Power stems from bloodline, and bloodline originates from heritage. Yet, nothing in this world remains at its peak forever. The simplest way to destroy a living being is through time—when time dilutes the blood, turning the transcendent into the mundane, and when time strips away the very attributes that allowed them to look down upon the world.
When that happens, it signals the irreversible decline of a race.
The Storm Lord of Limgrave, born from a union with humans, was already a manifestation of the inevitable decay of the Ancient Dragons. Just as the descendants of the perfect heir Godwyn—Godrick and Gofefroy—failed to achieve greatness, the Storm Lord, as a child of an Ancient Dragon and a human, was naturally inferior to a pure-blood. His feathered wings made him fear fire, and his yellow lightning lacked the brilliance of the ancestral Red Lightning. Only the storms he inherited remained somewhat respectable. Not long after his birth, a curse-like phenomenon struck the Ancient Dragon lineage once more.
It manifested in the descendants of the Great Dragon Gransax. They inherited his world-surpassing, colossal size, but not a shred of his storms, his life-imbued Red Lightning, or his rock-hard gravel scales. Instead, they were covered in strange, purposeless hair.
The most taboo aspect of this regression appeared in this particular dragon scion.
An Ancient Dragon is a near-perfect biological construct: four limbs supporting it upon the earth, two or four wings on its back, with hind legs strong enough to support the entire body while the foreclaws unleash devastating Red Lightning.
But this descendant was a pathetic regression. The powerful foreclaws of the Ancient Dragons had vanished entirely, replaced by a crude structure merged with the wings known as "wing-claws."
This dragon was named Greyoll. One could tell by her name that she was spurned by the Ancient Dragons, for she was denied the supreme suffix of their lineage—"sax."
Furthermore, Greyoll was entirely grey and covered in hair. Her wings were like those of a weak bat, lacking any of the golden, shimmering, sturdy membranes of her ancestors. She was the shame of the Ancient Dragons. This was perhaps the consequence of the Ancient Dragons intermarrying with other races in the past. When the curse of the bloodline falls upon a race, it only serves to accelerate their downfall. In fact, after Greyoll, few Ancient Dragons as powerful as Gransax, Lansseax, or Fortissax were born, let alone anyone capable of inheriting the mantle of the Dragon Lord, Placidusax.
Greyoll was abandoned. She was left behind in the ancient ruins of Farum Azula—what is now Caelid. Her only fate was to wither away in this place. In her youth, her massive body could still take flight, and she soared across the vast Lands Between searching for a place to call her own.
Then, she discovered her own unique power. As the most outstanding creations of the Crucible of Life, Ancient Dragons naturally contained the "unity" of the Crucible within them. Even a mutated scion like Greyoll still fell within the scope of the dragon heritage, and thus, she possessed that power.
Nature seemed to grant her a way to survive and continue. She breathed fire and chewed ice, eventually birthing two special broods of children: the Flame Dragons who could breathe fire like their mother, and the Frost Dragons who could adapt to the frigid peaks of the Giants in the north.
This was the path Greyoll forged by adapting herself to the environment. Since she was not accepted by the Ancient Dragons, she created her own race. Thus, a new species called "Flying Dragons" appeared in the Lands Between; though not as ancient as the dragons of old, they were peers to the Giants in seniority.
And so, Greyoll became known as the Mother of Flying Dragons. But time is cruel. It created this misfit being only to eventually strip her of her mobility. Lacking the near-immortal body of an Ancient Dragon, the elderly Greyoll found that her massive size made even flight an agonizing struggle.
Finally, she returned to the place where she was first abandoned—Caelid—to await her sunset.
"Greyoll... truly a size beyond compare." The Tarnished stood before her. Her breath was weak; she lacked even the strength to open her eyes and look at the tiny human before her. The smaller flying dragons huddled around her were mostly deformed—some had wings but could not fly, while others were incredibly frail.
She was a dragon over a hundred meters long. If she could still stand, she would be a vision of supreme majesty and authority. Unfortunately, in her old age, she was virtually paralyzed.
"ROAR..." Greyoll let out a low rumble. Though the sound was faint, it carried the resonant impact of a sub-woofer. Her massive frame naturally granted her physical capabilities far beyond normal creatures; in her prime, her roar could have shaken the mountains and rivers.
Greyoll's eyes were calm. She seemed to accept all of fate. She watched him with eyes several times larger than the Tarnished himself.
"Does all life seek death when it reaches this point?" The Tarnished drew his Crescent Blade. Sensing the threat to Greyoll, the swarm of small dragons crawled forward frantically, hissing and snarling. Their eyes were bloodshot, their mouths agape for an attack, but then—
Greyoll used the last of her strength to let out a final roar. The river vibrated and rocks tumbled. With this single sound, she halted the small dragons. It was the ancestral command of absolute obedience encoded in their blood.
These small dragons were not normal; they were likely the last brood Greyoll had birthed. They were born with such severe defects that they could only maintain their mobility by sharing Greyoll's own life force.
