We were falling. The wind buffeted us from side to side, a chaotic roar in my ears. Desperate, I reached out, my fingers scraping against the jagged rock until they found a narrow outcrop. I screamed as the stone tore through my skin, but I didn't let go. My hands were a bloody mess, but they were the only thing keeping me from the void.
The brute was heavy, his weight a dead anchor on my ankle. "Agh... I won't die like this!" I wheezed, my lungs burning. "Not here! Not today!"
I tried to shake him off, kicking frantically. "Let go!" He looked up at me, his face twisted in a snarl. "If I'm going down, you're coming with me!" "Damn you! Let go!" I shouted. With a surge of adrenaline, I slammed my free boot into his wounded shoulder.
He let out a guttural groan of agony, his grip finally failing. I watched in a daze as the abyss swallowed him whole, his silhouette vanishing into the mist below.
I looked up. The ledge was so far away. I tried to ignore the throbbing pain in my shredded palms and took a deep breath, though the wind made every lungful a struggle. I spotted a jutting rock a few feet to my side. I began to swing my body, building momentum, my muscles screaming under the strain.
With one final, desperate swing, I threw my leg out. My boot caught the edge. "Yes... now the next one," I whispered. I reached up with my left hand, searching for another handhold, but the outcrop beneath my right hand began to groan. A hairline crack appeared, then widened.
"No... no... no... AAAAAHHHHH!"
The stone crumbled, and I was airborne again. This is it, I thought, the world turning into a blur of grey and white. I'm going to die. I closed my eyes and started my final prayers, waiting for the impact.
Suddenly, the air around me shifted. A massive, rhythmic thrum shook my very bones. Before I could hit the rocks, huge, razor-sharp talons clamped around me. They were firm but didn't crush me.
I forced my eyes open and looked up. I saw pitch-black scales that seemed to drink the light, and wings so vast they blocked out the sun.
A dragon. A DRAGON!
We flew for what felt like an eternity, his massive wings moving in perfect sync, as if gathering all the wind of the world to propel us higher and higher. My ears rang with pure adrenaline. The higher we soared, the more the world below lost its shape. The fractured canyons, the winding rivers, and the jagged ridges blurred into a hazy tapestry of grey and blue.
What now? Will it eat me? Kill me? Or...
Different horrific ends crossed my mind until a deep, rumbling voice—more a vibration in my chest than a sound in my ears—cut through my panic.
"If I wanted to kill you, I would not have saved you. As for eating... you do not stir any appetite in me."
I froze. My heart skipped a beat as I stared at the dark, obsidian-like scales. Did... did it just talk to me?
"Who else is here to talk to?" the voice vibrated again.
My eyes widened in realization. Dear God, it reads my mind.
"Your God is far, and I am here," the dragon retorted, a hint of ancient weariness in his tone. "I had forgotten how loud and emotional the scaleless can be."
As we reached the quiet foothills, away from the treacherous peaks, the dragon began to descend. The pressure of the air changed. I felt the iron grip around me vanish as he slowly unclasped his giant talons. He unsheathed them for a split second to find his footing on the solid earth, and then, I was free.
I stumbled forward for a few meters, my legs shaking violently as they hit the solid earth. I spun around, gasping for air, to look at the creature that had just plucked me from the jaws of death.
The dragon was massive, a living mountain of black glass perched in the quiet foothills. As he began to fold his wings, the movement was slow and deliberate, like a great structural collapse. They were so vast that when they finally snapped tight against his powerful body, the sudden rush of air nearly knocked me over again.
Up close, his scales were terrifying. They weren't just black; they were a deep, consuming obsidian that seemed to drink the meager light of the foggy afternoon. Each plate was as large as my torso, jagged and overlapping like armor forged in the heart of a volcano. Yet, I could see a faint, ominous pulse of heat radiating from the dark seams between them, a reminder of the fire that burned within.
He shifted his weight, and the ground trembled beneath my boots. The sheer difference in our size was paralyzing. I wasn't even as tall as his clawed foot. If he chose to, he could crush me without even noticing, like a careless step on an insect.
His head was crowned with massive, upward-sweeping horns that looked like the rugged spires of a ruined obsidian fortress. He lowered his neck, and those eyes—pools of molten, glowing amber—bored directly into me. There was nothing beast-like in that gaze. It was ancient, seeing right through my skin to the fractured blue fire of my Flare. He looked at me not with hunger, but with a cold, detached curiosity, as if I were some strange, brief spark in his eternal darkness.
