Four years had passed since the Order's last sighting. No attacks, no messages, no traces. The silence stretched across the kingdoms like a held breath, everyone waiting for a storm that refused to break. Some called it peace. Those who understood better called it the calm before devastation.
Null stood on the palace's highest tower, watching the sunrise paint the dragon kingdom gold. He was larger now, though still small for a five-year-old dragon. His cosmic scales had deepened to true void-black, with galaxies swirling beneath the surface like windows into other worlds. His eyes held depths that shouldn't exist in someone so young.
The palace remained his home, though it felt different now. The corridors he'd once explored with wonder had become familiar paths. The training grounds he'd destroyed with Sierra had been rebuilt twice over. Everything was the same, yet nothing was.
Sierra visits rarely these days. Her training with her mother, Cryos, had intensified after their elements awakened, taking her to the Ice Territories for months. When she did return, their spars were brief, careful things. She'd grown stronger, mastering ice in ways that impressed even the elders.
But the gap between them kept seeming to grow
So she'd shifted to other knowledge. History became their focus. The ancient wars between races, the treaties that ended them, and the grudges still simmered beneath diplomatic smiles. She taught him about the world beyond combat, perhaps sensing he'd need it more than another fighting technique.
"Power without context is dangerous," she'd told him once. "You need to understand why the world is shaped."
During one such lesson, she explained something that finally gave structure to what he'd been sensing for years: the way power was measured in their world, the system that determined who stood where in the hierarchy of strength.
"Skills are everything in Nilus," Aurora had said, pulling out an ancient tome.
"They determine not just individual power, but the fate of entire races. Let me show you how they're classified."
She'd drawn a simple diagram, but its implications were profound. At the base were Common Skills—the foundation everyone possessed. Basic combat techniques that any warrior could learn.
Elemental manipulation that came naturally to dragons. The ether circulation that allowed magic to exist at all. Everyone had these, but mastery created chasms between individuals. A master of common skills could defeat someone with rare abilities who lacked control.
"Never underestimate common skills," Aurora had warned. "I've seen dragons with exotic bloodlines fall to those who perfected the basics."
Above common skills were Extra Skills, evolved forms of basic abilities. When someone pushed a common skill beyond its natural limits through training, understanding, or desperate need, it transformed into something greater. A simple fire breath could become Hellfire that burned souls as well as flesh. Basic flight could become Void Step, allowing movement between spaces. These abilities separated the elite from the masses, marking those who'd transcended normal limitations.
Then she'd paused, her expression growing serious. "Above Extra Skills exist powers that can't be taught or learned. Unique Skills."
These were different entirely. When someone defied fate itself—survived the impossible, achieved the unthinkable, broke reality's rules—the world took notice. Reality would brand them with a title, a conceptual power that belonged to them alone.
These skills changed their wielders over time, sometimes corrupting them with power, constantly transforming them into something beyond their original nature.
"Only a handful in our world possess Unique Skills," Aurora had said, and Null had heard pride in her voice. "The seven Nexus each hold one, earned through centuries of growth. The elders gained theirs through ages of dedication to their elements. I earned mine through a thousand battles where I should have died but refused."
She'd shown him her unique skill then, just a glimpse of solar sovereignty—the ability to command not just solar energy but the concept of supremacy itself. For a moment, Null had felt the weight of absolute authority pressing down. Then she'd released it, and he could breathe again.
"Unique Skills typically take decades of constant evolution to earn," she'd continued. "Reality doesn't acknowledge us easily. We must force it to see us through deed and will."
Above even Unique Skills, she'd mentioned Ultimate Skills, though only briefly. Conceptual dominions that granted ownership over fundamental laws. If Unique Skills bent reality, Ultimate Skills rewrote it entirely. But these were so rare that most considered them myth.
"All skills, regardless of tier, draw from the same source," Aurora had explained.
"Ether. It permeates everything—the air we breathe, the earth beneath us, the stars above. It's the leftover resonance of the Primordial Song that created our world. Anyone can learn to channel it, but few understand its true nature."
