While in the created shell, the boy's body began to gradually transform. The previously damaged consciousness was slowly restored. This process dragged on for five years. Although the transformation into a dragon takes much less time, the soul and personality were too badly traumatized. Due to the fact that his balance breaker was not activated correctly and did not want to stop even when the boy's body began the transformation process. Ophis had no choice but to use her power again. The snake she created penetrated the man's soul. Having absorbed the sacred gear, it remained inside him, slowly dissolving, becoming a necessary nourishment for the newborn dragon.
Throughout this time, Ouroboros did not leave the cocoon for a second. She monitored the process happening inside, ready to intervene if necessary. Ophis also acted as a guard. Due to the experiment going out of control and the appearance of the Infinite Dragon God, followed by the destruction of all sentient beings, many residents of the supernatural world noticed such an anomaly.
Every faction wanted to find out the essence of what was happening, but no one was able to get close. There were some brave souls who ignored the aura of Ouroboros in an attempt to obtain information, but the fate of such individuals left much to be desired. As soon as they approached the entrance to the former mage complex, an incredible thirst for blood spread throughout the surrounding area, and giant snakes created from the power of infinity appeared near the intruders. Paralyzed with fear, no one was able to defend themselves from a mouth full of fangs. Even if they could move, the result did not change. Ophis' snakes were equal in strength to such high-class beings as Demon Lords and Seraphim.
After two similar incidents, no one took any more risks, but everyone was curious to know what treasure the usually impartial Infinity Dragon God was guarding so fiercely.
***
Suddenly, his consciousness awakened. He found himself shackled in some kind of shell, but instead of fear, his body was in cozy comfort. The young dragon's mind still seemed sluggish, unwilling to think about anything complicated.
"We need to get out of here." Following his instinct, the boy pressed on the wall of the cocoon. The first attempt was unsuccessful, but on the third, small cracks were visible. Soon, the young man was free. He had to close his eyes to get used to the unusually bright surroundings.
"Where am I*?" The young man began to turn his head in search of some kind of clue, until his gaze fell on a little girl. "Um... who are you? And... who am I?"
His head was filled with various thoughts in an attempt to comprehend the current situation. The place he found himself in was familiar, but the only thing it evoked in the dragon's memory was pain. Pain caused by the endless experiments on him. However, the room looked destroyed and abandoned due to the accumulated dust and cracks in the walls.
"Ophis..." the girl answered monotonously, ignoring the other questions. She again began to stare at him, remaining silent.
"Okay," realizing that this would be a difficult conversation, the young man decided to continue asking questions. "Then, Ophis, what are you doing here?"
"Waiting for the one who creates silence to wake up."
"Creating... silence?" This phrase was unusual, but it immediately associated with the terrible noise that he had to endure in the past. As soon as this point was touched upon, the guy realized that the cacophony of sounds no longer bothered him.
- Yes, - Ophis nodded, pointing her finger at her interlocutor, - creating silence.
Silence hung between them. The young man was still trying to understand what was happening, and Ouroboros simply did not take her eyes off him. The silence continued. Gradually, the guy's consciousness cleared up, helping him understand the wrongness of the situation. Looking at his interlocutor, something in the back of his mind told him not to provoke her under any circumstances, but rather to run away and hide under a stone. As if he were just an insect in the hands of this girl, who was carefully examining a new toy. And it depended only on her mood: to release the "bug" into freedom or crush it, clenching her fist.
Remembering the moment when he was able to see his tormentors as not quite people, the young man tried to repeat it. After a few minutes, his eyes began to tingle slightly. Squinting from the unpleasant sensation, he felt the "activation" of his vision. When the young man opened his eyelids, a complex magic circle was glowing in his eyes.
— A-a-a-a!!! — with a cry of horror, the boy staggered back. His legs buckled, and he fell to the floor. — M-monster!!!
