Severin
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1 I first met Severin in a side hall of the Draconic Council. At that time, he had not yet been called a heretic. The elders were locked in heated debate over a report on bloodline stability, arguing as they always did over the nobility of Highborn Dragons and the necessity of lineage preservation. Severin sat in silence at the far end of the table, and only when everyone had finished speaking did he set down the scroll and say with quiet composure, "Bloodline stability is not a virtue. It is simply the most dignified way to describe stagnation... before it has been found out." Severin was known to come from a prestigious background and to be exceptionally gifted, one of the few scholars on Dragon Isle who devoted himself entirely to research. The hall fell silent for a long time. Although he hadn't raised his voice when speaking, his contempt was evident on the elders' astonished faces. That year, I requested a transfer into his laboratory. Not for the sake of my future, but because I wanted to see for myself what this scholar, who had the audacity to speak so boldly in front of the elders, was truly capable of. 2 In those first few years, he was still conducting conventional research. But he was never one to fixate on cataloguing the patterns of dragon scales, wing bones, and Draconis circuit pathways, nor was he content with patching over obvious flaws. What truly interested him was the idea of "rewriting structure". During one experiment, he suddenly asked me, "Have you ever seen a fly in amber?" I shook my head. He paused his work and said, "The Draconis is that fly. We are strong enough, and so we stopped evolving... but that strength is nothing more than a death sentence dressed up to look respectable." I only found out afterward that during that time he had been sifting through sealed ancient scrolls, the ones that chronicled how the Draconis had once forged alliances with humans and eventually become subject to their dominion. Most of our kin treated it as a humiliation, but he seemed to see it differently. I found him checking tissue sections when I came to return the archives. He cast a single glance at the title and said, "Do you think that was a humiliation?" I didn't dare answer. He gave a quiet smile. "That was not humiliation. It was evidence." At the time I did not understand what he meant. Only later did I come to understand that this piece of history represented to him evidence that the Draconis had never been truly perfect. If a race that prided itself on unshakable nobility could still be tamed by a superior order, then whatever claim it had to standing at the pinnacle was nothing more than self-consolation. From that moment, I vaguely sensed that what he wanted was to push the Draconis themselves into the next stage. 3 Severin's laboratory was sealed at the end of winter in the twelfth year. The charges were "desecration of bloodline and use of kin as research material". On the day the laboratory was sealed, I had expected him to at least offer some argument, but he simply watched in silence as the enforcers sealed off the rooms one by one. It was only when they moved to take away the core records that he finally placed his hand on the topmost volume. The enforcers tensed, expecting to find something forbidden. But when they turned the pages, they found nothing but anatomical diagrams of Draconis bones. "Don't worry, this isn't something to hide," he said in a tone so gentle it bordered on politeness. "Just some medical records I'd like to keep." Afterward, we left the Dragon Isle together and traveled to many places. From the snowcapped mountains of Hathor to the ruined capital of the ancient gods, and finally to a nameless rift at the very edge of the abyss. Our companions grew fewer and fewer. Some died to the harsh environment, some were broken by the whispers, and some just could no longer bear the way Severin looked at the world and chose to leave. Yet I remained. By that point, I could no longer tell whether I was assisting in a research endeavor or witnessing something far greater closing in on the world. And it was there that the Abyssal Core was discovered. It resembled a slowly drifting mass of black fluid, sealed within an ancient transparent container. When firelight fell upon it, impossibly fine patterns rose from within, like countless cells dividing and breathing. Two of the mercenaries who had led the way went mad on the spot. A third dropped to his knees and retched, saying he could hear voices speaking from inside the container. Severin stood several paces back and watched in silence for a long while, then pulled off his glove and gave the outer wall a gentle knock with his knuckle. The sharp tap rang out like a miner striking a chunk of ore waiting to be cut open. From that day forward, he abandoned all his previous research plans. 