I always believed that nature was unbiased—patient, ruthless, and fair in her own way. She never acted out of malice or favor, only balance. What was taken was returned; what was built was eventually reclaimed. I respected that about her. But gods? Gods were a different story. They had favorites. They played games. And if there was one thing I was sure of, it was that somewhere down the line, I must've ticked one off—because from the second I woke up that morning, everything in my life went straight to hell.
It started innocently enough. I was just walking down the street, hands in my pockets, thinking about whether to grab ramen or coffee first. The sun was out, traffic was light, and the world felt annoyingly normal. Then the ground growled. The vibration hit first—deep and guttural—followed by a crack that split the asphalt beneath my feet. A sixteen-wheeler up ahead veered off course, skidding sideways with a deafening screech of rubber and metal. The driver's face was frozen in shock as the truck tilted, one side rising like a tidal wave. In the next instant, it launched off the fractured road, flipping in slow motion as though the universe wanted me to appreciate the chaos it had crafted.
Instinct kicked in. I threw myself to the ground, rolling beneath the shattering shadow of steel and glass as the truck slammed into a line of parked cars. The explosion of sound was overwhelming—screaming metal, the hiss of leaking fuel, the shattering of glass that rained down like cruel confetti. When I finally looked up, the street was a ruin, smoke curling into the air. And me? Not a scratch. Somehow, I'd dodged death by inches.
That should've been it. A close call. A story to tell. But the universe wasn't done laughing yet.
Hours later, I found myself deep in the forest, lying on a bed of moss in my usual spot beneath the pines. It was my place of peace. I'd always felt more alive surrounded by quiet wilderness than concrete and noise. The forest didn't judge, didn't demand. It just existed. Animals, strangely enough, never bothered me—wolves, bears, even snakes kept their distance. Maybe they sensed something. Or maybe they just knew I wasn't worth the effort. Either way, I slept like the dead, unmoving, silent, blending into the stillness.
When I woke, something was off. The forest was too quiet. The air carried a static tension, and the faint scent of ozone tingled in my nostrils. Then came the sound—a faint hum that grew into a roar. Lightning crashed around me, three bolts striking in a perfect triangle where I'd just been lying seconds before. Each bolt lingered unnaturally, crackling with blue-white energy that refused to fade. The smell of scorched earth filled the air. I brushed dirt from my jacket and muttered, "Really?"
And then came the satellite.
It tore through the sky like a burning comet, leaving a trail of smoke and fire. I watched it fall—slow at first, then faster, until the ground exploded in a wave of dirt and pressure. The shockwave threw me into a tree hard enough to rattle my teeth. When I came to, the forest was burning in a circle around a crater the size of a house, metal fragments still glowing from re-entry. My ears rang, my vision blurred, but somehow, I was still breathing.
At that point, I figured the gods were just showing off. But the finale came in the dumbest way possible—a stray bullet. My neighbor, some wannabe hunter, had decided to test his new rifle in the woods. One unlucky ricochet later, and the universe finally punched the ticket it had been teasing all day.
Irony really is the cruelest poet.
The Void
Far beyond life, beyond meaning, the universe folds in on itself—a place where light forgets how to shine. The Void. Here, existence is reduced to echoes and drifting fragments of what once was. Stars flicker like dying embers, floating aimlessly through the darkness before vanishing. In the center of that infinite nothing, something stirred: a colossal black orb pulsing with magenta light. Tendrils of energy coiled outward like serpents, devouring everything in reach, feeding on the silence of the abyss.
Jinx's POV – The Void
I don't know how long I've been here. Time doesn't flow—it lingers, like breath caught in your throat. I tried counting once, but after ten thousand years, I gave up. You start to lose sense of what numbers mean after a while.
At first, I kept myself sane by doing what I always did—training. Old habits die harder than I did, apparently. I practiced meditation, replayed sage techniques I'd read about in life—Naruto-style, for lack of a better term. I focused on the rhythm of nothingness, the art of breathing when there's no air. It wasn't until a few decades passed that I realized the truth: I didn't have a body anymore. No limbs. No heartbeat. Just thought. Just will.
And yet… it didn't feel wrong. The cold around me was familiar. Soothing, even.
Eventually, I noticed them—the lights. Dozens, then hundreds, floating in the distance. Each one flickered like a dying memory. The more I focused on them, the stronger the pull became, until I touched one. The instant I did, my mind erupted with visions: a swordsman from the 1400s, his life flashing in fragments. I saw his childhood, his battles, his final breath. And when it ended, I realized something incredible. I didn't just see his memories—I inherited them.
With each soul fragment I absorbed, I gained access to an inner world—a realm forged from the essence of their being. Mine took shape as a frozen mountain range beneath an eternal eclipse. The snow fell in sheets of black ice, and a single red spider lily bloomed beside a crater, glowing like a heart that refused to die. At its center, a campfire burned—small, defiant, eternal.
As I absorbed more souls, more lilies bloomed, each one representing a life, a story, a memory. Most were mundane—workers, soldiers, wanderers—but every so often, I found something extraordinary: superheroes, demons, cosmic travelers. Whole worlds that shouldn't exist, but somehow did. That's when I realized I wasn't bound to one Earth, one timeline. The Void connected to all of them.
Then came the change.
