Morning hit differently.
The light spilled through the window—the broken one still covered in plastic, the intact one letting in golden shafts of sunrise. It found Yuuta's face first, painting warm stripes across his closed eyes.
He stirred.
Frowned.
Slowly, painfully, consciousness dragged him back to the world.
"SHIT—I'M LATE FOR COLLEGE!"
The scream tore from his throat as he lurched forward—
And immediately regretted everything.
His body screamed.
Muscles he didn't know existed protested violently. His back felt like someone had replaced his spine with a warped board. His neck crackled with the fury of a thousand tiny knives.
Wait.
He blinked.
Why am I—
He looked around.
Chair. Desk. Books. Morning light.
Why am I sleeping in my chair?
Then the memories crashed back.
Erza. Elena. Dragons. Ice spears. Broken windows. A child who called him Papa. A queen who wanted him dead.
Oh. Right. That.
Yuuta's eyes snapped toward the bed.
Empty.
Neat. Clean. Sheets smoothed. Blanket folded. Pillows arranged like no one had ever touched them.
His heart stopped.
No.
He scrambled—or tried to. His legs, asleep from hours in that terrible chair, refused to cooperate. He tumbled forward, catching himself on the desk, knocking over a stack of papers.
"No no no no—"
The bed was empty.
The blankets were cold.
Had it all been a dream? Had his broken mind finally snapped, conjuring dragons and daughters from the lonely depths of his soul? Was he still in that chair, still asleep, still alone?
Yuuta's chest tightened.
His vision blurred.
Please, he thought desperately. Please let it be real. Please let her be real. Please let them be real. I don't care if she kills me. I don't care if I die tomorrow. Just let them exist. Just let me have—
A sound.
From the living room.
Music? No. Dialogue. The TV.
Yuuta's heart exploded back to life.
THE TV.
Someone had turned on the TV.
Someone was in his apartment.
Someone—
He tried to stand. His legs buckled. Pins and needles shot through his feet like electric fire. His muscles screamed. His body betrayed him.
He didn't care.
He crawled.
Out of the bedroom. Across the floor. On hands and knees like some desperate caterpillar, dragging his useless legs behind him. The hallway stretched forever. The living room seemed miles away.
But he kept moving.
Kept crawling.
Kept hoping.
And then—
He saw her.
Elena.
Sitting on the living room floor. Cross-legged. Tiny wings relaxed. Silver hair catching the morning light like spun moonlight. Her violet eyes fixed on the TV, where some colorful cartoon played.
She was real.
She was there.
She was his.
Yuuta collapsed against the doorframe, relief flooding through him so powerfully his vision actually swam.
Thank you, he thought to no one. Thank you thank you thank you—
Elena turned.
Her eyes found him—crawling, pathetic, tears threatening to spill—and her face lit up with the kind of pure joy only children possess.
"PAPA!" She scrambled to her feet. "What are you doing?"
Yuuta opened his mouth.
Closed it.
Opened it again.
What am I doing? He looked down at himself. Crawling. On the floor. Like an idiot.
Think. Think. Excuse. Excuse.
"Papa is..." He grasped desperately. "Looking at your cute face from a different angle!"
Elena blinked.
Then she giggled—a sound so pure, so sweet, so alive that Yuuta felt his heart grow three sizes.
"Papa is weird again!" she announced happily.
"Yeah," Yuuta agreed, grinning despite everything. "Papa is definitely weird."
A sound from the bathroom.
Water running. Then stopping.
Footsteps.
Yuuta looked up—
And felt the temperature drop.
Erza stood in the bathroom doorway, towel in hand, her face still damp from washing. Her silver hair was slightly tousled—the only sign she'd slept at all. Her violet eyes swept over him with the warmth of a glacier.
Crawling. On the floor. Like an idiot.
"Tch."
That was all.
One sound. One dismissive, contemptuous sound that conveyed more disgust than most people could manage in a full sentence.
Yuuta's smile froze.
"What," she said flatly, "are you doing?"
"I—my legs—they were—"
"I didn't ask for an explanation." She dabbed the towel against her face with elegant, measured movements. "I asked what you're doing. Crawling on the floor like some sort of insect. It's pathetic."
Yuuta's mouth opened and closed.
Elena, oblivious to the tension, tugged at her mother's dress. "Mama! Papa was looking at my cute face from a different angle!"
