The world swam, and the little dragon screeched its confusion.

One minute it had been growing in its egg, flexing its muscles and getting ready to enter the world. The next, it had listened in fear and mounting rage as its mother's song turned to a cry of surprise, and howls of fury.

There were intruders in the lair! They were killing mother! Frantically, the dragon had readied himself to hatch, hoping against hope he could save his mother, and then—

And then, nothing.

But now it was here, in an unfamiliar place, definitely out of its egg. And oddest of all, the dragon felt sharper. Like his mind had grown in the blink of an eye.

“Little great one?”

The dragon's eyes focused on another creature. Small, puny, obviously prey.

Its stomach rumbled.

The dragon was hungry.

And in that instant, instinct took over. The dragon lunged forward, teeth snapping, and catching a mouthful of scales.

Your Brawling skill is now level 6!

A scream. “But you said you wouldn't! You said you not eat Geebo!”

The dragon paused.

Blood spilled down its throat, warm and delicious, but...

He could read, he realized. He could read the words that had just appeared before him. They had meaning now. They never had before, not when they flashed in front of him in the darkness of the egg, but now they did.

And the name, Geebo...

Images came to him then, of the small creature crouching with him in the dark, staring up at...

...staring up at his mother's murderers.

The images were gone then, washed away like egg dreams, but he knew they'd been true. The dragon released the creature— Geebo.

Geebo stumbled back, cradling its arm and crying.

“Stop that,” the dragon rumbled. “I won't eat you.” The blood had cut the edge on his hunger anyway. “You... what are you?”

“Geebo is... draggit,” the little thing said, between sobs. “Sworn... to serve...”

“Yes. Draggits,” the dragon remembered. “Our slaves. Some of them anyway.” Mother had mentioned those, though he didn't recall all the details. His mind was sharper than it had been, but he still had a long way to go before he was all grown up. “Where are we?”

Geebo explained how he had watched helplessly as the adventurers fought the dragon's mother. How he'd fled when she fell, fled to the dungeon that was the dragon's egg. And all that had transpired after that.

The dragon felt his confusion grow. “You are certain that I spoke to you? That I agreed to flee?”

“You did, small great one,” Geebo said, winding his arm with a bandage and wincing.

“That seems... strange.” The dragon paused. Then a more pressing question occurred to him. “What is my name? What did my mother name me?”

“She didn't, small great one,” Geebo replied. “She was to name you after your hatching, but... well.”

“Then I must name myself.” The little dragon knew what to do His ancestors had told him the deep magic, the secret words to say just in case such a thing happened. “I declare my true name to be Versinathraxamus!”

Geebo stared at him.

The dragon stared back. A sense of wrongness filled him. “That should have done something,” he said. “That should have made words appear.”

“It should have,” Geebo agreed. “But it didn't. Why?”

“That's a good question,” the little dragon agreed. “Perhaps she named me before she fell? Let me see. Status.”

Name: Rutger Royal

Age: 20 minutes

Jobs:

Cultist 1, High Dragon Hatchling 1

Attributes Pools Defenses

Strength: 76 Constitution: 75 Hit Points: 151 Armor: 30

Intelligence: 30 Wisdom: 25 Sanity: 55 Mental Fortitude: 30

Dexterity: 12 Agility: 25 Stamina: 37 Endurance: 0

Charisma: 28 Willpower: 75 Moxie: 103 Cool: 30

Perception: 76 Luck: 28 Fortune: 104 Fate: 1

General Skills

Brawling – Level 6

Stealth – Level 1

High Dragon Hatchling Skills

Burninate – Level 1

Chomp – Level 1

Draconic Tongue – Level N/A

Dragonseye – Level 3

Limited Equipment – Level N/A

No Thumbs – Level N/A

Scaly Wings – Level N/A

Slow to Age – Level N/A

Cultist Skills

Unlocked Jobs

“What?” The dragon was shocked. Beyond shocked. “I... my name... this is a stupid name! This isn't a proper name, it's all split up! And both parts are two short by themselves!”

“You have a name great one?” Geebo looked surprised.

And the dragon felt a new emotion. Embarrassment. Even if Geebo was only a slave, the dragon didn't want to tell him such a stupid name. “I do, but... ah... call me... hmm... call me Rotgoriel.” It wasn't great, but it would do for now. Perhaps there would be a way to change it when he was an adult.

“Yes, great Rotgoriel!” Geebo said, smiling widely. “I live to serve you now!”

Then Rotgoriel got back to reading. He didn't get far before another thing brought him to a pause. “I'm a Cultist?”

“You are?” Geebo said, eyes wide.

“Yes! It says so right there!”

“Geebo has never heard of dragon being a Cultist,” Geebo said.

