Legend CXIII–The First Breath Beneath the Mountain newly Hatched Dragon in a Cave

More about Legend CXIII–The First Breath Beneath the Mountain newly Hatched Dragon in a Cave

Legend CXIII tells of a moment so brief the world almost missed it, a moment hidden deep beneath stone and roots, where light penetrated only as rumor and time passed with the patience of the mountains. In a cavern shaped by centuries of slowly flowing water and even slower silence, lay a clutch of eggs, scattered like forgotten stars on earth, their shells cool, speckled, and heavy with anticipation. Stalactites hung above them like frozen thoughts, and the air carried the scent of damp stone, moss, and something even older, a promise that lay dormant in the bones of the mountain itself. For countless ages, nothing changed, and yet everything happened when the cavern listened to a heartbeat forming where none had been before. When the shell finally broke, it wasn't violent, but a gentle yielding, a cautious coaxing as the egg realized it could no longer remain what it had been. From within emerged the chick, its scales shimmering in deep shades of blue and green, reflecting the sky and sea still unknown to it. Instinctively, its tiny wings unfolded, trembling under the unfamiliar weight of the air. The shattered shell clung to its body like a memory it would soon leave behind. Fragments lay scattered on the earth that had protected it with darkness and silence. Slowly, its eyes opened, reflecting the cave walls, the scattered eggs, and the distant glow of the cave entrance, where the world waited, unaware that it was being awaited. The dragon did not roar, for it had not yet learned the sound of its own strength, but it breathed, and with that breath, the cave shifted, as if sensing a new presence in its long history. Around it lay more eggs, unharmed and still dreaming, each with its own future, each listening to the silent announcement that life had begun anew. The mountain stirred not with anger or fear, but with recognition. It remembered the last time such a breath had warmed its depths, when dragons were not yet legends, but neighbors of stone and sky. The hatchling moved awkwardly, its talons scraping softly against the rock, its wings brushing the dust of centuries, learning through touch what sight could not yet explain. Outside the cave, invisible to the creature within, clouds drifted by, the wind shifted, and valleys waited, unaware that something ancient had returned to the cycle of becoming. The light at the cave entrance neither called to the young creature nor frightened it; it was simply there, a future neither promised nor denied.