When Serenity woke up, he was presented with an unexpected message.

[A Community has been established in your Name]

[A Community may only share a Name with its Owner. The Establishing Party has agreed to cede Ownership to you]

[Message Follows: Rissa says she’ll boop your snoot if you say No. I bet she’ll boop your snoot either way. Say Yes anyway. This way we can tell you’re alive. ~Echo]

[Accept Ownership of the Community of Serenity?]

Serenity started laughing. Even to his own ears, the laughter of a hatchling dragon sounded a bit squeaky and a bit hysterical.

Echo had somehow found a way to let him know everything was fine. If it weren’t, she wouldn’t have been talking about booping. She’d have come up with some way to let him know. Echo was smart.

It took a while for him to wind down and accept - long enough that Raz knocked on the door and looked in when Serenity kept laughing. “You good in there?”

Raz’s worried expression was somehow even funnier than the snoot-booping, and Serenity laughed hard enough that something shifted in his throat. The laughing turned to coughing, and Serenity eventually spat out a small wad of fire, which evaporated into nothingness a few feet from his mouth.

Spitting out fire after coughing wasn’t funny, it was sort of painful. Serenity gasped and stared at Raz.

“Was that? Did you just cough out a tiny fireball?” Raz stared at the spot in the air where the fire disappeared, then at Serenity. “I didn’t think half-dragons could do that. Shouldn’t you just breathe fire? Can half-dragons even breathe fire?”

“Don’t know,” Serenity admitted, “But apparently I can. I wasn’t expecting fire, somehow.”

Serenity remembered the DeathLife Breath Path Skill the Voice had mentioned before his Evolution went sideways. That set of elements would have made sense, but fire? Yeah, it was traditional for dragons, but Serenity was pretty sure that the breath always had something to do with the dragon’s Affinity. Which for him was-

Serenity realized his eyes had drifted away from Raz and turned his gaze back to Raz. Maybe he should spend more time in his dragon form; it was so nice being able to see. “Wait. You said a tiny fireball. Did it actually look like a fireball spell?”

“Yes?” Raz clearly had no idea why Serenity asked.

That explained why there wasn’t any residue, though Serenity knew there would have been scorch marks if he’d actually hit anything.

Serenity hadn’t spat fire. He’d spat out a spell. He wondered if it was mana-based or essence based. Was it possible it was both?

How could it be a spell? Spells had to be built properly; how could he have built one by coughing? If you messed them up, they tended to explode-

Oh.

It wasn’t a spell. He’d coughed up some unformed mana. Or maybe essence? Probably mana. Whatever it was, it’d then exploded in midair. That was different, but it sort of made sense, he was supposedly some weird mana/essence hybrid and a dragon, so his breath weapon ought to be related.

Serenity would have to experiment later. He wasn’t sure how he’d done it the first time, which would make it harder. For now, though, he needed to get ready for the day. “Can you step back out? I’d like to change…”

The next three days were filled with more curse-breaking. Serenity saw more of Syri and Guildmaster Hollis than he did of Raz, Katya, and Hale combined.

It turned out that several of the other curse-breakers could break the curse; many of them were faster than Serenity as well, and most didn’t need another healer working behind them to clean up the damage.

What they couldn’t do was break curses all day. It tired Serenity out eventually, but it was simply mental strain; there was little Stamina expenditure, and he recovered the Mana and Essence he spent (and gained a good bit of Ev) from everyone he worked on other than the few with Species or Bloodlines that interfered.

Between the people in the warehouse and everyone else that Serenity dealt with, he woke six more bloodlines after the Guildmaster’s. It took Serenity a while to figure it out, but almost all of the species and bloodlines that ‘grabbed’ onto the curse were connected somehow to Life or Death; even Hollis’s Lightning Azata bloodline had a strong connection to Life-based healing. The only one that didn’t was the descendant of a Curse Witch.

It got to the point where people who were still conscious deliberately chose to wait if it meant they could have their curse broken by Serenity. The chance to possibly wake a bloodline of any sort was worth allowing the curse to progress further.

Serenity didn’t find out until the third day, when nearly everyone they could find was healed.

That evening, Hale informed him that Guildmaster Irene had asked them to come to a Council meeting the following evening.

Serenity spent most of the next day relaxing and trying to recover, after sleeping in. Even though he didn’t ever get low on mana, essence, or stamina, the days of curse-breaking were a strain.

The only news that day was that the undead he'd healed had reached a decision to travel to the Necropolis together and find a member of Order's Guild there to take care of the core issue. They seemed remarkably disinclined to accept anything more from Serenity; while he wasn't sure why, he didn't feel like arguing with them to get himself more work.

