CHAPTER 465: DRACONIC ESSENCE (3)

Ashwing slept coiled on a branch behind him, tail twitching, murmuring in dreams. The dragon’s presence was a comfort, but even his warmth couldn’t quiet what stirred within.

The mana inside Lindarion flowed too strongly now, faster, heavier, threading through every channel like molten light.

He closed his eyes.

[Core Stability: 94%. Mana Output: 320%. Fluctuation Detected.]

His jaw tightened. The system’s voice, calm, analytical, had become a reminder that he was more than elven now, more than blood or bone. He was a vessel for something older, something that spoke in silence.

’Control,’ he whispered inwardly, steadying his breathing. ’It’s just power. Power bends to will.’

But it wasn’t bending. Not fully. The Breath was alive, its rhythm not his own. He reached deeper, searching for the stillness at the center of his core. Instead he found heat, flickering, layered, like a forge fed by too many bellows. It pulsed with slow, deliberate defiance.

And behind that heat, a memory.

A voice, gentle, ancient. Elyndra’s.

"You carry what I once kept sealed. Do not fight it, for flame only devours when denied its air."

He exhaled through his teeth. "Easy for you to say," he muttered.

Ashwing stirred slightly, cracking an eye open. "Talking to yourself again?"

"Trying to," Lindarion said.

The little dragon stretched his neck lazily, yawning. "You’re glowing, you know. It’s kind of scary."

Lindarion looked down. Faint golden light shimmered from his skin, threads of mana tracing his veins like liquid sun. He clenched his fist until it dimmed. "It’s the Breath. It’s... adjusting."

Ashwing blinked. "Adjusting or fighting back?"

He didn’t answer. The truth was too uncertain to speak aloud.

He turned his gaze upward instead. The stars hung clear tonight, thousands of them, reflected faintly in the leaves.

In the world tree’s memory, when she was younger, before war and loss, before blades and shadows, she’d been told each star was a fragment of the world’s will, the echoes of spirits who had reached peace. Looking at them now, he wondered if any part of him still belonged among them.

His hands rested on the railing. The wood felt alive, humming faintly in resonance with his pulse. The trees of Lorienya had begun to feel him in return, their roots reaching a little closer each night, drawn to the same current that had bound him to the World Tree’s heart. The entire forest seemed to listen when he breathed.

He wasn’t sure if that terrified him or comforted him.

[Warning: Mana synchronization with external source—unidentified. Terminate link?]

"No," he murmured. "Let it breathe."

The air shifted. Leaves rustled. For a heartbeat, the entire forest exhaled with him, soft, deep, like the world had sighed in relief.

Ashwing blinked, sleep forgotten now. "What did you just do?"

"I didn’t," Lindarion said quietly. "It’s doing it on its own."

He looked down at his hands again. His reflection in the polished steel of his bracers showed golden eyes gleaming too brightly for an elf, too steady for something mortal. He felt no madness in it, no hunger, only an awareness. A growing connection to something vast, endless.

And beneath that awareness, buried deep, the faintest pull. Southward.

It had been there ever since the Breath entered him, faint at first, now steady, like a compass built into his bones. He knew what it was pointing to. Dythrael’s domain. The prison. The void where his mother and Luneth were trapped.

Ashwing tilted his head. "You’re thinking about them again."

"Always," Lindarion said.

The dragon hopped onto the railing beside him, watching the stars too. "You’re going to save them. You always do what you say."

Lindarion smiled faintly. "That’s a dangerous faith."

"Not faith," Ashwing said. "Just math. You haven’t lost yet."

The answer drew a soft laugh from him, one that faded as quickly as it came. He stared at the southern horizon again, where the faintest shimmer of darker light pulsed beyond sight. The Breath within him responded to it, recognizing it, hungering toward it, though it wasn’t hunger for destruction. It was recognition.

He whispered into the quiet. "You were born from the roots of creation, weren’t you? The first spark beneath the soil."

The warmth inside his core flared, just once, in answer.

He nodded slowly. "Then you understand. We can’t burn everything that stands in our way. We’ll burn only what must be burned."

The light steadied.

[Core Stability: 98%. Mana Output: Regulated.]

Ashwing tilted his head. "Did it just... listen to you?"

"Maybe," Lindarion said, almost smiling. "Or maybe it agreed."

The dragon yawned again, curling his tail. "You’re scary sometimes."

"I try not to be."

"Well, you fail spectacularly."

Lindarion’s gaze softened. "Sleep, Ashwing."

"Only if you do too."

He didn’t. Even as the dragon settled again, Lindarion remained by the railing, watching the faint movement of mist below. His heart had steadied, but deep down, he knew this was only the beginning. The Breath wasn’t done growing, and neither was the will it carried.

Somewhere within the World Tree, deep roots shifted, aligning with the rhythm of his own pulse. The forest now bore witness to its new guardian.

When the dawn came, Lorienya would wake to a prince changed once more, quieter, calmer, yet carrying the weight of something far older than the forest’s own age.

And though no one could hear it but him, the Breath within whispered one last thing before falling silent again:

You are not its vessel. You are its continuation.

Lindarion opened his eyes, the first rays of morning spilling across his face. For the first time in months, he smiled, not from peace, but from resolve.

The world had chosen him to carry its flame.

Now it was his turn to decide how it would burn.

Dawn came slow over Lorienya.

Mist coiled between the roots of the World Tree, soft and luminous. Dew clung to every leaf and vine, catching the early light until the forest looked spun from glass. Somewhere deep within the boughs, songbirds began to stir, their calls echoing like silver threads through the canopy.