When I gathered a quarter of the lilies, the fire flared, calling to me. I reached for it, and the world shifted. The ice melted away, replaced by endless dunes beneath a crimson sky. Statues of every kind—ancient kings, modern warriors, gods—stood half-buried in the sand. In the far distance, a colossal glowing tree rose from the horizon, its branches weaving through the heavens like veins of gold.
That's when she appeared.
A woman stepped out of the storm—pale as moonlight, eyes lined in black, a gothic beauty draped in shadows. Death herself. She sat opposite me with a tired sigh, conjuring a chair of mist and bone.
"I swear," she muttered, "the gods are getting sloppy. You shouldn't even be here."
I tilted my head. "Lucky me?"
Death smirked. "Or unlucky. Depends how you look at it. Anyway, let's skip the formalities. You've died. Again. But since you slipped past me three times already, I'm giving you a deal. Seven wishes. No limits."
I blinked. "No limits?"
She nodded. "Or trade them all for a lottery. Pure chance. You could get nothing, or something… world-breaking. I love a good gamble."
Seven guaranteed wishes or a spin of fate. Normally, I'd play it safe—but I've never been normal. "Let's roll the dice," I said, cracking a grin. "Give me the lottery."
Death chuckled and snapped her fingers. A slot machine materialized between us, carved from bone and silver, humming with power. I grabbed the lever. The reels spun, blurring faster and faster until they clanged to a stop one by one:
Empty Crossguard Lightsaber
Two Blank Kyber Crystals
Valyrian Steel Blade
Kitsune Outfit
Legacy of Darth Nihilus
Magic / arcane
Legacy of Mace Windu
Death leaned back, amused. "Well, aren't you the lucky one? Those gods are going to hate me for this. Enjoy your new life, Silent Prince."
She snapped her fingers—and the Void vanished.
When I opened my eyes, I was lying on wet sand, the wreckage of a ship burning nearby. Smoke stung my lungs as I staggered to my feet. Bodies littered the shore—crewmen, maybe guards. Then the flood of memories hit me like a tidal wave.
My name was Jeanyx Targaryen, second son of Baelon, grandson of King Jaehaerys. My mother died giving birth to me, and my father never forgave me for it. "The Silent Prince," they called me—mute, unwanted, a shadow in the royal halls. Only two ever saw me differently: my brother Daemon, wild and reckless, and my grandmother, the kind and iron-willed Queen Alysanne. They were my light in that cold palace.
But politics runs thicker than blood in House Targaryen. My father despised weakness, and my silence was a mark of shame. Worse, I had no dragon—another disgrace. Only Daemon bonded with one, claiming Caraxes after our uncle Aemon's death. The old men whispered that I was cursed. Maybe they were right.
The only thing that earned me a sliver of respect was my swordsmanship. Daemon and I dueled endlessly, our record locked at one hundred forty-three each. We fought dirty, fast, relentless—two sides of the same storm.
Then came my arranged marriage, a political trap disguised as honor. I was betrothed to a Northern lady—Lord Rickon Stark's legitimized niece, arranged by my grandmother to strengthen ties between dragon and wolf. She was kind, brave, and far too good for me. On our wedding night, she told me she was carrying triplets. My family celebrated; I felt the walls close in. So, that same night, I fled King's Landing.
They called it a storm at sea. I called it freedom.
But now, standing amidst the wreckage of my ship, I realized fate wasn't done with me yet. The gods had brought me back—for what, I didn't know and to be honest I didn't care.
After a while, my body finally stopped feeling like lead. I pushed myself off the sand, every muscle protesting, and took in my surroundings properly for the first time. The sight almost made me forget how close I'd come to dying.
The beach stretched for miles, untouched and pristine, the waves rolling in with a soft, steady rhythm that could've lulled even a restless soul to peace. The water wasn't the murky, dark blue of Blackwater Bay that I'd grown used to—it was a clear, crystalline blue, shimmering under the sunlight like liquid glass. It was the kind of view you'd never find near King's Landing, where the air reeked of salt and smoke. Here, the air was clean. It felt… pure. For a moment, I just stood there, watching the tide breathe in and out, pretending the world wasn't a graveyard behind me.
Then reality hit again.
Bodies littered the sand—crewmen from the ship, faces pale and glassy, their lifeless eyes reflecting the morning light. Some were still half-buried in the tide, clothes torn by the storm. I sighed and started walking, stepping carefully between them until something glinted in the sand. A half-splintered chest sat half-buried near the wreckage, the iron bindings rusted but still intact. Curiosity got the better of me. When I pried it open, my eyebrows shot up.
Inside was a small fortune—4,000 golden dragons and 14,434 silver stags, all packed neatly into leather pouches. Enough to buy an entire village, maybe even a minor lord's loyalty. Whoever packed it must've been very confident we'd survive that storm. I almost laughed at the irony.
Next to the chest, among what I assumed was my own gear, lay something that made my blood run cold. A dragon egg—black with streaks of deep purple running along its shell like veins of obsidian fire. I recognized it immediately. This was my egg. The one that had been placed in my cradle when I was born, the one that never hatched. The same egg my father mocked as a symbol of my supposed weakness. When it failed to crack, he called it fitting—that even dragons rejected me.
Yet here it was.
