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It dragged itself out slowly, shell fragments dissolving behind it as if the void disliked clutter. Each piece did not fall. It unmade, turning from hard shell to drifting dust to nothing, like the egg was erasing its own crib the moment it no longer needed it.
The creature's legs unfolded one by one with awkward newborn timing, not graceful yet, more like a tool being assembled in the dark. Its body was ant-shaped, but its surface was not normal chitin. It looked like a polished night, and faint specks shimmered along it like tiny stars trapped under glass.
When it moved, those specks shifted in subtle patterns, as if constellations were rearranging themselves to match its breath.
It stood on the mana platform and paused, still as a held inhale. The platform's runes faintly pulsed beneath it, and the air around its feet bent a fraction, as if the void was curious what the newborn would choose first: fear, hunger, or instinct.
Then it turned its head.
