The boiling sea of magma churned violently, popping bubbles of lava that radiated extreme heat.
Amidst this mental landscape that resembled a miniature hell, a suffocating silence took over.
Hestia, the Goddess of the Hearth who should have been deeply familiar with all forms of the fire element, found herself collapsed on the ground, trembling fiercely under the shadow of an existence that defied all her common sense.
Towering before her was a colossal western dragon with dark crimson scales.
A cross-shaped scar on its head looked like a battle monument from a primordial age.
One petite goddess and one giant dragon stared at each other.
To Hestia, this sight was pure terror.
As a goddess who hadn’t descended from Tenkai that long ago, she knew all the fundamental laws of Gekai.
In this world, monsters were the embodiment of chaos born from the womb of the Dungeon.
They were savage, mindless entities created with only one purpose: to kill and destroy human civilization.
Especially dragons—the race of monsters known as the most savage and the ultimate symbol of despair for adventurers.
Yet, the golden reptilian eyes currently gazing down at her radiated absolutely no blind savagery.
Those eyes emanated a profound wisdom, an absolute calm, and a majesty that could only be equated with the gods of Tenkai.
On the other hand, the giant dragon—Igneel—was observing the goddess with immense curiosity.
In his original world, Earthland, gods were not entities you could converse with or touch.
The gods of his world were absolute existences residing in abstract dimensions, ruthlessly maintaining the laws of nature.
The most famous god in his memory was Ankhseram, an unseen entity who cursed Zeref with immortality and death simply because the young man tried to resurrect his little brother.
Gods in Earthland never descended directly, never mingled with humans, and certainly never gave out blessings for free.
But here, within the soul of his adoptive son, Igneel was looking at a goddess.
A divine entity whose physical form was merely a fragile girl.
A girl willing to cry, work hard, and bestow a blessing called Falna upon a mortal.
This vast difference in the concept of divinity truly amazed the Fire Dragon King.
Seeing the petite goddess’s body continuing to tremble under the pressure of his aura, Igneel decided to break the silence.
He took a slightly deep breath, ensuring his voice wouldn’t shatter the goddess’s mind.
“There is no need to tremble, Little Goddess.
I have no intention of harming you,” Igneel’s voice echoed, heavy and vibrating through the air like rolling thunder in the distance, yet carrying an odd, familiar warmth.
Hestia gasped sharply.
Her eyes widened to their absolute limits.
Her heart felt as if it had stopped for a second.
“Y-you…
you can talk?!” Hestia exclaimed, her voice trembling, instinctively blurting out her shock.
An existence that looked like a monster but could string words together, possess intonation, and display warmth was something that defied all the natural laws of Gekai.
This dragon before her spoke like an ancient king who had witnessed the rise and fall of thousands of civilizations, not some bloodthirsty creature from the Dungeon’s womb.
Igneel lowered his head slightly, bringing his massive face closer to Hestia until the hot air from his breath brushed against the goddess’s face.
“Allow me to introduce myself.
My name is Igneel,” the dragon said with a tone brimming with pride.
“I am the Fire Dragon King.
And more importantly…
I am the adoptive father of the boy you are currently giving a Falna to.”
That sentence slammed into Hestia’s consciousness like a sledgehammer.
Her mouth fell open slightly as she tried to process the absurd information she had just heard.
Adoptive father?
Natsu Dragneel, the pink-haired youth who asked me to be his family, has a giant dragon for a father?
Hestia’s brain worked in overdrive.
In Gekai, no human had any familial ties with monsters, let alone being adopted by a dragon.
The relationship between humans and the dragon race in this world was filled only with a history of slaughter and blood, much like the tragedy of the One-Eyed Black Dragon that annihilated the Zeus and Hera Familias.
“B-but…
how is that possible?” Hestia hugged herself, staring at Igneel with an intense mix of fear and utter bewilderment.
“You are a dragon.
A monster.
In all of Gekai, there is not a single monster that can speak, possess wisdom like a god, and raise a human child!”
Hearing himself being compared to the creatures of this world, Igneel snorted softly.