I forgot how to breathe for a moment, then shouted, "You are real!" I couldn't believe my eyes.
The dragon let out a long, heavy sigh, sending a plume of hot steam into the cool air of the knoll. "You, scaleless, possess such fragile bodies, yet you still insist on staging these deadly trials for yourselves."
I stared into his glowing amber eyes. "They aren't just trials. We are learning how to survive."
"Your greed will never help you survive this war," he rumbled, the sound vibrating in my bones.
I took a daring step forward. "Then help us!" I shouted.
He narrowed his eyes, his pupils contracting into sharp slits. "Do not yell. I can hear your thoughts perfectly well," he said, rearing up majestically, his silhouette blotting out the sky. "And why should we?"
"Because we need help... because I need help. You helped before, didn't you? You left humanity after the Umbrals were defeated, but now they have returned," I said, my voice dropping to a whisper this time.
"We did not leave because they were gone. They have always been here, waiting," the dragon lowered his massive head until his snout was inches from my face. I could feel the scorching heat of his breath. "Why don't you ask for the true reason we abandoned your kind first?"
I fell silent. Why did they leave? The history books said they couldn't stand human nature, that it wasn't their war to fight.
The dragon's chest began to rumble with laughter—a deep, tectonic sound that made the ground tremble. "True, we find many of your kind intolerable. Но the real reason is that human greed knows no limits. It cost your ancestors their lives—and nearly cost us ours. You took the power gifted by dragons not as a blessing, but as a given. In the end, you were left with nothing. It was only the magnanimity of a few dragons that allowed you to keep the small spark you possess today."
"Why should we pay for the sins of few people who lived centuries ago? That's not our fault!" I argued, my frustration boiling over.
He blinked, and for a second, his voice felt softer in my mind, though no less sharp. "I like your fire," he hummed. "You ask why? Because you are of the same blood. The same kind. And greed... greed is a rot that never truly leaves the heart of a human."
I fell silent for a moment, then looked straight into his eyes. "Then why did you save me?"
He narrowed his eyes, his pupils contracting into thin slits of obsidian. Suddenly, he parted his massive jaws.
"Wait... What are you—"
I gasped and threw my hands up to cover my face as he unleashed a torrent of roaring flame directly at me. I braced for the agony, for the smell of singed hair and the blistering heat, but... I felt nothing.
I slowly uncovered my face, blinking through the haze. There was no burning, no sting—absolutely nothing. Yet, when I looked down, the ground beneath my feet was charred to a blackened crisp, steam rising from the cracked earth.
I looked up at that arrogant creation of the world. He straightened majestically, shifting his weight as if he hadn't just tried to incinerate me.
"Are you crazy?" I shouted, my heart finally beginning to hammer against my ribs. "What if you had burnt me alive?"
"I am not incompetent," he rumbled, the vibration felt more in my bones than in my ears. "Besides, you wouldn't burn anyway."
"Wouldn't burn?" I asked, completely dumbfounded.
"You asked why I saved you," he continued, a puff of smoke escaping his nostrils. "It is because I sensed the magic of my confession, and you were the one carrying it."
"Your... confession?" I repeated, the words feeling heavy and foreign on my tongue. "What does that even—"
"Don't they teach you anything in that... Sanctuary of the Pale Scaleless?" he interrupted, his voice dripping with a dry, gravelly sarcasm. He tilted his head, his massive horns cutting through the rising smoke like obsidian scythes. "Or do you all prefer to rot away in your stone halls, hiding your fragile, scaleless skin from the truths that would turn your minds to ash?"
I stepped back, shaking my head. "We no longer learn about dragons... You left us to die." Suddenly, my eyes widened as a realization hit me. "If you are here... does that mean your kind is returning? We truly thought—"
"Do not take my presence for granted, Scaleless! I am here only for you," he hissed, narrowing his golden eyes. "It is surprising how that fragile vessel you call a body can even contain the mana burning within you."
"Don't call me that!" I snapped, my voice echoing against the charred rocks. "My name is Elain."
He rumbled—a deep, vibrating sound that might have been a laugh. "I call a spade a spade." He lowered his massive head, moving with the fluid, predatory grace of a snake. "Why should I help your kind? Just because you claim you wouldn't betray me doesn't mean the others won't. Besides, even now, you are lying to me, aren't you? Honesty has never been a virtue of your race."
For a moment, I forgot how to breathe. The weight of his gaze felt like a physical mountain.