Something tugged at me—instinct, curiosity, maybe destiny. I reached for it without thinking. My hand, still streaked with blood from shallow cuts, brushed the shell. Instantly, a pulse of cold shot through me, deep and ancient. The egg trembled. I stumbled back in shock as faint lines of light traced across the surface like cracks in glass. Then, with a sharp snap, the shell split open.
I froze, breath caught in my throat. A small creature pushed through the smoke and fragments, shaking off the shell in a flurry of movement. It was… beautiful.
A newborn dragon, no bigger than a cat, with sleek black scales that shimmered faintly violet when the light hit them. A line of purple spines ran from the base of its neck down to its tail, and the membranes of its wings were almost translucent, glowing faintly like moonlight on obsidian. It blinked at me—curious, unafraid—and let out a soft, uncertain chirp.
For a second, I just stared. A strange wave of déjà vu hit me—something out of a story I used to love, about a boy with a metal leg and his dragon. Slowly, I crouched and extended a hand, moving carefully. The hatchling tilted its head, then shuffled forward on clumsy legs until it pressed its cold snout against my palm.
I froze again. Dragons were supposed to be hot—their bodies burned with the same fire that ran through Valyria's veins. But this one was different. Her scales were cold to the touch, like frost-kissed steel. She leaned into my hand, exhaling softly. A puff of black smoke escaped her mouth, curling in the air before brushing against a splintered plank of wood. When the smoke touched it, frost began to spread across the surface, thin and delicate as spider silk.
My heart stopped.
"...You're not a fire-breather," I whispered.
The little dragon looked up at me, eyes glowing faintly violet, and chirped again, almost smugly.
I couldn't help but laugh. "Of course. Trust my dragon to be the weird one."
She fluttered her wings, then climbed up my arm and nestled against my chest, her small claws pricking lightly through the fabric. A faint purr rumbled from her throat—a sound that no book or maester had ever mentioned dragons making.
Curiosity took over again, and I gently studied her form, trying to determine her gender. It took a few minutes, and a lot of patience, but eventually, the signs were there—female. A strong one, by the look of her scales and spine formation.
I thought for a while about what to call her. Names carried weight among Targaryens; they shaped destiny as much as blood did. My mind sifted through old stories—gods, spirits, stars—and then it clicked. I looked down at her as she blinked up at me, waiting.
"From now on," I said softly, a small smile tugging at my lips, "you are Nyx—the goddess of night."
She chirped again, almost as if approving the name, and curled up in my arms, her wings folding neatly as her eyes fluttered shut. I brushed a hand over her head, feeling her soft, cold scales beneath my fingertips.
For the first time in what felt like forever, I smiled—genuinely.
It seemed this new life might not be so lonely after all.
Snow drifted lazily across the endless white expanse, muffling the world beneath a soft hush. The air was sharp, biting—each breath a sting of frost and iron. Down below, the lake gleamed like a mirror of glass, so still it seemed frozen mid-heartbeat. At the hill's summit sat Jeanyx, his posture composed but heavy with exhaustion. Twelve years had passed since the storm, and the boy who once trembled on a foreign beach had become something far colder—something the North itself would have bowed to.
His silver-blond hair, now streaked black at the tips, framed a face cut from marble and scar. His eyes—violet, almost luminescent—carried that same quiet depth as the lake below: beautiful, but dangerous to fall into. Blood stained the snow around him, streaks of red marking the remains of another lesson he'd been forced to teach.
Across his knees rested a sword no man should wield.
It wasn't forged—it was grown, as if the earth itself had birthed it. The greatsword pulsed faintly, alive beneath the surface. Crimson veins coiled through black metal, twisting like roots feeding on unseen life. The steel glimmered dully, fossilized by time and death. At the hilt, bone fused into the shape of a hand clutching the blade, and from that bone sprouted writhing tendrils of sinew that flexed in rhythm with Jeanyx's pulse. Two gems burned faintly within the crossguard and pommel—one violet, one blood-red—flashing in alternating heartbeats. Every so often the veins moved, stretching outward like they longed to taste living flesh, then snapping back as if restrained by will alone.
Below him, the battlefield still steamed. Dozens of armored men lay scattered across trenches carved by fire and frost alike. Blackened armor clung to half-molten bodies. The snow was gone in patches, replaced by rings of scorched stone and glass. The air carried that terrible mixture of heat and cold—the scent of ash fused with the sweetness of frozen blood.
Jeanyx wiped the blade with a torn cloth already soaked crimson. "Another day," he murmured, voice calm, "another lesson learned."
Flashback — Twelve Years Earlier
When Jeanyx first hatched Nyx, the world had still felt too big for him. He'd barely been alive again for a day when he stumbled upon something buried in the sand near the dragon's nest—a gold-colored Valyrian blade, simple yet elegant, etched with faint runes that glowed when the light hit them. It stirred something in him, a half-memory that refused to surface. He decided to keep it, burying the chest of coins nearby before setting off to explore.
The island was vast, rugged, and blanketed by a thin sheet of snow that whispered with every step. From the mountain's peak, Jeanyx could see nearly the entire landmass—a wilderness of forests, frozen rivers, and cliffs that dove into the sea. Oddly enough, only the beach where he had washed ashore remained warm. Everywhere else breathed winter. The longer he wandered, the more he realized how alive the island felt. The wind carried whispers, and the trees swayed in rhythm to something ancient. It reminded him of the North—that same primal heartbeat pulsing through the land.
