200 years later on a tall mountain called "Lizard's Run"  in the Continent of Astarte. A young boy about 3 years old with silver -white hair, blue eyes and an ethereal blue colored stone embedded on his forehead could be seen. He had tanned skin and a durable looking body for his age, he could be seen facing off against a Blue-silver colored dragon. This boy was none other than Lucius Stormblade.
           


'Is this all you have? Bwahahaha you'll never catch me with only that level of speed!'

The dragon said confidently and cheerfully. Young Lucius pouted and replied with an annoyed expression.

'Your too fast Uncle Veranathus!! It's No fair!!' however his lips did not move, he was clearly using telepathy.

Though he couldn't yet read minds, he learned Dragonic magic that allowed him to increase and control the electric brain waves in his brain and amplify them to project his thoughts. If any scholar in the world below saw this, their understanding of things would be shaken up because his sort of feat could only be performed by a Deity Level Mage! However this magic was natural to Thunder Dragons who were natural born deities as well as possessed the lightning attunement, however for Lucius somehow this was quite easy for him to learn.

' Then you're just going to have to get faster won't you, Lucius!'
the dragon taunted with a huge grin on his face.

Veranathus wondered what the boy would think if he knew that every day he had increased his speed little by little without young Lucius knowing, always letting him almost catch him only to pull away at the last second, by doing this he trained the little boy's mind to want to crave victory, to always have him thinking what if he had only been a second faster.

He chuckled and was proud at the progress young Lucius was making. He thoroughly enjoyed teasing the young draconian boy as he saw him as a little nephew, not caring at all about their race difference, not only him but the rest of the Thunder Dragons as well. They had all taken a great liking to the young boy as he seemed to liven the place up and would always be amazed at the simple things they could do. This however inflated their huge egos and made them strike dumb-looking poses with pride on their faces.

They all decided to train the little one, to make his body strong and durable and teach him how to fight. The Dragons didn't want to relive the shame of being unable to protect the Queen's child again. They didn't do any combat oriented training as yet as his little body was too fragile. They then decided to train his body first, while under the effects of the God's Tear this was the best time to do so but they didn't want to make the young Lucius' life too miserable with grueling training and so they came up with an idea.

They decided to make his training into a form of game, they also offered rewards as incentives. First they played "tag", where he had to catch the Dragon Veranathus, the purpose of that was obviously to increase his speed and stamina.

The other Dragon went by the name of Xiaxinia who encouraged him to play a game called "Hunt". They rules were simple if Lucius could sneak up on him successfully he would get whatever he wanted for dinner, he even offered to gift him a young maiden from a village for which he received a slight bump on his head courtesy of Venastrasia. The point of this practice was to increase his predatory instincts as well as controlling his presence.

The last and final 'game' was done by a Dragon named Varathraga, who would summon a lightning cloud atop the mountain and he would then take control of the lightning and they would then treat it like a firing range. The goal of this game was for the young boy to aim his bolts of lightning to meet the ones coming from the sky before they could get passed them. This sort of training effectively increased his reaction time, control of his lightning, and eye-sight greatly, It was the perfect menu.

Lucius had some free time so he sat around the edge of the crater, he peered down from the mountain and sat wondering how long it would take for his mom to get back. Once every few weeks she would disappear for a few hours and come back, and then instantly she would have a meeting with the other dragons. He didn't understand what they were talking about, things about "Invaders" and  "Mutations" or some guy his mom really hated named "Raz Seph"

He then muttered "I wonder why she hates him so much, every time she speaks his name her eyes get scary"

After pondering for a bit, Lucius then finally noticed something shiny, buried and protruding from the ground, off into the distance, it reflected off the sun and blinded him for a bit.

He instantly made his way to it but what he hadn't taken notice of was how fast he crossed the 300 meter gap. As he focused on the shine before him he was quite curious as he had scoured the entire area atop the mountain and never saw it before, as he tried to pull it out, a sharp pain ran through his fingers and blood immediately began to trickle down his fingers.

 "Ahhh!"

he yelled in agony which drew the attention of Varathraga who flew over almost instantaneously, he grabbed the boy's hand and hurriedly poured a tiny bit of divine magic over the deep gash to heal the wound. Surprisingly what happened next shocked him, as he sent the divine magic to heal the boy, Lucius subconsciously took control of it and amplified it causing it to instantly heal himself instead of taking a few seconds.

He smiled wryly as he knew the boy wasn't aware of what he had done, this feeling was akin to what a sculptor would feel when he created his first master piece. Varathraga then noticed the long pointed shiny object and yanked it out.

"Who the hell left this here? Judging from it's size it's probably Xiaxinia's, he should know better than to leave it here " Sighed Varathraga

"Uncle what is it?" Asked Lucius as he tilted his head.