White smoke billowed from his nostrils, causing the temperature in the mental landscape to rise slightly.
“Yes, of course,” Igneel answered in a calm yet firm tone, as if lecturing a small child.
“That is because you must not equate me with the mindless monsters of this world.”
Hestia fell silent.
As a goddess accustomed to meticulously digesting every spoken word, her sharp mind immediately caught an anomaly in Igneel’s sentence.
Her eyes, previously filled with fear, now gleamed with intelligence.
“This…
world?” Hestia repeated slowly, spelling out the last two words carefully.
She looked up, staring straight into the dragon’s golden eyes.
“What do you mean by ‘this world’, Igneel?
You said it as if you came from somewhere else entirely, a place with no connection to Gekai or Tenkai.”
Igneel closed his eyes for a moment, a faint smile seeming to form on his hardened reptilian snout.
This seemingly careless goddess actually possessed a commendable analytical sharpness.
The Fire Dragon King decided there was no harm in sharing a bit of the truth.
After all, this goddess would be the one responsible for and protecting Natsu in the outside world from now on.
Trust had to be built.
“Your mind is remarkably sharp, Hestia,” Igneel praised, opening his eyes once more.
“Your guess is correct.
I, and Natsu as well, do not hail from Gekai at all.”
Hestia held her breath, not daring to interrupt as Igneel began his tale.
“In the past, when Natsu was very small, a great tragedy occurred,” Igneel continued, his voice now carrying a slight melancholic tone filled with bitter nostalgia.
“To change our fate, we attempted to pass through a magical portal called the Eclipse Gate.
However, a temporal storm—something you might consider an impossibly massive spatial and temporal anomaly—occurred during the process.”
Igneel raised his head slightly, gazing at the expanse of ash clouds in the mental sky.
“That anomaly tore through dimensions.
We were both sucked in and hurled across the boundaries of the universe, until we finally crashed and ended up stranded in a forest in this world.
To prevent Natsu’s body from being destroyed by the side effects of ancient magic, I sacrificed my physical form and sealed my soul within his body as a protector.
That is why my consciousness resides here, within my son’s soul.”
Silence once again blanketed the sea of magma, but this time not from the pressure of terror, but from the immense weight of the truth just revealed.
Hestia let her arms fall limply to her sides.
The fact that there were other worlds besides Tenkai (The Realm of Gods) and Gekai (The Mortal Realm) was a concept that could shake the very foundation of knowledge for the gods in Orario.
“So…
Natsu comes from another world,” Hestia murmured softly, more to herself.
“You two are dimensional travelers.”
A faint smile slowly began to form on Hestia’s lips.
She hadn’t expected that her very first child—the first Familia member who had sincerely accepted her poverty and dilapidated church—was actually a youth from another world harboring the soul of a Dragon King within his body.
Now Hestia finally understood why the young man possessed a calmness, caution, and sharpness of mind that was incredibly unnatural for a teenager his age.
The fear that had previously gripped Hestia evaporated completely.
The panic that had made her tremble was replaced by warmth and a profound sense of security.
Hestia realized the most fundamental truth: the figure before her was not a creature of destruction, but a father who had sacrificed everything to protect his child.
As a goddess who prioritized family values above all else, there was no entity Hestia respected more than a loving parental figure.
If this dragon was Natsu’s father, then Hestia knew with absolute certainty that she would never be harmed in this place.
The petite goddess brushed off her white dress, then without hesitation, sat down on the rocky surface radiating magical heat.
She looked up at Igneel’s massive face, her blue eyes now sparkling with exploding curiosity.
Her fear was gone, replaced by the pure enthusiasm of a goddess thirsting for knowledge.
“I understand now,” Hestia said with a wide, genuine smile.
“If you are Natsu-kun’s father, then you are also a part of my family.
But Igneel…
you can’t just leave me hanging with this much curiosity!”
Hestia leaned forward, looking at the Dragon King with burning eagerness.
“Please, tell me!
What was your original world like?
What has Natsu-kun been through?
And what kind of magic allows a dragon to hide inside a human body?
I want to know absolutely everything about my first child!”
“Like my work?