I Chose This Path, Now the Universe Will Know My Name

Silence.

Not the awkward kind, not the empty kind.

The sacred kind—the silence that follows revelation.

I stood in the aftermath of myself.

The air still shimmered from the shockwave that erupted when I emerged. The trees surrounding the grove bowed slightly, their branches rippling like they'd just felt something divine and didn't know how to explain it. Even the wind was quiet, almost reverent.

My body was… foreign.

Not in a monstrous way. No claws or scales or fangs.

But I could feel it. Power nested in my bones like it had always belonged there. My senses were sharper—too sharp. I could hear Lyssira's heartbeat across the clearing. I could taste the distant pollen in the air. I could feel… space around me. The way it moved. The way it bent when I blinked too hard.

Was this what being more than human meant?

Before I could even gather my thoughts, a rush of silver light surged toward me.

Seraphine.

She hurled herself forward, robes streaming behind her like comet trails, and wrapped her arms tightly around me. Her embrace was fierce, bone-crushing, almost primal—nothing like the composed, celestial figure she had been before.

"My hatchling!" she whispered, voice trembling with laughter and tears all at once. "You're here. You're really here. I've waited so long…"

I blinked, caught completely off guard. Her body radiated warmth like the sun filtered through clouds. I could feel her emotions—joy, relief, awe—pouring out of her like starlight through cracks in an ancient jar.

"I still remember," she murmured, pulling back just enough to look into my eyes. "I still remember when you first hatched."

"…Just now?" I asked, dazed.

She laughed—loud, radiant, full. "No, Zavier. In the vision. The one I saw millennia ago. You were only an echo then, a ripple across time. But now you're real." Her hands cradled my face. "You're real, and you're mine."

Lyssira stepped back, wide-eyed. Her green hair fluttered in the breeze, eyes shimmering with confusion and wonder.

Freya gave a low whistle. "This just got… complicated."

After a long moment, Seraphine finally calmed, though her fingers never fully let go of my arm. "Zavier, what you've become is unprecedented. You carry the essence of my bloodline… fused with something far older."

Her expression softened. "But know this: you are still newly hatched."

I frowned. "So... what does that mean exactly?"

"In dragon terms?" She gave a knowing smile. "You are a newborn. We are not considered full dragons until we've lived for a hundred years. Until then, your strength is unrefined. Wild. You have no rank."

I stared at her. "So I've… gone back to being unranked?"

"Yes," she said simply. "But don't misunderstand. That does not mean you are weak. It means you are incomplete. Your true form has only just begun to bloom."

That truth sat heavy in my chest.

I had come so far. I'd survived deadly battles, awakened something inside me I never knew existed—and now I was back to square one?

Not quite.

My power hadn't disappeared. It had changed. It had shifted from a climbing ladder to something deeper. Rooted.

Lyssira approached. "You okay?"

I looked at her, at Freya watching in silence from the grove's edge, and at Seraphine—still practically glowing.

"I'm… still me," I said. "But I'm also not. I don't know how to explain it."

Seraphine smiled, her arms now crossed proudly. "You don't need to explain anything. Just exist. That alone will change everything."

And somehow… I believed her.