For humans, with their poor vision, weak bodies, and pitiful magic, the night was deep and full of terrors.
It was different for dragons.
A dragon's sight was no less keen at night than during the day, and there were few forces left in the world that could threaten a dragon at the peak of their powers. Instead of being sothing to fear, the night was a ti for contemplation, a chance to dwell on matters that were often pushed aside by the many responsibilities and duties that occupied the day.
And so Doomwing contemplated.
Not in his lair and not upon the slopes of the great mountain range that ford the heart of Regal Fla's domain. instead, he contemplated in the sky with nothing but wind and moonlight on his scales, held aloft not by the beating of his vast wings but by the strength of his telekinesis alone. There, bathed in the rich currents of ambient magic that flowed through the sky, he allowed his thoughts to drift freely, trusting that they would eventually find their way to what truly mattered.
It was another gift from Brother Tiger, one of many he had received... and one of many he had been unable to repay before his friend's demise.
"Let the mind be free," Brother Tiger had told him. "For it knows best what matters, and will find its way there in ti. As a smith may damage a blade by asking too much of its steel at the forge, so too may even the keenest mind be hard when too much weighs upon it."
As a dragon known for his wisdom and knowledge, such ntal wandering had not co easily to Doomwing. His mind was powerful, and his thoughts flowed with swift, sure sharpness. In many ways, his mind was a blade, and a blade swung carelessly was prone to causing harm. Yet in ti, Doomwing had co to accept that there was wisdom in his friend's words as well. No blade, however sturdy, could go without rest and maintenance. To let his mind wander was to let it rest, and to let it co naturally to what mattered was to hone its edge once more.
Indeed, there was wisdom too in the words that Mother Tree had once shared with him: those with limitations often learn how best to overco them.
In the sa way that a mage with unlimited magic might never bother to improve their efficiency, so too had Doomwing, with his peerless intellect, grown complacent, pushing his mind ever harder without allowing it ti to rest.
It was a pity that it had taken the Sixth Catastrophe to realise how deadly and insidious such fatigue could be. But he had survived, and as always, he had learned from his mistakes. With little to do as he struggled to recover from his wounds, he had used his fleeting years of waking to slowly but surely master the ditation Brother Tiger had sought to teach him so long ago. He had not been ready to learn it when his friend had still been alive, but the death of another friend at his own claws had made him ready to learn.
And now he was a master of it.
The benefits were many, but chief amongst them was a renewed sense of ntal vigour. The slow but steady accumulation of ntal fatigue could be undone, allowing his wits and senses to operate at their peak.
There were unexpected benefits too.
The ditation techniques that Brother Tiger had sought to teach him had been designed for beast-folk. But Doomwing was a dragon, and dragons were, in so ways, far beyond beast-folk. Even now, despite allowing his thoughts to wander, he could feel his connection to the currents of magic in the sky deepen.
The earth had a pulse, as did the sea... and the sky. And he could hear that pulse. It was a steady rhythm born of the sky, the clouds, the wind, and the storm. As he fell deeper into his ditation, the pulse of the sky went from re rhythm to sothing that could almost be called words. It spoke to him of the great storm to the west, a wall of black clouds higher than mountains, their insides riven with lightning and the crack-boom of thunder. It whispered too of the ice and snow to the far south, of the tearing winds that lashed the mountains and the blizzards that had yet to form. And to the east there were dry winds and searing gales. Smoke rose upward alongside the prayers of those caught in the path of the wildfires that scorched the plains. And to the north, a hurricane struggled to be born, the warm ocean waters giving rise to a swirling column of air that might, just maybe, beco sothing more than a re storm.
All these things and more ca to Doomwing. He let those thoughts linger montarily and then let them go.
And at last, his mind drifted to what mattered: the path ahead of him.
He knew, in so instinctive way, that even the power he currently possessed would not be enough. He had seen, albeit at a distance, the Broken God, and he had heard from Mother Tree of the power it had taken to slay that foul creature. Doomwing was no braggart, but he was no fool to underestimate his own abilities either. His knowledge and wisdom would compare favourably to any dragon, even the legends of the First Age, and he would dare to pit his mastery of magic against even Fractal Reign's father who had been the greatest magic user amongst the dragons of that bygone era.
But power... that was the problem.
In knowledge and wisdom, Doomwing did not lack. Likewise, his magic lacked neither in versatility nor in depth. And although he could not match Ashheart in pure strength of arms, he was not lacking as a warrior either. His experience, too, was outstanding, honed over Ages of struggle and toil.
And yet the Broken God was proof of how little those things mattered in the face of overwhelming power.
Against that sort of power what good were skill, courage, and experience? Only in a contest of equals did such things matter, and Doomwing was not fool enough to hope that the Last Catastrophe would be so rciful. They had been lucky, very, very lucky that the Fourth and Sixth Catastrophes had ben sowhat lacking in pure combat power. Oh, they had made up for it in other ways.