He tested the local flora, finding wild roots and berries he recognized from the memories of his past life. The island had a strange harmony, as though it remembered him in return. Nyx followed closely, still small then—black scales glinting violet under the pale sun. Her appetite proved… different. When Jeanyx hunted a deer and offered to cook it, she gave a shrill roar of protest and devoured it raw, licking the blood from her claws before glaring at him with fierce defiance. It was the first time he laughed since his rebirth.
It took him two days to find civilization—not for lack of direction, but because, even as a boy, Jeanyx was lethally lazy. He preferred to rest beneath pines, carving sigils in the snow with a stick, rather than hurry anywhere. Eventually, he spotted smoke in the distance and followed it to a small cottage nestled against the treeline, a forge attached to one side.
There, a man and woman—both in their early thirties—worked together, the man skinning a deer while the woman prepared herbs beside a fire. It struck Jeanyx as unusual; across most of Westeros, men hunted and butchered while women cooked, but these two worked as equals.
When Jeanyx stepped too close, snow crunching beneath his boots, the man reacted instantly. He dropped the carcass, snatched an axe, and shouted into the trees. "Who's there? Show yourself!"
Jeanyx stepped out of the brush, ragged and bloodstained from the shipwreck, and the man froze. Seeing only a wounded, pale-skinned youth, he lowered the weapon. The woman hurried forward, concern in her eyes. "Gods," she whispered, kneeling to check his wounds. "How does a child end up here?"
"I'm not a girl," Jeanyx corrected flatly, earning a blink of surprise from both of them.
After cleaning and patching him up, the couple exchanged quiet looks. The woman asked gently, "Do we know you, child?"
Jeanyx hesitated—then decided this was his chance. "No," he said at last. "And it's better that way."
The woman, kind yet firm, declared he could stay with them until he recovered. The man looked ready to argue, but one sharp glare from his wife silenced him instantly. That was how Jeanyx met Mira and Torrhen Frost, and their spirited daughter, Lyra.
Lyra was about his age, with wild brown hair and storm-grey eyes that never stopped daring the world to challenge her. She wore men's clothes, carried a dagger at her hip, and smirked like trouble in human form. Jeanyx could tell immediately she wasn't one to sit quietly and embroider.
When Jeanyx introduced himself, he chose a name that rolled off the tongue like venom and legacy:
"Jeanyx Slytherin."
The couple didn't recognize it, of course—but it sounded foreign enough to pass. His real name, Targaryen, would only bring problems.
Then he showed them Nyx.
The tiny black dragon perched on his shoulder drew gasps from all three. Mira stumbled back, crossing herself. "That… that's impossible. Dragons are only stories."
Jeanyx smirked faintly. "Then I suppose I'm a good storyteller."
It was then he began to piece together the truth—the island wasn't just remote; it was forgotten. When he finally asked where they were, Torrhen's answer chilled him.
"This island," the man said, looking out toward the horizon, "was once home to the First Men—before they crossed into Westeros. When the Andals came, a few tribes returned here, away from the wars. Their descendants remain."
Jeanyx felt the world tilt. An island older than the kingdoms themselves. A place untouched by dragonfire or the Iron Throne.
A perfect place to disappear.
As Nyx nestled against his neck and purred softly, Jeanyx looked up at the drifting snow and smiled for the first time since his rebirth.
This would be his beginning.
Weeks blurred into months, and Jeanyx adapted to the rhythm of the island like he'd been born there. The morning after his arrival, Torrhen and Mira decided to bring him to their nearby village to meet the rest of the community. Nyx remained hidden deep in the forest—Jeanyx wasn't about to parade a dragon through a settlement that thought dragons were bedtime myths.
Calling the place a "village," though, was generous. It was more a cluster of huts and uneven paths stitched together by stubbornness and frost. The dirt road was full of potholes, the homes were made from timber and reed, and the air always smelled faintly of smoke. Still, the people were warm and curious—humble folk descended from the First Men, untouched by the wars and politics of the mainland.
When Jeanyx offered to help, most laughed, assuming he was just another soft-handed boy. But a week later, he proved them wrong.
He'd spent that week wandering the nearby mountains, foraging and experimenting in secret. When he returned, his arms were full of minerals, crushed stone, and strange powder mixtures that Mira couldn't identify. Torrhen was confused, and Lyra was immediately intrigued. She hovered at his shoulder, pestering him with questions. Jeanyx just smirked and said, "It's a surprise."
Two days later, the surprise revealed itself.
He led the family outside to the front of the cottage, where two paths stretched before them: one the usual uneven dirt, and beside it, a smooth, hard grey surface that gleamed faintly in the light.
"Try walking on both," Jeanyx said.
Torrhen stepped onto the dirt first, boots sinking slightly into the mud. Then he moved onto the grey path—and froze mid-step. "By the gods," he muttered, stamping it twice. "It's… solid. Perfectly smooth."
"It's called concrete," Jeanyx explained. "Strong enough to outlast generations if done right. You'll never have to fix it for a century, maybe longer."
