After the battle Lys felt a surge of emotions
Feeling the aura of the incarnation of the time dragon
He felt nothing but pure anger, seeing him as the one who caused the problem.
The sky fractured at noon.
Not with thunder, not with shadow—but with light.
It began as a single, piercing tone, high and clear, like glass being drawn across the edge of the world. Lys froze mid-step, dragon eyes snapping upward as the sound cut through time itself. Every seal in his body reacted at once—first tightening, then loosening in alarm.
Elda staggered, dropping to one knee. "That frequency—Lys, don't—"
Too late.
The mountain inhaled.
Not the volcano. Not the Dragon.
Lys did.
Air rushed into his lungs, burning cold and impossibly pure, flooding deeper than breath should go—past flesh, past bone, into something older. His vision exploded into white-gold clarity. For an instant, he saw layers of the world stacked atop one another: stone, fire, memory, future.
And above it all—
Wings.
Not draconic.
Seraphic.
Six vast silhouettes of light unfolded behind him, not truly there, but acknowledged by reality. Their forms were precise, terrifyingly symmetrical, etched with radiant script that rewrote the air as it passed.
Nyra shielded her eyes. "That's not dragonfire!"
Valerius backed away instinctively. "That's not anyth
ing mortal."
Lys felt pain—not sharp, but absolute. The kind that did not harm, but judged.
This breath is not yours alone, the Dragon warned, strained. It is older than flame. Older than me.
"I know," Lys whispered, blood running freely from his nose. "That's why it works."
Across the ridge, the air tore open again.
The incarnation of the Time Dragon stepped through—not calmly this time, but urgently, silver-gray eyes widening as he felt it.
"No," he said. "You don't understand what you're calling."
Lys turned to face him, trembling.
"I understand enough."
He opened his mouth.
And exhaled.
The Seraphim Breath did not burn.
It clarified.
A beam of blinding, harmonic light poured forth, layered with impossible geometry—circles within circles, wings within wings. Wherever it passed, distortion unraveled. Chronal scars screamed and collapsed. Shadow did not resist—it confessed, peeling away from the world like a lie exposed.
The incarnation threw up his hands, time warping violently around him, but the Breath ignored sequence. It struck him anyway.
Not destroying.
Revealing.
For a heartbeat, everyone saw it—the truth beneath the incarnation: a vessel stretched across thousands of outcomes, rewritten again and again until the boy inside no longer knew which version was original.
He screamed—not in pain, but in release.
The Seraphim Breath ended.
Silence crashed down.
Lys collapsed instantly, smoke and light bleeding from his mouth and eyes. The wings behind him shattered into fading glyphs, the seals snapping shut with a sound like ringing bells.
Valerius caught him, shouting his name.
Nyra stared at the empty space where the incarnation had stood. "He's gone."
"No," Elda said quietly, eyes wide with awe and fear. "He was returned—to a point before obedience."
Far beyond sight, in the Chronal Expanse, the Time Dragon reeled.
For the first time in uncounted ages, something had acted outside its forecasts.
Its still eyes narrowed.
"Seraphim Breath," it said slowly.
A pause.
Then, something dangerous.
Interest.
Back on the mountain, Lys lay unconscious, dragon eyes dim, his body scorched with radiant fractures that slowly faded into scars of light.
He had wielded something not meant for dragons.
Not meant for time.
And the world—every layer of it—had noticed.