"ROAR..." Greyoll let out another low rumble and slowly closed her eyes before the Tarnished.
"I see... Since you seek death, I shall see you off." This dragon was too ancient; she had existed before the Erdtree and was a contemporary of the Giants. She had lived too long. Longevity and loneliness had likely crushed her soul long ago. Even birthing the race of flying dragons could not save her from the ravages of time.
Nature and time had created her, and they were the ones destroying her. She had likely sought death from outsiders more than once, but her staggering size made most cower in fear. She knew, however, that the human before her would fulfill her wish.
Where there is life, there must be death. Will the death of one dragon usher in the rebirth of all things?
The blade fell. Aiming for the dragon's vital weakness, the Tarnished unleashed his most powerful strike. It was a blow infused with all the strength he had gathered thus far. Though she was a "Flying Dragon," her body was still formidable. Multiple layers of power erupted within her skull, and in a single instant, Greyoll's consciousness was severed.
In her final moment, she saw the birth of the first and mightiest Ancient Dragon, Placidusax... she witnessed the glory of the dragons, saw the Storm Lord, and finally saw herself—the one who signaled the decline of the race.
As her life faded, Greyoll sought only one thing: to return to the Mother of All, the origin of everything—the Great Crucible of Life.
As Greyoll's body vanished, a gargantuan Dragon Heart crashed to the ground. Its size was like a small hill. Without the confinement of flesh, every beat of that massive heart sounded like a thunderclap hitting the earth.
"She didn't inherit the dragon's lightning... but this heartbeat is enough to rival that ancient thunder," the Tarnished remarked. He looked at the surrounding small dragons; they had vanished along with Greyoll. They truly shared a single life.
"This heart is huge... how am I supposed to carry it?" The Tarnished was stumped. Was he expected to lug this mountain of meat all the way back to a Site of Grace?
"Host, please do not worry. Leave it to me." Hearing his dilemma, Asimi separated a portion of her body. That silver mass acted like an infinitely stretchable storage bag, enveloping the massive heart. Then, something miraculous happened.
As the silver bag shrank, the dragon heart inside shrank with it. Finally, a silver "sculpture" the size of a palm, shaped like a dragon heart, landed in the Tarnished's hand.
"Host, if you wish to use it, simply peel back the outer casing. The heart will return to its original size," Asimi explained.
"You have such power? You're quite something," the Tarnished said, genuinely surprised. He hadn't expected a Silver Tear to be capable of such utility. She was practically a multi-tool.
"You flatter me... We Silver Tears must be versatile enough to handle any situation," Asimi replied with her usual humility.
"You should be proud of this power. You have infinite potential," the Tarnished continued. Asimi hummed softly before asking in a quiet voice:
"Even to become a Lord of Night...?"
"Lord of Night? Ah... the king the Nox people pursued." He had heard of the Nox's secret plans to create their own god and lord, though their civilization met its end before the plan could reach fruition.
"To be the Eternal Lord of Night... is the destiny of us Silver Tears. So, my Host... can the world accommodate two Kings?" These were words Asimi, given her personality, usually wouldn't have said at this stage. But during her time sharing a body with the Tarnished, her thoughts had been influenced by him. Though she was still that naive Tear who feared death, she now had the courage to ask and resolve her own doubts.
"A 'King' is just a title people give you. The world has ten thousand paths, and even the King standing at the very front cannot look after everyone behind him. To me, anyone with leadership is a King. I believe the world holds countless Kings. The Elden Lord is the King of the prevailing 'Order,' but that doesn't necessarily forbid the existence of other Kings."
"Ah... my Host... I understand. Asimi understands... In that case, when you become the King who leads the Great Order... I, Asimi, your vessel, will become the Lord of Night behind you to share your burdens." The doubt in Asimi's heart was swept away. She understood now the caliber of the being she inhabited—a King of Kings who stood above ordinary Lords.
And beneath such a King of Kings, there would always be room for other capable souls.
Meanwhile, the group of killers from the Badlands had reached the border between Limgrave and Caelid. The inscriptions on a nearby stone monument made the crazed men burst into laughter.
"Gwah-ha-ha! Look at this! It records the deeds of that 'First Lord' Godfrey... let me see here..."
"Move aside, do you even know how to read? Let me... cough... basically, it says Godfrey was hounded out of the Lands Between right here! Ha! Do you all get it?" It wasn't particularly funny, but the man laughed anyway—proving once again that one should never try to understand a madman.
"Hahaha! Caelid... I heard this place has something called 'Scarlet Rot'? It thinks it can compete with our kill count? It's just a germ." The men were immensely proud of their body counts; the weakest among them had thousands of lives on his hands.
In the early days of the Erdtree, that might not have meant much, but they were born in the Badlands—a chaotic place filled with the strong. To achieve a thousand-man-slaughter there was enough to be called a "Hero" in the current Lands Between.
Every single member of this group possessed the combat power of a "Hero." What kind of impact would their arrival have? The world had yet to find out.