You walk down the path, the humans parting before you as you did, looking around at the various buildings – the strange things that were freely displayed and the words written everywhere.

It was all so… different, now that you were looking at it as a human instead of your normal form.

"So wait, let me get this straight. He-" Myra says as she walks besides you, addressing the floating orb of ash and light – the finger reader crone – while pointing at you, "is a reincarnated demigod, who was killed by turbo death, but somehow managed to survive and become… him?"

It had been a short while since Myra had asked you for an explanation for what happened to you, one she wished for you to give while she showed you around to a place you would like to go – a place with good food as you'd told her – and so far you had simply been slowly walking to the place that Myra said, with a weirdly red face, had the good food.

"Indeed," the glowing orb replied, shifting as it made a sound.

However, you hadn't really been able to do much in the way of explaining things, really you didn't even understand why time hadn't passed when you'd gotten back. You had tried of course… but she'd just looked at you blankly, her face reddening, as you moved your arms and body to try and provide visual examples.

So instead you had summoned the finger reader to explain instead, thinking that she would be able to explain better than you… which is how you found out that she had turned into this strange, shifting orb.

But seeing as it didn't really affect her ability to explain things you didn't really care what she looked like.

"…oh yeah, I can definitely see why he could have been a demigod," you heard Myra mutter as you slowed down and reached up to wave your arm through a flickering board of light that was hovering over a doorway, "…and his name is Votusax now?"

You turn towards her upon hearing your name being said, which for some reason got her to turn red again.

You wondered why she kept doing that, and what the specific emotion her aura flashed to when she did turn red was.

"It's nothing I was just confirming your name," she said, before rapidly shaking her head and speeding up her walking speed, the orb that was the finger reader dissipating behind her and returning to your storage, "come on, follow me. We have to hurry up or that restaurant will begin closing."

With that she sped up even further. Which you followed accordingly, increasing your walking speed until you were going about the same speed as her, and continued to follow her until she abruptly stopped in front of a particularly large building.

"Alright, we're here," she gave a sigh, before turning and looking up at you with only a slight hint of redness on her face… which was again spreading now that she was looking at you.

Was it you? Did you gain a new ability you didn't know about?

"Alright, you can do this. It's just a meal, what's so embarrassing about it? So, do you w-" she turned to you, after speaking quietly under her breath, and began to speak.

"Ah, Lady Myra!" only to get interrupted when a blonde man, a bit over your hip level in terms of height, appeared from around the corner and interrupted her. Before then rapidly closing in, "it is an absolute pleasure to meet you, such a surprise I found you in town."

You look at him at that, noting that his aura didn't seem to show any surprise despite his words. Myra's aura on the other hand is clearly shining in what you recognise as irritation.

"Ah, Prince Albrecht. It's a pleasure," she replies to the man, though her aura does not support her words either, as she slowly – reluctantly according to her aura – extended her hand, "I thought you had left yesterday?"

You just stared in confusion at the, unsure as to why their aura's did not match their words. Despite their words matching their actions.

"Ah, it turned out that I had some business left after all. I just finished it too and was coming to this restaurant, a new favourite of mine, to relax," the man said with a grin, lowering onto is knee and kissing the ring on the hand Myra presented, "and please, just Albrecht is fine?"

"Well, Prince Albrecht, if that is all?" withdrawing her hand, she asks him, "I would like to get back to dining with my companion here."

"Ah, well. I was wondering if you would perhaps like to join me in my meal? I'm sure your companion here," at that the man turns to you… and then looks up to look into your eyes, "… would be willing to eat at some other tim-"

You tell him that you wouldn't.

"Excuse me?" his aura flashes the colour of rage.

You repeat what you said, telling him that Myra had said she was going to give you good food. You did not want to wait till later, you wanted the food now.

His aura flashes with rage, only this time it doesn't fade, "perhaps you misunderstood something, brute. I suggest you take my offer if you know who I am."

You turn to Myra and ask who he is?

*ting*

"You dare belittle me!" the sound of metal colliding echoes as the man suddenly summons a long sword, before slowly – in your eyes – placing it onto your neck.

You don't even bother moving, you knew that the sword wouldn't even be enough to scratch your scales – or well, you skin in this form. Instead, you looked down at the sword, the urge to take a bite out of it rising in you.

The metal seemed pretty delicious.


Queen POV

Sometimes, at moments like this, Phoebe felt like her daughter was trying to kill her from alcohol poisoning.

She looked at Myra before her gaze slowly shifted to the man currently devouring several trolleys worth of food before it turns back to her daughter. She didn't have to say anything, she just stared at her in silence. Watching as she slowly began fidgeting, avoiding her eyes.

Good then, she at least understood that she did something wrong.

