Chapter 14: The Ultimate Experiment
The day **Charles** and **Valerian** matured—a full **3,000 years** of age—was celebrated all over Pandora. Pandoran humans end drakain alike like all loved the twin brothers. **Damien** used his Earth magic to create temporary bridges, connecting the landmasses at the time of year when they were closest to each other. The 100 mi long bridges where the stage for celebration for the entire Pandora to travel to the five central continents for the first time in hundreds of years.During the festival, **Marcellus** didn't smile once. His grand plan was now ready to be executed.
Marcellus's plan was to take his twin sons to a forgotten galaxy, a rare planet of souls that had been erased from Pandorian history. It was a forbidden place where souls were trapped, and if bodies landed there, the spirits would try to possess them, ensuring no one ever escaped the **Planet of Souls**.
Valerian and Charles entered the planet's atmosphere following their father, all three dragons spanning at least a mile wide. Charles was the first to land, his lightning abilities making him the fastest. Valerian followed, suspicious of his father's intentions.
"Boys!" Marcellus commanded. "As for your gift of power. You will travel the Great Canyon on this planet and collect as much gold as you can. Whoever attains the most will be the heir of the dynasty after your brother."
This was exactly the contest Charles wanted. He swirled in ecstatic circles of electricity. "Happy as hell, aren't you, little brother?" Valerian observed. Charles sneered, hissed, and then laughed with his dragon maw. "You know I was born first! It is in all the tales, and you're just jealous."
That's when Valerian pasted him in the race to the canyon teleporting turning into mist and appearing ahead of his brother Charles.
With a final laugh, the boys ventured into the canyon, unaware of the tragedy that awaited them. As they entered, they were met not with silence but with a chorus of voices, a ghostly whisper that seemed to echo from every rock. They could no longer see their father; he was miles high in the sky, his two-mile-wide body looming over them, blocking out the sun. In the deep, dark canyon, the boys moved like streaks of mist and lightning, their speed impressing their father. They heard his chuckle and had no worries.
But the souls had begun their attack. Hundreds poured from underneath rocks, mud, and creeks, surrounding the twins and trying to enter their minds. **Valerian** instinctively knew what to do. His core ability was perfect mental control, and he was able to instantly remove the souls from his own mind. **Charles**, however, tried to outmaneuver the spirits with brute speed, and it didn't work. Seconds later, the souls took over Charles's body, and he turned, trying to kill his twin brother.
Valerian fought back, exuding a dark mist from his scales and after a few minutes, he was able to purge the souls from Charles's body. However, the damage was irreparable; Charles's physical form was ripped to shreds and could no longer survive. In a desperate act, Valerian took Charles's soul and essence into his own. As his eyes turned completely black, every soul in the canyon disappeared into black mist and then vanished completely. Marcellus stared in excitement at the spectacle. Valerian was crying tears of shadows, and his entire body became ghostly as he reached for Charles one last time. He could feel something—it was his brother's essence, and he instinctively knew what it was. He wasted no time driving his claws into the energy, inhaling it as though it were air, thus combining both twins into the single body of Valerian. It was an instinctive ability that had lain dormant inside of him until he had matured. Sad and exhausted, he didn't know how he did it or what he had done, but he felt like he had done something right..
Exiting the canyon, a look of profound sadness on his face, Valerian faced his father. Marcellus's golden eyes narrowed, not from grief, but from observation. The air around Valerian was now heavily charged, and **black electricity, the signature of Charles's power, visibly crackled across Valerian's scales.**
**Marcellus** was delighted by the outcome. He saw only the ultimate success of his experiment: one son had proven his dominance and, in the process, had *consumed* his brother's elemental power. Valerian's vague explanation of how Charles died only confirmed this. **Marcellus had no idea that both souls were alive inside one body.** The death of Charles's body was a success, eliminating the inconvenient fourth child. He now had the **true power of three**—his three surviving children, each a perfect pillar of his new dynasty. The whispers of Zoth's memory were fulfilled.