Dragonslayer knight who's been groomed their whole life for the sole purpose of killing a dragon. Most of the knights simply die but they've been showing such great promise people think they might actually do it.
The day comes when they will set out on their mission, they know all the ways to hurt a dragon and they're equipped with the finest tools. A large metal shield to withstand the fire, a needle like sword to pierce the scales, climbing gear, a handgun to take out their foes eye and of course the finest plate armour. They don't know how to feel about most those items, except the armour. They never feel quite right without their second skin on, probably just the conditioning.
The journey stores thoughts in them as they get to act independently why they are doing this, apart from the reasons they had been given by hollow propaganda, what they would choose to do by their own volition. Still the prospect of the dragon draws them in, like a moth to flame.
Its lair is majestic, the corpses of fallen knights littering the halls, the knight wonders how much of them would join them and how much dissolve in fire. They can hear the dragons heavy breaths, sleeping perhaps they could stand a chance at ending it.
The knight claps their visor shut and readies their sword.
But as they turn the final corner into the nest of the beast something strange happens. They can't seem to bring themselves to move in for a kill. It looks too majestic. It would be a shame to deprive the world of such a creature... And something in them aches at the sight.
The knight falls to their knees, their sword and shield fall with them clattering to the ground. Yet it is their weeping which wakes the dragon. And the dragon asks what makes them weep.
The knight proclaims the dragons majesty asking it to burn them as they deserve. The dragon doesn't believe them fully. It pokes and prods and ponders until it lays bare the knights desire.
The knight thinks they must be killed for their hubris, but the dragon disagrees. It thinks their wish should be fulfilled and so it casts a mighty spell to see the secret yearning of their would be slayer fulfilled.
And so it comes that the knightly armour which had always been the knights shell expands and changes. No longer will it merely protect what is there but now it will nurture what is going to be.
The knight sleeps in the shell for 2 years in the warmth and safety they had carved for far to long. And in that dark warm safe place they slowly turn from knight to hatchling.
The hatchling wakes, it has scales now good and sturdy and so it knows it has no need of a constricting shell. The shell breaks with 5 strokes of its horn. The hatchling greets the world with a small chirp. It is in turn greeted by a chuckle and the warm tongue of its mama.
The hatchling remembers being the knight and perhaps it would like to be confused, yet it finds itself far to tired for such idle pursuits. It closes it's eyes as the dragon spreads it's wing above it and it falls into a comfortable sleep to await the world on another dawn.