She took her gaze off her daughter again, looking back to the giant of a man next to her. Noting the metallic gold sheen golden sheen of his hair, and the glow of his blue eyes as she sunk back into her office seat.

… she swears, if this is another heir to a lost bloodline her daughter picked up she was going to spank her like she was five again.

She can't just keep dropping these sorts of thing on her!

"… just explain to me your thought process?" she eventually asked, giving enough time for her daughter to squirm some more,"what was going through your mind when you did this?"

"Okay mom, before anything else I wanna say that this. He started it," she didn't say anything to that, she only nodded. It was something that the reports confirmed after all… except that wasn't all they told her.

"So you cheering on your friend here – and I'm going to get to him, don't think I won't – to, and I quote, 'kick that creep who can't take a hint in the nuts. Not too hard though, or he'll go bitch to his dad. Oh, pull his hair too…" she continued to speak, reading the words from the report in front of her, word by word, in a deadpan voice.

Each and every word caused her daughter to wince and wilt further and further.

"… I mean it could be worse?"

… she gave her best mom glare at her, "and how, pray tell, could it have been worse?"

"Well, I mean. He was only the prince of Laebador and not…" she tapered off, realising that her words were not helping her.

Which was great, because Phoebe had thought that her daughter had completely lost all sense of her words having consequences. It made her so happy to know that wasn't the case.

"… he was being a creep?"

Now that she could understand to an extent. She herself had more than once experienced some nobles or other royalty who did not understand the word 'no', nor the fact that she had a husband who she loved very much. She'd even taught some of the more 'obstinate' one's lessons that they wouldn't soon forget when they attempted to take liberties.

"Alright, so explain to me why you took his A class sword and fed it to your friend there," she glanced at the mentioned man as she said that… only to realized that one of the trolleys lies of food had disappeared.

Did one of the maids come in and take them away? She could've sworn she didn't hear the door open…

"Well… I mean, Votu had already take a bite out of it and I didn't want to go to waste," her attention turned back to her daughter, who avoided looking at her deadpan expression, "… plus, I'd already promised to get him something good to eat, you know? It wouldn't be nice to take his snack away after he'd already taken a bite."

She did not, in fact, know.

"You're going to be doing the opening speech for the academy," she watched as her daughter's eyes widened horror, "now, who is your frien-"

She stopped mid-sentence, staring at the sight before her.

The golden haired man, who she hadn't been paying, currently holding up a trolley, one of the ones the food had been on, and was holding it up to his head. Even worse, he had it tilted towards his mouth, allowing the cutlery on top of it to slide into his mouth.

"Ah right, that's Votusax. He's my patron," it took her a moment to comprehend what her daughter had said. But when the realisation hit and her head whipped around to look at her daughter again… only to freeze once more.

Her daughters had a blush on her face as she stared at the dragon in human form. When Pheobe followed her gaze? It was locked onto the abs visible from under the too tight clothes the dragon was wearing.

Oh no.

Oh no no no.

No no no no no.

"Oh right, mom!" her daughter, who was far too interested in the draconic muscles on display, turned to her in excitement, "does this mean that Lilah can finally meet him now? You said that you'd let her if he showed enough intelligence and restraint."

… never had Pheobe hated the past her and her inability to firmly say no to her children than now.

"… just because he can turn into human form does not mean he has restraint Myra," she reasoned with her daughter, while also thinking up reasons to convince her daughter not to… bone the dragons, if she was to put it crudely.

It wasn't that she wasn't willing to let her daughter love who she wished… it was just that she thought that her laying with a dragon that was, who know how much, older than her was a bad idea.

She looked towards the, now revealed, dragon – currently eating the trolley itself.

"Yeah, but he didn't kill that asshole because I asked him not to. That's restraint right?"

She felt a headache begin to form at the, admittedly, valid point. A headache that only got worse by the time she shooed the two walking headache dispensers from her office.

The promise that her daughter managed to extract from her, to let her little sister meet the dragon she was clearly attracted to, being only part of that headache. The rest being from how much politicking she'll have to do to get Laebador to fuck off with their demands of 'reparation'.

"Amelia," she addressed the maid by her side, "get me the number four and five."

"Umm, ma'am? His majesty said tha-"

"I know that he said I shouldn't go above two, I don't care. Just get me the bottles." immediately the maid bowed, before leaving and quickly returning with the two bottles in question.

Five minutes later, she stared down at the two empty bottles, "… I neef more."


Lizard POV

[High quality Porcelain] added to creation

[Refined harknium] added to creation

It felt strange.

Being back in this den that is, laying here to go to sleep for the day. Everything felt… different, in some ways. Not only because everything was smaller, or rather because he was bigger, but also due to the fact that he could now see the shadows of people who'd previously been in your den.

The humans who had done the changes to your den, the past you, even Myra, who had just left a short while ago.

