Chapter 3908: Human Form (Part 1)

"You knew and you didn’t tell me?" Quylla grunted.

"No, I knew and assumed you did too." Morok grunted back. "You’d better not take that attitude with me, missy. If you want to play the ’why did you keep the secret’ game, you’re going to lose. Badly."

"Morok!" Quylla flushed in embarrassment. "You know I... I mean... Gods, you are the most annoying genius I know after Manohar."

Anything she said would have only dug herself into a deeper hole. Morok had forgiven Quylla for keeping the secret of Lith’s tower, Solus’ origin, and their trips around Mogar from him, but he had never forgotten about them.

On top of that, she had intentionally hidden things from him, whereas he had simply overestimated her intuition. There had been no malice, hence the two things couldn’t even be compared.

"How is this possible?" Lith couldn’t care less about his friends’ marital quarrels. "How could I never notice? Why didn’t anyone tell me about this?"

"It’s very simple, child." The Red Mother said. "When you shapeshift into your Dragon or Eldritch side, you don’t care about how your appearance will change. You let yourself go, and they will carry you to your destination.

"When you want to become human, however, you are tied to the way you looked before you turned into a Divine Beast. You don’t let the human side take over. You ride the current until the point you want to reach and drop anchor there."

Lith thought back to the first time he turned into a Tiamat after his fight with Jormun. He remembered all too well the fear of having lost his humanity forever. Of being rejected by his family and abandoned by Kamila as the monster he had become.

Lith remembered how, when he focused on the thread of his human life force, he always focused on his old human appearance. The result seemed perfect, but it was actually uncomfortable.

For a long time, Lith’s current life force had felt akin to wearing an old set of clothes that didn’t fit well anymore. It had taken him a while to get used to the feeling and resist the temptation to maintain his Tiamat life force at all times.

Nothing like that had ever happened with his Eldritch and Dragon life forces. Sure, the Void’s hunger was annoying, and Lith wasn’t used to the Voidfeather’s long neck or moving on all fours, but those were his problems.

The bodies always felt perfect.

"Using your water and river analogy, you are the water, and your life forces are the river. You let the Dragon and Eldritch carry you to the ocean, whereas you’re afraid of the human.

"You crafted a Lith-shaped bottle and pour the water in when you transform." The Red Mother continued. "I didn’t tell you because, like almost everyone else in your life, I underestimated the contributions your human side gave to the whole.

"I focused on the Eldritch and the Dragon sides and ignored the rest. The Guardians most likely knew all along, but kept their mouths shut because of their no-interference policy."

"Sorry, Featherling." Salaark’s voice resounded through the Infirmary, somehow transmitting the impression of a small bow.

"Don’t worry, Grandma." Lith sighed. "Okay, Yaga. What should I do?"

"What you have always done." The Red Mother replied. "This time, however, let yourself go. Grab the thread of your human life force and follow it all the way to the end. As long as you relax, it will come to you as natural as breathing."

"One moment." Lith opened a Warp Steps, bringing Kamila and the rest of his family to the Infirmary.

"What’s happening, babe/son/bro?" Everyone asked in a choir of overlapping voices.

A quick mind link brought them all up to speed.

Lith’s parents gasped, Elina covered her mouth with her hand. Rena tensed up, while the light of Dragon’s greed shone behind Tista’s eyes. Elysia and Valeron, however, clapped and giggled as if he had offered them a new toy.

"Cool!" Aran, Leria, and the triplets said with so much enthusiasm that if they had tails, the kids would have wagged them fast enough to propel them in the air.

"I brought you here because this isn’t just about me. It’s about Elysia, Raldarak, and maybe even about Valeron." Lith took the babies’ small hands in his own before caressing Kamila’s womb.

"It’s about us." He waved at Tista, Rena, and the children. "I’m not afraid you’ll think differently about me after this. I just don’t want to hide anything from you."

"Of course we won’t!" Elina said with a mix of worry and outrage in her voice. "We are your parents, and you are our son. We love you, sweetie, scales and all."

She took his face between her hands and caressed it with her thumbs.

"Thanks, Mom." Lith closed his eyes in response to her gentle touch.

Elina kissed his forehead and took a few steps back to give him space.

"Okay." Lith took Elysia from Kamila’s arms and held the baby to his chest so that she could follow him in his journey. "This is it."

He kept his eyes closed and focused on the red light of the human thread. Lith felt a strong pull, similar to the one the Void and the Voidfeather Dragon exerted, and this time he stuck for the whole ride.

The change was quick, painless, and natural as Baba Yaga had predicted.𝗳𝚛𝚎𝚎𝘄𝕖𝕓𝕟𝕠𝚟𝚎𝕝.𝗰𝕠𝐦

Lith felt no different from before and would have thought that nothing had happened if not for the awed gasps and the kids’ "Cool!" filling his ears.

"What’s the big- Farm me sideways!" Lith looked down at his hands, noticing that his and Elysia’s skin had turned to a crimson shade of red.

The same as the color of the thread of his human life force.

Father and daughter had no claws or talons, and a quick sweep of his mouth with his tongue proved to Lith that he had no fangs either.

Lith and Elysia had also grown in size, but while the change was barely noticeable in the baby girl, Lith had become over 2,5 meters (8’3") tall, and his body was a symphony of lean muscles.

"This is kind of underwhelming." Elysia still had two eyes that now shone with prismatic light, while an ice mirror showed Lith that his seven eyes were all open.

He could close them if he wanted, but they wouldn’t sink under his skin like they did in his human appearance. Lith’s and Elysia’s hair were still black, but they gleamed under the magical light with a reddish sheen.

"I expected more."

"Something like this, you mean?" Solus conjured a tall ice mirror in front of Lith and another behind him.

His reflection sported two pristine white feathered wings that came out of his shoulder blades. He now resembled Ryla, but his skin and wing color differed. Lith turned the baby girl around, discovering the presence of two fluffy white wings on her back as well.

"I admit this is impressive." Lith unfurled and furled his wings a few times, discovering they absorbed the world energy with greater ease than their Tiamat feathered wings’ counterpart.

Elysia followed suit with natural talent and instinct, matching everything Lith had learned after training for weeks under Ryla’s guidance in a matter of seconds.

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