The Mad Vampire had used grand rituals and necromancy to weaponise an entire continent. Had he managed to avoid their notice even a little longer, the sum of his might, asured not only in personal strength but also zombies, rituals, followers, and more, might have grown beyond their ability to defeat. But once they had stripped those things from him, once Doomwing had managed to reduce the conflict to a battle in which the Mad Vampire was forced to face him alone, the battle, though by no ans easy, had nevertheless ended in his favour.
Kagami had, in so ways, been even worse. Her ntal attacks had turned people against each other, transforming what should have been a hopeless nurical disadvantage into an advantage. And though she had not possessed the sa sort of intellectual brilliance as the Mad Vampire, her cunning had been far greater. Had Doomwing been less aware of the depths of her cunning, he would have perished to one of her many tricks and secret weapons. Indeed, had he been a little less fortunate, the god-tal spear would have been his end. A little slower to dodge, a little slower to react, a little less paranoid of deception... and he would have died before ever getting the chance to destroy it.
And yet that sa blow, the one that had taken him a thousand years to heal from, had also given him so idea of the path he had to follow.
He had felt it as his life's blood spewed from his chest and his soul hovered on the verge of breaking: the god-fire within the spear.
God-fire... it was the essence of the gods, a power only they possessed. If god-tal was their flesh and bones, then their souls were wrought of god-fire. He had seen both many tis in the First Age. After all, Dion, one of his best friends, had been a god, and there had been many other gods at the ti as well. Yet searching his mories of those ancient days, Doomwing had co to realise a simple thing.
Dragons were intrinsically linked to fire. It was in their blood, in their very souls. Yet god-fire was different. He had not been able to feel it the way he was able to feel other forms of fire. As a young dragon, he had believed it was simply due to his age and power, that with ti and strength, he would be able to sense it the way he could mundane and magical fire. Now, however, he knew otherwise. God-fire was qualitatively different. It differed from mundane and magical fire not in simple nurical terms but in kind.
In the sa way that the blind could not see, those who were not gods could not fully perceive god-fire.
And yet, in that mont, on the border of life and death, he had felt the god-fire within the spear.
That, combined with his own understanding of Awakenings, pointed him toward the truth of the Fifth Awakening.
The Fourth Awakening destroyed the body and reforged it, removing imperfections and transcending purely mortal limits like old age. Certainly, such a thing was beneficial. But given the soul of the average Fourth-Awakening dragon, a body of that level wasn't strictly necessary to contain a soul of that strength. There was room to spare. But dragons had been created by the gods, and the gods, regardless of what mistakes they had made, had never acted without reason.
Why would a Fourth Awakening result in a body that surpassed the soul it contained to such a degree... unless the intent was to create a body capable of withstanding an even stronger soul, one that vastly surpassed the reinforced soul obtained in the Third Awakening.
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Yes.
The pieces fit.
A Fourth Awakening to create the body of a demigod... and a Fifth Awakening to create the soul of one too.
And yet, even if his conjecture was correct, it did not solve the more obvious problem: what conditions had to be t to achieve a Fifth Awakening?
Several ca to mind, but he dismissed them with scarcely a thought.
Great trials and tribulations? It could not be that alone. Doomwing had personally played a key role in defeating six Catastrophes. There might not be a single person in the world whose deeds matched his own.
Wisdom and knowledge? Again, Doomwing was proud of his achievents. Few indeed could match the depths of his wisdom or the breadth of his knowledge. There might be those who better grasped a specific topic than him, but in terms of overall wisdom and knowledge, he was confident of holding his own against anyone.
Skill and experience? Apart from the long-ago days of his youth, Doomwing had never slacked in his training and practice. The cruelties of reality had shown him how dangerous that could be. If skill and experience were pre-requisites, then he should et them easily.
Was it simply power then? Was there so threshold of power necessary to achieve a Fifth Awakening? Perhaps. If the stories Mother Tree told of the power she'd sensed from Sovereign Fla before his fall were true, then perhaps he had managed to go where no other dragon had. And even now, Doomwing was confident that no dragon had the sa raw power that Sovereign Fla had possessed in the days before the Broken God. Regal Fla's father had been a marvel, crafted by the hands of the Seven Gods and blessed with every conceivable advantage they could give him. He had not been lazy either, and his courage and resolve had been famous even before his death.
And in the long years since the death of the gods, Doomwing had realised the full ramifications of their loss. He and his fellow primordial dragons were stronger than their fellow Fourth Awakening dragons, and not simply because of their age or experience. They possessed a power that was difficult to pin down or quantify, but it made them mighty in ways that younger Fourth Awakening dragons were not. Mother Tree had not spoken of it - she had died before the difference grew too obvious - but she had made several remarks before passing that had led Doomwing to a conclusion.
The presence of the gods empowered their creations, changing them on a fundantal level. Without the gods, the younger dragons had been born bereft of this change, and they were weaker for it. Doomwing and his fellow primordial had continued to grow stronger over the years, but that strength was simply quantitative. It was greater strength, but of the sa kind. To achieve a Fifth Awakening was a qualitative increase in strength necessary? And... could such a thing even be achieved without the gods? After all, if the Fifth Awakening was about obtaining a demigod-like soul, then surely the gods would be involved in so fashion.
But, now, all the gods were dead.
Was the door to a Fifth Awakening thus closed forever?
No.