Still, it didn't really matter all that much to you as you finally lay down. Letting your entire body relax and your consciousness fade…

And you were standing in front of beaker and cauldrons, your right hand stirring a tincture while your left cast a spell to congeal the fluids in another cauldron


Day 53

When you woke up it was to a whole host of knowledge being present in your mind.

Knowledge on how to create concoctions, refine material, and separate the inherent qualities of materials. Along with spells that let you do both distil and degenerate material. Alchemy, in a word.

… it felt really weird, thinking you were a human for a bit.

[Alchemy] magic skill gained

[Alchemy] +20 lv's - [20]

Spells gained

Distil

Decrease the quantity of a material and increase it's inherent properties in exchange

Max increase: 50%

Conversion rate (volume multiplie to percent increase): 0.5:[skill level]

Cost: Dependant on material

May fail and ruin material if skill not high enough to deal with them.

Degenerate

Separate the material into different materials, each containing only a part of the original materials properties, though at a reduced level.

Quality loss per degeneration: (75-skill level) %

Cost: Dependant on material

May fail and ruin material if skill not high enough to deal with them.

Combine

Combine two different items.

Cost: Dependant on item

May fail and ruin material if skill not high enough to deal with them.

Special mutation bar: 2/30


But regardless of how weird it was, waking up from a dream of being human, you still got up for the rest of the day.

Which, firstly, involved doing something you hadn't done for a long time. Hitting yourself repeatedly until your scales toughened up, breaking your bones till they were even tougher, and your healing improved.

And you were about to do that, you did start doing that… until your very first hit caused your entire den to give a minor shudder. That caused you to stop immediately.

Mostly because you actually realised that, if the den was shuddering, the den and the buildings above would likely collapse if you continued to do so.

Which you were fairly certain wasn't good, especially since Myra had told you that there was other good food up there. Food which she'd promised to get you next time.

That probably wouldn't happen if you caused everything above to collapse… oh, and you didn't want your den to collapse either.

And it's with that in mind that you actually left your den first, flying high into the sky and using the speed boost you got, to fly to a random place that looked like it didn't have many things – your landing there causing small creatures to slowly scatter away.

Then you actually began the whole 'hitting yourself till you harden' process. Then you hit another problem.

Or rather, your attacks hit your own body… and barely did any damage.

Fortunately that was fixed with a simple flex of your core, and a white sheen on your claws, before you were once again hitting yourself. Tearing claws and crunching bones with far more ease than before.

Which, strangely enough, didn't feel as painful as before. At least, it was nothing in comparison to what you felt when you ate that flame.

… well, you still ended the whole session of hitting yourself with a notable boost in your bones, though not enough to cause a major change, and healing rate.

You'd also gained a large pile of your own scales, bones, and flesh that you saved upon remembering the deal you had with Myra.

Though it did take you a couple of trips between your den and the crater, that used to be the remote forest you'd landed in, to get it all into your den, but you still did it.

You wondered if you'd get something this time too?

"Oh wow… that's a lot of scales… and flesh…", Myra remarks as she looks at the pile of your refuse you'd made, the one reaching about half your height in size. Half your true form's size that is, in your current human form it towered over you, "…is that bone?"

You look up at her question, following her gaze to a part the pile, before turning back to her and confirming that, yes, that was a bone.

It was actually a bone you remember too, a rib that you'd ended up hooking with your claws, in an attack, that you'd accidentally pulled clean out. You made sure to tell her that too.

"Ar-are you okay?" the question was asked as she stared at you chest, her aura being similar to that of fear.

Which you didn't understand the cause of it, but you assumed it was because of how big and unstable looking the pile was. Maybe she was afraid that it'll topple over and bury her.

Still, you made sure to tell her that you were fine and that she didn't need to worry about the pile falling on her.

She stared at you.

"Not what I'm talking about, but its nice that you're worried about me…" and now she was turning red again, despite not turning red before, "… but this is really a lot… looks like both the alchemists and the blacksmiths are gonna be happy."

The last part of the words were muttered under her breath, but you perked up as you heard a specific word. Which you immediately asked Myra about.

"Huh, alchemists? Uh, yeah. We usually give your materials to them first, to let them enhance it all first and find any other uses…" suddenly her eyes widened, and she quickly began to whisper under her breath.

Something about you becoming the best alchemist like you were in something called a 'mod' and being able to refine your own materials. She also said other things, but you didn't quite understand what she meant by "optimum build" and "speedrun strats", at least not in the context she used the words.

"Hey, Votusax?" abruptly she addressed you, "how would you like to learn alchemy from the greatest royal alchemist?"

Of course you agreed to it without hesitation, even telling her that you were something of an alchemist yourself when she told you to grab some stuff from the pile and follow her.

To which she began laughing. A lot.

