Chapter 23-2
Ko had never seen the Great War.
He had been born in the age that followed—the age of ash settling, of names carved into stone, of old warriors falling silent when the north wind blew too hard.
When Ko was young, those who had fought the Great War were already ancient. Those who had returned from the sealed north—Dracoserpens who had lost wings, tails, or the light in their eyes—spoke of the Dracotyrannus plainly. That frightened Ko more than if they had spoken with hatred.
They did not speak of the Dracotyrannus as an enemy.
Enemies belonged to the world of reason.
Enemies had hungers, ambitions, fears—terms one might bargain with. Enemies could be threatened, deceived, appealed to, forgiven, or defeated.
What they called the Dracotyrannus was something else entirely.
“If thou meetest one, flee.”
“If flight is denied thee, strike first.”
“If it yet breathes, strike again.”
“And if pity stays thy hand, remember what it cost us.”
What they called the Dracotyrannus could not be reached by reason, nor redeemed by mercy.
It was not wicked in the small, ordinary ways of lesser creatures.
It was despair given flesh. Grief that had outlived language.
Whatever heart had once dwelt within such a being had fallen too deep for any voice to reach.
That was what Ko had been taught.
And for most of his life, he had seen no reason to doubt it.
Until the Dracotyrannus that had broken the seal appeared in Tatsuno.
The first to reach the fallen Dracotyrannus had been himself.
Not to welcome him.
To kill him.
The old warriors had been clear.
Injury meant nothing.
Severed flesh would knit. Broken bone would mend. Given time, even ruin might rise again. If the creature was breathing, the danger remained.
And yet, to Dracoserpens instincts, he did not resemble a creature fully grown into its monstrosity.
He was a Dracling that had somehow survived a thousand years without ever becoming what he should have been.
And so Ko hesitated.
That hesitation stretched into days.
When he finally woke, he was nothing like the nightmares Ko had inherited.
He was subdued. Almost painfully so.
He yielded too easily when pressed, faltered when praised, and seemed almost alarmed by kindness.
He had the strength to shatter kingdoms, yet moved through them as though he needed permission simply to be there.
Perhaps this one is different, Ko thought.
That was the mistake.
His mistake.
On the day he became the Dragon of Doom, Yuki, Tien, and Hasu fell. Tatsuno burned.
The strongest among them were cast down, and all Ko’s caution, all his memorized warnings, all the wisdom entrusted to him by the dead proved worthless because he had failed to act when action had still been possible.
The old warriors had been right. And so had Ko.
And yet being right had saved no one.
Now, the son of the Dragon of Doom slept in the guest chamber within earshot of Ko’s own room.
Night after night, Ko listened to the Dracling drive himself toward exhaustion through relentless training and lectures, grinding himself down until scarcely any strength remained.
If his Dormancy broke, there would be none in this country capable of stopping him. Not even Yuki.
Whether the Dracling follows his father’s path, this old fool cannot know. But if he does, then let me stand before him first. The mistake of showing mercy to that father all those years ago—these claws shall make amends.
Ko watched a moth hurl itself toward the candlelight and vanish in the flame.
Then he raised his cup and drank.