Erza glanced down at her daughter.
Then back at Yuuta.
One eyebrow arched.
"That," she said, "is the stupidest thing I've ever heard. And I've heard a lot of stupid things."
Yuuta finally found his voice. "I—I just woke up and you weren't in bed and I thought—"
"You thought what?"
"I thought you left."
The words came out smaller than he intended. Quieter. More honest than he wanted them to be.
Erza stared at him.
For a long, terrible moment, she simply looked. Her expression didn't change—still cold, still dismissive, still utterly unimpressed.
Then she laughed.
Not a warm laugh. Not a kind laugh. A short, sharp, incredulous laugh.
"Left?" She repeated the word like it offended her. "Do you think I traveled across dimensions, tracked you through worlds, spent a year searching for the father of my child—just to leave in the middle of the night?"
She stepped closer.
Towered over him—even though he was taller, even though he was standing now, even though he'd finally managed to get his legs under him.
"Listen carefully, mortal." Her voice dropped. "I am not your friend. I am not your companion. I am your judge. You exist on borrowed time. The only reason you're still breathing is because my daughter has grown attached to you."
She leaned in.
Close enough that he could feel the cold radiating from her skin.
"Do not mistake my presence for affection. Do not mistake my tolerance for kindness. And do not ever assume that I would run away like some coward."
She straightened.
Turned.
Walked toward the kitchen.
"Elena is hungry. Feed her. And stop crawling on the floor like a wounded animal. It's embarrassing to watch."
Yuuta stood there.
Legs trembling—finally awake now, finally functional.
Heart racing—but not with relief anymore.
"Papa?" Elena tugged his sleeve. "Food?"
He looked down at her.
At her hopeful face. Her innocent eyes. Her complete obliviousness to the ice queen currently invading his kitchen.
And despite everything—
He sighed.
"Yeah, little one. Papa will make food."
Elena cheered.
In the kitchen, Erza heard it.
Heard the cheer. Heard his quiet response. Heard the way his voice softened when he spoke to her daughter.
Their daughter.
She pressed her lips together.
Reached for a cup.
Poured herself water.
And told herself the strange feeling in her chest was nothing.
Nothing at all.
An hour later, Yuuta's legs had finally woken up.
The pins and needles were gone. The embarrassing crawl across the floor could be forgotten—or at least buried deep enough that he could pretend it never happened.
His first priority?
Feed his hungry little dragon.
Elena.
Standing in his tiny kitchen, Yuuta felt something dangerously close to happiness as he worked. The morning light streamed through the window. His daughter's laughter drifted from the living room. Even the Dragon Queen's presence—cold as it was—couldn't ruin this moment.
He grabbed vegetables from the fridge.
Carrots. Onions. Leftover meat from last night's dinner. Rice that had cooled perfectly in the cooker.
Meat rice balls, he decided. Elena will love these.
His knife moved with practiced precision.
Slice. Slice. Slice.
Carrots became tiny orange cubes. Onions transformed into translucent confetti. The leftover meat—some kind of pork he'd bought on sale—went onto the cutting board next.
He ground it.
Chopped it.
Smacked it with the flat of his blade until the fibers broke down into perfect, tiny pieces.
Mix with rice. Shape into balls. Deep fry until golden.
Perfect.
In the living room, the TV murmured.
Yuuta glanced over his shoulder as he worked.
Elena sat cross-legged on the floor, completely absorbed. Her tiny wings twitched occasionally—the dragon equivalent of bouncing with excitement. Her tail curled and uncurled behind her like an excited puppy's.
Beside her, on the floor—because she absolutely refused to sit on his worn couch like some common peasant—Erza watched with equal intensity.
Her violet eyes were fixed on the screen.
Unblinking.
Fascinated.
Yuuta blinked.
Was the Dragon Queen... enjoying National Geographic?
On screen, a herd of wildebeest thundered across the savanna. The narrator's deep voice explained migration patterns, predators, the circle of life.
Elena bounced.
"Mama! Mama! See this beast! It has horns!" She pointed at a wildebeest. "And this beast looks like a kitty!" She pointed at a lioness lounging in the grass.
Yuuta smiled, still cutting.
Even in her world, he thought, they have kitties. Some things are universal.
Then Elena added:
"But Mama, it has one head! Where are the other six?"
Yuuta's knife stopped.
His brain stuttered.
