The Grand First Step
By the time Invisible felt like he belonged to our family, a question had been nagging at me.
That same day the Cradle of the World’s peak cave was rolling along exactly as usual.
Alduin was sprawled in the inner warm corner with his long black body, while Invisible sat at the second spot near the entrance, front paws neatly arranged.
I squatted in front of the stone pot, stirring the soup, and suddenly glanced back and forth between the two of them.
One of them I had picked up from the forest.
At first small enough to sit on my palm, he breathed fire and got cinders in my face, and curled up in my arms like a black lizard.
Now he occupied an entire side of the cave, melted rocks with a single breath, and when in a good mood rumbled the whole house low. A colossal dragon.
The other one I had met in the snow-capped mountains.
A mysterious guest who stole our food, left scales, stones, and prey in exchange for a meal.
Then one day he saved me from an approaching snow-ork, and revealed himself with bloody outlines. Now he was the steel-bright dragon being stroked on the forehead at the second spot.
Both of them were dragons.
Yet no matter how I looked, they didn’t share many traits with each other.
Alduin was hot, big, and simple.
He would cry when happy, dim his eyes when hurt, and his tail would twitch first at praise.
Invisible was cool, quiet, and sharp.
He answered with the sound of scales and footprints instead of words, would dim his body when shy, and would neatly arrange prey with a single thin line on his neck.
A single word—dragons—and yet everything about them was completely arbitrary.
So it was only natural that this thought arose.
“Is there really only you two dragons?”
Alduin’s nose froze mid-sniff toward the meat smell.
Invisible slowly turned his gaze from the water bowl to me.
I rested the ladle on the pot’s edge and pointed at the two of them in turn.
“So you.”
“Krr.”
“And you.”
“Scrape.”
“It means there’s no third one besides you two.”
Alduin looked at me.
Looked at Invisible.
Looked at his own front paws.
Then looked back at me.
“Krr?”
The face of someone who knew the least in the world.
I slowly nodded.
“Yeah.”
“I asked you and I’m the one who’s wrong.”
“Krr……”
“Don’t sulk.”
I tapped Alduin’s snout with the back of my hand.
“You were just a little lizard who didn’t know the first thing about the world when we met.”
“Krr?!”
“Now you’re a big lizard.”
Alduin’s gold eyes widened in shock.
From Invisible’s direction came a small “Scrape.”
I immediately turned my head.
“Second one.”
“Scrape.”
“You’re not laughing at me either.”
Invisible’s scale sound stopped abruptly.
“You were also the weird guest who stole food and left scales as payment back then.”
“Scrape……”
This time it sounded a little aggrieved.
I let out a small laugh and pressed a finger to the black hardened floor of the cave.
The floor that had melted by Alduin’s breath and then cooled was solid, and a fine black dust rubbed off under my fingertip.
I drew one big circle on it.
“This is our home.”
Both Alduin and Invisible’s gazes dropped to the floor at the same time.
I placed a big dot inside the circle.
“Alduin.”
Alduin’s gold eyes brightened a little.
Next to it I placed a slightly smaller dot.
“Invisible.”
“Scrape.”
“The size difference is a symbol.”
“Scrape.”
“I’ll save my complaints for later.”
I moved my finger outside the circle.
Nothing had been drawn there.
Just an empty space on the black floor.
But the moment I tried to place a third dot there, my fingertip paused for a split second.
Just one dot. Yet strangely, the act of placing it made me feel as though I was the first to admit that another dragon existed somewhere on the continent.
Just Alduin could have been called a coincidence.
The strange baby I picked up from the forest.
The impossible thing that met me after I fell into this world.
I could have overlooked that.
But after Invisible appeared everything changed.
One dragon was a miracle.
Two dragons was a possibility.
In the end I placed a small dot outside the circle.
“Maybe there’s another one of these too.”
Wind blew in from outside the cave entrance.
The clouds drifted slowly beneath my feet, and beyond them the continent was nothing but unfamiliar places to me.
I first looked at Alduin.
“Don’t you remember anything?”
Alduin’s eyes dimmed a little.