4 The subject of the first experiment was one of the mercenaries who had been traveling with us. When the Abyssal Core was injected into his body, he was still at first, then shook with violent tremors, and then was still forever. Severin recorded the data without a word or the slightest trace of emotion. The next morning, he placed a new research plan on my desk, with a single line written at the end: "It does not accept any fixed form." He looked up at me and said, "Look, it's even trying to restructure the air." In that moment, he didn't seem to have discovered something dangerous, but rather found the answer he had been waiting for all along. After that, he rarely mentioned "revitalizing the Draconis," as the phrase began to feel too limiting to him. After all, the Abyssal Core belonged to no race. It would devour, mimic, and restructure all existing forms. I asked him once whether the subjects who collapsed and mutated during the experiments could be considered failures. His only reply was, "Those who cannot withstand change are not failures. They are eliminations." It was from that moment that I began secretly planning my escape. 5 Severin's self-arranged experiment began on a windless night. The entire experiment felt as routine as a daily schedule. Instrument numbers, Arcana thresholds, Abyssal Core dosage, injection timing, contingency protocols... every item had been revised by his own hand. Before the experiment began, he handed me a set of instructions, asking me to record his language ability, logical coherence, and stability of self-awareness at the earliest possible moment after the procedure. But what truly filled me with dread was the first step of the experiment. He asked me to assist with a dragonspeak forbidden incantation to excise the regions of his brain responsible for empathy, fear, and moral judgment. "Why does it have to go this far?" My hands would not stop shaking. He sat on the examination table and reached out to straighten my collar, as if calming an unruly student. "Because truth does not tolerate noise. Hesitation, pity, fear... these things corrupt observation. I am not after power without restraint. I am after judgment that emotion can never touch." The moment he opened his eyes and looked at me after the experiment concluded, I felt for the first time that I was no different from the instruments laid out on the table. The injection of the Abyssal Core took place on the fourth day of the experiment. The moment of injection, the energy field on the ground began to violently destabilize. I saw his spine convulsing wildly beneath his skin, as black fluid forced its way through his dragon scales, cracking them inch by inch. The viscous new tissue, entwined with shadows, continuously proliferated between his bones. When the Draconis enforcers broke down the door, this place already resembled the cross-section of a sliced abyss. The "monster" who no longer belonged within the bounds of the Draconis stood at the center, head bowed as he straightened his blood-stained collar, his voice as gentle as ever. "Please remain calm, everyone. What you are witnessing is not an aberration, but an effective iteration of life structure." The compassion in his eyes became terrifyingly disturbing, because he truly believed that what he brought was the unknown "truth." 6 What happened afterward can mostly be pieced together from the wanted notice for Severin: missing scholars, modified test subjects, and the ever-growing black fluid tissues in the abandoned tower. I found myself thinking of Severin standing before endless subjects as they descended into madness, still calmly logging every change as it came. "Sample lacks mental stability. Structural restructuring unsuccessful. To be eliminated." He didn't take pleasure in torture, but firmly believed that the Abyssal Core could restructure this decaying world. Until then, any bloodshed and death were merely experimental costs. And this may well be the last time I write in this record. Because yesterday he found me. His transformation has deepened since I last saw him, with the growths on his arms stretching the fabric of his clothes out of shape. He praised my loyalty, as I never reported the details of his experiments to the enforcers. Then he extracted a vial of Abyssal Core from the test tube. "You are an excellent observer," he said with a smile, "but your body is far too antiquated." The needle in his hand gleamed coldly. I suddenly remembered what he had said in the council's side hall many years ago. Back then, I thought it was merely arrogance, but now I realize it might have been his final judgment on this "old world". [Three months later] My writing is a little slower than it used to be. My fingers sometimes refuse to cooperate. When I try to grip the pen, they curl into a strange and unfamiliar shape. But my consciousness is still there. Every morning when he visits, he always asks me a few questions: "How many colors can you see now? Do you still remember your name?" I answer truthfully, and he notes everything down, his expression as calm as ever. I'm not sure what these records contain, but once I turned my head and caught sight of the last line he wrote: "Host's language logic intact. Emotional response reduced by 38%. Structure stable." Then his usual annotation: Progress proceeding well. Through all of it, he never once showed the slightest trace of cruelty. That is the last thing I want to say. If you've read this far, please don't think of him as a monster with ill intent. That would be a simplistic statement. What broke me was not what he subjected me to. It was that he never stopped believing this was something he was giving me out of generosity. It took three months for the fear to find me. Because sometimes, I almost believed him too.
Title
Scholar of Form
Max ascension
Ascended 5★
How Severin compares · vs 26 Draconis Heroes
Closest Heroes · nearest on ATK
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