Serenity wasn’t quite sure how he’d ended up sitting in a small room outside the Council meeting with only Raz, Katya, and Hale for company. He remembered each of the steps he’d taken to get there, of course, but it still didn’t quite seem like him. Why was he getting involved in politics in a city he didn’t even care about?

All he wanted to do was go home.

If he was honest with himself, he’d admit that there was more to it. He’d seen a problem he could immediately do something about and jumped in to help.

Regardless, what he should be doing was figuring out how he was going to get to the Necropolis, and how he was going to talk Raz into joining him. He also needed to check in with Hale and see about that book; if he could get some people to help out on Earth.

Actually, that would be a good thing to do right now. “Hale? Katya? About that book…”

Hale sighed and turned to Serenity. “The auction was yesterday, while you were still busy. I should have said something earlier. It went for more than I’d expected, with this mess, but less than I’d hoped. Were you serious about hiring some of us instead of taking your cut?”

Serenity nodded. “Yes. We should be able to manage without help, but you or Katya would be useful. We should plan for a long stay, returning here probably won’t be possible until all of the invasions are defeated. I think that’s when the primary teleports open.”

“Invasions?” Hale looked doubtful. “I haven’t heard about a war nearby?”

Serenity shook his head. “Not that kind of invasion. Well, sort of. Earth’s a newly inducted world. I’m not sure how many outside factions are trying to take a piece of it, but we have to get them all to surrender or leave or we’ll have to wait ten years before the portals open. We can’t afford to wait that long, that’s when the Great Factions can-” Serenity stopped himself a little too late. All he could do was hope that everyone assumed he worried about the Great Factions rather than believed that there were things on Earth that the Great Factions would want.

After all, most newly inducted worlds didn’t have anything particularly special.

Hale shook his head in open disbelief. “You’re talking about legends. Planetary induction is rare. I haven’t heard of one happening in my lifetime, but you know where one is? Even if you do, why bother with us? The book won’t cover nearly enough for a proper invasion force, never mind one strong enough to take a planet from other invaders and the locals.”

Serenity smiled. Hale had definitely misunderstood him, and missed Serenity’s slip as well. “No, that’s it. We don’t have to defeat the locals, we’ll be working with the natives. I am a native. I was born there, and that’s where my family is. I don’t care about conquering anyone; all we have to do is kick the invasions out. The Voice favors the locals; invaders are restricted in ways locals aren’t. The invaders still have a huge advantage and often win or at least capture enough to be worthwhile, but I know we can do this, whether or not you help.”

Earth had won in his own past, after all. It was messy and bloody and left huge swathes of destruction, but they’d won.

It was when the Great Factions came that Earth lost.

Serenity needed to make the first victory faster and less destructive to give Earth a chance at winning the second round. He turned back to Hale. “That’s why I’m looking for help.”

Serenity switched his attention to Katya, who was watching the discussion intently. “It’s also why I’m interested in getting craftsmen to Earth. I think it would be good for everyone; the craftsmen would get clients and students, Earth would get better stuff than we can make and people who can teach. That can’t happen until the portals are open, unfortunately.”

Serenity saw one of the doors open as an ordinary-looking man entered. He seemed to be armed with only a short sword, and his clothing was similar to that of many people Serenity had seen that day, less fancy than Guildmaster Irene’s or any of the Councilors.

“For the value of the book … I can’t send anyone for that for that long. But for that and the chance to open a new world, maybe. I’ll have to ask my father. He’ll say-”

The man interrupted Hale. “He’ll say you should go. He may send others with you, as well. Most likely Katya, if I had to guess. Possibly Arianne or Renvir, but most likely Katya.”

The stranger walked closer and examined Serenity. “You’re an interesting one, even before the rumors. From a newly inducted world would explain some of it; newcomers are often strange and innovative. They don’t know what can’t be done, so they do it anyway.”

Serenity had no idea what rumors the man was talking about, but his attention was on the man’s scent rather than his words. Whoever he was, he was a dhampir. Serenity somehow knew the stranger would be Syri’s superior if they met, even if he didn’t try. Serenity could tell he was Tiers more powerful than Syri, much less Serenity, yet Serenity had no desire to submit automatically; it was the opposite, if anything.

Serenity was outside the dhampir power structure, and always would be. Others might submit to him, but he would never have the desire to submit himself. The knowledge washed over Serenity from an unknown source and he could only thank the subrace choice he’d made.

Even as Thomas, he hadn’t done well as a subordinate to anyone he didn’t agree with, and he doubted he was better at it now.

When Serenity refocused on the others, he realized Hale was staring at the new man with his mouth open. “Tasi?”