Doomwing refused to accept that. There had to be a way. He had also seen the crowns in the Dreaming Lands. If there was no way forward, they should not exist although it was likely that at least one of the paths forward was a treacherous one that he should avoid at all costs. Once again, however, the spear Kagami had struck him with ca to mind.
God-tal and god-fire. The spear had possessed both - plenty of the forr and a hint of the latter.
Doomwing could never - and would never - forger the feeling of being struck by such a weapon. If he could better understand those feelings, then perhaps he could better understand the spear, and through it the god-tal and god-fire it was made of. And from there, perhaps he could find a path to the Fifth Awakening.
With that, he founds his thoughts wandering in another direction.
What would he do after the Last Catastrophe? If they were able to win - no, they would win, sohow - how would he occupy his days?
Certainly, he would continue to study magic and other subjects. There was no reason to stop. Indeed, he might even be able to focus on less imdiately useful subjects for once without the threat of a Catastrophe hanging over his head. But apart from that..? His thoughts drifted to Regal Fla and the words they had exchanged.
In truth, he had rarely given much thought to matters of the heart. As a young dragon, he had considered it, but the end of the First Age had dashed those hopes. The dear friend who might eventually have beco sothing more had perished alongside so many others. Later, there had been another, but she too had left, and it stung even more because she had not been taken by so nightmarish evil. Instead, she had chosen to leave. Even if she returned... even if she returned, he would never be able to look at her the sa way.
Because she ran.
And if there was one thing that Doomwing would never do, it was that. If Doomwing was going to die, it would be here, upon the world that had birthed him and his parents, the world that his parents had died defending, the world that he had shed tears and blood protecting. It was here that all his friends had been born, and it was here that so many of them had died. No matter the foe, no matter the impossibility of victory, Doomwing would not abandon this world. He would rather die defending it than flee and live.
Regal Fla... he held deep respect for her, and no small amount of affection either. A future with her... he could imagine it, but he needed ti. Not rely ti to deal with his domain but also ti to better grasp his own feelings and decide how best to approach the matter. He was no coward, but Regal Fla deserved better than half-asures and timidity. If he was to agree, then it would be whole-heartedly, and he was not yet sure. But even so, mutual respect and affection were good foundations to build upon. Certainly, he had seen dragons make do with worse.
Unbidden, he found himself recalling words his parents had spoken to him long ago.
He had asked them what they wanted for him in the future. Their reply had been simple: be happy, be strong, be wealthy, and have so hatchlings.
Happy? Doomwing was... happy, he supposed, but he would be happier still when the Last Catastrophe was dead and the world was safe. Strength and wealth, he had certainly achieved. There were few who could face him in battle and hope to erge victorious, and his wealth was considered impressive even amongst his peers. Needless to say, outside of his fellow primordial dragons, there wasn't a single dragon in the world who even ca close.
As for hatchlings...
He would need to have a mate for that. Besides, what did he know of raising hatchlings? To be sure, he had occasionally watched over the hatchlings of others, but playing babysitter was very different from being a father. And though his scholarly leanings were useful in many ways, he had seen enough to understand that fatherhood was sothing to be experienced not simply studied in advance. If he were to have hatchlings, he would have to rely on his mate to aid him and on his friends for advice.
Ashheart could be counted on to give solid advice. His friend spoke simply and clearly and he had already raised a good son. Alas, the one who knew the most about hatchlings amongst his fellow primordial dragons was also the one most likely to be obnoxious about it. Stormbringer had raised more hatchlings than any of them, and she had helped greatly in raising her grandchildren as well. There were probably few dragons alive who could match her wisdom and experience in that regard... and yet, he knew that asking her would be troubleso.
If he was ever that desperate, he might have to approach Tyche first. The dryad was infinitely more sensible and could be counted on to rein in the worst of Stormbringer's habits. He would also have to prepare a gift - so exotic animal she'd yet to throw into that wretched Pool of Ascension. Or perhaps he could prepare a catalyst, sothing that could boost the Pool's power. Was such a thing possible? He'd never given it too much thought, but maybe. Then again, if he did that, she'd pester him for ever stronger catalysts.
A new sensation flickered across Doomwing's scales, and his eyes opened.
Dawn had co, and the once dark horizon had given way to shades of gold, pink, orange, and red.
He had spent the whole night deep in ditation, and yet he felt more ntally rested than he had in weeks. Slowly, he clenched and then unclenched his claws. What would Dion and Mother Tree think if they saw him now? What would his other friends, long departed, think? Would they be proud? Would they be happy for him? He shook his head. In the end, they were gone, and he remained. All he could do now was make sure their sacrifices ant sothing.
"You were up here all night." It was Regal Fla. She had erged from her lair, and she glided on the wind beside him. "Are you hungry?"
"Not particularly," Doomwing replied. "But... a al might do good all the sa."
"In that case..." Regal Fla gestured with her tail. "Whales have been sighted off the coast."
"Whales?" Doomwing nodded. "A whale would not be a bad way to start my day."
"Then let us hunt together," Regal Fla said.
"Yes..." Doomwing shook himself and then angled toward the coast. "I would like that."
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