The dragon landed in the heart of the cathedral with an impact so strong, it cratered the marble floor. Stone fragments sprayed like shrapnel, embedding in the wooden pews and the fleeing nobles. For a moment, the great beast simply stood there, wings half-furled, steam rising from its flanks in thick, white clouds.
Then the change began.
It wasn't beautiful. It was brutal. The scales didn't dissolve—they pulled back, retreating into the skin like blades being sheathed. Bones cracked and reshaped themselves with sounds like dry wood snapping. The massive wings folded inward, the membrane thinning, the bone structure collapsing until all that remained were two long, bleeding lines down a human back.
Zekar dropped to his knees in the rubble.
