"I see that old lizard has finally decided to give away his crystal," sighed grandma, her face holding a sad expression as she lowered her head and walked out of the cave.

Her sudden reaction confused me, and so I glanced at my parents and grandfather waiting for an explanation of sorts. To my surprise, however, grandfather stood up and walked past me his tail gently patted me on the head before he followed after my grandma.

"Take care of it, little Aether," He said before leaving.

'What was that all about?' I inwardly mumbled.

Dad, Mom, and the strangely familiar silver dragoness quickly surrounded me. Their eyes seemed to shine with a brilliant light as they studied my body, or more specifically my faintly colored horns that were now slightly purple from the poison mana.

"Mother, Father," I said and lowered my head once more while waiting for them to speak.

Father nodded his head multiple times in satisfaction, and then asked, "Did you meet Amanita?" His tone was unlike any I have heard before, It was full of childish expectations.

I slowly nodded in reply, "I did," to which my father smiled happily before speaking.

"You'd best take care of it, I'm proud of you," Leaving behind such shocking news, father slowly stepped out of the cave.

But for some reason, his back seemed somewhat lonely. Although his smile of happiness was genuine, I felt like he was hiding something from me. Before I could think more about the matter, the guest silver dragoness jumped up on me and pinned me to the ground.

Her expression held a mixture of desire and expectations. She grinned as she lowered her head close to mine and licked the side of my face. This caused a shiver to run down my spine as I felt as if I was prey before her.

"How cute, you can keep your husband, sister. I want him," She said.

What she got in reply, however, was my mother's tail in her face, sending her crashing to the other side of the cave. Everything happened so suddenly that I simply had no time to understand what just occurred.

'Did she just call her sister? And wait! Is she that dragoness that we met a long time ago when we were just moving to our floating mountain? But I thought she died?'

"Keep your filthy hands off my child, Cetron! And don't act as if you were the one who left my husband to me, you lost. Unless you want to try again?" Said mother, her aura surging dangerously high.

Cetron, who I presumed was her sister, subconsciously clenched her left side where a long scar ran. She hastily shook her head with a smile before replying, "Now you are just being greedy, sister. Why not let the boy decide? I'm sure he'd be more interested in a mature dragoness over a little hatchling."

Her eyes scanned me with a look full of craving, it was as if she was looking at a snack. This made me involuntarily take a step back. She was pretty, that there was no doubt about it, but also terrifying.

As if sensing my uncomfortable mood, my mother stepped forward. Her mana swirled around her while her eyes shone dangerously, "I'm not going to repeat myself, Cetron. You'd best leave my child alone otherwise you're dead this time."

"Oh, scary~" Replied the silver dragoness with a shrug, she then moved to walk out of the cave, all the while her eyes never quite left me.

Just before leaving, however, she smirked at me and spoke, "If you are interested, come find me. I'll show you a whole new world, nothing like those hatchlings would," with that, the dragoness disappeared leaving me and mother behind.

I turned towards her just in time to see a sigh escape her mouth as she shook her head, she then glanced at me with a benevolent smile and spoke, "You must have had it rough," her gentle voice took me off guard as I dumbly nodded.

"Good job, Aether," She said and affectionately stroked my head with her tail.

A smile slowly stretched across my face, and I felt my chest warm up as I lowered my head and accepted my mother's touch, "Do you want to talk about it?" She asked, and I simply nodded.

And so I began to recall everything that had happened to me, my journey across the astral plane, my fight with the harpies, my meeting with the goddess Breta, the sights I saw in that plane, the monsters, creatures, and finally the shades.

Mother remained silent throughout my story and merely nodded occasionally with a smile. Once I reached the part of my meeting with Amanita, her eyes turned sad but she nonetheless attempted to retain her smile.

"I see, you did good, Aether."

"Are you not mad at me?" I asked hesitantly.

Mother tilted her head at my question in confusion, "And why would I be mad?"

"Aren't the Gods supposed to be our enemies?"

A sad chuckle escaped her mouth as she shook her head and replied. "The fact that Amanita helped you, means he had already let go of his grudge. You are Dragon Aether, and you have the freedom to choose your path. I will not be the one to tell you what is right and what is wrong since you already passed your rite of passage, all I can do is be here for you to lean on when you need me." Leaving me with those final words, mother slowly began to walk away.

I hastily called out to her just as she was about to leave the cave, "What happened to Amanita?" I asked, for some reason a bad feeling welled up in my chest.

Mother replied without turning her head, "He now lives through you."

"What-" My mind blanked at her reply.

What did that mean? Was Amanita gone? Was he truly dead? But he said he only needed to rest? Just as I thought about that, my grandmother's sad expression came into my mind. 'I see that old lizard has finally decided to give away his crystal.' Does that mean that giving out his crystal was akin to him dying? But why!?

I refused to believe that and rushed out of the cave only to come to an abrupt stop as my grandmother's lonely figure came into view. She was in her human form lying in the grass next to the cave and gazing at the sky.