The golden-scaled Hatchling asked his mother.
His clear voice rang through the Lair.
“Mother, why don't those people ever undo their transformation? Not even once?”
His mother smiled.
Her son had recently been permitted to leave his room. Even though his range of activity was restricted to the Lair, that alone thrilled him enough to explore every nook and cranny.
After observing his surroundings for a few days, something strange must have caught his eye. He was asking about his parents' dependents who worked in the Lair.
Why did they never release their Polymorph?
His mother cleared up the misunderstanding.
“They aren't transformed right now. Those are their original bodies.”
“Because those dependents are elves, not dragons.”
The Hatchling who would one day become the Dragon Lord searched through his pre-hatching memories.
According to the stories he had heard through his eggshell, various other races lived in the world besides dragons. Elves were one of them.
But that explanation did not seem to fully resolve his doubts.
“Even if they are elves, they can just transform into dragons. It would be much more comfortable to live here if they did.”
“Dragons can transform into elves, but elves cannot transform into dragons.”
“Why?”
“They lack the Magic needed to maintain such massive bodies.”
“Why?”
“Elves do not have a Dragon Heart. Because of that, even if they train their entire lives, there is a limit to the scale of Magic they can manifest.”
“Why?”
“Because the Dragon Heart was granted exclusively to dragons.”
“Why?”
Listening to their conversation, Jenkinson clicked his tongue from within the Hatchling's mind.
‘This is driving me crazy. Here we go again.’
It was the unavoidable phase of parenting—the so-called ‘why’ hell.
Ever since gaining the ability to speak freely, the Lord's questions had never ceased. It was bad enough to make Jenkinson dig through his own hazy memories and wonder if he had been this exhausting as a child.
Today, the boy seemed fixated on why dragons were exceptionally stronger than other races.
When faced with such questions, most parents brushed them off with a single phrase.
“Because dragons are great.”
He expected the Lord's parents to give a similar reply.
“Because we alone evolved that way.”
‘Hmm?’
Jenkinson found this unexpected.
Teaching such concepts this early? Wasn't this taking early childhood education a bit too far?
“Why? Why are only dragons special? Why are we the only ones this strong?”
“There is no particular reason. It is the result of overlapping coincidences. Following a path paved by random probability, we acquired bodies vastly stronger than those of other races, gained exceptionally intelligent minds, and ended up with hearts the likes of which cannot be found anywhere else.”
Unsurprisingly, the Lord could not grasp the concept. How was one supposed to explain random probability to a Hatchling?
His mother looked toward a corner of the Lair.
Whoosh!
Three toy Cubes made of Orichalcum flew out from the shadows pooled in the corner of the room. They were a gift meant to prepare for the Hatchling's teething phase, something he could chew on and play with whenever his gums itched.
Since that time had not yet arrived, their silver surfaces were pristine and smooth, without a single tooth mark.
“Try throwing them.”
The Hatchling did as he was told. The three silver Cubes rolled across the Lair's floor in a random spread.
At her urging, the Lord repeated the action several times.
“Notice how they scatter into a different pattern every time you throw them?”
“Yes.”
“Did you throw them with the intention of making these specific patterns?”
“No, I just threw them.”
“That is coincidence. When you just throw things, they land in meaningless patterns like this. But... try throwing them one more time.”
When the Lord tossed the toys for the last time, his mother intervened.
Slyly, so her son wouldn't notice.
Vwoom!
A wave of Magic enveloped the toys, and the three falling Cubes landed perfectly arranged as the vertices of an equilateral triangle.
“If you throw them an infinite number of times, wouldn't a pattern like this eventually appear? It's not common, but it's not impossible, either. As long as no one interferes to stop it, of course. Naturally, the result is both exceedingly rare and special. Enough to be instantly distinguishable from the previous throws.”
“...Nnngh.”
“This is how dragons were born. There was no outside intention involved. We just became special beings by pure chance.”
“But.”
The Dragon Lord pushed back against his mother's words for the first time.
“You ‘touched’ them just now, Mother.”
“...?!”
“This wasn't a coincidence.”
A pleased smile spread across the adult dragon's lips.
She had subtly nudged the Cubes assuming her son wouldn't notice, but his senses were so sharp that he had caught it immediately.
The mother felt a surge of excitement. Could her child be a genius?
Hiding that joy, she explained.
“I showed you this to make it easier to understand, since I can't stand here and throw them tens or hundreds of billions of times. If I really did throw them that much, a shape like this could appear purely by chance. Dragons evolved exactly through that kind of coincidence. We are not the result of ‘someone touching’ the process, like what I just did.”
