Leave a comment

The memories of the next few days were a blur.

The dragon seemed to have memorized what to do so Lucella could eat the meat, so it chewed the meat that it brought from somewhere, fried it with flames, and offered it.

Lucella ate it in a fussy state caused by fever and fainted to sleep once eating his fill.

The Dragon continued heating Lucella up with its throat.

He felt like some cold water was poured down his throat too.

He didn’t remember it clearly, but he could recall soiling himself a few times and then getting licked all over by the dragon.

When Lucella woke up one morning, he finally felt like he was alive.

He dragged his sweaty, tiny body and got up while leaning on the dragon’s neck, and looked at the morning sun.

The newly risen run permeated Lucella’s eyes, and there were also birds in the cry that chirped to announce the morning.

The dragon was sleeping while spewing flames like the smithy furnace.

The dragon’s nest was a particularly open spot in this mountain, and the terrain was also unnaturally elevated.

As Lucella took a staggering step forward, something entered his vision right away.

It was the remains of a big egg with a thick shell.

The fragment was covered in dry mud all the way, and moreover, there weren’t enough of them for the egg’s full size.

There was a cliff visible above the trees from where Licella was standing. And there was a massive collapse there. It was something that happened before Lucella came to this mountain.

It was a heavy rain that was considered a once-in-a-century event even for this relatively rainy area.

It caused flood disasters like landslides and river overflows in the Mount Kuguse vicinity.

Most likely, the remaining fragments, as well as the hatchling dragon that had yet to be born, were swallowed under that landslide.

The story went that the dragon had made its nest halfway on this cliff and was incubating its egg there. That position would normally protect the egg from beasts and scoundrel attacks, as well as from submerging by the rain. Save for the once-in-a-century torrential rain that could collapse the entire cliff.

—Huh? Why do I know where the dragon’s nest was?

Lucella just knew it for some reason.

He felt like he heard it somewhere from someone, but couldn’t remember from who or in what circumstances.

Lucella’s memories, memories spent as a human, were blurred in his mind as if someone had roughly erased them with an eraser like a pencil writing.

But seeing the broken egg, Lucella silently understood it.

“I see, so it had ended.”

For some reason, he was convinced of it.

A sense of loss spread through his limbs.

“Lucella.”

That was surely the name the mother dragon was supposed to give to her child.

Lucella had previously heard about name-bestowing from a certain practitioner. Bestowing a name meant to define an existence and give a clear shape to something indefinite and vague.

If so, then…

What if a grand existence like a dragon were to define Lucella as her own daughter by giving him her “daughter’s name”?

It would most likely become labeling with a kind of compelling force to it.

Even after coming to that realization, Lucella didn’t particularly feel startled. Rather, he even felt moved. Though he did have some reservations about being turned into a girl.

The dragon saved Lucella’s life. It had nursed him devotedly like its own ill child. He never thought a dragon of all things would care for him as much as it did. He felt warmth spreading in his heart at that thought.

However, as if he had swallowed a fragment of ice, or a small thorn stuck in his finger, something in him found it hard to accept this situation.

He himself didn’t understand why that was, however.

When the dragon woke up and saw Lucella walking with his own feet, it was overcome with emotions and snuggled its snout closer.