Starting out as a Dragon Slave-Chapter 96: Discovering the Cause

The cell door opened gently—no creak, no echo, every motion deliberate. The latch had been manually disengaged by the guard assigned to the mission, quietly neutralized for just a few minutes. A hooded figure slipped inside the darkness like a shadow blending perfectly into the prison’s gloom.

Elystria.The dragon princess of the royal bloodline. Daughter of the king, sister to the new emperor. Known for her coldness, her restraint, her clinical calm. Officially detached from blood and emotion, even in private. But tonight, she was crossing every line she had drawn for herself.

She closed the door behind her. No sound.Her eyes adjusted instantly to the darkness. She didn’t need light. Her reptilian pupils, golden and slit like a serpent’s, contracted for a brief second before locking onto the curled figure in the back of the cell.

Mordred.

Seated on the thin straw mattress, feet flat, arms limp, head slightly bowed. His back slumped, shoulders sagging. He was breathing—barely—slowly, mechanically. His gaze was empty, staring at the wall. No reaction to the intrusion. No tension. No recognition.

Elystria stood motionless for a few seconds, watching him.

— What’s happening to him? she wondered.

She was used to the Mordred who met her with a glimmer of humor, even under the weight of slavery. A Mordred with fire in his eyes. That fire was gone now.

She stepped forward slowly. Not out of fear. Not out of caution. But because everything in the air told her that even a sharp movement might shatter something fragile—something already broken. And that wasn’t why she had come.

She stopped one meter away.

Still, no reaction.

She pulled down her hood with a swift motion, revealing her stern, impassive face. No flicker of concern disturbed her features. But her eyes—they were sharp, scanning every detail.

The slight swelling beneath Mordred’s eyelids.The shadows under his eyes, deeper than usual.The microscopic tremors in his fingers.The complete absence of awareness in his surroundings.

This wasn’t fatigue.

— It looks like post-traumatic shutdown, she murmured. We’ve seen it in our enemies. But what happened to you?

She whispered:

— "Mordred."

No reply.

She moved closer. Knelt in front of him—not dramatically. Just to be level with him. Her right hand lifted slowly, stopping ten centimeters from his knee.

No reflex.No muscular tension.

A robot. A shell. No human left inside.

From her belt, she drew a small enchanted stone. With the edge of a claw, she tapped it. A pale green glow pulsed outward and gently settled on Mordred’s chest.

A scan. Basic. Non-invasive.

Mana flow: stable.Cognitive functions: diminished.No biological anomaly.No spontaneous synaptic response.

She stifled a sigh. It wasn’t physical. Not poison. Not a spell. Not a curse.

— I was right. He’s here... but his mind is far from this place.

And she... she didn’t understand.

What she understood even less was that something stirred inside her at the sight of him like this. A weight in her throat. A tightness in her neck. A faint shiver climbing her spine.

Unacceptable.

Her mother had told her recently:"This man is a fracture in time. A pivot of power no one can predict. What you do with him will define your future, your brother’s, and this world’s."

And now... that pivot was broken.Utterly.

Elystria thought quickly.There was no room left for hesitation.

She straightened, met Mordred’s vacant gaze—what was left of it—and raised her right hand. A stream of white energy began to glow in her palm. Rare magic, restricted to her caste.

Mental arts.Cognitive control.Invasive probe.

She wasn’t a novice.She had entered dozens of minds, dissolved secrets, ripped truths free.

But never like this.Never in this state.Never with this much unease.

Her hand trembled slightly, a few centimeters from his temple.

— It’s easier when they’re prisoners of war...

She bit the inside of her cheek.A cold, dull anger welled inside her. Not at him—at herself.

She didn’t want to do this.But she had no choice.

— "If you won’t speak to me... then I’ll come take what I need myself," she whispered.

The white mana focused—precise, surgical.It caused no pain. It opened. It slid.It slipped in.

She brought her palm gently to his temple.

Breath held.

And as she brushed his cold skin—

She sank into his mind.

Darkness.

Thick. Viscous.

Not the haze of a vague memory.Not the blur of fractured thought.

No—this was a solid blackness. Dense. Crushing.

Elystria, though experienced in mental manipulation, instantly knew something was wrong.The moment she crossed Mordred’s mental threshold, she should have encountered the first layer: recent memories, emotions, sensations.

But here?

Nothing.

Only the void.

And then, this weight.

Something heavy, oppressive, descended upon her mind. As if the very structure of the unconscious she had entered was trying to crush her, to suffocate her. She tried to pull back, to sever the connection—but her own magical stream was already locked in.

She saw nothing, heard nothing.But she felt it.A presence.Mute, enormous, formless... and it had noticed her.

The mental link snapped—sharply, violently—like a rope slashed in one clean strike. Elystria was thrown backwards, flung out of Mordred’s mind, her breath knocked out of her, her body slammed against the mental wall she had tried to force.