She went on to explain the skill system's stranger aspects. Monsters who gained Unique or Ultimate Skills often achieved sapience, sometimes founding entirely new intelligent races.
The Beast King of the Nexus had been a simple wolf once, until his Ultimate Skill elevated him to consciousness and power. Ancient weapons could contain skills sealed within, either passed down through bloodlines or crystallized from their wielder's death. Families guarded their inherited skills jealously, as they represented generations of accumulated power.
"The world runs on skills," Aurora had concluded. "They determine everything from individual battles to the rise and fall of kingdoms. Understand them, and you understand power itself."
That lesson was a year ago. Since then, Null had studied everything she taught while hiding his own growth. She didn't know about the skills he'd been creating through his Primordial ability
He'd acquired four skills in four years, each carefully chosen to build toward something greater.
Ether Breathing had come first, purchased with a year of waiting after
Genius Mind. It seemed simple on the surface—passively absorb ether while breathing—but its effects had compounded beyond his wildest expectations. Every breath for four years had expanded his reserves. While other young dragons tired after an hour of training, he could fight for days without exhaustion. His ether pool was an ocean where others had lakes.
Ether Prodigy had followed, the skill that marked the end of Aurora's combat training. Perfect control over his energy, ensuring no waste in any technique, every ability operating at maximum efficiency.
Cosmic Awareness had been his third choice. It granted perception of all ether and matter in his vicinity, including spatial and temporal fluctuations. He could sense attacks before they formed and feel the shape of space itself. Combined with his genius mind, it made it nearly impossible for him to be surprised or deceived.
The fourth skill had been the most ambitious. Cosmic Body had cost him three years of waiting, the longest gap between any of his creations. But the result justified the patience. His body had become something more than flesh and scale—a Primordial vessel where every cell was reinforced by cosmic ether. Strength that could shatter mountains, speed that bent space, durability that laughed at standard weapons, regeneration that healed wounds before they could fully form. All of it is passive and constant, requiring no conscious effort.
The countdown in his mind read clearly: 15 days, 7 hours, 23 minutes until he could create another skill.
But he had different plans forming. Creating skills was powerful, but it was still working within the system. He needed something more. He needed reality itself to acknowledge him.
Tomorrow would be significant for a different reason. Aurora had promised to teach him transformation, the technique that would allow him to take human form.
"It's not just about the form," Aurora had explained. "It's about understanding that we are more than our scales and claws. We are beings of thought and choice, not just instinct."
The Order's continued silence weighted the air like pressure before a storm. Four years without a single sighting, not even rumors. They were planning something, building toward something. Every kingdom knew it, felt it, feared it. The Nexus had increased its oversight, and the elders patrolled constantly, but still, nothing.
That kind of patience suggested a plan beyond simple terrorism. They weren't just gathering forces. They were preparing for something that would reshape the world itself.
Null descended from the tower, passing through corridors with memories in every stone. Here, where he'd first met Sierra. There, where Chalybs had lectured them about destroying the training grounds. The library where Aurora had revealed the existence of the Nexus. The medical ward where he'd realized Sierra was becoming more than just a sparring partner.
Null entered the throne room where Aurora waited, her golden form radiant in the morning light. She smiled when she saw him, the expression warm with maternal pride.
"Ready for your lessons?" she asked.
"Always," Null replied, settling into his usual position.
She began with history, as had become their pattern: the founding of the Academy three hundred years ago, created by the Nexus as neutral ground where all races could learn together; the Treaty of Seven Skies that ended the last great war; the birth of the Order from dragons who refused to accept defeat.
Null listened, absorbed, and analyzed. Every piece of information was a tool, every historical pattern a lesson for the future. His Genius Mind catalogued it all while his consciousness drifted through calculations.
The morning lesson continued. Outside, the dragon kingdom went about its day, unaware of the five-year-old in their midst who, in just a few short years, had surpassed what most dragons achieved in a lifetime.
The Order's silence would break eventually. The storm would come. And when it did, Null wanted to be ready with more than just skills. He intended to be ready with power that redefined what was possible.
But for now, he listened to his mother teach, content to be her student for one more day. Tomorrow would bring a new lesson, a new evolution