"Well, Sometimes when Dragons have too much mana built up for a long period of time, usually thousands of years, it becomes a bit dangerous as the mana gets condensed and tends to harden. To counter that we pour the condensed mana into either a tooth or a spike and break it off, it doesn't take long for either of them to grow back so it's a safe and healthy way to help keep our bodies healthy. Condensed mana can clog the mana veins in our bodies and that's something that's incredibly dangerous to us. We call this process 'shedding', however it usually doesn't grow this big, but if it's Xiaxinia's then it's understandable as he's the second eldest besides the Queen"

He explained as he pointed out the weird black sharp shine.

"Ohh..but Uncle Vara it's really sharp, I barely even touched it and it cut me!" replied Lucius with an excited expression.

He had seen all of his Uncles and Aunts claws, and touched most of them, none of them was this sharp.

"Bwahahaha, OF COURSE!!, who do you think we dragons are?! Our bodies can produce the hardest material in this world, No other metal in the world below can surpass our hardened teeth or spikes, what's more is that its coated and reformed by condensed mana for thousands of years! The only thing that surpasses this tooth here in sharpness and durability is the Queen's own claws and teeth!" Varathraga proudly stated.

Lucius was amazed at his mother's strength he always knew her to be the strongest existence so he could only feel pride about his mother. Lucius then looked at his fingers and made a sad expression, he wanted to be strong so that he could make his mother proud. Strength to dragons was an important thing, it's what separated them from the other races and gave them the ability to live as they pleased. He didn't want to be the one that held them back.

Varathraga taking notice of Lucius' strange reaction, suddenly had a bright idea. He knew Lucius wanted to be stronger to make his mother proud, so he picked up the Mana-condensed hardened, long tooth, looked at Lucius and said

"From today onward nephew, I'll train you in the ways of magical combat, I'll teach you to fight!" Lucius' blue eyes lit up with a renewed vigor.

"Really uncle?? But mom said I'm still to young to go out hunting..." he said as he got downhearted once more.

"If it was up to the Queen she would never let you leave the mountain, bwahahaha" He said and assured Lucius. He placed his hand on Lucius' head and rustled his hair.

"Don't worry I'll talk to her, I can feel her on her way back here already, just leave it to this uncle!"


An hour later...

Lucius was on the edge of the the cliff looking to the south, the direction his mother usually comes back from.

**Flap Flap Flap**

He could hear the wings from afar, he couldn't help but be elated, as soon as she landed a bright light filled the area and a Beautiful woman in her mid twenties appeared with Golden blonde hair. She had yellow bright eyes and a curvaceous figure. Lucius ran into her arms and hugged her, Venastrasia looked down at the small lad, hugged him back tightly, she beamed a warm smile and gave him a kiss on his forehead.

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"Mother! You've returned!" he said happily and excitedly.

"Yes, I'm home my child" She replied happily, for she so missed this cute little child she raised on her own. Noticing the dried blood on his palm she raised an alarm.

"There's blood on your hands, Did you hurt yourself?! Where?! Show me?!" she asked as she panicked, she knew how fragile this child was compared to the dragons.

"Don't worry mom! Uncle Vara healed it, I had a little accident but it's fine now" he replied instantly to calm her worries.

"Okay be more careful okay?..if something happened to you...then.." she said with a sad expression, he could feel her hug tighten subconsciously as she spoke.

"Don't worry! He'll be fine! He isn't as fragile as you think you know!" A thunderous voice came out from behind them, it was Varathraga in his human form, Silver hair with two small horns, silver eyes, a man about 40 years, he wasn't ugly neither handsome, but he was well built and his genuine smile made it easy to get along with him.

"Varathraga, what's the meaning of this? how was my child hurt?" She said with a cold tone and an ice cold glare. Varathraga felt cold shivers run down his spine, but he knew what he had to do...

"It was all Xiaxinia's fault!" He said trying to appear as trustworthy and honest as he could be, a small imaginary halo could be seen floating above his head. Which he then followed up with...

"He left his sheddings over there and it garnered young Lucius' curiosity, he tried to pick it up and it cut him!"

He said with an accusing tone as he shook his head, hoping the Queen would buy his act and turn her fury towards Xiaxinia. When it came to the Queen's rage, every man for himself was a statement that put it all too well.


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Xiaxina's POV:

'Ahh...I'm so bored...I finished my training with Lucius and now I have to wait till tomorrow...what should I do in the mean time?' I thought to myself,

'Maybe I should go take a nap..or hunt something for Lucius to eat...He's been making progress, now I can only sense him when he's about 100 meters away, Well that's because I lowered the bar a little hehe. Sometimes I let him sneak up a little more than he should, it was something Veranathus recommended, it would help his drive or something like that.'

Suddenly--, I felt a chill run down my spine.