"No, it's nothing," was her reply when you asked her why she was laughing, "I just remembered a joke. You wouldn't get it."

Before you could contest that however, the two of you arrived at your apparent destination. A giant door, covered in glowing symbols… that you vaguely recognised from your knowledge of alchemy.

They seemed to be, according to your basically non-existent knowledge on them, channeling Mana into the room?

"Hey Isla! I've got more stuff," however, before you were able to decipher more of the symbols, Myra threw open the door and shouted, "and I've got something else I've got to talk about to!"

Then she just walked in. To which you followed after a moment of standing there, despite wanting to stay and examine the door some more. Quickly catching up to her…

"You know, I remember saying to warn me before you come here?"

Only to find her in the middle of a conversation with another human, a woman with a darker colouration than most humans you've seen, who was also breathing out smoke. Which oddly enough wasn't a show of threat, the smoke breathing that is.

Because, despite some of your instincts telling you that she was getting ready to breath fire, most of the other signs of a breath attack weren't there.

"Yeah, you did. But as you can see I got you some good stuff, and a new student to go with them," you took that as a sign to put the large pile of shattered scales, bone shards, and flesh off to the side.

"Oh?" only to find the human woman walking up to you when you turned around, only stopping when she was right up to you, "my oh my, I'll admit that when you said I was getting students I didn't expect you'd bring someone so… to my tastes."

The woman looked you over, which seeing as she was barely up to your waist in height meant that had to crane her neck quite a bit, her aura that same almost hunger-like colour as Myra's sometimes did when she looked at you and turned red. Except this woman didn't turn red, and the colour on her was a lot more similar to hunger.

"Wait, wait, wait," and now Myra was in between you and the woman, her aura coloured in a very light shade of anger, "I thought you would be letting one of your other apprentices teach him?"

"Hmm, oh yes. That was the original plan," the way she emphasized some of the words was strange, like she was vibrating her voice, "but plans change, and I can definitely make an exception for such a fine student."

"… no, nope. He's gonna learn from the apprentices," you looked down at the two in confusion.

You thought you were going to be taught, something you made sure to ask Myra as she argued with the woman about not having her teach you.

"Yes your highness, why can't I teach him?" to which the woman asked with a laugh, continuing before Myra retorted, "after all, I'm sure I can get your dragon here to at least the journeyman level in a month. Even further if he's as… prodigious in learning as in other places."

She said that while looking around Myra and at your… waist? Regardless, it seemed to rile up Myra for some reason, but she didn't speak immediately, "… fine then. I guess you can teach him."

"Excellent!" the woman exclaimed with a clap, before looking up at you with a wide smile on her face and hunger back in her aura, "and we'll start the first lesson now."

You smiled at her, eager to learn more about alchemy, before then realising something. How did she know you were a dragon, a question you asked her.

"Well, I would be a poor alchemist if I couldn't tell the colour and shade of your hair matches those scales you just brought me," at her words you made a sound of realisation, grabbing a handful of hair and comparing it to the colour of your scales in your head, "now, come. We'll start with seeing how much you know, and since you're my student you can call me Isla."

With that she walked off, gesturing for you to follow, with a strangely swaying gait.

You wondered if that's because of her weirdly pointy ended shoes.

Some Time Later

You slowly lowered a dropper, filled with the fluid form of your scales, into the beaker of caustic liquid in front of you. Then, with a gentle squeeze, you let a single golden drop fall in.

And then it blew up.

"Well, it appears that your scales do indeed have some rather… explosive, properties in response to certain damage," you heard from behind you as you straightened up and wiped the ash off your face, "… hmm, we'll have to degenerate that out if we want to use them in armour."

You ask her why she needed you to do the test several dozen times to find that out, if she couldn't have figured it out after the first few times. Or why she couldn't do it herself and had you do it, despite you needing to bend over to even reach the table.

"Oh no, we have to test this rigorously," was her reply, "you can't really be sure about the properties of something till you've tested it to the same stimulus multiple times. Just assuming something will react a certain way because it did so the first few times is, after all, the height of stupidity… and I'm a fragile human, I wouldn't be able to withstand those explosions."

You thought on that, before nodding and accepting it. Especially the second, since humans were pretty fragile.

"Oh, and I'm sure it had nothing to do with where you were looking when he was bent over," Myra chimed in from the side of the room, where she sat with her arms crossed and face, as you were getting used to seeing, red, "not at all."

"I can certainly multi-task your highness. Though, I have to ask if you don't have anything else to do?"

"No, I don't," Myra's crossed arms tightened.

"Well, that's good… now then, Votusax?" you look at Isla in question, "I belive that your clothes may be causing some errors in this test. Take off your shirt before you do the next one, just to be sure."

"Wai-wha-" ash Myra speaks up you nod, before immediately storing the upper half of your clothes and leaving your top half bare.

