Kael and Nidhogg sat side by side on one of the long sofas in the east library, both with the posture of survivors of emotional warfare. The silence between them wasn’t comfortable, but it wasn’t hostile either. It was the silence of two people who had just survived twenty-three full minutes of continuous lecturing from Elion without a single pause for breath. The entire library still seed heavy with the absurd pressure of her mana, spread across the dark wooden walls like a physical warning that this woman’s patience had very specific and dangerously unstable limits.
Kael remained sunken into the sofa, elbows resting on his knees, staring at the floor with a completely blank look. The golden glow beneath his skin still appeared occasionally, mainly around his neck and hands, but at that mont he seed too tired even to worry about it. Nidhogg stood beside him in a surprisingly composed position, legs crossed, arms resting on his lap, and an expression far too neutral for soone who had just received detailed threats involving magical castration, runic exorcism, arboreal imprisonnt, and sothing extrely specific about Yggdrasil branches being used to "correct degenerate draconic behavior."
Elion remained standing before them, holding a wine glass that had clearly been empty for several minutes. She didn’t seem to have noticed this yet.
"Do you have any idea," she asked slowly, with the dangerous calm of soone on the verge of an elegant collapse, "how difficult it is to threaten an ancient dragon while your own son seems to have been spiritually screwed to the magical core?"
Kael slowly raised his eyes.
"Technically, I participated in the activity as well."
"Don’t help."
"Fair enough."
Nidhogg opened her mouth to speak, but imdiately closed it when Elion’s gaze slid toward her like a sharp blade. Silence lasted for a few seconds.
Then Elion took a deep breath through his nose before slowly pointing at the dragoness.
"You." His voice ca out too controlled. "How long exactly did you plan to sleep with my son?"
Kael closed his eyes imdiately.
Because that question would never end well.
Nidhogg, on the other hand, seed genuinely thoughtful. She brought a finger to her cheek while tilting her head slightly, clearly reflecting on the question with worrying honesty.
"A good few years? I an, when he was six he was so adorable that I—"
She stopped.
Instantly.
Elion’s eyes began to glow with such an absurd golden intensity that small runes appeared around her arms almost involuntarily. The temperature in the library dropped several degrees at the sa ti as the ambient mana began to vibrate dangerously.
Nidhogg discreetly cleared her throat.
"I fell in love when he found hiding." The silence that followed was almost physical.
Kael slowly turned his head toward her.
"...What do you an?"
Nidhogg looked away for a split second before sighing.
"Like I said before, Kael... we’ve known each other for a long ti."
"No," he replied imdiately. "We literally t today."
She gave a small, tired smile.
"You t today." Her golden eyes turned to him with an eerie calmness. "I’ve known you for years."
Elion remained completely still on the other side of the room, still dangerously close to conjuring so kind of emotionally driven nuclear magic, but even she seed curious now.
Nidhogg slowly crossed her legs before continuing.
The small smile that lingered on her lips now seed distant, almost nostalgic. For the first ti since Kael had t her that night, she didn’t seem like a primal entity toying with mortals. It sounded like soone reminiscing about a life too old to still matter.
"A long ti ago," she began calmly, "I managed to open a small crack in the spatial rift between my domain and the physical world."
Kael remained silent as she spoke. Even Elion stopped twirling the empty goblet between his fingers.
"The Original Realm isn’t exactly... connected to the rest of reality." Nidhogg rested his face in his hand as he gazed distractedly at one of the library shelves. "Yggdrasil and I exist separately from the normal flow of the world. The tree keeps the dinsional roots stable, and I remain bound to its domain." Her tone grew slightly drier. "Or I remained."
She let out a small sigh before continuing.
"Back then I was still searching for ways to completely cross the barrier. Not because I wanted to destroy sothing. I just..." She hesitated for a second. "I was tired of being alone."
The silence in the room grew heavier after that.
Nidhogg didn’t dramatize the sentence. There was no self-pity in her voice. Just a simple fact, spoken by soone who had existed long enough to make solitude a part of her routine.
"After many years of trying, I managed to open an extrely small passage." She raised two fingers close together. "Tiny. Unstable. And the world rejected almost my entire existence when I crossed it."