However, the Lord still wore a bewildered expression.
Even factoring in the stories he had heard from inside his eggshell and the appearance of the dependents working in the Lair, dragons were simply far too anomalous compared to other races.
He had already heard that dragons were special enough times to grow scales in his ears.
But why were dragons the only special ones?
“A coincidence?”
The Lord tilted his head.
“Are you saying we're great simply because we accidentally hatched this way?”
It sounded as if dragons hadn't put a single ounce of effort into becoming what they were.
Catching the doubt in his tone, his mother explained.
“However, it does seem true that we evolved much faster than the rest. They say dragons used to be as small as those elves in the distant past. I believe the Dragon Heart played a role. As our hearts held stronger power with each passing generation, our bodies changed to accommodate them.”
“Why?”
“Because we inherit the Dragon Heart through the generations.”
“Mmm. My head hurts. I don't really get it.”
“You don't need to think about that yet. The day you inherit our hearts... will be in the very, very distant future.”
Before he knew it, Jenkinson was also listening to the conversation with keen interest.
‘Evolving quickly thanks to the Dragon Heart. What an interesting hypothesis.’
Chewing on it, it actually made a lot of sense.
No other race in the world passed down their power the way dragons did.
Normally, a creature's corpse retained only a pathetic amount of energy compared to the total amount it had consumed throughout its life. Even if one desperately searched for a use, it amounted to little more than food, fertilizer, or fuel.
Furthermore, living beings survived in a way that continuously contributed to the increase of entropy in the natural world. The things they consumed were converted into heat and force, scattering in an increasingly disorderly direction. There was also a limit to the amount that could be stored inside the body.
But dragons were the sole exception.
They meticulously stored a portion of the energy they absorbed throughout their lives inside their Dragon Heart. Within the confined space of the heart, entropy decreased without limits. Instead of scattering randomly, the energy was intricately woven into crystals, arranged, and condensed. After death, it was even passed down to the next generation.
There was no creature on earth quite like a dragon. It was hard to find any other being that so efficiently defied the cosmic law of increasing entropy even after dying.
In the natural world, a phenomenon like the Dragon Heart did not exist elsewhere.
‘What's even more bizarre is that the inheritor cannot fully utilize the accumulated mana.’
Theoretically, if an only child inherited the Dragon Hearts of both an Ancient Dragon father and mother, they should instantly become a monster that surpassed both of them combined.
However, a dragon who absorbed a heart could never fully utilize that mana or the vessel containing it. For instance, if a young dragon inherited it, they might stand shoulder-to-shoulder with Ancient Dragons who had lived a thousand or two thousand years, but they could never immediately leap to the level of an Ancient Dragon at the very end of its natural lifespan.
They merely drew out a fraction of the inherited mana, expanding their vessel slightly while living out their lives. And upon their death, they packed their lifelong accumulation of mana into their heart once more, passing it on yet again.
As generations shifted and inheritance continued, the mana inside a Dragon Heart increased explosively, but the living dragons who owned the heart could never truly harness it all.
‘Why would we evolve this way?’
What was the point of amassing vast amounts of energy that the body's owner couldn't even use?
‘It's absurdly inefficient.’
Unlike Jenkinson, who was puzzled by this contradiction, the Hatchling's thoughts hadn't reached that far. He focused on a different aspect than the Ancient Dragon did. The Lord's worries transmitted directly to Jenkinson.
‘I'm inheriting their Dragon Hearts? That means... that only happens after Father and Mother die.’
Just imagining it made the Hatchling feel as though a part of himself had been torn away.
Seeing the child suddenly halt his ‘why’ bombardment and clam up, his mother smiled, seemingly guessing what was on his mind. It was a gentle, warm smile.
She gently draped her wings over the Lord. Rubbing his face against his mother's leathery membrane, the Hatchling prayed. He prayed that his parents would stay by his side for a very long time, long even after he had finally struck out from this Lair.
He prayed that the long lifespans nature had granted to dragons would fully manifest their blessing.
‘...’
Forced to empathize with that fervent wish, Jenkinson felt his mind suddenly reel.
‘That's right. The Lord's parents both fell during the war...’
Realizing that fact plunged him into deep anxiety.
What if he had to experience everything up to that point in time? What if Jenkinson had to live through the vast, agonizing journey all the way to that era? If this lifelike sense of time, this sluggish pace, continued...
Jenkinson could not be certain.