Then you instantly turned to Myra as she made some choking sound, to which she spoke with a particularly high voice and bright red face, "I'm fine!"

"Hmmm, maybe you should also take off the bottom just to be sur-" "No!"

New spell learnt

Liquify and solidify

Transition a material from one stage of matter to another

Mana cost: Dependent on material

Material can be ruined if your alchemy skill isn't high enough

It was a while later that you were done with the lesson on alchemy and had returned to your den, leaving a smiling Isla and red, redder than you'd ever seen before, Myra behind you.

And now?

You were just sitting on the ground of your den in human form, reading the book you'd found in the large library in Raya lucaria… and your attention was entirely engrossed in a particular section of the book.

It spoke of how to manipulate the Primeval current in entirely novel ways, ways that just…

The other outer gods were one of the greatest threats to the golden order so far, and you felt that this could be the solution you were looking for. Because the Greater will, despite it's undeniable might, couldn't block them all… but there was a solution to that. Turning the influence of outer gods upon themselves.

The primeval current, it was an outer god that gave its influence freely.

And it was that very influence that could be used as a spearhead, a leading strike, that would allow access to the core of an instance of outer god influence. To allow you to strike at the heart.

You blink, the book still in your hand and your mind abuzz.

That was a really good spell you just learnt… you were going to sleep now.

[Primeval rebuke] spell learnt

Primeval rebuke

Open outer god influence, and persistent status effects, to influence. Increases impact on things that are trying to alter status effects.

Must be stacked on top of any other spell

Cost: double mana cost of spell it's layered on


Day 54

You wake up to your head swimming with knowledge of the primeval current and the other outer gods.

And after a few stretches and cracks of your spine, that sent shockwaves through your den, they were gone from your mind.

Special mutation bar: 4/30

Then, with your mind clear and body stretched, you went out to do the same thing that you did after waking up yesterday.

That is, you flew out to the same place you'd gone to before and then began to hit yourself. Hit yourself hard, collecting all the shattered scales, flesh, and bone shards into another neat pile.

Which you, after finishing the self-mutilation, took a few trips to transport it all to your den so you could hand it over to Myra.

[Eternal sovereign foundation] +1 lv - (2/6)

[Everlasting aureate vitality] +4 lv's - (14/20)

And, as it turned out, you sensed Myra coming to visit your den just as you placed the last of the materials onto the pile. Meaning that you wouldn't have to go call for her to perform the trade.

However, as you turned your focused towards her after having already turned to human form, you noticed something strange.

Specifically, that there seemed to be someone else with her as well.

Someone who stayed behind when a widely smiling Myra fully entered the room, her aura shining with happiness, "good evening, Votu. How's your day going?"

You tell her you were doing fine, and that you have more refuse material from your training to give her.

"Yeah, I can see that," the smile on her face gets smaller as she looks past you, at the large pile of scales and flesh, before returning to how it was again, "but that's not why I came in here for today, I came here to introduce you to this little grem-"

As she spoke she turned around, swinging her arms widely as if to point at someone, only to freeze as she saw that there was nothing there behind her.

You ask her if she was talking about the person hiding just around the entrance, to which she groans, "dammit Lilah, do you know how much I had to convince mom for this?," she turned to you, "just one minute Votu, I need to have a chat with someone."

With that she began to walk towards the entrance as well, visually disappearing around it as you looked on in curiosity.

"Hey… what's wrong Lilah?" you heard Myra's voice," I though you wanted to meet him? Is there something wrong?"

"…its scary," another voice, quieter and higher pitched, replied. One that tickled some instincts inside you that you… didn't quite recognise.

"Whaaat? No way, Votu's a big softy. He isn't any scarier than that one lion monster is he?" once again Myra's voice came from around the entrance.

"…thas different, coco was a kitty… not a person," something clicked in your head as you listened, allowing you to realise why this new person wasn't coming out. They found your human form too intimidating.

… which you didn't get, after all your human form lacked any fangs and was tiny in comparison to your true form, but you still got an idea from it.

So, shifting into your true form, you called for Myra. Who then peeked into the den, realisation flooding into her aura. Then she disappeared back around the entrance, which was followed by a lot of talking, until eventually something changed.

Myra stepped into the den, this time followed by the other person. A small human girl, half the size of Myra, who slowly walked into the den.

Only to immediately freeze as her gaze fell on your draconic form.

"…so cool…" a whisper, quiet as the wind from your movement, came from her as she stared at you wide-eyed, your reflection visible in her shimmering golden eyes.

Instincts lead you to lower your head slowly, low enough that your one of your eyes was about level with her, and greeted her and tell her your name. Then you ask for her name.

"I-I'm Delilah!" she shouted in surprise, the question getting her aura to light up with a thousand positive emotions, as she quickly began to run up to your head. Then she suddenly stopped, "ah, I forgot!"