“Where you came from at the beginning.”
“Have you ever seen another dragon?”
Alduin stayed silent for a long while.
His large gold eyes followed the dots on the floor.
His own dot.
Invisible’s dot.
And the small dot outside the circle.
Alduin stared at that third dot for a long time, then let out a very low rumble.
“Krr……”
I stroked Alduin’s snout.
“It’s okay.”
“It’s fine if you don’t know.”
Alduin had been Alduin since the very beginning.
He slept curled up in my arms, bit my finger when hungry, got cinders in my face when he breathed fire.
Now he was a big black dragon taking up one side of the cave, but that didn’t change the fact that the Alduin before that empty space had been there.
I turned to Invisible.
“Invisible?”
Invisible didn’t answer right away.
Light from inside the cave flowed thinly over his steel scales, and his hazy silver eyes stared long at the dots on the floor.
I asked more gently.
“Have you seen other dragons?”
Invisible paused for a moment.
And lowered his front paws twice.
“Thump. Thump.”
It meant he didn’t know.
“Have you ever seen them?”
Invisible again didn’t answer immediately.
He sat very quietly as if searching his memory, then finally lowered his front paws twice more.
“Thump. Thump.”
I slowly exhaled.
“I see.”
“You don’t know either.”
“Scrape.”
Invisible’s scales gave a low rumble.
It sounded like a little sorry sound.
I reached out and stroked Invisible’s forehead.
The cold scales touched my palm.
“It’s okay.”
“No one’s scolding you for not knowing.”
“Scrape.”
“You were alone too.”
I rubbed Invisible’s forehead slowly.
“Not some guide who finds other dragons for you.”
Invisible blinked quietly.
Alduin let out a low rumble from beside me.
“Krr……”
I reached toward Alduin and tapped his snout once more.
“You’re okay too.”
“Krr.”
“It’s a little awkward that both of you don’t know.”
The two dragons’ gazes pinned onto me at the same time.
I shrugged my shoulders.
“It’s true.”
A strange silence settled inside the cave.
I looked back down at the floor.
Inside the circle were two dots representing Alduin and Invisible.
Outside the circle was a third dot whose name and location I still didn’t know.
There might be other dragons.
But Alduin didn’t know.
Invisible didn’t know.
I had no idea where they were, how many there were, or what they looked like.
Thinking that way should have made it painful.
Yet strangely my fingertip kept moving.
No map.
No memory of Alduin’s.
No guidance from Invisible.
But my fingertip pointed toward one direction outside the circle.
I froze in place.
“……?”
Alduin looked at me.
“Krr?”
Invisible tilted his head.
“Scrape.”
I looked at my own fingertip.
The fingertip pointed toward the direction close to the southwest when viewed from the Cradle of the World.
Mountains layered one after another, where low clouds lay.
A place I had never been to.
A place whose exact contents I didn’t know.
Yet I somehow knew it was that direction.
“Me.”
My voice came out a little odd.
“Why do I know this side?”
The cave fell completely silent.
Alduin’s gold eyes grew larger.
Invisible’s scales gave a low “Scrape.”
I tried to pull my fingertip back.
But strangely I didn’t want to withdraw it.
It felt as though my heart would calm down if I kept pointing in that direction.
Something existed over there.
I hadn’t seen it with my eyes, hadn’t heard it with my ears, hadn’t smelled it.
I just knew.
Wind blew in from outside the cave entrance.
The thin cold wind of the Cradle of the World.
But inside it carried a strange pattern.
Wind that had rolled around inside deep valleys for a long time, then risen carrying the scent of rock, clouds, and thunder.
I realized this was the first time I had felt this wind.
The strange stone Invisible had brought back before.
The blue piece that trembled slowly when it touched my fingertip.
The heavy wind I had brushed past the cave entrance and simply overlooked.
And the question I had suddenly asked while looking at Alduin and Invisible.
All of it led in one direction.
“That way.”
I muttered.
Alduin rumbled low.
“Krr?”
“I don’t know either.”
I pointed at the floor and said.
“But it’s that way.”
Invisible looked at my fingertip.
