Chapter 1936 1936. Past Breeze
The wind was fickle. That was how Ventus had described wind and air her whole life. When teaching the youngest of dragons or the dragonkin warriors, she would tell them that wind was an adaptable but fickle mana.
The air might be there for you to breathe, but it could change in an instant. The breeze could change and become sharp enough to cut through the very earth beneath their feet. Or it could shift and guide you along the currents toward home. Neither was a guarantee unless you could sense it.
None of this had been taught to her in a timely manner. Compared to the other royal dragons, Ventus had been the one that everyone worried about in her young age. It was expected though. The wind dragons remained in the sky, but Ventus, had her feet firmly on the ground.
The unusual fear of flying had appeared within her when she witnessed the previous royal dragon of the wind village fall. This had been years in the making. A wind royal dragon too old and too injured to be able to maintain flight.
A battle between a rogue dragon had caused this. They had been a skeletal dragon that attempted to force them in to a relationship where the wind dragons could follow them and create wind and skeletal hybrid dragons.
This wasn't uncommon. Sometimes a rogue dragon just went mad. This happened to all races. Undead, magical experimentation, or just general illness could cause this. Yet, when it happened to a dragon, there was no telling what insanity might ensue.
Luckily, the royal wind dragon had managed, with great effort, to kill the more powerful skeletal dragon. That was the first time many of the elders had seen such savage wind currents being manipulated in to wind blades. They had cut through the space between the two vicious dragons and torn the skeletal dragon in to pieces.
This was after greater injuries though. Wings had been cut, bones broken, and scales were missing. Due to her age, the royal wind dragon had been unable to easily heal. A few years later, her mana was gone and her life ended high in the sky.
Many wind dragons witnessed this. Dying in the air was the same for a warrior dying in battle. It was a great achievement. However, what followed was terrifying. Especially to the little hatchling that had been told she would become the next wind royal dragon when she managed to live and learn from the current wind royal dragon. That was just how much Ventus had shown her potential as a newly hatched little dragon.
But the scene of a powerful dragon that all of them looked up to crashing in to the earth with force enough to shake the entire village terrified her. The sounds of scales and bones breaking as wind mana was nowhere to be sensed made her heart nearly stop.
This had stayed with her for the entire time she was young. Until one day when she was looked at by the visiting royal dragon that had come to pay respects. They looked at the dragon that did not fly. They mocked the dragon that did not fly. Then even the earth dragon that preferred the depths, mocked the dragon that did not fly.
These things made her detest the wind. Hate the dragons. But most importantly, it showed a clear difference. She listened to them. Without words of her own, she heard the methods used to teach others as each royal dragon said what methods were better than the current royal wind dragon could not teach the next.
These methods all appeared different and made it very clear as to how poor she would learn. What truly showed her though, was when she heard of the eggs that had not been born. The failures to bring about a fire dragon worthy enough. She did not wish to be discarded like that. Like the many fire dragons left to become rogues without minds of their own.
The logical explanation that this little wind dragon hatchling came to was something that not many would come to. She had to create her own way through the wind and conquer it so that she would never fall. That no dragon would ever be able to make her fall.
More so, she needed to create such a method of education so that even those without anyone to lean on, could be wind dragons.
Years of isolation passed. The wind dragon that did not fly soon began showing signs of control that none of the elder wind dragons understood. A purity of mana well above her age. When a storm brewed, that hatchling took flight for the first time.
The elders believed they had witnessed her giving up on life. An insane and cowardly thing for any dragon. The elders roared out in anger and depression. They believed that they would be another hundred years without a royal wind dragon. That they would be losing their history for once and for all.
That was until they all lost control of the wind mana that they could manipulate. That was until they sensed the very currents that always existed around their village for years change. It wasn't the storm nor nature. It was a small drain still not even recognized as such calling the wind to her side.
Even the slightest flap of her wings brushed aside parts of the storm. The entire storm was at her will. The air currents guided it away and toward the ocean. Something that would have taken a decent amount of effort for the elder dragons.
When the little wind dragon landed, the air currents returned to normal. But every single elder wind dragon, wind dragonkin, and even a few avian monsters surrounded her. They had sensed a power that they lacked. A path that they wished to travel.
What the little wind dragon had done, was unique. She had sensed the wind without immersing herself in it. Instead, she had not taken flight or ever allowed herself to be taught a thing. She found her own way to reach the wind. An unyielding control of the air around her. Incredibly sensitive. Incredibly unique. One didn't need to be taught, they just needed to take the time to accept the very air around them and open themselves to it.
This was why now, Ventus hovered in the skies well above the center of the Sigil continent. What everyone who had witnessed her strength years ago had failed to understand was simple. She had not overcome a fear of the sky or flight. Instead, she had understood that it was not a fear of falling that plagued her.
It was a fear of not being able to live. To keep ahold of the wind and the mana she had a natural affinity for. This consumed her dreams and made them nightmares. Therefore, she threw aside everything that could have been taught to her.
Ventus opened herself up entirely to wind mana and the flow of wind. She let it reshape how she used her own mana instead of reshaping wind mana to suit her. In doing so, she was able to use it better than any other wind dragon to date.
Right this second, she opened her being again. Sensed the flow of every wind current over Sigil. She allowed it to take her. Nothing she saw guided her. She was the wind and the wind was her. That was why she sensed it.
A place where the wind mana swirled for just a second. The slightest change that should not be there. Neither the highest mountains or the shores had such an odd current of the wind.
As Ventus sped toward this, she saw the crumbled ground of a long split in half mountain. The natural shifting of the earth had caused it to crumble. But with her sharp senses, Ventus could feel the remnants of wind mana below it.
A single flap of her wings forced immense wind to tear away the earth that had fallen above the ruins. Draconic runes and incredibly complex carvings that made it appear the stone that made the ruins had once floated made Ventus eager to explore.
She could sense the stones had an integral wind affinity which directly clashed with what most people would know about stone. There were even wind mana crystals that had been growing within the ruins as time passed.
What truly made her gasp in surprise were the rune formations reacting to her wind. The ruins were reacting and opening to welcome the first wind dragon in longer than she knew. Opening to reveal extremely pure wind mana left behind by the wind dominator dragon. More importantly, this wind mana was what she had been after.
Untold secrets remained within the swirling winds. It wasn't the same as what had been left for the other dragons. Instead of stone slabs, the wind itself had been forced within the ruins and the runes. They were the records. They were the steps. But they were also adaptable. Showing Ventus the way to reach them that she had not imagined before.
"Now I can protect my little ones. They will not see me fall. I will not be weak. I will be the first to show the world a real wind dragon at its highest form." This proclamation was unheard by all but the world.
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