“That is because they are not!” Rotgoriel roared in frustration. “But here we are. I have a name and a job and I didn't choose either of those! This is horrible!”

“Geebo does not understand either,” said the draggit, curling into a ball and hugging its knees.

Rotgoriel sat down next to him, curling around his slave. Geebo was warm and it was much colder out here than it had been in the egg. The draggit squeaked, but didn't stir as Rotgoriel got comfy.

This close to him, there was a smell, one that was familiar yet not. It was his mother's scent, he knew, and it made Rotgoriel feel better.

Mother's dead, Rotgoriel knew, and tears threatened. But he pushed away the sorrow, turned it into anger. “We'll find them,” Rotgoriel said. “We'll find the ones who killed mother. And I'll eat them myself. And you'll help me do this.”

“Yes, little great one!” Geebo agreed wholeheartedly. “They must die for their wickedness! Many times!”

“Many times?” Rotgoriel asked, confused.

“They are players, they can die many times,” Geebo said.

“Oh. Oh! Those things,” Rotgoriel dimly recalled his ancestors singing of the time that was to come, and the new players. The fourth conjunction, that's what they had called it. Now how had the rest of it gone?

But even though he was sharper, his memory was fading now, fading with exhaustion. It had been a long day for a little dragon, and he was out of energy. “Going t' sleep,” he muttered, and Geebo responded, but Rotgoriel didn't hear his words as the darkness came to him.

When he awoke, Rotgoriel realized three things.

The first thing was that he was in a different place. It smelled of water and stone, and when he whispered “Dragonseye,” a new vista appeared before him. Instead of the black-walled stone room, he was in a natural cave. Stalactites hung from the ceiling, and stalagmites poked up from the ground, and water dripped into a wide, shallow pool.

The second thing was that he was overwhelmingly, horrifyingly hungry. His stomach was a pit of fire, and he needed to eat now.

The third thing was that somebody had left a pile of translucent, red-filled eggs right next to him. Tadpole-like things curled inside, watching him with unblinking eyes... and that's all the time he had to note the details before instinct drove him onto them, and he gorged with glee.

They split and splattered in his teeth, blood running down and out of his maw as he chewed, feeling his belly fill a bit with each swallow. Rotgoriel was eating his first real meal outside of the egg, and oh it was glorious. Even if it did taste funny and cold and slimy, it was the best meal he'd ever eaten.

Finally he was done, and only at that point did he notice that there was blood on the floor that he hadn't put there. Old and dried, it traced out patterns that he realized were words.

GOT YOU FOOD

LOOKING FOR WAY OUT

BACK SOON

GEEBO

Geebo had left him all alone?

Well, he'd left food.

And remembering the all-consuming hunger that he'd woken with, Rotgoriel grudgingly admitted that it had been a good idea for the little slave to be absent during his wakening.

So. He could either start poking around without Geebo, or he could wait for his return. That was the choice before him.

Rested and with a full belly, Rotgoriel found the idea of waiting didn't appeal to him. So instead, he waded into the pool and washed the last of the egg from his wings. Then, taking a deep breath, he tried them out for the first time.

“Scaly Wings.”

Instantly they felt stronger, snapping to full extension. He gave them a few experimental flaps, and tried to take off.

A few minutes, a cracked stalactite, and a thoroughly undignified fall later, new words appeared before his bruised muzzle.

Your actions have unlocked the generic skill: Fly!

Your Fly skill is now level 1!

Growling in frustration, Rotgoriel rose again, and launched into the air again. This time he made it eight seconds without crashing.

Your Fly skill is now level 2!

And this time, when he picked himself off the ground, Rotgoriel heard something that made no sense at all. A clicking noise, coming from deeper in the cave. He concentrated, focusing on it... no. No good. Whatever it was, he couldn't tell where it was coming from.

Rotgoriel shrugged. Maybe it was Geebo, off doing slave things. Running his tongue over his teeth, he found them still tasty and slick with blood from his meal. There was a fragment of rubbery eggshell stuck in them, and he ambled over to the water to get a drink.

But as he was leaning over the pool, strange words appeared.

WELCOME BACK:

TRIAL PERIOD EXPIRED.

SUBSCRIBE?

Y/N?

“What?” Rotgoriel asked. He knew Y/N meant you were supposed to choose, yes or no. The Ancestors had told him that this would be the new magic for his era. And welcome back was pretty self-explanatory. But the rest of it? Those were words that gave him trouble, and made no sense.

“No?” he tried, but the words remained. “What's wrong with you?” he asked them.

Staring wide-eyed at his reflection in the water, everything faded to darkness...

...and when Rotgoriel opened his eyes again, he was in another world.