‘Would I actually be able to remain “myself”?’
An ache throbbed in the corner of Jenkinson's chest. The Hatchling's worry and sorrow were bleeding into him without any filter.
Even knowing the historical fact that the Lord's parents had already died, a part of him now genuinely wished for them to live.
Standing before this maelstrom of confused emotions, the Ancient Dragon felt a sharp sense of crisis.
‘This... is genuinely dangerous!’
The Ancient Dragon asked himself.
Just how many years would this dream last?
*
A man wearing a golden ceremonial robe asked his mother.
His cheerful voice rang through the tearing gusts of wind.
“You don't seem particularly fond of me, Mother?”
The one asking this question was the Pope, currently soaring across the sky.
At Asiph-1's question, Del felt as though she had been ambushed. She was flying alongside the Pope, having transformed into a human.
“When we are this close, I can feel your wavelengths. Very complicated emotions.”
Still, she had no idea how to respond.
It seemed the resurrected Asiph-1 could read another person's mental state to some extent even without physical contact.
Truly, it was an ability worthy of the Committee declaring him the universe's worst criminal.
“...It's because of what Cain said.”
“Why Father?”
“Looking at you reminds me of the story he told me back then.”
Del simply couldn't get used to it yet. She couldn't stomach the way Asiph-1 called Minjun his father and called her his mother.
She muttered in a low voice.
“The Cain I knew would never have said such a thing, no matter how desperately he was trying to convince me.”
“Why?”
“Because that's just the kind of person he is.”
Del mentally replayed her ex-husband's words.
“Think about it. I'm breathing a soul I created into the flesh you forged. The reborn Asiph-1 will be a unique creation belonging only to us. He will be our descendant, transcending our races.”
The Pope shot her a puzzled look through his long hair whipping through the empty air.
“Why?”
“Because it feels like he was exploiting what I desired. The Cain I knew would have been ashamed to resort to such words.”
The Pope fell silent for a moment before replying.
“...True, shame is also something belonging to ‘humans.’ Well then, we have arrived. It's right over there.”
Turning her gaze to where Asiph-1 pointed, Del's expression stiffened.
There were over a hundred Space Motherships gathered there, alongside the young Endelions bound to them.
After the battle ended, Asiph-1 had forced the warships to land in a plain far from the city limits and put the youngsters to sleep. In that state, he dispatched his believers to suppress the Ancient Race prisoners and transport them to the holding cells.
Del and Asiph-1 touched down on the ground.
“Should we wake them?”
“No, let's remove those hideous restraints first.”
Though many parts had bent and broken according to Asiph-1's guidance during the battle, there were still numerous segments that had not been fully separated from their bodies.
Flash!
Del levitated her body back into the air. After a brilliant flash of light, Asiph-1, still on the ground, witnessed a shadow blotting out the surroundings. Raising his head, he saw a colossal organism hovering there, its back to the sun and the sky.
Having reverted to her main Endelion body, Del extended a tentacle downward. Simultaneously, a potent force rippled through the air.
Screeeech! Clang!
Rumble!
Her telekinesis acted as invisible hands, detaching the young Endelions from the Space Motherships. Minjun and Asiph-1 planned to hand the warships over to the believers in this exact state.
Fwoosh!
Her telekinesis flowed in rhythm with her tentacle's movements. This time, it was a gentler wave than the one used to smash the restraints. Compared to Del's main body, these tentacled creatures—puny things barely two or three kilometers in diameter—went limp and floated upward.
Swish!
Del's pitch-black eyes shifted. Meeting her gaze, Asiph-1 released a mental wave.
With that, the children woke from their slumber.
“Uh... where are we?”
Their last memory was being strapped to the ships just outside the freezing atmosphere.
Their consciousness had snapped from the agonizing pain of thousands of drills extending from the restraints and boring into their flesh.
They had no recollection of crossing dimensions afterward, of dragging the ships tied to their bodies through the air and blowing them up, or of landing in response to the voice in their heads.
Skipping past the violently severed blank spot in their memories, they regained their senses only to find an adult Endelion hovering before them. The children tumbled into deep confusion, completely unable to gauge the situation.
A moment later, one of them spoke up in a terrified voice. Hesitantly, and with great difficulty.
Because their caretakers had intentionally kept them uneducated regarding the concept of body renewal, the children interpreted the physical characteristics of the figure before them according to their own limited common sense.
Therefore, the child asked with profound politeness.
“Grandma... who are you?”
“...”
Del was unable to reply for a moment.
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