Clawed pressed her paw against the cool glass of the library window. Inside, scholars bent over ancient texts and maps of Artiqua. She wanted what they had—answers. Her black fur crackled with tiny blue sparks as frustration built in her chest. Somewhere in this world floated a crystal that held the secret to her past. She didn't know who her parents were or why lightning danced across her skin. But that crystal would tell her. It had to. A shout echoed down the street. Clawed's ears swiveled toward the noise. She leaped from the windowsill and followed the commotion. A crowd gathered around a mine cart filled with purple amethyst crystals. The gems glittered in the afternoon sun, each facet throwing light in different directions. A miner pointed at one crystal that hovered three inches above the rest. Clawed's heart hammered against her ribs. The floating crystal pulsed with a soft glow. She pushed through the crowd, her yellow eyes locked on the hovering stone. This was it. This was the proof that the legends were real. If one crystal could float, then the one that held her answers existed too. She just had to find it. The crowd blocked her view as people pressed closer to the cart. Clawed climbed onto a wooden crate and studied the floating crystal. It spun slowly in the air, its purple surface darker than the others. She needed a way to track crystals like this one. A tool that could spot them from far away. Her mind raced through possibilities. That's when she remembered the old telescope she'd seen in a shop window. But not just any telescope—one with a purple lens that might detect the same energy that made crystals float. Two days later, Clawed stood inside a building on the edge of town. The observatory had everything she needed. A purple-lensed telescope pointed toward the sky through an open dome. A satellite dish sat mounted nearby, ready to track signals. This place would be her base. From here, she would search for the crystal that held her truth. She pressed her eye to the telescope and swept it across the horizon. Somewhere out there, her past waited to be found.

Clawed studied the telescope's controls, her paws sliding over knobs and levers. Each one adjusted focus or direction. She needed to understand how everything worked before she could search properly. The purple lens caught the morning light and cast a violet glow across her face. She twisted a dial and the view shifted left, then right. Buildings blurred past until she found empty sky. Her first real search would begin tomorrow, but today she had to master this tool. She practiced tracking clouds as they drifted overhead, keeping them centered in the circular view. The movements felt clumsy at first, but after an hour her adjustments grew smoother. By sunset, she could follow a bird across the entire sky without losing it. Clawed stepped back from the telescope and looked at her paws. They no longer trembled with uncertainty. She was ready to begin. The next morning brought dark clouds and distant thunder. Clawed climbed to the observatory roof and found the satellite dish powered down. The equipment needed energy she didn't have. She walked the perimeter and spotted a rod mounted on the corner—it glowed with a vibrant purple hue. The rod hummed as lightning flashed across the sky. A bolt struck the tip and the purple glow brightened. The satellite dish whirred to life below. Clawed's fur crackled with matching energy. The storms of Artiqua would fuel her search. She descended the ladder and returned to the telescope. The dish rotated above her head, scanning for signals. Her hunt for the floating crystal had truly begun. Days of searching taught her that the telescope alone wasn't enough. She needed a way to test what she found. Behind the observatory, she discovered a stone workspace with a mortar and pestle covered in frost patterns. The cold stone would let her grind samples safely before bringing them inside. She collected three purple rocks from different locations and crushed each one carefully. The first two crumbled into ordinary dust. The third released tiny sparks that matched the lightning on her fur. Clawed's heart beat faster. Not all purple stones were special, but now she knew how to tell them apart. She cleaned the mortar and looked up at the sky. The real crystal was out there, and she was learning how to find it.