POV: Jon Stark
I used biokinesis to observe Daenerys's DNA.
It was... messy. That was the only word for it.
Usually, nature weaves a smooth tapestry. Evolution is a slow, careful artist. However, the Targaryen genetic structure looked like it had been stitched by Arya.
There were the standard human strands, of course. But twisted around them, forced into a violent, unnatural symbiosis, were two foreign strings.
The first was Dragon. It didn't belong there, but it had been grafted onto the human helix with brute force... maybe with blood magic?
The second string was quieter, but more complex than even the dragon's.
However, the second string in Daenerys was damaged. Fragmented. Large sections were dormant or missing entirely.
I turned my attention to the mice cages on my desk.
"Let's see what you really are,"
I carefully isolated specific active gene clusters from Daenerys's sample and overlaid them onto the mice. Accelerating their expression, I also disconnected the pain receptors.
The change was rapid. The mice's white fur was replaced by silver, and their black eyes turned violet.
Subject One. I activated the sequence for fire resistance from the dragon DNA.
Dragons possess this gene because it lets them withstand fire without turning into a screaming torch when they breathe flames.
I extracted a tiny tissue sample without hurting the mouse. Then, I lit a candle, placed the tissue on a glass strip, and held it over the flame for a good minute.
When I checked it afterward, I found that most of the cells were still alive, except for a few that died because I had separated them from the mouse.
"Fire resistance. Just like her."
Subject Two got the Fire Catalyst gene.
It took a minute to develop. When I examined the structure, though? I frowned hard.
Crude as hell.
Compared to the catalysts I'd built for my other enhanced creatures, this Targaryen version was... honestly embarrassing. Powerful, yeah. It could generate devastating heat. But the efficiency was garbage compared to my designs, wasting energy all over the place.
Then again, Targaryens were bottom feeders in Valyria's hierarchy. It makes sense their magic would be knock-off quality.
Subject Three. I tried activating that non-dragon string, the part supposedly responsible for Dragon Dreams.
The mouse started twitching. Its nose started bleeding, and in just a few moments, it stopped moving.
"Incomplete," I muttered, wiping blood off the desk with my sleeve. The code was full of holes, like a bridge that just stops halfway across a canyon.
To fix that mess, to actually unlock what that sequence could do, I needed the missing pieces.
Bran. I think his DNA would have the uncorrupted version. I poked at my mental connection to the birds up north. I needed a sample. A few hairs would do it; they would fill in those gaps nicely.
Subject Four. This one got the neural pathway modifications from that second string again.
The fourth mouse stopped scurrying around like an idiot. It sat up and tilted its head at me. I could feel its brain restructuring itself, neurons firing at terrifying speeds.
Hyper-neuroplasticity, basically. Its learning capacity had just increased drastically.
Last subject. A new organ formed near the mouse's heart.
It worked, but... it was disappointing, honestly. Unlike the Mana Nodes, this thing was leaking energy like a cracked barrel. It could store magical power to fuel the catalyst, sure, but the output was pathetic and the storage capacity was low.
I pushed the cages containing the silver-haired mice aside. The Valyrian experiment was at a standstill until I could get my hands on Bran's DNA to bridge the gaps.
I turned my attention to a different problem.
The Faceless Men. Their magic allowed them to wear the faces of the dead, to physically shift their features. But they were limited. They remained human. I wanted a beast that could adapt its entire structure according to need.
I reached into the crate and pulled out a fresh field mouse.
First things first. I reached into its nervous system and disabled the pain receptors. What I was about to do would be agonizing.
I began the modifications.
I constructed a Faceless Man catalyst on the mouse's back, right between the shoulder blades. It manifested as a small, black circle of hardened tissue.
Next, I moved to the chest. I created a Mana Node. It pumped a steady stream of magical energy into the blood, turning the circulatory system into a ley line for the body.
"Phase one,"
I took a small vial of raven blood. I let a single drop fall onto the black circle on the mouse's back.
I focused on the catalyst. Transform.
The mouse convulsed. The black circle flared, absorbing the blood. The mouse's spine arched, bones cracking as they tried to lengthen. Fur rippled, attempting to harden into quills or feathers.
But it stopped. The mouse collapsed, panting, its body twisted halfway between a rodent and a bird, a grotesque failure.
I reversed the damage, knitting the bones back together.
The Faceless Men wear skins, I reasoned. They trick the world, but they stay within their own species. To jump from mouse to bird... the biological blueprint is too different. The catalyst doesn't know how to build a bird from a mouse.
I needed the blueprint to be internal.
I reached into the mouse's genetic code again. This time, I didn't just rewrite it; I added to it. I took the genetic strings of a raven and spliced them into the mouse's helix, leaving it inactive and dormant.
The body needed to know what a raven was before it could become one.
"Phase two,"
I triggered the catalyst again.
This time, the reaction was violent. The mouse's snout elongated, hardening into a beak. The paws stretched, the claws curving. Grey fur molted instantly, replaced by sleek black feathers.
It worked. It was a raven.
But a second later, the bird let out a dry croak and fell over onto the stone, dead.
I scanned the corpse. It was a husk. The transformation had burned through every ounce of glucose and fat the creature had. It had died of acute starvation and mana exhaustion in the span of three seconds.
The energy required to rearrange its body was immense, and the nutrients required to build feathers and a beak out of fur and skin were too much for its small body.
I placed my hand over the shriveled bird.
I grabbed a fruit basket sitting on the edge of my desk. I took a large apple and a pear; I stripped the biomass from the fruit and fed it directly into the mouse's system.
I watched as the mouse swelled. It didn't get fat; it got dense. I expanded its size, doubling its mass to accommodate the requirements of the new form.
One heart wasn't enough. I constructed a second heart next to the first, linking them in a series. Inside this second heart, I built a second Mana Node. Double the flow. Double the output.
The mouse was now four times bigger than its original size.
"Phase three,"
I added raven blood to the catalyst. This time, the transition was fluid.
Its body elongated, the extra biomass started rapidly converting into muscle and bone, the feathers burst forth, and the skeletal structure shifted into an avian configuration.
In less than five seconds, a large, healthy raven stood on my desk, ready to fly.
....