She then bowed, "it's really nice to meet you mister Vochusax!"

You instinctively tell her it's nice to meet her too, ignoring the mispronunciation of your name, getting a bright smile from her when she stood straight again.

Then she began running up to your face again, rubbing your scales when she did, "woooow, your scales are reeaaaallly gold mister Vochusax!"

"It's Votusax, Lilah," Myra finally spoke again, causing you to look at where she was standing with a smile on her face as she looked at the tiny girl.

"How did you get so big?" the tiny girl, Lilah, completely ignored that, "did you eat a cake from wonderland like grandpa did? Did you meet Alice there? Did you eat the rabbit? Did you…"

You just continued listening as she kept asking more and more question, most of which you didn't even know the meaning off.

So, when she finally stopped asking to breathe, you answered the questions you did understand. Namely that you grew so big by eating everything you could and sleeping.

"… but I do that too, why am I not as bigger?" she asks and you… are stumped.

Taking a moment to think, you ask her if she ate everything, to which she reluctantly admits that she didn't eat 'brocklies' because they tasted bad. Which you nodded at, your mind flashing back to that fire, as you tell her that some things can be too dangerous to eat.

But then you're still confused, unsure about why she isn't growing if she's only avoiding dangerous stuff like that flame – you note to avoid this 'brocklies' when eating human food.

Eventually though, that topic is forgotten when, after being prompted by Myra, the girl asks you if she can sit on you as you fly around. Which you allow, seeing no particular reason not to and feeling instinctually that it'd be a good thing to do.

So most of the rest of that whole meeting is spent with you flying around, very slowly so as to not have them fall off your back mid-flight, with Lilah and Myra, who joined to 'keep her from jumping off'' on your back.

"Bye mister Vochusax!" Lilah, the human who apparently doesn't grow as she repeatedly told you, shouts as she waves at you from the entrance.

It was only at the very end that you took human form again and helped Myra take away the materials, getting a promise of something nice from her… along with a quick hug, after which she teleported out of your den.

[You know how to deal with children… in your own way]

It was a short while after both Myra and Lilah left that you suddenly… had an urge. One that caused you to put aside your initial want to sit down and read from that journal again.

Because, ever since you'd returned here, you'd been having the urge to go up and hunt. Not just up in fact, but further up than you ever remember going.

Which is what you do, stepping out of your den and shooting into the air.

Within moments you reach high enough that the blue of the sky darkens, another moment and you were surrounded in a black edged with a very light blue, another moment and you were well and truly surrounded by pitch black…

And you felt absolutely great, as if you'd returned where you were meant to be.

You just hovered there, not even needing to flap your wings to keep moving away from the world below you, watching the visible trail that showed your path. Luxuriating in the feeling.

… but that didn't last long, as you still remembered why you were up here for. To hunt.

Which is exactly what you did, a tiny flap of your wing sending you almost all the way to the moon, as you began to look for anything that moved. Then you tore that thing apart with extreme prejudice, even managing to tear the heads off some four armed creatures that looked like you — among other strange looking creatures.

Some were covered in some delicious metal, some weren't even solid, but in the end it didn't matter. You killed them all, and since you were so far from your den, eating them within moments of killing them.

By the time you traced your trail back, to return to your den, you were completely satisfied and already looking forward to going back up there.

Perhaps, you thought as you lay down to sleep, next time you'd be able to eat those dragons that looked like you – only purple.

You'd seen them in the distance, but instinctively knew you weren't strong enough to fight them. But you were sure that would change in the future.

[Meteoric steel] added to creation

[Frigid star-ore] added to creation

[Fire mutation (11/7)]

[Ice mutation (11/7)]

[+ 5,594,835 xp]

[You reached level 107] +6 lv's

[+40 to all stats]

[+10 agility]

[+30 Strength, Constitution, Spirit, & Magic]

[+ 10 agility, + 9 Magic] (prodigy)]

[+102 Max HP]

[+78 Max SP]

[+93 Max MP]


Day 55

Once again you were in the dark void, a place you didn't expect to wake up in. Especially since you hadn't used your travelling ability at all.

[Anomalous interaction detected]

You look around, seeing nothing, before trying to move…

[Generating avatar]

… only to stop immediately when the giant eyeball blocked your way, a light shining down onto your body from the centre of its pupil.

[Scanning… scanning… interaction isolated… recording]

You just stand there, letting the light shine on you. You continue standing there… until eventually you find yourself growing impatient.

[Error found… preservation of anomaly required… adding limiters]

Another few moments and your impatience finally hits the limits. You ask the eyeball why you're here.

*Ping*

Oh, it was making sure you didn't dies from your new ability, because you may produce more anomalies and this level of investment was acceptable… you understood some of that.