But it wasn’t her body holding her down.

Her eyes flew open.

And it was worse.

She was no longer kneeling.Her feet no longer touched the ground.

She was lifted, hovering some thirty centimeters off the floor, her back arched, her throat crushed by a scaled hand, its grip monstrous. Her own hands clutched instinctively at the arm holding her, but it was like trying to squeeze a stone pillar.

In front of her—Mordred.

No.Not Mordred.

A creature, upright, present, its eyes burning through the gloom.

His face was frozen—locked in an expression of brutal coldness. No visible anger, no scream. But his pupils—no longer dull, but incandescent—blazed with a rage so tightly coiled it made the air vibrate like a silent earthquake.

He hadn’t spoken.He hadn’t roared.But the magical pressure radiating from him was unbearable.

Not wide. Not diffused.Targeted.

Elystria felt her own magic compress, shrink, buckle under that wave of mana. Not violent. Not explosive. But focused—like a scalpel. Like a laser.

Her breath shortened. Mordred’s grip tightened—slowly. Calculated. Each passing second scraped away her breath, her defenses, her composure.

She wanted to speak. To stop him. She could have used magic. She could have activated a defensive spell, screamed, invoked her royal privilege.

But she couldn’t move.

And yet—he had felt her.He had intercepted her.And now... he held her.

His face was close to hers.She could see his eyes burning—animal, feral, unknown.

The grip tightened again.

His hand didn’t move.His fingers, powerful and ice-cold, were locked around Elystria’s neck—choking her. Not in rage alone.In judgment.In response to the intrusion.To the pain.To the silent violation.

What burned in those eyes was more than fury.It was too much.Too much.

In his gaze, she saw more than anger. She saw it all.

A hatred born of guilt, suffering, and loneliness.

And a bottomless despair—of a man who had lost everything, and who moved now only out of habit. With no goal. No compass.

She tried to speak. She wanted to say his name, to calm him, to reason with him.

But her crushed throat let out only choking sounds.

He leaned in even closer—barely inches from her face. His pupils were blazing. A furnace held in check. A scream imprisoned beneath his skin.

And in that burning gaze—Elystria understood.

She had been a fool.

She had tried to penetrate his mind...When everything was already in his eyes.

Everything he couldn’t say.Everything he couldn’t put into words.

She didn’t see a man in rage.She saw a man utterly broken.

So she acted.

She closed her eyes, briefly.Summoned her magic—gentle, stable, mastered. The inner current unique to dragons of noble lineage. Her mother’s blood. Refined. Precise. Not explosive. But dominant.

And in the heavy silence of the cell—she took back control.

Of her breath.Of the pressure.Of the space.

Her own aura rose—slowly. No word. No cry. A crushing presence, but tempered. Focused.An invisible hand wrapped around Mordred’s arm.

It didn’t crush.It weakened.Like the ocean smothering a dying flame.

Mordred’s fingers began to loosen.

He resisted. His jaw clenched. A low growl rumbled in his throat—like a cornered animal refusing to let go.

But his grip opened.Slowly.Inevitably.

She kept her hand on his wrist, guiding the motion. With a smooth, firm gesture, she lowered his arm.

He didn’t touch her anymore.He no longer resisted.

He was still standing. Still in front of her.But the tension in his body—that compressed rage—had dissipated.

His breath turned erratic again.His gaze, still sharp, wavered.

Elystria stepped in closer.

Her free hand—the one not channelling magic—brushed his face.First his cheek.Then the line of his jaw.

Her fingers—cold but soft—traced the curve of his skin, fevered and rough with sweat. It wasn’t tenderness. It was contact.An anchor.

Then, without a word—

She moved forward.Just enough to close the space between them.

A proximity filled with everything they couldn’t say.Everything they weren’t allowed to feel.

And she kissed him.

Her body pressed lightly against his, both hands now on him—one still at his wrist, the other sliding to the back of his neck. Her lips found his with a warmth that was almost brutal. An instinctive need to break the wall. To touch him differently.To wake him up.

Mordred, at first, stayed rigid.

Surprised.Trapped in a contact he didn’t understand.Didn’t expect.

His breath caught.His heart stopped for half a beat.

But the fire inside him... faded.

That burning tide of mana in his veins retreated—like a defeated wave. His magical pressure collapsed in an instant.His fist uncurled.His shoulders dropped slightly.

And his gaze—still glowing orange—softened.

A flicker of humanity returned to his eyes.

He tried to push her away—But Elystria held the kiss for one second longer.

One second where she gave him what words could not.One second to show him—He wasn’t alone.

Then she pulled away.Slowly.

Her lips left his.Her breath mingled with his, warm and calm—like this one act had calmed the storm.

A silence filled the room.

Until Mordred finally spoke, voice hoarse, cracked—

— "What... what happened?"