Mira ran her hand along the surface, wide-eyed. "It's cold… but sturdy. Like stone."
"Better than stone," Jeanyx corrected with a grin. "I made it from crushed rock, ash, and a special mix from the mountains."
Word spread fast. The next day, the village chief—a broad-shouldered, white-bearded man named William Harrow—came to see it himself. When his boots touched the smooth path, his face lit up like a child seeing snow for the first time.
"This," William said in awe, "could change everything."
He immediately commissioned Jeanyx to rebuild the entire village's roads. It took two weeks of back-breaking work and sleepless nights, but when the last section was finished, the people were astonished. For the first time, carts rolled smoothly even in the rain. Mud no longer swallowed wheels. Travel between homes became effortless.
Jeanyx, however, wasn't finished.
A month later, he called Torrhen to the forge. Inside stood a new structure of stone and iron that hissed and glowed with heat—a blast furnace.
"It's inefficient to rely on open fires," Jeanyx told him, adjusting the vents. "This channels air into the flames and keeps them hotter for longer. You'll forge more steel, faster, and stronger than before."
Torrhen was skeptical—until he tried it. The results were immediate. The furnace burned hotter than anything he'd seen before, turning raw ore into molten steel in half the time. The quality was unmatched, and the output nearly tripled.
Within a week, every blacksmith in the village—three in total, not counting Torrhen—was begging Jeanyx to build one for them. He did, each more refined than the last.
By then, Chief William had started calling Jeanyx "the Boy Genius of the North Sea." And the title stuck.
Soon, farmers came to him next. Their harvests had been poor for years, so Jeanyx taught them the concept of four-crop rotation, explaining how rotating different plants could preserve soil nutrients and multiply yields. The villagers trusted him completely by that point, and William implemented the system across every field on the island.
Months later, the results were staggering. The harvest was nearly four times greater than the year before. The granaries overflowed, and the once-isolated island began to thrive.
Word spread to neighboring settlements on the east, west, and southern coasts. Chiefs from other villages sent envoys, requesting trade and—more importantly—roads.
Chief William, Torrhen, and Mira asked Jeanyx if he would accept the requests. At first, he wanted to refuse; he'd never cared much for power or fame. But then he thought about Nyx, who had grown rapidly and was eating more than the family could spare.
So, he agreed.
When William insisted on paying him, Jeanyx almost said no—until he remembered the cost of keeping a dragon fed. He accepted, though he hid the smile tugging at his lips.
( timeskip)
A full year passed before Jeanyx finally touched the part of himself that had been waiting all along—the Force. It didn't come with thunder or visions or any divine herald; it simply was. Like the air he'd been breathing without realizing it. One day while meditating beside the frozen lake, the snow around him began to swirl—soft at first, then rising into a slow spiral as if drawn by an unseen hand. He'd exhaled once, reached out without moving, and felt the wind respond.
That was the moment he understood.
But the Force wasn't alone. Something else stirred alongside it—the Arcane.
At first, he thought they were the same thing, just two sides of one power. But the more he practiced, the clearer the difference became. The Force was instinct, the silent will of the universe that bent when you imposed your own. It demanded focus, meditation, and patience. You asked nothing of it—you simply willed something to be, and if your will was strong enough, the world listened. But progress was slow. Frustratingly slow.
The Arcane, on the other hand, was structure. It was logic. It was language made power. To Jeanyx, who had once been a lifelong magic nerd, it felt natural—almost nostalgic. The Arcane obeyed rules like an equation, flowing through sequences and syntax the same way words formed sentences.
He learned quickly that every ancient race had its own dialect of runes. The Northmen used Nordic symbols, runic scripts carved into their very bones of faith. The Valyrians, however, wielded a more complex alphabet—an ancient Germanic derivative infused with geometry and rhythm. The hardest part wasn't power; it was translation. Finding which runes meant what, how they interacted, and what shape gave them form. A single mistake could make an explosion instead of a light.
It was exhausting work—mentally draining to the point of nausea. Lyra noticed first. She caught him one night hunched over a table, surrounded by parchment and glowing sigils, his eyes bloodshot and his hands shaking.
"You're going to kill yourself doing whatever that is," she'd said flatly.
Jeanyx just smirked. "Only if it doesn't work."
Lyra told her mother, of course, and the next morning Mira cornered him, insisting he learn something practical for a change. "If you're going to burn all that effort," she said, "at least make it useful."
So, she introduced him to alchemy.
He agreed, mostly to humor her—but it didn't take long for him to realize how naturally it came to him. Plants, minerals, fluids—he already understood them instinctively. In a few short months, he was blending mixtures, creating tonics and poultices with precision that shocked Mira.
Then, one night, inspiration struck.
Jeanyx remembered something from his past life—a medicine that had saved millions where he came from. It had been simple there: mold and patience. Here, it took weeks of trial and error, experimenting with fermentation, fungus, and stabilizers from native plants. When he finally succeeded, he held up a vial of golden liquid and whispered, "Penicillin."
When he presented it to Mira, her jaw dropped. Within days, his mixture cured a young villager's infected wound that even the healers had given up on. The miracle spread fast. Word reached Chief William, then the entire island. They called it a gift from the Old Gods, a blessing channeled through Jeanyx.
The irony wasn't lost on him.