Unable to get up, he began to crawl back on shaking limbs, not taking his eyes off the source of his fear. As soon as the young man opened his new eyes, instead of a little girl, a huge creature, taller than multi-story buildings, appeared in front of him. The long, narrow body of the monster was covered in dark purple scales, sharp claws stuck out on small, relative to the body, paws, and branched horns grew on its head. An incredible amount of energy emanated from the creature, as if there was no end to it.
Even when his back hit the wall, the boy continued to push off the floor, wanting to get as far away as possible. Accidentally looking into the eyes of the monster with a vertical pupil, he felt curiosity directed at him.
- NO!!! - A new wave of panic swept over him when the creature began to slowly approach. - Stop! Don't come closer! P-please don't come closer!
Ignoring the screams, tears and pleas of the young man, Ophis walked straight towards him. She did not understand the reason for such behavior, but she did not care. Ouroboros simply wanted to feel that feeling of silence again, like when she first met the anomaly.
- STOP!!! - the young man shouted with all his might, crossing his arms in front of his face, hiding his gaze. When the distance between them almost disappeared, something inside the newborn dragon responded to his desperate desire to protect himself from danger.
The dragon aura bubbled up in his body, creating a two-meter sphere, in an attempt to isolate the host from the rest of the world. Ophis's eyes sparkled as she saw the unique power again. She excitedly entered this area and felt the long-awaited silence.
A minute passed, then two, then five. The young man lowered his hands, still waiting for no action from this creature. His eyes again took on their usual appearance - a bright yellow elongated pupil, a change he had not yet known about. In front of him again stood a little girl. She did not pay attention to anything, closing her eyelids and enjoying the sensations. On her doll-like face he saw a sincere, charming smile. Realizing that he was completely ignored, he simply could not take his eyes off this monstrous and at the same time divine girl, mesmerized by Ophis. When another five minutes passed, the young man felt the accumulated fatigue due to the large expenditure of dragon aura. At the twelfth minute, there was no longer enough energy to maintain the sphere, and it disappeared.
At that moment, he heard the cacophony of sounds in his head again, as did the girl opposite him, judging by the gaze directed at him. The young man was no longer afraid and looked back at her.
"Bring back the silence," Ophis said, regaining her usual indifferent look, but unlike before, there was a palpable emotion in her voice.
"I can't," he replied with a slight breathlessness. "There's no strength left."
"Too bad," Ophis's sadness showed on her face, causing her only interlocutor to experience the same feeling.
"Sorry," he apologized unconsciously. They continued to look at each other. "Tell me, who are you, Ophis?"
She tilted her head slightly, not quite understanding the question, since she had already introduced herself.
"... Ophis," Ouroboros thought for a while, and gave her answer. "Infinite Dragon God."
"A dragon..." the young man repeated after her unconsciously, and memories of some stories he had heard before surfaced in his head, where heroes had to fight a dragon to save a princess. Only the monster in the picture was very different from the one he saw in front of him. The dragons described in the books were significantly inferior in both size and strength to the girl in front of him. "Perhaps it's because she is the God of Dragons?" the young man thought to himself. "Then why do you need me? Can't you do the same with your strength?"
"I can't," she shook her head in denial. "I was born in a spatial gap. There is nothing there and it is always quiet until the red fool appeared. He was too noisy and did not want to leave. When I tried to defeat him and failed, he kicked me out. I gathered people to drive away the red one, but recently I sensed an anomaly," Ouroboros pointed her finger at him. — When I came here, I found the silence you created again. And now too.
— H-But how? I'm just a human. I...
— A dragon, — Ophis interrupted him.
— A dragon?
— Yes, a dragon.
— No, I'm a human! I remember, — memories appeared in his mind of how he lived in a house with two other people, or how he often went to a building with other children, but he couldn't remember the names or places where he lived. — Yes, I remember... I... I was a human.
— I made you a dragon, — the girl said phlegmatically. — You were dying, and I didn't want to lose the silence, so I turned you into a dragon.
— So you saved me? — Ouroboros nodded. The young man was completely confused. He remembered practically nothing, and especially didn't know anything about dragons. — Now, what should I do?