… wait, you have a new ability?

[Scan complete]

And it was with that thought that you suddenly found yourself back in your den… inside a new, completely smooth, crater in your den. The walls somehow having turned a deep pearlescent blue.

Turning onto your legs you got up… and realised a lack of weight on your back.

… wait, where are your wings! Where did they g- Oh, there they are…

Huh, you can change the shape of your wings now… yep, four wings, like Lansseax's wings, feel weird.

Not bad, just weird.


Special mutation bar: 8/30

[Grand ascension] achievement gained

Grand ascension: You gained an ability that you should never have been able to.

Focus: [General evolution quality up (large)], [Absolute prodigy], [Resources up (large)]

Causality worth: 8


As it turns out, the new changes to your wings did far more than just make them able to change as you wanted them to.

No, the changes had also resulted in a massive increase to your flight speed. As you discovered when you'd left your den to go and train your regenerative capabilities.

A singular flap of your wings – two pairs as you'd decided to keep them – not even with all your strength, and you ended up back in the sea of black before you'd even realised you'd moved. The same sea of black it'd taken you a handful of moments to reach yesterday.

Further, in fact, than yesterday, since you could no longer see where your world was… which meant you were lost.

Fortunately, you had marked your den first thing after waking up, having finally remembered to do so, and thus you could vaguely sense in which direction your den was. So, reorientating yourself towards where you sensed your den was, you gave a light flap of your wings… and suddenly found yourself back in your den. A chunk of your, rapidly recovering, mana missing.

… so, you could also teleport now. That was nice.

[Den under royal palace marked]

This time, when you took off to train, you were far more careful in how much force you put in your wings. Ensuring that you didn't end up flying off again and instead only flew, at a speed that still far exceeded your previous one, to the crater you'd made in the remote forest.

And once you were there, you began training again… by tearing off as much of your flesh as fast as you could, in the shortest time you could.

Of course, you avoided the whole 'bone breaking' that you'd been doing the last few times you did this. Mostly because you felt like improving your rate of regeneration first, and splitting your focus of mutilation from both bone and flesh to just flesh would let you do that far faster.

You felt right.

Because, by the time you finally stopped tearing off full layers of your flesh, you felt that you'd reached the peak of your current regeneration capacity. It wouldn't improve any further without a change.

Which made you rather satisfied as you flew back to the den, with the torn off flesh, from the smoking crater.

[Everlasting aureate vitality] +6 lv's - (20/20)

[Body training] +1 lv - (7/10)

+1 section per day

And your satisfaction only got even deeper when you finally returned to your den and Myra came in shortly after, once again without you having to go get her.

Obviously, you immediately presented the pile of flesh and scales – slabs of flesh stacked like books – to her.

"Ah… that is… very nice?" to which she didn't really seem all that enthused to see, enough so that she turns to you and asks a question, "look, I don't really want to tell you what to do, but doesn't training like that… hurt?"

You tell her that it's incredibly painful. She keeps looking at you after that though, like she expects you to continue saying something.

"O…kay? Look Myra, just ignore it. He probably doesn't feel it… yeah…," she whispered under her breath, before looking up at you… and you turn to human form before correcting her. You did feel the pain.

"… I'm gonna have to find a way to cut off pain aren't I?" before you can reply to her question she began talking again, "but anyways, lets just get back to why I was here for… here, catch!"

Your hand lashed out instinctively, immediately wrapping around the familiar looking crystal she'd just thrown at you. You look back up at her.

"Turns out that your flesh and scales, when used in minute quantities, allow equipment to self repair," she explained, getting you to hum as your knowledge on alchemy let you know was actually a rather impressive thing, "so this is the reward I managed to convince mom to give you."

You smile at her, thanking her for the crystal as you store it.

"It isn't really a big deal, you earned it after all," and she's red again… well, you were used to it by now, "and plus, that's not all I wanted to talk to you about this time."

You ask her what that was.

She goes to speak, before stopping. Then she goes to speak again, before stopping once again. Eventually though, she managed to find her words, "well… okay, firstly. How did you like learning alchemy from Isla?"

It takes you a moment of thinking about it, but eventually you reply that it was nice. You enjoyed learning about alchemy, least of all because you thought it may help in your cooking once you got good enough.

"Kay, kay… that's great," she says, nodding, "so would you want to learn any other magic skills the same way? With teachers who'll help you?"

Immediately, your mind flashes to the various schools of magic you knew, and you nod slowly.

"Great!" she clapped her hands and smiled widely, "that means that I've got an offer you'll absolutely love."

And so she began to tell you about that offer, the offer to become a proper student in the royal academy – the same place you'd listened to lectures on magic at long ago. She told you how it'd let you get lessons on dozens of different magic schools, as well as how it'd let you interact with nobles. How it'd be possibly to get more stuff, like the crystal she'd just given you, if you got along with some of the nobles.