That miracle solidified his place among them. Soon, he was declared the village's head alchemist, a title that meant little to him but made the people beam with pride. And through his work, he discovered something else—their religion. Unlike the mainland, where the Old Gods were little more than nameless spirits whispered to through trees, this island had preserved the original texts.
It wasn't vague prayer—it was mythology. Odin. Thor. Freya. Tyr. The Aesir and Vanir—all names that sparked recognition from Jeanyx's old life.
He couldn't help but laugh. "So the North's Old Gods were just Norse all along," he muttered.
The people saw no mockery in him, only wonder. And though Jeanyx had always despised organized religion, he found himself drawn to their philosophy. The Aesir's view of balance and inevitability resonated with his own. It felt right. He adopted the faith quietly, not out of fear or obligation, but because it matched the rhythm of his soul.
In time, he also revealed to the villagers another faith—the Old Gods of Valyria, long forgotten and buried beneath dragonfire and time. He didn't present it as competition but as a companion to their own beliefs, explaining that faith could evolve without betrayal. The revelation stunned them. Many had never even heard that Valyria had gods.
When he told them about R'havos the Flameheart, Selhaera the Sky Weaver, and Xarion the Worldbinder, they were fascinated. And when he compared them to Thor, Freya, and Odin, the parallels were undeniable. Over the months that followed, nearly half the village began quietly acknowledging both pantheons, merging them into one shared belief—the Old and the Elder Gods.
It was a strange harmony Jeanyx hadn't expected, but it suited the island perfectly.
Meanwhile, Nyx's growth became impossible to ignore.
By her first year, she was larger than any recorded dragon her age in Valyrian history. Her wingspan stretched nearly thirty feet, her body sleek and elegant, scales like black obsidian dusted with frost. The old scrolls Jeanyx studied—written by ancient Dragonseers—suggested dragons grew fastest in their first decade, yet even they couldn't explain this kind of acceleration.
After months of pondering, Jeanyx concluded there were three main reasons.
First, Nyx spent nearly all her time close to him. Every time he meditated on the Force or practiced Arcane sigils, she lingered nearby. When he focused his will, she would hum faintly, her eyes glowing violet in sync with his. Somehow, his magic fed her—just as her presence sharpened his focus.
Second, her environment. Nyx had made her lair beneath the nearby lake, in a vast underwater cavern Jeanyx had discovered while exploring. The cave glowed faintly with blue crystal veins, large enough for her to stretch her wings freely. More importantly, she could breathe underwater—though only in cold water. The realization left Jeanyx stunned. Dragons, according to all records, hated water. But Nyx wasn't like other dragons.
Third, her diet.
Feeding her had nearly ruined Jeanyx until he found a clever solution. When the villages began paying him for his work, he struck deals with the local farmers—four families in total. Each agreed to give him one old or infertile cow and a bull after each breeding season. It kept their herds healthy and gave Jeanyx a steady supply of food for Nyx.
He gave seventy-five percent of those animals to her, saving the rest for Torrhen and Mira's household. It was a delicate balance—keeping her fed enough to sustain growth, but not so much she'd draw suspicion.
Over time, Nyx's legend grew in secret. The villagers didn't know it yet, but while Jeanyx walked among them as their humble alchemist and inventor, a black shadow circled high above the mountains at night, her violet eyes glimmering like stars.
(timeskip)
By the dawn of his second year on the island, Jeanyx had long since shed the image of the quiet, mysterious boy who washed ashore. He had become something else entirely—a walking force of progress, invention, and quiet chaos wrapped in a silver tongue and a lazy smirk.
He didn't make grand speeches or chase power; he just did things—things that changed how people lived, worked, and thought.
It began with the farmers.
One morning, Jeanyx appeared in the square with a strange-looking contraption strapped to a sled—a heavy frame of iron with curved blades polished to a dull shine. The villagers gathered around, curious. "It's called an iron plow," he explained, brushing frost from his gloves. "Try it."
The skeptical farmers hitched the plow to two oxen and began testing it on the frozen fields. Within minutes, their disbelief turned to open-mouthed wonder. The iron blades cut through the permafrost and soil like butter, churning rich earth that no wooden plow could have managed in winter.
By the end of the day, the men were crying—literally weeping in the fields. The device turned a week's work into a single day's task. The next morning, a dozen farmers arrived at his door, pledging ten percent of their yearly harvests to Jeanyx in gratitude.
He waved them off at first but relented when they insisted. "If you want better crops," he added lazily, "use your animals to plow. It saves your backs. And mix your fertilizer with ash."
That last part caused confusion until he elaborated. "Not just any ash," he warned. "High-alkaline. From certain fruits and vegetables—melon rinds, fruit cores, some dried roots. It enriches the soil faster and keeps disease out."
The farmers scribbled notes on bark parchment while Jeanyx yawned halfway through his explanation.
The next project was far more ambitious.
During one of his foraging trips, Jeanyx discovered a volcanic vent at the island's heart—a deep fissure breathing out heat and sulfurous smoke. He realized it could power the forges indefinitely, sparing the blacksmiths from cutting down entire forests for fuel.
It took him a week to map it out and three more to organize the labor. A dozen villagers followed him into the mountain to help lay crude metal pipes down from the vent all the way to the village's forges. They worked through biting winds and near-constant tremors, guided by Jeanyx's unnervingly precise directions.
