Before time learned to keep count, before the realms knew their own names, the heavens burned.
Fire and shadow collided in a sky that had never known division. Gold tore through darkness as Aurum, the Heavenly Dragon, rose like a living sun, his vast wings scattering constellations in their wake. Each scale upon his body glimmered with sacred radiance, etched with sigils older than language itself.
Opposite him loomed Tenebris.
Where Aurum was light, Tenebris was absence. His obsidian scales devoured the glow around them, swallowing starlight whole. His eyes burned with infernal hunger, twin abysses filled with rage that had fermented since the dawn of existence.
When they roared, creation trembled.
Their battle tore across the firmament like a divine calamity. Aurum unleashed torrents of celestial flame, radiant arcs that carved through the void, turning darkness into molten brilliance. Tenebris answered with waves of abyssal energy, shadows so dense they bent reality itself.
Below them, the first mountains shattered. Oceans boiled. The boundaries between realms thinned until existence itself screamed.
From the edge of that annihilation stood the Seer.
Cloaked in ageless shadow, his face hidden beneath a veil of woven fate, he watched the dragons clash with a stillness born not of indifference, but of knowledge. Each strike sent a tremor through his bones, not from fear, but from certainty. He had seen this moment long before it came. He had whispered warnings into the void. The heavens had not listened.
Tenebris lunged, jaws wide enough to swallow worlds. Aurum twisted midair, narrowly avoiding the killing bite, but the Demonic Dragon's claws raked across his side. Golden blood spilled into the void, each droplet igniting like a dying star before fading into nothingness.
Aurum roared in agony and fury. He surged forward, channeling the last reserves of his divine core. Light erupted from his chest, a blinding conflagration that drowned Tenebris in searing radiance.
The Demonic Dragon screeched, a sound that fractured reality itself. Smoke billowed from his scales, yet he did not retreat. Hatred drove him onward. Hatred, and something deeper.
They crashed together, titanic bodies colliding with the force of collapsing worlds.
Days bled into nights. Nights into timeless ruin.
Finally, upon the brink of collapse, they reached their final exchange.
They hovered, battered and burning, gazes locked across the void. No words were spoken. None were needed.
They unleashed everything.
The heavens shattered.
A supernova of divine and demonic power tore through existence, splitting the sky into fractured sections, each bleeding raw creation. When the light finally receded, silence fell like a funeral shroud.
Tenebris lay still.
His massive form drifted lifelessly through the void, darkness peeling away from his scales like ash.
Aurum remained.
Barely.
His wings were gone, torn from his body in the final blast. His once-glorious scales were cracked, their golden glow dimmed to embers. His eyes, once radiant with divine clarity, stared sightlessly into nothing.
A single tear slipped from them.
As the Seer approached, the air around Aurum shuddered.
From the dragon's chest, something pulsed.
With a sound like the breaking of a thousand bells, Aurum's heart tore free.
The Dragon Heartstone.
A sphere of pure golden light, radiant beyond comprehension, screamed as it was wrenched from its host. It hovered in the air for a single, suspended heartbeat, then vanished into the fabric of the universe, scattering destiny across countless realms.
Aurum exhaled one final breath.
The Seer bowed his head.
"Though the dragons fall," his voice echoed across the ruins of creation, "their legacy will not."
He lifted his gaze to the fractured heavens.
"A new light shall rise. A new darkness shall awaken. And when their souls collide, the final symphony will begin."
Present Day
Aeris Vale was standing on her father's desk.
Not metaphorically.
Physically.
She sat cross-legged atop polished darkwood, boots resting beside a stack of neatly organized scrolls, a half-eaten apple dangling from her fingers as she stared down at the two most powerful figures in the Elemental Realm.
"I am eighteen," she declared, silver hair falling into her eyes as she gestured dramatically. "Eighteen. Which means I am legally, magically, and morally capable of participating in the duels."
Her mother, Queen Lysandra looked like she might combust.
Her green robes shimmered with restrained elemental energy, long hair braided intricately down her back, though several strands had escaped, framing a face that was far too young to belong to a woman who had ruled for decades.
"You trained her like a barbarian," Lysandra snapped, rounding on her husband. "I leave for one diplomatic mission and come back to find my daughter climbing palace walls and cutting her hair like some reckless street fighter!"
King Tharos raised his hands placatingly, though the twitch in his eye betrayed him. "She asked to learn combat, Lysandra. Repeatedly. Very loudly."
Aeris took another bite of her apple, legs swinging. "In my defense, mother, long hair gets caught in flames."
Lysandra spun on her. "And your chest?"
Aeris choked.
"I beg your pardon?"
"Where," the queen continued sharply, pointing without shame, "did my daughter's chest go?"
Aeris made a strangled sound and crossed her arms defensively. "Mother!"
King Tharos coughed violently. "Now, dear, that's hardly…"
"How am I meant to marry her off if she looks like she might challenge her husband to a duel?" Lysandra demanded.
Aeris leapt off the desk. "Who said anything about marriage?"
Silence.
Tharos slowly lowered his hands.
Lysandra smiled.
Aeris felt immediate dread.
"You're not serious," she said.
"We are very serious," Lysandra replied sweetly. "Which is why you will not be participating in the duel today."
Aeris's smile vanished.
"That's not fair."
"You are the heir," Tharos said gently. "And some risks are not yours to take."
Aeris stared at them, something sharp and unspoken tightening in her chest.
Then she grinned.
"Okay."
Both of her parents blinked.
She sprinted toward the window.
"Aeris—!"
Silver wings burst from her back in a shimmer of light. She vaulted through the open air, laughter echoing as she dove into the sky.
Lysandra turned slowly toward Tharos.
"…She's going to do something dangerous, isn't she?"
Tharos sighed, "Yes."
Outside, Aeris Vale soared into the open sky, heart racing, a grin on her lips.
The world was vast and she had no intention of being caged.
Far above the clouds, unseen and unknowing, another soul took his first step toward collision.
The symphony had begun.