And looked outside the entrance.
His silver eyes swayed faintly.
“You know too?”
Invisible paused for a moment then lowered his front paws twice.
“Thump. Thump.”
It meant he didn’t know.
Invisible didn’t know.
Alduin didn’t know either.
But I knew.
It was strange.
That was why I couldn’t ignore it.
I drew a line from the circle toward that direction.
A faint path began on the black floor, starting from our home.
The moment I looked at the end of that line, a name spilled from my mouth.
“Dragon Canyon.”
Alduin lifted his head.
“Krr?”
Invisible’s scales gave a small rumble.
“Scrape.”
I found myself saying it again without meaning to.
“The Canyon of Dragons.”
I had never heard that name before, nor seen it on any map.
It wasn’t a word Alduin had taught me, nor a word the footprints of Invisible had pointed to.
Yet it felt as though I had to call it that.
A vast valley where winds gather, clouds gather, and thunder stays for a long time.
And inside it a place that felt like something—or rather, dragons—would be.
Strangely, the moment I spoke that name out loud, something inside my chest sank a little.
The feeling of being lost disappeared, and I felt as though I stood before an unseen door.
I looked at the line on the floor and slowly nodded.
“Let’s organize this.”
Both dragons looked at me.
“You two don’t know.”
“Scrape.”
“But I somehow know the direction.”
“Krr……”
“I feel strange too.”
“Scrape.”
“Don’t disagree with the second one either.”
Invisible avoided my gaze a little.
Alduin looked down at me with worried eyes.
I received their gazes and stayed quiet for a moment.
What would other dragons be like?
Would they have been alone when they first awakened in a smaller form than Alduin?
Would Invisible have hidden from someone’s eyes like he did?
Or were they gathered together somewhere I didn’t know, living together?
Dragons are strong.
That I knew just from seeing Alduin and Invisible.
But saying they are strong didn’t mean they were alone.
Alduin had been smaller than me at first.
Invisible had hidden his own form at first.
Both of them had been alone until they came to my side.
Thinking about that, I couldn’t brush off this strange sense of direction.
I didn’t rub the line I had drawn on the floor.
A path starting from the Cradle of the World and leading to an unknown canyon.
I looked at the end of that path and said.
“Let’s go.”
The tip of Alduin’s wing lifted slightly.
Invisible lowered his head.
“Scrape.”
“The Canyon of Dragons.”
My voice came out calmer than I thought.
“Let’s check if there are other dragons there.”
Alduin rumbled low.
“Rrr.”
Invisible lowered his front paw once.
“Thump.”
A yes.
I nodded at their reaction.
“Okay.”
“Let’s all go together.”
The moment I said that, a small laugh suddenly escaped me.
Until just now I had been acting like someone searching for secrets of the world.
The Canyon of Dragons, other dragons, a strange sense of direction—any way I looked it was far from ordinary life.
Yet right then I noticed the steam from the pot was lessening.
I reached for the ladle belatedly.
“Ah.”
“We got distracted talking and the soup boiled away.”
Alduin flinched.
Invisible’s scales gave a small rumble.
“Scrape.”
I looked at both of them.
“…Can you still eat?”
They both avoided my gaze at the same time.
“Why are both of you avoiding it?”
I shook my head side to side and kept stirring the soup.
Whether there were other dragons or the Canyon of Dragons, whether I somehow knew the direction.
Tonight’s dinner had to be eaten.
Being the mother of dragons meant protecting the pot even while worrying about the world’s secrets.
I looked at the line I had left on the floor one more time.
Southwest.
The Canyon of Dragons.
A place I had never been to.
Yet strangely a place I felt I absolutely had to go.
“Good.”
I said while stirring the ladle.
“Eat first and get ready.”
Alduin rumbled low.
“Rrr.”
Invisible’s scales gave a small rumble too.
“Scrape.”
I listened to those sounds and thought.
“…I wonder what their combat power is like.”
I hadn’t seen either of them at full power, so I was a little worried.
Won’t they get hurt on the way?
And that I had needless worry… wasn’t long in coming.