Kael frowned slightly.
"Rejected?"
"Primordial entities don’t belong to the physical plane." She replied imdiately. "Reality compresses our existence to sothing it can tolerate." Her golden gaze slowly returned to him. "Then my form turned..." She seed genuinely offended. "...into a ridiculous blue lizard."
Elion slowly brought her hand to her face to hide a tired smile.
"Divine justice," she murmured.
Nidhogg completely ignored her.
"I wanted to visit you," she continued, looking at Elion now. "It’s been a long ti since we last t directly. I thought maybe..." She shrugged. "Maybe talking would be better than continuing to silently observe dinsions."
"Elion let out a small, dry laugh."
"Talking." She rested her head on her hand. "You showed up hidden in my fortress for three months stealing smoked at from the kitchen."
"I was adapting."
"You bit one of the guards."
"He tried to touch my tail."
Kael blinked slowly.
Then another very old mory surfaced in his mind.
Small. Fragnted.
A blue lizard constantly appeared near the lower training field. Dark blue scales glead in the forest light. Golden eyes silently watched as Eleanor forced him to repeat sword forms until his arms ached.
Kael imdiately raised his head.
"...Wait."
Nidhogg looked at him.
"...Now I rember."
Her gaze softened imdiately.
"Rember?"
"When I was six years old." Kael slowly squinted as he tried to organize the old mories. "A blue lizard always appeared near the training field." He slowly turned his face to Elion. "Eleanor saw it too."
Elion nodded without surprise.
"She saw it."
Kael frowned.
"But she never said anything."
"Because there was nothing to say."
Nidhogg answered before she could.
"There’s no normal way to detect sothing that the world itself doesn’t recognize." She slowly crossed her arms. "People could see . They could perceive physical presence. But associating that with my true existence was impossible."
Kael remained staring at her in silence.
Nidhogg continued calmly:
"The physical plane rejected my primordial nature so aggressively that even magical perception failed." She gave a small, wry smile. "To any rational person, I was just a strange lizard following a child through the forest."
"You were following ," Kael repeated slowly.
"Constantly."
"That sounds extrely criminal."
"I was curious."
"You were spying on a child."
"Technically I was spying on Elion." She replied imdiately. "You were just always nearby."
Elion let out a short, tired laugh.
"A blatant lie." She pointed at Nidhogg without even opening her eyes. "You completely ignored my existence as soon as he appeared."
Nidhogg didn’t deny it.
Because he couldn’t deny it.
Kael now rembered more things. The blue lizard appearing when he trained alone. When he skipped classes. When he hid near the lower forest to avoid political etings. Always silently observing.
Never aggressive.
Just present.
"You fed her," Elion said casually.
Kael slowly turned his head.
"...What?"
"You stole food from the kitchen every week." She finally opened her eyes to face him. "I thought you’d gotten so hidden animal."
Nidhogg seed discreetly pleased.
"You brought dried at." She rested her chin on her hand again. "And once you tried to give cake."
Kael imdiately seed offended.
"The cake was good."
"It was terrible."
"You ate it all."
"Because you got sad when I thought it was bad."
The silence that followed was strange.
Lighter.
Kael stared at Nidhogg for several seconds as extrely old mories slowly resurfaced. The small blue lizard appearing out of nowhere among enormous roots. The golden eyes watching him practice bad magic. The constant feeling of being watched even when he was alone.
He had never been afraid of it.
He had never even considered it strange.
Now he understood why.
Nidhogg watched him silently as well. There was sothing vulnerable in her expression now. She didn’t seem comfortable admitting all of this aloud.
"You talked a lot," she said after a while.
Kael raised an eyebrow.
"I was six years old."
"Exactly." Her smile widened slightly. "You would sit near and complain about the training, the classes, the nobles, the guards." She tilted her head slightly. "Once you spent forty minutes explaining why you hated math."
"I still hate it."
"I know."
Elion watched the two in silence for a few seconds before finally sighing.
"So while I was busy..." She slowly massaged her forehead. "...my son was emotionally adopting an ancient dragon hidden in the garden."
"Technically," Nidhogg said calmly, "I was the one who adopted him."
Elion imdiately pointed at her again.
"You remain quiet."
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