— Become stronger so that you can always create silence. You are too weak now. You don't have the strength to maintain this power for long(?).
- Um... are you going to make me stronger?
- No. I've always been strong, - Ophis was born at the peak of her power and didn't know how to train to become stronger. - Let's go to the other dragon. He's the strongest after me and the red fool.
- Okay, - he got up from the floor and only then realized that he had been naked all this time. - Office, wait. I need clothes.
Ouroboros said nothing and used her powers to create on him the usual pants and jacket that she had seen on someone before.
- Let's go, - a magic circle with an infinity symbol in the center appeared under their feet, in the form of two snakes biting each other's tails.
***
Explosions were heard among the endless mountains and hills, each one destroying another ridge. The culprit of all this destruction was a tall young guy with dark-blond hair, dressed in a coat. Each blow of his hand or foot had enormous destructive power. He had been training for decades in this uninhabited space, one of many that existed in the fold between the spatial gap, like Heaven or the Underworld.
Crom Cruach stopped his training as soon as he felt spatial fluctuations near him. Seeing the familiar magic circle, the evil dragon relaxed his tension, but did not relax his vigilance. In the place of the circle, two creatures appeared, the already familiar Dragon God of Infinity, and next to her a young guy who had an external resemblance to Ophis. Unlike Ouroboros, there was no sense of power from him, but he was definitely a dragon.
"What have you come for, Ophis?" the evil dragon immediately asked. - And who is this brat next to you?
- Crom Cruach, - the girl addressed him, but Crom noticed a slight change in her compared to their last meeting, which alerted the dragon. - I need you to make him stronger.
- What? - He looked at the said guy, but did not find anything outstanding about him.
- Why do you bother with this weakling? And who is he?
- I need him, - Ophis stated, and the evil dragon could swear he heard a note of concern in her words. - And he... - the girl fell silent, realizing that she did not know the name of her companion.
- Me? - Seeing how they both crossed their eyes at him, the young man decided to introduce himself, - My name is... my name is... - He could not find anything in his memories, so he looked at Ophis, - And what is my name?
- Are you kidding me?! — Crom Cruach roared as the pair looked at each other in confusion. — Ophis, where did you find this dragon? I've never heard of it before.
— I turned it myself when I found it dying, — the girl said, shocking the dragon.
— Hey, are you serious?! Why did you need to create a full-fledged dragon? — He looked at the bewildered boy again.
— He can create silence for me, — to the shock of the evil dragon, a smile appeared on the girl's face, — but right now he is too weak to maintain it for long.
— How? — concentrating on the boy, Crom discovered an incredible thing — the newly-formed dragon had its own open dragon aura. In his memory, only a few dragons were able to do something like this. — Ha... ha-ha... HA-HA-HA! Excellent! Simply magnificent! — the evil dragon burst into thunderous laughter.
The guy Ophis brought had incredible potential. He was capable of rivaling him if he was trained properly, and he would definitely do so! Having surpassed the Heavenly Dragons, Crom had no one equal to him, not counting the Dragon Gods. He needed a rival to continue improving, and if he didn't have one, he could create a better rival himself.
"I agree!" the dragon exclaimed excitedly. "Hey, kid, how old are you?"
"I don't know," he shrugged indifferently. "As soon as I woke up, I met Ophis, and then we appeared here.
- Ha! So you just hatched from an egg, kid, - Crom's smile grew wider. With this, he would be able to create the perfect fighter. - Since you created him, you get to choose his name too, Ophis. Hurry up, I want to get started!
- ... Silence, - Ophis decided after a long thought. - This will be your name, Silence.
- Okay, Ophis, - having received the name, the dragon felt as if the previously invisible emptiness inside him had disappeared, and now he had become complete. - Thank you.
- Enough of your tenderness, - Crom interrupted the duet. - Let's begin your training, - the evil dragon said excitedly. - I will teach you how to be a real dragon, Silence.