When they finally sealed the last pipe, every forge in the settlement roared to life with steady, endless heat.
Torrhen tested it first, hammering steel late into the night with a boyish grin. "It never cools," he whispered. "It never goes out!"
Jeanyx shrugged. "Good. Less work for me."
Originally, he'd planned to build a sewer system alongside it, to channel volcanic gas and repurpose the waste for alchemical filtration—but the lack of manpower forced him to shelve the idea. The villagers already recycled their waste as fertilizer anyway, thanks to his earlier advice. "Maybe next year," he muttered, sketching rough blueprints for later.
A month later, Jeanyx turned his attention to something he considered far more urgent: personal hygiene.
He'd grown tired of the perpetual smell of sweat, soot, and wet fur that clung to the villagers. His tolerance finally snapped when Lyra walked into the forge after training, tracking mud and sweat with an innocent grin. "You all smell like wet sheep," he said flatly.
That evening, he began building a public bathhouse—a massive stone structure near the river's edge, complete with heated pools, steam rooms, and a clever drainage system. He carved heating runes into the stones—Nordic and Valyrian glyphs combined—creating a self-sustaining enchantment that not only kept the water hot but purified it in cycles.
When he unveiled it, the villagers were stunned. For most of them, bathing was an occasional luxury, not a daily routine. But after their first experience in warm, clean water, there was no going back.
Mira noticed it first—their skin felt smoother, their bodies lighter, their sleep deeper. And, most importantly, the town stopped reeking.
He even built a smaller, private bathhouse for Mira, Torrhen, and Lyra beside their home, fitted with runes that shimmered faintly blue when active. Lyra had nearly cried the first time she sank into the steaming water.
A few weeks later, Chief William called a village gathering to prepare for the coming winter. The topic turned—as it always did—to Jeanyx and his endless stream of inventions.
"Boy," William said, stroking his beard with a grin, "how in the seven hells do you keep coming up with these things?"
The crowd leaned in expectantly.
Jeanyx, who had been half-asleep at the table with a mug of hot cider in hand, opened one eye and replied in the most casual tone imaginable:
"I've had these ideas for years," he said, yawning, "but I was too lazy to actually do them before. Usually depends on what annoys me that day."
The hall went completely silent. Even the fire crackling in the hearth seemed to hesitate.
Then William blinked, rubbed his temples, and said under his breath, "Gods help us if this boy ever gets motivated."
Laughter erupted through the room, but Jeanyx only smirked and took another slow sip of cider, his violet eyes glinting under the candlelight.
If laziness bred this kind of progress, the island was in for a golden age.
(timeskip)
By Jeanyx's third year on the island, life had grown strangely routine. Every morning, the smell of bread and metal filled the air; farmers worked their fields with iron plows, blacksmiths sang to their forges, and the sound of laughter echoed from the bathhouses. The island that once barely scraped by now thrived—and yet, somehow, Jeanyx still found something to complain about.
That particular morning, he sat beneath the carved eaves of a gazebo made entirely of ebony wood, a structure he'd built himself atop one of the three mountains overlooking the village. The dark wood shimmered faintly in the light, polished to perfection. It was his favorite place to play chess. Across from him sat Brandon Harrow, the former village chief and father of William, now eighty years old but still sharp enough to frighten most men half his age.
Jeanyx had built the gazebo only a month earlier to have a "quiet thinking spot." Brandon had claimed half of it the next day, insisting that no place of peace should go unused. Now, it had become their daily ritual—an hour of chess, tea, and Jeanyx muttering to himself whenever Brandon outmaneuvered him.
The old man moved a pawn forward, his wrinkled fingers steady. "You're slipping, boy," Brandon said, stroking his long silver beard with that infuriating smugness only old people could pull off. "Five moves in a row you've made blunders. That's not like you, even with your famous laziness. Something on your mind?"
Jeanyx exhaled sharply, slumping back in his chair. "It's not the game, Brandon. It's that."
He jabbed a finger toward the valley below.
The old man turned, squinting into the distance. The view was breathtaking—rolling snowfields, glimmering roads of smooth concrete, and the cluster of wooden huts that formed their home. Smoke curled peacefully from a dozen chimneys. "Looks fine to me," Brandon said, frowning.
Jeanyx slammed his hand on the chess table, making the pieces jump. "That's the problem!" he snapped. "It looks fine to you! There are fifteen—fifteen—houses in this entire village, Brandon. Fifteen! For nearly five thousand people!"
Brandon blinked. "Well, when you put it like that—"
"Even the lowest tribes in the frozen wastes of my homeland have better living standards than this!" Jeanyx ranted, gesturing wildly toward the valley. "Do you know what that means? Families stacked together like animals, sleeping shoulder to shoulder in huts barely fit for goats. You've got a population density worse than King's Landing's slums and the architecture of a fishing camp!"
Brandon blinked again, clearly struggling to keep up with the tirade. "I… suppose we never thought about it that way," he admitted.
Jeanyx glared at him, then sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose. "That's the problem. None of you ever think about it. You've lived this way for centuries. Your father before you. His before him. No roads, no expansion, no ambition."
