The world did not weep when the Dragon Emperor died.
High in the obsidian peaks of the Drakhal Range, where the wind never ceased screaming and no stars dared shine, the last embers of Kaelrith's fire guttered out. Alone in a palace carved of black stone and molten gold, surrounded by the skeletal remains of a thousand conquered kings, the once-great Emperor of Flame closed his eyes for the final time—not in battle, but in stillness.
It was not death he feared.
It was what waited after.
He had known it would come eventually. Even dragons, eternal as they claimed to be, bowed to time. His claws had dulled, his wings ached with every movement, and his breath—once hot enough to melt mountains—now only whispered warmth. But he had refused to die by sword or spell. No, he would die as he lived: unbent, unbroken, untouched by mortal hands.
Or so he thought.
When the darkness took him, it was not the void he found—but a light that burned without heat, a sky with no horizon. And within that formless space stood three figures cloaked in starlight. The Divine Tribunal. The ones who watched the realms, but rarely acted.
"Kaelrith, Lord of Cinders. You are judged."
"Your crimes are countless. The annihilation of the Western Kingdoms. The razing of the Emerald Shore. The extinction of the House of Elria."
"You die unrepentant. But not unpunished."
He snarled in their presence, even as smoke rose from his scaled skin. "I brought balance," he growled. "Humans betrayed dragons. I merely answered."
"You answered with fire. Now you will learn of ash."
And with a sound like a thunderclap across eternity, they tore him apart—not body, but soul.
He awoke gasping.
No fire. No wings. No palace of bone and gold.
Just damp straw, cold stone, and a body that felt too small, too weak, too… human.
He bolted upright, nearly smacking his head on the low rafters. His chest heaved, arms flailing at unseen enemies, but all he struck was a wooden bucket and a broom. They clattered to the floor, startling a rooster outside into angry protest.
Pain flared across his spine. A dull, throbbing kind of pain. The kind no dragon had ever suffered from something so mundane as bruised ribs.
Kaelrith looked down at his hands.
Soft. Small. Flesh.
"No…" The voice that rasped from his throat was not the deep, thunderous tone of a dragon king. It cracked, high and young, like an adolescent boy.
He staggered to a broken mirror hanging on the wall of the tiny shed. The face that stared back at him was human—barely sixteen, with tangled dark hair, sun-touched skin, and eyes the color of dying coals.
It was not his face.
Not yet.
Outside, the village stirred with early morning life. Chickens clucked, carts rolled, and wood smoke curled lazily from chimney tops. Somewhere nearby, a woman was singing—soft and untrained, but sweet in a way that made the silence ache.
Kaelrith took a step outside, blinking against the light. His legs wobbled, as if unused to gravity. Or guilt.
"Ah, you're awake."
He turned.
A young woman stood by the well, holding a bucket with one hand and shielding her eyes with the other. Her hair was a soft copper-red, braided over one shoulder. Her eyes—green like moss after rain—regarded him curiously, not with fear.
"You were burning up with fever when we found you near the riverbank two nights ago," she said. "You're lucky the wolves didn't get you."
He opened his mouth, but words failed him. He was too busy trying to feel. There was something… familiar in her. Not her face. Not her voice. But the way the world seemed to shift subtly around her presence, as if she were a thread tied tightly to something long buried.
She offered her hand.
"I'm Liora. And you are…?"
He stared at it. Then, slowly, hesitantly, took it.
"…Kael," he said. The name fell from his lips like ash.
A lie. And yet, the only truth he could afford.
For now.