His soul briefly left his body.
Six... other heads?
He turned slowly toward the living room.
On screen, the lioness yawned. One head. Perfectly normal. Exactly as many heads as a lion should have.
But in Elena's world—
In Erza's world—
A "kitty" apparently came with seven heads.
That's not a kitty, Yuuta thought faintly. That's not even a monster. That's a demon straight out of hell.
He looked at Erza.
She was watching the screen with an expression he couldn't read. Curiosity? Confusion? Disappointment that Earth's "beasts" were so pathetically under-headed?
She must have felt his gaze.
Because she turned.
Looked at him.
Then, without breaking eye contact, she spoke.
"You, mortal."
Yuuta tensed. "Y-yes?"
"How come your Earth doesn't have fairies? Or nightmare creatures? Or monstrous beasts?" She tilted her head slightly—a gesture that might have been curious on anyone else. On her, it felt like an interrogation. "How is it so... peaceful here?"
Yuuta blinked.
Peaceful.
She thought Earth was peaceful.
He looked around his tiny apartment. At the cracked walls. The secondhand furniture. The city outside his window with its millions of people and its pollution and its wars and its quiet, ordinary human dangers.
Peaceful.
Compared to a world of dragons and demons and seven-headed kitties—
He supposed it was.
"Well," Yuuta said carefully, "let's say our world was created by a God of peace."
The words hung in the air.
Erza stared at him.
One second.
Two.
Three.
Yuuta shifted uncomfortably.
Did I sound stupid? he wondered. Does she not believe in God? She's probably the strongest being in her world—why would she believe in something greater than herself?
But then—
"That's... amazing."
Yuuta's jaw dropped.
Erza's expression had shifted. The cold disdain was still there—it was always there—but beneath it, something else flickered.
"There is also a God for this tiny planet?" she said. "I am amazed."
Yuuta gaped.
"Wait—you believe in God?"
Erza's eyes narrowed.
"Of course." Her voice carried the weight of absolute certainty. "What fool doesn't believe in God? Those who have knowledge and a brain will surely never deny His existence."
Yuuta opened his mouth.
Closed it.
Opened it again.
If Earth's scientists ever heard her say that, he thought faintly, they'd have nightmares about her voice for years.
"Well," he managed, "to be honest... our world is already destroying itself. By our own kind. So I don't think God needed other creations to rival us."
Erza considered this.
"Hmm."
She turned back to the TV.
"Such a strange world," she murmured. "No predators. Humans are at the top. Yet they march straight toward their own end." Her eyes followed the wildebeest on screen. "Interesting."
Yuuta didn't know how to respond to that.
So he went back to cooking.
Meat rice balls. Focus on meat rice balls.
The oil heated. The first batch sizzled. Golden brown. Perfect.
"Papa!"
Elena's voice cut through his thoughts.
He looked up.
She was standing now, pointing at the TV with desperate excitement. On screen, a elephant trumpeted.
"Papa! Mama! I want to see that beast!" She bounced on her tiny feet. "I want to see all of them! The horned ones! The one-headed kitties! The big grey ones with the long noses!"
Yuuta smiled.
It was such a normal request.
Such a child request.
And for a moment—just a moment—he forgot that his daughter was half-dragon, that her mother wanted him dead, that his life had become an isekai nightmare.
He just saw a little girl who wanted to see animals.
"Of course," he said warmly. "Let's go to the zoo."
Elena screeched with joy.
Behind her, Erza raised one eyebrow.
"Zoo?"
"It's a place where they keep animals," Yuuta explained. "For people to see. Learn about. It's safe. Educational."
Erza's expression didn't change.
But something in her eyes—something almost imperceptible—softened.
"Elena has never seen animals like that," she said quietly. "In our world, beasts are... different. Dangerous. You don't go to look at them. You run from them."
Yuuta's chest tightened.
He looked at Elena, still bouncing, still excited, still completely unaware of the darkness her mother was describing.
"Well," he said. "Here, she can look. As long as she wants. Safely."
Erza studied him.
That long, unreadable gaze.
"Tch."
She looked away.
"Don't expect me to thank you, mortal. I'm only coming to ensure Elena's safety. Not because I'm interested in your primitive animal displays."
Yuuta hid his smile.
Sure, he thought. Not interested at all.
"Food's ready," he announced.
Elena ran.
---
To be continued...