rise!"

"Don't be afraid," the voices of male ancestors also sounded, like eerie whispers, echoing in Paul's mind.

"Don't resist. The moment you take another's life is the moment you die."

Until the sun gradually rose on the horizon, Paul woke up from his immersed thoughts.

Fremen girl Chani walked over, looking at the young boy who seemed deep in thought. She said softly, "I don't believe you are the Lisan al Gaib, but I hope you die honorably,"

Chani drew a knife from her waist and handed it to the clean young boy.

Paul looked at the girl's beautiful eyes in confusion.

"This crysknife was left to me by my family. It's made from Shai-Hulud's tooth, the sacred sandworm,"

Chani's beautiful blue eyes looked at the boy, her eyes full of affirmation.

"It would be a great honor to die holding it, and Jamis is a powerful warrior. He won't let you suffer."

In the eyes of Chani, a female warrior, Paul, a young boy, would undoubtedly fail the test of a formidable warrior like Jamis and die at Jamis's hands.

But young Paul dared to stand up for his mother and face Jamis's challenge, proving the boy's courage.

"Chani,"

Paul looked at the girl's eyes, hesitating, wanting to tell her that he had seen her in his dreams, but in the end, his moving lips swallowed all the words.

He held the knife Chani gave him and followed the girl to the flat ground.

All around were the Fremen warriors' cold gazes of scrutiny, and his opponent, Jamis, was already waiting for his arrival.

Paul saw his mother Jessica's worry, but Stilgar's eyes also had concern for him, or rather, the believer's concern for Paul's other identity.

"May your blade break!" Jamis stood up from his crouching posture.

Paul held the knife horizontally in front of his forehead, his expression serious. When the future intertwined with the present, and illusion shone into reality, did he have other choices?

Jamis stepped forward and took the initiative to attack Paul. The movements and traces of the knife were particularly familiar in Paul's eyes.

In the illusion, Paul had fought Jamis. With this ability to foresee the future, Paul dodged Jamis's attack. The knife danced in his hand, coming and going more than a dozen times in an instant.

Jamis's experienced attacks were always intercepted by Paul midway. The collision of arms replaced the fight between knives.

When the scene seen in the first prediction flashed, Paul instinctively twisted away from Jamis's urgently and fully thrust knife, his left hand twisted Jamis's right hand holding the knife, and his right hand put the knife on Jamis's neck.

"Do you admit defeat?"

Paul shouted loudly. He didn't want to die, but he didn't want to kill anyone either. He hated the revelation of fate.

"Ho!"

The Fremen's voices rang out.

"This young man doesn't understand our Fremen rules,"

Stilgar shouted loudly, "There is no such thing as admitting defeat in the Amtal Rule. It's either you die or I die."

Fremen warrior Jamis, as if insulted, roared loudly, pushed away Paul, who was waiting for him to admit defeat, and began to attack like a mad dog.

Again and again, Paul blocked Jamis's attacks, holding his crysknife to Jamis's neck, trying to force him to yield.

The surrounding Fremen hissed and booed, and even Stilgar couldn't help but ask Jessica, "Is he toying with him?"

"No, Paul has never killed anyone," Jessica said, her voice trembling. As a mother, she fully understood her son's actions.

Stilgar's expression immediately turned serious, and he stood up from his seated position.

In the arena, under continuous defense, Jamis's frenzied attacks made it increasingly difficult for Paul. His stamina was rapidly depleting, and he began to realize that if he continued like this, he would die.

Just like the other outcomes he had foreseen, if he didn't submit to fate, he would only face a more tragic end.

A fierce aura rolled out from Paul's eyes. In a trance, he heard ancestral voices shouting, "Kwisatz Haderach, rise, ascend!"

A flash of movement, and the knife fell.

Jamis was the one who fell, while Paul was the one standing.

Paul walked despondently out of the arena. The Fremen warriors around him placed their hands on his shoulders, a warrior's acknowledgment, recognizing his courage and strength, recognizing that he had killed with courage.

"You are one of us now," Stilgar said, "A life for a life. Come with us to the sietch."

"No, Paul must leave this planet," Jessica stepped forward to stop him. She said, "You must have a way. There are spice smugglers among you, you have ships, you..."

"No," Paul said, the first time in this young boy's life that he so strongly opposed his mother's opinion.

Paul's face regained its composure, but his eyes were more determined than ever before. He said in a deep voice, "The Emperor sent us here, my father came,"

"But not for money, not for spice, but for the strength of you Fremen."

"Destiny led me into the desert," Paul paused for a moment, "I can see!"

He looked at Stilgar with unwavering eyes, "If you accept me, we will go together."

The sun rose high in the sky. Paul and Jessica joined the Fremen.

They faced the light, wrapped Jamis's body in cloth, and set out on the road home. But as they walked out of the canyon, Paul felt, as if by telepathy, that he was being watched.

So Paul Atreides turned around and looked up at the cliff.

He seemed to be able to see the phantom that existed there.

It was a being that appeared in his future memories, standing on the cliff with that sacred angel, as if watching him.

There were no dragons in this universe, but the moment he saw that being, he understood that it was a dragon from mythology, perhaps even a god in the mortal world.

But gods should not exist in this world.