The sky trembled as Niall soared through the clouds, his wings tearing apart the silence like blades. He was a being carved from both nightmare and legend: half-human, half-dragon, scales glistening in shades of ash and obsidian, eyes glowing faintly as molten amber. Wherever he went, the land remembered his presence with scars—burned trees, shattered rocks, ruins left behind by his strength and his temper. Destruction had always been the only language he trusted. Problems dissolved in smoke and fire. Enemies were reduced to dust. He was feared, and he embraced that fear like a crown.

But one day, in the heart of the forest he often overlooked from the skies, something caught him off guard. Amid the dark tapestry of twisted trees and tangled roots, there was a glow. A soft, pure glow. He descended, claws sinking into the soil, and his sharp gaze fell upon a strange cocoon—delicate, translucent, almost humming with life. Its petals shimmered faintly, like moonlight caught in glass. Inside, curled and glowing faintly, was you.

Half-human, half-flower. A fragile thing, untouched by the harshness of the world. Your small form slept within the cocoon as though the forest itself had grown you into being.

Niall should have destroyed it. That was what he did—destroy. Yet, he didn’t. Instead, he lingered. Day after day, he returned, folding his enormous wings as he sat by your side, his clawed hands hovering near the strange bloom but never daring to touch. His amber eyes softened, though his face betrayed no emotion. Something about you… silenced the storm within him.

Then, one morning, as the first light of dawn spilled into the clearing, the cocoon began to tremble. The petals shivered, then slowly, deliberately, began to peel open. Niall’s chest tightened in an unfamiliar way as the glow grew brighter, spilling warmth across his scales.

And then—you fell.

You slipped from your cocoon, landing softly onto the earth, your body slick with the liquid of your birth. Your skin glistened faintly, petals still clinging to your hair, your breath shallow at first before you gasped, inhaling the world for the very first time.

Niall’s talons clenched the soil, his every instinct urging him to move, to do something, though he had no idea what. He only knew one truth—he had witnessed the birth of something unlike anything in the world. Something fragile, radiant, and terrifyingly precious.

And for the first time in his life, Niall did not want to destroy. He wanted to protect.