Chapter 309: Inheritance and Imbalance

Well, just freezing would have been great.

But in truth, there was a lot of wheezing and wobbling as various dramatic dragons reacted to the newest piece of information.

One such dragon was Riley Hale Dravaryn.

Newly married. Ancient beyond ancient. Yet still firmly insisting that he was twenty-five. And someone who truly could not believe that just when he thought he had experienced everything life had to offer, it had somehow found a way to prove him wrong again.

Then there was Orien Dravaryn Vathros.

A golden dragonling who was currently clutching at his own chest like he had just given his heart away.

Which, unfortunately, was not an exaggeration.

He stood there stiff and wide-eyed, one hand pressed flat against where his heart beat, as if sheer disbelief might somehow coax it back into behaving normally.

Then again, Orien was one of the very few beings present who had quite literally done exactly that. After all, while giving away one’s heart was possible, most beings who did that were already riding the train to meet their maker.

As expected, the dragons were reacting far more dramatically than the actual child involved.

Because while Riley looked like he was one breath away from either fainting or biting someone, and while Orien looked moments away from spiraling into a full existential crisis, Liam, like the calm child that he was, sat quietly on the floor.

The small boy listened.

He waited.

And more importantly, he looked between the adults with clear concern, not for himself, but for Orien.

“…Is he going to be alright?” Liam asked softly at last, eyes fixed on the dragonling who was still gripping his chest.

That was the question he cared about.

While the rest of them were still struggling to keep their shit together, Liam was already trying to think of how he could possibly give back a heart he had never meant to take.

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Then again, how did this even happen? And a heart, really?

It took Riley a bit longer to process that particular detail.

Partly because panic had a way of overriding reason when it involved his baby brother. And partly because the word dragon heart had a tendency to short-circuit every coherent thought he possessed.

Eventually, though, he managed to sit down.

Not because he felt any better. But because he realized something important.

His parents were calmer than him.

Not calm in the sense that they were unaffected. But composed enough to keep it from spilling over.

Because panicking in front of Liam wouldn’t help.

It was one thing for everyone else to lose their composure. It was another entirely for a child to see his own parents fall apart. That would have started a spiral that would have been difficult to stop once it began.

And perhaps that was why they were holding it together.

That, and the reactions of the elder dragons.

Lawrence Hale had worked under Lord Karion long enough to know that expressions mattered.

And the expression on his former boss’s face told him everything he needed to know.

This was serious.

But thankfully not yet catastrophic.

That alone was enough to keep him from becoming an even worse patient.

As for Renee, she only managed to remain composed because dragon mana was not something entirely foreign to her, or to her son.

As drakes, beings that once originated from dragons, their bodies couldn’t help but recognize dragon mana. While they lack the special qualities that define true dragons, they shouldn’t outright reject dragon mana.

Now, had it been mana from another race, then she might have already collapsed.

After all, while her husband wouldn’t have been able to detect mana, she, as a drake, should have figured something was amiss.

Such was the guilt of a parent.

But if even the dragon lord himself had not realized what was happening right away, how was she supposed to have known?

But now that it had already happened, there was little point in dwelling on what could have been done differently.

What mattered was understanding what was happening now.

And what they could expect moving forward.

Which led them back to the same question.

Why was Orien’s heart outside his chest in the first place?

A very good question.

One that even made the melted golden dragonling twitch faintly, eyes sharpening with interest despite his earlier shock.

Yes.

He very much wanted to know.

He also very much wanted to know whether he and the little sprite would still be alive after all of this.

To everyone’s surprise, however, the answer traced back far earlier than expected.

All the way back to when Orien first hatched.

“Huh?”

Surprise was probably the correct reaction.

Most of them had not been aware of this. In fact, even Kael found himself straightening as he realized that this was information that now mattered to him.

In the span of his long life, he had never bothered to learn about such details.

He had been too angry to assume he would ever take another mate and so he never bothered to learn about exceptional cases.

But that was no longer the case.

So like everyone else in the room, Kael fell silent as Lord Karion finally began to speak about Orien’s case.

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Riley thought it was rather odd.

Because when he really thought about it, even Kael looked like he was hearing all of this for the first time. That alone was unsettling. But what was even more perplexing was how the baby dragon at the very center of the issue looked just as blindsided.

But honestly, how could anyone blame Orien?

The entire explanation sounded like it would open a much larger box of problems. The kind he similarly didn’t want to touch when faced with a similar situation.

Riley suddenly found himself unsure of who he should be holding onto tighter.

In the end, he did get to hold onto anyone.

Instead, he felt an unexpected wave of relief when he realized that Liam had already made that decision for him. His baby brother had moved without hesitation, arms wrapping around Orien the moment everything began to unravel, as if that alone could keep the world from tipping any further out of balance.

Lord Karion exhaled slowly before speaking, as if choosing each word with care.

“Aspect saturation,” he began, “is a condition observed in mixed-aspect dragons. It occurs when one inherited draconic aspect overwhelms the developing core.”

He paused, letting that settle.

“Normally, this shouldn’t be an issue. In fact, it’s expected, especially when one aspect comes from a dominant bloodline. The body would adapt appropriately. One aspect would establish control while the rest would recede.”

His gaze shifted, serious and deliberate, until it landed squarely on Orien.

“Now what causes danger,” Lord Karion continued, “is when the opposing aspect refuses to yield.”

Orien blinked.

“Instead of harmoniously yielding, there would be a moment of imbalance. The lack of coexistence would then eventually result in the core becoming contested.”

The elder dragon straightened as he continued to explain.

“In your case, that opposing aspect was the blood of the red dragons.”

“Huh?” Orien breathed, clearly startled because he never really asked to talk about how he came to be. In fact, when they did try to speak to him about it, the golden dragonling didn’t feel the need to know.

Or maybe that was him telling himself that he didn’t need to know.

So hearing all this now overwhelmed him.

“Golden dragon blood,” Lord Karion went on, “naturally overwhelms most other aspects. With rare exceptions, black and white dragons among them, the offspring would almost always manifest as golden.”

He folded his hands together.

“However, when the other parent possesses particularly strong mana, that inherited blood may attempt to assert itself.”

Riley felt his chest tighten as he listened to such an unexpected explanation.

“That is something that can be resolved later in life,” Karion said. “But as a hatchling, it is extremely dangerous and should be corrected as early as possible.”

He looked down at Orien, his expression uncharacteristically weary.

“To prevent your body from becoming a battleground, the fragment that carried the opposing aspect had to be removed.”

Silence fell.

“It was meant to be temporary,” Lord Karion added. “Once you were old enough, once your core had stabilized, you would be able to reabsorb it. Safely. With benefits rather than harm.”

He raised a hand and rubbed it over his face.

“I apologize for failing you like this. We should have told you sooner,” he said quietly. “I didn’t think this would happen.”

His fingers curled slightly.

“The encased heart should not have reacted at all unless it was you who intended to use it.”

That was the part he also wanted to understand.

But it didn’t change the fact that they should have really encouraged the little one to consider learning more about his origins.

Then again, as his guardian, Lord Karion felt like the biggest error was assuming they had time or that Orien was fine as he was.

Sure enough, sometimes it was better to deal with the uncomfortable truth.

Especially when the golden dragonling who was quietly listening didn’t even notice how his eyes were wet with tears.

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