Ersia: Raven Dawn

Nearly seven hundred people had gathered along the shore of Lake Sérénité. They stood not merely before the wide expanse of water stretching into the distance, but before something far more arresting—a presence that drew every gaze upward. Looming above them was a figure that seemed almost like a mountain given form and wings, its immense body casting a quiet, oppressive weight over the crowd.

The dragon lowered its head in a slow, deliberate motion, its attention settling on them. Horns rose from its crown like tall, brilliant silver spires, and within its eyes burned a deep crimson light, steady and unblinking.

A hush fell, though no voice had called for silence. What had moments ago felt like a collective trance began to loosen its hold, and awareness returned in uneven breaths and subtle shifts of posture. Fear did not come as a sudden jolt, but as something heavier and more certain, settling into the bones of those who stood there. It was not simply the sight of the creature that stirred it, but the quiet recognition of its scale, its age, and the distance between its existence and their own.

“Approach, should you wish for the dawn.”

The dragon spoke, its voice low and immense, rolling outward until it stirred the trees along the surrounding forest and set faint ripples across the surface of the lake. No one moved at first, yet there was no real choice in the end. One by one, then in small groups, they found themselves edging closer to the water.

Without warning, the dragon bent one of its claws and tore it free. The motion was unhurried, almost absent of strain. It let the severed talon fall. The object struck the lake, slipped beneath the surface, and vanished without a trace. Only then did the dragon speak again.

“Enter the water in your entirety, and you will be what you are meant to be.”

Fear held them where they stood. Doubt lingered in the space between each breath. For a time, no one answered the call. Then, at last, someone stepped forward.

She was a young woman, though her body bore the weight of years it should not have known. Stoneman syndrome had shaped her into something rigid and contorted, her movements slow and uneven as she leaned heavily on a worn, splintered cane. Each step toward the lake seemed uncertain, as if the ground itself might refuse her.

“Should this be my end, then I pray for death to be kinder,” she said quietly, more to herself than to anyone else. “For I have long stood apart from the living.”

At the water’s edge, she let the cane fall. It landed with a dull sound against the earth, forgotten almost at once. Then she lowered herself forward and slipped into the lake, offering no resistance, allowing the water to take her as it would.

The surface closed over her. For a moment, nothing changed.

Then, beneath, she felt it—a pull, steady and inescapable, drawing her downward. There was no light, no sound, no air to fill her lungs. As her awareness began to fray, pain spread through her body, sharp and absolute, as though something within her were being broken apart and remade at once.

Time passed. No one could say how long.

She did not return.

Murmurs began to rise along the shore, low and uncertain. Some stepped back. Others turned away entirely. It had been nearly ten minutes since she had entered the water, and the silence left behind felt heavier with each passing second.

Then a voice broke through the tension.

“I—I see something. Over there.”

They turned as one. A shape drifted toward the edge of the lake, carried by a slow current. It was her.

The crowd drew closer, forming a loose circle as her body came to rest along the shore. At first, no one spoke. What they saw did not fit what they remembered.

Her form, once twisted and rigid, was now straight and whole. The unnatural angles that had defined her were gone, replaced by a quiet symmetry, as if her body had simply been returned to a state it had always been meant to hold.

“How is that possible…?”

“Has the lake… changed her?”

“Wait—don’t jump to conclusions! She isn’t breathing!”

The words had barely settled when she coughed, suddenly and violently, expelling water in ragged bursts. Her body trembled as air returned to her lungs. Instinctively, she reached for herself, hands moving over her arms, her shoulders, her back, as though confirming each part in turn. When she found no trace of what had once bound her, she drew in a shaking breath and broke into quiet, uncontrollable sobs.

That was enough.

Hesitation gave way all at once. The others began to move, no longer in doubt. They made their way toward the water, some stumbling, others supporting those who could not walk alone. The mute guided the blind. The young carried the frail across their shoulders. There was no order to it, only a shared urgency that pulled them forward.

One after another, they entered the lake.

What happened that day remained with them for the rest of their lives. Illnesses that had lingered since birth, bodies shaped by pain and limitation, all of it fell away without trace. What the water took, it did not return. What it gave, it left behind completely.

"Walk the world with your head held high, for you, O humankind—know that you were created in perfection."

“Now go with haste, and tell the people what you have witnessed today.”

They moved to obey, the weight of the moment carrying them forward. Yet before the crowd could fully depart, the woman who had first entered the lake stepped back toward the shore and lowered herself in reverence before the dragon. With quiet care, she placed her cane at the water’s edge, leaving it there as one might return something no longer needed, or offer it to something beyond themselves.

The dragon did not respond. It neither encouraged nor forbade the act, and in that absence, the others followed. One by one, they set down what they had carried—crutches, braces, the small burdens that had once defined the limits of their bodies—until the shoreline was marked by these silent offerings.

“I, Renée, devote the whole of my life to You. Bless us in Your name,” she said, her voice steady and clear, carried upward with quiet insistence.

For a moment, there was only the stillness of the lake.

“I am the one known as Mistus,” the dragon said at last. “But this form is not something you should ever revere. It is only a nightmare, borrowed.”

A brief stir passed through those gathered. Some lifted their heads in surprise, others faltered where they stood, but the reaction did not linger. Whatever they had received here remained unchanged.

Without further word, they turned toward the road that would lead them back to the capital. Their departure was uneven, shaped by the lives they had just regained. Some broke into unsteady runs, laughter rising in disbelief. Others walked more slowly, their faces wet with tears they did not try to hide.

They did not leave the lake as they had come.

Those who had never seen the grace of colors stood at the water’s edge and lingered, as if uncertain of what to do with the world now opened before them. Light was no longer an abstract warmth against their skin but something with shape and uniqueness indescribable, shifting across the surface of the lake in quiet gradations they struggled to name. Some reached out without thinking, as though sight itself might slip away if left unattended.

Those who had never heard paused at the smallest sounds. The movement of wind through leaves, the soft break of water against the shore, even the uneven rhythm of their own breathing—each carried a presence that drew their attention inward. A few laughed without restraint, startled by the sound of their own voices, while others fell still, listening as if afraid to interrupt what had just begun.

Limbs once bound by stiffness or loss moved with a cautious unfamiliarity. Steps were tested, then taken again with growing certainty. Hands that had known only limitation now traced the air, the ground, the simple structure of their own bodies, as though learning them for the first time. There was no single expression among them—only a quiet unfolding, different in each person, yet bound by the same unspoken realization.

They gathered what little they had left behind and turned from the lake.

No one spoke of what they had lost. There was nothing left to mourn. The pain and the limits that had once defined them were simply gone. What remained did not feel like a gift newly given, but something returned—quietly, and unflawed.

Behind them, Lake Sérénité returned to stillness. The surface held no trace of what had passed, and the presence above it no longer drew the same weight of attention. Whether the dragon still watched or had already withdrawn, none could say with certainty.

They did not look back.

The road to the capital stretched long and uneven, yet it no longer felt burdensome. Some moved ahead with restless energy, unable to contain what had taken hold of them. Others followed more slowly, each step measured, as if reluctant to let the moment pass too quickly. Laughter rose in fragments. So did tears. Neither needed explanation.

By the time the first of them reached the outer gates, the story had already begun to shift in the telling. Details blurred, words changed, and no two voices carried it in quite the same way. Still, what mattered did not fade. Each of them spoke of the same lake, the same presence, and the same moment their lives had turned.

And that was a match stroke for a certain someone.