The old man looked down at the village again. For the first time in decades, shame crossed his face. The truth in Jeanyx's words hit harder than any insult could. The young foreigner had achieved more for the island in two years than his bloodline had in generations.
After a long silence, Brandon coughed awkwardly and looked back at him. "Well then," he said, trying to recover some dignity, "how do you suggest we fix it?"
Jeanyx grinned—a dangerous, knowing grin that made the old man suddenly regret asking.
Jeanyx unrolled his parchment and spread it over a flat rock. The sheet was covered in precise drawings—lines, circles, and notes written in Valyrian script that no one else could read. The villagers leaned in, awed and baffled.
"This," Jeanyx began, tapping the plan, "is what your home should look like. Efficient, organized, and actually livable."
He divided the settlement into four sectors:
Residential District — for families and homes, structured in rows along wide streets.
Industrial Quarter — blacksmiths, forges, carpenters, and alchemists.
Market Square — for trade, food stalls, and gatherings.
Administrative Hill — where the chief's hall and community buildings would stand, overlooking the rest.
Each district was connected by concrete roads wide enough for wagons to pass side by side. "No more mud, no more broken carts," he explained. "And yes, I know it'll take time, but I'm not asking—I'm telling you."
That earned a few nervous laughs.
Then he pointed to smaller sketches—houses designed with steep slate roofs to resist snow, deep stone foundations to retain heat, and chimneys built with internal vents to circulate warmth throughout the rooms.
"You'll each get your own home. No more five families to a hut," he said, voice calm but firm. "Every house will be insulated with packed moss and clay between planks, and I'll teach you how to build them."
Someone asked how long it would take. Jeanyx smirked. "That depends on how lazy you are."
The following week, the entire village became a living construction site.
Jeanyx split everyone into groups—builders, masons, miners, smiths, and carriers. Even the children helped, fetching stones or mixing mortar. He personally oversaw every stage, sketching on bark slates, marking measurements with colored chalk, and correcting mistakes with brutal honesty.
"Too thin," he'd say, tapping a wall with a hammer. "A strong wind could knock that down. Try again."
"Use a longer joint there; it'll distribute pressure better."
"Don't argue—just trust me."
Torrhen, always practical, became Jeanyx's unofficial foreman, organizing labor rotations and keeping morale up. Mira coordinated supplies and food for the workers, ensuring no one collapsed from exhaustion. Lyra—ever stubborn—joined Jeanyx directly, helping with measurements and lifting planks almost her own weight.
At first, the progress was slow. But then Jeanyx stopped holding back.
When a group of villagers struggled to raise a house frame, Jeanyx exhaled and lifted his hand. Before their eyes, the beams rose smoothly into place, hovering in midair like feathers before setting perfectly into their slots. The people froze, jaws hanging open.
"What in the gods' name—" Brandon started.
"Magic," Jeanyx said lazily, waving his hand as if it were nothing. "Now keep working."
From that moment, the pace tripled.
With his telekinesis, Jeanyx could handle four construction sites simultaneously. He guided beams into place, shifted stone foundations, and compacted sand into perfect concrete slabs. Each day he pushed himself until his nose bled, his body trembling from the drain—but by nightfall, entire streets had taken shape.
By the third week, the settlement no longer resembled the poor fishing hamlet it once was.
Concrete roads crisscrossed the center square, glistening with a faint frost that didn't crack under the cold. Homes rose in perfect symmetry, their walls painted with resin to protect against moisture. Each house had shuttered windows, reinforced doors, and hearths connected to shared underground heating vents designed by Jeanyx himself.
He'd even thought of sanitation—gutters lined with stone channels that carried runoff into the fields rather than letting it freeze in the roads. The forges were moved to the industrial quarter and linked to the volcanic pipe system he'd built the year before, providing endless heat.
And in the center of it all stood a grand meeting hall built from black oak and pale stone, with runic carvings etched across its beams. It became a symbol of progress—the heart of the new village.
At night, torches lined the roads, burning clean blue fire from alchemic fuel Jeanyx synthesized. The whole settlement glowed against the snow, like a beacon to the gods themselves.
The villagers began calling it Winter's Hearth, saying that no matter how harsh the storm, warmth would always return here.
When it was all done, Jeanyx stood at the edge of the mountain with Brandon, overlooking the village. The old man's eyes glistened in the firelight below.
"In two months," he said quietly, "you've done what a hundred chiefs never dreamed to attempt."
Jeanyx didn't answer right away. His breath steamed in the air, his coat dusted with snow, hair tied back loosely. "They had the time," he said finally. "They just didn't have the imagination."
He turned away, his tone light again. "Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to sleep for a week."
Brandon chuckled. "If this is what you do when you're irritated, I'm terrified to see what happens when you're motivated."
Weeks later, Jeanyx presented his final innovation—the Icecell Vaults, underground storage chambers lined with frost-resistant stone and sealed with runes. He taught the villagers how to use the natural cold of the soil to preserve meat, milk, and vegetables through the entire winter.
Each home built one beneath their floor, and soon, the village no longer feared famine or spoilage. It was a quiet revolution, but one that changed everything.
By the year's end, the island's once-humble fishing village had become a thriving, self-sufficient settlement of stone, light, and warmth—a place so advanced that travelers from other coasts whispered that it had been blessed by gods.