"I... I..." I started, then let out a long, shaky sigh. "Fine. My real name is Aelis Arcanum. I am from the North."
He exhaled, a cloud of hot steam ghosting over my skin, smelling of ancient ash and sulfur.
"I have not lived for centuries and bestowed power upon your ancestors only to fail at recognizing the echoes of my own kind's magic," he rumbled, his voice vibrating deep in the earth. "I knew who you were the moment I felt your mana, Little Sinn. You survived the frost and manifested your strength... for what? To hide in a school of cowards?"
"To find out what caused the ruin of my home! To discover what destroyed everything I held dear," I said, meeting his gaze firmly, refusing to look away. "I will have my revenge, and I will restore my name with pride."
The sun was setting, casting long, bloody shadows over the burnt clearing.
"If you have no intention of helping me, or any of the people of this continent against the Umbrals, then so be it," I said, adjusting my cloak and mask. "But I have to head back... my friends need me. We have a task to finish, and I intend to win."
I felt as if he was looking through my soul, his golden eyes digging deep into my very being. Then he straightened, and only then did I truly realize how massive he was. He snorted, twin plumes of steam erupting from his nostrils as if he had finally reached a decision.
"I choose you, Little Sinn. Get on my back and hold on."
I froze. "What? Are you kidding? How am I supposed to do that? You're huge! I'll break my neck before I even get a chance to fly!"
He let out a heavy, vibrating sigh. "You Scaleless are always so complicated."
I looked at his obsidian scales; they looked so polished that I feared I'd slip off the moment I started climbing. I remembered how Felix had scaled that slippery wall in the cave... maybe if I tried the same...
Suddenly, the dragon rumbled, "Try something like that, and I will make you experience the same fall." A shudder went through me as I imagined it. I shook my head quickly. "Fine... what about this?"
Summoning what little magic I had left, I called forth a gale of wind to propel me upward. I managed to reach his shoulder, then scrambled the rest of the way until I reached the ridges on his back. I sat there, gripping the bone-like protrusions with white knuckles. Valdaar turned his head with the terrifying, fluid grace of a snake to look at me.
"Hold on tight, Sinn," he rumbled, noticing my terror. "We can't have you falling now, can we?"
He stretched his wings—massive sails that blotted out the stars. With a single, earth-shaking downbeat, he launched into the air. A piercing scream left my throat before I could stop it. "AAAAAAAAAHHHHHH!"
The wind was so fierce it threatened to tear me from his back. "Stop screaming," he rumbled directly into my mind.
"I... I'M GOING TO FAAAAAAAALLLLL!"
"You are not. So stop. You are too loud for your own good," he said, his mental voice dripping with irritation.
"You are a DRAGON and I'm a HUMAN! Do you see the difference?!" I yelled back, gripping the ridge even tighter.
The dragon growled. "Don't insult me, Scaleless. I am not some incompetent creature. I am one of the Great Ones." He paused, then added, "Call me Valdaar."
"Valdaar," I whispered to myself. "Are there... are there other dragons? Or are you alone? Where have you all been this whole time?"
"It does not concern you. But of course, there are others. We have been watching your kind all this time. People die, others take their place, but the nature of the Scaleless never changes."
"How?" I asked, breathless. "No one has seen a dragon for centuries."
"You just didn't know where to look."
After a while, the terror faded into a numb sort of awe. I didn't know how or when I fell asleep and how i didn't fall off of his back—the exhaustion finally winning over the fear—but when I opened my eyes, the sun was rising. The ivory spires of Veritas were already visible on the horizon.
"Aren't you tired?" I asked softly. "You've been flying for hours."
He turned his head with terrifying speed. "Do not underestimate our power. It is insulting."
I scoffed. "Are all dragons this arrogant?"
He narrowed his eyes. "Scaleless do not choose; dragons do. It is me or no one—unless another decides to challenge me for you. And I am not arrogant. I am prideful. There is a difference."
"I wasn't trying to insult you!" I argued, feeling the injustice of it. "I was just... worried. I pitied you."
"Even worse," he rumbled. "We are not pitiful."
"What did you mean, 'until another chooses'?" I asked, ignoring his grumbling.
"If two dragons choose the same vessel, the strongest takes the prize. A fragile human body cannot contain two conflicting manas. If they are equal, they fight to the death. But do not worry—no other dragon is going to take you from me."
As we descended toward the academy, the screams reached us before we even touched the ground.
"DRAGOOOON! IT'S A DRAGON!"