She also said that she herself will give you some interesting things if you accept, and that it'd probably be really fun.

All you'd have to do, according to her, to get those things?

Remain close enough to the academy and spend a decent chunk of your day there, in human form to prevent 'panic'. Though that last bit you could ignore when you needed to, as she made a point to clarify.

Academy offer

+ Get full boosted training for 3 available magic schools daily

+ Noble connections (possible good food source)

+ Fun activities

+ Myra gib good stuff for it

- First 2 actions per day dedicated to it

- At least try to stay in human form

It didn't really take you all that long to think about it before you mentally accepted the offer. Really, you didn't see any reason to not get more help in learning magic.

… and speaking of learning magic, a something occurs to you.

Specifically, the many times you'd sat down with Lansseax and tried to learn magic flash across your mind. The frustration you felt at your slow speed at which you learnt the spells.

If you were going to go to the academy specificallyto learn magic was there anything you could do about it? You were, after all, not interested in not being able to learn multiple spells in a day.

"Uhhh, so?" you were knocked out of your thoughts by Myra, the realisation that you hadn't given your answer yet hitting you, "what are you thinking about? Do you not want to go or…"

You deny that, telling her that you do want to go there. The only thing is that you wanted a solution for the problem of your slow learning speed when it came to magic.

She's looking at you again, "… have you thought about altering our deal?"

You stop, looking at her in confusion. You ask her what changing how you went to the academy will help that problem.

"Wa- no! Not that, I'm talking about the patron contract we made!" you… just look at her, before it finally clicks in your mind what she was talking about, "yeah, that one. If I give you my magic skills you'll learn way faster, at least until you reach my level."

A moment of thinking before you nod at that, telling her that it sounded good, "great, now just give me a second…"

After a moment, in which she poked thin air, you were once again presented with the same feeling you'd first felt when you first met her. The feeling of her offering you something in exchange for something, waiting on your acceptance.

Though in this case she was offering experience in magic in exchange for nothing.

… you didn't accept immediately, not because you didn't feel it was worth it but because you had an idea. If you got an increased learning rate based on how much she knew, and she was learning more constantly, what would happen if she learnt faster? Would you not get the increased learning rate for longer?

"Wait, what are yo-" Myra exclaimed the moment you denied the offer and began to make your own offer, freezing once you finished. Her eye's visibly dilated as she continued staring ahead.

"Hey, Votusax?" eventually she spoke again, "could you get down here for a bit?"

Seeing no reason not to, you did as she asked… and then she held your face and touched your lips with her own, "you are the best, I want you to know that."

Then she backed off, once again tapping the air rapidly, and you were given another offer.

You didn't really see how it was different from what you offered…


You get: Experience sharing from all her skills (massive learning boost base on her level of skill)

She Gets: Inherent understanding ability share


You accepted the changes to the contract, not finding anything particularly wrong with them, and immediately felt the knowledge right at the edge of your mind.

Not close enough that you could mentally touch it, but enough that you knew that, if you were to practice the relevant things, it'd begin flowing into you.

"Oh wow…" you look at Myra, who was just staring around wide eyed, "this is… this is something alright…"

[Contract experience share ability gained]

Contract experience [Unranked]

Light magic learning: +60

Death magic learning: +60

Neutral magic learning: +35

Fire magic learning: +15

Curse magic learning: +25

Sword skill learning: +40

Staff skill learning: +15

Studying skill learning: +40

Body training skill learning: +30

Speechcraft skill learning: +10

It was a short while later that Myra left your den, having turned redder and redder as she continued to tell you how happy she was with the deal and how much fun the two of you were going to have tomorrow when you went to the academy.

And with her gone you were left alone to get along with your day. Which you did by not doing what you originally planned, strengthening you bones that is, and instead going out to search for a teacher.

A teacher who would help you learn more about how training your body works.

Because you'd just gotten a pool of knowledge about that very topic and not tapping into it seemed like a great waste.

"Oh, are you interested in training your body too?" and so it was that, when you went to the staff and asked them to bring the appropriate teacher, that a white haired man appeared from a corner. Myra's father, from what you could recall, and he was wearing some strange clothes, "if you'd like, I could teach you some things?"

It was after you accepted, ignoring the staff who'd began bowing, that you spent the rest of the day with the man. Learning about this thing called callisthenics, a thing that he said Myra gave him, and how warm-ups and perfect form was an important thing. How you could use your own body to provide the resistance needed to exercise.

You also got some size adjusting, self-cleaning, workout clothes, several tank-tops and shorts, that he said Myra introduced, which you stored away after giving thanks.

Still, now that you're laying down to sleep, you feel that a lot of good things happened today.