'W-What was that? I suddenly felt as if death just breathed down my neck'

As I looked into the distance, I saw 3 human-like figures approaching me. It was Varathraga walking behind the Queen with a despicable smile aimed at me, while holding something shiny...

'What is that? Ah!! It's my shedding!!'

I then noticed, young Lucius with worried eyes aimed at me, some dried blood on his hand.
and the Queen with an ice cold glare, her pressure building up as she walked towards me.
Instantly, I knew what happened.

'Flee from here!!'

Was the first thought that came to me and so I did, but not before the Queen appeared before
me in an instant.

"YAAAAAOOWWWWWWWWW"

I cried as she used me for a punching bag. She didn't let up until Lucius begged her not to continue and told her it was just an accident. She warned me to be careful with sheddings since we have a new family member to which I agreed.

'but indeed it was careless of me, sometimes I'd forget he's not a dragon,if he had fell on it the wrong way while training with Veranathus, I'm sure it would have been alot more devious than a cut on the hand...I really messed up this time..I promised from today I won't ever take my aura off of him, it wouldn't cost anything to keep him under watch.' I had resolved myself.

"Xia, go call the rest of the kin, it's time for the report" The Queen ordered.

Instantly the mood changed, I nodded seriously, flew up and went to go call the others.

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A group of dragons could be seen huddled around a Beautiful blonde woman, and a cute little boy around 3 years old sat in front of her looking around at everyone trying to make sense of the conversation. Venastrasia, the Queen, then began speaking.

"It seems my fears were correct, the 'Invaders' have begun mutating, I'm not sure how, but before they were just mindless, violent creatures, now some of them have begun to show signs of intelligence, and what's more they began changing forms. Some remained mindless,they turned from a humanoid form to a beast form, some got on all fours, some had wings, taking different shapes and forms, what they all have in common is a number on their foreheads. Ranging from 1-9" She said in a serious tone.
 
The other dragons nodded to this new piece of information rather than be surprised, as if they had knowledge about it beforehand, and rightly so as Venastrasia was no fool, she would never ignore her enemy. She would leave once every 2 weeks and head to the Continent of Einzel, once known as the Continent of Lightning, now known as the "Ruined Continent".

She never neglected her surveillance on Raz Seph, always insisting on doing it herself, as she wanted to be sure of what she was up against, even the slightest detail she would never miss. She then followed up-

"A Large amount of aura inside the palace walls of the House of Lightning, is constantly being emitted, in 200 years, It has yet to change. We've already deciphered that it's Raz Seph, as the 8 remaining Death Knights never leave the area surrounding the castle. He knows if he sends out the 8 Death Knights toward conquering Zenheim, we would never let that opportunity slide, us Thunder Dragons would surely come crashing down upon him with all of our might in his weakened state, and utterly destroy him."

When she said this part she glanced at young Lucius with a hint of sadness and he stared back in confusion.

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Lucius POV:
'There she says it again, This "Raz Seph", These "Death knights" but the most troubling thing was when she brought up the "House of Lightning" '

She looked at me with a bit of a troubled expression, a little bit of pity, and then a little heart-break but most of all love. I then began to ponder, maybe it maybe it must have been something to do with me.

"Lucian, don't worry in good time i'll tell you everything okay? I have to make sure you're first in a state of mind that can handle it, you trust mommy right?"

I instantly nodded without hesitation, mom always does what's best for me so, I heard a little bit about what she did to save me, I asked Varathraga and he told me I got cursed when I was in proximity of a high level magical attack, and mom saved me and spent months staying by my side, who could I trust if not mom?

"Yes mom I always will" and ran over and hugged her and stared at her beautiful golden eyes
that stared back at me warmly.

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The meeting had came to an end, and everyone went back to their respective posts, some just went back to sleeping, Dragons love sleeping. Lucius saw Venastrasia talking to Varathraga, she showed a shocked expression and then smiled. She then came back to Lucius.

"Lucius, come it's time for your treatment we can't wait and delay any longer"

Lucius, got up and took her hand as they both made their way into the cave he went to lie down in his furry nestlike bed, she lay next to him, her hand was placed on his chest and a bright divine bubble covered Lucius, after a few minutes low breathing sounds could be heard as young Lucius fell asleep.

Venastrasia took out the God's Tear and started integrating it into his body, She made sure and never missed a treatment, even though things looked fine if he hadn't recieved it, his body would age rapidly and he would die, but it would be slow and painful because of the God's Tear, she dare never risked it.

While the God's Tear activated, it began soaking into his body rapidly, his body had become accustomed to the pure divine energy. Venastrasia was shocked, this was partly to due to the training he had been receiving.

"So what Varathraga said was true, You do indeed have a talent for divine magic, though it will still take some time, but this means you'll, grow up sooner..."

She made a happy expression and then a sad one, she wanted to spend some time with her son.